Knighthood for Beginners

by Elys Dolan

  Waiting for the tournament to begin, Dave was feeling incredibly nervous without the book. “But Albrecht, we’re not knights, we don’t know how to win a tournament! If I could just check a few things about hitting with swords…”

  “Worry not, scaly one,” said Albrecht. “Everyone has a weakness. Let’s study our opponents and see what we can learn.”

  These knights don’t seem much like the ones in the book, thought Dave, as he watched Sir Ironpants do another set of disturbing lunges. So they went to have a look at the other knights.

  “See meine Dave, dummköpfe!” whispered Albrecht. “I have a plan for nearly all of them…”

  Just then, he was interrupted by the sound of trumpets.

  First came Sir Ironpants, who was very ticklish without his armor.

  Then Sir Snoz, who had terrible hay fever.

  Sir Mightybrow was nothing without his glasses.

  Sir Butterball had a big soft spot for his pie.

  The mighty lungs of Dame Hilda were almost too much for Dave and Albrecht.

  But Albrecht found another use for Butterball’s pie.

  Thrilled with their victories, Dave could almost smell the knighthood.

  “This is going rather well,” said Dave.

  CHAPTER 6

  With just one knight left to vanquish Albrecht explained his plan for Sir Gnasty. It would involve beards, mice, and hair spray, but Gnasty had a surprise for them.

  Albrecht looked perturbed. “I had a plan to defeat one huge Gnasty, but a huge Gnasty, on a massive horse, with a super long, pointy stick? I can see no weakness here!”

  Dave went pale and felt like he needed the bathroom.

  But wait… if he was a real knight he wouldn’t just go to the bathroom. He’d fight Gnasty with his big horse and his big stick anyway. It was time to use some of that bravery the book talked about.

  “Okay, Albrecht, I remember something about having to “stay on your steed no matter what” so I’ll hang onto you with everything I’ve got and we’ll figure out some way to knock Gnasty off his horse.”

  When the joust began, Albrecht and Dave weren’t doing so well.

  But Dave refused to let go of Albrecht, even when Gnasty gave them such a whack with his lance that they flew straight up into the air. Gleeful, Gnasty listened to the crowd’s applause and waited for his opponents to hit the ground so he could give them an even bigger whack.

  But they didn’t come down.

  Gnasty looked puzzled for a moment then broke into a huge grin. “I jousted them so hard I smashed them into oblivion! I’m so talented, so amazing, so STRONG! Look at my quads!”

  As Gnasty flexed his muscles for the crowd, Dave and Albrecht were having a hasty conversation above him.

  “I can’t hang on for long!” said Dave.

  “Eugh, if you let go we’ll hit the ground and that dummkopf will whack us again!” said Albrecht, wriggling.

  Dave’s eyes widened as he thought of a brilliant idea. “But maybe we don’t have to hit the ground! Brace yourself, I’m letting go.”

  “Oh, now look at that. Dave is the WINNER!” declared the King. And the peasants went wild.

  Dave scrambled down from the heap, but before he could check on Albrecht, Gnasty hauled himself up and bawled at the King. “THEY WERE OBVIOUSLY CHEATING! That’s not how you knock a knight off his steed!”

  “And he gave away my pie!” Sir Butterball joined in. “That’s just not right.”

  Soon all the knights were accusing Dave of cheating.

  “SILENCE!” said the King. “All right then, we’ll settle this once and for all. I hear there’s a peasant uprising in town. They’re nothing but trouble, those peasants. Gnasty, you and Dave will go down there and the first one to stop the rioting will be the winner and I’ll make them Chief Knight!”

  “That sounds wunderbar,” said Albrecht. “And I also may need medical attention…”

  CHAPTER 7

  As they rounded a corner to see the Dragon’s Head tavern, things didn’t look great.

  Dave flinched. “Oh dear me, there’s some dirty fighting going on here.”

  “Dirty? Ha!” said Albrecht. “When I was a professional mud wrestler we did the dirty fighting. This is all squeaky clean.”

