The Princess Beard

by Kevin Hearne

  The king smiled as he waved in a goofy sort of way and said, “Hi!”

  “Yes, your highness?” said one of Morgan’s red-shirted crew, bowing low.

  “Oh. No. I was just saying hello.”

  “Yes, your highness?” Another man fell to his knees beside Hye.

  “How many of these guys do you have?” Gustave asked, stroking his fuzzy goatee as he stared covetously at Morgan’s braided beard. “Because you could all just bow at the same time and get it over with.”

  Morgan swept her own bow, hat held tightly on with one hand. “Your majesty, these men are called Hye and Hurlo, and my name is Morgan.” She left out her full title, knowing she was wanted in more than a few cities. “On behalf of the entire crew”—she looked behind herself and jerked her chin at her crew—“we will now bow together and stop wasting your time being obsequious.”

  “That’s a big word,” the king said to Al. “It sounds like it has to do with otters. Does it have to do with otters?”

  “It has to do with grrrroveling, sirrrre.”

  Morgan’s heart lifted as she recognized that gravelly growl coming from behind the centaur.

  “Luc?”

  “Aye, Captain!”

  The yellow-and-red parrot appeared as Morvin walked around Vic to sheepishly bob his head.

  “If it ain’t the lady,” Morvin said.

  But Morgan was too excited to see Luc, and she had never been more honored than when he bridged the gap between them to land on her shoulder, contemplatively kneading her muscle with his black talons.

  “Awww, that’s betterrrr!” he enthused. “Gettin’ quite supple, lass.”

  “Well, I did learn from the best.”

  Otto chittered from Morgan’s hat, and she lifted it to let the otter loose.

  “I think y’all are messin’ with me. It did have to do with otters,” Gustave said.

  But Otto wasn’t cavorting around the king. Quick as a shot and squeaking to himself, the otter ran past Vic and anyone else waiting their turn behind him to make an entrance.

  “Oh, no,” Morgan muttered. “Is there any fish in there that you particularly needed? Because if so, I apologize in advance. It’s gonna get messy.”

  “No fish,” Vic said, grinning. “But you might as well come up and see.”

  Vic turned, and Morgan followed him with Luc on her shoulder, Al by her side, her crew behind her, and the king kind of skipping along with his strange gait in the middle, unworried about being first or last or indeed any sort of protocol, murmuring about tea cakes and how angry his adviser would be when she discovered what he’d done.

  “Well, what’d you do?” Milly Dread asked, for she had somehow taken to walking in step with the king as if it were the most natural thing in the world, and their unsteady steps were very similar in stride length.

  The king shrugged. “I stole my own ship and set sail to a secret island when I was supposed to be in dance class. That’s going to get her goat, know what I mean? She’ll be booking a de-stressing session with her wattle masseuse right about now.”

  “A wattle masseuse! I’ve heard of those. Is it worth it to go see one?” Milly asked, a hand raised contemplatively to her neck.

  Listening to him pace beside the leathery old lady and discuss the various schools of wattle massage in Kolon without shying away from Milly’s general aura of chum and oyster juice, Morgan realized he was a very likable king.

  They took a familiar path, for all that the factory looked completely different. The otter cages had been torn out, replaced with yoga mats and a juice bar, and the barrels of EATUM were gone, leaving only tidy crates of cannonballs and other piratical munitions. The grand door that had once led to “The Boss” had been taken off its hinges and the hallway beyond painted a cheerful and welcoming lavender. The many offices showed clear signs of use, and Gladys was still apparently at lunch, if the dusty sign was to be believed.

  Taking the stairs, they encountered no middle managers dangling from the ceiling or security guards with crossbows, and they soon reached the rooftop. Morgan carefully schooled her face, knowing what she would find on the other side of that door.

  Her friend Tempest, the willowmaw.

  Beautiful and terrible and bloodthirsty, her maw waiting to snap off a stray arm, her waving branches strong as whips, and all her kindness and intelligence fled.

  But what Morgan saw surprised her.

