PART TWO
THE HUNT had been quiet enough the last weeks while the Prince lay on his bed and raved; but on the day that the Princess joined them no word at all was spoken, and everyone averted his eyes as if afraid to look upon her, and even the horn-calls to the dogs were subdued. The Princess left no message behind her; but the stablemen would notice the empty stall of the Princess’s favorite, as the watchers at her brother’s bedside would notice her empty chair.
Morning had barely broken, and the first sunlight had only begun to find its way through the leaves of the forest when the Hunt were brought to a standstill by the long-drawn-out wail of the lead dog. Into a tiny green clearing before them stepped the Golden Hind.
She was a color to make wealthy men weep, and misers drown themselves for very heartsickness. New-minted gold could not express the least shadow of her loveliness; each single hair of her magnificent coat shone with lucent glory. Her delicate hoofs touched the earth without a sound; she turned her small graceful head toward the little group of hunters, seemingly unconscious of the miserable dog that had flattened itself almost at her feet. Her eyes were brown, and for a moment the Princess’s eyes met those of this creature of wonder; and it was as though they were only inches from each other in that moment, looking into the depths of each other’s souls; for the Princess knew at once that the Hind had a soul, and hope stirred within her. The brown eyes she looked into somewhere held a glint of green, and somewhere else, almost too subtle for even the Princess’s lonely wisdom, a glint of sorrow.
Then the Hind turned away, and the Princess touched her unspurred heels to her fleet young mare’s sides, and followed silently. The Princess had a brief vision, though she did not stay to see, of the Hunt turning to make their sad and weary way homeward before they had even begun.
The Princess had no idea how long the chase lasted. The Hind wove swiftly through the close trees, and followed paths so narrow that the young mare’s light feet could hardly find width enough to hold them; but while branches lashed at her and bushes held out twisted thorny hands to grab at her, the Princess found that she suffered little hurt; for some reason the forest let her pass, although the men who had ridden as she rode now had been less fortunate. The mare’s neck and shoulders grew streaked with sweat and then with foam, but she still followed the Hind flashing through the green leaves before her, with all the heart and spirit that was in her; for the love she bore her young mistress.
The sunlight began to cast different sorts of shadows than it had in the morning; and the mare began to stumble, and her breathing was painful to hear. The Princess drew her up in pity, though her own spirit was mad for the following and she knew her horse would run till she fell dead if she were so asked. But the Hind paused too, and seemed to wait for them to catch her up; though her golden coat was unmarred, and her flanks moved easily with her light breathing.
All through that night they followed her; and there was moonlight enough to show those gilded flanks whenever they looked for their guide; the Princess had dismounted, and she and her horse faltered wearily on, and found each other’s bleak and hungry company a comfort.
Just at dawn they staggered out from the edge of the forest—an edge they had not realized lay so near ahead, for the shadows of night had hidden it. But as the first blush of dawn aroused them, they stood blinking at the beginning of a land the Princess had never seen. There was grass before them, and scattered rocks, and a stream that ran babbling off into a distance they could not discern; and then looming up like a castle at the end of a field stood a mountain of bare grey rock. From where the Princess and her mare stood, they could see the green plain stretching out before them and to their right, up to the verge of the forest they had just crossed; but to the left, and standing against the last trees of the forest on that side, was this great hump of stone.
Before this mountain, only a few arm’s-lengths away, stood the Hind. She waited till she caught the Princess’s eye, and held her gaze for another moment while again they drank of each other’s spirit; and then the Golden Hind, who blazed up with a glory that could be hardly mortal as the morning sunlight found her, turned and disappeared into the rockface as if through a door.
The Princess dropped the bridle, and took a few steps after her; and then darkness came over her and she fell to the ground.
When she stirred again and turned her head to look around her, for a moment she had no idea where she was; the rough grass she lay on, the wild landscape around her were utterly unfamiliar; and then her mind began to clear and she sat up. The sun was near noon, and perhaps her faint had turned to sleep, for she felt a little rested, although still dizzy and uncertain; and she looked around first for her mare.
The mare had seen her sit up, and came toward her, holding her head delicately to one side so that she would not tread on the dragging reins, and her nostrils quivered in a little whicker of greeting. The Princess contrived to stand up by holding on to one of the long chestnut legs; and she stood for a moment with her head resting on the horse’s shoulder. The sweat had dried, leaving the hair rough, but when the Princess raised her head and saw the mare with her own head turned to look back at her, she saw that the mare’s eye was clear, and her bits were green and sticky with her grazing; and her breathing was untroubled.
“You’re stronger than I am, my Lady,” she said, “but then you have been standing in the stable and getting fat comfortably this last month …” and at that the Princess’s mind cleared completely; and she remembered why she had come so far, and with what strange guide; and her head snapped around, and she stared at the grim grey pile before her, and she thought of the Hind, and her deep eyes and treacherous ways.
First she washed her face and hands in the running stream, and drank some of the sharp cold water, and when she stood up again she felt alert and well. Then she unsaddled and unbridled her horse and flung the harness indifferently on the ground; and paused to stroke the mare’s forehead. “I’d be sorry to lose you, my Lady,” she said, “but you know best; I can’t say when … I can come back for you.”
The mare nodded solemnly, and then stretched out a foreleg and lowered her head to rub her ears against it. The Princess turned to the steep stark mountain.
She remembered where the Hind had stood, and there she went, and examined the stone carefully; but she saw nothing that resembled a hidden door, and the hard grey surface appeared unbroken. She ran her hands over all till the fingertips were rough and sore; and still she found nothing. The mare had returned to her grazing, but occasionally she raised her head to watch the Princess curiously.