Excerpt from The Two Princesses of Bamarre

Out of a land laid waste

To a land untamed,

Monster ridden,

The lad Drualt led

A ruined, ragtag band.

In his arms, tenderly,

He carried Bruce,

The child king,

First ruler of Bamarre.

 

So begins Drualt, the epic poem of Bamarre’s greatest hero, our kingdom’s ideal. Drualt fought Bamarre’s monsters—the ogres, gryphons, specters, and dragons that still plague us—and he helped his sovereign found our kingdom.

Today Bamarre needed a hero more than ever. The monsters were slaughtering hundreds of Bamarrians every year, and the Gray Death carried away even more.

I was no hero. The dearest wishes of my heart were for safety and tranquility. The world was a perilous place, wrong for the likes of me.

Once, when I was four years old and playing in the castle courtyard, a shadow passed over me. I shrieked, certain it was a gryphon or a dragon. My sister, Meryl, ran to me and held me, her arms barely long enough to go around me.

“It’s gone, Addie,” she whispered. “It’s far away by now.”

Meryl was my protector, as necessary to me as air and food. Our mother, Queen Daria, had succumbed to the Gray Death when I was two and Meryl was three. Father rarely visited the nursery. Bella, our governess, loved us in her way, but her way was to moralize and to scold.

Meryl understood me, although we were as different as could be. She was fair, and I was dark complexioned. She was small and compact, a concentration of focused energy. I was always tall for my age, and loose-limbed, and my energy was nervous and fluttery. Meryl was brave, and I was afraid of almost everything—from monsters to strangers to spiders.

Her favorite game was the Gray Death adventure. Oddly enough this one didn’t frighten me. The Gray Death wasn’t a monster or a spider I could see and shiver over. It was invisible. If I caught it, it would be somewhere within me, and while the outside world was full of danger, I knew my interior. I was certain I could oust an intruder there.

In the game I always portrayed the Gray Death’s victim.

I’d fall asleep there on the floor. A moment or two later I’d wake up and rise, consumed by fever. I’d rush to the fireplace and rub ashes into my cheeks, because the faces of the afflicted always turned gray near the end. I’d pretend to shiver, and I’d try to make my teeth chatter.

Meanwhile, Meryl would be busy battling monsters, consulting with sorcerers, climbing mountains, sailing stormy seas. While I shivered, I’d keep one eye on her, because I couldn’t start to die until she was ready to rescue me. When she triumphed and found the cure, I’d slump to the floor.

She’d rush to me, cradling the cure in both hands. Kneeling at my side, she’d whisper, “I have found it, maiden. You shall live.” She’d cure me, and I’d jump up.

We knew that a cure would be found one day. A specter had prophesied it, and the prophecies of specters always came true. The cure would be found when cowards found courage and rain fell over all Bamarre. That was all we knew.

Once, at the end of our game, I asked Meryl if she really planned to quest for the cure. I was nine at the time, and Meryl was ten.

She took a heroic stance, legs apart, brandishing an imaginary sword. “I’ll find the cure, and knights will flock to me. We’ll destroy the monsters and save Bamarre. Then I’ll return home.”

She wouldn’t. She’d be dead. But I knew better than to say so. Instead I asked, “What will I do while you’re away?”

She lowered her pretend sword and smiled. “Why, you’ll be the wife of a handsome prince and mother of a little princess who is learning to embroider as beautifully as you do.”

I didn’t smile back. “What if the prince hasn’t come yet, or he didn’t like me and left?”

“Then you’ll come with me.”

“No, I won’t. I’d be too afraid. You know I would.”

We lay quietly for a moment.

“If I ever really caught the Gray Death,” I said, “even if you hadn’t found the cure yet, I wouldn’t die.”

Meryl rolled over. “Why not?”

“Because I wouldn’t give in to it. When the disease made me feel tired, I wouldn’t act tired. When it made me want to sleep, I’d stay awake. If the fever still came, I’d run up and down to keep myself warm. By refusing to do the Gray Death’s bidding, I’d chase the illness away.”

Meryl leaped up. “I will find the cure, you know.”

I nodded. “But if I become ill before then, I won’t fall prey to death.”