| THE LORELEI SIGNAL |
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| Written by Suzanne Sykora / Artwork by Lee Kuruganti |
| My Unicorn Summer |
I’ll never forget the summer I turned 17, the summer Bunbury, our snug and smug little town, lost its mind.
The fun started when Bill Wylie slipped out of the barracks to hunt red deer in Tanglenook Forest. A flinty
sergeant in King Cuthbert’s guard, and a man not known for swilling strong drink or telling outrageous tales,
Bill later told anybody who’d listen, grey eyes agleam as though he’d seen a wonder:
“I swear I saw a unicorn at Mirror Pond, pale as milk and peering at his own reflection. When I dropped my
bow he raised his head, and that’s when I saw his single horn, plain as a silver candlestick, before he bolted
off like an arrow.” Soon King Cuthbert posted a reward of 10 gold pieces for the unicorn, caught alive.
Back then I was just a baker’s apprentice, serving sour old Widow Farthing; and a sour old time I had of it
too, getting up before dawn to mix her dough and fire up her wood-burning ovens, hungry all the time as a
starveling mouse. Sometimes the yeasty smell of the baking made me dizzy; and sometimes I dreamed of
buying my freedom, but I’d no coin to spare. My contract with the widow had another year to run, and run I
did with that red-faced, wincing scold at my heels the live-long day.
It’s true I was clumsy, and stubborn as a mule. One morning I dropped a bowl of eggs. “Get down to the
market, Jacky,” she roared, “and fetch us a dozen more. And pay for them yourself, you oaf. That will teach
you to take better care.” Snatching up a basket I skipped out the door, trying not to grin, for I’d hatched a
plan to come at King Cuthbert’s gold.
Legend has it, you know, that to catch a unicorn you need a virgin maiden; and these were in short supply in
our town because of the castle barracks with all its handsome knaves. I myself didn’t fit the bill, though
nobody knew but me and the one who’d lured me into Tanglenook Forest that May, after the Maypole dance.
Still I thought I knew where to find Bunbury’s last virgin.
My cousin Leah, just 14 and pious as a plaster saint, lived out on her mother’s farm, trudging into town on
market days to sell fresh eggs and cheese. After I dropped the widow’s eggs on purpose, I ran down to
Leah’s stand in the square. She looked neat and sweet in her pink apron, blue eyes round as a china doll’s,
blond braids stiff as twigs.
“Have you heard the news, Jacky?” she greeted me.
“What’s up, cousin?” I shook the flour from my rumpled skirt before giving her a hug.
“The seamstress says Dr. Brine is missing from the castle. Yesterday he went to catch the unicorn and never
came back.”
My heart skipped a beat, but I didn’t let on. I’d a bone to pick with the king’s favored quack. “But you can’t
catch the beast with herbs or potions.”
“Well Puccio’s trying to catch him with magic, the seamstress says, for his travelling show.”
I rolled my eyes and swallowed a curse (I’d a bit of a history with Puccio too). “Everybody’s hungry for the
king’s gold.” I patted my growly stomach. “The butcher’s boys have dug a pit in the woods into which the
beast should fall. The hangman’s wife is knotting a net of ropes, but I’ve got a better idea.” I winked. “Trust
me, cousin; we’ve got to hurry.”
“Haste makes waste,” she said primly.
“And a trick in time saves me and mine.”
“Where did you hear that proverb?”
“I just made it up.”
“Well my mum says you’re a pert miss, and I shouldn’t listen to a word you say.”
“But, you always do.”
~ * ~
Out beyond where our town cuts wood for winter Tanglenook Forest grows dense and wild. Though nobody
had seen a bear for years, my heart beat hard as daylight faded. Almost time to light the lantern I’d filched
from the widow.
“Don’t you think this is far enough?” Leah quavered. “We might get lost, or eaten by a bear.”
I hesitated. Mirror Pond, where I’d gone fishing as a child, still lay a weary walk away; and even if we caught
the unicorn, Widow Farthing would beat me with an oven paddle for sneaking out at night. I’d left a sack of
flour in my bed, with the covers bunching over it; but knowing the widow she’d notice a sack was missing
from her storeroom.
