Free The Fool's Girl by Celia Rees

Persephone.
    ‘Is it finished, Mother?’ Feste asked. He had left off whistling and was inspecting her carvings, as though looking for something.
    ‘Not yet,’ she replied. ‘You must be patient.’
    She drew a cloth from the piece she had been working on, exposing it to Feste’s scrutiny. I had no idea what it could be. It looked just like a lump of wood to me.
    Guido had recovered enough to wander over to where a sword hung on the wall. It was a Turkish yataghan, a fine weapon, with a hilt of mother-of-pearl and verses in silver and gold laid along its slender, curving blade.
    ‘Sharp enough for a man to shave himself,’ she said, as Guido tested the blade with his thumb. ‘When you have a beard to cut, perhaps it will be yours.’
    She turned to where Stephano stood admiring a vest of chain mail covered in beaten silver discs which shimmered like fish scales.
    ‘Fine work.’ Her fingers fluttered over the shining surface. ‘It is said to have been worn by great Saladin himself and to have been blessed by the Prophet Mohammed, may peace be upon him. It is covered with verses from the Holy Qur’an.’ Although the majority worship Christ, there are those in Illyria who follow different faiths. Muslim and Jew live side by side with Christians. She made obeisance to other religions, like many in the town. ‘A gift from a soldier who had no further need for it.’ She plucked it up and measured it against Stephano. His fair hair had grown darker, it would be like his father’s, and his face had lost a child’s roundness, but he was still only halfway to a man. His chest was narrow and the yoke of the mail shirt stretched well past his shoulders; the shimmering length of it fell almost to his knees ‘Too big for you yet, boy.’ She threw the shirt aside and clapped her hands. ‘Do not wish to grow up too soon. Go away now and be children. When it is time, you will come back.’
    With that, we were dismissed. We left her and followed the walls round, down into the town. The sun had fallen below the level of the battlements, the bright blue of the sky was darkening to purple and lavender, the air was loud with the sound of birds coming home to their roosts, bats just flying out. We linked arms, jumping down the steps that led down to the Stradun. The market had righted itself. The first lamps were lit and the wide street was busy with people coming out into the cool of the evening. There was little sign of the fighting that had broken out earlier, only a few rusty stains on the white paving stones. Feste stationed himself at a corner, set his battered hat in front of him and played and sang until he had collected enough to buy us lemon drinks sweetened with sugar, honey cakes and sweetmeats from the vendors. We went out into the harbour and sat on the wall together to watch the sun go down over the water. We ate and drank and laughed until the curfew bell summoned us back inside the city walls. I remember it better than yesterday. It was the last time that I was happy.

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    8
    ‘The spinsters and the knitters in the sun’
    VIOLETTA
    ‘From the sea she came, and the sea will claim her.’
    Marijita was a soothsayer. That is the trouble with prophecies. Once they are made, you wait for them to come true. I could not get it out of my mind. I found myself watching my mother, listening to her conversation for any hint that she might be going on a ship, or taking a voyage, but it didn’t happen like that at all.
    Two years passed. It was the summer when I was twelve. We were at the summer palace when my mother disappeared. Her clothes and sandals were found on the beach, left in a neat pile as if she had gone for her early morning swim. She was never seen again. Servants and soldiers searched the coast for miles in both directions. Lookouts stared out to sea until their eyes were red and aching with tiredness, but they saw nothing but the restless waves.
    My father ordered boats both large and small to take up the