When the hiss of the steam and the rhythmic chug and huff of the train slowed, the bell clanged and the low and melodious Wooo-Wooo of the engine dragons’ song sounded, signaling the end of the journey.
A porter dressed in the same livery as the messenger who brought Her Highness’s message came to each person and gave him or her a velvet scarf. “Her Highness’s security force insists that all attendees be blindfolded while approaching and entering the palace.”
“Oh, of course,” said the Magistrate.
“Perfectly understandable,” said his wife.
“You’d expect that sort of thing from people guarding a Maharani,” Malady Hide said, as if she knew from personal experience. “I suppose they are all eunuchs.”
“Malady!” her uncle said sharply. She stuck her tongue out at him behind his back.
They were carefully guided along the path by other exotic looking retainers, heavily perfumed with sandalwood and patchouli, which masked the scents of sulfur and blood from the four dragons sitting atop the glacier. The blindfolds also helped mask the dragonish grins which might have unnerved the passengers proceeding to the palace.
Soft drums and wailing strings played as they were seated on cushions before their blindfolds were removed. The lighting was low and atmospheric.
By now the guests were all extremely sleepy, but no one objected, as one might expect people used to both their comforts and to being obeyed might do.
A woman was carried in on a low couch by four husky men. Briciu thought a couple of them looked familiar, but their heads were wrapped with helmets of brightly colored fabric, the room was dim, and he felt it wasn’t important enough to interrupt what might be the making of his fortune.
Another woman bowed into the room and the woman on the couch gestured her to stop groveling. Both the princess and her spokeswoman wore long glistening gowns trimmed with gems and gold embroidery, as well as matching veils on their heads and faces.
Chapter 34
“I Suppose You’re all Wondering Why We’ve Asked You Here”
“Exalted guests,” she said, “I suppose you’re all wondering why we’ve asked you here. Please be patient and all will be explained in due course. Before Her Highness addresses you, I will first refresh for you a history of your own country so that you will better understand the impact of her proposal upon you.”
The princess made a slight noise, and when her spokeswoman salaamed before her to learn her desire, murmured something, and flicked her fingers in the direction of Malady Hide.
“Her Royal Highness has been told you have among you a young scholar most articulate on your local historical matters, and wishes that this person speak first.”
Malady, stuffed as full of her own importance as she was on the little cakes from the journey, stood, suddenly conscious once again of the soot still in her hair.
The Kingdom According to the Queen
“Thank you, Miss Hide,” the spokeswoman said when Malady had finished a version of the same speech she had given at Our Lady of Perpetual Locomotion.
The spokeswoman consulted with the princess again. “Her Highness says she can tell from what you say that you are very unhappy in Argonia. Perhaps you would fancy a position as Her Highness’s attendant?”
A strangled noise came from Her Highness, but it quickly turned into a cough.
Malady nodded primly, but her eyes sparkled. The sparkle faded as first the Seashell Archivist and then the woman who seemed to be simply a spokeswoman told their versions of how modern day Argonia had come from the old one.
People yawned. Some fell asleep. At last Sophronia whined, “We didn’t come here for history lessons, Your Highness, we came to be cut in on the new port, as your letter said.”
“Presently you will be transported to the coast, where the entire project and your part in it will become clear,” said the woman.
“And why’s that?” Briciu asked with a charming, if conspiratorial, smile. He sensed a con. He should have sensed it long ago, but something clouded his perception and besides, he couldn’t seem to care.
“Because you are all traitors or murderers or abusers of the critical Argonian allies, the dragons.”
“Traitors to whom?” the Magistrate asked, sounding puzzled. “Young woman, I am in charge of this country.”
“Sir, you are not,” she replied. “I am.”
She explained how it was that she was still Queen, though she’d been missing for over a hundred years. “I know you people prefer to deny magic, but I travel through time and space so I’ve kept an eye on the realm in various stages of development. I feel responsible, since when I did not return at once to govern, the kingdom fell into chaos. Actually, I like some of what you’ve done. Kings and queens seem a bit old hat these days, and the industry helps us keep up with the rest of the world. I see that. So perhaps a magistrate is the best idea. My daughter is well suited to the task, as I think everyone will see when she commences. But changes are coming, so brace yourselves.”
Her Highness sat bolt upright on her throne. The deception around her was giving her a painful headache and no one had said anything to her about being a magistrate.
“Mother, a word,” Her Highness said, and they sat. The attendees nibbled on the refreshments while they waited with extraordinary forbearance that amazed even Briciu, who was doing quite a lot of forbearing himself.
Five Reasons Not to Be a Princess
Verity pulled her mother into the kitchen. Ephemera was already there, brewing a pot of tea and about to reach for one of the kibble cakes arranged on plates for the guests. Verity snatched the plate away and Ephemera said, “Oh yes. Oh dear. No, I don’t want any of those, do I?” She looked expectantly at Verity.