Suddenly we heard men arguing, and I pulled Leah behind a bush. “What are you doing in this trap?”
shouted a deep, hoarse voice like Puccio’s.
“I didn’t fall into it on purpose,” shrilled Dr. Brine’s. “I was just gathering herbs to make the king a laxative.”
“Let’s run away,” Leah whispered.
“Let’s see what they’re up to first,” I said. “Bet they’re looking for the unicorn too.”
Gingerly I stepped towards the voices, and Leah took hold of my skirt like a little girl. Peeking over a bush we
saw three ragged men with torches: the gypsy who’d made my childhood hell, and two of his mob of
strapping sons.
The handsome doctor, his doublet mussed and long hair stuck with leaves, glared up from the deep-dug,
smooth-walled pit like an angry beast at bay: “So you think you can catch a unicorn?” The gypsies all
guffawed. “They don’t exist. Bill Wylie must have seen a goat from the side. Now you pull me out of here,
Puccio—or I’ll get the king to cut off your head and stick it on a pike.”
“My dear medicus,” he said in a mocking tone. “If I left you here to rot our foolish king would never know.”
He beckoned to his glowering sons as if to lead them away.
When Leah stepped forward indignantly, I clapped my hands over her mouth and hauled her back. I knew
Puccio like my own foot; as a child I’d slaved for his travelling show. With a grin he could kick us into the pit
and leave us to starve with the doctor.
“Let’s make a deal,” Brine wheedled as the gypsies pretended to walk away. “If you pull me out of here, my
friends, I’ll put in a word for you with the king.”
“King Cuthbert wants a unicorn,” Puccio said slyly, stepping back to the lip of the pit, “and I’ve got a snow-
white goat with horn buds. Can’t you help me out with your surgical skills?”
“That would be a fraud,” Brine said with a huff.
“So are your expensive herbs and lotions.”
“I saved our king, who loves to be ill, from the charlatans who purged and bled him half to death. I’ve never
done any damage to his health.”
“Come along, my good medicus; you’re too wise to waste.” When Puccio snapped his fingers one of his sons
pulled a coil of rope from his cloak and tossed the end to Brine. “Consider this an experiment: can we build
ourselves a unicorn?”
“Can you believe it?” Leah moaned. “Both of them such knaves.”
“That’s old news,” I hissed. “And both of them make a splendid living.”
Now the men went striding off together, headed for the gypsy’s camp, I thought. I waited till they vanished
over a ridge and then lit our lantern with my flint. The candle offered a flimsy glow. The wild old trees seem to
harbor weird faces in their low branches and twisting roots. Better not to look too close…Leah’s teeth started
to chatter.
“I want to go home,” she whined, scrunching up her face as if she’d burst into tears. “When my mum finds out
I’m not abed she’ll think I snuck away with the red-headed archer.”
“Just a little longer, dear. Legends say the unicorns are fierce and shy. I sure wouldn’t go trotting around till
most folks were abed.”
The moon was rising, wafting veils of silvery light through the tangled trees. Holding high the lantern, I tried
to pick our way towards Mirror Pond. Then an owl called out, “To-whit, to-who,” like a sentinel challenging us
for the password. Leah clutched my free hand, and I heard my heart beating like the Maypole drum. Maybe
Dr. Brine was right and Bill Wylie saw a goat? My young cousin trusted me. How could I risk her life?
Clumsy as ever, soon I stumbled over a log and dropped the lantern. The candle sputtered out, and cursing I
groped for it on the ground. Meanwhile Leah broke down and sobbed: “I never should have listened to you.
You’re always in trouble; you’re a bad girl.” Her snuffling seemed to echo.
“Be still,” I hissed. “There’s somebody here.”
“It’s probably a bear, and he’s going to eat us—and you’ll go straight to Hell! And when I fly to Heaven I’ll tell
my daddy this was all your—”
I bumped into something soft and shrieked, and Leah ran away screaming. Wheeling I saw the pale unicorn,
long horn shimmering in the moonlight. No larger than a goat, he trotted right past me as if I didn’t exist.
Leah—who’d snagged her clothes in a bush—stood blubbering like a fool.
