I knew that if I was to look into those purple eyes, I would not be able to leave her.
In my days of wandering the world as a white bear, I observed much about the ways of men and women—and I knew that for me to start a life on unequal footing with Rose was to court disaster.
I must at least know my name.
Fransk was where I would begin my search. The one thing I knew about myself was that I had been a prince. The pale queen had told me one day when I said to her that I felt inadequate to rule the land of Huldre. "But you have royal blood," she said. "You were a prince in the green lands."
A prince in Fransk. More than a hundred years ago.
But I thought I'd be able to find someone in Fransk who knew of a long-ago king with a son who had "died" prematurely. I had been having more frequent flashes of memory the farther south we traveled, and I thought it was even possible that I might recognize the place where I had grown up.
I had no intention of trying to reclaim a royal title. I would have been thought a raving lunatic if I even attempted to convince anyone I was Prince So-and-So of the previous century, not to mention being ushered off to the nearest madhouse. Fortunately, my brush with potential kingship in Huldre had left me thoroughly disinterested in royalty of any kind. No, whatever form my life took, I wanted it to be a simple one.
I had decided to go to the castle in the mountain, though it seemed unlikely the castle would still be there. It was possible the Troll Queen had not taken me too far from where I had originally lived. Whether that was true or not, I thought it a good place to start.
My plan was to slip off the ship after it docked in La Rochelle. I would depart well before dawn and make a good start before anyone was awake. I wanted to leave a note for Rose, but when it came time I found myself unable to. What could I say? "Dear Rose, I go to find my name. Hope to return in a year or two. Yours truly, the man who was once a white bear."
No, I decided, it was better just to go. After all, she might be relieved.
I did not sleep well that night and thus had no problem rising before dawn. I gathered the few belongings I had decided to take with me—including my flauto—made my way through the silent ship, and descended the gangplank.
Rose
I AWOKE AT DAWN, which in itself wasn't unusual. What was unusual was the way I sat bolt upright feeling that I'd been smacked across the face.
I jumped out of bed and dressed with an urgency I didn't understand. I left my room quietly and made my way down the hall. Suddenly I stopped, not sure exactly where I was going. I stood like a hunting dog sniffing the air, trying to figure out the direction in which its quarry lay.
Then I knew. I made my way to the room where the white bear had been sleeping. Silently I opened the door. In the dim light from the porthole I could make out the slumbering forms of two sailors. But the third bunk, the white bear's bed, was empty.
In some odd way I had been expecting it. But I was flooded with despair anyway. He'd said nothing to me—no good-bye, nothing.
Then I saw something shiny lying on top of the neatly folded blankets of the empty bed.
I crossed the room. It was a silver ring, the one with VALOIS inscribed on it, the one I had worn on my thumb throughout the long journey. He had left it for me.
I grabbed it up, stuck it on my thumb, and left the room.
I returned to my quarters, got my cloak, then left the ship.
There were many people already on the docks, but none of them had seen a mail with golden hair wearing a coat of white fur. How long ago had he left? Could it have been as long ago as the night before, right after the last person had retired for the evening? I felt suddenly cold and wrapped the cloak tighter around my shoulders.
Was I going to have to seek him all over again? I felt a rush of anger. Why would he disappear like that, in the middle of the night with no explanation or even a goodbye?
I stopped midstride. Perhaps I should let him go, I thought.
Then I remembered his face those past few weeks, strained and pale, and my anger softened. Maybe this was what he needed to do.
White Bear
As I WAS WALKING along the road leading out of La Rochelle, an old farmer and his son came along in a wagon and offered me a ride. It turned out they were traveling in the same direction, and I was very grateful for their kindness.
The farther south we traveled, the more familiar the landscape began to appear. It was extraordinary how fast memories were returning. I was glad to be riding in the back of the wagon, for the farmer and his son would certainly have thought me quite mad if they had heard all my exclamations each time I was assailed by a new memory. Most were memories from when I had been a white bear, those endless years I had wandered the world looking for the one who would set me free. And some were memories from when I had been a child. What I had trouble remembering was how I had gone from boy to bear.
I asked the farmer about the history of the land, about who was king a hundred or so years before, but he and his son had no knowledge or interest in the past. All that concerned them was their lives at the time—how high the taxes were, what a wet spring they'd had, and so forth. I would need to go to a larger city to find scholars who made a study of the past. But for the time being I would continue south.
When their way turned east, the farmer and his son left me near a small village called Koln. Again I was fortunate enough to get a ride from a traveling merchant, who set me down at a crossroads not very far from the edge of the large forest that was known in the region to be haunted. Wouldn't the locals be amazed, I thought, to learn the true story behind the odd occurrences in that forest. Because the trolls working the farm had wanted their activities to be undisturbed by softskins, they had created the strange noises and lights that were seen coming from die forest. As for those who had been so bold as to stray too far into the forest, the trolls had killed them at once.
By the time I reached the mountain where the castle had been, I remembered everything.
The red ball. The beautiful pale girl with the voice like rocks. And my surprise at seeing her again when she had returned. The sound of bells and finding myself wrapped in furs, flying high in the sky. Arriving at the immense ice palace. Her father in a deadly rage. Watching stupefied as he berated her, setting out the conditions that took my life from me.
The terrifying moment when my body was transformed. The years of hopeless searching.
Rose.
Down to the last night and the last day. Finding the white nightshirt with the stain.
That night I did not remember, as I do now, about the last of her father's conditions:
Further, no request that he shall make of one of Huldre shall be denied. Except the request to be released from his enchantment. To be released from the enchantment, the white bear that was a softskin must abide by and satisfy a set of inviolable conditions. These conditions shall be made known to him in their entirety.
When I asked the pale queen to wash the shirt, I did not think of this last condition. Or perhaps there was some dim, buried memory spurring me on. I thought only of Rose. Of the story she had told of the careless husband and the tangled washing line—and of how we both had laughed. Of how she had made the nightshirt for me because I was cold. And of how she had washed it for me. I knew she would be able to wash it clean. And I knew the Troll Queen couldn't.