“I wonder what Billy would think of all this,” he said aloud, listening to the hounds howling somewhere below. “Doubt he’d be scared.”
Charlie looked out at Vampyreishtat, this Monsterland, and felt as alone as ever.
— chapter 10 —
Dinner with the Prime Minister
WHEN CHARLIE GOT back to the kitchen, he found Ringo playing with a large wolfish dog with gray-red fur. He watched as they chased each other through the main double doors and out into the hall. Music was playing somewhere in the castle, a violin alternating low moans and shrieks with a sad melody in between.
“Mrs. Winthrope?” Charlie called. “Oscar?”
But neither Mrs. Winthrope nor Oscar answered, so he followed the dogs to the foyer.
“Ringo . . .”
The dog came instantly, trotting around the corner, followed by Mrs. Winthrope, who was tucking her hair back up into its bun.
“Oh, Charlie,” Mrs. Winthrope said, a bit surprised. “So how was it? Spectacular view, isn’t it?”
“Uh, yes, ma’am. It was. Looked like I could see all of Monsterland . . . Uh, I mean Vampier . . .”
The music stopped.
“Vampyreishtat, but oh, no. No, no, no. You couldn’t have seen the whole of it, my goodness,” Mrs. Winthrope dismissed. “Please, Charlie, right this way. The Prime Minister would like you to join him before dinner.”
The violin resumed its playing, although this time the melody, while still foreboding, rose with a flurry.
“Uh, yes, ma’am. Thank you, but my parents, they might be getting worried. I really should be getting home.” Charlie thought that they would probably start looking for him soon, and he wasn’t sure he really wanted to see this Prime Minister again anyway.
“Oh, it will be fine, Charlie. Just fine,” Mrs. Winthrope reassured him. “Remember we were just aiding a fallen traveler, and I think you’ll find that the Prime Minister can be quite charming . . . when he wishes to be.”
With Ringo nipping at their heels, Charlie followed Mrs. Winthrope back through the foyer, up a small set of stairs, and into the library. The vast room was filled with leather-bound books on every wall from floor to ceiling; a narrow ladder on rails offered access to the volumes on the highest shelves. Their faded titles sparked gold in the light of a large, open fireplace.
Two high-backed chairs sat facing the hearth. Rings of smoke lingered in the air above the one on the left, which also appeared to be the source of the somber tune. The melody abruptly stopped at their approach.
“Aye, good evening, sir,” Mrs. Winthrope said. “I have Charlie . . . oh my, I’ve realized I never got yer last name—”
“Cooper, ma’am. Charlie Cooper.”
“Aw, yes. Well, Charlie Cooper,” Mrs. Winthrope continued.
A long leg pushed back one of the high chairs, opening it away from the fire and to the room.
“Ah, yessss, our intrepid wanderer. Please show him in . . .”
The Prime Minister stood. The shadows from the fireplace had an elongating effect, making it appear as though he towered all the way to the ceiling. And he looked different than he had back in the tunnel. He seemed younger, like in the portraits from the middle stairs. His ears were no longer tattered, and his black hair, while streaked with gray, was full and slicked back from his forehead. But Charlie could still see, despite this younger appearance, the look of sadness that lingered in his eyes.
“Charlie, why, it is an honor to see you again,” the Prime Minister said, extending his long, thin hand. “Welcome, please sit.”
Charlie shook his hand, shocked once again by how cold it felt, as if he were just holding a snowball.
“And, Mrs. Winthrope. Would you be so kind as to bring Charlie some of your hot chocolate? His hand is simply chilled to the bone.” The Prime Minister turned to Charlie. “You will not be disappointed.”
Charlie could have skipped the hot chocolate, if just to keep Mrs. Winthrope and Ringo in the room, but he stayed and reluctantly followed the Prime Minister, sitting beside him in the other high-backed chair by the fire.
“Thank you for joining me before dinner. We are a bit isolated here so high in the mountains, so always up for a bit of conversation. I trust your accommodations were satisfactory?”