“It’s him!” I yelled and grabbed a stick; and she tore herself free, leaving a piece of skirt on the bush like a
white flag:
“Help me, Jacky—and I’ll never call you a bad girl!”
“You stay still. I’ll try to catch him.” From my pocket I pulled the widow’s clothesline.
Nervously Leah sidled away, the unicorn followed whinnying.
“Sit down,” I pleaded. “Just sit down. He’s supposed to lay his head in your lap.”
“Jacky I’m afraid!”
“Just sit.” His horn looked sharp as a hunter’s spear. Slowly Leah sank to her knees. I held my breath as he
pranced closer. He snorted, and she wouldn’t look him in the eye. Gracefully he folded his forelegs then and
lowered himself to the ground, turning his horn so it pointed past her body.
Now he lay still, head in her lap, I could see him clear: more delicately built than any horse, with a fine arching
neck, and a silvery tuft of beard beneath his chin. His horn didn’t look silver like Bill said, but pearly grey and
whorled like a shell. I’d never seen such a beautiful animal. Could I capture him with Leah?
Slowly and softly, step by step, I snuck up on him…When I tried to slip the clothesline around his neck he
tossed his head and snorted at me, his wide eyes flashing like lightening. No, he didn’t want to be caught by
me; my heart wasn’t pure.
“What are we going to do?” Leah whined as my efforts to tie him failed. “My feet are cold and I’m hungry as a
bear. And when my mommy finds out—”
“Let’s head for Mallow Farm and see if he follows you.” I felt hungry too and exhausted. Catching a unicorn
isn’t easy, and this one had a will of his own.
To my surprise he followed Leah back through the woods like a baby lamb. Where the trees grew apart he
walked beside her, and she draped her arm over his neck. He even let her pet his curly mane.
At length we caught sight of the rutted road that runs along the forest. “He seems pretty tame,” she said
thoughtfully. “He’d make a nice pet, unusual. Why people would visit Mallow Farm just to see him standing in
a paddock. I could charge them a penny apiece.”
“We’re going to sell him to the king,” I reminded her. “We’ll split the gold; that was our deal. You can buy your
herd of spotted cows, and I can tell the widow where to stow her loaves.”
“She always put them in her cupboard, Jacky.”
“Never mind.”
Sleepy and footsore, we finally crossed Mallow Farm’s east meadow, reaching the tumbledown shed where I
planned on hiding our prize. Now the stubborn creature wouldn’t follow Leah inside, glaring back at me as if
I’d insulted him.
“It’s just for one night,” I told him though I doubted he understood. “Tomorrow you’ll meet our glorious king,
who can offer you a better accommodation.”
“Good little unicorn.” Leah tried to shove him through the doorway. “Do what my cousin Jacky says. She’s
smarter than the two of us added up.” My idea to hide him was a rotten one, though, as you’ll soon hear. But
I was afraid a villain like Puccio would try to steal him.
So I tugged him inside by the silky beard, while Leah prodded him with a stick. Why didn’t he didn’t kick our
teeth in then, or run us through with his sharp horn? Maybe unicorns have principles. Maybe they’re more
honorable than most men?
“He’s stubborn as you,” Leah said smugly, bolting the creaky door behind him. I felt a pang of guilt for leaving
him alone there, without water or hay. What had he done to deserve this? He’d fallen for Leah because she
was a virgin, just like the legends say.
She and I were greedy pigs. Already I was counting King Cuthbert’s gold, and imagining Widow Farthing’s
grimace when I boasted I’d open my own bakery—right across the street.
By now dawn was glowing as bright as my dreams. “I’ll head for the castle straight away,” I told yawning
Leah. “Before Puccio the crook and Brine the quack show up with their doctored goat.”
~ * ~
As I staggered up the last of seven flights of stairs, I saw farmers and town folk milling around outside the
castle’s walls. A guard held a parasol over the sunburned scalp of our pint-sized king, while Puccio, in a
turban of emerald green, posed beside a gaily painted wagon. On it, in a red lacquer cage, a small white goat
stood blinking its eyes. A lone horn protruded from its forehead.
