Sunlight and Shadow

Of course, they had planned the excursion for the hottest day of the year. But then, it had been many years since the kingdom had enjoyed such warmth, since the nearly twenty years of winter and then the return of spring.

“I don’t want you ill from the heat,” the Queen told her three sons.

“We’ll be careful, Mama,” promised Theodor, tossing back his head with a reassuring smile. “Justus and I have seen battle. We know how to handle ourselves.”

In truth, they had observed from a distance, being too young to take part in much more than skirmishes.

“Very well. But stay clear of the Dark Forest. Stay where the sunlight still reaches through the trees, and where shadow does not cover all the ground.”

“We will,” Dieter, her youngest son, promised.

“And you,” the Queen said, pressing a kiss to her son’s forehead and ruffling his tawny hair, “keep your brothers out of trouble.”

“I wonder that you tell me that!” Dieter laughed. “They will not listen.”

“Because I believe you’re the only one who has an ounce of sense and will not run into a dragon’s nest,” teased the Queen, watching them dash down the hill together from the castle to the forest.

Her youngest son had always held a special place. Most of her children bore her gift of beauty, and even her husband was known for his fine appearance. And more than appearance, her elder sons were made of greatness. Even now the generals watched their swordplay with approval, awaiting the days when Theodor and Justus would be fully men and permitted to engage in real battle.

What of Dieter? He could have wandered into a peasant’s hut and nothing would have appeared amiss, for his plain freckled face and ordinary look. Where the generals spoke of Theodor and Justus with pride, they turned away from Dieter with raised eyebrows. Weaker. Soft-hearted. Womanish.

If she thought it would do anything but exacerbate their criticism, she would have spoken in defense. Dieter’s sword was as swift as his brothers’, though less quick to be drawn. If he preferred the bow and the tactics of stealth to the open combat of his brothers and father, what of it? Surely such skills could be used in war.

Finally she sighed and turned from the window. Her sons must take care of themselves. For soon they would be men and she could not be there to protect them.

The three of them marched through the forest, off for a day of adventuring. Theodor and Justus relished the time away from their constantly watchful tutors, both of them swinging swords at each other in laughter.

 “It’s too hot,” Justus grumbled after a while, tossing his sword aside and slumping onto the moss. “This was a foolish idea.”

“Afraid of adventure?” Theodor taunted.

“No, it’s just a hearth, and I’m the roast goose.” Justus pressed his head against a tree trunk. “Water, Dieter?”

Dieter tossed him the container, before turning away to examine a disturbance in the soil. He parted the dry, dead grass to spot a clear boot print. He narrowed his eyes. They had gone very far in the forest, closer to the west of the kingdom, and this was no soldier’s footprint. Beside it hoofprints marked the ground. Farther still a scrap of indigo wool marked a briar. Ahead the trees grew close, their branches blocking out all light, mystery and enchantment lurking even in the still hot air. The Dark Forest.

Nobody roamed these woods. This part of the forest was very close to the Enchanted Kingdom, which had lain in ruin for centuries. Nobody cared to go close to a land where the ground was barren and the castles were covered in briars.

His mother had often told him the story of the princess of that land, a princess who slept and dreamed in nightmares. Sometimes he had even dreamt of her, playing with her as a child and talking to her as they grew older. Of course, he’d always wanted to visit the kingdom. He had sworn when he was grown he would be skilled enough in combat to sneak in and out without any curse laid upon him by whatever dark force ruled it.

“What is it?” Theodor asked, falling into step with. “Oh! An intruder.”

“We should hunt him down,” said Justus, the heat suddenly forgotten.

He slashed the air with his sword. Theodor rolled his eyes.

“Don’t be a dumb head. It’s probably a peasant poaching off Papa’s game.”

“Poaching isn’t a crime,” Dieter reminded him.

“Well, it ought to be,” Theodor grumbled, darting forward into the shadowy trees. “Every other kingdom makes it a crime to hunt the king’s game. Being king is no fun when you have hardly any crimes that you can execute people for.”

 “I hardly think a peasant deserves death for feeding his family from deer Papa doesn’t even own!” Dieter protested, but his brothers only laughed.

“We’re only in jest,” Theodor said. “Do not fear, we won’t cut off any peasant hands.”

He forged ahead into the trees, disappearing into the shadows. Justus followed. Dieter paused, glancing back to the light, before he dashed after them into the forest.

The heat seemed to dissipate as soon as he reached the deep shadow of the trees. For a moment, he thought it would be dark and evil, like the magic in his dreams of the Enchanted Kingdom—creeping and thorny and malicious. Instead, a wildness permeated the trees, an aliveness deeper than the tamer woods closer to civilization. He could feel it in the air, and as he breathed it in it made him stand straighter and look more keenly and listen more carefully. Ancient things have dwelt here. Tales of dark elves and sneaky nixies and dwarves wielding pickaxes and mountain giants all in furs and bush grandmothers with matted hair cold as ice all came to him.

