FOUR KINGS: A Novel

by M. D. Elster

  I nod, but the tiniest part of me still remains unconvinced, and Mr. Fletcher sees it.

  “I was the one who found him on the road to the Western Kingdom,” Mr. Fletcher says. “I caught him red-handed. If you can’t trust your gut instincts, can’t you please trust in me, Anaïs?”

  “Yes,” I say, relenting. “You’re right. I trust you, Mr. Fletcher.”

  He smiles, looking relieved. “Very good then,” he says, and we continue on our way.

  The Unicorn King and his advisors have gone on ahead. Mr. Fletcher leads me down corridor after corridor, and down several flights of stairs. The staircases are wide and grand, but gradually become smaller and narrower until they transform into tight, windowless stone spirals and I understand we are going down to a dungeon. It is difficult to believe this is the same castle: Above ground it is pristine glass and diamonds and marble but down below it is gloomy and hellish, the walls are wet and the ceilings drip.

  A jailor greets us at the bottom of the last staircase. There is a jingle of keys and we go through one wrought-iron gate and then another, and another. Finally, the jailor brings us into a sort of cavernous, circular room lit up with torches that lean out from the walls. It has a familiar structure, like that of a courtroom. There are rows of pews for the spectators, a triad of thrones on the far side of the room, and then, off to one side… I see him as my eyes adjust to the torchlight: Sir Lewin, huddled on the ground, chained to the wall, looking miserable and rather filthy. The Unicorn King rises from where he sits on the highest of three thrones, and the rest of the room mirrors him.

  “Bring the human to the stand!” he commands. He is flanked by the Young Cwen and the High Cwen. “We shall begin.”

  Mr. Fletcher walks me to a chair positioned on the side of the thrones opposite to Sir Lewin. I sit.

  “Your Highness.” The Unicorn King bows to the High Cwen. “You may ask your questions.” He sits back down, and I understand the High Cwen is now leading the tribunal.

  “Do you pledge on your life and honor as a human to tell the truth?”

  “I do.” All of a sudden, I notice my hands are trembling. I fold them and tuck them in my lap.

  “Very good, then,” the High Cwen replies. “I want you to tell us what you know about the creature you see before you in chains.”

  “I met Sir Lewin while visiting the royal court of the Lion King,” I say. I steal a nervous glance at Sir Lewin but he is staring straight ahead from where he sits huddled on the floor, and won’t look at me. “He seemed kind at first.”

  I pause, and revise in my head. “Well, no. Actually, at first it seemed he took pleasure in making fun of me. But later he seemed nice. I was wounded in a duel, and he took pains to bind up my cut.”

  “The same injury that produced the bloody bandages that were later found on his person?”

  “Yes.”

  “Go on.”

  “There was a rumor the Snake King had a spell in his grimoire for the ritual that transforms human blood into an elixir of enslavement. We traveled to the Snake King’s court and were miraculously able to obtain the page containing that very spell. Sir Lewin led me to believe he was helping to prevent the spell from falling into the wrong hands, and I trusted him. I didn’t know he was tricking me at the time.”

  I steal another glance at Sir Lewin. He is acting very strangely. Or, to put it more accurately, he is not acting like anything at all. It is as if almost all the life has gone out of his body. He sits as still as a statue and his gaze seems hollow and vacant. He’s ashamed, I think.

  “And then what happened?” the High Cwen asks me now.

  “Well, he promised to deliver the spell over to Mr. Fletcher for safekeeping, but he didn’t. He was found running away, along the road to the Western Kingdom, with all the incriminating evidence on his person.”

  “Sir Lewin, is that the way of it?” the High Cwen says, turning to address him where he sits.

  “Yes,” he says in a low, flat voice.

  “You deceived the human girl?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you conspired to help the Lion King to ignite a war?”

  “Yes.”

  “You murdered the other four human girls, and drained their blood?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you only kept this one alive because she was useful to you?”

  “Yes.”

  “And finally, Sir Lewin, would you have harmed the girl, had she gotten in your way?”

  “Yes.”

  The High Cwen pauses, stiffens her spine and straightens up in her seat. “Well, Anaïs, this appears to be a rather open-and-shut matter. But you are accorded the right to confront him for his wrongdoings. Is there anything you would like to say to Sir Lewin?”

