JEDAWrites

“Great Spirits,” Triia whispered.

A skyship glided above the tips of the empty branches and draped the girl and her foxfellows in shadow. The hull gleamed with oil, and banners dripped from its sides, fluttering like a thousand butterfly wings. Triia’s heart beat hard in her chest. The Lord of the Botlinds could be right above her, and she hadn’t figured out even half of her speech. 

The ship turned toward the setting sun to reveal a merchant’s mark carved into its side. It was a crow, not even one of the royal houses, and Triia had to laugh at herself. Even the Botlinds’ lower merchants were like kings to her. She rubbed her father’s ring with her thumb. Flecks of blood hid between the gemstones despite all the scrubbing. Still, it would get her into the Court, as long as her shaking knees could carry her there.

Haau yipped, twitching his tail back and forth. 

Triia hoisted up her outcloak to catch up. “Sorry.”

Leein huffed and turned to keep going before Triia arrived, but ever faithful Haau waited. His dark black eyes stared in her direction, but they didn’t look at her. They looked back, toward home. Triia glanced back despite—or perhaps in spite of— her mother’s warnings. They hadn’t worked last time anyways.  The mass of dead forest choked the horizon even with all their leaves lying in in wet clumps in the dirt. No glimpse of Priuul could hope to reach her here. 

Triia turned away and cleared her throat to practice.

“Mighty lord, I beseech you in Priuul’s hour of great need. Invaders have decimated our land, and of the royal family, only my mother, my sister, and I remain. My sister stands strong with our army in Cleea—no—” The Lord wouldn’t know their cities. “Our southern stronghold, and she—wait—stands strong in our stronghold?”

Triia kicked a wad of leaves. They landed with an unsatisfying flop. She always struggled with the Botlinder language.

“Stands steadfast in our southern stronghold—”

From ahead, Rolaa screeched.

“To me!” Triia said.

She spread her outcloak to its full size, and the three foxfellows piled in around her feet as Triia pulled herself inside like turtle. Her practiced hands moved to tie off the openings and shut out the danger and the light. In the dark, shallow breaths echoed around the outcloak’s sides. Triia pressed a hand to her mouth.

“Hello? Someone in there?” 

The man spoke Botlinder with accent Triia didn’t recognize. He rapped on the outcloak with a stick and laughed.

“Hello? We’d like to rob you.”

Triia dropped her hands to her knife hilts with relief. Roadside robbers weren’t much of a challenge to her, let alone the foxfellows. As if hearing her thoughts, Haau lead the group in chittering their teeth.

“Oh ho, you’ve got little foxies in there? Listen to them boys. Like little shaking sticks.”

The laughter sounded too loud and from too many directions. There had to be at least fifteen of them. Triia twisted her father’s ring.

“We know you’re in there. It’s a bit rude not to answer,” the same robber said. “And we don’t appreciate rudeness.”

THUNK.

The outcloak shook with the impact of the blow, but fine Pruuilian craftsmanship—even at its age—didn’t buckle. Triia settled onto her haunches and let out a long breath. She could wait them out.

THUNK.

THUNK.

Triia leaped to her feet. A sliver of light, the width of her knife’s edge, pierced the darkness. It must have been there before. Rolaa sniffed at the crack but stumbled back as the robbers hit the cloak again.

THUNK.

The crack widened into a crescent. The robbers had found the seam, but how?

THUNK.

The foxfellows pulled into a tight formation around Triia. Leein nipped at her ankle, demanding direction Triia didn’t know how to give. Her finger began to sting as she twisted the ring faster.

THUNK.

“Stop!” Triia cried.

“Yes?”

Triia attempted to keep her voice level as she spoke. “You must let me pass. I am on a dire mission of great—”

“Sure, sure, hand us your money and any sparkly things you have, and you can keep going on your ‘mission’”

The jewels on her father’s ring felt heavier than ever.

“I can pay you when I get to the Lord of the Botlinds,” Triia said.

“Great spirits! You’re seeing the Lord? With a hand-me-down outcloak? Have you seen his skyliner?”

His accent made the words sound biting, and the murmers of laughter made Triia feel worse. When she didn’t answer them, the blows continued.

THUNK.

Triia tried to regroup, but she couldn’t get past his mocking “great spirits”. Her eyes widened. He knew the Spirits. And the foxfellows. And then there was the cracking of the cloak.

“You’re Pruiilian,” Triia said in her native language.

The robbers paused, and she plowed forward.

“You must help me! My mother—the queen!—sent me on a diplomatic mission to the Lord of the Botlinds. It’s the only way to save our people.”

“How funny.” He spoke with Pruiilian words, the first Triia had heard in weeks. “We have our very own princess. Which one are you? The small one or the tough one?”

Triia reached to untie the outcloak’s front.

“Doesn’t matter I guess. You both have money.”

Triia’s hand fell. “I’m trying to help my—our—home. Please let me pass.”

“Our home is already gone, princess. This is all we have left.” 

“My sister still holds Cleea. It’s not lost yet.”

“Just a matter of time.”

