Miranda and Caliban by Jacqueline Carey
To all my fellow lovers of the Bard, forgive me my trespass.
ONE
MIRANDA
I awake to the sound of Papa chanting in the outer courtyard. It is a morning like any other morning. I lay abed watching a bar of sunlight creep across the dusty tiles of the floor.
Papa forbids me to interrupt him at his art. When I was little, sometimes I would take fright upon waking alone and forget; and then he would have to punish me, which grieved him. But now I am six years of age and old enough to know better, for I mislike nothing more than to grieve him.
Beneath the deep, distant tones of Papa chanting the music of the spheres, I hear a faint pattering sound close by and roll over on my pallet to see a little green lizard creeping down the wall. It stops and stares at me. Its eyes are like shiny black beads and its throat pulses. I hold my breath and count, one, two, three, before I reach out with one finger to stroke it.
The lizard skitters away. Disappointed, I trace the flowing lines carved into the wall instead.
Papa says the lines are Moorish writing, which is different from the Latin writing he teaches me. He says that Moors built this palace, but they went away and left it behind when their magic grew weak, too weak to summon the spirits of the island to do their bidding.
I think it was a long time ago, for the palace is old and crumbling now. Still, it is my home; and Papa’s magic is strong. The air shivers and chimes as he calls upon the spheres.
There is a calm note in his voice this morning, not a stern one; and I am glad to hear it, for mayhap it means the studies he conducts late into the hours of the night in his private sanctum went well, and he will be pleased to see me and attend to my studies today. Mayhap he will even pet my hair and praise me.
When the last note of Papa’s voice fades, I throw back my bed-linens and rise. The dusty tiles are smooth and pebbled beneath my bare feet. I had shoes, once; cunning little kidskin slippers embroidered with seed pearls. I have them still, tucked away in a chest, but they’ve been far too small for ever so long.
I don’t mind. Even in the winter it is not so very cold that I cannot bear it, and I think I should hate to wear shoes, now. Indeed, on warm days I should like to shed my clothing and run as free and naked as the wild boy, but Papa says we must be civilized or all is lost; and so I wear an old nightshirt of his to sleep and cast-off robes cut down to size by day.
Thinking of the wild boy, I go to the window and look into the walled garden. I’ve caught a glimpse of him lurking more than once, crouching like a toad in one of the wall’s many gaps.
Not today, though.
I make use of the privy in the garderobe. When I have finished and emerge, a lumpish spirit scuttles past me; one of the household spirits Papa has bound to our service, an earth elemental smelling of freshly turned soil.
“Hello!” I call after it. “Good morrow!”
The earth elemental shows its stony teeth in a deferential smile, but it doesn’t answer. They never do. It empties the chamber-pot beneath the privy cupboard into a pail and scuttles away.
I sigh, don my robe, and make my way through the empty halls of the palace to the garden outside the kitchen.
Mayhap it is mean-spirited of me to feel lonely. After all, I do have Oriana for company, as well as Beatrice, Bianca, Carmela, Elisabetta, and Nunzia. And I suppose I must count Claudio, although I like him no better than he likes me. He makes muttering sounds deep in his chest, cocking his head and eyeing me with suspicion as I examine the nests one by one. He is a handsome fellow to be sure, black with a fine speckling of white and a proud red comb, but I have reason to be wary of his sharp beak and spurs. I find an egg. Claudio scratches in the dust and mutters.
Bianca is my favorite. She is all white and she does not peck at all, only clucks softly in protest as I inch my hand beneath her and find a second egg. On the east side of the garden, Oriana strains against her tether and lets out a mournful bleat.
“I shall return anon to milk you,” I promise her, carrying my prizes carefully into the kitchen. It is only since the spring that Papa trusts me to gather the eggs, and it grieves him when I am careless with them.
Papa is already seated at the kitchen table when I enter, his head bent over a slate tablet on which he scrawls with a piece of chalky ochre. I wait for him to notice me, and curtsy when he does.
“Good morrow, lass,” he says in greeting. “What does the day’s bounty bring us?” I show him the eggs and his brow furrows. “Only two? Methinks someone may be ripe for the pot.”
My heart quickens with alarm. I am not ready to lose one of my only friends. “Not yet, surely! ’Tis the heat renders them sluggish.”
Papa considers me for a minute. His eyes are grey and piercing, and I feel their gaze like a weight upon me. At length he relents with a nod. “Very well. But you must begin keeping a tally of who is laying.”
I curtsy again. “Thank you, Papa.”
When I place the eggs in a bowl on the shelf, I see something unexpected; a chunk of honeycomb lying on a large green leaf. There is a bit of dirt in it as well as a squashed bee and several long black hairs, but, oh! My mouth waters at the prospect of sweetness and I reach for it unbidden, thinking to dip just the tip of one finger in the amber liquid oozing from the comb.
“Do not touch it!” Papa’s voice is stern and I feel a painful prick on my extended fingertip like the sting of a nettle. I snatch my hand back, tears coming to my eyes, and curse my impatient greed. “What do you see?”