Oh, he was open-handed to others when it suited him, but it only suited him to demonstrate generosity to those knights whose quests brought home the bacon. (Also the gold, the jewels, and the damsels whose doting parents were wealthy enough to shower largesse upon the warrior who'd saved their Little Pumpkin from becoming dragon chow.) This was not favoritism, but pure reciprocity: All knights were compelled to tender the spoils of their adventurings to the king, who in turn restored to them a fair share of said tribute. ("Fair" being based on the king's conviction that his loyal knights were most likely holding back a good ten percent of their gross booty.)
The system worked. That is to say, it worked for Good King Donald and for those knights who came into his employ from wealthier families. Along with sword, shield, lance and banner, each affluent applicant for a position in the king's chivalric entourage likewise packed "A small, most unworthy gift for Your Majesty, in gratitude for Your Majesty's most unlooked-for favor in accepting my humble self into your service."
It did sound ever so much more romantic than: "Hey, King! Here's your bribe!"
The gift-of-unworthiness was not obligatory, by any means. Neither was His Majesty required to hand out the really tasty quests—the quests where the gold and jewels and truly hot damsels practically fell into your lap—to any knight whose family circumstances prohibited him from bringing that gift with him when he first joined the team.
Funny, the way it always just happened to work out, though.
Thus, as he lingered at the border of the Dark Woods, Sir Hanson the Hawk-eyed well might have been pausing to regain his balance, for his career as a knight had been the most vicious of whirligigs: No choice assignments without a plump gift to the king, no way of obtaining a plump enough gift for the king without a choice assignment. Sir Hanson the Hawk-eyed could have changed his name to Sir Hanson the Knightly-scutwork-until-you-die without violating any truth-in-advertising laws.
The quest to which he was presently assigned was a case in point. It was a simple Missing Persons affair, and while the Persons thus Missing were important enough, none involved were princess-level important.
"Maybe it's a dragon that's responsible," Sir Hanson muttered to himself as he leaned slightly forward upon the pommel of his saddle. "There aren't supposed to be any dragons in the Dark Woods, just trolls and goblins and giants and flesh-eating witches, but you never can tell with dragons: They pretty much turn up wherever they like. Who's going to tell them not to? And where there's dragons, there's hoards of gold. It can't be helped." He ended on an optimistic note that rang somewhat tinny, even to his own ears.
He consulted the scrap of parchment in his hand one more time. Sir Hanson had requested that the palace scribe write down the particulars of the case, being a firm believer in the Rule of the Six P's, viz.: Prior Planning Prevents Poorly Prepared Paladins.
"Vanishments," Sir Hanson read. "Mysterious vanishments within the Dark Woods, cause unknown, sorcery suspected." He shook his head. "But that's impossible. Who'd go into the Dark Woods, these days? Everyone knows that they're rife with witches who'd turn a child into gingerbread and gobble him up before you can blink. And since the construction of the Dark Woods Bypass, there's no need to risk traveling through this unholy place. Only a fool would do so."
Once more, Sir Hanson's head filled with the king's indignant voice giving him his assignment: We're not talking about a bunch of children or village idiots here, Hanson; we're talking about some of the most cunning, ruthless, successful merchants in my realm! These were not stupid men, and yet, they were all last observed going into the Dark Woods and not coming out again.
Men? Sir Hanson had echoed. But in the old tales, isn't it always children who—
His Majesty cared not a festering fig for the old tales. Do you think I'd be wasting any of my manpower if this was about children? Children do not pay taxes, or see fit to remember their beloved king with appropriately lavish gifts at Yuletide. To the fuming pits with the children: These are real people who've vanished, and I want to know the reason why.
It was interviews like that which sometimes made Sir Hanson the Hawk-eyed pause to wonder just what, exactly, Good King Donald was good for.
Sir Hanson took up the reins, and urged his steed forward. "On, Barbelindo!" he cried, lifting his chin and striking a heroic pose.
