by K. E. Mills
'Returning to your apartments. Where you shall remain until you agree to do your duty. I shall be along presently to chastise you.'
'Chastise me!' she echoed, furious.'You're not my father and I'm not five years old! How dare you — ' 'Melissande!
She went red, then white. 'Fine. Banish me to my rooms. Put a guard at the doors while you're at it, why don't you, and see to it I'm fed on nothing but bread and water from now until doomsday! I don't care. You're making a mistake with the Kallarapi, Lional, and the only duty I have is to see that you realise that!'
She marched from the room without a backwards glance. Lional stepped aside to let her pass then approached the bed, his expression grave. Despite his pounding head Gerald tried to sit up. 'Your Majesty…' 'Gerald!' screeched Reg.'You're awake!' 'More or less. What happened?'
'What happened?' Lional echoed. 'Don't you remember?'
'No,' he said, after a moment's frantic thinking. 'The last thing I recall is riding out of the stable yard. I take it I fell off?'
'Comprehensively,' said Lional, smiling. 'I'm afraid Dorcas put her foot in a rabbit hole and threw you headfirst into a tree. It's a miracle you didn't break your neck. You are concussed, though, according to my doctor.'
'Ouch,' he said, and with tentative fingers explored the top of his head. 'OuchV He looked at Lional. 'What about Dorcas? Is she all right?' 'Who cares?' said Reg. 'Are you?'
He took a quick inventory. 'I think so. Apart from my head… and my chest.'
'Your chest? Ah. Yes,' said Lional. 'Possibly you were bruised by my saddle. I carried you home on Demon, you see.' He laughed. 'Draped before me just like a kill.'
Oh. How embarrassing. 'Your Majesty, I'm sorry, I — '
'I say!' said an excited voice from the bedroom doorway.'He's awake? That's marvellousV
Rupert. Underneath a voluminous green apron he wore canary yellow plus-fours and a bright violet shirt. His socks were striped red and pink.
'Blimey' breathed Reg. 'That's no sight for a sick man to bear!'
Lional speared his brother with a look. 'Yes, Rupert. Now isn't there a butterfly somewhere you can chloroform?'
Rupert blinked. 'No. I never chloroform my butterflies, not unless they're suffering.'
'Trust me, Rupert, that can be arranged! Now go away. The professor doesn't need to be disturbed by your mindless drivel, he needs to rest.'
'Oh,' said Rupert. 'All right. If you say so, Lional. I'm so happy you're not hurt, Gerald. If you're feeling up to it later perhaps you'd like to come visit me? The Grandiose Feather-Headed Lobbet babies hatched an hour ago and they're ever so sweet.'
'That would be very nice, Your Highness,' he said weakly, not daring to look at Lional. 'Once my head stops aching.'
'Wonderful!' said Rupert, beaming. 'Only Grandiose Feather-Headed Lobbet babies don't stay sweet for very long, so — ' 'Rupert!
Rupert departed. 'Dreadful man,' said Lional, shuddering. 'I sometimes wonder if he isn't a changeling.' Then he smiled. 'Now, Gerald, you must rest. There are urgent matters of state about which I must ask your advice, as soon as you feel up to it.'
Wonderful. Just what he needed. / really feel rotten. I'll never ride again. 'Of course, Your Majesty,' he said weakly.'Thank you, Your Majesty'
'Oh, no, Gerald,' said Lional, and pressed a friendly hand to his shoulder.'Thank you'.
'Well!' he said as the door closed quietly behind the king. 'Do you suppose he's concussed too?'
'Don't know, don't care,' said Reg. 'How bad are you feeling really? Can you get up?'
He raised his head from the pillow and nearly vomited. 'I don't think so. I feel hideous. And why would I want to get up, anyway?' 'Because we're leaving.' ' WliatV
Reg lowered her voice. 'Look, sunshine. I don't know exactly what happened out there because I zigged when I should've zagged and lost you for a bit in all that dratted greenery, but I do know this. Whatever happened didn't have anything to do with that horse sticking its clumsy hoof down a rabbit hole!' His jaw dropped.'You were following me?'
She had the grace to look guilty. 'I had a feeling, all right? And my feelings are never wrong.' She leaned closer. 'I think Lional tried to murder you.'
