The Wild Swans
-
Eliza was but four when the Queen of Darkness married her father. The kingdom had shone of golden beams for years as the twelve children of the king grew up in the palace. The eleven princes had animated the halls of the palace, eager in their studies to be knights and defend their kingdom. The twelfth child, a little princess, dearly loved her father, not knowing much of her dead mother, and was the sun and light of the palace. The sun of the outside however, hid behind its clouds as the sky let forth a burst of howls and perspiration, for the Dark Queen had come upon the kingdom not long after. Her coldness could only be matched by her beauty, and the King fell in love at the site of her in his courts.
At four years old everything changed for the little Princess. The Queen had no love for her new husband's twelve children and she sought to be rid of them all.
"Your daughter must be brought up out of the palace life," she spoke to him one night, "for the best way not to spoil a princess if for her to grow up in poverty. A princess grown up in wealth and luxury will rot faster that an apple fallen from a tree thrice moons past."
The King, so taken in with his new bride, would only see sense in her words. And so the Princess not yet five was sent away from home, away from her brothers, to grow up on a farm with peasants at the edge of the kingdom. Within the month, the Queen finished off her conspiracy by turning the king against the very sons he doted on.
"They had a pair of children slaughtered today while they were out in the market, because the two little commoners would not move out of their horses' way fast enough." She would say, or, "I have it from my ladies-in-waiting that your sons are making constant advancing towards them, and will not take no for an answer."
She filled his head with more and more tails so that he lost all deep feelings for his sons and would not listen to their denials.
"Enough! You are no sons of mine, not fit to be princes or kings. You will leave my palace, and be thankful I would even allow you entrance into my kingdom again."
Turned out of the palace, the wicked Queen herself followed them to the gates, making sure they would leave. And as they all exited, she sneered at them, with cursed words.
"Take flight from here, and never return!"
Take flight they did, for at her words the eleven boys all transformed into eleven beautiful swarms, flying away from the evil Queen.
And here the story really begins;
Elisa was leaning against the broom in her hands as she let out a deep sigh. It seemed that no matter how she swept it, the hearth refused to look anything but ashen and grimy. Pulling the flaxen-wool mat over it, she hoped it would do. She had only a moment to stare off into space in a daydream before she heard the voice of the woman who claimed to be her mother.
"You need to bring the milk in Iza."
Her eyes focused and she realized mother was calling to her from the kitchen.
"Yes, I will do that now."
Eliza walked out the back door of the farmhouse and out into the fields. The barnyard was a couple hundred yards away, but hardly a walk for a girl who had grown up used to it. She got to the barn, where two pails of milk were placed outside of the pens of the cows. Her younger sister had done the milking earlier, and it was Eliza's job to bring in the pails. Carrying them across the fields and into the house, she dropped the milk pails in the kitchen for her mother to make use of.
"Your sister is supposed to be having her bath now. Go tell her to do so, and then go yourself, you smell like the animals you fed this morning."
Eliza nodded, leaving the kitchens and walking down the hall to the rooms. Her mother was right; working on a farm did tend to give you a smell, which was why every afternoon after all the morning chores had been done, it was important to bathe.
"Aria, why haven't you taken your bath yet?" Eliza walked into the small room she shared with her sister.
Her sister made a face. "Because when Ruther came earlier he said I stank of cow."
"Ruther…? You mean that little boy from the farm across from ours?"
"He isn't so little, only a year younger than me." Aria huffed.
"Alright," Eliza chuckled, "but if he told you that you smell, why not take the bath?"
"So that next time he comes 'round I smell even worse, then he'll be sorry he said it."
Eliza continued to laugh at her sister's logic. "Forget Ruther and take your bath, for the sake of our house so it doesn't smell like a sully animal."
Aria squinted her nose. "You smell like the barn too."
"Because I've been working out there all morning. But I'll be taking my bath after you."
"None of the boys ever say you smell. They all just stare at you when they come over with baskets of berries for us, or a sack of grain to trade with papa."
"Pay no heed to those boys, they are simply silly for their age."
And that meant the discussion was closed.
For twelve years the Queen was able to make her husband forget about his twelve children, but as those years had drawn to an end, the King came to despair over the idea that he had kicked his eleven sons out of his country, disowning all of them in turn.
"Whatever wrong they could have done, surely it was not as great as I, their father, turning them out to the cold, the youngest one not ten!"
