The Endora Trilogy (The Complete Series)

by Thomas J. Prestopnik

  Christopher wrinkled his brow as he gently held the reins of his horse, trying to figure out what incident the magician was referring to. He slipped a finger under his ski cap and scratched his head. “Okay, I give up, Artemas. What happened before we met Ulric? All we did was step through the timedoor and hurry out to find King Rupert–except, of course, pausing to watch Molly obliterate those dozens and dozens of roses you created in your chamber. That still makes me laugh!”

  “So glad I can provide you with amusement and entertainment, big brother.”

  “Appreciate it!”

  “Back to normal, I see,” Mr. Jordan said with a grin.

  “Oh, Christopher is on the right track,” Artemas said. “After Molly opened the balcony door and sunlight flooded over the roses I had made with magic, causing them to, well, what Chris said… Anyway, that event, coupled with Ulric’s advice, got me to thinking–what if I created a new Belthasar and tricked his spirit into inhabiting it? All I’d have to do then is wait for the sun to rise and destroy it, thereby freeing us from all our troubles forever. How’s that for a plan?”

  “Piece of cake!” Mrs. Jordan skeptically replied. “But then again, you actually did it, so who am I to talk.”

  “But how did you do it?” Molly asked. “You solved the sunlight problem. Christopher and I saw you create a rose in our backyard and it survived when I carried it into the blazing sunshine in front of the house.”

  Artemas exhaled a sigh of guilt. “I must confess that everything you saw was not what it appeared to be. But I’ll explain shortly. It isn’t in my power to create life.”

  “A fascinating story,” King Rupert said. “I can’t wait to hear more!”

  “Me either,” Mina said. “But could you clear up one little detail first, Artemas?”

  “Certainly.”

  “Why did you create so many roses in your chamber in the first place?” A puzzled expression clouded Mina’s face. “I saw the flowers when I passed through the timedoor, but didn’t know what to make of them.”

  Artemas blushed. “Well, I, um…”

  Mr. Jordan jumped in to rescue his friend. “Artemas was simply trying to perfect one of his experiments,” he said. Then he whispered across to Mina. “Hoping to impress a lady friend of his next time he saw her!”

  Mina understood and smiled, putting the subject to rest. Artemas continued his story.

  “So the next step in my plan was threefold–to convince Belthasar that he could have his old body back, make him believe he could be more powerful than ever, and finally, lure him back to Endora.” Artemas raised an eyebrow. “Not an easy task. Belthasar was becoming enamored with life in the other world. As a famous actor, he possessed boundless riches and, of course, the phony and fawning adulation of his fans and associates. I feared that Belthasar might not want to return home. That’s why I had to make him think he could have my magical powers once he recreated himself.”

  “Those explosions behind us looked pretty real,” Mr. Jordan said. “You can’t tell us they were make-believe.”

  “They were quite real, Sam. All part of the illusion to keep Belthasar from discovering what was really happening.”

  “So how’d you do it?” Molly asked with growing impatience.

  “Well, after we sent those numerous e-mails to Elvin L. Cooper to draw Belthasar back to us, I needed a plan to deal with him when he arrived,” Artemas explained. “I knew sooner or later he would try to attack me, Christopher or Molly, perhaps all three, so I prepared for that possibility. If Belthasar did strike us, he would surely learn of my spell to recreate a living thing and realize he could exist in his old form again–only this time with my magic powers.”

  Christopher nodded, recalling the terrible time when Belthasar had trapped them in the museum basement. Belthasar had learned about Artemas’ spell after inhabiting him and Molly and reading their thoughts about the experiment with the rose. Belthasar fled in the magician’s body and returned through the timedoor shortly after, believing he could recreate a more powerful form of his old self.

  “Artemas, I still don’t understand,” Christopher said. “When you demonstrated your spell in our backyard, you created a real rose that could survive in sunlight. How come Belthasar was destroyed when the sun rose this morning? It doesn’t make sense.”

  “It will when you understand my elaborate, headache-inducing plan,” Artemas replied.

  “But you’ll have to hold that thought for a moment,” King Rupert said as they neared the plains and the encampment. “Ulric and I must consult with our troops on the troll situation, then we’ll break camp and head back to the castle. In the meantime, everyone should grab a bite to eat.”

  Nobody objected, inhaling the fresh scent of grass as their horses waded through the springy green stretch of plains. The world seemed alive again amid a sea of striped round tents, crackling bonfires and the green, silver and yellow banners snapping in the brisk morning breeze. The hungry travelers quickly found soup and bread while King Rupert and Ulric attended to military matters. A few scouts were dispatched to the nearest outpost to send word to Queen Eleanor and King Jeremiah that the situation had been resolved.

  Within the hour, tents were swiftly taken down and packed away, campfires were extinguished and King Rupert’s three hundred troops made ready to depart. Shortly after, he leisurely led the way southeast across the plains, instructing Artemas to continue his story. As King Rupert, Ulric, Mina and the Jordan family eagerly listened, a lone figure draped in a hooded cloak quietly paid attention as well, riding unassumingly on a horse just behind the others, offering neither comment nor question.

