Fortune's Fool Read Online Free PDF Page A

spring-fed pool of clear water that was the Heart of Led Belarus.
    This pool of water never froze over, not even in the depth of winter. It was as pure and sweet as water could be, which was hardly a surprise since unicorns drank at it twice a day. And in general—
    “Oh! It is the prince!” The voice was not familiar, but it didn’t need to be. He knew what it was, if not who.
    The words carried an overtone of whinnying, and Sasha braced himself. In a moment, he was overwhelmed by five doe-eyed, adoring female unicorns.
    “Prince Sasha, would you comb my mane?”
    “Prince Sasha, I have this dreadful itch behind my ears.”
    “Oh, Prince, could you please—”
    They pressed in around him, nostrils quivering, horns glowing with magic, all trying to touch him at once.
    Predictably, getting in the way of what he actually needed to do.
    “Ladies, please!” he said, after a moment of being softly jostled and inundated with pleading. “I need to let some magic free! If I don’t, something might happen that you wouldn’t like!”
    They giggled, but backed up. Trotting around to the opposite side of the pool, they lined up, watching him expectantly. He didn’t know what male unicorns were like, but the female ones seemed to have the same intelligence and good sense as any empty-headed young human in the presence of his or her first love. Which was to say, none at all. In fact, he’d seen toddlers with more sense than the unicorns.
    And it made him wonder, how on earth did they reproduce if they were besotted with humans and not their own kind?
    Maybe they didn’t. Maybe new unicorns were spontaneously generated out of something. Nectar and dandelion floss. Honey and milkweed seeds. Spiderwebs and leftover magic. Or maybe the forest spirits created them; some of them were quite mischievous enough to do so.
    Now that he was free of attention, he pulled his flute out of the front of his tunic, made sure that it hadn’t been damaged in his falls, and put it to his lips. Music was how he called on the magic that The Tradition packed around him, And while he couldn’t say that he controlled it, he certainly guided it.
    He sensed the magic flowing from the first note. Using him as a conduit, and the music as direction, it poured out over this place that was somehow integral to all of his Kingdom.
    Bring us Luck, he urged the magic. Give us the reddest cherries, the juiciest apples, the sweetest berries. Make all the nuts sound and savory. Let the cattle and sheep, the goats and the horses, the donkeys and swine and fowl of all sorts bring forth their young in ease and health and abundance. Let the land flow with milk and honey. Let all things flourish…yes, even unicorns….
    He almost heard the magic reply in agreement. It was as if there were something just on the edge of hearing that said, But of course! The Fool is the Luck of the Land!
    And the magic stopped looming over him like a wave about to break, and flowed off to make all things in Led Belarus as bucolic as an illumination in a manuscript.
    Meanwhile the unicorns sighed and gazed at him with undisguised longing, their eyes growing moist and soulful as he played. He suppressed a chuckle; it didn’t do to laugh when you were playing a flute. It would have been nice if he could have turned their passions toward a more appropriate species, but he knew better than to charge the magic with that task. He was no mage, and anything subtle would almost certainly backfire on him.
    Now there was one more thing he had to do. With the last of the magic waiting to be released, the tone of his song grew dark. The unicorns shivered, and even the golden sunlight dimmed a little.
    In his way, he was not only the Luck of the Land, he was its protector.
    Demons, and monsters, and night-walking vampires, all things that would harm my land and my people, hear now my music and flee from this Kingdom—
    Again, the simplest of commands, and one with no ambiguity. Whatever was evil