  Gnasty came barreling down the hill behind them and ran straight into the crowds of flailing peasants. “You want a riot do you?!” he shouted.

  “I’ll punch the riot right out of you all!”

  “We have to do something fast before someone really gets hurt,” Dave said, getting concerned. “I’ll just take a really quick look at the book.”

  Dave may have read the page a little too quickly. “Right, it… um… says something about talking to them. That seems sensible. I’ll go over there and have a chat with that man hitting that other man with a chicken.”

  Albrecht thought this would probably lead to Dave also getting hit with a chicken, but Dave was already chatting.

  “Hello, Mr. Peasant Sir, what seems to be the problem?” asked Dave.

  The peasant, known in the town as Boil Man mainly because of his boils, was so shocked at being spoken to nicely by a knight that he dropped his chicken.

  “Well… err…we’re dissatisfied with our health-care system!” Boil Man told him. “The doctor is terrible!”

  “The only thing we can do is BRAWL!” added Carbuncle Guy, happy that he was no longer being hit by a chicken.

  “This does not bode well for meine hintern,” said Albrecht. “How bad is this doctor?”

  • • •

  Boil Man explained.

  “Pah, I’d make a better doctor than him!” said a large woman with a large beard (that’s right, beard), startling Boil Man and Carbuncle Guy so much they scurried off back into the brawl.

  “Would you?” asked Dave.

  “Well, yes, actually. Watch this.”

  “My hintern hasn’t been in such trouble since the cannibalistic Sheep Men of Bahbahland ate my tail! I have a wooden one now . . . but how did you learn medicine, hairy lady?”

  And so the Bearded Lady began to explain.

  Ever since she was a girl the Bearded Lady had been forced to earn her living by sitting in her stall and charging people to stare at, tug on, or run screaming from her beard. Her stall bordered the first aid, counseling, and aromatherapy sections of the bookstall next door. She used to read the stock while the people pointed and screamed. Gradually she picked up a wide range of medical skills. There was one book on fly-fishing in there, so she’s not too bad at that, either.

  “I wish I could open a clinic,” she said, “but who would want to be treated by a bearded lady?”

  “You could shave?” suggested Albrecht.

  The Bearded Lady looked furious. “I came to terms with the fact that I’m a bearded lady years ago and I won’t change just because people are narrow-minded. Plus, this is the most beautiful beard in the whole kingdom. It’s a work of art!”

  “Maybe you could team up with the doctor?” said Dave. “Let’s go and talk to him.”

  “Don’t forget about the task, Dave!” said Albrecht.“Who would not want to help this lovely hairy lady, but we can’t let Gnasty win.”

  “But if we can solve this doctor problem we can stop the riot.” said Dave. “What have we got to lose?”

  CHAPTER 8

  Dave peeked round the door and said, “It doesn’t look like there’s anyone home.”

  “Hmm, you are correct Dave. Is he in the back having a tea break maybe?” Albrecht went over to a curtain covering a door at the back of the room and pulled it open. “MEINE GOTT! What is this?!”

  “DON’T LOOK AT ME!” shouted the doctor. “I’m so ashamed!”

  “It’s just that I’ve always wanted to be a fool. The glamour, the applause, the hat, the bells! I made my own costume and I can nearly do a headstand. Don’t tell my patients though! I’d lose my job…”

  “Do you like being a doctor?” asked Dave “You don’
t seem that into it.”

  “Gosh no!” said the Doctor. “It’s terrible. All those peasants with all their giant boils and plague everywhere. I mean literally EVERYWHERE. You should see Boil Man’s backside…”

  “Okay, STOP!” said Albrecht. “Could you become a full-time fool?”

  “I can’t, I just can’t!” said the doctor. “I’d lose my leeches! They’re the one thing that’s made being a doctor bearable.”

  The doctor really loved his leeches. They did so much together:

  “That’s a bit weird,” said Dave.

