Scene 6
The fairy palace, rising amid the trees of the Forest of Arden. Queen Ariel, in her room, sits at her vanity, before her silver brushes, her unguent bottles, attended by her maids, who comb her hair and lay out her nightclothes.
Sitting in front of her crystal mirror, Ariel, Queen of Fairyland, King Quicksilver’s wife, found herself more restless and more fearful than ever before.
So many times she’d sat at this table, late at night. So many times had her maids, Peaseblossom and Cobweb and Cowslip, tended to her needs. And how often had Quicksilver, himself, been standing behind her, watching her nightly preparations with a smile.
But this night Quicksilver wasn’t there. This night, Quicksilver had left, to face some threat, some evil on the boundary of elven Avalon—a threat that bid to be more monstrous than anything Fairyland had ever faced. And Ariel must wait here, in the false safety of the palace.
Oh, she knew she had upset Quicksilver with her offer of help. But why could her lord not understand that Ariel would rather be there, beside him or instead of him, facing whatever danger threatened to swallow the land, than here, in the palace, slowly driven mad by waiting anguish.
Oh, the traditional lot of females, human and elf alike, was much crueler than that of males. Females must wait and seem to smile while out on the field of battle their loves might be breathing their last.
Ariel could not endure it. With a gesture—raised hands, exasperated expression—she bid Peaseblossom stop running the soft brush down Ariel’s pale blond hair. “Stop, Peaseblossom. Stop. I cannot endure touch. Only tell me if there’s word . . . any word of my lord?”
Peaseblossom shook her head. She was one of Ariel’s prettiest maids and today looked tired and out of humor. But she’d looked thus before the boundary breech had been announced. What hailed was the absence of her human lover, a Stratford weaver named Nick Bottom, who’d gone to London on guild business.
Ariel wondered if the silly thing even knew that the whole hill was threatened and that Ariel’s lord and king might be dead at this moment.
And yet, he couldn’t be dead, could he, truly?
For Ariel, besides being queen, was the seeress and prophet of Fairyland, her powers acquired through having been born at summer solstice, the blessed night for her kind.
If Quicksilver were dead, surely she would have felt it.
And yet she couldn’t be sure of it, and yet she sighed, and yet she frowned at her maids and wondered what could be delaying her lord and why her lord tarried so.
A knock sounded upon the door, a sharp knock, almost martial.
Quicksilver.
“Peaseblossom,” Ariel said, gesturing toward the door.
But the door, opening, revealed no more than the long face, the dark hair of Malachite, his features pinched into worry such as Ariel had never seen.
Ariel rose hastily, breathlessly, her heart at her mouth, her fear in her face, not knowing what she feared until she should hear it, refusing to fear that her lord was dead, for fear the confirmation of it should slay her.
Would she not know Quicksilver was dead? Would she not? Was she not queen and the seer of Fairyland, and were their hearts not united?
“Milord Malachite,” she said, hurrying toward him in a flying flurry of her nightgown’s lace. “Milord Malachite? What of my lord and husband that you come here, thus, without him?”
Malachite, pale of cheek, wide of eye, showing fear on his face and smelling of smoke and death, shook his head.
“Milord—” Malachite shook his head and looked at his feet. “Milord bid me to tell you guard his kingdom and look after his subjects as he would himself, and in all obey his will, as though were you him, milady.”
Oh, was Quicksilver dead? Why else would Quicksilver bid her to watch over his subjects as though she were himself?
Hand to her chest, as if seeking to still her heart from beating through the slight ribs and the skin that covered them, Ariel gasped. “What happened to my lord? Oh, tell me and be done with it. Is he then dead?”
Malachite shook his head. “No, milady. No.” His denial had no joy. “The breach of the wards was an illusion, an effect of . . .” He visibly hesitated. “Of an ancient curse. That is all solved.” His eyes, dark with worry and small with sadness, would not meet her gaze. “Only . . . only . . . only some urgent business calls my lord to London and he might be some days upon returning. He begged me to tell you from him that you should watch for his return and meanwhile guard his kingdom with your heart and govern it with your own solid mind.”
Ariel breathed fast as she stood staring at Malachite, torn between relief and doubt. She could not believe the breach had been of so little account, after such an alarm. And why would Quicksilver so hasten to London? What had he to do in London?
What could be the truth? Was Malachite lying to hide Quicksilver’s death?
No, that could not be. Quicksilver could not be dead, or else would Ariel have felt it. As King of Fairyland, Quicksilver held in his own the power and the souls of all his subjects.
Quicksilver’s death would have thrown all that power and might on Ariel, the Queen of Fairyland, and she would have felt it, felt it through and through, the loss of her lord, as strongly as the loss of her own life.
No, Quicksilver wasn’t dead. But then Malachite must speak truthfully and Quicksilver must have gone to London. Why to London? Why would the King of Fairyland go to that land of dirt and iron and massed humanity?
She wished Malachite would give her an explanation of this sudden departure.
The cold upon her chest, the horror trembling through her limbs, all of it bespoke what she feared, perhaps more than death.
Her attempt at protecting Quicksilver had offended him. It had been too much. Humiliated, fearing that she loved him not enough, Quicksilver had returned to a former love—that human whom the Lady Silver had loved so dearly, that William Shakespeare, who had taken himself to London six months ago.
Ariel had loved Quicksilver ever since she could remember, since they’d been toddlers together in the vast palace hall.
For Ariel, Quicksilver’s love was more important than life, or hill, or indeed the whole world entire and filled with all wonder. For without his love, neither life nor hill nor world could exist for Ariel.
Was his love for her threatened? Had he left for London just because he resented her offering to help with defending the boundaries?
Was his love for her so frail? A firefly in a summer evening, the inconsequential dust of Fairyland?
Ariel shook her head. She felt tears heavy beneath her eyelids, like threatening grey clouds hanging over a fair day. “Thank you, Malachite. No. I need no more. Thou hast comforted me marvelous much.”
She returned to her vanity and to her mirror, and contemplated her features in the mirror. An unexceptional face, oval and pale.
Did her lord still love her? Would he ever come back?
And if not, what would become of the hill without him?
What of poor Ariel, without his love?
She’d be a shadow, no more. A captive spirit doing his bidding and devoid of all self-worth.