Awaken - Sleeping Beauty Retold

Part 2

TWO

"Mistress, you must wake and eat something," Rosamond's maid urged.

Rosamond's head hurt, as it always did after she'd tried to perform magic. What sort of witch swooned whenever she cast a spell? One who shouldn't perform magic at all, her mother's voice echoed in her head. A princess, and a future queen, should be practicing protocol and learning all the arts of a highborn lady so that she could be an example to her subjects.

As this apparently didn't include spending long hours in the castle gardens, Rosamond had ignored her mother as much as possible. What was the point of being a queen if you couldn't do what you liked once in a while? After all, it was the king who ruled. Queens were just...for decoration, and doing whatever it was women did to get children. Oh, she knew it involved men and clothing was not required, but no one had been willing to tell her all the details. Her mother had promised to tell her everything on the night before her wedding.

Wedding. Ugh. Rosamond didn't fancy a single one of the noblemen she'd met at King Erik's court, and she fervently hoped the feeling was mutual. She'd be happy in her ignorance until the right man came to his senses and asked for her hand.

Just thinking about men made her head hurt all the more.

"Bring me willow bark tea first," Rosamond ordered.

"I have it here already, mistress," the maid said, sounding aggrieved.

"Give it to me, then."

A cup touched Rosamond's lips and she gulped down the contents, barely tasting the tepid tea.

"Now you must eat something," the maid insisted.

Rosamond gritted her teeth. Monika had been her maid for as long as she could remember, and she swore the girl liked to boss her around as much as Rosamond's mother did. More, perhaps, because Monika was not much older than her mistress and Rosamond was certain she reported everything she said to Queen Maria, Rosamond's mother. Hence why Rosamond was stuck wearing the gowns and veils her mother had insisted upon for every royal event at court.

So Rosamond took the small loaf of bread Monika held out, broke off a piece and popped it into her mouth. Food helped combat the weakness she felt after casting a spell. More helpful was a visit to the palace gardens, where the plants would restore her far faster, but the memory of yesterday's whispering courtiers was enough to make her wish to keep to her chambers until she was well enough to return home. Under no circumstances did she want even one of them to see her in the palace gardens, talking to the plants. It only took one to spread vicious rumours.

But one vicious rumour might mean no marriage proposals, too, which would be a godsend in Rosamond's eyes. And she would so love to see the roses which had provided the queen's crown.

Rosamond stuffed the rest of the bread into her mouth, forgetting all propriety in her haste. With an effort, she swallowed. "Help me dress," she commanded.

Monika set her hands on her hips. "Are you sure you're well enough? You've been abed, senseless, for a day and two nights, mistress."

The way Monika said it, she made "mistress" sound like "helpless child". This wasn't new.

Rosamond smiled sweetly. "I've rested plenty. Time to be up and about. Doesn't Mother want me to bring a husband home?"

Monika gave her a dark look, but all she said was, "If you hurry, we might make it to the tournament before it starts."

A tournament? Rosamond had heard of such things, but never attended one before.

"With knights? And jousting?" Rosamond asked eagerly.

"That was yesterday," Monika said, helping Rosamond change into a fresh shift. She selected a gown the colour of ripe strawberries and held it out for Rosamond to put on. "Today is the melee."

Rosamond slipped her arms through the sleeves and forced herself to stand still so Monika could thread and tie the laces of her gown. "What is a melee?"

"I am not sure," Monika admitted, giving the laces a sharp tug so that Rosamond was left breathless. "But Sir Warin has entered."

"Sir Warin? But who will guard me?" Rosamond demanded.

"You have a place beside the queen, if you are well enough," said Monika. "I'm sure her royal guard won't mind taking care of one more."

That sounded all right to Rosamond, so she submitted to Monika's toilette with good grace as the maid dressed her hair and tucked it under a white veil.

They made their way out to a field Rosamond barely recognised. Gone were the sheep that had grazed there when they'd arrived. Now it was crowded with brightly coloured pavilions crowned with flags that snapped in the breeze. At one end, there was tiered seating that held a crowd of courtiers. Rosamond suppressed a groan as she felt their eyes turn on her.

"This way, mistress," Monika said, touching Rosamond's elbow. She pointed at a stand shrouded in a purple canopy. In the shadows beneath it, Rosamond could just make out the king and queen.

Rosamond took her seat beside Queen Margareta and tried to hide her surprise as Monika placed herself on the boards at Rosamond's feet.