The horse just stood there and, very slowly and with supreme contempt, turned to look at him. In spite of the grandiloquent name Sir Hanson had bestowed upon his mount, they both knew the truth: Barbelindo the Bold was really Bessie, a stolid, serviceable stopgap steed from his father's modest stable. Instead of a proper knight's horse—a fiery stallion with coat of midnight and eyes of flame—all Sir Hanson could afford was Bessie, a mare with coat of oatmeal, eyes of hazelnut, and an expression that made him swear she was always laughing at him.
Covert equine insubordination aside, she was obedient enough. Her one non-negotiable point, however, was her name. And so, muttering angrily under his breath, Sir Hanson managed to grit out a terse, "Giddup, Bessie," before the beast would consent to carry him on to adventure 'neath the Dark Woods' drear and dreadful boughs.
They rode down a forest path that was not entirely unfamiliar to him, even though he had never traveled its tree-shadowed twists and turns himself before now. The Dark Woods and its reputed perils were old hat to Sir Hanson, who had grown up bored halfway out of his skull by tales of this selfsame place of dangers dire and dolorous, whenever Auntie Gretel came to visit. It never failed: The conversation with her brother Hansel always slewed back to their childhood adventures with the Dark Woods, the breadcrumb trail, and the witch they'd so cleverly slaughtered.
"Ah, there was gold aplenty in that gingerbread house!" Auntie Gretel cackled. "God knows how the crone came to have it."
"Who cares how she got it?" her brother Hansel responded. "What matters is we did. Gold's a good dog: It knows its proper master!"
"True, dear brother, true." This was invariably the point where Auntie Gretel sighed happily and twirled the fat strand of pearls around her neck.
Unfortunately this was invariably also the point where young Hanson let loose a cavernous yawn. (Family histories are wasted on the young.) That yawn made young Hanson's father cuff his ear and deliver a lecture about how the witch's purloined riches became the foundation of the family's modest fortune.
"Aye, and the reason why a poor woodchopper's son like me will become the father of a belted knight some day!" he concluded, clouting young Hanson in the other ear for good measure.
Sir Hanson's mother was just as weary as her son of hearing the old, old story. She took pains to confide a few salient details that Dad and Auntie Gretel left out, details she'd learned once upon a time in vino veritas, when her husband had turned truthful in his cups.
"Abandoned by their parents in the Dark Woods?" she said with a sarcastic lift of one eyebrow. "Did you never meet your grandparents? Your Grandpa Hansel-the-Elder would sooner chop off his own arm for the stewpot! Your pa and auntie ran off into the Dark Woods on purpose, by themselves, because they'd heard about the witch's gold and decided it'd be great sport to rob her. That whole bit about the witch caging your pa to fatten him up while making your auntie keep house for her, that's trash and moonshine. Gretel's such a slob, she wouldn't know which end of a broom to hold if you shoved it up her— er, never mind.
"You see, the witch was a keen cardsharp—loved gambling to the point where she couldn't think straight when the gaming fever was on her. Gretel challenged her to a long sit-down over the devil's pasteboards—hand after hand of Trim the Brisket, Five Yellow Dogs, Seeking Aubrey's Ankle and Camelot Hold 'Em—and by the time the sun went down, she'd won most of the old woman's gold."
"And the witch let her go home with her winnings?" young Hanson inquired of his mother.
Her laughter shook cobwebs from the ceiling corners. "After she caught on that Gretel'd marked the cards? Fat chance! But while Gretel was separating the witch
from her treasure, your pa'd been rummaging through the old besom's books until he found one full of simple spells.
"The witch was just about to mount her broomstick and fly after those treacherous brats when your pa launched an incantation that brought the gingerbread cottage tumbling down on the crone's skull. She was crushed beneath an avalanche of stale cake and candy pieces, your pa and auntie took to their heels with her gold in a little casket between 'em, and that, dear heart o' mine, is what really happened."
"Oh," said young Hanson, who rather liked the family history account better.
Now he rode along the way his pa and aunt had trodden so long ago. It did not take him long to notice that something was not quite right about the path through the Dark Woods.
"A troll-haunted woodland road with fresh wagon ruts? And so many?" He blinked at the evidence of his eyes. True, merchants had vanished 'neath the not-so-jolly greenwood shade, but Sir Hanson was expecting to find the hoofprints of horse or donkey, something proper to a lone wayfarer who'd taken a wrong turn into the forest and was waylaid by crone or creature. When a merchant went into the Dark Woods with a wagon heavily laden enough to leave ruts this deep, it meant he'd gone in with property and purpose.
