Free Birds Fly

1
The Not-so-usual Curse
The birds did not fly away.

When Allegra opened the aviary door the birds had come out in an excited flutter. She had waited eagerly, expecting them to take to the cloudless sky with joyous abandon. Instead they flew to an aged orange tree by the goldfish pond and settled down on a skeletal branch, their rainbow-hued wings primly folded.

Allegra brushed off a strand of unruly hair from her furrowed brow and wondered whether the birds understood that they were free. Perhaps their long captivity and their sudden release had made them disoriented. She decided to tell them. “You are free. Remember you always said you want to fly away to the sun? Now you can; fly away, anywhere you like. But you have to hurry. If Mother comes she will put you back in the cage and send me up to my room.”

The birds continued to gaze at her with their jewel-bright eyes. Allegra felt tears of frustration clouding her vision. “Go,” she said, her voice rising to a desperate pitch; “Go!”

And they went. One after the other all twelve lovebirds flew back into their spacious gilded cage. When the head gardener came by a few minutes later he found the door of the Queen’s aviary wide open, all the birds dozing inside and the ten-year-old Allegra, crumpled on the ground in an undignified heap, crying her heart out.

Allegra never again tried to set the lovebirds free. But she did manage to save several batches of pigeons from being turned into delectable pies. As she grew older she started sneaking into the royal woods and free rabbits and foxes caught in traps. She used to stand with a pounding heart watching the creatures fly or flee to liberty. She relived those memories as she sat on a rosewood-and-brocade chair in her mother’s pink-and-gold salon listening to delicate voices discussing the relative merits of silk and sarsnet, peacock feathers and bird-of-paradise plumes or rubies and sapphires. She clung to those memories when she sat through ten-course state dinners, listening with polite attention as dignitaries on either side recounted their own deeds and laughed at their own jokes.

A spacious round room at the top of one of the towers functioned as the study of royal children. The east window gave a clear view of the city below and beyond. The distance was too far for sounds to carry, but the houses and the shops, the streets and the main square were all visible in miniature, like a gaily-colored painting. Allegra never tired of watching that scene, bustling with crowds and activity in the morning and the evening, bare and somnolent in the afternoon. She longed to go out there, walk those streets, enter those shops, visit those houses, perhaps even talk to those people. But the royal children were not allowed to go into the city. Sometimes they rode through it, in their gilded chariot, on their way to somewhere equally royal. But the horses would move fast, and Allegra was never able to take a good look at either the city or its inhabitants.

The Dream made an indelible impression on Allegra perhaps because it added some spice to the interchangeable days, weeks, months and years which succeeded each other with well-regulated precision. It was always and every time the same dream. It would begin with Allegra walking in an unknown forest and end with her sitting in an unknown kitchen, listening intently to an unknown woman dressed in sober black. While she was dreaming everything was clear to her. Awake she retained nothing more than a vague memory of the woman in black and a curious conviction that she had forgotten something utterly significant.

Birthdays for Allegra and her sisters usually meant presents and a tea party. But Allegra’s fifteenth birthday turned out to quite different. She got presents of course, but instead of the tea party there was a picnic by the royal lake for lunch and a fancy dress ball in the evening which ended in a superlative fireworks show. It was Allegra’s first grown-up party. She dressed up as a witch, danced to her heart’s content with pirates, mages, robbers, tramps, highwaymen and archers and enjoyed herself immensely. The fireworks included a flock of gold and silver birds appearing in the night sky as if from nowhere and flying away into the unknown. Allegra watched the illusory birds in their illusory flight, wishing she too could fly as free as a bird, unchained by any bond, unimpeded by any limit.

Even before the last piece of the intricately decorated pink-and-silver birthday cake was eaten, her parents got into the matchmaking mode. Royal advisers, after much deliberation, had concluded that the princess should be married to a nice, handsome prince before she reached the age of sixteen. So suitable suitors were sought, from lands near and far. Eventually Allegra’s parents settled on a prince who was as good looking as he was amiable. He was also proficient in all the usual princely arts; his manners were perfect, his pedigree impeccable and his prospects more than acceptable.