Margareta turned to Rosamond. "It is good to see you better, Princess."

Before Rosamond could reply, the king added, "She looks like a strawberry with cream on top. She'll distract the knights from combat in those colours. Ha, they'll all want to eat her up!" He laughed at his own joke, as did most of the courtiers within earshot.

Rosamond blushed as red as her dress.

"Do shut up, Erik, or the girl will return home convinced there's an a*s on the throne here and her father's army will be at our gates within the week," Margareta said in a low voice, so that only Rosamond and the king heard. The queen's serene smile never faltered. "Now, Princess, let me look at you. He is right about one thing. That colour does suit you. I hope you brought a lot of favours, for all the knights will be asking for yours today."

"Favours?" Rosamond faltered.

Monika pushed a bundle of cloth into her lap with a pointed look.

"Is this your first tournament, Princess?" the queen asked. When Rosamond nodded, Margareta continued, "It is mine, too, but I have had both my husband and many of his knights explaining the intricacies of tournaments to me for weeks until I agreed that all of the men would be allowed to show off in my honour. Apparently, beating each other senseless is a sign of respect to their new queen. Quite barbaric."

While they waited for the day's combat to begin, Margareta regaled Rosamond with tales of yesterday's jousting. Two horses had been killed, several knights had broken arms and legs, and one was sporting two black eyes so dark he'd refused to remove his helmet.

Rosamond couldn't hide her shock. "You mean men were hurt? All I have heard of tournaments is that they are heroic. Romantic, for knights fight for their lady-loves. I had not heard that men were injured."

The king heard this and laughed. "Silly girl, of course men are hurt. This is good practice for battle. And just like in battle, we have physicians on hand to help set bones and the like."

Rosamond felt ill, as though she would bring her breakfast back up again at the king's feet.

"Erik," the queen said warningly.

The king opened his mouth as if to protest, then closed it again without a word and turned to face the empty field.

"I would like to hear more about how you choose your gowns, Princess," Margareta said. "First the pale pink at the coronation, and now this deeper rose for today. What will you choose tomorrow? Purple? So that on the day of your departure, you wear black?"

Embarrassed again, Rosamond mumbled something about how her mother had chosen her gowns for this trip.

"Then you are very lucky. My mother would be perfectly happy to send me out n***d, as long as I wore a string of pearls," Margareta declared.

Rosamond couldn't help herself. She burst out laughing. "Your mother would let you go out n***d? Not even wearing a shift?"

Margareta nodded. "n***d. Clothing is just a distraction, she said, when the way to catch a husband is to show him what you will bring to the marriage. If you truly wish to enchant a man, let him see you n***d. I assure you, it will torment him until he finds the courage to ask for your hand so that he can see such beauty again."

Rosamond doubted she would ever have the courage to do something so brazen. Not to mention that there was little chance she would ever want to enchant a man. King Erik seemed like a nice enough husband to Margareta, yet she'd called him an a*s. If even the best men were donkeys, where did that leave her?

Thinking to change the subject, Rosamond ventured, "I can't imagine it. You look so lovely in your gown, Your Majesty. What manner of creature grows fur in such a rich red colour?"

The queen laughed. "This is not fur. It is velvet – made on a loom by a weaver who brought her knowledge of its craft from distant foreign lands. I shall make you a gift of some, if you wish it."

"I do," Rosamond said fervently.

Conversation ended for a little while, as a cacophony of trumpets signalled the beginning of the tournament. Two teams of knights lined up on opposite ends of a field, while a page in the king's colours set what looked like a blown-up pig's bladder in the middle of the field.

Rosamond turned to the queen to ask about the bladder, but someone blew a short blast on a trumpet and the thunderous clatter of two dozen men charging across a field toward one another drowned out any sound she made.

She lost sight of the bladder amid the madmen trying to kill each other, though only armed with wooden staves.

It was nothing short of brutal. She went from gasping at every blow to leaving her mouth permanently open. Rosamond tried to close her eyes but a fresh shout or c***k of bone only made her snap her eyes open again until finally she clapped her hands over her eyes so she could only peek through her fingers. Even that limited field of vision made her sick to her stomach.

All around her, people cheered and groaned as their favourite knights gained or lost some sort of victory, but Rosamond couldn't tell one mud-spattered man from another, especially with them clad head to toe in boiled leather.

Finally, when she was certain she could endure no more of this violence, the king called a halt to the match. Servants stood beside the field with flagons and the squires raced to get their knights a drink. Only then did helmets come off, and Rosamond realised she recognised one of the half-dozen men left standing as the captain of her guard, Sir Warin.