I looked around in vain for Dr. Brine: too embarrassed to attend this show? Then I tried to catch King
Cuthbert’s eye. He ignored me, so I shouted:
“That beast is a fake, your majesty: an ordinary goat!”
“Balderdash,” the red-bearded gypsy cried. “Sire, I caught this creature in the woods.” With his shovel-sized
hands he mimed reeling in a fighting fish. “I used a spell handed down all the way from the pharaohs of
Ancient Egypt.”
“Puccio,” I bellowed, “you’re a shameless crook!”
“Who’s the loud wench?” I heard from all sides. “Isn’t that Widow Farthing’s drudge?”
Before I could open my mouth again, guards grabbed me like a bag of fresh pretzels and hustled me before
the king. “Wench, you dare to criticize our royal unicorn?” Cuthbert mopped his forehead with a fine lace
hanky and dropped it over the nose of his dwarf. “I could have you drawn and quartered this morning. I could
have you hung from our battlements.”
“Your majesty, I was in the woods last night—”
“Don’t listen to her, sire,” Puccio broke in. “The wench is a good-for-nothing liar.”
“And how would you know?” The corners of Cuthbert’s mouth turned up as if expecting a royal joke.
“She used to work for my show as a cook’s helper. I bought her off her pauper uncle. She’s stubborn as a
beast and does what she likes, so I sold her on to the Widow Farthing.”
“Sire,” I said boldly. “I may be known for my strong will (and with my life I’ve needed it) but it’s Puccio who’s
the liar. Last night I overheard him plotting to fool you with that—”
“This is a perfect unicorn,” Cuthbert cried with the faith of an eye-shut fool. “Just look at his horn. When it’s all
grown in we can have shavings made. We can powder them on our food to purge it of all poisons.”
“A brilliant idea, my lord.” From behind a spreading tree stepped Dr. Brine. He wore a new black velvet
doublet, and his lean face looked flushed. With shame at his part in this farce?
“And you’re no better than Puccio, quack!” I burst out at him like a cannon. “It’s your skilled hands that
doctored that goat.”
“This child doesn’t know what she’s saying, sire,” Brine said evenly, over my head. “She’s young and
impulsive--”
“Sure am. I fell for you at the Maypole dance…”
“Guards,” cried the King and stamped his foot. “Give our favored magician his reward.”
So all of the men, working together, turned their backs on spitting-mad me, and I had to watch while that
villain Puccio collected 10 pieces of gleaming gold. Grinning, he drove off down the hill in his painted wagon,
leaving his fraud behind.
Stubborn as a stump I waited till nobody was watching me, and I reached into the cage and tugged that
goat’s horn. He bleated as it came off in my hand.
“You see this?” I yelled at our foolish king. “This end’s all sticky with glue!”
“Well he was a perfect unicorn.” Cuthbert mopped his brow and threw the embroidered hanky at me. (Maybe
he meant it as a bribe, but I let it lie.) “And he can be perfect once again, if somebody only fixes his horn.
Brine, my medicus, I want you to do it.”
“That will be an honor, sire.”
“Do what you like; it’s a goat,” I shouted as two guards hauled me away.
Hurrying after us Brine ordered quietly, “Let her free,” and they did. “Hush, my girl,” he murmured in my ear.
“The placebo effect is real, so if our king believes in unicorn powders they will keep him well. It’s what people
believe that matters in life.”
“So if I believed you really loved me, John, you would?”
For a moment he looked sheepish. But sheep never blush cherry red.
“Go back to your loaves, Jacky Mayfair,” he said. “Baking is what you understand.”
~ * ~
I’d show him. I turned away. That arrogant, selfish twit! What a fool I’d been at the Maypole dance, opening
my heart to the likes of him, and following him into the forest…
I hadn’t given up on King Cuthbert’s gold. I’d get it back from Puccio. I had to hurry though before his
traveling show moved on.
My young heart burning for revenge on all the men who’d trodden on me, I rattled back down the seven
flights of stairs. Then back down the rutted road I trudged that runs along Tanglenook Forest. To reach
Puccio’s camp I’d have to pass right by the Mallow Farm again. Shouldn’t I stop in for a minute and tell Leah of
my new plan?
