The Royal Family

by Colin Thompson

  About the Book

  Nothing lasts forever, not even for Nerlin, King of the wizards. He is bored and tired and wants one of his children to take over as ruler of Transylvania Waters so he can retire to his holiday cottage in the Enchanted Valley and grow chickens. The trouble is, no one wants the job.

  But then, out of nowhere,* a long-lost face** from Nerlin’s past arrives and everything is thrown into disarray.

  Who is Gertrude and who will end up ruler of Transylvania Waters? The answers to this – and more – are inside …***

  Contents

  About the Book

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Interregnum – Act 1

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Notes

  But wait, there’s more . . .

  Actually, there isn’t.

  Winchflat’s Wonderful World of Hats

  Ultimate Super-Wizard Powers

  Some Unusual Transylvania Waters Communities

  Have You Seen This Book?

  Watch this Space

  Copyright Notice

  Loved the book?

  As it says in THE FLOODS 12, if you don’t know who all the FLOODS are by now, you should be ashamed of yourself.

  It also excuses you for maybe not having read all the earlier books, but that was then and this is now and it’s no more Mr Nice Author.

  The Floods 13 is dedicated to the memory of Corey Lake (2000 – 2013)

  Corey will forever be the Official Number One Floods Fan and the bravest person I have ever met. You will always be alive in our memories.

  Nigel Davenport, 423/4, had an epiphany. Not an everyday sort of epiphany like when you realise you actually like brussels sprouts, but a Big Epiphany. On Thursday, while getting dressed, he realised that he was actually Nigella not Nigel, which, coincidentally, his mother blamed on eating too many pickled brussels sprouts.

  He wasn’t sure if this had anything to do with his deafness or the weather being much damper than was normal for that time of year. Nor was he one hundred percent sure if he had always been a lady. After all, his mother, Ironica, had, like him, also started shaving at the age of twelve. He decided that before he went any further, he should probably find out exactly what a lady was.

  All Nigella and her mother knew for certain was that they were now both very confused, though neither of them were half as confused as Nigella’s wife and Ironica’s husband.

  In an attempt to sort things out, Nigella enrolled in a tango course and Ironica started making a huge model of the Umpire State Building out of recycled banana skins.

  Meanwhile, back in Clackmorton-de-la-Zouch, Lady Crustine Plantepott has been looking at herself in the family mirror.

  Obviously, things could not go on like this.

  Something had to be done.

  Nigella decided to take drastic action and take up Highland Dancing when, by a stroke of luck, he realised it was all just a trick of the light and he was actually Nigel after all, which later tests proved to be the case. He then had to spend the next three months swapping all his buttons and button holes back again and undergoing bagpipe adoration de-programming therapy.

  ‘As I always say,’ he said, ‘every cloud has a bacon lining, except the rubbish ones that are lined with silver. Or is it saliva?’

  Now read on …

  Nerlin, King of Transylvania Waters and the world’s top wizard, paced back and forth in the topmost floor of Castle Twilight’s highest tower. From here, he could see his entire kingdom, which he had ruled over since returning from exile several years before to overthrow the evil dictator, his beloved wife Mordonna’s dreadful father, King Quatorze.

  Nerlin went on to reclaim the throne for the true kings of Transylvania Waters, descendants of the great line of wizards that included the legendary Merlin himself, who now lived with his wife – Mrs Merlin – in a delightful cottage on the edge of the famous Lake Tarnish, a mere five minutes away from the capital city of Dreary, where Castle Twilight stood towering over the narrow streets like a huge green cauliflower balanced on a bundle of decaying celery.

  The mountains that ringed Transylvania Waters enclosed it like a pair of loving hands, keeping it securely hidden from the outside world. The furthermost mountains were no more than a misty grey blur dotted with thin lines of smoke drifting up from remote communities that were spread throughout the kingdom, but, even in their blurriness, they gave Nerlin and everyone else living in this magical kingdom a wonderful feeling of security with added contentment. The ring of mountains was more than a physical barrier from humankind – it was bursting with all sorts of demons, old crones, pointy sticks and unpredictable spells.

  Each Transylvania Waters community was unique, with every village having a speciality that no one else had.

  There were, for example, the inside-out weavers of Llandango, who made magic baskets for keeping things out rather than in. These weavers were not to be confused with the outside-in weavers of Ffandango, who wove normal useful baskets but kept their stomachs on the outsides of their bodies for easy cleaning access.1 Quite why the Llandangolites kept on producing these year after year was one of Transylvania Waters’s many mysteries, as there was no record of anyone ever buying their inside-out baskets. In fact, anyone who was unfortunate enough to visit Llandango actually paid money not to own one. The baskets were piled up in their thousands all around the village, gradually sinking into the ground and taking root where their willow branches had originally grown. If anyone ever got a headache – which, of course, the Llandangolites never did on account of them being wizards – there were enough willow trees to make every single inhabitant of the country fourteen thousand and seventeen aspirins each.

