Wisdom's Kiss

by Catherine Gilbert Murdock

  BENEVOLENCE: No! We made a solemn vow—upon the death of another!—that we would abstain forever from magic.

  WISDOM: Yet this union shall cause the death of me!

  BENEVOLENCE: Surely we may yet devise a natural solution. O dear cat, what are we to do?

  Memoirs of the Master Swordsman

  FELIS EL GATO

  Impresario Extraordinaire ♦ Soldier of Fortune

  Mercenary of Stage & Empire

  LORD OF THE LEGENDARY

  FIST OF GOD

  Famed Throughout the Courts and Countries of the World

  &

  The Great Sultanate

  * THE BOOTED MAESTRO *

  WRITTEN IN HIS OWN HAND~ALL TRUTHS VERIFIED~

  ALL BOASTS REAL

  A Most Marvelous Entertainment. Not to Be Missed!

  ***

  SADLY, the audience's most fitting veneration of "The Demon Vanquished" was cut short by the emperor, who—to my pique, I cannot deny it—interrupted the thundering adulation to proclaim that the princess would wed Duke Roger the very next day! This unexpected news sent the princess into a swoon— performed quite artfully, if I may say. Duchess Wilhelmina appeared thoroughly satisfied with the emperor's words; clearly the woman deduced what so many astute observers, myself most of all, had already observed: her son's betrothed now preferred a well-trained circus acrobat. Sensing that the spotlight had faded from our act, with a flourish of my red demon cape I withdrew from the stage with my apprentice. The uproar from the emperor's announcement affected the show for some time, and I fear the tigers, with that innate animal ability to sense unease, were too unsettled to perform. Nor did Tomas appear for his usual act upon the Globe d'Or despite the three runners I sent to seek him out, and so I was forced to stage the Jug Juggler in his stead, and a poor substitute he proved.

  Experienced as I am in the torment which love wreaks, I sought Tomas out upon the show's conclusion, and, as I had expected, found the young man in the throes of romantic agony. While he recognized too well that Wisdom, royal born and promised to another, could never be his, he had yet dreamt of enjoying his sliver of paradise a few brief days more. Exacerbating this tragedy—as I learned in sobs and fragments while he raged about his chamber—his childhood sweetheart, that tavern wench to whom he remained so interminably loyal, was in Froglock this very minute, employed as none other than lady-in-waiting to the princess! And she, in witnessing the fervor of Tomas and Wisdom, underwent her own most brutal humiliation—made all the worse by her having up to that moment believed her love to be a soldier!

  I could only marvel at the extraordinary drama of this romance, and my mind straightaway commenced concocting how best to put it to the stage. My theatrical instincts, however, did not prevent me from simultaneously endeavoring to set Tomas's heart at ease. He, I deduced, had already sent Trudy (a name I recalled all too well from countless previous conversations) a missive explaining his predicament and apologizing for the suffering he had inflicted, and while his promptness in this regard should be commended, the gist of his correspondence as he summarized it for me was not close to the more lyrical words of which an experienced beau would doubtless have been capable.

  So it was that I urged the young man without fail to approach this Trudy, and with voice and manner express the thoughts that with ink and paper he so patently had not. I advised such a tactic well aware of the lad's magnetism, and the fact that he wielded his dark brows and lashes as another might a bouquet of roses. For a woman had but to see the young man—as so often I had witnessed these past years—to fall under his spell. Such was his inherent goodness that never once had Tomas employed this facility for the infliction of suffering, and I knew in my heart that the maid's pain would only be eased by his physical presence. With kind words he could explain the necessity of passing himself off as a soldier given his two brothers, who together had as much appreciation for art as an eel would for mountaineering. Though Tomas begrudged the falsehood, I had forever exhorted him to persist, explaining again and yet again how this one small misdeed permitted all his great deeds (a lovely example of the phenomenal word craft of which I am capable, particularly when my genius is called upon in the heat of debate). Now, conversely, I employed the same brilliant logic as I soothed him that this cloud of misunderstanding had a bright silver lining in that he could at last speak the truth and relate to the girl his many adventures and accomplishments these past years.