Allegra liked the chosen prince in the same, somewhat detached, way she liked creamy-marshmallow puddings or cheesy-mushroom pies. He was nice and considerate; he opened doors for her, carried her books, and helped her to mount her horse. She did not want to be married so soon, but her parents insisted and she did not argue with them. Obedience had been an important part of her curriculum, placed way above math or grammar.

She voiced her discontent only once, and to her tutor, an old professor who was almost as fond of her as he was of his book-collection. All her life it was to him Allegra had turned with her interminable questions about why, where, how, what and when. “Why must I be married so soon?” she asked him, between history and geography, when her sisters were having a dolls’ tea-party in the playroom below. But he, who always had an answer for her, looked so agitated, and so disinclined to answer that Allegra did not persist.

A few days later she let out a trapped fox, and watched the little creature vanish into the undergrowth, with uncharacteristic envy.

After months of hectic preparations the W Day finally dawned and the palace became transformed into an abode of whirling dervishes. Allegra woke up earlier than usual and decided to go for a short walk. Everyone else was busy with a dozen tasks. She was the only one in the entire palace with nothing to do, until the arrival of the official dresser with the many tiered, long-trained, diamond encrusted, pearly-lace on ivory-silk wedding dress. Going for a stroll seemed the only sensible idea. Some mornings look as if they are made for walks. This was just such a morning.

Initially the princess walked in the palace gardens. Someone had left the gate to the royal woods open and Allegra passed from one to the other, lost in her own muddled thoughts. An hour passed and then another hour, but the little walk continued. Allegra was too absorbed in the future to pay attention to the present, until she almost fell over the jutting root of an unfamiliar tree.

Woken rudely from her reverie Allegra looked around. Tall trees grew ever closer together, shutting out the sunlight, except for a few scattered rays. No flowers bloomed here, no bird sang, no small animal raised its furry head; just total, almost primeval, silence. Had there been a visible path back, Allegra would have run home. But there was no path either back or forward; all she could hope to do was to find some way to somewhere. After all, even the deepest, densest forest has to end, sometime.

Allegra did not know for how long she walked. She was tired, hungry, thirsty and very scared. She realized that the night may not be far away; spending it in this forbidding wilderness did not seem a very inviting prospect.

Suddenly the forest ended in a thick wall of trees bordering a clear, bubbling brook. Beyond was a meadow of unruly grass and purple wildflowers. A single dead tree with intricately shaped branches stood like a sentinel next to a small wooden house with a blue slate roof, curtained windows and a smoking chimney. Allegra almost cried with relief. The cottage looked inhabited and welcoming. Inside she was bound to find food, shelter and company.

An old woman with a homely mien opened the door, almost as if she had been waiting for the knock. Behind her was a little kitchen dominated by a well-laid table. The woman greeted the girl politely and invited her to tea. Allegra accepted with alacrity. Nothing more than, ‘Have some more honey,’ or, ‘This jam is lovely,’ was said, until she had her fill.

Hunger and thirst, both utterly unaccustomed experiences, had numbed Allegra’s mind and stopped her from thinking about anything other than food and drink. But once she was reasonably satiated, her brain kicked in. She examined the kitchen with its bright copper pots and large stone jars. She stole a glance at the title of the dog-eared book which sat on the table, among plates and cups: The Complete Guide to Manias and Phobias. Then she looked at her hostess, who was now standing up, gazing down at her. The woman looked neither old nor homely. In fact she looked tall, thin and angular, with the sharpness of knives. Allegra stared at her strange hostess and made a discovery.

“You are my Dream!”

“That was perceptive of you, Allegra. Yes I know your name. I saw you when you were a baby and since then, I have seen you a few times playing in the garden. I know you are dying to ask me questions but first let me tell you a story. Once I am through you can ask all the questions you want and I will do my best to answer them. Do you agree?”

Allegra, for once lost for words, nodded.