~ * ~
When I peeked over a wall she and her mum were gathering onions in the kitchen garden. They didn’t look up
as I ran across the meadow and unbolted the shed’s door. Slipping inside I squinted around in the dim light
filtering through the walls’ chinks. I heard not a snuffle from our unicorn. Had he escaped?
No, he lay hunched in a corner, ribs protruding from his dull coat. Even his horn, pearly grey last night, looked
darker and dull, the color of ashes.
I felt a stab of guilt. “Hey,” I murmured and tapped his cheek. “Fellah, don’t die on me; do you want to
disappoint me too?” He lay still on the dirt floor, barely breathing.
I’d run and fill a bucket at the farmyard’s trough and toss it over him. I couldn’t find a bucket in the shed. Was
I too late? Was he already dying?
“Oh I’m sorry.” I started to cry. “Catching you was my idea.” He opened his wide-set violet eyes. Weakly he
raised his head and nickered. “Me and my great ideas.” I petted his silky mane. “If I only had a penny for
every one…”
The door flung open, and in stepped Leah with a bucket of water and a bundle of hay. “Jacky, you’re back,”
she said with relief. “Can we sell him to the king?”
“No,” I said sharply. “Cuthbert the Fool already bought Puccio’s goat; it’s unicorn enough for him and that
quack Brine.”
“What are we going to do?” she wailed.
“We’ll sell this one to Puccio, for his show. He should pay us the gold he got from the king.”
“Jacky, that’s a great idea…”
The unicorn took one dainty sip from her bucket and raised his head. Mournfully he gazed at me, as if blaming
me for everything gone smash in this broken world. I looked at him, he gazed up at me, and my sore heart
broke and drained; and I felt it filling up again with a pale, soft light.
“We can’t sell him, Leah,” I said slow, hardly believing my own words. “We can’t. ‘Cause we have to turn him
loose.”
“What are you saying? What about our deal? I buy my cows, you buy your bakery. Fine men will marry us for
such dowries.” She flung down her bundle of hay. Our unicorn ignored it.
“Look at him,” I said. He hung his head, and tears like pearls rolled down his cheeks and plopped on the
moldy hay. “He won’t eat anything; he’d rather die. Leah, he needs to be free.”
“So what? He can last till we sell him to Puccio. That’s how farmers sell our horses.”
“Leah, this is not a horse.”
“Jacky—”
Rudely I shouldered her aside, she squealed and tried to pull my hair. I shook her off and pushed open the
creaky door:
“Get out of here,” I yelled at the unicorn, “before I change my mind!” His eyes flashed light, he snorted twice
and went bounding out the door…Wringing her hands, my cousin cursed like a sailor waking from a drunken
revel, only to find that he’s lost every coin.
~ * ~
So that’s what I learned from my unicorn summer: how to give away what I most wanted. Just as well…
Later Dr. Brine told me he made sure Puccio got paid with iron pyrites. That’s “fool’s gold,” if you don’t know.
Only Leah knew about the real unicorn, and she never forgave me for setting him free. Anyhow a few years
later she ran off with her red-headed archer.
And me? I’m still single and busy as a mill. I cannot complain. You see, when Widow Farthing spanked me with
her paddle for slipping out at night, the poor old thing gave herself a heart attack.
And did she leave her bakery to the church in Bunbury, as we all expected? Did she leave it to her distant
cousins, who are all horse thieves, people say? No, she left the Bent Dragon—with all its equipment, and
recipes, and sacks of flour and jars of spices, and lists of happy customers living in our town and roundabout—
she left it all to me. And her testament called me the hardest working apprentice she’d ever employed. And
nobody in town will ever forget it, either. I won’t let them.
So you can say that summer, long ago, I also learned you earn your way: a lesson more precious than true
gold, perhaps.
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Anna Sykora has been an attorney in New York, and a teacher of English
in Germany where she resides with her husband, Karl the Patient, and
three Norwegian Forest Cats. To date she has placed 88 tales in the small
press or on the web, and 157 poems.
Writing is her joy.
in Germany where she resides with her husband, Karl the Patient, and
three Norwegian Forest Cats. To date she has placed 88 tales in the small
press or on the web, and 157 poems.
Writing is her joy.