He padded up this hall. He padded down another.

He padded to the top of the long corridor that led below.

Hesitatingly, he descended into the dark.

Stopping at the door where the heir and the wolf were kept, he put his ear to the wood.

A soft song.

“The meadows now all wait for us,

the hills, the cliffs, the stream,

the forest with its endless dusk,

the hushing fern-swept green.…”

The sounds were bright as splashing water. As lilting as honey. He closed his eyes. He felt the song slipping through him, both filling him and marking places he did not know were empty. Oh, so empty. It scraped a place behind his ribs. It marked a hollow in his belly. It scrubbed against the voids in his legs and feet and shoulders and arms. Oh, the song was beautiful. And, oh, it was terrible. It was terrible feeling this emptiness. Empty, empty, empty.

He put his eye to the hole in the door.

Too dark.

But even in the darkness, the song went on. How could sounds like those come from such a dark place?

He hurried down the corridor. He plucked a lantern off its hook and hurried back. He held the lantern to the window in the door.

A long beam showed the dark form of the girl cradling the beast. She sang and sang and sang.

Oh. The emptiness. It was all through him. It was white-hot and sterile. He was hollow all through, as empty as smoke.

“Enough!” he cried. He slammed his hand on the door. “Enough!”

The singing stopped.

The no-longer-a-boy-boy-king smiled with relief. He padded back to his room and lay on his silks. He stared into the darkness. He listened to the silence.

He waited for sleep to return.

He waited.

And waited.

And waited.

LI

SOFT, FAT, AND GHOSTLY

Rae stood with her ear against the door. Outside, the guard with shadowed eyes was whispering to the governor-advisor.

“She refuses to go!”

“Then let her refuse.”

“But will she not starve?”

“Then she will starve.”

“But she’s only a child!”

“She is a threat to the king. If she wishes to harm herself…” A silence that could be only a shrug followed. “Then let her do so.”

“Bu—”

“You have in the past shown yourself dutiful.” The governor-advisor’s voice was sharp, the word dutiful stretched under some weight. “Do not let us now question whether you are. Do not intervene in the affairs of the king.”

One set of footsteps strode away.

After a moment, the whispering was at the window, regretful and urgent. “You must come to eat.”

“The wolf is not being fed,” Rae said simply. “I know he is not. I will eat when I see that he’s eaten.”

“They say he is fed whe—”

“They do not tell the truth.” She glanced at the wolf. He had once again begun pacing, but now his pacing seemed less about entrapment and more about… desperation. Even so, his pacing was laggardly. His feet dragged behind the motion of his legs, so with each step, his claws scratched the dirt. His nose and ears hung low; his tawny coat had lost its luster. “Please,” she begged at the little window. “Bring me something I can give him.”