“You see Allegra, there is a common royal affliction…..”

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Kings and queens never learn.

Surely a few dozen major disasters, ranging from long noses to hundred year slumbers, would have sufficed to teach royal parents the unwisdom of leaving out certain fairies when issuing invitations to naming ceremonies. Surely even in worlds of slow travel and slower communication the word would have got around, eventually, of how a marginalised magical-being visited woe and danger on Prince Angelo or Princess Angela? Surely soon-to-be royal parents, upon hearing the disturbing news, would have reminded each other constantly of the importance of inviting all fairies, or none, to the naming ceremony of their own incoming pride-and-joy?

But royal parents who differed from other royal parents in uncountable ways were as peas in a pod in one respect – they never could get the guest-list right.

So once Upon a Time, there was a (yet another) dyslexic royal couple who forgot to invite the most bad-tempered and malignantly inclined fairy in their world to the naming ceremony of their long awaited daughter.

Marginal was world-infamous for her curses, which ranged from the mildly funny (baying voices, frog gaits) to downright nasty (pyromania, ambulophobia). She made all other evil fairies in every tale ever told look like your average bad-tempered aunt. All royal parents lived in dread of Fairy Marginal; yet an amazing number of them managed to forget her name when they compiled the guest list for their little baby’s naming ceremony.

Everything happened the way everything always happens. The good fairies fluttered round gracefully, showering the princess with vacuous compliments. Guests of the more solid sort mingled with each other, eating and drinking, giggling and whispering. The courtiers busied themselves, mostly doing nothing. The King and the Queen sat on their royal thrones and smiled. The baby lay in her gold and rose-pink cradle, unimpressed and uninterested.

But one fairy, Fairy Pinky, slightly more perspicacious than the rest, did not join the revelers. In all the stories there is such a fairy, the one who saves the day. Pinky looked around carefully, failed to see Marginal’s dreaded form and baleful visage amongst the assembled guests and guessed that some terrible disaster was in the offing. So while her sister-fairies danced about the royal cradle dispensing wishes, she hid herself behind a potted palm and waited.

A second after the last fairy made her wish, the heavy doors of the banquet hall burst open and Fairy Marginal entered, a nightmarish vision in yards of black tarlatan and live-moth trim. As she made her way to the gold and rose-pink cradle, waving her wickedly pointed jet-black umbrella, all sounds and movements ceased. The guards stood rooted to the ground, the musicians stopped playing, the courtiers became living statues, the king stopped eating and the queen stopped gossiping. The only being unaffected was the baby who continued to wave her tiny arms and blow air bubbles.

Marginal came up to the cradle and peeped, giving the baby her coldest most searingly penetrating stare. That glance would have shriveled a giant; it once made a dragon cry. But the princess just looked back, her baby eyes filled with interest. Hitherto she had seen only the lightest, glossiest colors. So much matt black had never figured in her little world before.

In the end, it was the fairy who looked away first. Partly because she found the baby’s steady and curious gaze unsettling (in her long career of cursing royal babies she had never met one who looked back at her; they usually cried); and partly because she saw through the baby’s standard royal looks into her inner-self. With a shock, Marginal realized that this baby had been born with a fully functional-brain. She was intelligent, the rarest of qualities in families royal, far rarer than certifiable lunacy or babbling idiocy. This baby would be able to see and hear things royals were generally blind and deaf to; she would be able to think about them too and, perhaps even care about them.

Marginal knew all about the intelligence. She had a higher IQ than the wisest sage in the land; and a brainy fairy was as much of a square peg in a round hole as a brainy princess. Brainy fairies at least had some option in life, to embrace black and scatter curses. Brainy princesses had none. For a royal lady expected to do nothing more arduous than play the harp not too discordantly, sew uselessly, paint moderately, dance industriously and gossip discreetly, a brain is not just a superfluity. It can be a positive impediment to her progress in life.

Curses are to make the happy unhappy, to even fate’s lopsided scales somewhat. One did not curse those born into misfortune.