"Hush, you did the right thing." His wife tried to persuade.
"Yes, perhaps." He sighed, her voice soothing him.
Still, the uneasiness did not leave his mind and he feared he did a terrible thing.
"Perhaps I shall seek them out, ask for their pardon."
"It is too late, they are long gone. Even your ten-year-old has become a man by now," or perished in death, she preferred, "take the troubles from your mind."
Again he let out a deep sigh, and came to another thought. "But my beloved daughter! How could I come to forget her all these years! Twelve of them! She is a young maiden by now."
"Yes so it would seem. Probably off married to some peasant, my love. It is not worth your looking into."
But the King wouldn't hear of it. He must see his daughter again, if no other child of his.
Eliza had on rare occasions seen a royal go by the dirt road in front of her farm home. The King of the neighbouring kingdom and his son, along with a group of men, came hunting around this area once every summer and fall, and over the years if her family was lucky enough, they were able to catch them coming down the road, and go up to the fence and bow down to the royals. It had been last month when she last saw the merry party, the king starting to looking old in years, the son looking more and more like a man now. He had even smiled at her once in passing. Oh, and how Aria had talked of nothing else for weeks after that!
On that quiet day on the farm, not only was a royal procession coming down the road, but when it came to the opening fence of the farm, the procession turned in.
"My Lord, why are they coming—oh!" Her mother squealed from the kitchen window. Turning to Eliza who was sweeping the floor, she said, "Go! Call your father from the fields to come in here immediately!"
Eliza ran as if the wind possessed her, and minutes later her father was at the front door with his wife, welcoming in a royal messenger of the king.
"Iza, come here." He called to his eldest daughter, and she came to stand by them as the messenger opened up his scroll and read;
"The King Mattius requests the honour of meeting his daughter, Princess Eliza at his palace tomorrow in the court. The Queen, Eloise is to come here personally to pick her up directly and ready her to meet her father."
All Eliza could think at the moment was, Eliza who? Who's Eliza, and why are they reading this to us? Why are they here?
The messenger rolled up his scroll, and giving them all a curt bow, he left the house and went back to his carriage, and the procession was off again.
Eliza looked up at her parents in wonder, but they would not meet her eye. What could this mean, she wondered. What are they hiding from me?
Just then Aria came out of her room and into the hall. "Are they gone?"
She noticed everyone's facial expressions and added, "what?"
It was her mother that broke the silence. "Be quiet for a moment Aria." And turning to look at Eliza, she continued. "Your name is not Iza, it is Eliza, and you are the princess of this kingdom."
It took her a moment to register her mother's words; they were rather hard to believe.
"Mama, really?" Aria asked excitedly, but no one answered her.
"You are not…my parents? Aria is not…"
"Your sister." Her father finished for her. "Your real father is the king. He sent you to live here on the edge of the kingdom so that you could grow up without being spoilt."
"We're treated you like a daughter, have allowed you to grow up as a farm girl, so that he would be pleased and you would not be a pampered princess."
"But…" She could find no other words to use to express her feelings at the moment.
"It was the Queen who asked us not to ever tell you of who you were. We were given instructions to let you believe you were our own child."
This was not…her family? She looked around from mother to father, to her sister who had salt-water coming down her cheeks, sniffling at the sudden news.
"How long…?"
"You were given to us just before your fifth birthday. You were too young to really remember it now I suppose, but…"
But Eliza did remember dreams of a palace, and a jovial man who would swing her in his arms, and many boys, rows and rows of them, all older and looking after her, entertaining her, even occasionally teasing her. She clearly remembered the number eleven.
"I'm the king's daughter." She mumbled to herself.
The thought struck her down like a ton of bricks. And yet, it was true.
- - -
The wicked Queen came the next day to collect her. As the family sat waiting in the parlour, all of them dressed in their best clothes, a sort of dreadful silence subsisted in the room. Aria had cried her voice gone, but bitter tears still sparkled down her cheeks. Her mother looked fidgety and anxious, as if something horrid was to befall them, and her father was pale and pensive, staring at the floor and making no eye contact with anyone. Eliza's heart went out to her family, for it was them who had raised her for twelve years, and the people she had come to have a strong kinship with. And now she was to be ripped away from it all. Her mother's sternness had suddenly become a treasured thing, her sweet sister's annoying questioning and mockery was dear to her heart, and her father's constant need for her to do chores and labour around the farm seemed like tasks of splendour now. She'd miss them. And what of this King, her real father? Would he treat her as nicely, for hadn't he sent her away in the first place? And the Queen, her stepmother, she doubted she'd have much love for the woman who was known as the cruellest lady throughout the darkened land.
