Leo wrote the letter. Everything polite and well expressed, just as expected, not a single word misspelled, not a single sentiment sincere. Any girl with half a brain reading that missive would immediately write a similarly polite refusal . . . but no chance Daylily would be so perceptive. No, no, she’d probably consider herself highly complimented and set out for Hill House posthaste.
Leo growled wordlessly as he placed the letter in the gold tray on the end of his desk. Then, because his mood was too black for anything else, he went to his fireplace and took an old urn down from the mantel. Supposedly this urn, carved in a relief of Maid Starflower on one side, the Wolf Lord on the other, and a motif of wood thrushes around the lip and lid, contained the ashes of some venerable ancestor. What it really contained was a set of juggling sacks.
Leo started to juggle. First one sack, then two, then three, finally five sacks altogether. He moved about the room as he went, first at a slow, sedate pace, then adding little hop-steps, then moving into a silly jig, all the while keeping his eyes fixed on the rotation of his sacks. He orbited the room, avoiding furniture and corners, still jigging, still juggling, and as his concentration increased, his anger faded away.
This was a world that had room for no one else, just him and his sacks, and the energy it took to keep them moving in time to his dancing feet. No one could touch him here, in his element, just so long as Leo kept his eyes steady and his hands flashing, and those sacks flying. He was no prince in this realm of existence; he was king.
He added a sixth sack. Six was the most he’d ever managed to juggle at one time, and then only for a precious few rounds. But today they flowed almost effortlessly, and he started to jig again, softly singing as he went:
“With dicacity pawky, the Geestly Knout
Would foiter his noggle and try
To becket the Bywoner with his snout
And louche the filiferous—”
It was too much. He missed a step and the sacks flew wild. One hit a window, two landed in the hearth ashes, one knocked the gold tray with its letter clattering to the floor, and two more rolled out of sight beneath furniture. Leo stood empty-handed, feeling a bit of a fool.
No, not a fool. A jester.
He remembered dreams of boyhood days. Dreams of travel and laughter and tomfoolery. “I’m going to be a jester,” he’d boasted once. A jester, traveling the world, performing for kings but answering to no one. For jesters were wild, madcap, and best of all . . . free.
Which Leo was not.
Gritting his teeth, he collapsed into a chair before the fire, contemplating the empty grate. He should have known how his power struggle with Mother would turn out. She’d take even the freedom he’d known at Hill House and turn it into means for her own ends.
Hill House.
Leo grimaced. Memories of that summer were indistinct. Over the last five years, many things had slipped away, leaving only vague impressions in their wake. But those impressions weren’t unpleasant . . . he remembered games in the forest, and building a dam. He remembered laughing and running and feeling more himself than he ever had before or since. He remembered breathing freedom in that wild mountain air.
He remembered Rose Red. His friend.
Nothing had been the same after leaving Hill House. Perhaps nothing would be the same again, but—dragons eat Foxbrush, Daylily, his mother, the whole fire-blazed world—he was going to find out this summer if it killed him!
Leo closed his eyes, and his head rested on the back of his chair. Soon his breathing relaxed into a snore. But when the snoring ceased, he dreamed.
“Tell me what you want.”
The Lady steps into his dream as if through parting curtains, and they stand face-to-face. He does not want to look into the vast emptiness of her eyes. But she holds his gaze.
“Tell me what you want.”
Slowly, the Lady takes him by the shoulder and turns him to the right. There he sees a vista open up before him. He sees a road leading off into the horizon. He sees beyond the horizon, beyond the edge of the world he knows, and the path leads all the way to the sea. Then he speeds across that blue expanse, riding the wind, following the path over land, over water, over mountains, on and on. His soul thrills at the freedom of it, and he laughs and somersaults and leaps just because he can, as light as a wind-tossed leaf.
“Tell me what you want.”
The Lady takes his other shoulder and turns him to the left. He wrenches his gaze unwillingly, but as his eyes adjust to the new scene, the smile dies on his lips, replaced with a stern line.
He sees a prince . . . no, a king. Noble and bearded and strong, he sits upon the Seat of the Eldest in a great hall of sweeping alabaster arches. The king sits with a golden sword upon his knee, and people flock to his feet, pleading their causes, looking to him for justice, protection, wisdom. At this king’s right hand stands a lady of great beauty, her red hair circled in gold. All those assembled are amazed at the sight of her.
“Tell me what you want.”
The Lady cups his face in her hands and forces Leo to look at her, though he strains to catch a last glimpse of that brilliant hall and noble king. But her white eyes fill his vision.