If she could have, Marginal would have glared all around and vanished in a puff of malodorous smoke. But that would have done irreparable damage to her carefully crafted reputation. Within days the story would permeate every distant corner of every once-upon-a-time land. From royal palaces to tumbledown hovels it would be said that Fairy Marginal had lost her touch. They would titter and pity. They may even remember to invite her to all the naming ceremonies. And the fun would go out of life.

So Marginal did what was expected of her. She cleared her throat, sending a shiver down every spine. She held up her umbrella and said in a suitably ominous voice, “This princess will run away when she is sixteen; she will roam the world endlessly in search of herself. She will know neither home nor rest, until she dies.”

Then she vanished, not a moment too soon, even from her point of view. For the first time in her long and feared life, Marginal felt the stereotypical theatricality of her own conduct and was embarrassed by it, a little.

As the smoke cleared, the assembly came back to life. The King screamed; the Queen fainted; the ladies and the gentlemen of the court tripped over each other trying to revive the Queen and calm the King.

And Fairy Pinky, realizing that her crowded hour of glorious life had finally arrived, stepped out daintily from behind the potted palm.

It took her a little while to gain the necessary attention. Eventually she had to fly up to the king and pull his nose. The tug made him stop in the middle of his litany of profanities. He thought she was a mammoth fly (the royal eyes were misted with blind fury) and would have swatted her with his golden flycatcher had she not screamed in his ear.

“I have not given my wish. I have a wish to give.”

When she had the attention of the assemblage, Pinky explained her strategic conduct and her plan to mitigate Marginal’s curse.

Amidst cries of gratitude and sighs of relief, she flitted up to the cradle. Suddenly there was total silence, the kind of silence in which you can hear the sound of butterfly wings or even of the moon rising. It must be admitted that Pinky took longer than she needed to give her wish. For once she was the cynosure of all eyes, and very pardonably, wanted to prolong the moment as much as possible.

Eventually she waved her wand, and said in her loudest most portentous tone, “The Princess’s search will not be endless; it will come to an end when she finds herself and she will find herself when she loses herself.”

Afterwards, many wondered whether Pinky could have phrased her wish better, making it less enigmatic and more standard, such as, “The Princess’s search will come to an end when she meets a handsome prince and falls in love with him”. Some accused Pinky of worsening things by adding a riddle to a puzzle. Others argued that Marginal’s baleful presence had a disastrous effect on everyone’s thought processes and a sweet little fairy could not be blamed for being more than a bit confused by it. In any case, they said, Pinky introduced the possibility of closure to an open-ended curse.

Fairy Pinky herself, when inquired about it subsequently, had no satisfactory answer to give.

The next fifteen years and three hundred and twenty nine days passed uneventfully.

Ordinary things happened. The Princess took her first steps and said her first words; she played and studied and grew up. And two other princesses were born, picture perfect, made-to-order type royal ladies. Their naming ceremonies passed uneventfully. Marginal, duly invited, made no appearance and the usual fairies gave the usual wishes. As young girls they liked pretty dolls; as young ladies they were as pretty as dolls. They fulfilled their royal destinies, to the satisfaction of their parents and everyone else.

That was not so with the cursed princess. In a less polite parallel universe she would have been called a nerd. She had an inquiring mind and an insatiable desire for knowledge. She read every book she could get her hands on (this was not many, since the royal library was far from well-stocked) and badgered her tutor with innumerable questions. Had her somewhat unusual inclinations and habits came to the notice of anyone important, there would have been trouble all around. Fortunately her father was busy with hunting and banqueting and her mother’s days were full of new dresses and parties. The Princess learnt early the value of prudence, after a question about why she cannot visit the city resulted in a kingly tirade and three days of rice pudding. She observed, thought and wondered a lot but so long as she did not question, speak or act, life flowed smoothly.

