You have to question the strategy of the four men in that house. They sent the ugly one, who was quite a skilled swordsman, and the two handed kidnapper against me, while they sent the fat one, who could barely waddle around, and a week and injured kidnapper against Ellwood, who though I am loath to admit it, is a slightly better swordsman than me. Consequently my friend cut down her two opponents in seconds flat, while I toyed with mine, in a brilliant display of swordsmanship until Ellwood stabbed them both in the back, making a rather anticlimactic end to what would have otherwise been a wonderful display of marshal acrobatics, which is to say a swordfight.
Ellwood and I rushed to the Queen. I began to untie her as Ellwood pulled the gag from her mouth.
“Thank god you’re here, Your Majesty” said Queen Elleena to Ellwood.
“Wait a second,” said I. “Why are you calling her ‘Your Majesty’?”
“I’m in shock,” said the Queen. “It’s ‘Everyone is Your Majesty’ day. I was accidently looking in a mirror. I thought she was the king of Siam. I have amnesia. It’s reverse day and I’m reverse in everything saying. I’m weak from lack of food. I was thinking about my mother. I didn’t say it. I never say anything. I call everyone ‘Your Majesty’, Your Majesty.”
Chapter Sixteen: Wherein I see the Queen’s bedchamber.
“I’m confused,” said I.
“What else is new?” asked Ellwood.
“I know you,” said Queen Elleena. “Aren’t you that famous story-teller Eaglehand Rustbucket.”
“Eaglethorpe Boxcar,” said I.
Ellwood snorted.
“You know me.” I struck an angry pose. “I once had the pleasure of spending a fortnight in your company.”
“If you say so,” she said. “A lot of men have.”
“Come on,” said Ellwood. “I think all the conspirators are dead, but there’s no point in sticking around here. We need to get somewhere safe.”
This sounded entirely reasonable to me, so gathering up what we came for, which is to say Queen Elleena, we left out the back door. The palace was not too terribly far, but we took a circuitous route to it, to avoid passing through the northwestern portion of the cemetery, which is where most of the zombies lurk. Zombies are always after brains, so anyone in my company is in particular peril.
“You mean because next to you they look extra yummy?” asked Ellwood.
“What?”
“You were thinking aloud again—this time about zombies,” she said.
“Was I?” For perhaps the first time in my life I began to doubt myself. “For perhaps the first time in my life I am beginning to doubt myself,” said I.
“Come along,” said Ellwood, putting a comforting hand on my shoulder.
We reached the back wall of the palace. Pressing a small button, Ellwood opened a secret panel and the three of us stepped inside. The previously hidden and then moving wall, which is to say exactly the kind of wall I was talking about in chapter thirteen, slid shut behind us. Moving along a narrow passage and then up a series of stone steps, we entered into a vast room trimmed with purple. It was more than trimmed with purple. It was dripping in purple. There was a large bed with a lavender canopy. Banners of mulberry and magenta and heliotrope hung from the walls near the ceiling. The floor was covered in indigo and violet rugs. Orchid doilies sat atop both nightstands, beneath violet vases. There were even periwinkle periwinkles in the vases.
“So, is it all that you thought it would be?” asked Ellwood.
“Is what all that I thought it would be?” I wondered.
“The Queen’s bedchamber,” she said, with a wave.
“It is very purple,” said I, “and purple is good.”
“Really?” wondered Elleena. “I thought white was good.”
“Oh, it is. But purple is good also.”
“How about green?” she asked.
“Green can be either good or bad. It is bad if your soldiers are green. But it is good if your thumb is.”
“But red is bad, right?”
“Oh yes,” said I. “Red is bad.”
“What about Valentine’s Day?” asked Ellwood. “What about red, heart-shaped boxes of candy. What about red roses? What about love?”
“Yes, red is bad,” said I. “and red is evil too.”
“You are very smart, Master Boxcar,” said the Queen. “You are the kind of man I’d like to get to know better.”