  The Llandangolites may never have sold a single basket, but they lived happy, comfortable lives, as did everyone in Transylvania Waters. This was simply because all Transylvania Waterians were wizards and witches and had more than enough magical powers to make sure they were never hungry or cold, or in need of bacon or the very latest in mobile phones, pitchforks and socks.

  It was a beautiful autumn afternoon, as was every afternoon in this enchanted kingdom.2 The sun was hovering above the mountain tops making everything glow like gold, and because Transylvania Waters was a land of magic, real gold oozed out of the ground everywhere the sun shone. And the gold was reflected in the autumn leaves that were getting ready to drop dead, leaving the trees cold and naked but happy, for the approaching winter.

  The air was filled with the comforting smell of bonfires, and in a tree just below the window two skylarks were singing one more song before packing up and flying down to Africa for Christmas. Far away a distant church bell sounded, which was only there to add to the romantic atmosphere, as there were no religious organisations or churches of any sort in the whole country. In actual fact, the sound came from a rather upmarket ice-cream van calling the faithful to partake in exotically flavoured sorbets and gelati.3

  ‘It doesn’t get any better than this, does it?’ said Queen Mordonna, coming up from behind Nerlin and putting her arms around his shoulders.

  ‘Mmm,’ Nerlin mumbled. ‘I suppose not.’

  ‘You don’t sound like you agree,’ said Mordonna. ‘What’s the matter?’

  �
��I’m tired,’ said Nerlin. ‘I’ve had enough of being King. I want to retire. I want to go high up into the mountains to the Enchanted Valley of the Impossible Waterfall,4 and build a little cottage by the river, just for the two of us, and we’ll keep chickens and ducks and quail and do gardening and watch the birds.’

  Mordonna was quite surprised at this. It wasn’t as if being the King of Transylvania Waters had ever been particularly hard work, apart from the bit at the beginning when they had kicked out her awful father and his even awfuller girlfriend, Countess Slab, and sent them to Rockall, and even that hadn’t been especially tiring, though they had been without bacon for four days.

  Since then, there had been no wars or riots or trouble of any sort. After all, any problem in Transylvania Waters could be fixed pretty quickly with some magic. In fact, ever since the Floods had returned to Transylvania Waters, the country had been overrun with happiness, contentment and bacon, and an enormous percentage of the population spent huge amounts of time keeping ducks and chickens,5 doing gardening and watching birds,6 and Nerlin had been one of the most enthusiastic.

  The birds, who had been used to getting shot and eaten for centuries, had become very confused when people had stopped trying to kill them and started watching them.

  ‘It’s creepy,’ said one of the magpies, ‘the way everyone keeps staring at us.’

  ‘They’re up to something,’ said a sparrow.

  ‘At least when they were hunting us, you knew where you stood,’ said the magpie.

  ‘Until you got shot, that is,’ said the sparrow.

  ‘Yes, but then you’d find that out when you fell down dead,’ the magpie replied.

  ‘So, have you spoken to your eldest son about becoming King?’ Mordonna asked.

  ‘Valla?’ said Nerlin. ‘Not directly. I said I’d like to retire and he said he could understand that. Being King isn’t a job he’d ever want to do.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Though he did tell me he’d think about it, if he was able to introduce a blood tax,’ Nerlin added.

  ‘A what?’

  ‘Everyone in Transylvania Waters would have to give him a small glass of their blood once a month,’ said Nerlin. ‘But no one would ever agree to that.’

  ‘Apart from the Haemorrhaging Nuns of the Bloodlet Street Monastery,’ said Mordonna.

  ‘Yes, but there are only seventeen of them and they’re weird,’ said Nerlin. ‘I suppose Valla just said that because he knows he’d never get away with it.’

  ‘There’s only fifteen nuns left now,’ said Mordonna. ‘Someone said that two of them got a bit over-enthusiastic during the last full moon and drained themselves completely.’

  ‘Anyway, I think we can assume that Valla does not want to be the next ruler of our great land,’ said Nerlin.

  ‘But surely wanting to be King is irrelevant, isn’t it?’ said Mordonna. ‘It’s a matter of duty.’

  ‘For humans, it is,’ said Nerlin. ‘Can you imagine the havoc a wizard could create if they were forced into the job? Remember when your fifth cousin, Prince Wireworm, was made to take over the throne of Puritania after his father got toasted by a dragon?’

  ‘Oh yes, I’d forgotten,’ said Mordonna.

  ‘Hardly surprising when you think about what happened,’ said Nerlin. ‘It’s too horrible to keep in your memory any longer than you have to.’

  When Prince Wireworm’s father had ruled over Puritania, it had been an idyllic kingdom equal to Transylvania Waters in happiness and with even better weather. Winter only lasted for one afternoon – the third Friday in February – and it only rained for thirty minutes every day around 2am, when everyone was asleep. Everyone fell in love with the person of their dreams – even One-Eyed-Lumpskew, the ugliest person in the country, who had very weird dreams – and they all lived happily ever after until that fateful day of the dragon toasting, which had been a combination of unfortunate events and accidents after Prince Wireworm’s father had made a poor choice of fancy-dress. No one had told the dragon that the King was dressed as a marshmallow and, like every sensible creature with easy access to fire, the dragon had been happy beyond measure when he had come round the corner at the annual castle fete and seen the biggest marshmallow imaginable. Before anyone could do anything, the King was a toasted gooey dead thing and Prince Wireworm took over the throne.