Oh, for the love of Saint Snodgrass. This was taking the little brother routine way too far. 'Murder me? Why would Lional want to murder me?'
Her expression became mulish. 'There could be any number of reasons. Lord knows I've been tempted once or twice. But when I finally found you in that wretched forest, Gerald, you were laid out like a corpse at the base of a tree and Lional was staring down at you as though you'd just swallowed the keys to his Treasury. Proper put out, he was, swearing and muttering and carrying on.' She sniffed. 'Very unroyal behaviour.'
He rubbed his aching head. 'Really? Knowing you I thought it was par for the course.'
'Gerald, stop trying to be clever and listen] Not only was that sluggard Dorcas nowhere to be seen, because it had bolted for home, when I looked it over in its stable I couldn't find hide nor hair to prove it'd fallen flat on its face.' 'So?'
'So a fall like Lional says it had, should've broken its knobbly knees! That nag shouldn't have been able to hobble ten yards, let alone gallop all the way home to bed!' Reg snapped. 'And I'll tell you something else. There wasn't a rabbit hole within a hundred yards of that tree you were supposed to have been thrown against. Show me your chest.'
'What? No, I'm not going to show you my chest!'
With an impatient cackle she tugged open his night-shirt. 'Lional says his saddle bruised you. Well, I'm not looking at any bruises, sunshine, I'm looking at three chest hairs and some underdeveloped pectoral muscles. And what does that tell you?'
'That you've got no respect for a man's privacy' he muttered, covering himselt again.
'No, you idiot! Lional's lying] If you got yourself knocked silly by falling off that pony then I'm Shugat's maiden aunty. And trust me, I'm not.'
'Reg, this is ridiculous. If Lional wanted to murder me he could've done it while I was unconscious on the ground! Why bring me all the way back to the palace? You've got this all wrong.'
'Oh, GeraldV said Reg, stamping one foot for emphasis. 'Forget about my outside and remember what I am on the inside. What I was. I know about these things, you fool, they were my meat and drink and they put me in a feathered dress for the rest of my unnaturally long life and I don't want you to end up the same way or worse! Just because I don't know why Lional wants you dead doesn't mean he doesn't] Or that he won't try again! That's why you've got to get out of here. You might not be so lucky next time.'
He frowned. He'd never seen Reg this upset before. She was really frightened. He felt an answering stab of fear. If Reg was really frightened… He brushed a fingertip across the top of her head. 'Sorry' he said gently'It's just a little hard to believe, that's all. As a rule, tailor's sons from Nether Wallop don't have kings trying to kill them.'
She rattled her tail feathers. 'Not unless they've done a very poor job with their pin tucks, no.'
It was ridiculous. But Reg was so convinced… 'Oh lord,' he groaned. 'What's Melissande going to say when I tell her you think her brother tried to kill me?'
'Nothing useful,' Reg said briskly. 'She probably won't believe you. Lional's got her well and truly hoodwinked, the cad.'
'Well, I have to tell somebody in authority here.' He screwed his eyes shut against the pounding pain inside his skull, i suppose I could tell Rupert.'
Reg laid a wing across his forehead. 'Don't look now, Gerald, but fever is making you delirious.'
He managed, just, to push the wing away. 'He's next in line for the crown, Reg. It's my duty to tell him.'
'And /f you tell him, Gerald, what is he going to do? Send his trained attack butterflies to carry Lional off the throne and put him under lock and key?'
He hardly heard her exasperated question. Suddenly there was a fuzzy kind of ringing in his ears and the world was going smeary round the edges. 'No. No, of course not,' he sai
d vaguely. 'But something…'
'Gerald?' said Reg, sounding alarmed and querulous.'What's wrong? Gerald! Talk to me!'
He tried, but his tongue felt like a fat roll of flannel, his eyes wouldn't focus and none of his limbs would obey him. Reg was saying something else but he couldn't hear her, she sounded as though she were speaking from the opposite end of a very long tunnel.
And then all the lights went out, and he tumbled headfirst into welcome oblivion.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
When Gerald opened his eyes again, morning sunlight was streaming through the bedroom window, bathing his face in golden warmth and painting the cream bedspread butter yellow. His headache was gone, and the dull pain in his chest with it.
'Hmmph,' said Reg's slightly muffled voice from above him. 'You're awake.' He looked up: she was sitting on the bed's padded headboard, consuming a mouse.'It's about time.The clock's just struck seven.'
