I smile. He’s comfortable enough to make these kinds of jokes now that we both know he isn’t out to steal anything. But I don’t answer. Mom always says I’ll make a great ruler. You think but don’t talk too much, and you don’t wear your emotions on your face. I used to take offense to that because she might as well have been saying You’ll make a great robot. Sometimes it takes time to see the value in something.
“May I ask you a question?” Jack asks.
“Shoot.”
“You’re always sanding that chair, etching another flourish. But it could’ve been done ages ago, right?”
The wood chair is the best thing I’ve made so far. Sturdy, smooth, beautiful. It looks like the work of someone who knew what they were doing. I keep going over and over what I’ve already done, and if something has been holding me back from finishing the seat, I don’t know what it is, exactly. I shrug.
Jack says, “Do you want to hear something funny? Well, I suppose it’s more a question.” He laughs nervously. “This is going to sound ridiculous, but . . . when I first started coming here, I thought you were planning to skin me alive or whatever. You know, use me as upholstery or something.”
I laugh so hard I have to wipe my eyes.
“Were you?”
“Are you kidding me?” I say between giggles.
“Were you?”
I stop laughing. Jack looks more serious than I’ve ever seen him.
He looks up at me, his eyes moving side to side as if he’s trying to see deep into my soul, one eyeball at a time.
I turn my gaze back to the gold-dotted darkness below and lean farther over the railing, letting the cool breeze whip my hair against my face.
“Jack, it never crossed my mind.”
Jack doesn’t return for a long time, so long that I begin to think he isn’t ever coming back. Summer slides into autumn, and my parents head to a cluster of clouds over Germany on royal Northern Hemisphere business.
And then, one midnight, Jack returns.
We’re in the basement and Jack is leaning back onto his hands while staring into the fire. Goldie, basking in the warmth of the hearth, ruffles her feathers and raises her head for a second. She looks at Jack’s hand like she wants to stab it with her beak. She’s still miffed about his absence; I think he grew on her.
Jack speaks for the first time tonight. “I considered staying away.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t have come back.”
“It’s not like you were going to come down.”
I don’t answer.
“And anyway, my uncle and I are back home to Cambridge this week.” He sighs. “So you don’t want to be friends anymore?”
“Jack, you like your uncle’s cat, right? But can you really say you’re friends?”
“Yes.”
I shake my head, and Dad’s words fill my brain and then my mouth. “It’s not my nature.”
“It doesn’t have to be your nature to not have friends.”
But Jack doesn’t know what I mean, and it’s best that way, anyhow.
I say, “Remember that cabinet? My parents just got something I know you’d like to see.” For days, Mom couldn’t stop talking about that missing harpy of a harp, but then she found something more interesting to put in its place. The moment I saw it, Jack popped into my mind, because I knew he’d love it. “Just didn’t know if you were coming back.”
Jack looks sheepish, as expected. I don’t wait for a reply, just scoop him up and take him upstairs, and he only squirms a little.
We get to the bull room, and I set Jack down on one of the cabinet shelves, next to a tiny black velvet pig that trots around and hiccups silver marbles. Jack oohs and aahs, and the pig nuzzles his hand.
“Does it bite? What does it eat?” he asks. “Doesn’t it get lonely locked up in here?”
“No and nothing and I don’t think so.”
There are so many wondrous things in this cabinet, things that have made me proud ever since I really stopped to look: human-sized helmets and swords from antiquity; enormous goblets that were stolen from giants who lived in the depths of Mount Ararat but reclaimed; a golden egg that is said to be one of the first ever laid; a human-sized, jewel-encrusted crown that was given to one of my ancestors for mercy shown; a fortified slab of wood said to have been part of the hull of Noah’s ark, which a crew of giants helped build.
What does Jack see when he looks at these things? Money? Fame?
I see a proud history, buried and overlooked.
Jack runs a fingertip along the dulled edge of a saber. “My uncle would love this.”
“I’m sure.” I set Jack on the floor and secure the cabinet.
Jack walks over to the bronze bull, presses his palms against its breast, and looks up expectantly. I lift him onto the bull’s neck and he lies back, but as soon as he puts his hands behind his head, he starts. He twists around to see what poked him in the head.
“Is this a latch?” he says.
“Stop squirming—you’ll fall.”
“It is. Am I lying on a door?” Jack pushes himself to his feet and shuffles backward so he can see the hinged door, which runs like a spine down the bull’s back. “Brilliant! It’s some kind of trunk, isn’t it?” If I let him continue his attempts to pull the thing open, he’s going to slide off the bull and break something.
“Relax,” I say.
Jack straddles the bull’s haunches, watching wide-eyed as I undo the latch. As soon as the door is opened, he launches forward and lowers himself into the empty space.
“It’s so slick inside . . . Wow . . .”
“Do you smell blood?” I ask because I’m curious.
“What’s that?”
“Never mind, nothing.” I’m sticking to my original theory.
“So uh . . .” His voice slides funny, an attempt to smooth the sharp edges of caution. “I’m guessing this isn’t your father’s bullion box.” A forced laugh echoes upward.
Am I sad? I knew in my gut it would come to this, even before I really knew. But yes, I do feel a pang of regret; just because you know something’s coming doesn’t make you feel any less bad for it.
I close the lid and latch it so that no matter how hard Jack pushes, it won’t open.
The thing is getting them to trust you, the animals. He’s got fear permeating every bit of his body, but it’s not like I care about sharpness or acidity. That’s not what this is about.
I walk to the cabinet and pull open a drawer. I bet this is what a person feels like when they have to slaughter one of the chickens they’ve been feeding all year. But Jack isn’t a chicken and I’m not just any person. I’m the future Empress of the Northern Hemisphere, and just as Jack ingested the python, just as he ingested fierce, unflinching power incarnate, I have to ingest Jack so that I can take my people into our next era. There’s a lot to learn, and I can’t do it scared.
Jack wouldn’t want that.