Robin McKinley - Deerskin

When he released her it was only her own weariness that prevented her from fleeing him headlong; slowly instead, and with the half-helpless grace of someone near the point of collapse, she stood, and tipped her chin up; and found herself on the arm of the old minister-the first arm in the whole long evening she had been glad to lean on.

He escorted her to the door she had entered so many centuries ago, murmuring small nothings that neither of them paid attention to; but she recognized that he was attempting to be kind to her, not only preventing the princess, the king's daughter, from making an awkward exit. At the door she dropped her hand and turned to face the old man, to thank him. He bowed to her and, upon straightening, looked into her face as if looking for a sign. He opened his mouth, hesitated, closed it again, bowed a second time and turned away silently.

Viaka had been watching, and was waiting for her at the door. She looked into her friend's face and then put an arm around her waist, expecting to have to support her; but as soon as Lissar was free of the ballroom and walking down the hall full of none but ordinary serving folk and occasional lords and ladies-no kings, no painted queens-her strength began to return, and soon they were walking so quickly that Viaka, with her shorter legs, had to half trot to keep up.

Lissar paused once to pull off her shoes-"Oh, don't run," pleaded Viaka, recognizing what this meant; "I am much too tired." Lissar laughed, not a light-hearted sound, but one not devoid of humor either, and they went in a somewhat more leisurely fashion the rest of the way to Lissar's round tower room.

Her bed had, as it turned out, to be remade, down through to the top mattress, for when Ash had finished flinging the blankets all over the room (including one into the fireplace, where the banked fire scorched it beyond recovery, and, as Lissar said severely to Ash, who knew she was in disgrace but did not care, it was fortunate she had not set the palace on fire or at least the room and herself) she began digging a hole, causing a considerable rain of feathers.

Lissar, although she attempted to give Ash the scolding she deserved, at heart cared for this as little as Ash cared for the burnt blanket. She tore off her ball-gown, to the dismay of the other ladies who had appeared to assist and, as they hoped, to hear from the princess's own lips how she had enjoyed her ball. They were all of them envious that the king had danced with none but his daughter; but Lissar would not speak, and she dropped her hall-gown on the floor as if it were no more than a rag. Her high-heeled shoes, embedded with diamond chips, had been left in the receiving-room, like an offering at the feet of the statue. Her stockings followed her dress, and then she wrapped herself in an old woolen dressing-gown and began tearing at her hair. Viaka took her hands away and began to take it down herself, gently.

The other ladies were dismissed, somewhat abruptly, but since the princess would not play the game with them of what a lovely ball it had been, how beautiful she (and they) had looked, and how splendid her father was, they were not all that unwilling to go, and talk among themselves about how unsatisfactory a princess Lissar was, even on an occasion like this one. They had thought that her very own ball would have had an effect, even on her.

Lissar and Viaka and Ash went to sit in the cold garden; Lissar loaned Viaka another dressing-gown, so that she would not harm her own ball-gown.

After Ash's initial transports, including suitable but absentminded grovellings when she was scolded, were over, followed by racing around the perimeter of the garden at a speed that made her only a vague fawn-grey blur in the starlight, she came and wrapped as much of her long leggy self as would fit around and over Lissar's lap. Autumn was passing and winter would be there soon; the three of them huddled together for warmth. Viaka kept looking into her friend's face, a narrow line of worry between her own brows; but for once she had nothing to say, and they sat in silence, Lissar combing her released hair through her fingers as if reassuring herself it was her own.

Rinnol's niece came out in a little while to tell Lissar that the bath she had ordered was ready. Even in Fichit's voice was some consternation that Lissar should wish instantly to divest herself by washing of so delicious an event as the evening's ball.

But Lissar at once disentangled herself from Ash's legs and tail and came indoors.