  Much gladdened by my excellent counsel, the lad promptly set out, though heedful of my warning that his appearance in Phraugheloch would doubtless sit ill with the duchess. I, on the other hand, delighted that my sagacity had once again produced such an assuredly successful outcome, settled myself in my private tent for some well-deserved slumber.

  A Life Unforeseen

  THE STORY OF FORTITUDE OF BACIO, COMMONLY KNOWN AS TRUDY, AS TOLD TO HER DAUGHTER

  Privately Printed and Circulated

  WRETCHED TRUDY! No one in the history of Lax had ever been so miserable. To discover in one instant that Tips had been misleading her for six years and that he now loved another ... It was only a terrible dream, Trudy almost convinced herself—and then came his letter, confirming all her worst fears.

  She could not bear, not for another instant, to remain in that horrid suite, not with the princess in the next room—with Trudy expected to wait upon her! Horrid Montagne and its horrid people stealing other lasses' sweethearts! Trudy would never speak to them again. Not even to Nonna Ben, however nice the old woman might sometimes appear to be, at least to Trudy's face...

  Weeping with sorrow and rage, Trudy fled into the palace proper, thankful beyond measure for the empty corridors, the vast rooms and marbled staircases echoing away into silence, their few occupants focused on their own tasks and thoughts. Every Phraugheloch staff member and attendant, it seemed, was busily preparing for the extravagance of tomorrow's royal wedding—a wedding Trudy would not be attending, however unseemly that might appear. All she wanted was to go home. Put a scarf over her hair, her old cape over her shoulders, and go back to Bacio.

  But ... but ... she could not.

  In her anguished wanderings, Trudy realized with a wheeze of dread, she had become totally lost. She had not a notion where in the palace she was. The corridors faded one into the next: here a mirror, there a palm tree standing forlorn and lonesome in an enormous embellished pot, elsewhere a ceramic vase taller than Trudy herself. And everywhere, firmly shut doors.

  Even if she could find the palace entrance—which seemed very far away indeed from wherever it was that she now stood—she would not depart Froglock without her few possessions. But where in this architectural monstrosity was their suite?

  She must not panic ... Nor need she panic, she realized suddenly, for her sight seemed to work here, quite tidily, in fact. If one corridor filled her with trepidation, then she obviously should take the other.

  Which was precisely what she did.

  Trudy moved through the hallways with growing confidence, pausing only to step aside when others approached; tonight of all nights she had no appetite for prying eyes and disparaging whispers.

  On she trekked, climbing staircases and creeping down dimly lit corridors, surprised she had traveled such a distance unwittingly ... and then stopped. She had to stop, for the corridor ended, quite abruptly, at a great pair of doors bearing a polished brass plaque:

  CHANCELLOR OF FINANCE

  ENTRY INVARIABLY & MOST VEHEMENTLY FORBIDDEN

  WITHOUT THE EXPRESS WRITTEN PERMISSION

  OF HER MOST NOBLE GRACE

  THE DUCHESS OF FARINA

  The Supremely Private Diary of Wisdom Dizzy of Montagne

  Any Soul Who Contemplates Even Glancing

  at the Pages of this Volume Will

  Be Transformed into a Toad

  Suffer a Most Excruciating Punishment.

  On This You Have My Word.

  Friday—v. late—

  My life grows ever more drea
dful! Roger has just departed—I cannot imagine what I ever saw in the man. He does not love me—he loves only my title & his infernal glory. Were it not for the emperor's edict I should run away this very night with Tips & a few possessions in a sack—like that girl in the story—& find my fortune as I might—perhaps another circus would take us—

  Yet why waste the ink to write these words—there is no hope. I even suggested—such is my desperation!—that Nonna & I chance magic—but she v. wisely set me straight! Now she weeps as well—the only time I have ever seen her cry save for dear Mama.

  0 Mama—why did you have to do that! You were so good at so many things—you did not need to fly! It should have been me on the broom that fateful night—I have a head for heights—it is on ground that I fail—as I fail now! >

  Nonna is right—magic brings only jealousy & outrage & despair.> Besides how could a magic broom help—or the Elemental Spells? We have no power against the will of Rüdiger IV—& that beastly, beastly Wilhelmina!

