Knowing what was in her heart, Prince Ember bent to her. “Dear Lady of the Shadows,” he said, “to serve you is my highest joy. And now there is no other enemy left for us to dread. I have but to lead you home.”
CHAPTER XV
With what happiness Prince Ember and the Shadow Witch resumed their journey! All the way before them seemed a way of brightness, though it led across a Plain as grey and desolate as it had been before; but they knew that no perils lay in wait for them, and that every step led them safely on.
While the Shadow Witch talked gaily with the Prince, she turned to him a face as radiant as though a light shone through it from within. Ever and again her laughter rang out low and clear, not the echoing, mocking laughter, known so well to the evil fairies of that land, but a laugh of rippling music, as if all sweet sounds, all gentle whisperings of the fire were caught up and gathered into it. The Prince listened to it with keen delight. Of all the notes of gladness that he had ever heard, it was to him the loveliest; and she herself, gliding tall and beautiful beside him, he could never tire of gazing upon.
They came at last to the Land of Shadows. Its pale trees and gardens lay before them, and in the distance they saw the Palace of Shadows lifting its grey towers against the sky.
They had spoken less and less frequently as they drew near it, and the laughter of the Shadow Witch had ceased, for her heart had grown heavy, and her mind was filled with troubled thoughts. Soon Prince Ember would leave her to return to his own home in that fair land which she so much longed to behold. He had left it to come to her deliverance, and at first sight of him she had known that her heart’s love could never be given to anyone but him. That he loved her in return, she did not doubt. His eyes had said it, the tones of his voice had revealed it a hundred times. Had he not called her more than once his “dear Shadow Witch,” and given himself to danger for her sake again and again?
Yet he said no word of taking her home with him—of making her his bride; and so her eyes were sad, and her heart was full of pain at the thought of the parting which was now so near at hand. She did not dare to speak, lest her grief should break forth uncontrolled.
Who was she, she told herself, the mischievous Shadow Witch, a creature of grey magic, to be the bride of such a one as this bright, this glorious Prince, whose magic was all noble, whose land was all joy and brightness? In her mind she had no picture of that land. She had seen only Prince Radiance and his White Flame and this Prince Ember, yet she could guess from these, its bright inhabitants, how marvelous the Land of Fire must be.