She shuddered to think of what her new life would be.
The Queen came promptly at noon to bring her stepdaughter to the palace. She remained in her carriage as one of the servants went in the house to fetch her.
"Well, this is farewell, I suppose."
Her mother and father both embraced her, wishing her good fortune throughout her life, should they never cross paths again.
"But no!" Aria gasped. "You must visit us!"
Eliza smiled. "Indeed I shall, should I be allowed."
And with a final hug with her sister, she was out of the farm and helped into the carriage by one of the servants.
The Queen, dressed in royal blue and looking like a doll with porcelain skin and rosy cheeks, sniffed at Eliza's simple attire, and waved a hand out the window to tell the driver to proceed.
Not a word was said during the journey to the palace, but Eliza did not mind for she knew just from site that the rumours of the Queen were true, and she rather not talk with such a woman.
When they arrived at the palace and were handed down out of the carriage, the Queen for the first time turned to her stepdaughter and spoke.
"Come my child," she said softly, "I will help you prepare for meeting your father."
Eliza felt ashamed in her simple farm clothing an agreed to follow her stepmother to dress into something a princess should wear. Only instead of to her quarters the Queen lead her through the palace and out into the courtyard. Eliza was finally working up the courage to speak when the Queen pushed her into a puddle of mud. Dirt smeared everywhere and the Queen picked up more dirt from the ground, rubbing in into Eliza's hair so it became tangled, clumpy and filthy. Next she grabbed Eliza's arm, and smeared mud over her arms, then her neck and face, so Eliza looked like a filthy servant girl. Confused and unable to fight the Queen off, Eliza then tried to rub the mud off herself, but it was drying on her skin and the Queen warned her that if she tried to remove it, she would be killed.
And so they entered the court of the King, and all the courtiers let out a shrill and abashed gasp at the sight of the wild-looking maiden walking behind the Queen.
"My love, your daughter." The Queen came to stand by her husband.
He looked at the soiled girl standing before him and refused to believe it was his child.
"But alas, it is," the Queen assured. "She has grown up into something fierce I fear, like her brothers."
Heartbroken and depressed over what had become of his only girl, he sent Eliza away, vowing she was no daughter of his. Eliza was escorted out of the palace and told not to come back. The wicked Queen came out after her, making sure she was leaving for good, and as Eliza was let out of the gates the lady called,
"Be gone from this kingdom maiden, for your wild-appearance is only fit for the forests now."
Eliza turned away from her in anguish, and walking out of the gates she instantly found herself in the middle of a forest. What kind of witchcraft is this? She thought to herself, for there was no other explanation.
Walking through the forest she found a clearing with a lake just as twilight came upon the world. The water seemed to glow radiance, as the jitterbugs danced above and around it, the fireflies resting on the weeds that blew lightly with the breeze. Eliza dipped her hands in the lukewarm water, washing first her face and arms, and then her hair, so that she was the beautiful princess again. Then, as she was combing her hands through her wet hair, eleven white birds came from the sky and smoothly landed into the lake one after one. They all glided through the water in long peaceful strokes, as if they were preparing for rest. Eliza watched them, taken in with their beauty, until the sun set and the moon rose high in the sky. The lake's water began to glow in an unnatural way and the eleven swans all began to grow, shedding their feathers until they no longer resembled birds, but instead they looked like men. Eliza blinked. Indeed, her eyes were not deceiving her, for in the lake eleven men stood with water up to their chests, all of them looking at her with smiles. She counted eleven of them, and remembering that this number was significant in her memory, she began to wonder what this could mean.
"Sister." One of them called, startling her, "we have watched you walk about this forest since you came into it hours ago."
"Good sirs," she gulped down the lump that formed in her throat, "are you quite human?"
They all laughed.
"Neither human nor swan, I'm afraid."
"But…how did you transform? Were you born such creatures or was a spell put onto you?"
"An enchantment of the evilest kind," said another, "the Queen, our stepmother, uttered a curse upon us and we have been birds by day, men by night ever since."
"The Queen!" She cried. "Why, then the King is your father, and you are my brothers!"
"Yes little Eliza, who is not so little anymore." The youngest one said. "You were our darling sister, taken away from us just before we were banished ourselves."