  I contemplate this, and slowly, lift my head in Sir Lewin’s direction. Maddeningly, he still won’t turn in my direction and look me in the eye.

  “I don’t have anything to say, but I do have a question, Your Highness.”

  “Go on.”

  “Sir Lewin… why did you do this?”

  I am embarrassed to ask, embarrassed to hear the quaver in my voice. But it is the only question I have, the obvious question. Everyone waits for his answer. Silence. His hunched form does not so much as twitch.

  “Alas,” the High Cwen finally says, “I believe the prisoner declines to answer. I am sorry, Anaïs. You may go now. I have seen what I needed to see. We thank you for your testimony.”

  I nod, and rise from my chair, as the Unicorn King stands and declares the tribunal has concluded.

  “Come, my dear,” says Mr. Fletcher, putting an arm around me once more. “You look tired.”

  “I am.”

  “I’ll escort you back to the Diamond Room, where if you like, you may retire for the evening.”

  “Thank you.”

  The dungeon courtroom continues to buzz with activity as we make our way back along the tunnel-like hallways, one of the jailors unlocking and relocking gates as we go. When we pass through the final gate and reach the bottom of the spiral stairs, a guard ahead of us sees us and bars our way, holding out an arm.

  “Wait here just one moment, if you will. The royal guards are bringing something down.”

  Mr. Fletcher nods, and we both wait and watch as a group of four guards — two at each end — very cautiously carry a stretcher covered with a long white sheet down the staircase.

  “More evidence against the Lion’s courtier,” the guard who stopped us explains.

  I squint at the shape on the stretcher, then look at Mr. Fletcher, shocked.

  “Is it…?” I ask, but can’t finish my question. He nods.

  “The body of the final human girl Sir Lewin was able to kill, also found along the road to Lion’s Kingdom.”

  Once at the bottom of the stairs, the guards argue with one of the jailors about where they are to keep this item of “evidence.” I stand with my back to the dungeon wall, staring with disbelief at the stretcher. The figure under the sheet looks very small and slight. A hand trails out from under the sheet, along with a bit of long, dark hair. Urged on by some strange impulse, I reach my own hand out for the sheet and lift a corner.

  I gasp, stifle a scream, and drop the corner of the sheet immediately.

  “Anaïs!” Mr. Fletcher scolds. “What in harpy’s name are you doing!”

  “I’m sorry,” I say, feeling ashamed and sick to the point of dizziness.

  The guards, oblivious to my morbid breech of conduct, resolve their argument and step aside to let us pass. Mr. Fletcher shepherds me back up the many staircases. I feel like I’ve been underwater, and am coming up for air.

  Finally, once we are once again surrounded by tall ceilings, glass walls, and sweeping views, Mr. Fletcher addresses me.

  “What were you doing?”

  “I don’t know,” I say. “I thought I recognized her. I had to look.”

  “You s
houldn’t have seen that,” he says, more kindly now. “You’ll have nightmares now.”

  Ha, I think. I already have nightmares. You don’t know the half of it.

  Finally, we draw up to a familiar door.

  “Here we are. Let us hope the Diamond Room will bring you some comfort so you can rest tonight,” he says, opening the door to the room. I take a few steps as though to enter, but he remains standing in the doorway, partially blocking my entry.

  “I’ve been meaning to tell you, Anaïs,” Mr. Fletcher says. “I think this ought to be your final visit.”

  “What? Why?”

  “Well, because I like you,” he says in a genuine voice, smiling. “I have grown fond of you, and I believe you’ll be safer back in your own world.”

  “There are people back there trying to harm me too, you know,” I say, thinking of Colette, of Dr. Waters and the electroshock machine.

  But Mr. Fletcher only shakes his head. “You have done much good here in this land, Anaïs,” he says in a somber voice. “I hope you know how much you mean to me, and how much I’ve gone out of my way to protect you.”

  “If I was in danger being left alone with Sir Lewin, it wasn’t your fault, Mr. Fletcher. I went willingly with him to Snake’s kingdom. I trusted him every bit as much as you did, and perhaps even more. I’ve… I’ve liked being here. In many ways, these visits have saved me from… from other things.”