  The last time she’d seen Tempest, the dryad had looked like a gnarled old willow with a thick, twisted trunk. But now the willow looked young and supple, with smooth bark. The capacious maw was barely big enough to fit in a finger, much less an entire arm. And it—she—seemed to be smiling. Otto was gamboling at the tree’s base, chittering like he’d once done with Tempest in the times when she’d given him a good scratch.

  “What happened?” Morgan asked, hurrying ahead to what now looked less like a monster’s mouth and more like a woman’s amused grin.

  “Vic took care of me,” the maw said through lips of tender bark. Tempest’s voice was as soft as leaves swaying in the wind.

  “You can talk!”

  “I can. And it’s almost time.”

  “Time for what?”

  “Tea.”

  Vic appeared, holding a teacup full of…well, something Morgan didn’t want to think too much about. Using a dainty teaspoon, he scooped what appeared to be a flesh smoothie into Tempest’s mouth, her dry lips hungrily sucking.

  “Uh, that doesn’t look like tea,” Gustave said, peering into the cup. “That kinda looks like raw meat. Do I even wanna know?”

  Vic raised an eyebrow at him. “You do not.”

  And then it happened.

  It started in the branches, which shook and swirled as a golden light shone from Tempest’s bark. Her roots pulled up from the rock, and most of her leaves fell to the ground, and the king said, “Oh, wow. That’s pretty special. I did something like that once. Did she eat a boot? Because I used to be…well…different, and then I ate the wrong boot. Or the right boot, I guess. And here I am. Don’t tell anyone I told you that.”

  “What?” Morgan said.

  “What?” the king responded. “Hey, I’m gonna go over there now.”

  The king went a bit away to castigate himself, but Morgan didn’t care about kings anymore, because suddenly Tempest was a woman again, on her hands and knees, shivering. Morgan draped her velvet frock coat over her friend and helped her stand, and Vic was laughing and offering her oatmeal cookies, while Al shook his head and muttered, “Mange patties. It’s an anagram for Tempest again. I’ll be danged, that Sn’archivist works in mysterious ways.”

  “How did this happen?” was all Morgan could say, looking into Tempest’s eyes in a way that she’d never thought she would again.

  It took Tempest a moment to remember how her mouth worked. “Vic fed me,” she finally said. “For however long it was—years?”

  The centaur nodded, his lush and healthy mullet gently bobbing on his head.

  “And I felt more and more myself with each bite,” Tempest continued. “And just a few weeks ago I realized I could speak again, and I told him what would happen, and I asked him to send for you.” She looked around at the odd little group, smiling at everyone. “For all of you. And then I asked him to wait to give me the final bite until you’d arrived.”

  “Pretty rad, right?” Vic asked.

  “Verrrry rrrrad,” Luc agreed, for all that he sounded like he’d never said the word rad before and probably shouldn’t ever say it again.

  “So why did you guys invite me?” King Gustave asked. “I mean, I came because I needed to get out of the throne room, you know? Not that it’s not a swell party, but it seems like you guys are all good friends and I’m just this guy hanging around talking about boots.”

  “
We owe you our thanks,” Tempest said, holding out her hands and taking the king’s, easy as that. “For Al’s Proudwood Park, and for the new MMA contract that’s allowed us to transform this place. And for keeping Pell safe and free.”

  “Oh! And that’s the other thing,” Gustave said, jumping up and down a bit in a goatlike manner. “I also wanted to thank you for stopping that whole EATUM business. I just…really understand why otters wouldn’t want to be eaten, you know? I will never eat in a Dinny’s again. And the MMA really does make the best cannonballs in Pell.”

  “We told him MMA stands for Machinery and Munitions for Authority,” Feng whispered to Morgan. “So he wouldn’t know we’re pirates who rountinely attack Royal Navy ships. I think he missed the sign that says ANARCHY above the door.”

  “And aren’t I supposed to cut some sort of ribbon?” King Gustave wondered aloud. “I know how to use scissors and everything.”

