By Ruth Asch
Word Count: 4556
Rating: PG (Discussion of euthanasia)
Summary: A fairy tale of freedom and life.
If you happen to pass along a country road in a land far away, at that time when the blue of a day is sucked up into the unknown, leaving sky beneath blanched and luminescent, you might see two odd figures sitting side by side upon a rough-hewn bench or log, gazing intently into air. One of them could be a knight sitting erect in fine-cut, gorgeous cloth and worn polished leather, the shield propped against his knee of blue and green, with a single brown bird, footless and in flight upon it, surmounted by a small gold crown. The other is an elderly man wearing homespun linen, peasant trousers, and clogs, but with an embroidered robe flowing loosely from his shoulders as he leans heavily upon a curiously carved wooden staff.
There was once a young Sorcerer of rustic origin who fell deeply in love with a farmer’s daughter and married her. She was graceful and strong, and as wise with the animals and birds they saw living around them in field and forest, as he was with the elementals most people could not see. They were both kindhearted, and though they loved peace and loved to study the natural and supernatural enough to make their home in the forest, the hamlet and farm folk for miles around knew that they could go to Cedric and Myrtle whenever things were bad with themselves or with their beasts – for healing, for counsel, and for comfort. On market day the couple would come into the village to buy supplies and make quiet cheer with friends, and one time they visited the great city Zonda, capital of the kingdom, to admire its wonders and celebrate the birth of a new heir to the throne: Prince Carl.
During their stay in Zonda, Myrtle conceived their first child, and nine months later, in their wooden, moss-thatched cottage, a daughter was born to them. She had her father’s fragile build, her mother’s abundant brown hair, and a smile that lifted the heart of anyone who saw it. Otherwise, her features were unremarkable, but her character was not. She possessed, they soon found, a vivacity and outgoing nature strange to both of them. They named her Sybil, but as she grew and took to racing the farm boys in the fields, dancing in the meadows, climbing the hills, and walking light-footed from one end of the valley to the other on errands, she was nicknamed ‘Little Swift’ and called so by everyone but her parents. From these, she learned the warmest sympathy for those in need, and as her energy and curiosity carried her regularly through the cottages, workshops, and barns of the valley, she was soon a favourite sight to the villagers, bringing herbs and childish stories, an open ear and her bright, sweet smile.
As Sybil grew in the freedom of the countryside, so did another child in a distant palace. The Queen died soon after her son’s birth. But Prince Carl had a learned and sympathetic father, a king concerned that his son should be aware of his people’s lives – of the hardships he need never share – as well as of the laws and customs of a great country. He sent the little boy off with tutors and guards at an early age to visit to the poorest areas of the realm and had him witness the suffering of people and animals, as well as enjoy the luxuries of the palace and instruction from the highest academics in the land. Prince Carl was handsome and loving, with a rare intensity and keen intellect – but shy and introspective. He struggled with approaching people he did not know, even while he took to heart all he saw and reacted to it, as to his own sensations, in an extreme manner. Some said this was royal blood speaking “like that princess who made such a fuss over a pea!” Other witnesses to his private agonies and tantrums questioned aristocratic inbreeding and his sanity. But much rehearsing and a determined will made him master of the Royal persona in all its dignity by the time he was a young man.
By that time also, Little Swift had grown to a young woman, and borne the sorrow of her mother’s death from painful illness. Through long days at her side, restless legs were tamed by the weight of love and sorrow, and Sybil learned to be still. Afterwards, there were days when, unencumbered by her clogs and letting her hair stream loose, she would run over rugged foothill, or through vineyard and field as though she were flying, but more often when she kept to the housekeeping with grim determination, or wandered the forest alone. She began to enter into her father’s faerie world, reading his books and watching his practice in silence. She no longer felt gregarious, and generally avoided the village. Yet sad experience had taught her how precious it was simply to be there, loving – whatever you could do, or not do – and so she went whenever called, to cheer the sick in the village of Baernog.