The monarchs were determined to keep the story of the curse a secret from their daughter. But this was no easy task because the story was known in its entirety to every last inhabitant of the land. Their solution to this seemingly insurmountable problem was to keep the Princess cloistered in the castle and the royal grounds and to decree disclosure as a capital crime, punishable by a particularly gruesome death. The prospect of being hung, drawn and quartered silenced even the most garrulous tongue; and the Princess, who knew quite a lot about far off lands and long ago happenings, grew up totally ignorant of her own prologue.

As the Princess grew up, the King and the Queen, after much discussion with ministers, came up with a plan to counter the curse: to marry the Princess to a suitable prince before she reaches sixteen. That way, they believed, it would be possible to negate Marginal’s evil wish and ensure that the Princess has a normal royal life. So a prince was found, and after the usual discussions and negotiations, the day of the wedding was set. It would be the day before the Princess’s sixteenth birthday. Just in case, said the King to his ministers; better to err on the side of caution, murmured the Queen to her ladies.

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For Allegra it was like figuring out a particularly elusive jigsaw puzzle.

“You are Marginal”.

The woman nodded. “I am indeed Marginal and I am the bad fairy of your story. The pink-and-white kind who comes to tea with your mother is just one type of fairy. There are many other types. And mages and witches. The world, my dear, is a far varied and a much more complex place than that little palace of yours, as you will find out.”

Allegra felt illuminated and completed. There were only two unanswered questions left and she asked one of them. “Why do you go around cursing royal babies?”

Marginal was somewhat startled. That was a question no one had ever asked her. (In fact, no one asked her questions.) Consequently she had never bothered to think about, let alone analyze, her own actions. Now she did both, rather rapidly. She knew that an inadequate answer would lower her in the eyes of this girl, and to her surprise, Marginal realized she did not want that.

“Habit I suppose,” she said ruminatingly. “You see, my dear,” she continued hastily as she saw the look of dissatisfaction in the girl’s eyes. “Most fairies are rather pea-brained, as I am sure you know. A brain is a bit of a handicap for a fairy, because in the general order of things, there is very little a fairy with a brain can do. I hate tea parties with queens because normally queens are as empty-headed as fairies. Kings too. I do not enjoy the company of flowers; they have no conversation whatsoever. And I could never see the point of those shimmering pink dresses. Have you noticed that a group of fairies are really very herd-like; they look alike, flit around alike and talk alike. I like solid things, sturdy cottages, vegetable gardens, cooking, well-worn clothes and flesh-and-blood animals. When I was invited to my first naming ceremony, I found it as boring as those fairy parties. Plus I hated that simpering baby boy on sight. So when my turn came I wished him floppy years. The next one got a baying voice. I began to acquire a reputation and I realized I liked it. It was even fun. I never intended things to get as far as they did, but once you let something out, there is no controlling it. So here I am,” she stopped a trifle lamely.

Allegra shook her head. “Here we are,” she said, emphasizing the plural pronoun in her young voice. Then she asked the second unanswered question. “What are you going to do with me?”

Marginal gave the girl a quick calculating look. “I can undo my curse if you like. You can go back to your palace, marry your prince and live happily ever after; or whatever your kind does.”

Allegra was taken aback. Usually other people made decisions for her, from small things like what to have for dinner to big things like when to get married. Now this strange fairy was asking her to make the biggest, most momentous decision of her young life: go back home, get married and fulfill her royal fate; or head into an unknown future. Suddenly she wondered what was happening back at her parents’ castle. She thought of her father’s face red with fury, her mother’s tears, the confusion of her two sisters, the consternation of her tutor and the terror of her nurse; she thought of everyone running around everywhere looking for her; she thought of the prince she was to marry and wondered what he would feel. Would he feel sad or relieved – like her?

At that moment she knew what she wanted to do.

She looked at the waiting Marginal, her young face serious and a little sad. “Even cows have individual qualities. Some cows are friendlier. Some are very playful while others are more lethargic. It is the same with sheep. So even in herds, there are differences. And I am not of any particular kind. I am me, whatever that means. I think I would like to travel the world and see whether I can discover myself. Please do not undo your curse. Just let my parents know that I am safe. I do not want them to worry about me, too much. I cannot go back to say goodbye because they will never let me go away. Can you please get word across to my parents and tell me the best way to begin my journey?”