  “Now where was I?” Artemas said as he scanned the horizon while riding alongside Mina. “Ah, the details of my plan! I had to work fast, you know, as we only had a short time to linger in Endora after we brought Emma back. While all of you enjoyed a tour of the castle with King Rupert, I was busy in my chamber and the library preparing my battle tactics, so to speak.”

  “I interrupted you during our tour,” Molly said, remembering sticking her head through his chamber door. “You appeared startled, as if you didn’t want me to see what you were looking at.”

  “At that moment I didn’t,” he replied, explaining how he had been studying a map of Endora, specifically an area near the Katánin Mountains. “A short time later I went to the library to continue my work.”

  Christopher glanced at the magician, feeling just a little bit guilty. “I must confess, Artemas, that Molly and I accidentally spied on you in the library. We went to look for you because the timedoor was going to close soon. We heard you talking to someone–only no one was in the library with you.”

  Artemas grinned. “You must have caught me talking to myself in the mirror. A strange sight, no doubt.”

  “We didn’t want to let on that we saw, so we left and came back shortly after,” Molly said, lightly punching her brother in the arm. “You weren’t supposed to tell, Chris.”

  “Why would you talk to yourself in a mirror?” Mina asked, perplexed and amused at the same time.

  “Forget that we even brought it up,” Molly said apologetically, believing that Artemas had followed her suggestion about practicing what he wanted to say to Mina in front of a mirror. Molly hoped that she and her brother hadn’t caused him too much embarrassment.

  “It’s perfectly all right to talk about it now,” Artemas said without a hint of care. “I was using the mirror to cast a series of spells upon myself as part of my plan to defeat Belthasar. So many spells, in fact, that I ended up with a massive headache!”

  “That’s what you were doing?” Christopher asked.

  “Yes. Why else would I talk to myself in a mirror?”

  “Never mind,” Molly said, chuckling to herself.

  “What types of spells did you cast?” Mrs. Jordan asked, intrigued by the magician’s course of action.

  “Where should I begin?” Artemas said. “First, I had to protect my thoughts about my
plan to destroy Belthasar from Belthasar. If he ever took control of me, he would instantly know my true intentions and the show would have ended before it started. I also cast a spell to give me extra strength to resist Belthasar’s influence over my mind and body, though I sometimes pretended that he had the upper hand to make him think he was winning. But it was always a struggle nonetheless.”

  “What else?” Ulric asked.

  “Well, I added a spell to make Belthasar believe that my powers would transfer to him if he recreated another of himself,” he continued. “I had to make him really want to be himself again. Therefore, I invented a few explosion spells that transferred with him when his spirit inhabited his new body. That perfected the illusion and bought us more time until sunrise.” Artemas sighed, recalling the pounding throbs of his former headache. “Plus I had to implant in him the desire to go to Three Frogs and establish his kingdom there. I pinpointed that desolate and lifeless place on my map. It would offer his spirit no escape route as the sun destroyed him.”

  “Quite clever!” Mr. Jordan said. “You are a crafty magician indeed.”

  “Clever, yes,” Molly said. “But when I found you in the cave, you denied that you deliberately left the clues for us to follow you to Three Frogs. If you made Belthasar want to go there, then you must have led us there, too.”

  “What else could I do but deny it? If I had admitted that part of the plan to you and then Belthasar found out, well, he would have suspected something was afoot and may have fled.”

  “So how’d you pull off that bit of magic?” Christopher asked.

  “Three more spells, of course!” he said. “It was quite a headache! I had to cast a combination of three temporary sleeping and memory-erasing spells that I could trigger as needed, allowing me to throw Belthasar’s spirit into a short sleep without him remembering that he had been affected. That was the most taxing spell. I would never have had the strength to cast it more than three times, and even that was a tremendous strain in the end.”

  “That’s how you delivered those notes without arousing Belthasar’s suspicion,” Ulric said with admiration.

  “I activated that spell the first time as soon as Belthasar passed through the timedoor,” Artemas said. “I hastily wrote two notes while in my chamber, Ulric, giving the first one to Emmett when I saw him in the corridor, telling him to give it to you. I ended the spell immediately and Belthasar fled the castle, not realizing what had just happened. Next, when near the Inn of the Twelve Horses in the darkness, I triggered the second spell, quickly presenting the other note to Henry Droon after pounding on his door and waking him up. I must apologize to him one of these days for ruining his sleep.”

  “I think Henry will forgive you,” Molly said, hoping to visit the inn one more time before they left Endora. “So I suppose you activated that spell for the last time after you arrived at Willow Lake.”

  “Precisely. I put Belthasar’s spirit to sleep just long enough to build a tiny replica of Three Frogs out of some stones, then I started a small fire and extinguished it, figuring it would smoke awhile afterward to draw your attention at daylight.” Artemas smiled. “I believed those three clues were more than enough to lead you to Three Frogs where Belthasar awaited.”