Prince Carl had come to enjoy the expected pursuits of hunting and riding more and more, as undefined longings and energies surged within him, competing with anxiety over kingly dilemmas-to-be, schemes for renewing the country’s tired institutions and unease over the luxury he lived in while others were so much to be pitied. He could not bear to spend time with such deprived people since his early experiences, but they haunted him. Outwardly he grew handsome, generous, and brave; developed high ideals of what a monarch, society, and life should be; hankered for his rule and a chance to set things right. Hidden, even from himself, was the doubt that he was kingly material; thoughts of failure pushed to the bottom of his soul: a sunken ocean of despair, like the one he always imagined beneath the serene surface of his fatherland.
One day Prince Carl was on an exploratory ride with a two of his men through the forest toward Baernog, when the sudden appearance of a great stag made his steed bolt. Carl regained control almost immediately, but the ground nearby was treacherous; the horse fell where it gave way beneath the slope of a small cliff, and at the shaking, rocks fell from above, thundering down upon both horse and rider.
It was the charging of a startled stag which drew Sybil’s attention toward the accident. Hearing a shout of pain and men’s raised voices, she rushed to the spot and found, crushed beneath several boulders, an elegantly clad stranger, pale and still, eyes closed, while his companions – evidently men at arms – were trying gingerly to heave the stones away.
“Wait!” she said. “Let me fetch help. The villagers will know best what to do. And they can carry him to my father, who will heal him.”
She sped off, and returned in a little while with a party of men whose strength and skill removed the stones…but though nothing was said, the faces of all expressed doubt as to the fate of the handsome stranger who lay unaware of his bloody injuries and mangled legs. Between them, they carried him upon their coats to Cedric’s cottage and left him there, the two men-at-arms galloping off to alert the King and to say that the prince could not be moved, but would be given the greatest care the region could afford.
Cedric set to work immediately, with Sybil’s help, tending the man’s wounds, and after they had done all they could, he asked her to run once more to the village and send a rider to the nearest town for a physician. While they waited, Carl woke once from his faint, evidently in great pain and confusion, even fear. Seeing this, as was her custom, Sybil took the sick man’s hand reassuringly. At her smile, a different light slowly entered his eyes, and he breathed more slowly and deeply before drifting again into unconsciousness. Though she hardly realised it at the time, his gaze had an unusual effect upon Sybil, too. Afterwards, she found herself strangely conscious of both herself and the young man she was caring for, and a new warmth seemed to radiate within her.
The doctor came, and his professional smile faded as he examined the injuries. Arrangements were made for him to board in the village and redouble the attention given to the prince, but he held little hope that the patient would walk again.
The following days, as the prince regained consciousness and strength, were bittersweet for Sybil. Her father and the doctor made up poultices and tonics, examined and massaged, but she was Carl’s regular nurse, and as her gentle touch and smile became familiar to him, the prince seemed to surrender in his waking moments to a relaxation and quiet happiness which showed his trust. He did not seem aware of how seriously hurt he was, nor to wish to enquire. Sybil found herself more and more happy to be there with him, to want him so much to stay… but the thought of how he would feel when he realised the truth was lodged inside her like a stone, heavy and sharp.
The enormity of the situation dawn on her when she discovered that Carl was not merely of the royal household, but his Royal Highness, and that her father would be held accountable for his cure before the King. She began to watch her father’s back with pleading concern in her eyes, and to slip from the room while he was asleep, to leaf through his books.
Soon there came a liveried messenger, requesting urgent tidings of the prince, and advising that two days hence a royal bodyguard would come with all that was necessary to return his Royal Highness back to the palace. It was only age and failing health that had prevented the King himself from coming; he wanted his son restored immediately.
At the sight and sound of the messenger, a change came over Carl. Suddenly he seemed to rouse himself with all his strength…and to realise where that was lacking still. He ordered the servant’s departure from his bed with an air of gracious aplomb, then raised himself to a seated position and questioned Cedric and the physician with a directness that could not be avoided. Once he had taken in the news – through silent expression as much as brute word – that his legs were paralyzed, the prince fell into a mood so black that all were fearful of his unuttered, palpable rage, and of the depression that followed.