“Uh, yes, sir,” Charlie said. “Thank you.”
Charlie noticed there were no portraits in this room. Instead, there were several framed photographs of older gray-haired men and women shaking hands with other older gray-haired men and women. Most of them wore dark suits, but some of them were wearing military uniforms.
They sat in silence for a while, listening to the crackling flames of the fire before the Prime Minister finally spoke.
“So, to the question of the hour, why is it, Charlie Cooper, why were you wandering in the rain, in a graveyard, all alone, and on All Hallows’ Eve of all nights?”
“I guess I got lost,” Charlie said softly.
“Easy to do in a wood that wild.”
“Well, to be honest, I thought you were Billy at first . . .”
“Ah, yesssss. Your cousin, I believe you said.”
“So when I saw you, I thought you were him, you know, from the pumpkin patch, and that you could help me, because I was lost.” Charlie shrugged. “I guess I was wrong. It’s just that he usually dresses up like . . . well, like you for Halloween.”
“Billy does?” the Prime Minister asked as he plucked the strings of the violin with his long fingers.
“Yes. Or he did,” Charlie said.
“He did?”
“Until last year.” Charlie turned away and looked at the fire.
“And yet, you were following him, this year?”
Charlie was not sure what to say but thought that his parents and Old Joe, even Ms. Hatchet, would probably be asking him the same question.
“You must not tell anyone that you saw me there in the pumpkin patch, Charlie. It can be our secret, for now . . .”
“Yeah, okay, I mean yes, yes, sir,” Charlie replied, knowing that no one would ever believe him anyway.
The Prime Minister plucked another string. “You know, I have seen you before, Charlie. Seen you there, on the other side, the other side of the mountains, as you call it.”
“You have?” Charlie wasn’t sure how he felt about a vampire watching him, even if he was a Prime Minister.
“Yessss. Sometimes I pass your way, through the woods, and I have seen you alone late at night, sitting, sitting on your, how do you say it, porch,” the Prime Minister said with a smile. “It appears we share a similar nocturnal nature, does it not?”
“Yes, I guess so.”
The Prime Minister plucked a few more notes and adjusted the strings.
“At times I have wondered, why do you sit there, Charlie, alone on the porch so late at night?”
Charlie shifted uncomfortably and said, “I have trouble sleeping. Bad dreams. Nightmares, really.”
Except for last night, Charlie thought. Last night was the first solid sleep that he’d had for as long as he could remember.
“Bad dreams?” the Prime Minister repeated. “I suppose we all have them . . .”
“Well, they’re not always bad. Sometimes they’re all right.”
The Prime Minister plucked another string.
“Please stop me if I appear too forward, but I am also troubled by sleep and wonder. What do you dream of, Charlie? What keeps you up at night? I must admit, I find the subject simply fascinating.”
Charlie paused for a moment, thinking of the hot, arid plain from his dreams. The sun was bright, but he could see the boy in the distance. He could see Billy.
“Billy,” Charlie said, feeling dizzy again. “I have this dream about my cousin Billy. He’s lost somewhere, and I can’t find him.”
“L
ost? Like you were?”
Charlie felt the blood drain from his face, and it was warm, too warm sitting next to fire.
“Yes . . . lost . . .” But Charlie’s voice trailed off. He was confused.
Billy had been gone for over a year. They were working after school in the orchards with Old Joe the day he left. When they were done with their chores, instead of going back to the house to do their homework like Old Joe said, they climbed their usual tree, a weeping willow that reached out over the river.
In the summer, they hung their shirts and shoes in the branches and jumped from the tree to swim in the cool, swirling waters below. But it was October, and that day, the river was cold, too cold. Still, Billy didn’t care. He said that summers should last forever and bet Charlie that he could swim to the other side despite the temperature. But Billy never came back up. And aside from his troubling dreams, Charlie had not seen Billy since.