'Reg! How many times do I have to say it? No eating in bed!'
'Now, now, keep your underpants on,' she replied, unmoved. 'I'm not a young woman any more and a sight like that might do me a mischief.'
'So help me, Reg, if you leave the tail in the bedclothes again…'
Hopping onto a convenient pillow she slurped down the last inch of mouse and gave a genteel burp. 'Happy now? Right. The way I see it, if we get a move on we should be back through the portal to Ottosland before that murderous lunatic Lional has even opened his eyes. Do you want to start packing or shall I?' He sat up.'Neither. I'm having a bath.'
Closing the ensuite door on her outraged shrieks, he inspected himself in the mirror as the tub filled with steaming water. The lump on his skull had almost disappeared and the sore spot on his chest barely protested when he poked at it. That was the good news. The bad news was his memory still hadn't returned. And, after yesterday's hours in the saddle, the rest of his body felt like it had been racked.
Inching himself into the bath, moaning as the seeping heat began to unknot his tortured muscles, he closed his eyes and tried to make sense of the chaos that was currently his life. In the sober light of morning, and without that vicious pounding headache, the idea of Lional as a homicidal maniac seemed increasingly unlikely. Not only was the king completely without motive, wizards just weren't that easy to murder. They had in-built alarms. Extra sensitivities. Wizards got murdered by other wizards, not civilians, even if said civilians were royal.
So. That disposed of one problem. Unfortunately it still left him with several others, the most pressing ot which was the Kallarapi situation.
Even if Lional had tried to murder him, which he hadn't, he couldn't possibly leave New Ottosland before making sure he'd prevented a full-scale religious conflict with the kingdom's neighbour… or found a way to stop Melissandes unwilling marriage to Zazoor.
If Lional was so keen on asking for his advice, he'd make sure to give him some. Forget the marriage. Pay your debts. Pull your head in. And no religious hanky-panky.
Once all that was accomplished then he'd go home to Ottosland. Much cheered, he finished bathing.
Reg had made herself comfortable on his pillow and was in the middle of a half-hearted primping session. She took one look at his face as he emerged pink, damp and towel-wrapped from the bathroom and groaned. 'You're not leaving, are you?'
'I'm sorry' he said, hunting through his chest of drawers for fresh clothing. 'I know you're worried but I can't leave until I've stopped Lional from provoking a war when he doesn't have an army to protect his kingdom with.'
'He doesn't have one now! said Reg. 'But that doesn't mean he can't get one.'
He looked up from buttoning his shirt. 'How? There's no such thing as a mail-order defence force.'
'There doesn't need to be. You forget that somewhere in this drafty old pile of a palace there's a nursery with a whole battalion of tin soldiers in it.' 'So?'
'So you've got a nifty knack of turning one thing into another, haven't you?'
He gaped at her. ' What? You think I'd turn tin soldiers into real ones? That could hurt people?'
'Not willingly, no,' said Reg. 'But I think if Lional put his mind to it he could be very… persuasive.'
'I would never use my magic to make something that could hurt people, no matter what Lional said!'
Reg considered her wing tips. 'It's not his pretty speeches that worry me, sunshine.'
'So now you're saying he'd try to — to torture me? How? I'm a wizard, Reg! A damned powerful one as it turns out. He wouldn't get close enough to torture me, I'd have him flat on his back and across the other side of the room before he took one step towards me.'
Reg shrugged.'He managed to lay you out cold and get you to forget how it happened, Gerald. Right now I wouldn't put anything past him.'
'Oh, don't start that again! For Lional to do what you're suggesting he'd have to be a wizard himself, and he's not. I can smell a wizard a mile away'
She considered him steadily. 'Really? You didn't smell that tatty old Shugat, did you, till he was right under your nose.'
Damn. He didn't think she'd noticed that. 'Shugat's not a wizard. Not in the accepted sense of the word. He's a holy man. All bets are off when it comes to religion. And Lional is not a wizard. The only thing he smells of is expensive aftershave. Anyway, if he was a wizard he wouldn't need me, would he? Now can we please not talk about this any more?'
She flapped from the pillow to the chest of drawers. 'What about Humphret Bottomley?'