  “You say that, my dear, but if you returned after Sir Lewin’s execution, I imagine you would be very sad, even if you don’t care to admit it.”

  I think about this. “You’re not wrong,” I admit. “But I trust you when you say it is the right thing.”

  “It is,” Mr. Fletcher says, nodding somberly.

  “And I would like to think that maybe I could return, if only for a short while every now and again.”

  “Perhaps,” Mr. Fletcher smiles a strained smile. “We’ll see. For now, I wish you peace tonight, Anaïs — here and back home in your own world.”

  So. I am going back. What the High Cwen said is true: I will fall asleep here, but wake up again in the asylum. I am already dreading it. gotten so wrapped up in the affairs of this world, I’d forgotten about the affairs of my own. I forgot: Colette, Jules… the trial.

  “Good-night, Anaïs.”

  “Good-night, Mr. Fletcher.”

  For a moment, I think he is going to embrace me, but in the end, he does not. He steps aside, and I walk into the Diamond Room alone. Once the door clicks shut, I crawl into yet another fluffy, sumptuous bed, but it isn’t much for comfort. I’m too sad, and I find myself crying into a pillow. It’s stupid — I can’t even say exactly what it is I’m crying for: For Sir Lewin? For the dead girl? I only got the quickest, briefest of flashes, but… she looked so much like Lucy, it was uncanny. Am I crying because I’m frightened?

  Or am I crying over what I must face, back home in my own world? For my stepfather and for Jules and for the trial? The likely answer is: All of it. I am crying for all of it. I am dreadfully exhausted — almost too exhausted to sleep.

  —Almost.

  Hot and sticky with my own tears, I sob quietly until finally I drift off, and the Diamond Room, the Unicorn King, the banquet hall — all of it, dissolves once again into the stuff of mere dreams.

  CHAPTER 36.

  I wake up burdened by an overwhelming sense of dread, but not because I find myself back in the asylum yet again. Mr. Fletcher gave me some indication that I could expect this would be the case. No, the reason I wake up full of dread has to do with my awareness of what day it is, and where I am going. I am to be discharged today, and given over to Colette’s care and supervision. This would not be so terrible if I weren’t so frightened of her at the moment.

  “What a lucky girl we are today, eh, ma chérie?” Nurse Baptiste sings out, smiling as she helps me pack my things. “Going home — you must be happy, no?”

  She is holding a knapsack that I recognize as my own, and together we fill it with the meager contents of my footlocker, sans the items that belong to the asylum.

  Colette comes to collect me while it is still morning, shortly after I’ve finished my breakfast. The nurses have dressed me in my civilian clothes, and collected my hospital gowns, slippers, and cardigan. I feel strangely sad to watch them round up these items and carry them away, and strangely sad, too, to watch them strip my bed, flip the mattress, and empty out the remainder of my footlocker. I don’t wish to stay — that much is sure — and yet, it’s as if I never existed here, in the asylum. In a few days, there will likely be a new female patient laying the very same bed, squirreling away her treasures in the same footlocker.

  But, this much reminds me: Now that I am wearing “civilian clothes,” I have pockets. And with pockets, I have deftly managed to secret away the brass key bearing the symbols of the Four Kings, as well as a random token, my playing card — the Jack of Hearts — on my person. Tucked quietly into my skirt pockets, these two items will come home with me to my stepfather’s house. The key in particular, with its cold, hard, metal shape, makes me feel I’m not so crazy.

  When Colette arrives, there is at least an hour’s worth of paperwork and sitting in Dr. Waters’s office while he makes speeches from on high, relishing his power over the two of us, all the way up until the very last second he holds it. And then, when all is said and done, I climb into my stepfather’s Cadillac and Colette drives us away. As we pull out of the parking lot, I twist in my seat to wave goodbye, and get a glimpse of the asylum from the outside. I am struck by how much it resembles a gothic castle, with its tall stone walls, crenellated turrets, and tiny, narrow windows.

  I turn to wave goodbye, but there is no one there to wave to. No one stands at the window, gazing at me as I go. Nurse Baptiste gave me a pleasant hug before Colette and I exited through the front entrance, but that was all. I did not see Nurse Kitching at all this morning, and can only assume she was either off duty or else entirely uninterested in my departure. All in all, my departure from the asylum is an unceremonious one.

