The Follies of Men

by Aline Herbreteau

The moon was round and bright in the twilit sky. Its silvery light glanced off the newly fallen snow, sprinkling it with diamonds, and spilled upon the castle steps. Every tree in the forest was draped in shimmering snow and trimmed with frost. Every creature, every plant, every snowflake had stopped moving; the whole wood seemed to be holding its breath.

Inside the castle, though, everything was in an intense bustle: handmaids scurried around, pages hurried about carrying messages and demands from various counts, dukes, barons and knights; horses were being saddled, hounds gathered, bows tested, arrows sheathed. Hunting horns were strung across many a hip; the ladies fervently wished the men good luck; knives were sharpened, torches lit. Everywhere, whispers ran around: ‘Will it be tonight?’ ‘Will they catch her?’ ‘Will they catch the doe?’

But a certain young lad was not asking these foolish questions; to him, the matter was already a certainty. How could such illustrious men as Prince Edelhard and Prince Aidan not catch the renowned silver doe? To be sure, men had spent centuries trying to catch her, but princes Edelhard and Aidan had not been alive centuries ago. True, the two princes had already tried on several midsummer and midwinter nights to catch the silver doe, but those had only been warmups. This time, they would catch her for sure.

This confident young boy, named Aldwyn, was around the age of eleven; and, with all the naïveté that children at that age possess, believed that royalty was capable of accomplishing anything, be it flying to the stars or walking on water—and, believing this, his impressionable self had been incredibly proud of bearing a name that, in his eyes, resembled Prince Aidan’s so closely.

But this pride was surpassed—oh, how far it was surpassed—by the immense honor Aldwyn first bore when he learnt he would be going to hunt the silver doe along with the two princes and all the counts, dukes, barons, earls, viscounts, and other lords of the kingdom. However, if we stepped out of Aldwyn’s mind and into Prince Edelhard’s, we would notice the young boy was only allowed in the hunt at all because of Prince Aidan’s favor for him, and only as a carrier of victuals, lest any of the actual hunters went hungry during the night.

But let us abandon both Aldwyn’s and Edelhard’s minds, to revert to the main story: the hunt of the silver doe. A crowd had already assembled upon the castle steps to bid the hunters farewell when the two young men—princes—stepped out. The elder wore a scarlet mantle, indicating his status as heir to the throne; the younger wore a dark green cloak and had a quiver of arrows slung behind his back. Both stepped up to their horses and swung their leg across their horse’s back in the same monotonic motion.

The horses pranced and bucked, shuffling in the snow, eager to start the hunt; the hounds bayed and sauntered on their leashes. The hunters shifted in their saddles, anxious to be gone—but the elder prince, unconscious of or unwilling to acknowledge their impatience, began his usual speech with, ‘We all know what an important night it is.’

 ‘Yes, we do,’ his brother muttered. ‘So skip the speech and start the hunting, Edelhard.’

‘Why so impatient, Aidan?’ the crown prince replied with an easy smile. ‘You know she will only appear after the first star has risen, and the sky is empty yet.’ Turning to the crowd, he continued. ‘Centuries ago, one evening, an old crippled man in ragged clothing begged at our castle for food and shelter. The king wholeheartedly granted him his wishes, inviting him to eat at the king’s table and sleep in a silken bed. The old man, in gratitude, told the king about a silver doe who could bestow endless riches and eternal youth upon the person who killed her. She only appears on midsummer and midwinter nights, and stays only when the stars are out.

‘But the old man also told the king that killing the silver doe was impossible. Then, he cast away his ragged clothes, revealing a long white tunic and cloak; he threw a pouch to the bemused king and swept out of the castle into the night. The king opened the pouch; ’twas full of priceless gems.’

‘For centuries past, the royal family has attempted to kill the silver doe. We have tried in vain to kill her twice each year for three centuries, despite the old man’s words about how the death of the doe is impossible; but we will still try, and we will still succeed. Fate has been lenient this year, granting us a clear night. We will not let this opportunity go to waste. We will succeed in killing her to-night.’

The concourse cheered as Edelhard raised his fist in certainty of success. Now, there was nothing more to do but to wait for the first star to appear. A deep silence reigned over the assembly as every face was upturned; every pair of eyes roamed over the indigo expanse of sky in excited anticipation; every cheek was flushed crimson from the cold.

