One
The only thing the prince loved more than himself was magic.
He loved the instantaneousness of it, how one moment it didn’t exist and the next it did. He loved how many forms it took, from curses to transformations to enchantments, all beautiful in their own ways. But most of all he loved the reactions of others to magic, and the wonder that overtook them when he granted their wish.
He had two great sadnesses in life. The first was that his only magic was wish granting. The second was that he could not grant wishes for himself.
The prince worried his magic would run out, so he granted wishes only to those who could answer a riddle, and he changed the riddle depending on whether he wanted the person to be able to guess it. Nonsense riddles stumped the nobles of the court, who thought they could wring magic out of him for their enjoyment; easy riddles allowed commoners in the marketto win. He didn’t mind letting the commoners win. They had true joy on their faces when he granted their wishes, and they never asked for anything outrageous. A bigger house. A stronger horse. A cured illness. He never let children play. Children always wanted the sky a different color or their friend turned into a donkey.
The prince did not intend to go to jail for turning a child into a donkey.
“Couldn’t you twist it somehow?” the prince’s companion, Evren, asked one day after the prince turned a group of children away. “You know, get them to say, ‘Turn my friendtoa donkey,’ and then the magic just spins them in the direction of the nearest donkey?”
“There’s not much time between the wishing and the granting,” the prince said dryly. What he didn’t want to admit was that there wasnotime between the two. It seemed that by imposing his riddle rule, he had inadvertently given up part of his control. If someone answered a riddle correctly, the princehadto grant the wish, but he couldn’t choose the time or the place or the interpretation. It was like the riddles sucked the magic out of him. And, since he’d started asking riddles, he could no longer grant wisheswithoutasking riddles.
Threegreat sadnesses.
Soon the prince grew tired of his court and his people grew used to his magic, and he felt stifled and hot and sad on his throne, so he took Evren and they set off to travel the world. When he granted wishes, he selected his target very carefully: a person who needed help, who was desperate for it, and who had enough sense to answer an easy riddle.
One day he met an old woman in the desert whose well had run dry. He made the riddle about the sun, the thing she baked under every day. When he left, the woman, standing next to a deep freshwater pool in a lush oasis, waved him off with a big smile.
In the mountains, a married couple couldn’t conceive. They had tried for years and suffered several miscarriages. The answer to the prince’s riddle was their front door, bright red against the emerald green of the hills and the snowy white of the peaks. The wife wished to be pregnant, and the prince’s magic—which seemed to know exactly what the wish maker meant, even when the prince himself didn’t—made her stomach swell nearly to bursting. There was a moment of panic among all of them, but the baby was delivered safely, right there on the doorstep.
The prince and his companion moved to cooler climates, through vineyards and valleys, along steep mountain passes and through cities that looked nothing like the prince’s homeland. On the outskirts of one such city, they joined a caravan travelingeast. The caravan leader, a woman named Jocasta who had a craggy face and a big smile, said she liked the prince’s sass and his stories, and he might help bring in some revenue.
The caravan was all performers and craftspeople: musicians, actors, artists, woodworkers. They hailed from all over, not more than two of them from the same region. They set up shop in villages, towns, and cities to trade their wares and entertainment for coin and goods. They had established circuits, and they traveled those circuits several times a year, weather permitting.
“We’re headed into the forest now,” said Omar, one of the musicians, while the prince watched him harness the horses to his cart. “You said you like magic? You’ll like the forest, then. There is a different world inside the woods, and in that world is a village that breathes magic.”
Breathes magicsounded exactly like the kind of thing one might say if one did not see magic performed often, thought the prince, but he acted politely intrigued anyway. He’d never been to this forest or the village inside it, and doubtless there would be plenty of people there he could show somerealmagic to.
“The village is called Greymist Fair,” said Omar, pulling a strap tight and then looking around, as if he’d misplaced something. “It’s not much to look at, but the villagers have quality goods and are happy to trade for the entertainment”—hepaused here to shout at the top of his lungs—“ILYAS! WHAT HAVE I TOLD YOU ABOUT YOUR LAZINESS—”
On the grassy slope behind the prince, a small boy with a tattered book was huddled behind a tree trunk. When his father began to yell, he leaped to his feet, the book behind his back, his face a mask of terror. He was a cute child, Ilyas, smooth brown skin and big dark eyes, but in the short time the prince had traveled with the caravan, he had known the boy to do little more than daydream and cry.
“Oh, not again,” groaned Evren as Omar stormed over to his son, ripped the book from his hands, and dragged him to the cart. The sound of a belt whipping and a small child’s cries were heard shortly after. “Horrible man,” spat Evren. “The boy doesn’t deserve that.”
And we don’t deserve to listen to the boy crying for hours, either,the prince thought, but Evren would reprimand him for it, so he kept it to himself.
Ilyasdidcry for hours afterward, a muted snuffling from the back of the cart that had the prince wanting to whip Ilyas himself.
“Can’t you just...” Evren made a motion with his hand in the air that didn’t mimic anything but clearly meantgrant him a wish?“Surely he’d use it well.”
“Even if he did—which hewon’t,because children neverdo—” the prince said, “he’s too scared of me to answer any riddles I pose him.”
“Then keep asking him until he gets it right,” Evren said.
“No.”
“Altan.”
The prince shot Evren a look. Evren bowed his head. “Sorry. My prince.”
“Look, he’s fallen asleep,” the prince said. He didn’t know for sure that the boy was sleeping, but his small form wasn’t moving and he was quiet at last. “He’ll be fine. Once he learns to listen to his father, he won’t have any trouble.”
Evren turned away, lips pursed in displeasure and disagreement. He, too, knew when not to say something that would incite an argument.
The forest was dark and dense, and if not for Evren’s pocket watch, they would have lost track of the time of day. There was no sun here, only the ghostly light that filtered between the trees and the bluebell flames in iron lamps along the cobbled road. Owl cries haunted the deep forest. The far darkness was tinted the purple-blue of bruises. Jocasta had warned them before they set out not to leave the road for anything, no matterwhat they saw or heard. The prince’s skin prickled beneath his shirt and brocade jacket, a telltale sign of ambient magic.