When the agonizing evening came to a close, and the unsleeping, unmoving prince closed his eyes, Sybil drew her father aside into his study.
“Father. Can you think of no way to cure him, given time? Is there really no hope?”
“None that we know of.”
“But we can still save him. There is a way. You can use your magic!”
Cedric looked fondly at his daughter. “No, dear. Sorcery rarely works miracles. And my power is not so great. The spirits who help me can work only upon those with great belief. I am afraid I can do nothing for the prince.”
“But you can do something for me?”
Cedric brightened. “Anything, my dear.”
Sybil paused, took a deep breath, raised her head and looked into her father’s eyes. “Give the strength of my legs to Prince Carl.”
Cedric gasped and turned a little pale as he answered, “That is impossible! And I would not do it, if it could be done.”
“Father, you must. You can. And you have promised me anything. I want this. I have found the spell. I know it is possible, and it would work because I believe with all my heart. I love the prince, Father. And I believe that I am meant to save him. Will you do this for me?”
“No!”
“Father, if you do not, and the prince remains like this…can he rule? He is so sad, as if he had lost everything. And the king will hold you responsible for failing his son, and the kingdom. He will order your execution, Father, or lock you away. Then where shall I be? I can live with weak legs, Father, but I cannot live without all the love I have in the world.”
Cedric held out his arms to Sybil and wrapped her in a tight embrace, thinking, thinking… When he released her, his eyes shone and his voice was tight. “We’ll talk again, Sybil – tomorrow night. Think, my dear. No running, no dancing, no roaming for my Little Swift? You are a good girl. But is it wise to give up your freedom? Make your decision tomorrow. You will have seen sense, by then.”
Next morning, the prince was unmoving – unresponsive even to Sybil – as though he had sunk back into the coma after his fall, with his eyes open. She tried to go about things as normal, cheerful, and reassuring, but could not manage it for long.
“Your Royal Highness? Prince Carl…? Listen… We will heal you. Trust me. Please.” She took his hand nervously.
The prince seemed to slowly come back into his own empty eyes. “Sybil. You…you have been good to me. I – your smile gave me the will to live when I was injured, and I have been in a dream of happiness, despite my pain, here with you. But if I have no strength in my legs, what kind of man can I be? For you, for my father, or for the kingdom? Now, all I can hope for is to die.”
He looked briefly into her eyes, raised her hand to his lips, and resolutely returned to his lethargy.
When evening came, Sybil was determined and began preparations before her father came.
“It will not be easy for either of us, Father. But it is the best thing we can do. We can save our future King, and save our life here. We must do it tonight, once the prince is asleep; the people from the palace come tomorrow. There is only one condition I ask: the prince must not see me once it has been done, and you must not tell him what has happened. All he needs to know is that he is strong again.”
After many hours, Carl closed his eyes in a deep sleep. Sybil spread cushions and an embroidered cloth upon the ground next to his low bed, and lay down beside him. By the dim illumination of one candle, Cedric slowly began to read the long incantations in low tones, passing his shaking hands in the air over the legs of his daughter and the prince. From time to time he looked up, seeking the help of the spirits, or draining back tears. His daughter’s eyes were closed, her face pale, but her expression was of resolution and peace.
In the morning, they were wakened by a great shout. It was almost a roar – of joy. The prince stood up in the middle of the room, astonished, stretching and full of life. He spun around the room and nearly lifted the little sorcerer off his feet when he came in.
“Sybil! Sybil!” he called.
“Your Royal Highness,” said Cedric soberly, with a tired smile on his face. “Sybil does not wish to be disturbed. We must prepare you to leave. The palace retinue will be here soon.”
And so they were. Prince Carl was escorted in state from the cottage to resume his royal life. No one but Cedric understood the longing, perplexed gaze he directed at its shutters before he turned and rode away.
Life did not so much resume, as remodel itself, painstakingly, for those he left. Sybil had decided that she could not show regret now; she must assuage rather than add to Cedric’s sorrow and guilt, for she was glad to have given Carl his life back, and could never wish his return. But it was hard, very hard.