Charlie felt his eyes welling up but willed himself not to cry. He hadn’t cried, really cried, not since Billy first disappeared, and he was not about to start now in the presence of this strange creature. He coughed back the tears and continued, “Yes, sir, lost.”
“There, there,” the Prime Minister said, patting him gently on the shoulder. “No need to solve all that ails us this very moment, right? The night is young, and as I am sure you have gathered, Mrs. Winthrope knows her way around a kitchen.”
The Prime Minister stood and took in the kitchen’s aromas with a wave of his hand.
“Ah, hot chocolate. Come now. I am quite sure that a feast awaits . . .”
And feast they did. They moved to a formal dining room and sat at a long table lined with candelabras and more dripping wax. There was roast beef and potatoes, fish and ham, vegetables so large that Charlie could hardly believe what he was eating. And the Prime Minister, as Mrs. Winthrope had said, did turn out to be quite the conversationalist. They spoke of faraway places, great journeys, fantastic creatures, and many battles, which oddly enough made Charlie feel better. The Prime Minister told him more of the government’s roundup of the world’s monsters and agreed that when they had first arrived it was different, a more hopeful spirit to it all. Mrs. Winthrope concurred and just as Charlie thought he had eaten all he could, she moved on to dessert.
“Oh, Charlie,” Mrs. Winthrope said, passing him a hefty strudel. “When we first arrived, we had more support from yer government, from the outside. But now, with the budget slashed, my, my, you wouldn’t believe what it takes to keep the place going.”
“But how?” Charlie said. “How did you all even get here?”
“Why, at night, Charlie, they used to bring us through the tunnel, the very same tunnel that brought you here,” Mrs. Winthrope said, rather matter-of-factly.
“By my house?”
Charlie pictured the woods and the abandoned military base next to Old Joe’s orchard. All these monsters, the world’s monsters, had come here to this strange place through the woods by his house. Charlie shuddered at the thought, but then remembered what Mrs. Winthrope had said about the word monster—how it was not always a fair label. Charlie pondered this, concluding that perhaps his fears were inappropriate.
“Similar to the outside world, there is much that plagues us here besides our own true nature,” the Prime Minister admitted. “Like any government, I suppose, balancing the needs of the many factions is a constant battle.”
“We talked about that,” Charlie said through a mouthful of strudel. “The Headless Horsemen being at war with the Headhunters.”
“When are they not at war?” the Prime Minister said wearily. “While I must admit that the Headless Horsemen have a legitimate grievance, they are unfortunately the least of our concerns. The real issues that plague our valley are to the north in the Agrarian Plains, warring factions, neither side willing to yield or compromise . . .”
The Prime Minister turned to Charlie. “And how is a government, any government, expected to function without compromise? As I am sure you have learned in school, compromise is at the very essence of what a government is. It is by its very nature what it is supposed to do, is it not?”
“We did learn about that in school,” Charlie replied, noting that the Prime Minister hadn’t eaten anything during the entire meal. He just sipped at his cup of hot chocolate as he spoke about the troubles of Monsterland with a growing intensity.
“And as elected by the Council of the Congressional Caucus of Vampyreishtat, the Prime Minister is charged with—how should I put this?” Mrs. Winthrope said, standing up from her chair. “Sorting it all out.”
“I suppose that is one way to put it, Mrs. Winthrope,” the Prime Minister added.
“These are trying times to be sure,” Mrs. Winthrope went on, collecting an armload of dirty dishes and loading them on a serving tray. “Trying times indeed.”
“Yessss, it is hard to say what is next for your government’s grand experiment with us, the apparent horrors of the world. Who knows what the future holds for Vampyreishtat and its many inhabitants?” the Prime Minister concluded. “This, from our shared insomnia, is what keeps me up at night, Charlie.”
As Charlie ate the last of his strudel, Mrs. Winthrope left for the kitchen. Despite her absence, Charlie now felt oddly at ease with the Prime Minister. After their conversation, the fear he remembered overtaking him back at the tunnel and again before they met in the library had somewhat lifted.