She ran to the lake, but would not go into it with all her clothes. So instead she turned her eyes away as they all got out of the water, making use of the bushes and plants around them to cover themselves. When they were ready she turned back to them, and they talked for hours, catching up and remembering all the great days of their past together.
"But we have not been to the kingdom since." The eldest brother told. "For as we were turned into swans we were also banished from it."
"Yes, the Queen also banished me today from the kingdom, and that is how I ended up here, in this forest. What kingdom is this then?"
"The neighbouring one; the kingdom where the King has just taken ill and is dying, and his son is soon to be new king."
"How dreadful!" She exclaimed. "I have seen this King pass my farm once every autumn and he was always delightful to see as he rode by with his party. Though last month when I last saw him, he did look unwell."
"A better king will not be missed, for unlike our father, he was not bewitched by a sorcerer." One of the men said bitterly. "But enough of that! It is time we all rest, no?"
"Oh, but when the sun comes up you'll all be swans again." Eliza sighed.
"Then come with us." Her middle brother suggested. "We can make a net with the plants and carry you in it during the day, and at night we can all land and be a merry party together. We can bring you to the village so you may get yourself a proper home."
"Oh, how delightful it would be to fly with you!"
And so they came to rest, hopeful of the new day the sun would bring.
That night the Princess dreamt that she was sitting by the lake, and from out of the waters a little fairy burst out, fluttering her dripping wings and landing on Eliza's shoulder. Leaning into her ear the pixie seemed to whisper.
"Collect from the stems of the starvat flower that grows in this forest. You must stomp your feet on the stems until their turn into a sort of flax for weaving. You must weave eleven long shirts for your brothers, and put each shirt on them so that they can be freed from their spell. For however long it takes you to accomplish this, you must do it all in silence, for if you utter a word throughout any of it, you will instantly pierce their hearts."
The fairy flew away from Eliza, and nodding her head, she dived back into the lake. Eliza then woke up with a start. Looking around, she realized she was resting near a tree, where she had laid down to sleep. So it was just a dream. Or was it, she thought, finding a single starvat flower lain across the grass in front of her.
- - -
The next morning the eleven swans all collected the long strings of plants as Eliza set out to make a net out of it. When it was done, the swans all took an end of the net in their mouths and flew up to the sky, as Eliza sat in the middle. As nightfall descended upon them they landed to the ground and the brothers transformed and made use of the bushes to cover themselves. Eliza began walking around, looking for starvat flowers, collecting a whole bunch, and then bringing her pile over to them where she began to grind them down with her feet, so they began soft and thread like. The brothers asked her what she was doing, and doing her best she tried to explain without using words, for indeed she could not speak in fear of killing them.
And so for the next fortnight she flew with the swans in the net during the day, and at night they watched her collect starvat flowers, turning stems into thread, and begin to weave the thread pieces together. After that fortnight of long hard hours she had been able to complete one whole shirt, but she had yet another ten to do. On the fifteenth night of their travels, the swan brothers dropped her off into a cave, as they left to go transform into men and then make garments out of the bushes. She had been sitting in the cave, starting to weave her second shirt with the flowers she had collected the day before.
The sound of hooves and men talking came from outside the cave and she stepped out to see what was happening. A procession of hunters was passing the cave though it was late into the night, and they saw her and stopped. Then the young man riding in the middle of the hunting party, whom she recognized to be the prince of the lands, dismounted his horse and came to her side, asking her who she was. Unable to use her voice, she shook her head indicating she would not talk.
He peered at her saying, "I've seen your face somewhere before."
And oh, how she longed to tell him she was the farm girl from the village he passed with his father every year. But with the thought of his father she noticed that the aging man was not anywhere to be seen, and his son was cloaked in black.
"Well, whoever you are, you are alone in these forests, not a safe thing for a maiden to be. Come, we are heading back to my palace, you shall come and be a guest there."
She shook her head, not wanting to leave her brothers, but he insisted, steering her away from the cave and over to his horse. She looked back at the cave, where she had left her completed shirt and the beginning of the new one, as well as some pieces of starvat thread. How could she leave his side without speaking the reason?
He placed her up on his steed, then mounted himself behind her, and they were off and away. Her brothers would soon return to find her gone.
