Then he pulled her to him and kissed her.
The prince saw them, while he was at the door of the hall, and felt a slight hint of jealousy, perhaps the first of his young life, but he chased it away immediately, decisively. He came back and announced his arrival noisily. The parents, unaware, greeted him with a smile, welcoming him in their arms.
Later his father asked him to accompany him to check an old fortification guard. Located at quite a few kilometers distance from the castle in a north-eastern direction, it had been built close to a massive stone bridge and, from very ancient times, with its severe bulk, it reminded those who passed by there that its authority was impervious to any pleas.
In reality, it was no longer serving any practical functions and had remained little more than a symbol, but the king was strongly and ambiguously tied to it, since it was there that his father had once locked him up after he had rebelled , and there he had also learned to know, in solitude, the value of a true friendship, when an old childhood companion of his had left his noble home for him and challenged the king's vengeance to remain with him.
Even now, every time he returned, the sovereign felt a mixture of repulsion and love for that place, which had seen him quiver with anger, fear, resentment as well as physical and moral impatience with the petty rules of the court and that, at the same time, had accompanied each passing day with the sounds of the sweet surrounding countryside and had finally seen a warm and splendid relationship develop between two young people.
The king wanted his son to know what he had felt, imprisoned in that bare and uncomfortable fortress to look at the life that happened undisturbed out there, in the waters of the river, in the woods and the fields; about his long conversations with his favorite friend and their ardent dreams about the future. Unfortunately, those dreams had never really come true because life had soon defeated them both, one with death, and the other with a scorching betrayal.
Certainly, the king realized that the child was perhaps too small to be able to understand what he felt, and he knew he was likely not able to find the right words to explain himself clearly.
How can a man express his soul in words, his desires and his follies, his instincts of life and death and emotions that are stirred without a reason in the heart, maybe only at the sight of flowering grass swaying in the warm summer wind or a swarm of fireflies wandering in the night, or the scent of freshly harvested hay, symbolizing work, hard work and hopes?
The king ignored it, but he wanted at all costs for the prince to understand that.
They arrived on horseback, along the narrow road that came from the woods and opened up from behind the tower, not the main road that crossed the bridge and touched the base of the building, passing it on the right, before continuing towards the mountain and the pass that led to the state borders. That was the way the king himself had followed then, in his restless youth, escorted by his father's guards, in order not to have to cross the village, a little further down the bridge, lying halfway up the hill like a small flock of sheep, protected on one side by the fortress and on the other by the city, perhaps farther away, but even more oppressive than the shadow of the tower itself.
This is the only thing his father had granted him in his fury: to be able to avoid the derision of the people, who knew of his rebellions and certainly had to have at least partly shared them and that now would put him in the pillory for his miserable failure, as always happens when a strong man falls and the weak take advantage of it by taking a petty revenge.
The king dismounted and held out a hand to his son, who jumped down with the agility of a squirrel; they moved forward holding the horses by the reins and the king ordered their companions to wait for them outside the tower, near the bridge.
They tied the animals to the iron rings set in the ancient walls and began to climb up the old stone stairs that led to the sentinel quarters in the look-out tower.
The father never left the boy’s hand, although he wanted to run ahead.
The air smelled of dripping wood and stagnant smoke, though no one had been guarding the structure for many years. In the darkness, a bat brushed their heads in fear and the prince shook briefly, but immediately held his fear at bay. The king smiled in the dark and squeezed his small hand, sweating profusely with emotions and tension, which seemed to go from one to the other.
The king felt his heart beat decrease with every step and his breath becoming more and more frantic, certainly not due to physical fatigue; only with great effort could he control the urge to run up those steep stairs and go to open the first-floor window to breathe the clean air of the countryside. Had he been alone he would have done it and then he would have felt better immediately, free from the phobia that made him hate enclosed places and that even in his dreams often made him go crazy and scream. But he couldn't risk having the child trip on those loose stones only to fall downstairs. So, he tried to be calm and to talk to the prince, reassuring him that they were almost there and that they would see the light again and breathe again ...
In truth the boy was not afraid, trusting his father would protect him, and his emotion was not merely greed of discovery and expectations, but he felt that the great king was nervous and anxious, and he wanted to arrive quickly on top of the tower.
He spoke to him, yet not to him.
As if the words said were to be heard by an invisible being that only the king saw and heard.
Finally, they came to the first floor of the tower and the king opened the window: a flood of light hit them, and they narrowed their eyes for a moment.
The first to reopen them was the young prince who, despite being busy more than anything else to look around with his usual curiosity, did not miss the fact that his father had an odd look that he had never seen on anyone.
Not the teacher when he was angry and scolded him almost turning his face purple, nor the advisers when they listened to the king's orders submissively and unhappy, or to the servants when they were tired or came to implore help from the queen crying from the daily worries and troubles. His father had a similar appearance: his face was almost twisted in a grimace of pain and slightly beaded with sweat, his eyes closed, and his mouth half open as if short of breath, his head rather tilted forward.
The prince's gaze ran to his hands and he noticed that one of them was open and rested on the panting chest of the king and the other, clenched in a fist, had not yet left the bolt of the shutters, as if glued to it.
" Father " the child asked in a faint voice " are you fine?”
The king did not answer, and the prince was frightened to see that his face was getting paler and that two tears were now flowing silently, sliding down his cheeks until they were lost in the thick of his beard.
" Father, please, don't you feel well? Should I call someone?”
He was about to turn around and go down, despite the fear of retracing the dark stairs by himself.
" No " the king finally answered " just a moment.”
He opened his eyes again, breathed deeply two, three times, the painful grimace disappeared from his face, the hand that clawed the window handle relaxed and he turned to his son, still dominated by the fear that his father might be ill.
"I'm fine," he said. "You don't need to be dismayed."
" Excuse me, but I thought something similar to what happened to the old gardener last year was happening to you.”
" Hey, take it easy! I'm not yet at that point" grumbled the king" And then what do you know about these things?”
" I was with him when he felt sick and his face turned grey with pain, and he squeezed my hand so hard it made my fingers bleed. Forgive me, father, but you looked sick a little while ago.”
" It's true I was sick, but not in the sense that you think.”
" And how then?”
" I was thinking of an old friend of mine who died a long