Last eve the king called me to his council room. I clenched my skirts with sweating hands as I curtsied low before him.

"Witch," he said - my knees trembled at the word - "I have need of your services." His gaze did not rest on me; rather, he picked up a delicate serving bowl from the small table before him and turned it in his hands. It shone in the torchlight, glimmering from some sparkling matter cleverly worked into its clay.

"My Liege," I said, curtsying again, "I am no witch, only a healer -"

"Witch you are. Who but a witch could take a live prince from the belly of my dead queen?" He spoke to the courtier at his side, a tall, thin man in a lacy, soiled tunic. "What good is it for me to have my own witch if I never use her?" The courtier spread his hands in wonder, but the king missed the gesture as he turned to me like a harrier on a mouse, his eyes narrowing. "Witch, I have a question for you to answer. Kill an ewe and examine its entrails. Make a potion and gaze into it. Consult the dead. Do whatever it is your kind do, but bring me my answer at first morning's light."

He raised the bowl high above his head. When it hit the ground, even its breakage was a thing of beauty, its shards bursting outward like a spray of water. I bowed my head. His meaning was clear.

"I have either conquered or married every kingdom within reach of my armies. My fighting force is the greatest in the history of man. I've built alabaster palaces for my wives and children, and gardens for my court that defy description. Musicians and artisans flock to the haven I've created for them; they repay me with a tapestry of ear and eye that fills both day and night. I've not ignored the common folk in the course of my triumphs, no, the roads I've built allow them to transport their wares and tend the fields with less wear on their livestock, and I reduce their taxes by taxing all, rich and poor alike, according to their means.

"Witch, do you suppose there has ever been a kingdom such as mine? You shake your head. Ah, but that is not my question - it takes no magic to answer. My question is this: tell me the future of my kingdom."

Since the day I had delivered the prince, my new home had been a windowless garret with a door that locked on the outside. The guards that escorted me there from the council room were coarse and rude, jesting as they dragged me along faster than I could walk. One of them swept a dozen vials off my worktable, laughing at some unfathomable joke.

"You fool!" I muttered, trying in vain to salvage precious drops from the shards. "One of these might have held a cure for the sores that have plagued you since you visited the village whore." From the sudden silence and his countenance, I realized my offhand comment had rung true, raising yet another welt on the brand of my underserved reputation for sorcery. They left me in silence, and I heard the bar slip into place on the other side of the door.

That night I dreamed of the future of the kingdom. In my dream I saw a child's rag ball, dropped from an unseen hand. It bounced once, twice, thrice, each time lower, then rolled away into a dark corner. I saw a strolling maid who aged as I watched, each step rounding her shoulders into a hunch beneath her whitening hair. Her dreamy song turned to a cackle, then to mews of bewilderment. I saw a soldier fall from his horse and break his back. He tried to use his arms to pull himself away from the stamp of warhorses all around him, scrabbling in the dirt with broken nails. As a hoof descended toward his head, I sat upright in bed, now awake, shaking. I knew I had dreamed the truth.

Am I indeed, then, a witch? No, but I am also not only a healer. I am also a scholar, a reader, a student of man and his ways. I know what happens to that which is built by human hands.

When the king's guards came for me this morning, they were subdued, as if respecting my person. The one I had spoken to - with the affliction - took my arm and looked about to speak to me. Another shook his head and said, "Later." I knew there might be no later for me. Did they not fathom this?

My king waits. What shall I tell him? Shall I lie to spare my life, and say only that he will rule well the vast lands he holds, and that his eldest son will rule well after him? For all I know this may be true. But I trust the king knows this, and asks me a deeper question. What will become of all he has accomplished, all he has conquered? Will it last? Is it a mountain, an eternal testament to his own greatness? Through it, will he live forever?

Foolish man.

Should I tell? Shall I reveal what he would already know were he not blinded by his own unslakable need for immortality? The truth is that the dreams of this peasant, this healer, this unnamed shadow in the corner garret, will surely fail to quench the smoldering nightmares of a king.