  Al stepped in smoothly, one hand on the king’s back. “We lost the scissors. But could I interest you in a puffin? Or perhaps some elvish magic?”

  “No, and no. Way too messy. But can we break into these biscotti?” King Gustave had sauntered over to a long banquet table covered with the fruits of Vic’s magic. Gorgeous tea cakes, mounds of cookies, hands and hands of ladyfingers, and an unwanted pile of crumpets waited.

  “You’re the king, idiot,” someone said, a little snippily. “You can eat whenever you please.”

  Gustave scowled. “Did you do that thing where you put your ghost mouth over the food, though? Because stuff doesn’t taste as good when you do that.”

  At first, Morgan thought the king was talking to himself, offering further proof that he was barmy if harmless. And then she saw the ghost standing behind a four-layer cake with a handcrafted willow tree of modeling chocolate on top. Another ghost appeared on the ground in front of the first ghost, squatting and pointing at Otto and the puffins cavorting around the roof.

  “Lord Toby, sir, is that some kind of new chicken? ’Cause it followed me under the table with its friends and I feel called out.”

  The first ghost, a man with a sad little scrub of a beard, looked down at the new ghost, a woman in a tight rogue’s suit. “It is an otter, Poltro, and those are puffins, and if you ignore the wings, they have nothing in common with a chicken, outside of being alive. Which we are not.”

  “Well, of course I knew that, Lord Toby! Bloody fool I’d be if I didn’t know the difference between alive and dead.”

  “You didn’t know with that crab yesterday,” Gustave said, as if these ghosts were simply normal friends who joined him on strange outings to odd islands all the time. “You talked to it for like an hour, and it was definitely dead. I could smell it.”

  “But I can’t smell, you gristly goat! Ain’t got nose hairs anymore, do I? And them puffers look pretty chicken-like, and I’d bet my butternut biscuit they make the grimy, hateful buttfruit.”

  “Do you,” Al began, looking strangely fascinated, “have something against eggs?”

  “Um,” Vic gently interrupted, as everyone was crowded around the refreshments table, starving and salivating but also terrified to eat during the king’s conversation, even one with incorporeal strangers. “Refreshments are served.”

  The pirates fell upon the food, and Vic had never looked prouder. Many compliments on the victuals rained down from the crew and even the king himself, although the ghost man merely said, “Hmm. Cupcakes. Not as useful in a fight as a day-old baguette, but not bad wizardry, that.”

  At some point, Morvin dropped his muffin and screeched, and the ghost rogue screeched, and they were soon arguing like siblings because they were siblings, and the ghost man began haranguing Morvin for abandoning his landscaping duties, and Al said it was the weirdest party he’d ever been to and he’d once been to a party with the Dread Necromancer Steve.

  Daintily holding a shortbread cookie and sipping her tea, Morgan stuck by Tempest’s side as various old friends called out their congratulations, and after what felt like forever, the pirates went downstairs to look at the fireworks selection Vic had amassed for their entertainment. Only Morgan, Tempest, Vic, Al, Luc, Morvin, and, oddly, the king and his ghost companions stood on the roof as the sun set picturesquely over the harbor.

  “It’s been quite an adventure, hasn’t it?” Tempest said.

  Morgan looked over the wall and down to her ship, which still wore the stains of ding-gull berry juice. She’d come so far from her time in the tower, and she had the beard ring to prove it.

  “Definitely an adventure. I never would’ve guessed that this might be my future.”

  “Nor mine. I never thought I would be free.”

  “Me neither. But here we are.”

  “Yes, here we are.”

  “With heckin’ good cookies,” Morvin added, as Luc had returned to his chosen shoulder, and the two women were tearing up and hugging.

  Vic sighed happily. “And good friends.”

  King Gustave raised his teacup, and everyone else did too. “As I’m the king and I can do what I want, I hereby raise a toast. To that lady who used to be a tree!”

  “My name is Tempest, your majesty.”

  “Hey, you wrote the document I had to sign so that kinda elfy-looking guy could raise puffins! My advisor said you had the killer instincts of a shark crossed with a—”

  “Chicken?”