By the time she reached the palace, it was the early hours of the day. The Prince had her brought to a room to sleep, and instructed two ladies-in-waiting to wait on her when she was to arise. When Eliza woke up around the noon, she found a new set of clothes sitting for her by her bed and a hot bath being prepared. And oh, how delightful it felt to be out of the dark forest and to have a nice long bath after weeks of grubbiness! But no, she scolded herself, no don't forget about your brothers. It is them you must remember and make shirts for. You must find more starvat flowers and continue one with your work. She finished her bath, changed into the royal clothes given to her, and found two ladies waiting outside of her room.
"We are to serve you fair maiden." One of them said. "The King had requested for you to join him for brunch."
When she came down to the dining hall she found that the King they were referring to was the Prince. For his father had died the week before and he was now the young king of all the land.
"I take it you cannot speak." He asked her as she sat down to join him.
She nodded her head sadly.
"No matter, for even without words your beauty alone is engaging enough."
She blushed and turned away to hide her smile.
"Well, I am king of all these lands, so if there is anything you want or need, just come to me and I will have it brought to you. Is this food pleasing enough to you? I could have them make anything your heart desires."
She smiled and took a bite of her food, enjoying it immensely.
"If you would stay here in my palace with me, then you would never have to live in the forest again." He mentioned sweetly, taking a drink from his goblet.
She dropped her fork, remembering that indeed she should not be enjoying this. Her brothers were out there probably sick with worry, wondering what had become of her. And she would never see them again; for if they were to live, she must keep quiet and that meant she couldn't excuse herself from the King's presence or palace. Tears began to fill her eyes and she wept for the thought of being stuck, and the King was out of his seat and at her side in seconds.
"I am sorry if I have upset thee in any way." He held her hand in his, and gave her a look of earnest apologizes.
She shook her head and cried on, for he was a man with a heart of gold, but she couldn't stay, she had to leave and be done with her work.
"Come, we will have a walk out in the courtyard and you will feel better." He gently took hold of her arm and guided her out of the dining hall and out into the open.
The Princess wept on though, leaning into him for support as she stumbled to walk she was so distressed, but then out in the courtyard she caught site of starvat flowers going wild all along one side of a stone wall, and she deceased crying, seeing that there was a way indeed for her to continue her work here.
"There, there now." The King brushed a strand of hair from her delicate face. "Whatever troubles you, I will see that it is fixed, and so that you are happy here. I do not know why you were in the forest, but one of my hunters found a shirt and pieces of thread in the cave you were in and brought them back here to the palace. Are they yours? Would you like them?"
The Princess wiped her face and smiled at him in great appreciation, taking his hand and kissing it in thanks. He pulled her into his arms, giving her a tight squeeze, and asking her if indeed she would stay with him. She kissed him lightly in response and the seal was made.
- - -
Now the archbishop of the country did not approve of the maiden who had stolen the young King's heart. He saw her gathering starvat flowers from the courtyard and bringing them up to her room every evening and suspected witchcraft. For what lady collected and used plants but to make spells with? He mentioned his suspicions to his King, but they fell on deaf ears for the King would not have one word said against his dear silent maiden, whom he intended to take for his bride.
Poor Eliza was torn between the mad and longing desire to talk with the King, to thank him with words and have conversations with him when he asked her for walks in the courtyard, but she knew she mustn't say a word for it would be her brothers' death. So no matter how sweet the King was to her, how lovingly he treated her and made sure she was content, how he asked her one evening during a walk if she would be his wife, she could still not talk. But she found other ways to show him of her affection.
By the day of her marriage, she had come to complete nine shirts, and the tenth was coming along well. She had not seen her brothers since the day she was taken away to the palace, but she hoped to find them after the shirts were complete. The wedding celebration was to take place outside with the bright shining light, which the kingdom was blessed with on that day. The archbishop who still suspected Eliza of being a witch was quite opposed to this match, but had to do as the King ordered him and so he joined the two in union shortly after noon. With his bride now in his arms, the King lead the people to the beautiful feast in the grand hall of the palace and that night the entire kingdom celebrated.
Being the Queen of the kingdom, Eliza had only one thing to find unfortunate with her new position; she no longer had her own private quarters, so she could no longer work on her shirts at night and bring her collected flowers there. Unable to explain to her husband without using words, she knew she could not work on the shirts in their chamber without rising some speculation and so she took to sneaking out some nights after her husband was asleep, and going down to the courtyards to collect starvat flowers and work under the cover of darkness, with only mother moon to guide her eyes.