A sudden shout rang through the silence. ‘There!’ And indeed, a gleaming star winked just above the tree line. All eyes turned to it, then to the man who first spotted it. To no one’s surprise, that was Aidan, the king’s second son: he had the keenest eyes in the castle. He was awarded a brief smattering of applause, of which Aldwyn’s claps were loudest, but everyone was watching the heir, anticipating what would come next.

Edelhard slowly unstrung his hunting horn; he paused, then blew on it, emitting a long, even note. The crowd cheered even louder than before as the hunters sprang forward at the sound. The foremost of the hunters, on foot, loosened their hounds’ leashes; the dogs darted towards the forest, barking more wildly than ever. The horsemen followed close behind, the crown prince at their head; and in a swirl of silver snowflakes, the whole company had disappeared amid the trees.

An icy wind had begun to blow; it shook the snow loose from the frostbitten branches. The hunters wove between the naked oaks and evergreens with their snow-coated needles. The hounds’ noses were glued to the ground; they scampered around, barking once or twice, pricking their ears up at a promising smell, growling at the scent of wolves. The hunters on foot scurried around after them, while the princes led the horsemen behind at a more leisurely pace.

Royston, one of the royal hounds, suddenly pricked its ears at some unseen trail. Barking madly, Royston dashed forward so fiercely the hound pulled its leash free from its houndsman’s hand. The other dogs lifted their heads as well, then, in a frenzy, all rushed forward towards the trail. The horsemen dug in their spurs: this was a promising lead. Branches whipped their faces and tore at their clothes, but these scratches were utterly unimportant compared to the possibility that Royston might have picked up the silver doe’s trail.

Aldwyn, just as excited as the lords, if not more, scuttled after the horsemen; thorns snagged his tunic and the bag in which a plethora of food was stored, got caught in his tangled, sand-dusted hair, but were ignored with the same impatience the horsemen felt. There was absolutely no doubt Royston had caught scent of the doe; he was Prince Edelhard’s favorite and a prince couldn’t be wrong, now could they? No, of course not, Aldwyn would never worry about that; but he did worry about one thing: not being able to catch up to the horsemen in time and miss the death of the doe.

His worries were proven quite unfounded, however. As the gullible child arrived panting next to the horsemen, he found them glaring at the pack of hounds and Royston, who was scrabbling at a frozen rabbit hole. Prince Edelhard yanked on his horse’s reins, heading away, muttering something about ‘hedonistic dogs;’ the rest of the lords followed close behind, cursing the dogs as well for wasting their time on rabbits.

 Prince Aidan paused before Aldwyn. ‘Enjoying the hunt?’ he asked the child.

‘Yes, v-very mudge,’ Aldwyn answered, amazed at the prince’s attention, although immensely mad at himself: he could barely speak through his chattering teeth. The prince smiled, then jumped down from his mare’s back, lifted the boy as though he weighed no more than a feather, and set him on the horse’s back. He then mounted as well, before spurring the mare forward.

Aldwyn could not believe his luck. First, he was allowed to hunt with the princes, then to ride with one. How could this be possible?

However, he shed all thoughts of this, and indeed all other thoughts as well, when they rejoined the lords and found them already following another trail discovered by the dogs. This also proved to be a false trail, to the detriment of the dogs’ reputations. Another trail, another disappointment, another trail, another disappointment; these made up a considerable part of the night.

Around midnight, Prince Edelhard called for a rest. He, like all the others, was driven dangerously near insanity by the hounds; they would bark and scamper at the faintest scent of a hare, growl and yelp at the odor of wolves, or randomly snap at the other hounds. All esteem the horsemen had previously held for their hounds rapidly evaporated over the course of the few hours since the start of the hunt.

Aldwyn distributed bread, cheese, and cold roast fowl among the lords, who sat disgruntled on the frozen ground; however, just as they were eating, Royston began barking loudly at another unseen trail. The hunters ignored the hound, but, unfortunately for him, he persisted in his call for attention. The lords’ patience was already at its limit, but with the nonstop yelping, it finally snapped. Several lords rose to their feet at the same time, ready to strangle the hound; but Aldwyn was quicker, and aimed a kick in Royston’s direction. The hound bolted away through the snow-clad forest without need of further persuasion.

Prince Edelhard half-rose from the ground as he saw the hound run away, but Aldwyn quickly told him, ‘My liege, I can go after Royston if you want.’