  The doctor explained that if he quit, the leeches would have to be passed on to the next doctor and that would break his heart.

  The Bearded Lady scoffed. “That depends on your methods! I operate a leech-free practice because there are some schools of thought that suggest leeches are icky.”

  The doctor scowled and hugged his jar of leeches closer. Then he gasped. “Wait, you practice medicine without leeches? So I could keep my leeches?”

  “Surely this means we could arrange something so everyone’s happy?” said Dave. “Doctor, are you actually any good at fooling?”

  The doctor responded by telling them a terrible joke about shark-infested custard at the same time he tried, but couldn’t quite manage, to do a headstand.

  “That was terrible,” said Albrecht. “But it is probably better than his doctoring. Dave, do you have a plan, and is this going to stop the riot?”

  “Yes! Albrecht I’ll need your help. Are you much of a performer?”

  “Pfff are you kidding?!” said Albrecht.

  Back at the Dragon’s Head the peasants were rioting, despite Gnasty trying to fight them into submission. Just as it was starting to look like Boil Man might burst a boil, there was a loud GOOOONG! sound and everyone turned to look at a makeshift stage constructed from boxes. Albrecht leaped into view.

  The peasants immediately stopped fighting and started to laugh. Even Gnasty giggled at the shark-infested custard joke. Sharks? In custard? Absurd!

  While the crowd was distracted, the Bearded Lady, assisted by Dave, quietly snuck up on any peasant in need of medical attention. Before they had a chance to run off screaming or even glance at her beard, she slapped Band-Aids on wounds and creams on boils, and in some cases just forcefully recommended a good bath.

  Afterward, Boil Man came up to Dave, Albrecht, and the Bearded Lady. “Terrific! That man’s a much better fool than a doctor. And did you see that leech on the unicycle?… Just amazing! Also that cream the hairy lady gave me has done wonders for my boil. It’s shinier than ever now. I’ll be going to her with all my ailments. There will be be no more rioting round here.”

  “AAAAHHH!” A blood-curdling yell cut across the square as Gnasty realized that he’d officially lost the competition and with it, the title of Chief Knight.

  He stormed over to Dave and Albrecht. “You interfering little pains in the backside! I’ll get you next time, and when I do I’ll smash you so hard you’ll …”

  But before it could get ugly, he was interrupted by Sir Ironpants sprinting down the street. “The Princess! Something’s happened to her! Something terrible. We need all the knights back at the castle. Now!”

  CHAPTER 9

  Back at the castle, a full Code Pink emergency was underway. Princess Rubella had fallen into a magical slumber and the King had locked himself in her bedchamber and was refusing to let anyone in.

  Outside the bedchamber, an orderly line had formed of knights swigging mouthwash while they waited for the chance to bestow the magical kiss that would wake the Princess.

  Dave and Albrecht made their way to the door, but Gnasty, who had been practicing kissing on the back of his hand, spotted them and blocked their way. “Line jumping, eh? I can’t have you two getting in the way of me awakening the Princess and getting back in the King’s good graces! I’ll deal with you once and for all.”

  Gnasty flung his mouthwash at Albrecht and tried to grab him, but he was stopped in his tracks by a small voice coming through the bedchamber door.

  “Dave? Is that my best knight Dave? Let him in at once but the rest of you kiss-mad knuckleheads stay outside!”

  • • •

  Inside the bedchamber, safe from Gnasty, Dave saw that the King was in great distress. “Oh my beautiful Rubella! This is all my fault! I should never have married that terrible woman!”

  “Which woman?” asked Dave.

  “The Wicked Witch!” said the King, narrowing his eyes. “Ever since the divorce she’s been trying to get back at me. She didn’t even tell me she was a witch, though I suppose her flying around on brooms and talking to magic mirrors should have been a clue.”

  “Ah, affairs of the heart are never simple,” said Albrecht, sipping his newly-acquired bottle of mouthwash.