Practically speaking, Cedric had to involve himself much more in caring for the house, himself, and of course, his daughter. It was good for him, and she continued to do as much as possible. Sybil was ashamed of some of what her disability entailed, but glad she had spared Carl.
Soon after his departure, the gift of a beautifully carved wooden staff from the royal treasury had been sent to Cedric, and for Sybil, some lovely material and embroidery threads. She could see no point in making a dress for herself, but passed the time sewing and embroidering it as a robe for her father – more fitting for his magic than the homespun he usually wore. For many weeks she stayed in the cottage, not from shame but because the sight of the hills and paths she used to run along woke such frustrated longing, but as the months went by she found a new calm, and would sit outside most of the day, working, reading, watching the birds. The carpenter and blacksmith between them made her a chair with wheels on it, to give her movement once more. The villagers who began to visit her found the same willing ear and a new thoughtfulness. They did not see the bitter storms of tears which came over her sometimes behind the closed bedroom door, hear the knifelike words with which she could not help but threaten her father when the agony of legs cut off from life became too much, or see how dark and deep was the hole in the middle of her heart. But they might have guessed at the strength of the bond of loving support between father and daughter in the lively and tender glances between them.
Not long after Carl’s return, his father died and he became King. A popular figure, yet he felt he must prove himself and so plunged into reform of many kinds. Still the philosopher, yet impulsive and a little neurotic, much thought and feeling went into these motions, but little practical experience, for he was impatient with advice from any but an idealistic tutor and a handful of cunning but renowned statesmen. Deeply affected by his near-loss of limb, and more energetic than ever, King Carl decided he must do something for the crippled. Such horror was in him of the helpless state he had briefly experienced, he would have such people sought out and brought to a mansion near the palace. Once there, the best doctors would look at them, prescribe…or in the case of the incurable and wretched, perhaps it would be best (remembering his own despair) to put them out of their misery. His counselors approved (a land where there were no cripples – what progress!) and put it into effect.
The people, unaware at first of the final end of “hopeless cases”, gladly sent their lame and paralyzed to the special hospital. Only when many of them peacefully passed away there, and some of their families began to grieve for their lost loved ones, did rumours begin to spread.
Once he had acted like a King, and life became a busy routine, Carl began to feel once more a man…and that something was missing. His courtiers urged alliance with an influential country by marriage; the procural of an heir to the throne was a priority. But Carl could not forget the girl he had met in a cottage, who had refused to say “goodbye”. He could reform in that department as any other, so he sent out a secret delegation with a message for Sybil, to enquire whether or not she would be disposed to accept His Majesty, should he propose?
Meanwhile, the Invalid Escort was also approaching the region of Baernog. Villagers had heard the rumours, and Cedric wanted to ask someone to take an urgent message with the true story of what had happened – or at least word of Sybil’s condition – to the King, begging him to order her left in peace. But she would not hear of it. To be pitied, or hated and feared, by the man she had loved was too painful. But how could she escape his judgement? The officials knew of a disabled person living thereabouts since the survey of the people, taken at the start of Carl’s reign. She neither could, nor did she wish to lie, flee, and live in hiding.
Once more their happiness was immediately threatened. Remembering the first time, Sybil’s thoughts turned to magic, her plea to the spirits, and her father.
“What can you do? Father, there must be something…?”
A sob tried to break through Cedric’s words. “You know there is no way to heal you… and no safety in flight.”
He buried his face in his hands. Sybil noticed how wrinkled they were now. She stared at the large freckle on the back of one of them – somehow comforting; she remembered looking at it, seated on his lap, when he read her myths and legends as a child. No safety in flight. No safety in flight. It went round her tired mind like an echo.
Echo. Flight. Echo… flight… Myth… transformation. The answer!!!
“Father! We cannot heal me. But we can transform me. Just like the gods in the stories transformed those they wished to save. Make me a bird, Father! Or a tree, if you will. Keep me with you; even in the form of an animal or plant, it would be better than a home for invalids, or an early death leaving you alone.”