  However, the Prince did not want to be King. He wanted to admire cabbages and play computer games, particularly computer games that involved cabbages. He did not want to make important decisions and be wise and clever. All he knew were cabbages and the occasional brussels sprout. Broccoli was beyond his realm of knowledge and even cauliflower was completely foreign to him. The happiest day of his life had been when, at the age of forty-seven, he had been awarded the Grand Order of the Golden Savoy Cabbage, a medal that he had worn outside his underpants for the rest of his life.

  Unfortunately there was one other thing that Prince Wireworm was good at, and that was having tantrums. Not feeble little human ones that involved throwing himself on the floor and screaming, but spectacular wizard tantrums that involved melting the floor and dissolving entire mountains, and making lakes boil and boils burst in torrents of green slime that could drown entire villages. When he had been proclaimed King, Prince Wireworm had the greatest tantrum ever, and by the time he had finished tantrumming the once beautiful paradise that had been Puritania was transformed into a derelict rubbish dump in a really rundown part of a depressed industrial town just outside Belgium, and all the Puritanians, including the Prince himself, had been turned to dust.

  So it was hardly surprising that Nerlin and Mordonna agreed that whoever was chosen to rule Transylvania Waters had to be really keen to do the job, or at least have very reduced tantrumming tendencies.

  ‘I wouldn’t worry too much about it,’ said Mordonna. ‘We’ve got five other children who could do the job. One of them is bound to want to.’

  ‘Six,’ said Nerlin.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Six,’ Nerlin repeated. ‘We’ve got six other children, apart from Valla.’

  ‘Yes, I know that,’ said Mordonna, ‘but there’s no way we could let Betty take charge.’

  ‘Why not?’ said Nerlin, who had a soft spot for his youngest child.

  ‘She’s a right little madam. It would be total chaos,’ said Mordonna.

  ‘Oh, I think you’re misjudging her,’ said Nerlin.

  ‘No, darling, it’s you who is misjudging her,’ said Mordonna. ‘All those pretty blonde curls and big blue eyes don’t fool me for a minute. She’s turned out to be quite evil.’

  ‘Isn’t that what witches are supposed to be like?’

  ‘Not towards their own mothers,’ Mordonna snapped. ‘No, there’s no way our youngest child is ever going to be Queen of Transylvania Waters.’

  ‘OK, so moving on,’ said Mordonna. ‘Who’s next after Valla?’

  ‘Well, I’m not sure,’ said Nerlin. ‘With humans, the succession goes down through the boys, so I suppose it would be Winchflat.’

  ‘Yes, but you know it’s not the same with wizards,’ said Mordonna. ‘We are far more liberated than that. It goes down by age, then boys or girls. We haven’t had any of that sexist rubbish since the Dark Ages.’7

  So it meant that the next in line to the throne was Satanella.

  ‘I can see a problem there,’ said Mordonna. ‘You know and I know that Satanella is our daughter and we love her dearly, but she looks like a dog, barks like a dog and sniffs trees like a dog, and loves nothing more than chasing red rubber balls. Of course, inside that little dog is an enchanting girl, the victim of an unfortunate accident with a damaged wand and a bad prawn.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And we also know,’ Mordonna continued, ‘that it would take mere moments to turn her back into a human-looking witch. I blame myself, really. I should have changed her back when she was a tiny baby, before she was old enough to know any different.’

 
‘True,’ Nerlin agreed.

  ‘But we both know she likes being a dog and doesn’t want to change now.’

  Nerlin nodded. He would never have considered doing anything to upset his eldest daughter, though the thought of having puppies for grandchildren filled his heart with sadness.

  Mind you, they would be great fun to play with, he thought, and we wouldn’t have all that awful nappy-thing to go through first, either.

  ‘So I think we’ll have to skip Satanella,’ said Mordonna. ‘I must say, she’d do an excellent job, but lots of people would have a hard time accepting a small black hairy dog as the head of state.’

  ‘Especially human beings,’ said Nerlin. ‘Can you imagine her at a Heads of State conference?’

  ‘Yes, but what is really funny,’ said Mordonna, ‘is that some of the human leaders would be better off with a collar and lead on.’

  What neither Nerlin nor Mordonna had taken into account was that time can change things. Because Satanella had decided to be a dog, they assumed that was how she would always feel. Everyone had long since stopped talking about it. So no one had the faintest idea that a little voice inside Satanella’s head was wondering more and more what it would be like to be a person.

  When I was a puppy, she said to herself, I thought like a puppy. Chewing slippers and chasing rubber balls were the most important things in the whole world. Peeing on the carpet and leaving little poos behind the sofa were the highlights of my day.