Sir Hanson had just reached this conclusion when his musings were shattered by a loud, ungodly bawling. It came from under an abandoned wagon dead center on the forest path. He dismounted and peered into the shadows beneath the cart, expecting to encounter a banshee, at the very least. Instead, he found a weeping child.
It didn't take much parley to persuade the tyke—a dirty-faced, towheaded boy who looked barely nine years old—to come out and accept an apple. As the lad crunched into the rosy fruit with the grace of a starving dog, Sir Hanson tried to question him, thus:
"Boy, how did you come to be here?"
"Mumf vavver tol' mezoo wait here furrim 'til heecumback f'me," the boy replied, cheeks bulging like a chipmunk's. Then he swallowed and repeated: "My father told me to wait here for him until he comes back for me."
"Your father left you here?" Sir Hanson had a bad feeling about this. The whole thing smacked of mid-woodland child abandonment, something with which he was more than a little familiar.
On the other hand, there was still the matter of the wagon. People abandoned children far more readily than they gave up all claim to a fine vehicle like this one. Come to think of it, though the cart was here, where were the beasts to pull it? The roadway bore ample, pungent evidence that the cart had been brought this far by the labor of oxen, yet oxen here were none. It was all most puzzling.
"Lad, did your father happen to mention where he was going and why he took the oxen with him but left you behind?" Sir Hanson handed the boy a piece of bread and a small chunk of cheese to grease the wheels of conversation.
The boy was not quite so desperate for food after the apple, so he munched the bread and cheese in smaller bites while replying: "Oh, he had to take the oxen. They're all he had to offer up after the last time. But kids ain't allowed to go into the candy house. My father said that she turns away anyone who tries to bring one in, 'cause it's no fit place for children."
"Whereas the Dark Woods is quite the ideal place to leave a child alone." Sir Hanson's mouth tightened. "The candy house, you say? Odd. That sounds very much like the place where my father and auntie once met a woodland witch."
"A witch, that's right!" The boy bobbed his head happily, licking crumbs from his lips. "That's her, the one my father's gone to see; a witch top to toe, he says."
Sir Hanson liked what he was hearing less and less. His hands began to twitch, as though they dreamed their own dexterous dreams of what they would do to this child's father once the formal introductions were over. "Boy, which way did your father go?" he asked.
"Down this path," the boy said, pointing in the direction made obvious by the wagon-ruts. Then he paused, a worried look in his eyes. "Are you going to leave me, too?"
For answer, Sir Hanson picked up the boy and plunked him down astraddle Bessie's rump, then remounted. "I am called Sir Hanson the Hawk-eyed. Let's find this errant father of yours, lad," he said with a backward glance.
"Bardric," the boy said.
"All right, your father Bardric. I'm sure we can—"
"My father's name is Wulfram the goldsmith," the boy cut in. "My name is Bardric. Or were you going to call me 'lad' and 'boy' and 'hey, you' all the time?"
As Sir Hanson and his newfound companion trotted on down the road, they passed more and more abandoned carts. The graveyard of derelict vehicles presented a more chilling tableau than any set-piece of gnarled and sinister trees, their bare branches like black claws, their lightning-blasted limbs home to birds of ill- or somewhat-under-the-weather omen.
"This likes me not," said Sir Hanson. Bessie stopped dead in her tracks, turned, and gave him one of those equine Oh, please! looks such as she always dispensed whenever he assumed the mantle of pretentious parlance so dear to his blue-blooded paladin peers. "What I mean to say—" Sir Hanson gave the sarcastic steed a killing look. "—is this smells funny."
"No, it doesn't," Bardric said, his nose twitching like a squirrel's. "It smells like gingerbread."
Indeed it did, and after navigating her way through an especially nasty bottleneck of forsaken carts, Bessie brought Sir Hanson and the boy out of the Dark Woods and into a bright clearing whose centerpiece was a wonderful cottage made all of gingerbread and decorated with lashings of sweetmeats and candy.