He was reluctant, but as word came that the Invalid Escort approached, he considered it seriously…until a thought struck him and he shook his head. “It is impossible. Transformation can only work in perfectly healthy subjects. Your legs will not respond to the spell.”
“Father; I am sure something is possible. We must try. Please. Be brave. There is no time to lose.”
This time there was no ceremony, no template. All depended upon the sorcerer’s instinct, invention, the spirit’s help, and Sybil’s desire to break free.
Only one thing seemed fitting. And moments before the Invalid Escort turned down the lane, there was no more young woman sitting in a chair, but hovering and darting about the cottage a little brown bird, with a white chest where the woman’s blouse might be. It had a prettily forked tail, but when Cedric looked carefully, he saw that there were no legs or feet at all. It did not seem to matter – on slim, strong, tapered wings it wheeled and spun with the energy and delight he remembered so well….out of the window, and away.
The private delegation from Carl III arrived not long after the Invalid Escort had left, a little puzzled. When Cedric told them that there was no lady named Sybil living there, and never would be, they repaired to the village to deliberate. The King would be angry if they returned without having seen her. Could they have mistaken such a particular address? Over glasses of ale, they asked the hamlet folk if they knew where Sybil lived; they had a special message from the King to deliver. Some mumbled suspiciously, others, sure that the man she had helped to heal could have only the best motives, were happy to oblige and volunteered to lead the way. En route, they spoke enthusiastically of how charming and energetic a scrap of a girl she had been, how kind a young woman she had become, the mysterious tragedy which had deprived her of the use of her legs just around the time of the prince’s accident, her strength of character in bearing up afterwards, and goodness to all who visited.
Carl could not rest after he had sent the delegation. What if she somehow misunderstood? Or was married already and people laughed at him? What if…he went himself, in person? Yes, that was the way it should be done. He would go alone, incognito, so as not to attract attention. If he rode fast, cross-country, he might arrive at the same time as the party he had sent….
He arrived just as the delegation returned to the cottage, and Cedric realised by the excited comments and gestures of the locals that he could no longer deny them an explanation, though he wondered if they would believe it. But on sight of the King, the others retired to wait in a nearby glade. Cedric invited His Majesty inside…and haltingly told their story.
Carl could not tell whether the turmoil within was more disbelief and outrage, or shock, sorrow…and loss. He stood speechless as Cedric stumbled to the window and leaned out, upon which a little bird swooped in, brushing past Carl’s cheek and shoulder, and whirled around him and the old man before once more disappearing. The locals had edged near again and called out eagerly, begging the King not to let anyone take their beloved Little Swift, asking how His Majesty’s legs were, and if he were going to marry her and have her cured. Convinced at last, the King sent them all away to the village with his men, and asked to stay one night, for old times’ sake, with the sorcerer.
Neither entirely succeeded in containing his emotions during the long talk which followed. The crisis seemed to ebb with daylight, and they went to sit on an old bench down the track in the pallid dusk, watching the birds ’till the blue above was shadowed and revealed its hidden stars.
Carl III returned to the Palace with an immediate mandate to permanently halt the sending-to-sleep of disabled inmates, but continue the hospital’s medicinal work. He changed his coat of arms to a footless brown bird and the royal crown against sky blue and forest green. His best knights were favoured with the right to bear a heraldic swift (in later times named a martlet) – always footless: the emblem of self-sacrificing love and dauntless freedom. Wedding plans were dismissed, and though the King continued his duties, often now he would absent himself for a day in the country to visit Cedric and watch birds.
The bird that was Sybil, once the story was out, continued to be known by all as “Little Swift”, Swift for short – a name more appropriate than ever. It seems she eventually found a soulmate, for soon there were more birds of her kind where there had been none. They had tiny legs, but rarely used them, relishing speed of movement, delighting endlessly in life on the wing.
What became of King Carl III in the end remains a mystery; he disappeared years later and a great-nephew took his place. It was said that he finally went mad, wandered into the forest, and never returned. Some rumoured that he, too, was transformed by the sorcerer Cedric. Others claim that cannot be so, for they were both seen from time to time years later, sitting on a bench in the forest, watching birds in flight.