“Patience,” said Ellwood with a sigh. I thought that perhaps she was talking to Elleena, warning her that she shouldn’t rush into a relationship with a roguish yet handsome warrior such as myself, and a story-teller and a playwright too. Then I thought that perhaps she was talking to me, warning me that as the Queen didn’t remember me, she was obviously addled by a large blow to the head and I shouldn’t take advantage of her. But when I looked at Ellwood, I realized she was talking to herself, as she had closed her eyes and was rubbing her temples like she had a headache.
“You don’t have to be anywhere anytime soon, do you?” asked Elleena, slipping her arm into the crook of mine, which is to say the crook of my arm or the inside of my elbow.
“Bitch, don’t even,” said Ellwood.
“I never get to have any fun!” shouted Elleena.
“What do you mean, you never have any fun?” Ellwood shouted right back at her. “All you do is have fun! How many pounds of cheesecake have you eaten in the last year? Have you looked at the size of your ass in the mirror lately? How many days have you stayed in bed, ordering the palace staff to bring you sweetmeats? And speaking of bed, how many knights and squires and ambassadors and wizards and adventurers and blacksmiths and elves and court jesters and dwarves have you had in yours?”
“In my what?” asked the Queen.
“In your bed!”
“All the queen’s horses and all the queen’s men,” said Elleena with a bow.
Ellwood grabbed the Queen by the hair with her left hand and with her right, punched the hapless monarch so hard that she went tumbling across the floor.
“You’re ruining my reputation!” she shouted.
Elleena rolled up into a sitting position, a look of surprise pasted across her face. Then she grinned in fierce determination.
“You don’t have a reputation, you frigid tight-ass!”
Ellwood jumped on her and soon the two of them were embroiled in as bitter a battle as was ever fought by the forces of evil and the forces of good, though I would have been hard-pressed to identify which was one and which was the other. They rolled across the floor, knocking over small occasional tables, which are tables that are occasionally tables but usually something else, and breaking purple objects of just about every shape and description. I wanted to stop the mayhem, but how often does a man get to watch two women, one dressed as a man and another dressed as a queen, beat the living stuffing out of each other? I mean, really? But alas, as I had no beer and no snacks and no place to comfortably sit, except the Queen’s bed which would not have been appropriate to sit on, especially considering the dirt and blood on my clothes, I was forced to break up the fight. I pulled them apart, though both lost at least a handful of hair to the other as I did so.
“Hold,” I ordered, holding them. “Somebody had better tell me what is going on, and somebody had better tell me right now.
“That was very forcefully said and very manly,” said Ellwood.
“Indeed,” said the Queen. “It is the kind of forceful and manly statement that makes me glad to be a woman.”
“Me too,” agreed Ellwood.
“Nobody is going to believe that I ever said that,” said Ellwood.
“Trust me,” said I. “If they believe the rest of this story, they will believe that.”
Chapter Seventeen: Wherein I remind the reader of the story of The Queen of Aerithraine, with whom I am pretty sure I once had the pleasure of spending a fortnight.
As my legion of devoted followers will no doubt remember, The Queen of Aerithraine i
s one of my best stories and is certainly the story by which I have earned the most coins. Oh to be sure, I have made coins from my other stories as well—The Werewolf’s Maid, The Elven Princess, Prudence the Possessive Pirate, and The Irascible Monkey People—but none so much as The Queen of Aerithraine. It is all the more wonderful a story because it is true, so everyone already knows most of the details.
Aerithraine was a more or less great realm, until about fifty years ago, when the old king died. His name was King Julian the Rectifier, and as he was mostly interested in rectifying, he was accounted a good king. King Julian had only one son, and he passed to that son the strongest and wealthiest kingdom in all of Duaron. That son’s name was King Justin the Unready. King Justin married a princess from the faraway land of Goth. She was a plucky girl named Beatrix with very white skin, very black hair, and a ring through her nose, which is the fashion in the east.