The robber leaned close to the outcloak to peer in with a red and sunken eye. When he spoke, his wild beard scratched against the fabric.

“It’s time for you to give up too, princess. We won’t kill you. Just give us your valuables.” 

Impatience pulled out his accent further, and now, in Pruuilian, Triia recognized it.

“You’re from the northern provinces, aren’t you?”

The robber grunted, and his red eye rolled. “Look princess, I don’t have the time or the patience for an interrogation. Either give us your jewels, or we’ll take them.”

“You must have been the first attacked. That must have been hard.”

“Yes, and its still hard. Hence, the need for your money.”

Triia twisted her ring again and tried to think of anything she knew about the north, anything to keep him talking.

“Did you ever see my father there?”

The robber didn’t reply for a breath, and Triia braced for another attack.

“He stopped at our town on his way to the front.”

“How…how’d he look?”

“Tired,” the robber said. “Well, he brightened at our feast.”

“Feast? How did you get the food?”

“Your father pulled from his own supplies. I guess he noticed our burnt fields.”

Triia squeezed the ring and brought it to her lips. “Sounds like him.”

“The last I saw of him was his banner riding toward the fire.” The robber said.

“The banner was the last I saw too.” Triia said. “My mother said it was good fortune to not see his face in the leaving. The Spirits would give the look back later.”

But they didn’t. All they gave Triia were a bloody ring and an impossible task.

“My mother would say the same thing. Always covered her eyes when I’d walk out the door,” the robber said.

“Superstitious nonsense,” Triia muttered and immediately regretted it.

The robber only chuckled. “I thought that too, but they came through for me in the end.”

“What do you mean?”

“Before the raiders killed her, the Spirits gave me one last glimpse.”

“Oh. I didn’t… I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright,” the robber said. “It was a good glimpse. She was laughing.”

Triia didn’t know how to reply, but she didn’t have to. The robber’s eye had focused on something far beyond the outcloak and he continued.

“She tricked them.” Triia could hear the pride in the man’s voice. “She convinced them we’d gone weeks ago and left her behind. She really sold it. Yelling and cursing us. It was such a show, they didn’t realize we’d taken their horses until we started galloping. The look on those fools’ faces.”

He laughed softly, and Triia felt a small smile pull at her lips.

“What was her name?”

“Looana.”

“Looana. Looana. I’ll remember that,” Triia said. “What’s yours?”

“Bruuit.”

“I’m Triia, the small one.” Triia said. “Listen Bruuit. I know its a long shot, but I believe if I can convince the Lord, we can save Priuul. My sister is depending on me.”

“We can’t wait until Priuul is saved. We’re starving,” Bruuit said.

“You could get a good price for my knives. And even if its old and a little beat up, this outcloak is worth a good five goldones.” Triia paused, not wanting to give up her last comforts, but Hauu leaned into her leg as if to give her permission. “You can also have the foxfellows. They could hunt for you. It’s what they do best. I only ask to keep my father’s ring. I can’t enter the Botlinds Court without it.”

“How many foxes do you have?” Bruuit asked.

“Three.” Triia hoped it would be enough. It was all she had.

“I’ll take two,” Bruuit said. “Along with the knives and the outcloak.”

“And the ring?”

“What would a bunch of smelly bandits do with a pretty thing like that? You might as well keep it.”

“Thank you, Bruuit.”

The foxfellows parted around her as she released the clasps of the outcloak and stepped outside. At least thirty people shivered in ragged clothes before her, their gaunt faces made cavernous in the building shadows of dusk. Her people.

Triia tugged the knives off her belt and handed them to Bruuit. His mess of a beard almost covered his smile.

“Wonderful. Thank you, Triia.”

She nodded and knelt next to her foxfellows. They all stood at attention, even Leein.

“Would two of you be willing to stay here with them?” Triia asked.

Haau broke from the pack and nuzzled her hand before trotting over to Bruuit. Rolaa wound around Triia’s legs before bounding away. Triia looked into Leein’s dark eyes.

“Not you?” she whispered.

Leein’s ears twitched, but he settled onto her foot.

“How do you get them to listen to you?” Bruuit leaned away from the foxes as they approached.

Triia shrugged. “You ask.”

She motioned to Leein and turned to leave. The crowd darted away as she approached. None of them could meet her eyes.

“Princess Triia,” Bruuit said. “The Spirits have given you another look of him.”

Triia turned back, confused. “What?”

“Your father. I can see him in you.”

Triia smiled. “Thank you, Bruuit.” 

Far above, her destination loomed. The great skycity blotted out the moon as it rose to meet the stars. One of its banners caught a shaft of light and illuminated the Lord’s screeching falcon in shining gold thread. Its ruby eye glared a challenge down at the little princess and her lone fox. The princess clenched her ring tight and answered with a smile.

Picture acquired through Smithsonian Open Access: Bruce Crane, December Uplands, 1919, oil on canvas, 30 1/8 x 40 1/4 in. (76.5 x 102.3 cm.), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Bequest of Henry Ward Ranger through the National Academy of Design, 1947.11.3