Marginal smiled. “I made you come here for that very purpose. Do not worry, I will send a message to your parents. You should sleep now. The night is not a good time to begin a journey. Tomorrow you can start the rest of your life.”

Next morning, after breakfast, Marginal looked over Allegra, now dressed in a serviceable brown dress and a cloak of darker brown of Marginal’s providing, and said, “You need a companion”.

“A dog,” cried Allegra; “I always wanted one”.

“Dogs are good if you live in your corner of the world. None better. But you are going to go to every corner of the world. You will need something rather more prepossessing. A wolf will suit your purpose much better.”

“But people are scared of wolves”.

“Precisely; some people should be frightened. That is why I will give you a were-dog. A were-dog,” Marginal explained hurriedly, before Allegra could ask any questions, “is an animal in an intermediate stage between wolf and dog. When the world was young, some wolves befriended men. They became dog. A were-dog is neither a wolf nor a dog, or perhaps it is bits of both. Depending on the situation a were-dog can be either a dog or a wolf. If you need protection, he will be a wolf; if everything’s safe, he will be a dog. He will know when to make the change. His kind does. That is how they have survived humans.”

Marginal walked up to the window gave a most unfairy-like whistle. A few minutes later, the door opened and a dog came in, a largish black and white mutt with a generous dose of terrier in it, hairy and with a wispy beard. He walked up to Allegra and sniffed her over with a slightly disdainful air. The princess went down on her knees and looked into the creature’s eyes. The animal stared back at her, look for look.

“Thank you for agreeing to come with me,” Allegra said politely. “Would you mind telling me your name?”

“He does not have one. Animals need names only if they associate with humans. He will be your companion. So you can give him a name. But remember to ask him if he approves.”

Allegra thought hard for a while and said, “Spooky?”

“Curious,” said Marginal with a smile. “I thought you will suggest a popular royal dog-name like Cavalon or Vortimer. How do you like the name, Master?” she asked the creature.

“It will do.” The were-dog’s voice was a perfect blend of indifference and superiority. “Uncommon child, is she not? I see she can understand our tongue. Did she get a fairy-wish?”

“Yes”, replied Marginal. “Her parents had some sense. They had a minister standing by with a list to make sure those fairies did not repeat their wishes; and to guide their minds – if you can call them that – in the appropriate direction. So she ended up with quite a few useful attributes. I heard that she went off meat and fish after she was told by the relevant creatures where those delicious pies, stews and casseroles came from. It apparently created a minor implosion in the palace; the head cook had hysterics and the royal dietician went into a swoon.”

Allegra did not fancy being talked about in the third person, as if she did not exist. But she decided to let it go. She was beginning to realize that one can learn things not just by asking questions but also by listening. In any case she found the new information interesting. She did not know that her dietary change had caused such a commotion.

Marginal opened a wooden cupboard and took out a brown bag made of jute. “You will find a few necessities here. You will have to start finding your own food soon, though the clothes will last for a while longer.” Allegra took the bag with words of thanks. Marginal then walked to the sideboard, opened a stone jar and took out a star-shaped cookie and gave it to the girl.

Allegra looked at the small brown thing; it felt soft, almost crumbly, but she had the feeling that this was another one of those deceptive impressions.

“See if you can break it”.

Allegra couldn’t, though she tried, as much as a princess who had not been given the wish of strength by any fairy could.

“It is something with multiple uses. If ever you are in want or danger, you can eat it. Remember to eat it in one gulp. If you are in need, your need will be fulfilled. If you are in danger, you will become safe. But, this also embodies my curse to you. If you consume it, for whatever reason, my curse too will be consumed. You and Spooky will be back in your original habitats, free to resume your ordinary lives.”

“So I can decide, I can go back if I want to….”

“Free will” said Marginal mockingly. “Is it a blessing or a curse? Well I am sure you will develop your own idea as you go on”.