"Wow!" Sir Hanson exclaimed in astonishment. Unluckily, Bessie took "Wow!" for "Whoa!" and pulled up short. The surprise of this sudden stop sent the unready knight toppling from the saddle, landing flat on his back on the ground.
The ground was lumpy. The ground was talkative.
"Hey! Get offa me, you big clod! I'm workin' here!"
Sir Hanson rolled himself over quickly and pushed himself up on his forearms, then stared in astonishment at the wee goblin who'd broken his fall. The creature wore a crisp peppermint-striped tunic emblazoned with an embroidered badge bearing the name Drogo. Beneath it was a brass pin with the words Employee of the Month.
Sir Hanson stood up and bowed to the goblin. "My apologies, good monsterling. It was an accident."
"Yeah, that's what they all say." The goblin clambered to his feet and brushed loam off his livery. "'Specially the cheapskates what leave their carts parked back in the woods so's they won't hafta tip a poor, honest, hard-workin' goblin." He spat to emphasize his contempt for such niggardly highpockets. "So you want I should take care of the horse or you wanna stand there yapping all day? No skin off my scales, either way." Then he glanced up and caught sight of the boy, still holding onto Bessie's back. A cloud crossed Drogo's grotesque visage. "Hey, wassa matter, you don't know the regs? No kids allowed!"
Sir Hanson calmly drew his sword and leveled it at the goblin's wrinkled throat. "That, sir, is no child. That is Malagendron, the most puissant wizard in seven kingdoms. He has taken a fancy to view the world through a child's eyes, and who am I to argue with a sorcerer who has the capability to summon up a legion of fiends at the drop of a hat? Goblin-eating fiends," he clarified.
Drogo gave "Malagendron" a dubious look, but between Sir Hanson's persuasive steel-edged argument and the cardinal rule of You-never-can-tell-with-wizards, he decided to err on the side of cowardice.
"Oooookay, buddy, he's a wizard, have it your way." He cut a brief bow to "Malagendron," then turned back to Sir Hanson and said, "So you want valet parking or not?"
"WOW," SAID BARDRIC, his eyes growing wide and wider as he took in the scene that burst upon his senses the instant he and Sir Hanson passed through the gingerbread cottage's door. "This is— It doesn't make sense that— It's impossible for—" He gave up trying to put his astonishment into words and merely whistled, low and long.
Sir Hanson agreed with him on all counts, including that whistle. "This is beyond belief. How can a simple, woodland cottage hold a hall like this, clearly at least three
storeys high and the length of ten such huts? How could it contain so many people making so much noise, yet we heard not one hint of this commotion on that side of the door?" He made a sweeping gesture, wishing to indicate the humble pastry portal.
The door was gone, and in its place there stood a woman of surpassing allure, clad in a gown of rich carmine velvet. She must have paid a pretty penny for it, though a shrewd consumer would point out that she'd been short-changed as far as upper body coverage. The neckline swooped so low that for all intents she wore a skirt with sleeves.
Sir Hanson's dramatic gesture wound up lodged warmly between her bared bosoms. He gasped and jerked back his hand, blushing. The woman gave him a smile that dripped piquant knowledge.
"Have we met?" she purred, fingers playing idly with her thick black curls.
"Er, no," Sir Hanson managed to say. "I'm new."
"Wouldn't you rather be used?"
"I beg your pardon?"
The lady laughed. "Never mind. Welcome, good sir knight. I am Bezique the enchantress. Your pleasure is my sole concern, however—" She cast a sidelong look at Bardric. The boy was gazing rapturously at her cleavage with the single-mindedness of a cat regarding an unattended anchovy. "Hmm. I was about to say that we do not permit children on the premises, but given the way this one's staring—"
"He's not a child, he's a wizard, and we're only staying long enough to find his father," a flustered Sir Hanson blurted.
Bezique lifted one shapely eyebrow. "Do tell. Very well, then. Welcome, O mighty wizard." She curtseyed low before Bardric, who almost choked on his own tongue as a result of the view. "What name do men employ who speak of thee?"
Poor Bardric uttered a series of hormone-hampered squeaks and gurgles before managing to gasp: "'S Murgedandron— Rhododendron— Didjamindron— Bob!"
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