Precisely two months into this routine, when Eliza had almost completed the eleven shirts and had only to finish off the sleeve of one of them, she pulled back her bed sheets very slowly and delicately, as not to disturb her sleeping husband, and got out of bed. Putting on whatever garments were of reach to her in the dark, she got dressed and left the room and made her way down to the courtyards. Now the archbishop had been out that night, for he could not find rest and had come outside to pray before the night sky to his Lord. Upon seeing the Queen come out of the palace walls and into the courtyard he stepped behind a tree to conceal himself and watched as she began collecting starvat flowers, than stomping on them. She did this over and over again, collecting the pieces of stem, which she had stomped all over and he became certain either of her insanity or her wickedness. After having collect two handfuls of thread-like pieces of crushed stem, the Queen then pulled what looked like a strange item of clothing from her layers of dress, which she kept tucked away and hidden. Then she began to weave the pieces of thread through part of the cloth made of thin stems and she did so for almost another hour, until yawning overcame her and she retired back to her rooms. The archbishop knew his job to his kingdom and his king. This strange and outlandish behaviour could not go unanswered for.
- - -
"I tell you once again, I will hear no ill word said against my love."
"But your highness—"
"No, I have given you much warning my dear archbishop, and I have calmly listened to your suspicions, but I must give you warning now, should you persist I will have you removed from my courts."
"But my Lord it is not suspicion this time, I tell you, I have seen it with my own eyes!" Then the archbishop related all he saw that night.
The King's countenance changed immediately, and it could be seen at once that he was beginning to worry. "It must be a misunderstanding, perhaps you were dreaming and only think what you saw."
"Spy on her tonight and see for yourself, my King."
That night, as the King and Queen laid down to sleep, the King encircled his arms around his wife as usual, but Eliza couldn't help feeling that his embrace was tighter than usual, as if he was trying to hold her fast to him for fear, as well as love.
"Sweet dreams my love." He caressed and kissed her warmly goodnight.
Then he pretended to progress into natural sleep, but Eliza stayed wide-awake. At first she had wondered that even in his sleep he could hold fast to her as tight as he did, but she credited it to his strength and love for her even in his sleep. Perhaps she didn't need to go out tonight, for the final shirt was almost done as it was, only another two or three nights and she would be done. But that was all the more reason to hurry up so she could free her beloved brothers and then talk again. Still, she was reluctant to leave her husbands embrace, which was so sweet and endearing to her that night. Wriggling out of his arms, she eventually broke free, clothed herself, and left the room. The King had had no choice but to allow her to depart from him, otherwise she would have figured out he was really conscious and then he could never figure out what was going on. Still, he had half the mind to keep tight hold of her, so she could not leave and prove the archbishop right. For a fear had grown in him since he was told of her night doings, and he wished more than anything for it to be false. There were, after all, laws against witchcraft in his kingdom.
Gathering courage to get to the bottom of his, he dressed himself and left his quarters. As soon as he had gotten to the doors of the courtyard, he peered out and saw his darling wife, bent over and collecting flowers. Was there anyway he could differentiate this from witchcraft? Could she not just be seen as a woman collecting flowers? Flowers in the middle of the night in the dark; it seemed not. To add to the absurdity, she threw the collected starvat flowers to the ground and began to stomp them with her feet, over and over again until they lay flat and thread-like on the ground. The King hung his head in shame and wept bitter tears, for he had seen himself something that could not be explained otherwise. Wishing not to see any more, he went back to his chamber but no sleep would follow and only when his wife returned did he close his eyes and pretend.
"Was it not as I said?" The archbishop asked the next morning.
Tight lipped and in despair the King could only nod.
"Then you see what has to be done. This kingdom has rules, and as a Christian kingdom we all have an obligation to the Lord."
The king did not nod this time however. He knew what had to be done, but he would not let it happen. Witch or not, he could not let them hurt his beloved.
"As king you must set the example, you must do it for your people, for when word gets out they will turn on her, and in turn, you. We must do our duty to God and to the people."