The king saw him at the same time Rosamond did. "You man fights well," he said. "You should make sure he carries your favour into battle, for if he fights for one of the ladies in my court, I will do everything in my power to persuade him to stay in my service instead of your father's."

Her man. Rosamond hadn't thought of the knight that way before, but now that she looked at him, she had to admit he was quite handsome. He was no simpering courtier but a brave knight who fought well. Who would fight for the woman he loved, and her honour. She sighed. So romantic.

Rosamond flapped her hand to get Monika's attention. "Go to Sir Warin and give him this," she instructed, thrusting a piece of pink fabric at her maid. "Tell him he fights for his princess's honour."

Monika didn't say anything. She simply took the handkerchief and made her way from the royal stand to where Sir Warin stood, drinking his cup of ale.

The queen, noticing Rosamond's preoccupation, followed her gaze. "So that's why you aren't flirting with the courtiers here. You have better men at home."

Rosamond reddened. "I don't know how to flirt, Your Majesty. And even if I did..."

Margareta patted her hand. "Most men won't notice anyway. They're simple creatures, really. Let him kiss you, find a way for him to glimpse you n***d, and then refuse all else until you are married. Everything else is just so you can make sure he's not a complete a*s, right, Erik?"

"Mm?" the king said. His attention was on the remaining six men forming up on the field once more. "Yes, of course. They're about to fight again."

Margareta's serene smile surfaced as she added softly to Rosamond, "And never agree to host a tourney. I swear, this will be our last."

The horn blasted its command for the fight to begin, and Rosamond hid behind her hands. But if she peeped between her fingers, she could still see the pink handkerchief tied to the shoulder of Sir Warin's cuirass as six men became four, then three, then two, until he faced a single foe who was much larger than him.

Their staves clacked together like practice swords, but both men wielded them like steel blades they intended to kill one another with. They circled, crossed, thrust...it looked like an elegant dance, until Warin stumbled on an uneven patch of ground and his thrust went wide. His opponent saw his chance and brought his stave down hard against Warin's sword arm.

Rosamond heard the c***k as Warin's arm broke, but the shouts and cheers from the stands drowned out her frantic cry.

The other man lifted his wooden sword in salute to the king, turning his back on Warin. Warin still held his stave in his injured arm, but he transferred it to his other hand and assumed a fighting stance.

"This is not over – I do not yield!" Sir Warin roared, loud enough for even Rosamond to hear.

Her heart beat rapidly in her breast. How could he be so brave, when he was injured?

The bigger man turned, and brought his stave up slowly. He, too, was tired, but he wasn't as badly hurt as Warin. The dance resumed. Warin's opponent dragged one foot, as though his knee had been damaged. Warin kept his broken arm close to his body, but as far away from the other man as possible.

Each time the staves knocked together, it seemed softer, as though both men lacked the strength to continue.

Time ticked by. A second. An hour. An eternity. Or so it seemed to Rosamond, who longed to run out onto the field and heal her hero, but she could not until this duel was over.

A collective gasp rose from the stands as the big man overbalanced and fell to his knees. Warin, in an almost leisurely movement, set the point of his stave to the man's throat.

Rosamond heard wild cheering, and it took her a moment to realise the sound came from her own throat.

"Do we have a winner?" King Erik boomed.

Warin pulled the pink handkerchief from his cuirass and waved it above his head like a flag as he staggered to the royal box. When he reached it, he fell to his knees. "I am the victor, Your Majesties," he said.

"To the joy of your countrywomen. I'm sure they are glad they will be protected by an able knight like yourself for their journey home," the king replied.

Countrywomen? Oh, of course. Monika. Rosamond dismissed the maid from her mind easily. Sir Warin was the captain of the princess's guard. He would defend her with his life, before he even glanced at Monika.

That was why she needed to heal him. She might be a poor witch, but he had fought for her honour and won. Rosamond rose and descended to the grass, or what had been grass before the fighting had churned it into dust. Heedless of her gown or who saw, she knelt beside her valiant knight and reached for his broken arm.

Blood. She needed blood to cast a spell. There were no thorns today, so she scraped her hand along the edge of his stave until she felt the prick of a splinter. With her fingers bleeding, she touched her wounded knight, closed her eyes and concentrated on healing him.

She concentrated so hard she barely noticed when the spell sent her into yet another deep swoon.