‘Do,’ the prince replied. ‘Aidan, will you accompany him?’

‘Certainly, Edelhard.’ Aidan mounted the horse, lifted up Aldwyn and set him in front, and they were gone with a jab of the spurs. Royston’s frantic barks echoed up ahead as the trees rushed past.

The prince and the lad suddenly emerged into a snow-coated clearing. Royston was already there but had stopped barking. He was set in a hunting crouch, ready to spring, ready to attack—her. The doe.

The famed silver doe stood before them. There was no mistaking her: every hair on her body glistened as though it was dipped in liquid silver; her palladium hooves were polished until every single moonbeam reflected off the snow was caught in their luster, given a new life of a thousand sparkles. In that instant, Aldwyn’s mind suddenly grasped the immensity of such a treasure as the doe. This single being, once killed, could bring fountains of gold, mountains of silver, seas of jewels. She could bring immunity from death and old age, allow them to avoid the torture of the slow rotting of the brain and body as their life marched on, allowing them to skip over the endless abyss of death.

‘The silver doe,’ Aidan whispered in awe, and Aldwyn suddenly knew the prince was having the same thoughts as himself; and in that same moment, he remembered that in all the times Prince Aidan had gone to hunt the doe, not once had he seen her. A sudden streak of disdain flashed through Aldwyn’s heart; but no, that couldn’t be. Aidan was all-powerful, all-knowing. But to have hunted the same doe dozens of times, without even having seen her, was—there was no other word for it—pathetic.

A part of him was full of disgust for the prince’s lack of ability; but another part was still full of admiration for the same person. Aldwyn felt torn in two, unsure where to turn, where to flee, where to hide; but as Aidan turned towards him, he shoved it all down, becoming his usual, obedient self once more.

Urgency illuminated the brown irises of the prince. ‘Aldwyn, go and get Edelhard and the others at once. Tell them the doe is here. Run, as fast as you can. Go!’

Aldwyn found himself stumbling forward, back toward the lords, away from the silver doe and the one who had once been his idol—and then he was there, gasping before Edelhard, panting out the words, without quite knowing how he had gotten there—then he was on the horse behind Edelhard, clutching at the prince’s crimson mantle, without quite knowing how he had gotten there—

Different scenes were flashing before his eyes: a gasp of snowy thorns, the prince’s mantle billowing like liquid blood, a branch hitting his cheek—and then the fog clouding his eyes cleared, and he was in the clearing, still behind Edelhard. The doe had not moved, and was watching them with eyes sparkling with disturbing clarity. ‘Shoot her,’ Edelhard hissed at his brother. ‘But not in the heart. We will share the treasure, but only one of us can gain immortality, and since I am the heir, I—’

 ‘Quiet,’ Aidan hissed back—with a glare that showed he did not only mind the volume of his brother’s words. He slowly drew an arrow, armed his bow, then drew back the bowstring; the doe did not move, and watched them with her large dark eyes that threw off the moonbeams cast at them. Aidan narrowed his eyes, concentrating on his target; his fingers loosened, but in that same moment, his brother’s words suddenly emerged before his eyes, clouding them with rage; and he viciously let go of the bowstring. The sudden movement put the arrow off-balance, and it missed the doe by a hair. The silver doe, frightened, leapt away, and before Aidan could draw another arrow, had already disappeared between the trees.

‘You imbecile!’ Edelhard spat at his brother. The crown prince looked like he wanted to rebuke Aidan some more, but instead spurred his horse towards the doe. Aldwyn grabbed a fistful of the prince’s mantle as Edelhard dug the spurs ever deeper into the horse’s sides. Their plunge into the forest was wild and frantic; they barely missed an oak tree before having to careen away from a birch to avoid collision. The doe soon reappeared, as swift as the wind, before them; her pace grew ever faster. The lords were left far behind as Edelhard’s horse, pushed to its limits, stretched its pace to match the doe’s, who was effortlessly staying ahead of them. The horse started to lag behind as the doe continued fleeing, despite the spurs the prince dug into its flanks.

Then suddenly the horse’s hooves were not thudding on frozen earth but resonating against ice: they had emerged onto a frozen lake, two dozen yards wide and five dozen yards long. The doe, light as a feather, had already clip-clopped to its center, and was now watching them with the same unnerving gaze.

