The Hill-King's Bride: an Allegory for the Modern Church

Maple

Less than a month after Midwinter's Day, Howe was harvesting the first spinach leaves from her glassed-in garden. As she'd expected, the cabbages and broccoli were doing well. The remainder of the plants, which all preferred longer days, were growing as well, though Howe didn't expect them to grow very fast until the days were longer and a bit warmer. Just being able to plant them where they got sunlight at all was allowing them to do far better than usual.

Ordinarily, Howe planted her seedlings in wooden flats that were kept indoors until it was warm enough for them to go outside during the day. Only when all danger of frost had passed, did she usually plant them in the ground. As it was, rows of flats were planted at the edge of her garden, waiting to be transplanted in the plot of ground behind Cade and Rowen's cottage, where Rowen thought the garden would grow best and be trampled least.

"My Princess, are you up here?" The hopeful call was preceded by the creak of hinges. Howe smiled, knowing that the king was about to join her on the pretext of learning to garden. Since Rowen was also hard at work, learning to garden with her niece, Howe had absolutely no hope of true privacy with her suitor.

"Come on up," she called over. "I'm about done here though."

"Perfect!" His head appeared from behind the retaining wall, but he didn't walk up onto the dirt. "My Princess, I've found your new name!"

Howe jumped up, nearly spilling the spinaches she'd harvested. "You did? What is it?"

"Come and see," he urged with a voice full of excitement.

"See?" Howe headed toward him, neatly skipping over the rows of seedlings. Rowen followed more carefully. "Are names not usually heard?" She was only partly teasing him.

The king nodded, still grinning. "Yes, but this time, I want you to experience the full depth of meaning behind it when I explain. You'll need your coat; what I wish to share is down the hill a way."

Howe reached him and showed him the apron-full of greens she'd picked. "I just need to get these to Gwyn first." He seemed a bit disappointed by the delay, but Howe grinned at him as she ducked through the doorway. "Which works well, since I left my coat in the Common Hall."

Soon, he was almost towing her along the path, holding her hand and walking at a half-trot in his eager haste. When they'd reached the appointed place, he pointed out where a broken twig had caused the sap of a particular tree to form a small icicle in the freeze-thaw cycle of late winter/early spring weather.

Howe watched him snap the icicle carefully from the damaged twig. He held it up to her lips, allowing the melting sap to drip onto her lips a little. "Taste it," he advised. "This is a maple tree. We catch the sap in buckets and boil it down to make a syrup." Howe licked her lips. The incredible sweetness of the sap was unlike anything she'd ever tasted.

"You are Maple of the Hills," he continued quietly, "in the way of your mother's people, because like the maple, you are strong and tall. You weather the storms of life and bring a sweet savor to all around you." He let her finish eating the icicle, wetted her lips with the sap on the end of his fingers, then bent and kissed her.

Maple had never been kissed like that before, and neither had she when her name had been Howe. Abruptly, he let go and backed away. "My Princess, I'm sorry," he cried hoarsely. "Forgive me, I got carried away." He looked ready to flee.

She realized something in that moment, something very important. It took her a minute to calm her racing heart enough to think, and by the time she'd marshalled her racing thoughts, he was already walking away, no doubt convinced that he'd destroyed all hope of a relationship with her.