Viaka, who was happy to keep her fancy clothes on a little longer, for the only shadow cast on her evening was by watching her friend, came indoors too. She carefully took the protective dressing-gown off, so that she might float around the little round room, humming gently to herself, pretending still to be in the arms of young Rantnir, son of her parents' friends. She was anxious about Lissar, but willing to set that anxiety aside; being a princess, she thought, was doubtless a difficult business in ways she had no guess of.

She recollected herself enough from the sweet dream of Rantnir's eyes, when Fichit emerged from the bath-room to ask if Viaka had any orders for her, to ask if Lissar had ordered dinner; and upon the negative, commanded some herself. She had eaten with Rantnir, but she could guess that Lissar had eaten nothing, and perhaps after her bath she would be relaxed enough to be ravenous-which Viaka felt that by rights she should be. Viaka herself, who did not chase a fleethound around a garden on a daily basis, nor go for long plant-gathering walks with the indefatigable Rinnol, was often astonished at the amount of food Lissar could eat.

One of life other maids was still creeping about the round edges of the tower room in search of escaped feathers.

Lissar rubbed herself all over with the soap, and washed her hair vigorously. Over and over again she scrubbed at her cheek, as if her father's kiss had left an indelible mark. The bath was so hot as almost to be scalding, for she had added even more hot water from the ewer after Fichit had left and yet beneath the soap and hot water she still smelled warm velvet.... She stayed in the water till it cooled, and when she came out, rubbing at her hair, she found Viaka asleep in a chair by the fire, her face in her hand, smiling happily in her sleep, with a tray of covered dishes next to her on the round table.

Lissar tucked a blanket around her and climbed into bed herself, with no inclination to discover what was under the dish-covers, her wet hair still wrapped in towels. Her last waking memory was of Ash's long length stretching out beside her.

EIGHT

LISSAR AWOKE LATE, AND MUZZY-HEADED, WITH A HEAVY, dragging sense of dread, but without at first remembering any cause. She recalled vague oppressive dreams; remembered one in which someone was shouting at her, though she could not remember the words spoken, nor if they were uttered in joy or wrath.

In another, a distant figure waved at her, in a gesture like a farmer scaring crows from cropland. His sleeves gleamed: blue velvet.

Even after she recalled the evening before she felt confused; the ball was over with, the new morning wanted to tell her. She had disliked the night before very much, but ... her thoughts trailed away, and morning became an evanescent thing, with no comfort to give. It wasn't over with. Last night, the ball, had been a beginning, not an ending.

There had been many lords present; she had known they were there, though she had been introduced to few of them, by their heraldry. She had seen them conferring with her father's ministers, as her gaze wheeled through the room and her father drew her through the long dances. She sought out the ministers to focus on, to keep her feet when the ground seemed too uncertain; to eliminate the possibility of accidentally meeting the eyes of her mother's sovereign portrait. Only her mother and the ministers, in all the huge ball-room, were not dancing; even the servants seemed almost to dance, as they made their ways through the guests; even the musicians moved and swayed as they bent over their instruments. Only her mother, and the ministers, were quiet enough that she could look at them without making herself dizzy; and looking at her mother made her more than dizzy.

The lords danced with other ladies; but some of the lords stood a while and spoke to the ministers, and when they did this she saw how often their eyes looked toward her. What if one of them bid for her? What if the fat duke were to offer his best price for her?

Why did these thoughts seem less horrible than others that remained wordless?

She sat up suddenly, dislodging Ash, who muttered to herself and burrowed farther under the bedclothes without ever opening her eyes. What if-? She could not bear the what if's. She would not let herself think of them.

Viaka had gone; but someone had come in and quietly made up the fire while she slept, and taken away the supper she had not touched. There was water that had been hot but was still warm in a basin with fresh towels laid out beside her tooth-brush; and a fresh dressing-gown lay over the back of a chair. She stood up slowly, feeling old, as old as Hurra, as old as Viaka's tiny bent grandmother, who was carried from her bed to her chair by the hearth every day, and back again every night; as old as the stones in her round tower room.