 ‘Go find the others,’ Edelhard said. ‘No, no, wait, don’t. I can’t call them.’ He seemed to be talking to himself more than to Aldwyn now. ‘I can’t go out onto the ice; what if it breaks? But I can’t shoot her either, since I have no arrows. And even if I did have them, my shooting skills are…well, atrocious. No, I have to get her to come towards me so I can kill her with my sword. I can’t ask the lords to go out onto the ice to make her come towards me; I can’t—I can’t, they would never agree to risk their lives for me, and once there, they might kill the doe instead of me. But what shall I—’

 It was like lightning had struck the prince. He turned towards Aldwyn with a perturbing smile. ‘You,’ he breathed. ‘You are light enough, aren’t you? And you are loyal to me. Will you, my dear lad, do me a favor and go chase the doe towards me? You will be richly rewarded for it, of course.’

In that moment, Aldwyn forgot all his previous contempt for the princes; he nodded eagerly, wanting nothing more than to prove his worth to Edelhard. The cause of this sudden change of heart was not the reward; indeed, the mere suggestion that the crown prince needed him was enough to reduce him to a puppet.

‘All right,’ said Prince Edelhard. ‘Now, I want you to go around the lake to its other side; then, I want you to wave your arms and yell, as loudly as you can, at the doe, to scare her towards me. If that doesn’t work, step out onto the ice, get as near as you can to the doe, then do the same thing again. If it still doesn’t work, throw this knife towards her; aim for her shoulder or back. You must not, under ANY circumstance, kill her, understand?’

‘Yes my liege,’ replied Aldwyn; he grabbed the knife offered by the prince and ran off. The distance around the lake he ran in the blink of an eye, or so it seemed; once he arrived at the other side, at no amount of waving and yelling would the doe move. Time, who had previously been rushing its course like a swift-flowing river, suddenly became a slow, sticky stream of honey, gluing Aldwyn’s eyes to one specific thing: the doe.

Aldwyn slowly shifted his gaze to his foot, stepped onto the ice, tested it; it seemed solid enough, but… ‘Stop imagining things,’ he whispered to himself. His other foot inched out almost against his will; but he made no effort to stop it. He tested the ice again, put pressure on the soles of his feet. It held.

Now his gaze was everywhere but on the ice; his heart skipped at the slightest hint of a crack. He stepped forward again, tested the ice again, stepped forward, tested the ice, stepped, tested. It took an eternity for him to get near the doe. Aldwyn’s gaze roved over the forest for several moments; there was no sign of the lords, except for Prince Edelhard, waiting beside his horse. Where were they? Why did they take so long in coming?

Aldwyn was now only two dozen feet away from the doe. Never before had he noticed how her pelt shone in the moonlight; her hooves tinkled lightly on the ice as she stepped towards Aldwyn. He did not even wonder at the movement, did not question her wisdom of going towards the enemy. He was entranced by her beauty, her purity, which he himself possessed, unknown to him, in a boundless quantity; but his beauty and purity was marred by the chains entrapping them, the iron links of his mindless devotion to the princes.

That same mindless devotion drove him out of the doe’s enchantment over him; he tightened his grip on the prince’s knife, stepped towards her again. The doe mirrored his movement. This time, he wondered at her; was it bravery, or idiocy, that made her step forward so?

His eleven-year-old brain could not fathom the meaning of her movement; but resolutely, he took another step forward—so did the doe.

This made him stop. Why did the doe come towards him? Could she not see the knife in his hand? Or maybe it was because she was a dumb beast, like all other animals. But somehow he could not bring himself to believe this. Her eyes did not allow him to: they were strangely dark and calm and…human.

Impossible. That was impossible. Animals were mindless creatures; there was no reason for her movement towards him, unless it was a lack of wisdom or of intelligence. He steeled himself and stepped forward again; only this time he did it without the caution he had previously used. A thin crack appeared underneath his foot, but he did not notice it; his gaze was fixated on the doe. He was now only three feet away from her. He slowly raised the hand holding the knife, his eyes never leaving hers; the moonlight shimmered against her pure black irises. The knife was poised above her head, but she did not run, as though she was not afraid of him, of the knife—of death.

The knife suddenly left his hand. The moon’s beams gleamed upon its blade as it soared away from Aldwyn and landed upon the ice. Half a dozen cracks emanated from both the ice under the knife and the boy.