King Justin and Queen Beatrix set about begetting children. They were so busy begetting that they didn’t notice when millions of goblins poured in across the border from the Goblineld. That was the thing that Justin was unready for. The goblins were supported by ogres and trolls and all manner of horrible monsters provided by their ally, The Witch King of Thulla-Zor.
King Justin had four strong sons and another child on the way when he charged off at the head of his army to defeat the goblins. Sadly for him, it was the goblin’s turn to defeat somebody and that somebody turned out to be King Justin. King Justin, his three younger sons, and all of the Dragon Knights were slaughtered—to a man. Prince Jared, the eldest son of the king, who had been in the north fighting sea raiders, hurried his forces south, only to meet the same fate. The goblins were waiting for him. The entire southern third of the kingdom fell—and remained in the goblins’ filthy little hands for almost a generation. And the Goblin King feasted on the spoils of war, sitting on his throne far below the surface of the mountains, drinking his disgusting goblin wine from a cup made from the skull of King Justin.
Queen Beatrix died of a broken heart, just moments after giving birth to her only daughter Elleena Posthuma. With nobles vying among themselves for control of the kingdom, Pope Bartholomew whisked the young princess away to Fall City and had himself appointed as regent. In Fall City, Elleena was kept safe and taught all that she needed to know in order to run a country. At the age of fourteen, she took the crown, exiling the Pope back to his place in the church.
Returning to Illustria, Elleena not only took her throne as queen, but at the age of fifteen, took her place as leader of Aerithraine’s army. At the head of 10,000 knights and men-at-arms, she crushed the bands of goblins that had been terrorizing the lands of the south since her birth. But that wasn’t enough. She led her forces into the Goblineld and deep into the mountainous passages and caverns, killing the goblin king and all but exterminating the little monsters. She would have gone further and attacked Thulla-Zor, but by that time her soldiers had been continuously fighting for more than five years.
So a twenty-one year old queen returned to the capital and led her country to prosperity undreamed of even by her grandfather. The people and nobles of Aerithraine were nervous though. There was no heir to the throne. Suitors came from every corner of Duaron and beyond. Princes from Goth and Lythia brought great gifts and Dukes and Lords from every realm plied the Queen with favors and compliments. Even the King of Theen’s idiot son courted Elleena.
Then when she was twenty-five, Elleena suddenly chose a minor noble from the east. They married quickly and there were two weeks of feasting, and then the little lordling returned to his land and the Queen stayed in Aerithraine. Years passed. There was no heir. The lordling never returned, and people began to say that it was all a ruse, designed by the Queen to remove the pressure for her to marry. There was still no heir. But the Queen led her knights again and again victoriously in battle against Aerithraine’s foes, and the kingdom was more prosperous than it had ever been. So what could anyone say?
That’s a story worth half a crown, don’t you think?
Chapter Eighteen: In which I finally learn the truth of what a fool I’ve been.
I looked at Ellwood Cyrene, the hollow feeling of curiosity suddenly giving way to the bloated feeling of understanding.
“You are Queen Elleena, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” she said, and stepping over to the mostly purple bed, she sat down. “I wanted to tell you, but I couldn’t.”
“But we have been through countless adventures together over the past five years,” said I. “Ellwood Cyrene is a legend in the land. He’s a great hero. He’s my best friend.”
“He’s a she.” She smiled sadly. “Well, you know that Ellwood is the male form of Elleena.”
“Yes I knew that.”
“But you didn’t know that Cyrene is actually the old elvish word for queen.”
“No, I knew that too,” said I.
“And you didn’t put it together?” she frowned. “You didn’t figure it out?”
“Well, it seemed a bit too on the nose, if you know what I mean. And who is she?” I asked pointing at the woman I now knew to be a faux queen.
“Just a slut that looks like me.”
“You do look alike,” I admitted, “except her hair is a bit longer and her bosoms are perhaps a bit bigger.”
“Nice, aren’t they?” asked the faux queen, cupping her breasts in her hands and lifting them upward.
“Shut up, whore,” said Ellwood.
“My name is Miriam, by the way.”