  Once home, I am slightly taken aback to realize I have become habituated to the steady noise and chaos of the hospital, for I find it exceedingly strange to be inside the large, empty, echoing house again. Colette and I move warily around each other, like two recently adopted cats that haven’t quite struck an alliance yet, or decided whose territory is whose. I unpack my knapsack, then leave my bedroom to wander around downstairs. I see immediately that the hurricane left its angry mark on the house. At the center of the house sits the large, cavernous sitting room, a room in which we often used to receive visitors or throw small parties. I feel a draft and realize a massive hole still gapes in the middle of the ceiling from where the oak tree toppled over onto the roof. The tree is gone, but there is sawdust on the floor — evidence that a team of workers no doubt carved the oak up into pieces and carted it away. The room was hit both with floodwater as well as singed a bit from debris that caught fire from the candles burning that night. It looks and smells like a mildewed, scorched mess, but repairs are underway: There are ladders, fresh beams of wood, joists and hammers and nails. An oiled tarp flaps over the hole, concealing the sky that hangs above.

  I leave the sitting room and wander down another hallway on the first floor, towards my father’s office.

  “STOP! Don’t go in there!” I hear Colette’s voice ring out. Seemingly out of nowhere, she rushes towards me. How long has she been watching me? I freeze, and turn to look at her with a baffled expression.

  “It’s just that…” she says, her voice sounding tense, awkward, “It’s just that, you must understand: No one has been in there since the night of the accident.” She moves to stand between the door to my stepfather’s office and me. “The carpet needs replacing, and some of the furniture really ought to be removed,” she continues. “Anaïs… I don’t want you to see it… I’m worried it might upset you — you know, the state things are in.”r />
  “The night of the ‘accident’?” I repeat back her words to her, raising an eyebrow, irritated to hear her trivialize the fact that my stepfather was shot. Shot on purpose.

  “Yes,” she sighs. “Please. I think it would be better for you if you didn’t go in there, Anaïs. Promise me you won’t go in there, won’t you?”

  I stare at her beautiful, implacable face, at the glittering diamond necklace around her neck. The dim suspicion that has already been brewing in the back of my mind is now percolating to a boil. Colette certainly isn’t making it easy to believe in her innocence. What clues does my stepfather’s office still hold? What is she afraid I might discover? Something about his office resonates with me, with my broken memories. In that moment, I know with absolutely certainty: I must go inside.

  I must go inside, but not now. Not brazenly in front of Colette. I will wait until the timing is right.

  “Anaïs,” she says, narrowing her eyes at me, “Please. Promise me you won’t go in there.” She reaches for my shoulders. Quite suddenly, I feel her hands squeezing my flesh and bone.

  “Fine,” I say, shaking her hands from my shoulders, stepping away from the door, moving towards the staircase.

  “Do you promise?”

  “Sure.”

  Her rigid posture relaxes.

  “You must be tired,” she says, her voice cool and calm, laced with an eerie lilt. “Don’t you want to go upstairs to your bedroom and lie down for a while?”

  “Yes,” I say, “that sounds like a good idea. I think I’ll do just that.”

  I make my way towards the staircase and hurry up the stairs. I don’t really feel like retreating to my bedroom, but I need some time away from Colette’s supervision to think, and to plot my next move. I can feel her watching me as I mount the stairs, and — feeling especially leery of her by now — I try to watch her from out the corner of my eyes in return.

  There is little to do in my bedroom, and I hardly feel like taking a nap. I pace the floor for several minutes, taking care to step quietly, just in case Colette is listening outside the door. There isn’t anything to do but lie in wait. I don’t feel much like reading, but nonetheless my eye catches on a book resting on the shelf near my bed: The illustrated book of Flemish fairytales my father gifted me so many years ago. Wanting a little of his guidance now — however I can get it — I lift the book into my hands, sit down on my bed, and slowly turn the pages. When I come upon the missing page, I pause and let my fingertip run over the remaining jagged-edged stub still sewn into the binding. How did the page go missing? I have never solved this mystery, and now it nags at me. Whatever was here was ripped clean out.