The Princess Academy (its time to shine)

Chapter 9

Breathe, buzz, hint, spell

Sigh, speak, say, tell

Each day, each snowfall, each lesson until spring holiday felt endless, and Miri was sore and restless with waiting. Each night as she lay on her pallet, she held on to the thought that she was one night closer to telling her pa and the villagers about Commerce. All seemed to feel the anticipation of spring. Even Katar stared out the window as though measuring the snow depth with her eyes and counting the days until they could go home.

When Miri's punishment lapsed, she walked outdoors with Britta, explaining what they had to look forward to.

"Food," she said. "The best. Doter shares her honeyed nuts, and Frid's pa makes salted rabbit so thin it melts on your tongue. And hot tea with honey, the last of the apples salted and roasted, bread on a stick baked over a fire and seasoned with rabbit fat. Games and contests, and when the night comes we build bonfires from wood gathered all year and hold story shouts."

"Sounds lovely." Britta's faraway look said she was already imagining it.

"And it will be even better this year," said Miri. "I have some secrets."

Just by admitting she had them, the secrets pushed inside her, a snowmelt stream against a fallen branch, and the desire to share swept over her. She hesitated. Would Britta believe her? Or would she laugh? Miri thought of Doter's saying, Never hesitate if you know it's right. After months of ignoring Britta just for being a lowlander, at least she deserved Miri's trust.

So Miri took Britta on a frantic stroll around the academy, telling her with huffs of frosty breath about Commerce and gold coins and quarry-speech outside the quarry. Telling someone felt good, like drinking warmed goat's milk, and she rushed out every detail before Olana could call them back.

"That's the most amazing story I ever heard." Britta smiled, looking where the sun picked out stars on the icy husk of the snow. "What the traders are doing, that sounds dirty to me. We have to change that."

"So, you really never heard anyone using quarry-speech? Not even when you were working in the quarry?"

Britta shook her head. "Before coming up here, I never imagined such things could exist. It makes sense to me that mountain folk have that talent. I remember, the noise in the quarry was deafening, even with clay plugs in my ears."

"Up here, quarry-speech is as normal as bug bites. I don't suppose anyone's thought much about it."

Britta scratched her nose. "Maybe that was why I had a hard time at first, that and everyone is singing all the time. I could never join in because I don't know the words."

"You don't have to know the words, you just make up your own."

"But I don't know the tunes."

"You don't need to know the tunes, just find the rhythm and the song comes."

"I can't do that. I never learned how."

Miri had never realized that singing was something that needed to be learned. "Is it true what they say about lowlanders, that they have a way with growing things?"

"I've never heard that, but it is a lot greener down there." Britta looked west. "Less snow, more rain, green all along the seashore, and forests and farmlands for miles. Every house has its own garden."

"I'd like to see it sometime." It was awkward for Miri to admit, but she did want to see the lowlands, the places she had imagined since she was a child and the things she had read about at the academy. The ocean, cities, palaces built of linder, musicians and artists, people from countries across the ocean, sailing ships full of wonders to sell and trade, a king and a queen. And a prince. Perhaps he would not be so horrible; perhaps he would be Britta's kind of lowlander.