Suddenly he felt the forest’s anger, though it was not directed at him. He heard a muffled cry. He froze, before catching himself and darting behind a tree.

His brothers fought for their lives with three strange men dressed in the deep blue of the enemy kingdom to the north.

A fourth man stepped from the shadows. Prince Clemens, heir to the enemy throne.

“Ah, and what spies have we?” he asked, kicking Theodor’s back so that Dieter winced. But he dared not cry out. One against four would hardly work, at least not in open combat.

“I demand you let us go!” Theodor cried. “I am the heir to the throne!”

“As if I didn’t recognize you before. Any child of the Fairest One is easily marked,” Clemens said.

“What are you doing here? You know the cost for being in our land!”

“A cost I am willing to pay with blood and vengeance, should it be required of me.”

“You know you could be executed for this.”

“My aim is not even your land. It is to the Enchanted Kingdom I go, to find the princess and claim what is rightfully ours.”

“More land?” Justus asked.

“Land and a bride, of course. The sleeping princess is very beautiful, gifted with all that the arts of the wise women could offer her. She would be an excellent prize to show all the kingdoms of my greatness.”

Dieter found his fist clenching. The princess in his dreams was hardly more than a girl. She had always remained his age, growing up alongside him even though he knew her curse would strike when she was fifteen, sending her into everlasting sleep. Of course, she had the gifts of the wise woman, and he had seen her beauty in blurry moments, when he had actually stopped to notice. But to hear her spoken of as a prize, an object to be won…

He felt for his bow over his shoulder. Slipping it silently over his chest, he took an arrow from his quiver.

“Perhaps it would be fitting to slay both of you,” Clemens went on. “Leave no heir to succeed your father.”

Dieter paused, before smiling grimly. Clemens forgot that he existed, that his father had a third son.

But then the soldiers were drawing their swords. They meant to kill his brothers. His heart pounded and he looked down at his arrows. To hurt. To perhaps take a life, if need be. But a terrified cry from Justus spurred him. He snatched up an arrow and aimed at the soldier hoisting his brother up by his hair. He let out a breath. You cannot miss. You must eliminate the danger. He let fly the arrow.

It struck the man in the stomach as he was drawing his sword. Dieter winced at the blood, and his heart raced all the faster. The soldier who reached for his brother he felled with another arrow, so that the man’s legs crumpled and he fell screaming in pain. The hurt in his tone tore at Dieter—he had caused another human pain, one who was perhaps only doing his job, but he had no time. The third soldier ran at him, and he had only one shot…

He missed. Dieter dodged out of the way of the sword, but the soldier was faster. He grabbed him by his collar and threw him to the ground. Dieter’s breath left his body. Then Clemens was standing over him.

“Your page?”

Dieter only coughed in response, and Clemens kicked him. Then the prince yanked him up, staring at his gold-embroidered collar. Recognition dawned on him.

“Ah. There was a third. By the old gods, are you your parents’ child? Never have I seen someone so ill-suited for the princely garb.”

Dieter clenched his teeth.

“I can see much of your father in your pride, though if he were a glorious stallion, you are a common mule.” Clemens threw him to the ground again.

The boy rolled over, wriggling out of the grasp of the soldier. He stumbled up, the world tilting around him as pain exploded in his head. Just as quickly his clear course of action sliced through the muddiness. Get out.

He sprinted for the dark trees, expecting to trip over roots, but the way was clear. He ran and ran as the wood swallowed him into its black maw. When he could run no more he fell.

His eyes fluttered open to the sun beating down on him. Sweat already soaked through his back. The light. Where did it come from?

A gentle hand paler than snow brushed his forehead. He sat up, and the person before him stood from where she had bent over him. A cool rag slipped from his forehead.

 “Who are you?” Dieter asked, turning his head quickly to follow the sound.

Before him stood a woman almost more beautiful than even his mother, her hair bright as the sunshine, her skin like white diamonds. He scrambled up, before dropping to one knee instinctively.

“Rise, Dieter, son of the Fairest One. You bow to nobody but God and King.”

“You know my mother?” Dieter whispered. Of course, the Dark Forest was full of strange beings, but perhaps they had always seemed more myth than anything else. But then, myth did very often become fact.

“All in the Dark Forest knew your mother. But you worry for your brothers. Come!”

At her sudden cry the trees around them erupted with life. A great man, white-haired, with eyes glowing under a sweeping cloak, stomped past the oaks. Mossy-haired giant women followed, and beneath them dark elves slipped through the shadows. Dwarves with pickaxes and grim looks on their faces stalked with certainty through the forest.

“It’s true,” Dieter breathed, laughing in delight, despite the peril his brothers were in. “The Moss Folk do live in these woods!”