“Mother, Aunt Ephemera, I understand why you and the others didn’t want to include me in your plans—sort of, but I do think you might have consulted me before announcing that I am to rule the realm. It’s true I’m not good at subterfuge, but you know what else I’m not good at? Ruling Argonia, for pity’s sake! You never actually tried your hand at the whole princessing thing, did you, Mother?”
“No, but not from choice. I was kidnapped by the gypsy side of the family as a baby, for my own protection.”
“That doesn’t change the fact that you weren’t brought up to rule by regal relatives, nor did you win the throne because your army was fiercer than someone else’s. You maybe know how to get the people in your band to do what you want, but you haven’t managed affairs of state before.”
“Perhaps not openly, but as I’ve traveled through time since the Great War, I see the damage the Frostingdungians have done to Argonia under the guise of friendship. I have information to the effect that they engineered the original invasion that caused the war.”
“Excellent. But the war was over a century ago and it was not these particular people who did any of that. I don’t like them or the way they do things, but although I’d do things differently, I haven’t the foggiest idea how to go about it. I’m still a schoolgirl, Mother.”
“Exactly. You’re educated. That makes you more qualified than me. Also, there’s your curse. You know when someone is lying to you or when something sounds wrong.”
“Exactly!” Verity said, “And this sounds wrong.”
“But if we exile them as they deserve, without anyone to rule, the country will fall back into the kind of chaos it did when I could not take the throne.”
“No more than it would if I try to rule the country without authority or support. Nobody outside this castle knows what you do about the war or about how the magic was destroyed and the murder of all of the powerful magical people in the land. Even if I tell them, even if you tell them, they have no reason to believe us.”
“It’s an appointed job. We could insist the current magistrate appoint you in his place.”
“No. I can’t do that. It won’t work.”
Ephemera looked into the small chamber off the great hall, which was not actually
all that great, being about the size of the parlor at Verity’s house. “There’s one other route to exercising your power that I can think of, but I don’t believe there are any eligible princes in our immediate vicinity any longer.”
“Princes be damned!” Mother said with eyes flashing. “Verity can rule in her own right, and banish the current administration. I will not waste this opportunity to bring these tyrants into line! You have the support of at least some of the dragons. Use them.”
“It won’t be helpful to the dragons to encourage them to ravage the countryside as they supposedly did in the olden days,” Verity said. “Some of them like their jobs—the two driving our train here, for instance. And dragon power does work well with the machinery. The dragons must have the choice though and be well-treated and fed proper dragon fare if they sign on. The kibble robs them of their freedom—as you hope it will do for our friends out there.” She turned to Ephemera and said. “I think princes are out of the question. I don’t feel like marrying, certainly not to a stranger, and if I have the support of a prince, assuming he would support my claim, what’s to stop him from using his own power to take over Argonia as Frostingdung has done? It won’t work, I tell you. We need more allies. If only the old wizards and mages and magic folk were still alive, they might help.”
“Or not,” Ephemera said.
“You don’t think the beads will be enough?” Princess Romany/Gypsy Molly/ Mother asked. “Perhaps you could share the magical legacy with their descendants?”
“I have to find them first and that will take time I won’t have if I’m trying to run the country. No, Mother, I’m sorry, but I think you really do have to return these people to Queenston. Briciu and Sophronia should be put on trial for Papa’s murder. Toby and Taz, once they’re exonerated, can bring evidence against them. So can I. But the rest of them—perhaps the magistrate can teach me things if you keep him around. But I do not, under any circumstances, want Malady anywhere near me.”
“Nic will help you, too,” her mother said. “He knows a lot about the law.”
“I wish I were an expert swordswoman or archer or even a good shot,” she said. “I’m pretty good at a scratching, hair-pulling, shin-kicking match. I’ve been in a lot of those and have the expulsion letters to show for it, but those aren’t impressive queenly battle skills. I’m sorry to let you down, Mother. I guess if you want a princess to run the country, you’ll have to do it yourself.”
“If only I could, then I could give you your proper legacy, but as you noted, I am a bit lost beyond tribal politics.”
“I have some ancient songs of binding if you’d like to try one of those to ensure the support of the Magistrate and the others. But they’re a bit limited and can backfire easily.”
“If you aren’t sure, perhaps I should just stay here?” Verity suggested. “According to history, stray heirs to a throne usually become the prey of assassins.”
Ephemera said, “I suppose I could try some of the songs of binding to bend them to our will, but they work best in a magical environment, mind you.”
“If you have the words of power, I have enough juice to make them work,” Verity’s mother said.
“Very well then.” Ephemera patted her bosom absently. “Oh dear, I’m not wearing the frock with the appropriate shells. Verity, dear, do you think you could fetch it for me?”
“I’ll be happy to,” Verity said, and gratefully departed.
Briciu Doesn’t Buy It
Unlike his fellow guests, Briciu had no taste for the little cakes, and ate none of them. He knew as soon as they arrived at Wormroost Castle where they were. Although he couldn’t sneak a peek through his blindfold to see, the glacier emitted its own chill atmosphere and he felt it at once.
In persuading Sophronia to come, he had been following his curiosity as much as anything. The warm water port had sounded too good to be true, which almost invariably meant that it was, and the eligible princess was none other than that wretched great galumph of a girl.