  O! A sound—at the window! It is my love come to me at last!

  Queen of All the Heavens

  A PLAY IN THREE ACTS

  PENNED BY ANONYMOUS

  Act I, Scene ix (cont'd).

  Wisdom's suite in Phraugheloch Palace.

  Benevolence paces. Wisdom writes at her desk. A knock.

  BENEVOLENCE: A ghost, atop our other woes!

  WISDOM: It is my love—my angel!—come to me at last!

  Enter Tips.

  TIPS: I mean no fright, Your Majesty, for I am no ghost, only a humble performer. I beg you: I must have a word with Lady Fortitude.

  WISDOM: What? Not me?

  TIPS: I must explain myself to her—perhaps my words will offer comfort.

  BENEVOLENCE: She has fled, I fear.

  TIPS: To Bacio? 'Twill be my undoing!

  BENEVOLENCE: I know not her location, or intent ... But tell us, fair lad, why tread our windowsill? We have a door quite serviceable; indeed several.

  TIPS: The duchess, I suspect, has little stomach for my presence—

  WISDOM: So? Let all the world behold our love!

  TIPS: Moreover, I know this building's casing well, having many times traversed its façade in service to the emperor.

  BENEVOLENCE: As spy?

  TIPS: I must confess it. Love demands naught but truth.

  WISDOM: O my darling, you are too brilliant! How could I ever love another?

  BENEVOLENCE: A spy ... a vocation of which we now have desperate need.

  WISDOM: O darling, you must spy for us!

  TIPS: I am not sure of this...

  Enter Escoffier the cat.

  BENEVOLENCE: I am certain the duchess schemes even now ... Know you her location?

  TIPS: Without fail ... Yet no human could enter that room unnoticed.

  BENEVOLENCE: Nor shall any human do so.

  WISDOM: O Nonna Ben! You would not!

  BENEVOLENCE: Spelling lost me my daughter, but perhaps it will preserve hers.

  Exit Benevolence holding Escoffier.

  Wisdom and Tips embrace.

  WISDOM: A moment of bliss! I cannot deny myself!

  TIPS: Nor I ... Yet I confess I do not follow Her Majesty's thinking. How does spelling lend assistance—have you no dictionaries?

  WISDOM: Think not upon it. Simply deliver Escoffier to the duchess's chamber; he shall see to the rest.

  Enter Escoffier, who leaps onto Tips's shoulders.

  TIPS: Gadzooks! He is like no creature I have ever known! Does this cat possess intelligence?

  WISDOM: Far more than that; he doth provide it. Fly, my love! Be safe! Be true!

  Exit Tips and Escoffier through window.

  WISDOM: I shall keep the casement open in expectancy of their return ... My grandmother slumbers behind closed door, preserved in a veil of enchantment ... We have profaned our vow! Yes, yes, I am a sorceress—I do confess it—but one imperiled by misery eternal. O, how I pray these Dark Arts illuminate my gloomy plight, and light a path to resolution...

  The Imperial Encyclopedia of Lax

  8TH EDITION

  Printed in the Capital City of Rigorus

  by Hazelnut & Filbert, Publishers to the Crown

  DOPPELSCHLÄFE RIN >

  Also known as "the sleeping double," the Doppelschläferin is yet another now-disregarded shred of magical lore from the Kingdom of Montagne. That the name is feminine—the standard, masculine phrase should be Doppelschläfer—reiterates the kingdom's long association with female witchcraft. The Doppelschläferin is part of the legend of Queen Virtue, founder of Montagne, who was said to have devised it while held prisoner by the Pots de Crème Giants; the spell (she claimed) allowed her to split into two identical bodies—one unrousably asleep, the other conscious and cogent—that could be reunited at will, often many years later. Several of her heirs professed, when it was yet acceptable to invent such tales, to have improved upon the spell by employing pets, most often cats, to operate as their doubles, viewing the world through the animal's eyes while their human body remained "asleep." As false as this myth most patently is, the legend had strategic advantages: the Montagne army once feigned sleep en masse, and the sight so terrified the approaching Drachensbett forces that the soldiers broke ranks and fled. The fairy tale "Cat Whiskers" contains the last published reference to a Doppelschläferin, and it concludes with both the witch and her Doppelschläferin feline burnt at the stake.