  “Where was I?” said the King. “Oh yes! The witch always hated Rubella. She was a terrible stepmother, and now she keeps trying to give my Rubella a terrible poison that will cause a hundred years’ slumber… USING FRUIT!”

  “Not fruit!” said Dave.

  “First she tried planting a poisoned apple.”

  “Then a poisoned orange.”

  “A poisoned banana.”

  “Poisoned cherries.”

  “And even a poisoned watermelon.”

  “Then that terrible woman changed tactics and left Rubella a poisoned . . . PORK PIE!”

  I found poor Rubella curled up asleep covered in pie grease. Now the traditional way to wake her up is with a kiss from a handsome prince, but frankly, none of those bearded idiots outside will do. And just after we’d got past the whole compulsive kissing a frog thing…”

  “Is there any other way to break this curse?” asked Dave.

  “Well, I suppose the witch could lift it, but there’s no way that hag would do it!” “I could try to talk to her,” said Dave. “Do you think you could convince her, Dave?” asked the King. “If you do I’ll make you the finest knight that ever lived! With your own castle and . . . and a . . . special hat!”

  “A special hat?!” said Dave, “Oh my!”

  CHAPTER 10

  Dave trotted up to the witch’s cottage and knocked on the door. Slowly it creaked open and the witch loomed in the doorway. Dave ducked to avoid a bat and said, “Er, hi. We were hoping to have a quick chat with you about the King?”

  “That tiny little idiot!” the witch hissed. “I just knew he’d freak out if I told him I was a witch.”

  “I can see you’re angry,” said Dave, “but maybe you’d feel better if you moved on? He’s not worth it and you deserve better. Maybe it’s time to start dating again?”

  The witch explained that she was quite busy these days running a new business designing candy cane conservatories, but admitted dating could be fun.

  “Wunderbar!” said Albrecht. “I used to be a professional matchmaker so I can set you up on some blind dates.”

  That night, at the Dragon’s Head tavern, emotions were running high.

  Date one was not a success.

  Date two wasn’t much better.

  But date three was very, very different.

  “Nice work,” said the witch. “Ironpants and I are off to the country for a long weekend.”

  “Wait!” said Dave. “We really need to know how to wake up Princess Rubella.”

  “Oh fine, I don’t even care any more! Just use this.” The witch flung something loud and round at Dave as she rode off into the sunset with Ironpants.

  • • •

  Rubella wasn’t actually very happy to be woken up and demanded that she have “just five more minutes,” but the King was thrilled.

  “You are just about the best knight we’ve ever had, young David! So brave, so clever, so green. I can’t believe we had that big oaf Sir Gnasty as Chief Knight,” the King chuckled.

  Gnasty, who had been listening at the door, turned a deep shade of purple and stormed off.

  “Dave!” said the King. “Tonight,
I’m going to hold a feast in your honor and there I shall make you Knight of the Special Hat!’

  CHAPTER 11

  Soon Sir Gnasty had assembled his Army of Evil in the most secluded and secret location in the castle, the downstairs bathroom.

  “I call this meeting of the Army of Evil to order!” said Gnasty as he leaned on a toilet.

  “Alf?”

  “Present!”

  “Gary!”

  “Present!”

  “John?”

  “Present!”

  “Linda? … Linda!”

  “She’s just getting the cookies, O Mighty Lord of Evil,” said John.

  “It is unacceptable to be late to a meeting of the Army of Evil!” raged Gnasty. “What kind of cookies?”

  “Butter cookies with jam, I think,” said John.

  Gnasty considered this. “Good. So, the first item on today’s agenda is sharks! Have you acquired the sharks? When the kingdom is mine and I’ve taken over this castle it’s definitely going to need sharks in the moat or it just won’t be evil enough.”

  John looked worried. “Not yet, Sire but Alf was thinking he’d go down to the pet shop tomorrow and ask…”

  “UNACCEPTABLE!” roared Gnasty. “Get me sharks immediately, or I’ll feed you to them as soon as we have some!”