She picked

up

the dressing-gown,

gratefully inhaling its

ordinary,

quilted-cotton-with-a-whiff-of-laundry-soap aroma, ignoring the creaking of her joints. There was nothing of ball- perfume ... velvet. . . about the dressing-gown. She put it on and opened the door to the garden.

After the warmth of the bed, and of Ash, who radiated heat like a hairy, long-legged stove, the autumn wind cut through her, cut through her skin, and tugged, as if it were peeling back a layer of ... what?.. . left by the ball: of a gummy film deposited by the touch of all those eyes, of warm blue velvet, that her bath the night before had not dissolved. She went outdoors, feeling the wind on her face, blasting through the seams of her nightgown and up the sleeves of the dressing-gown; she paused, shivering, at the mint patch, not yet frost-killed, and pulled up several stems. She bruised them in her hands and put her face down among the sharp-smelling leaves, breathing thankfully in-till she coughed from the sting at the back of her throat.

She looked up, at the blue sky; it was a beautiful day. She would take Ash for a long walk-they would go to see Rinnol; and after that she would feel much better.

Absently she put a few mint leaves in her mouth and dropped the rest in the pocket of her robe. She rubbed her mint-sticky hands through her hair, banishing the last whiff of perfume. It was a beautiful day, and it was going to be all right. She would think no further than this fragile splendid morning, and the wind on her face.

She went back indoors to drag Ash out of bed, where she would stay, so far as Lissar could tell, till her bladder burst, if no one disturbed her. Once or twice Lissar had been a little late, and Ash had left a small yellow trail in her wake, just the few steps from the bed to the garden's threshold. Lissar was careful that no rugs were laid at that edge of the cold stone floor, and she cleaned up herself, and soaked the towel afterwards in her bath when she was done with it.

"Ash," she said. Nothing. "Ash, " she repeated. Faint rustling, then silence. She walked to the bed and ripped the bedclothes off. Ash opened one eye, every graceful line of her body expressing outrage and indignation. "It's time to go out,"

said Lissar. "You will go, or I will pull you out of bed by your tail."

Ash yawned hugely, displaying several ells of pink tongue, daintily stepped out of bed and stretched elaborately (this absorbed most of the floor space of the small round room; Lissar retreated to the doorway) and then bounded for the open door.

After she relieved herself Lissar chased her around for a few minutes-or Ash let her think she was chasing her-and when they came back in again they were both in quite a good humor and ready for breakfast.

Lissar brushed her dark hair, separating by hand the strands that the mint-sap had matted, relishing still the smell of it, glad that she need not have her hair imprisoned in a headdress or herself in a ball on this day. She banished the knowledge that last night was a beginning, not an ending, from her mind; she concentrated on thoughts of breakfast, and on what Rinnol was likely to be looking for, this late in the season.

Fichit should be here soon, to see if she was awake yet, to see if she wanted anything. She had missed dinner last night; she was very hungry. She would make an excellent breakfast. Lissar hummed to herself while Ash chewed on her current favorite stick, leaving wet, gooey wood fragments on the carpet.

Fichit came in almost immediately with the breakfast, but Lissar's eyes had barely rested on the well-burdened tray when she noticed that on Fichit's heels came Lady Gorginvala. Lissar could not remember her ever having penetrated so far as to the little room before; the receiving-room with the statue was much more her usual habitat. She was a friend, insofar as such ladies had friends, of Lady Undgersim.

Gorginvala was wearing a gown so elaborate that only someone who had seen her in a ball-dress could imagine it as ordinary day wear; she had some trouble getting through the door. Lissar paused, hairbrush still in her hand.

Lady Gorginvala cleared her throat and said, as if announcing to a multitude,

"Your father wishes you to attend him in the receiving-hall, as soon as you are . . ."

She paused, and her eyes travelled briefly over Lissar, still in her nightdress, its hem muddy from running through the garden. ". . . Ready." She turned, stately as a docking ship, and went back up the few low stairs as if they were tile steps to a throne, and disappeared. The odor of her perfume lingered, an almost visible cloud.

Ash sneezed.