“Nobody cares,” said Ellwood.
“But why?” I asked.
“My father named me after my grandmother,” said Miriam.
“No. I wasn’t asking why your name was Miriam, which by the way is a lovely name.”
“Because she’s not integral to the plot,” said Ellwood.
“I wasn’t asking why nobody cares that her name is Miriam either. I was asking why Queen Elleena of Aerithraine became the famous adventurer and hero Ellwood Cyrene and why Miriam became Queen Elleena.”
“Because she’s a big dyke,” said Miriam.
“Because she has no discernible skills and I offered her money,” said Ellwood.
“Stop, stop,” said I. “It’s obvious and only natural that you both want me, but you mustn’t fight over me.”
“We weren’t fighting over you,” said Miriam.
“Of course not,” said Ellwood.
“Anyway,” said I. “I want to know the whole story.”
Ellwood, which is to say Elleena, rolled her eyes and Elleena, which is to say Miriam, climbed to her feet.
“You tell your story,” the fake queen told the real one. “I’m going to go take a bath.”
I turned to the woman, the person I thought I knew, sitting on the bed, which is to say she was sitting on the bed and not me. With a sigh, she began her story.
“I grew up wanting nothing but to rule the land, defeat my enemies, and kill goblins. Just as soon as I was skilled enough with the sword, I took the crown and the army and led them south. I did kill goblins too, perhaps more than anyone else in the history of the world, if I do say so myself. I made sure that they feared me; that the mere mention of my name gave them nightmares. That wasn’t enough, of course. It turns out that I loved battle. I loved everything about it—the splash of hot blood, the smell of sweat and excrement, the heat of the sun on the back of my neck, the bone chilling rain leaking into the seams of my armor, the feeling of bones and skin breaking beneath my sword. I would have never stopped. I would have destroyed Thulla-Zor, and then united Lyrria and Lythia under my banner, crushed Theen, and then swept northward and westward again until I had conquered all of Duaron. Then I would have set out for new worlds to crush or destroy. But after five years my soldiers refused to go on. They wanted to come home and sleep with their wives and plant corn and grow old and fat.
“There was nothing else for it. I had to come home and take up in the palace. I never wanted to be that
kind of queen. I never wanted to wear a big dress and parade around in front of the nobles, or listen to minstrels and eat cake. I was miserable. Of course I led my knights out to defeat any threat to the kingdom, but pretty soon there was nobody with enough backbone to threaten it.
“And then everyone wanted an heir. For that I needed a husband, but the men they brought before me were spineless weaklings or grotesque baboons or perfumed dandies. Besides, the thought of pushing a whole human being out of my hoo-hoo is pretty damned frightening. So I arranged a fake marriage to get everyone off my back for a while. But I was so bored.
“It started as a lark. I dressed up as a man and snuck out of the palace. I drank a few pints in a pub and got into a drunken fist fight. It was the most fun I’d had in ages. I began to go out more and more often, but I couldn’t go far, because the Queen had to be here to take care of all the tedious things that a queen has to do on a daily basis.
“Then one night while I was out, I saw a man assaulting a woman. He had dragged her into a dark alley to do what those types of men do to women in dark alleys. I played with him for a while before I killed him. But it was the woman who interested me.”
“I told you she was a dyke!” called Miriam from the other room.
“It was that whore Miriam!” shouted Elleena/Ellwood. “She wasn’t such a fat cow then!” Then she continued her story. “I immediately realized how much she looked like me. So I brought her to the palace. She had no family and no prospects, so I let her be me for a while. That way I could go out adventuring and she could sit around looking like a caged parakeet. I only had to return every few months to take care of any business, because she doesn’t have a brain in her head.”
“So every time I’ve seen the Queen, it’s not really been the Queen?” I asked.
“Not usually,” said Ellwood/Elleena. “When you saw her riding through the streets with her knights, it was Miriam.”
“But when the Queen summoned me?”
Many Adventures of Eaglethorpe Buxton Page 16