He had heard the tales of the strange people who battled to overthrow the queen of evil before his mother. But they were a solitary folk, who feared strangers and preferred to be left alone. They weren’t even safe, exactly, which was why Mama warned against wandering the Dark Forest alone, but they were generally on the side of the Crown after all his parents had done for them.

“And you—” he gasped, turning to the woman. “You must be Perchta. The Bright One.”

“Indeed. Your trouble summoned me. Now come! They are not far, but I fear they will be irretrievable if they are made to pass into the Enchanted Kingdom.”

They hurried back. The path was nearly clear of any barriers, the sun shining down on them with favor, though it felt ill-welcome at the time for its heat.

 “Our forest opens for you,” said Perchta to him.

“Why?”

 “Your mother. You carry the blood of the Fairest One. You too are blessed by the Wandering King to carry on a great mission. Your dreams are not your own. You share them with the one you were meant to save.”

They came to the clearing where he had left his brothers. Theodor and Justus were still alive, though by the sagging of their shoulders, they were very weary and probably faint from the heat. The two soldiers whom he had hit were lying on the ground. He winced. They were only following orders.

When a dwarf handed him a sword, he straightened and took it.

“There is a time for mercy and a time for battle, lad,” the dwarf said. “Compassion and courage can dwell in the same heart, and often it makes for a better warrior than a man who is consumed by bloodlust.”

“Go forth, Dieter,” said Perchta.

Prince Clemens turned, his eyes instantly alighting on Dieter, who had emerged from the shadows.

“You,” he spat, drawing his sword. “Come back to fight me like a man?”

“No,” Dieter replied. Though he could not see Perchta and the others still in the shadows, he felt their reassuring presence as he stood in the warm sun. “I have come to demand your surrender.”

“My surrender? And pray, tell me why I should surrender to a peasant-faced boy?”

“If you surrender now, you will only be sent back to your own kingdom in humiliation, once your father has paid the price.”

“And if not?”

“You will remain in our dungeons until you die. Your father will perish without an heir, and your kingdom fall into chaos as your barons battle each other for the throne.”

Clemens frowned. He stepped closer. Dieter lifted his sword, ready for defense. He felt the breaths of the Moss Folk behind him. He lifted his head and stared the man in the eyes, his gaze steely so that the prince was the first to turn away.

“Let my brothers go, and it will not go so hard with you. I promise that you will be treated with mercy.”

“And what makes you believe you could best me?” Clemens said, his voice surly. This quest of his was not going so well as he had planned. But then, already he had lost two soldiers, either to death or wound, and the third stared at Dieter as if he were a full-fledged warrior instead of an armor-less boy half a head shorter than either of the men.

“Have you made your choice, then?” Dieter asked. His brothers looked up at him. Theodor was shaking his head, mouth drawn in a taut line. Don’t try to be a hero, little brother.

Clemens’s gaze shifted to behind Dieter. Dieter could not tell if he had seen the Moss Folk in the dark of the trees. But then the prince lowered his sword.

“Very well,” he said, his voice ragged with humiliation. “We are yours.”

“Drop your sword,” Dieter ordered, chest swelling with relief. No more killing today.

“To see a man of his reputation frightened by a mere boy!” Justus laughed as soon as his hands were free.

“I expect he was more frightened by them than me,” Dieter chuckled, nodding his head to the forest.

But the Moss Folk were not there. For a moment Dieter thought they never had been, but then he remembered the trees parting and the sun shining where never it shone and the cool cloth on his head. Strange ways.

One of the other soldiers lived, though his face was pale as blood seeped out from a strip of linen wrapped around his leg. Dieter laid the dead to rest, crossing his arms over his sword, as a warrior must be. His stomach turned. It was my arrow that slew him. But if he had not, he would be burying his brothers now.

They walked home in silence. Dieter still remembered Perchta’s face, the light of the future in her eyes as she told him about one he was meant to save. Dreams? Sharing them? The memory of a beautiful princess slipped through his mind—the princess of the Enchanted Kingdom. But just as it had come, it was gone, and he brushed it aside in the hazy thoughts of the heat.

They came to the castle triumphantly, pushing the three prisoners ahead of them. Theodor stopped him as their own men dragged Clemens away.

“You were brave, little brother,” he said.

“I was afraid you would be killed,” Dieter admitted.

“You hardly showed it. You bore yourself well. With valor, but more than that, with wisdom.”

Dieter bowed his head, flushing.

“Come join us on the battlefield, someday,” Justus said.

“Perhaps,” Dieter murmured, letting them walk on ahead of him. He sensed that there was something else in store for him, something far different than the battlefield, but something that would require as many of his skills.

As the summer solstice burned out in a fiery blaze of sunlight in the west, he found himself looking east, towards the Enchanted Kingdom, where a cursed princess lay dreaming in shadow for the day a prince was fated to wake her.