“Perhaps we should take advantage of this brief intermission to seek the privy,” he whispered to Sophronia. She looked a bit surprised, but allowed him to take her hand and lead her from the room, where all of the other guests were reaching again for the platters of cakes.
“What are we really doing?” his lady love asked. “Not that I don’t need to use the privy.”
“I intend to complete some unfinished business and take care of the obstacles in our path to securing your fortune. You run along and find the privy.”
A door opened down the corridor and the girl emerged in her princess disguise, minus the head gear and veil.
He hurried after her. Behind him, the old aunt and the self-proclaimed queen came out of the same room, speaking in low voices, and headed back to the parlor. Excellent. He would be undisturbed.
Down a side corridor, she entered another door. He caught it before it could swing shut. Endless rows of shelving, each crammed with large conch shells, lined the walls. Verity passed by them and into another chamber off the main one. A heavy striped blanket hung in the doorway and she pushed it aside, disappearing behind it.
Noiselessly, he followed.
She sat in front of the shelf, broader than the others, that jutted out from the wall to serve as a desk, and reached far up, away from him, to pick up a shell on a shelf just beyond her reach when seated.
He stole up behind her. She wore multiple strands of sinew strung with glass beads and small shells around her neck. Those would do nicely! He realized now that he had allowed himself to be carried away by his romantic nature, trying to dispose of her by such colorful means as balloon accidents, supposedly hungry dragons, and oncoming trains.
No, the girl was too durable for that sort of imaginatively staged demise.
As she leaned back, he stole up behind her and grabbed the backs of the sinew thongs and yanked backward, twisting them in his hands as he pulled. She fell backward gagging, her hands flailing, sweeping the shells from the desk with a great clatter. She clawed at her necklaces, but they dug into her long white throat. The beads and shells were going to leave marks, he thought. She was not going to make an attractive corpse.
Talismans and Transformations
When Ephemera and Romany re-entered the meeting in the parlor, their guests had grown restless and, yes, a little frightened, which went to show that the kibble cakes hadn’t completely robbed them of their sense of self-preservation.
“So this has all been a ruse to announce your return and your daughter’s rank?” the Magistrate asked. “There is no warm water port?”
“Not at this time, no. But since those of you on the board of Widderwinds Amalgamated, have been enjoying the resources of our realm, and have assumed the properties and authority once wielded by Argonian citizens who disappeared, I think it’s high time you contribute to it. Most of you will be allowed to do that. Some, however, have committed crimes, including murder, and that we cannot allow—indeed, Mr. Magistrate, you ought not to have allowed. So we have begun to review the land grants and hereditary lines in the records and will be returning much of the property to those from whom it was taken. In the cases where the original owners have disappeared, are missing in action, or were presumed dead, their families should benefit. Perhaps Widderwinds will be able to re-purchase the property. The royal attorney, Mr. Balgair, will be handling all such transactions.”
“But, we built it up, invested heavily in its development.”
Romany nodded at him, saying, “The magistrate looks peckish. Someone give him another cake.”
A distant racket arose and Ephemera immediately turned toward it and walked very quickly from the room, crying, “The shells! Someone is breaking the shells.”
At that moment, Romany noticed that Briciu and Sophronia were missing from the audience. She began to run.
Tagliaferro the Transformer
The harder Verity tried to release herself from Briciu’s grasp, the harder it was to pull a
ny air into her lungs, she kicked and tried to punch backward, tried stepping back toward him hoping to find his nose with the top of her skull, but he was relentless.
With her last coherent thought, she cried for help, but it was a silent cry, unlikely to bring even the dragons. Dark spots exploded in her eyes.
Pain and burning in her mouth, throat, and chest were the only sensations she could feel until, oddly, she heard the clack of shell against bead and a wisp of colored fog floated like ectoplasm in front of her, then she was engulfed in it. Had one of the wizardly wraiths come to escort her to the other world?
After the first crash and crunch of the breaking shells, her hearing failed as Briciu tightened her necklaces around her neck.
Abruptly, his grip on the necklaces loosened and she gasped in air.
Briciu was the one making the strangling sound now. “What are you?” he asked, clearly not talking to her, She turned her whole body to see the rainbow mist sparkle like it was about to ignite.
The shell that had been digging into her neck answered through her voice, rasping and uneven, “I am the revenant of Tagliaferro the Transformer. You are a murderer, a thief, a liar, and a cheat, but if you had just let me rest, I wouldn’t have made an issue of it. But, no, you had to grab and twist and pull. You were annoying. Now you are a chameleon.”
And with that, Briciu shrank, his clothing puddling on the floor.
Verity’s mother reached her just as Briciu scuttled between her feet, through the crowd of guests, Gypsies, and Fusiliers gathering at the entry, and down the icy corridor. “What happened?”
“When he tried to choke me, he disturbed one of the wizards occupying the shells on Aunt Ephemera’s dress. He had transformative magic so he turned Briciu into a lizard.”
The Dragon, the Witch, and the Railroad Page 31