The king left the archbishop in the throne room and met his wife in the dining hall where she was having her breakfast. She was in a happy mood because she knew that it would only take another night to finish the shirts and then she'd be done. Soon she could speak to her husband, and tell him so much she wanted to say but couldn't at present. She longed to whisper sweet nothings into his ear as he did to her, not only show him but be able to tell him how much she loved him. To make him as happy as she felt. Only he looked quite sad and out of spirits as he sat himself across from her to eat. He hardly ate anything she noticed, and would not look her in the eye. Something was wrong, she realized and she moved to his side, slipping her arm around his shoulder and trying to soothe him. He leaned into her, trying to gather comfort from her, but his misery was so great at the thought that as a king he was entitled to do his job and have her executed, that he found himself clinging on to her desperately. Eliza kissed his head, his forehead, his eyelids, his cheeks, and finally his lips, but she could not make him happy. He was in anguish distress and she knew not why.
In the afternoon as Eliza sat by herself in the courtyards watching the butterflies mating in the spring season, the archbishop approached her with two of his personal guards and asked her;
"Do you admit yourself the wife of Satan, a witch under his control?"
Her eyes opened twice their size and she was quick to shake her head.
"I ask you again my Queen, are you a sorcerer, who collects plants here in the courtyard to make spells and enchantments with?"
She thought of his question and shook her head again, for that was not what she did.
"I will ask one more time. Admit your folly and the devil will leave you and you may begin to repent. Deny a third time and you will be burned at the stake. Do you do witchcraft?"
She feared for her life, but she could not lie. She shook her head one last time.
The archbishop turned to his two guards and said, "You as witnesses see this, that though both I and the King have seen her gathering her plants for witchcraft, she denies it still. Let it be known in the record we offered mercy and she would not have it."
And here the two guards seized her and dragged her down in the dungeons where they locked her in a cell and threw in there all of her possessions, including her gowns and the eleven shirts that she had secretly hidden in many of them.
The king was powerless to do anything for the people all were quick to hear of the Queen's wickedness and he could not go against the people and set her free, not when he knew she was in the wrong. So instead he locked himself in his chamber, grieving and mourning for the loss of his true love.
With no access to the outside, Eliza could not longer collect flowers to continue the last shirt, and so the final shirt went without a complete sleeve. It seemed not to matter however, for she would be burnt at the stake in the village of the kingdom that next day, and then her brothers should never have their shirts.
That next day she put on her most voluminous gown and stuffed the eleven shirts within the folds of it. Then she was brought out of the palace and chained to a moving contraption, in which the archbishop lead and many of the people followed, mocking her, laughing at her, saying rude and distasteful things.
"Witch!"
"Burn her!"
"Devil's maiden be gone!"
"Burn the wench!"
The King was called to come to the village to see his wife be set ablaze and so traveled behind her, unable to make his way properly for he could not see with eyes so full of salt water, and he could not walk properly but rather staggered in dread. His servants had to help him make it to the village, where he implored the people to pardon his wife, to set her free and let her repent for her sins. But the archbishop told that he gave her a chance and she merely mocked him in response, so God's law must be upheld and the people would not be moved.
Just as the moving contraption she was on stopped into the middle of the village, and the archbishop was saying his last words of prayer before setting her on fire, eleven white swans flew overheard and dived down into the crowd, striking the archbishop in the head, not to kill him, but only to give him a headache so terrible he could not continue saying her last rights. Then seeing the birds, the Princess pulled the eleven shirts from under the folds of her gown and threw them in the air, so that each miraculously landed to fit on the swans. Then the entire kingdom saw as each swan turned into man, the youngest one however had gotten the shirt with the unfinished sleeve, and so his left arm was still a feathery wing.
Eliza brought her chained hands to her face and weeping, cried, "Finally, I can speak!"
Everyone was astonished both by her sudden voice and the eleven men standing before them, and then the eldest went on to explain to the people what had happened, clearing Eliza's name so that by the end not even the archbishop thought of her as a witch.
And so, overjoyed by the sudden turn of events, the King ran to his wife and embraced her, tears coming his face as he exclaimed. "My living darling, you speak!"
She smiled shyly at him, and found the words she had been wanting to say pour out of her mouth. "I love you with all my heart. It is you, who have done so much for me, and you who I have been wanting to converse with for months now."
And he caressed and kissed her saying, "we now have all of eternity together to talk."
The guards undid her chains and the villagers and archbishop apologized for the mistake, and that night the King held a feast in honour of her brothers becoming men again and his wife finding her voice.
fin.
Author Note:
I decided to post this while a couple are waiting for me to update on my other story. I wrote it over four months ago, and it's based on Hans Christian Andersen's The Wild Swans, which I'm sure most of you are familiar with. Thank you for reading.
The lady,
Lady of the Stardust Butterflies