Aldwyn could not comprehend what he had just done. He had thrown the knife away from the doe, disobeyed the prince; he had spared her life. His eyes glanced towards the knife, unbelieving—then turned his head back towards the silver doe. His eyes met hers, both sparkling under the beams of the moon.

The boy and the doe stood under the waving tendrils of the moon’s beams. They were surrounded by white: the snow-covered forest, the beams of the moon, the ice frosted with stray snowflakes; everything was white. So were they, it seemed, under the light of the moon: both the doe and the boy shimmered like silver ghosts, silent, unmoving. The moon reached down to caress the boy’s features, coating them in an ethereal light; his normally golden hair shone as molten silver, his normally ruddy face had gone pale.

The silence was suddenly ripped apart by Edelhard’s voice. ‘What are you doing? Chase her towards me!’ Aldwyn started as if woken from a spell; his startled mind suddenly remembered his purpose, and how he had not waved and yelled like he was told to do, and had taken out the knife directly. He raised his arms, opened his mouth, took a threatening step forward, and—stopped. At his step, a sharp crack had resounded beneath him. Terror rose up inside him; what if the ice broke? He couldn’t swim; neither could Prince Edelhard; what could he do if he fell into the water?

‘Do it!’ the prince shouted at him, incensed. Aldwyn stepped forward again—to what end he did not know; he only knew that the ice cracked again; a spider web of fissures covered the ice underfoot; but in a last gasp of loyalty, he dove towards the doe, pushing her away towards the prince. The ice gave way; Aldwyn slid down towards the ink-black water; he fell in with a scream. The freezing water paralyzed him for a moment, before he started clawing at it, kicking at it, struggling to make his head stay above the surface. The doe stumbled, staggered; the slab of ice she stood upon started tilting towards the water; and suddenly she was in the water, kicking out blindly with her front hooves. No! The word resounded inside Aldwyn’s head. The doe wouldn’t die, couldn’t die; she was immortal—no, she would make the person who killed her immortal. But she was—or maybe wasn’t—was she immortal? Aldwyn suddenly remembered a crucial detail he had been neglecting throughout the whole night. The old man had said the doe couldn’t be killed; but he was surely lying—the princes were much too wise to waste their time foolishly chasing after the impossible. Or were they? No, the old man had to be lying; of course he was.

Suddenly Aldwyn realized that if he killed the doe, he would live; if he killed that beautiful creature, he would live and—

No. He couldn’t kill her. And more importantly, he wouldn’t try to. Why should that sublimely beautiful beast die, just so he could live? What made his life more precious than hers?

A part of him whispered, ‘If you don’t kill her, both of you will die. Deer know how to swim, but if the water doesn’t kill her, the cold will. Would you rather both of you die, or only her?’

Another part of him retorted, ‘Would you rather live knowing you killed the doe or die knowing you didn’t?’

And suddenly Aldwyn knew. His troubled soul became calm, his mind blank. He would die undefeated, and proud; proud of who he was, of the choices he made. He stopped struggling, only watching the doe as long as he could, watching her still fighting for life; but what was life worth for her? If she escaped, she would still be hunted down by the lords, year after year; and for what? Wealth, which they already had? Or immortality, which they did not need? Why did they try to kill the doe, anyway? The old man had told them she could not be killed. Aldwyn realized he believed the old man. And why shouldn’t he? The old man was not a liar, but the princes were fools. Why strive to attain something that cannot be, for something we do not need?

The water had closed over Aldwyn’s head, but he did not try to stop it. The doe had stopped thrashing as well. Was it because she had finally realized it was useless after all? Everything was dark around him, except for that thin pinprick of light they called the moon. No, there was also light reflected off the doe’s silvery pelt. It looked like polished glass under the water.

Was the moon becoming dim? Why was all light fading? Funnily, Aldwyn felt no need to breathe. His chest had not tightened in lack of air, his eyes had not experienced irritation at being opened so long underwater.

It seemed as though all light was receding. Aldwyn could not spot the doe’s silvery shape, and did not search for her. It was already ended.

His last sight was the waning light of the moon. He never closed his eyes as he sank into oblivion.

Aline Herbreteau is a budding writer, The Follies of Men being her first short story. She currently lives in Shanghai, China; her comparatively short list of hobbies includes doing puzzles and playing the piano.