Chapter Six In Which Everyone Lies a Lot #2
There is a school of thought that says telling the truth is always the best policy.
According to this doctrine, liars inevitably end up tangled in their own web of falsehood and soon enough suffer a suitably ironic punishment.
Cry wolf, and you will be devoured, with none coming to your aid; cut off your toes to change your foot size, and all you’ll get is a painful limp and a blood-filled glass slipper.
Which can’t, incidentally, have been pleasant for the next person to try it on.
The truth-tellers, meanwhile, will be seen for the pure souls they are and always come out on top in the end. They’ll win by virtue of their virtue, so to speak.
This is complete nonsense. The next time a giant asks whether you are a delicious, edible mortal woman or some kind of oddly shaped rock formation, try giving the first answer and see what happens.
So my judgment was that until I had more information about my current situation, deception was the better part of valor.
I finished off a final stitch and patted Sam on an unwounded patch of shoulder. “There. That should do for now.” He sighed in relief and gave me a crooked, if pained, smile.
I turned to Bloody Knee.
“If I am a princess,” I said, “then where is my retinue? My servants? My guards? Where is my carriage?”
The masked men had already made half my argument for me.
They’d noticed I was out alone and had little besides the sturdy clothes I’d been wearing for the journey, now somewhat torn by the claws of monsters.
Nothing but scattered teeth remained of my traveling companions, and there’d been no sign of my gowns and jewels and squirrel-selected shiny shoes in the remains of the enchanted carriage; presumably, they were pumpkin innards now.
Never, ever leave anything important inside a dying spell.
“For that matter,” I continued, “if I were the mighty sorceress you’re apparently expecting, then why would I need to be rescued from a few, um…” I glanced over at the tangle of monstrous corpses. “What were those, anyway?”
“We’ve been calling them spider wolves,” one of them said.
“Because otherwise they’d be wolf spiders, and that’s already a thing.
” He held a finger to one nostril and blew through the other.
A blast of wind lifted up the carcass of a spider wolf.
It danced around in the air for a few moments before it dropped with a squishy thud.
“Ah,” I said, disquieted. “But anyway, no. Not a princess. I hope you weren’t counting on meeting her today.”
Bloody Knee’s shoulders relaxed with such stark, obvious relief that I felt slightly insulted. I’d thought I might see disappointment or perhaps suspicion, but not that. He really hadn’t wanted to meet the princess. To meet me. I wondered why.
“Well then,” he said. “If you aren’t the princess, who are you?”
“Her handmaiden, of course,” I answered. “No more than a minor noblewoman from the court of Skalla.” Lies are best concealed within as much truth as possible. “I’ve been sent out in advance to make sure everything is properly arranged for the wedding.”
“I see.” He frowned thoughtfully, but if he had any doubts, he didn’t express them aloud.
“My horse was chased off by the spider wolves before you arrived.” That was also reasonably close to the truth. I hoped the mice were doing well, wherever they were; they’d been Calla’s friends. “So if you’re King Gervase’s huntsmen, might you be willing to escort me to the castle?”
“Aye, of course,” Sam said, rising a bit unsteadily from the log. “We’d be happy to.”
“Even though you’d have to give up on your stag?”
“Stag?” he said.
“The one you were tracking,” I reminded him, “when the spider wolves attacked.”
“Obviously, your plight takes precedence,” Bloody Knee cut in. “We might want to wait until morning to travel, though.” He glanced up at the darkening sky. “It’s a full day’s journey from here.”
“If we have to, I suppose.” A night facing unknown dangers with people I didn’t entirely trust wasn’t exactly what I’d been hoping for.
Sam seemed less than thrilled with the notion as well. “Shouldn’t we be on our way? What if more of those things come?”
Bloody Knee shook his head. “Then better that they come when we’re in a good defensive position and not wandering through the woods in the dark.”
“But, Jack—”
“Oh!” I said. “You’re a Jack! Why didn’t you say so in the first place?”
My muscles unknotted as the bulk of my tension drained away. Bloody Knee’s name was the most reassuring piece of news I’d had since my rescue.
Everyone knew that you could rely on a Jack—or a Hans, or an Ivan, depending on the local naming conventions.
They weren’t likely to be outright villains, even if they weren’t always heroes.
These so-called hunters might be lying about who they were, but if their leader was a Jack, my chances of being kidnapped, robbed, abandoned, or forced to scrub dishes had dropped considerably.
He looked discomfited. “It’s…a nickname, really. You shouldn’t make too much of it.”
“Isn’t it usually a nickname?” I asked. “For John, or Jonathan? Or maybe James? I don’t see why that makes any difference.”
“Let’s git awa’ fae thae deid beasties and mak’ camp,” Clem interjected. “Afore we lose th’ light athegither.”
We left the bodies of the spider wolves behind, pressing into the forest for perhaps another half an hour before we topped a low, clear hill that, being slightly less boggy than the lower land around it, was judged a suitable place to spend the night.
By then, the clouds were clearing, and the first stars of evening glimmered in the sky.
The hunters who were well enough to help moved to busy themselves, gathering the driest leaves they could find for bedding and the driest branches for a fire.
Clem and The Nose Blower constructed a lean-to with a blanket they’d produced from somewhere.
They all worked together in a way that spoke of long practice.
Sam wanted to pitch in, too, at first, until I described exactly what would happen if he pulled out his stitches and sepsis set in. Since the rest of them appeared to have things well in hand, and I feared I’d only be in the way, I sat next to him on a flattish rock and let them get to it.
I readied myself for at least one more horrible night in the wilderness. Although if they truly did intend to get me to my destination the next day, it might be the last one.
“What’s your name, princess’s handmaiden?” Sam asked, turning toward me. His jaw clenched as his stiffening, bloody shirt pulled away from his wounds. “Since I’d rather not have to refer to you as ‘Princess’s Handmaiden.’ ”
“At least it’s better than ‘Detachable Leg’ or ‘The Nose Blower,’ ” I muttered.
“Sorry, what?”
“Nothing,” I said. “You can call me Clover.”
“That’s a bonnie name.” His smile made me wish it were actually mine.
“So…” I cast about for a way to turn the conversation to any subject but me. “Have you been a huntsman long?”
“Not as long as all that. I’ve been with Jack since the beginning, though.”
“The beginning?” My forehead wrinkled. “The beginning of what?”
“That, I’m afraid, is a rather long story.”
“Is it a good story?”
“It’s filled with mystery, magic, adventure, and danger,” Sam assured me.
“The kind where every word is proclaimed or avowed?”
“Exactly.”
“Sounds intriguing,” I said. “And we have all night, it seems.”
I made myself as comfortable as I could on a hard rock in a damp forest on a chilly autumn evening.
Exhaustion dragged at my eyelids, but I wasn’t likely to get much sleep in those conditions.
And if I was going to spend the night wide awake, wearing torn and bloody clothing, surrounded by strangers, and lying my head off, there was no need for me to be bored as well.
“Once upon a time…” Sam began.