The prince saw a portrait of the king. The king was dressed like he had been earlier at the palace: a golden crown on his head and a magnificent ceremonial robe draped over his body. But the expression on his face was different: There was no longer dignity and wisdom in his eyes. Instead, a complex mixture of emotions could be detected: awakening from a dream, confusion, shock, sorrow… and behind them all was a terror that couldn’t be fully expressed, as though his closest companion was attacking him with a sword.
“The portrait of the king is finished,” said Needle-Eye.
“Very good.” The prince nodded at the portrait. The torches reflected in his irises, as though his soul burned in deep wells.
Miles away in the palace, the king disappeared from his bedchamber. In his bed, held up by posts carved into the shapes of four gods, the blankets still retained his body heat, and the sheets still retained the impression of his weight. But of his body, there was no trace.
The prince picked up the finished painting and threw it on the floor. “I will have this mounted and framed and hang it on the wall here. I’ll come here from time to time to look at it. Paint the queen next.”
Needle-Eye flattened another sheet of snow-wave paper with the obsidian slab, and began to paint the queen’s portrait. This time, the prince did not stand to the side to observe, but paced around in the bunker. The empty space echoed with his repetitive footsteps. This time, the painting was done in only half the time it took to do the first.
“My king, the portrait of the queen is finished.”
“Very good.”
In the palace, the queen disappeared from her bedchamber. In her bed, held up by posts carved into the shapes of four angels, the blankets still retained her body heat, and the sheets still retained the impression of her weight. But of her body, there was no trace.
In the garden outside the palace, a hound seemed to detect something and barked loudly a few times. But the sounds were instantaneously swallowed up by the boundless darkness, and it fell silent in fear. Trembling as it shrank into seclusion, it melded with the night.
“Is the princess next?” asked Needle-Eye.
“No, paint the ministers first. They are more dangerous. Of course, paint only those ministers who are loyal to my father. Do you remember them?”
“Of course, I remember everything. I can paint a picture of each strand of hair on their bodies and head—”
“Just do it. Hurry. You must finish before sunrise.”
“That will not be a problem, my king. Before dawn, I will paint a portrait of each minister loyal to the old king, and the princess.”
Needle-Eye flattened several sheets of snow-wave paper and began to paint like mad. Every time he finished a portrait, the subject disappeared from his or her bed. As the night flew by, the enemies of Prince Ice Sand turned one by one into pictures on the wall of the bunker.
Princess Dewdrop was awakened by insistent, loud knocks. No one had ever dared to knock on her door like this before. She got up and came to the door, which had just been opened by Auntie Wide.
Auntie Wide had been Dewdrop’s wet nurse, and then cared for her as she grew up. The princess felt closer to her than even her own mother, the queen. Auntie Wide stared at the captain of the palace guards outside the door, whose armor still gave off the chill air of the night.
“Have you gone mad? How dare you wake the princess! She hasn’t been sleeping well the last few nights.”
The captain ignored Auntie Wide. He bowed slightly to Dewdrop. “Princess, someone wants to see you.” Then he stepped aside, revealing an old man.
The old man’s white hair and beard surrounded his face like silver flames. His gaze was both sharp and deep. This was the man who had been in the first portrait shown to the prince by Needle-Eye. His face and cape were caked with grime, his boots were covered in mud, and he carried a large canvas bag on his back; clearly, he had been on a long journey.
But, oddly, he was holding up an umbrella. Stranger still was the fashion in which he held it: The umbrella spun nonstop in his hand. A closer examination of the umbrella revealed his reason: The pole and the canopy were both pure black, and at the tip of each rib was a small sphere made of some translucent, weighty stone. The stretchers for the ribs within the umbrella were all broken and could not hold the canopy up. Only by spinning the umbrella continuously to make the stones fly up could the canopy be kept open.
“How can you allow random strangers in here? And such a strange old man at that,” said Auntie Wide.
“The sentries stopped him, of course, but he said”—the captain of the guards gave an anxious look to the princess—“that the king is already gone.”
“What are you talking about? You
But the princess said nothing. Her hands clutched at the front of her nightgown.
“But the king really has disappeared, as has the queen. My men said that both bedchambers were empty.”