  >

  From the Desk of the Queen Mother of Montagne, & Her Cat

  My Dearest Temperance, Queen of Montagne,

  Granddaughter, I have broken my pledge and returned to magic—violating every vow I made to you and Dizzy and the memory of your dear mother. And would that I had not—for the truth I learned is far worse than anything I could have conjectured!

  Tonight Duke Roger paid a call to our suite and in heated conversation revealed his true self, which is only a more polished variant of his mother's selfish grasping. Dizzy now professes that she would rather die than wed him. I do not believe she will take her life, but I would not wish this life upon her.

  No sooner had His Grace departed than Dizzy's new love appeared at our window—fittingly enough for an acrobat!—hoping to speak to Trudy, or Lady Fortitude as he sweetly termed her. His good intent crumbled to despair when he learned that the lass had departed the suite for points unknown. Our conversation did reveal that the lad had no little experience as spy—also fitting for an acrobat in liege to the emperor! At once I glimpsed a faint path out of our horrible predicament: in learning Farina's true intent, we perhaps might thwart it. I recognize too well that eavesdropping in and of itself is villainous; to conduct such depravity through veil of magic rightly brings upon witchcraft every censure the empire might devise. However dismayed you must be in your grandmother, know I am more dismayed in myself. Yet if I could have perceived a solution beyond sorcery to this wretched dilemma, trust I would have exploited it forthwith.

  Oh, Granddaughter, you cannot imagine my agony as I whispered those enchanted phrases. With every word, I recollected more vividly that fateful night, the reckless exuberance of Dizzy and myself, and your mother's breezy assurance that she would be fine and safe upon my broom, her eagerness to experience at last the magic of flight after so many years of yearning... I should have known better! You are wise beyond measure to keep your two feet firmly planted upon the ground and to accept, however reluctantly, that you lack both the power of magic and its pain.

  Thus incorporated with my feline partner while my creaky old body snored abed, I then contravened the Empire of Lax's most cherished laws and mores. With little urging from Dizzy, Tips escorted noble Escoffier—unaware of the cat's recent enlightenment —to the duchess's privy chamber. There, as I had suspected, she sat plotting with her son and several others. Tips was fortunate enough to find a window cracked ajar, and though the young man could not hear the conversation within, supple Escoffier slid through this opening as a black shadow and tr
aversed her suite undiscovered to the table, heaped with papers, where the schemers conspired. To my delight, the duchess had with her that miserable little dog, and so Escoffier's silent leap to the table's center had the effect not only of frightening the faction almost to death but also of setting the dog off as a fuse lights a firecracker, with easily as much noise. Adding insult to injury, Escoffier then lounged in a most possessive and feline manner across the documents, a stroke of brilliance that even in my fear and grief cheered me immeasurably.

  The duchess at once made to strike Escoffier a vicious blow, but her son deflected her swing, pointing out that a pet from Montagne should not be harmed. "Not yet, anyway," sneered Wilhelmina. "I shall sleep much easier once this marriage is sealed and the abdication complete."

  Yes, Granddaughter, you read correctly: Abdication! Oh, Teddy, an awful conspiracy has been concocted, and Wilhelmina and her son fully expect you will quit your throne—within the week!

  Would that I could spare you this terrible reality—alas, I cannot. Instead I shall report my findings swiftly; the sooner pain is felt, the sooner it may pass. Darling, it appears—and from the confident and informed manner with which these connivers schemed, I cannot but believe they speak the truth—it appears your suitor, sweet-tongued though he may be, is in actual fact an agent of the Duchy of Farina! And his only task has been to win your love that he might convince you to leave Montagne forever—and by so abdicating, pass the throne to your sister! Is that not horrible?