Travellers in Magic by Lisa Goldstein Read Free Book Online Page B

know—I only know one of them, the—the leader, I guess. He asked me to deliver the note.”
    â€œAnd what’s he like?”
    â€œOh, he’s very handsome, my lady,” Alison said. “He’s I don’t know—very persuasive. A personality like sparks flying. You should meet him, my lady.”
    The princess said back, satisfied. It was clear now. A young woman in love with a handsome young man who persuades her to deliver a note. Perhaps there was no revolution at all, perhaps there was just this young man. There was no threat to the palace, she could be sure of that. She had done her duty. She could let the harpist go.
    And yet—and yet there was something else, something that intrigued her. “How old are you, Alison?”
    â€œNineteen, my lady.”
    â€œNineteen,” the princess said. “How long have you been playing the harp?”
    â€œOh, all my life, lady,” Alison said, laughing. “I got my first harp as a child, for my sixth birthday.”
    â€œBut to play for the king—young women generally don’t—”
    â€œI’ve been playing for my supper since I was ten, my lady,” Alison said.
    â€œYes?” the princess said, hoping the girl would go on, unable to ask more questions.
    â€œI’m from the north, my lady,” Alison said. She spoke flatly now, without emotion. “My house was burned by the king’s armies when I was ten years old. I’m an orphan, my lady.”
    â€œSo—so am I!” the princess said, delighted to have something in common with her.
    â€œI know, my lady,” Alison said.
    The princess stopped. Of course Alison knew. No doubt the whole country knew. No doubt Alison had even sung songs about the orphan who had married a prince. When would she stop being so stupid?
    And Alison—things had not gone as well for her. She was very plain, flat face, flat nose, her green northern eyes too wide and too far apart. Not even the revolutionary would be interested in her. “And then?” the princess said. “What happened then?”
    â€œI dressed as a boy and made my way here,” Alison said. “To the capital.”
    â€œA boy?” the princess said.
    â€œOh, yes,” Alison said. “I’ve done it—I’ve had to do it—many times since then, to travel. A boy or a man. It’s not very difficult.”
    â€œListen,” the princess said suddenly, impulsively. “Could you—I mean, would you like to give me harp lessons? That’s something a lady should know, isn’t it? How to play the harp?”
    Alison smiled for the first time. “Yes, my lady,” she said. “I would love to.”
    Somehow the harp lessons were fit into the princess’s schedule. The prince made no objection. Alison told her about her life, about the time she had sailed on a merchant ship because she had no money, the time she had played in an alehouse and spotted in the audience the man who had burned her house, the time she had lived in the woods and hunted to stay alive. Gradually the lessons on the harp stopped and the two women would talk instead. Alison learned to stop calling her “my lady.”
    And gradually the princess began to tell Alison about herself. The prince’s eyesight was failing, like the king’s, and he was coming back from the hunt in worse and worse temper. She felt, she told Alison, as if she should know what to do, as if there were some court pleasure that would keep him occupied but she had never learned what it was. She could not confide in any of the ladies-in-waiting. When the prince was away she would remember how he had loved her, remember the look in his eyes when he had found her after all his searching, and she would try not to cry.
    Alison continued to see the revolutionary and to tell the princess a little about his plans. The princess felt as if she should be telling the prince what she