He retreated to the bedroom armchair and threw himself into it.'What about him?' 'He's missing.' 'No, he's not!'
'That Markham boy says no-one's heard from him in months,' she retorted. 'In my book that's called missing.' She sniffed. 'But in yours, apparently, it's called wilfully disregarding the facts.'
'What facts? There are no facts! There's just you having some kind of mid-life crisis!'
She fixed him with a gimlet glare. 'Trust me, sunshine, when I'm having a crisis you'll be the first to know. Now wake up your crystal ball and call that Markham boy. Tell him what's happened around here in the last day and see if he doesn't agree with me. And while you're at it, see if he knows how many more of Lional's ex-court wizards have disappeared.'
He drummed his heels into the carpet. 'Reg…' But it was depressingly clear from the look on her face that she'd give him no rest until he indulged her, so he stamped to the workshop, activated the crystal ball… and completely failed to get a call through to Monk.
'Did you get the address right?' said Reg, flapping from the bench to Gerald's shoulder. 'Try the wretched thing again.' 'Yes of course I got the address right,' he said, teeth gritted.'And I was just about to try again.' He did. Still nothing.
'Maybe it's the ball,' said Reg. There was just the faintest hint of panic in her voice. 'It's an old ball, Gerald, it was fourth or fifth hand when you got it and it's taken a bashing in the last few years. Try it again.Third time lucky'
'Or unlucky, as the case may be,' he said a moment later, staring at the inert lump of crystal in front of him.'Now what?'
Reg clattered her beak. 'Now we sneak into Madam Fashion Plate's office and use her crystal ball.'
'Why sneak? Why don't I just go and ask Melissande — '
'Because she's being guarded under lock and key, remember? We don't have time to fart about with all that. Being underhand is faster.' 'What about my breakfast?'
'Bugger your breakfast, Gerald!' snapped Reg, launching herself into the air. 'We have to get cracking. I've got a very bad feeling about this!'
Groaning, he followed her out of the workshop. 'Wait, Reg, I really need my breakfast!'
But she was already on her way to the foyer, so he shoved his sockless feet into his shoes and hurried to join her. 'You'll have to pick the lock,' said Reg, as he rattled Melissande's office door-handle. 'Quick, before a lackey comes along.'
Gerald rolled his eyes. 'A lackey would be useful, Reg. I could ask them to let us in.'
'At this hour of the m
orning?' she snapped. 'Go on, you know how to diddle it. Stop dithering and get us inside!'
He turned his head to stare at her nose to beak. ' What has gotten into you?' 'I told you. I've got a very bad feeling.'
'So have I,' he muttered, and sprung the lock with a word and snap of his fingers.'Doctors call it dangerously low blood sugar.'They slipped into the office. 'So where's the crystal ball?' he whispered, staring at Melissandes desk. 'It was right there, she was using it as a paperweight.'
'Search me,' said Reg. 'She must've had an unexpected fit of tidiness and put it away somewhere. Start looking.'
If Melissande finds out about this she's going to kill me. He hunted in the cupboards, behind the books in the bookcases and in the filing cabinets. Opened all the desk drawers, including the ones that were locked, and nearly bit his tongue at what he found in the last. 'Reg!' 'You've found it? Excellent!'
'No,' he said, and held up a book bound in dimpled red leather.'But I found this!'
'Gerald,' said Reg severely. 'We don't have time for reading!'
'It's a textbook,' he said, flipping open the cover. 'Monk's sister Emmerabiblia's got the same one. Melissande's been studying witchcraft!'
'So she's got a hobby! At least it's not butterflies! Now is that crystal ball in here or not?'
'Not,' he said, tucking the textbook under his arm.
'Maybe she took it with her when Lional locked her in her apartments,' said Reg. 'We'd better go and ask her.'
'How can we ask her? Guard, lock and key, remember?'
'So we get rid of the guard, unlock the doors and then we ask her.' 'I don't know which part of the palace she lives in.'
Reg groaned. 'That bang on the head really rattled your marbles, didn't it? You've got her textbook, haven't you? Use it!'
Oh. Right. Feeling like an idiot he spread his fingers flat against the book's cover and closed his eyes.'Locatio Melissande anuxi.' An answering tingle of energy ran through his hand. The book quivered and tugged. 'All set,' he said, and headed for the door. 'Let's go.'