The Prime Minister sat back in his chair, lit his pipe, and smoked silently until Charlie set down his fork.
“You know, he never said good-bye,” Charlie said, looking at his plate. It could have been the food or the warmth of the fire, or maybe even the Prime Minister’s own unexpected candidness. Whatever it was, Charlie suddenly felt compelled to tell the Vampire everything.
“Billy?” the Prime Minister replied, turning from his thoughts to the boy.
“They say he drowned. They dredged the river and everything, but they never found him. I don’t believe them, though. Billy was one of the best swimmers in town, so I think he might have just run away. He’s done that before. I tried going to look for him. I thought maybe he got lost, but my mom and dad stopped me.”
“Do you still think that, Charlie?” the Prime Minister said. “That your cousin Billy has run away?”
Charlie looked up at the Prime Minister.
“I don’t know anymore. But sometimes at night, in my dream, I can see him, and I think he needs me.”
The Prime Minister took a long draw on his pipe. Charlie watched the smoke swirl into a cloud that hung just above their heads. The Prime Minister was quiet, seemingly lost in thought again. The ticking of a clock echoed from the foyer.
“Whatever Billy’s fate, lost or otherwise, there is perhaps a way,” the Prime Minister said after some time. “A way, Charlie, that you could see him again.”
Charlie sat up. “Where? Here?”
“Yessss, here. I have only been there once, but there is a place in this valley, far beyond the horizon. A deep wood where the lost and the spirits gather. It is possible . . .” The Prime Minister leaned forward. “Perhaps, as you say, he is just lost, lost like you, and he ended up there. It happens. It is a long, hard journey, though. Not for the weak of heart. If you were to accept such a challenge, you will see things, horrible things, the likes of which you have never dreamed . . .”
Charlie thought about it. He knew that Billy wasn’t back home. And they never did find him in the river. If he was what they said, maybe he was there. Or maybe, as the Prime Minister said, he was just lost. Lost here, over the mountains. Lost just like Ringo had been. Lost, just like him.
“But you think Billy might be there?” Charlie still couldn’t believe his ears.
“He might be. I make no guarantees, though. The lost—they come and go in this place as they please.” The Prime Minister set down his pipe. “
However, a trip like this should not be taken lightly, Charlie; monstrosities aside, the terrain alone is treacherous, much of the route uncharted.” The Prime Minister paused for a moment. “You will need a guide, and one who knows the mountains as well as the open range. There is only one I can think of who might be able to accompany you there safely. As we speak, he is preparing to go north to the Agrarian Plains on a diplomatic mission, an informal summit, really. Perhaps he could be persuaded to push a little farther. Might do him some good, actually.”
After all he had heard about this strange valley, Charlie tried to imagine what could possibly be ahead. He pictured himself walking down cobblestoned roads, through heavy woods teeming with bizarre creatures of every shape and size. There was no doubt about it—Charlie was scared. He thought of his parents, who surely would be concerned by now, and Old Joe, but at the end of the road, he saw Billy.
Shivering, he heard himself say, “I’ll do it. I need to let my family know, but I’ll go.”
The Prime Minister looked at the boy quizzically. “So little tribulation. Are you not frightened?”
“No, sir, I am. To be one hundred percent honest, I’m already terrified. No offense,” Charlie said, holding his shaking hands under the table. “But I know Billy would do the same for me, so I need to be brave. That’s what he would want, is for me to be brave.”
“It is that important to you, is it?”
“Yes, sir. Whatever happened, I need to talk to him. I think he’s out there somewhere, and like in my dream, I wonder if he needs me.”
“Well, your Billy is certainly lucky to have you for a cousin.” The Prime Minister smiled, exposing his pearly fangs. “Then it is settled. Tomorrow, if you still want to go, I shall try to help you arrange the details.” The Prime Minister stood. “Now, if you will excuse me. As we have discussed, I have pressing matters that require my attention.”
Charlie stood as the Prime Minister crossed the room to the door.
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