  “No, Poltro. A shark crossed with something else that was very smart and obviously not a chicken or an egg. Say, Tempest, do you want a job? Our current lawyer is this elf who’s always trying to give me a magic wedgie.”

  Tempest smiled. “It would be an honor. As long as I get good benefits and plenty of time off to sail the seas of Pell.”

  “Talk to my lawyer about that,” the king said.

  “Hey, can we finish our cheers soon? Me sister the ghost keeps putting her blue ghost mouth on my cup, and I don’t like the ectoplasmic aftertaste,” Morvin complained.

  “To Tempest!” Morgan shouted in her best pirate bark.

  “To Tempest!” everyone said.

  But before they could drink, Tempest added, “And to Vic, for saving me!”

  “To Vic!”

  Vic raised his glass to Luc. “And to Luc, who got us all here!”

  “To Luc!”

  “And to Captain Morrrrgan, my finest prrrrotégée!”

  “To Morgan!”

  “And to the king, because he’s such a great guy!” Gustave said out of the side of his mouth.

  “To the king!”

  “And to Pell,” Al added. “Because it’s been one Pell of an adventure.”

  “To Pell!”

  After an awkward moment of everyone hoping the cheering was over, they breathed a collective sigh of relief and drank.

  The tea tasted like success and also lemons.

  “So what happens now?” King Gustave asked, making it kind of weird.

  “You’re the king. You decide,” the peevish ghost Toby muttered.

  “Oh, yeah. So I am. I am the king, and I hereby declare…” Gustave trailed off, and everyone waited.

  “Yes, your highness?” Tempest pressed.

  “I declare everyone must live happily ever after.”

  “But that’s impossible!”

  King Gustave smiled a goaty smile.

  “Nothing’s impossible in Pell.”

  To our readers,

  with love and tea and cake.

  A foul vole, ye owl!

  Kevin says: While we must thank all foine people everywhere, we want to especially thank Seattle for literally being there for us as we outlined this novel. During Emerald City Comic Con in 2018, Delilah and I hopped from one sushi place to another as we broke down this story of a bearded lady who wants to save the otters and a centaur swoleboy w
ho eventually realizes he can simply discard the poisonous baggage of toxic masculinity and be super happy afterward. Seattle is a magical place where new ideas are born and yet where many succumb to the siren call of the same old things; it’s the perfect inspiration for a cast of characters who look at what society says they’re supposed to do and then choose to do better. They’re gonna say nope to those tempting siren fish tails.

  Thanks to Metal Editor Tricia Narwani and the Del Rey team for shepherding this book to fruition, and to copy editor Kathy Lord for wrangling with our linguistic peccadilloes. Would you believe us, Kathy, if we said we were very sorry for grossing you out with the ding-gull berries but…simultaneously delighted?

  Immense gratitude to my family for always being everything good.

  High fives and super mega turbo thanks to my co-author, Delilah, for uncounted giggles on this journey of poignant silliness. It’s not every day you’ll find a friend who will let you hook a plot to a prophecy of elf butts and otter balls. I still cannot read “tampoonist” without smiling, and the same can be said for many other passages in the Tales of Pell. Writing these stories with you has been a tremendous privilege and even more affirming than living with an affirmation gecko. Thank you for the laughs, for the friendship, for your unrelenting creativity, and for loving fantasy enough to poke fun at it.

  * * *

  —

  Delilah says: First of all, thanks be to Kevin for always writing his acknowledgments first, that I might copy him.

  Secondly, yes, many thanks to Seattle. Your foine flavors run through this book, from Spam musubi to rummy grog to the salt tang of Pike’s Place Market. Thank you for your flat whites and gluten-free cinnamon rolls in the morning and your flaming tiki drinks at night. This book wouldn’t be this book without you.

  Nextly, our forever thanks to the entire Del Rey team. You are the wind in our sales (heh heh), and we’d take a tampoon in the chest for any one of ye.