Miranda and Caliban(3)

It seems it has always been thus, though I know this is untrue. Save for the terrifying spirit that remains trapped in the great pine tree in the front courtyard, there were no spirits in attendance before Papa summoned them, and the palace grounds were desolate. It must have been a difficult time, I think, although I was too young to remember it well, and Papa shielded me from the worst of it.

There was a time before the island, too.

I think so, anyway. Papa does not speak of it and I do not ask because it grieves him. Sometimes I think it is a thing I have dreamed; but if it were not true how would I know to dream of such things? There was a great house with walls of stone, not carved plaster, and pictures that hung upon the walls. There were ladies with kind eyes and gentle hands who brushed my hair and tied it back with ribbons; ladies who helped me dress, who slipped my kidskin slippers onto my feet. Ladies who sang me lullabies, smoothed my bed-linens, and bade me to sleep with a soft kiss on my cheek or brow.

Yet if it were true, how did Papa and I come to live alone upon this isle?

Yet if it were not true, from whence came the kidskin slippers I keep tucked away in a chest?

Thinking on it makes me feel strange to myself. Papa is so wise. If he does not wish to talk about it, likely it is best I do not think on it.

I will think about the wild boy instead.

When the midday heat begins to abate, I climb the winding steps of the watchtower. It is a good place for thinking. From atop the tower, I can see far: the whole western side of the island from the rocky path leading down the hill on which our palace perches to the sprawl of land below, dotted with palms. Beyond it lies the sea, and what lies beyond the sea, I cannot say. The sea is ever in motion, crashing and churning. It frightens me, although I do not know why. I dream of it sometimes.

Today it is calm and shining, and the ripples break gently on the rocks. When the tide goes out, the sea leaves pools behind. I think I should not be scared to splash in those pools. From this mighty vantage, I have seen the wild boy do so before, a tiny hunched figure clambering over distant rocks.

I look for him there, but I do not see him. It seems I will catch no glimpse of him today.

Soon that will change. I cannot help but be hopeful at the prospect. Surely there is goodness in his nature to leave us gifts as he does. I think he must be lonely, terribly lonely.

Like me.

“I will be your friend,” I say out loud, wishing the wild boy could hear me. “Only come and stay, and I will love you. I promise.”





TWO

It is a good many days before Papa is prepared to summon the wild boy. He chides me for impatience when I can bear it no longer and ask him when he means to do so.

“Are you a magus to chart the heavens?” he asks me. There is a cutting edge to his voice that warns me I have overstepped my bounds, and something inside me shrinks at the sound of it. “Can you tell me when the stars will be favorable for this endeavor?” I shake my head no and Papa waves one hand in dismissal. “Then importune me no more.”

I swallow my impatience and hold my tongue.

Of course there is a great deal more to Papa’s art than the simple notion of like drawing like on which it is founded. I know this although I understand but the merest portion of it.

I know that God in His heaven is the highest of highs, and there are nine orders of angels that sing His praises. Between earth and heaven are the celestial spheres, and the planets whose emanations influence all that happens here on earth.

There are seven planets, which are called the seven governors, and they are the sun and the moon, of course, and Venus and Mercury and Mars and Saturn and Jupiter; and each of them have secret names, too. Those are the names Papa chants every morning at sunrise to draw down their influence.

I know that the planets follow a wandering path within their spheres and the fixed stars move with the turning of their spheres, and that some conjunctions are good and some are bad. Also there are things in nature which attract the planets as like draws to like, and that the good Lord God has placed everything in nature for man’s disposal.

And that is what I know.

Oh, and there are stories written in the gathering of the stars. When Papa is in a rare good humor, he tells them to me.

I think waiting would be easier if Papa would only tell me how long until the conjunction of the planets will be favorable for summoning the wild boy, but mayhap it is a more difficult tally to reckon than how many eggs a hen has laid in a week. Although that is not always easy either. Unless they are broody, hens do not always stay on their nests.

Alas, when Papa tells me at last that he means to summon the wild boy on the morrow, he tells me that one of the hens must be sacrificed in the attempt; a white hen to attract the moon’s influence.

There is only one pure white hen and that is my Bianca.

I cannot contain my tears, but Papa is gentle at first. “You’ve kept your tally well, child, but ’tis time a new brood were hatched and ’twere best done while summer’s warmth lingers,” he says kindly. “Think on it. In a month’s time, you’ll have chicks to console you.”

That may be, but a chick is not the same as my sweet Bianca. “Would not one of the others serve?” I plead. “Bianca is yet a better layer than Nunzia.” Papa’s expression changes. I look down to avoid his gaze. “Forgive me, Papa. It is only that she is my favorite.”

“I cannot change the laws that govern the planets and their correspondences, Miranda,” he says. “And I should hope that your devotion to your father casts a longer shadow than your fondness for a mere hen.”