Miranda and Caliban(82)

It is a dazzling picture that Papa sketches for me, and I should like to say I care naught for any of it, but it would be a lie. “Should I be allowed to continue painting?” I hear myself ask.

“You shall have pigments of the finest quality.” Papa sounds weary. “And the doting prince shall indulge your every foible.”

“Why could you not—”

Tell me, I mean to ask; but Papa divines the familiar plaint and interrupts me ere I can give voice to it. “I’d no wish to raise your hopes if it were in vain, Miranda,” he says to me. “To bring the events of this day to pass, to influence matters from afar so that the king’s vessel did pass near enough to the isle … it has been the undertaking of a lifetime.”

“I know, Papa,” I murmur.

He studies me. “Tell me, would you have been content on the isle these long years had I dangled the possibility of such a prize before you?”

I meet his gaze squarely. “As to that, we shall never know, shall we? No more than I’ll ever know if the prince might have come to love me for myself.”

Papa lifts one hand from the table and turns it palm upward as though to cede me the point. “Forgive me, child,” he says in a quiet voice. “There was too much at stake, and I dared leave nothing to chance.” His wrinkled eyes flicker. “Does that mean you intend to abide by my will in this matter with good grace, child?”

Although I am grateful for the semblance of an apology, I do not fail to note Papa’s phrasing; one way or another, I will abide by his will. Whether or not to do it with grace is my choice. “What of Caliban?” I ask him. “What is to become of him?”

“Caliban?” Papa looks blankly at me. “I suppose some menial position might be found for him.” He pauses to reconsider, stroking his beard in thought. “Although I might make better use of our wild lad. As a savage who learned speech, he would serve as the subject for many an interesting discourse.”

Oh, Caliban! My heart aches at the prospect; but then here is Ariel, returned from his latest errand.

“Master!” the spirit announces, eyes sparkling like the sunlit sea. With every hour that passes, every piece of Papa’s plan that falls into place, his freedom grows closer in reach. “The king and his retinue draw nigh!”

“Well done, gentle spirit!” Papa praises him. “Lead them to the innermost courtyard of the palace, bypassing our presence here, and there address them as I bade you.”

Ariel bows. “In a trice!”

Papa turns to me. “I’ve pressing business at hand. Do I have your word that you’ll make yourself pleasant and helpful to the young prince, or need I threaten punishment for the lack of courtesy?”

I have no cause to begrudge the prince my courtesy. “No, Papa. I will be as pleasant as I may.”

“If all goes well, I shall send for both of you.” Papa glances out into the kitchen garden where Prince Ferdinand is industriously skinning the sacrificial he-goat. He frowns to himself, and summons a pair of gnomes who come trotting obediently in answer. “They will tend to the spit, for it is metal and of their element,” he says. “See to it that the prince is rendered presentable after his labors.”

I incline my head. “Yes, Papa.”

“I pray there’s firewood to suffice,” he says fretfully, and glances around again. “Where is that villain Caliban?”

I would that I knew. “I know not, Papa.”

In another part of the palace, there are indistinct voices; men’s deep voices, and then Ariel’s voice.

“I must go,” Papa says.

I venture into the kitchen garden to make myself pleasant. The silent gnomes trot after me, carrying the great spit from the hearth between them.

The goat’s carcass lies on the dusty ground, headless and skinned. Kneeling on one knee, the prince slits its belly and removes the glistening offal, piling it neatly on the raw hide.

His hair has dried; it is brown with threads of bronze that glint in the sun. It looks soft to the touch.

“Such rude labor is no more fit for your delicate gaze than it is for a prince’s stature, my lady!” he exclaims when he sees me; then he catches sight of the pair of gnomes and stares. “What new wonder is this?”

“Only simple earth elementals bound to Papa’s service,” I say. “They will tend to the goat’s cooking.”

“Such marvelous creatures!” he says as the gnomes set about spitting the goat.

“Are there no spirits to assist with the chores of the household from whence you come?” I ask.

Prince Ferdinand laughs. “No, to be sure! But you will find willing mortal hands a-plenty, my lady.” I draw a bucket of water from the well to sluice the dust from the goat’s flesh, and he takes it from me with alacrity. “Your father set me this task, my lady! You must allow me to complete it. Only…” He pauses. “Might I beseech the boon of your name as my reward?”

My name.

It seems to me there is a power in names. It was the gift of my name that allowed Caliban to remember his own, the first step on the road to regaining human speech. When I first awoke from my affliction, uncomprehending and terror-stricken, Caliban returned the gift to me, and thus began the long road of restoring me to myself.

If Caliban had not surrendered the name of Setebos to Papa, Ariel would still be howling in his pine tree.