  “It worked like a charm,” Christopher said.

  “The only other challenge after that was to withhold the final word of the spell from Belthasar until as close to sunrise as possible,” he continued, wondering how he had juggled so many spells so successfully. “It was all a matter of timing.”

  “That’s why you were so anxious not to leave the cave until morning,” Molly said. “You simply had to wait until sunrise before you could proceed.”

  “And that’s why you didn’t want the battle to commence until daylight either,” Ulric said.

  Artemas nodded. “Exactly. If you had launched an attack before I could finish my plan, then Belthasar might have escaped in the darkness and we’d be back to where we started. I doubt such a chance would have ever presented itself again.”

  “As bad luck would have it, I ended up postponing the attack anyway,” King Rupert said. “When I learned that Sam, Sally and Mina had disappeared, I figured something foul had happened and that Belthasar most likely had a hand in it. I couldn’t risk putting their lives in danger.”

  Mr. Jordan couldn’t help but laugh at himself . “My brilliant plan to rescue Christopher and Molly sort of went awry.”

  “Sort of? After I found out the three of you had left, I was furious,” King Rupert said. “Now I’m merely curious.” He turned to his chief guard. “Ulric, since I’ve had time to think about it, you never did tell me why you wanted to postpone the attack until morning when you stopped by my tent. I never asked you to explain since I had already changed my mind.”

  “I had a very good reason,” Ulric said. “A visitor in the night told me about Artemas’ secret plan.”

  “What are you talking about?” the magician said, wide-eyed with surprise. The others joined in with exclamations of disbelief. “How did you find out about my plan?”

  Ulric glanced at Artemas with an awkward grin. “I guess now is as good a time as any to reveal my little secret. I was waiting for the right moment during your story.”

  “Do enlighten us!” Mina said, eager to hear the latest twist in the tale.

  “Very well,” Ulric replied, glancing back at the cloaked figure riding on the horse behind them. He signaled for the individual to come forward. “Ladies and gentlemen, I’d like you to meet Artemas’ secret collaborator over the last several days. Someone working behind the scenes and in the dark.”

  At that instant the mysterious arrival dropped the hood of his cloak. Everyone gasped in astonishment, though smiles and laughter soon followed.

  “You again!” King Rupert exclaimed, though more amused than upset. “Still spying on us?”

  “Not spying this time, your highness,” Mr. Smithers admitted, blushing slightly. “Merely working behind the scenes. I was following Artemas’ instructions after all.” The magician was instantly besieged with more questions about how and why Mr. Smithers was recruited in his elaborate scheme.

  “As powerful as my magic may be,” Artemas said, “I can’t do everything!” He immediately dived into an explanation. “As soon as we returned from Endora, I knew I would need a reliable ally to help me. So while Sam, Christopher and Molly waited in the restaurant for the car to warm up, I found a perfect time to inform Mr. Smithers about my plan when we went upstairs to get some aspirin for my headache.”

  “So you were plotting right from the start,” Molly said. “You should work as a spy for Ulric.”

  “I had no option. There were a few tasks I couldn’t complete myself and Mr. Smithers was a logical choice,” he said. “So I quickly explained as much as I could, swearing him to complete secrecy.”

  “After that moment,” Mr. Smithers said, “I couldn’t come in contact with any of you for any reason. I had to remain invisible in case Belthasar should notice. If his spirit ever invaded me, then the plan would have been discovered and failed. Since Emma was visiting her sister in Endora and the restaurant was closed that week for Christmas, I was the ideal candidate. I had plenty of time to act as a secret agent.”

  “How did Mr. Smithers help?” Christopher asked, unbuttoning his coat as the warming sun rose higher in the bright blue sky. “And how did you keep in touch?”

  “Keeping in touch was easy,” the magician admitted. “On the day we sent those e-mails to Elvin L. Cooper, I wrote a long note to Mr. Smithers explaining my plan in detail and what he needed to do for me. I sneaked out of the house later that night and left the letter under a trash receptacle near a mailbox for him to find.”

  “While in the restaurant, I had instructed Artemas when to place his letter there,” Mr. Smithers said. “About a half hour later, I walked by and picked it up.”

  “The following day we discovered that Belthasar’s spirit had followed us to the libra
ry,” Artemas continued.

  “He sure fooled all of us,” Molly said. “We were convinced that Belthasar left the woman in the maroon coat and had gone into Mr. Porter when she handed him those bookmarkers. And all the time he was inside Lucy.”

  Artemas cleared his throat. “I must confess that I had my suspicions that Belthasar did not go into Mr. Porter that day. I suspected Lucy right from the start.”

  “How?” Molly asked, taken aback.

  “I noticed that Mr. Porter had slipped on a pair of driving gloves while he was checking out his books, just before he was handed the bookmarkers. That lady in the maroon coat never touched him on the skin, but Lucy did hold her by the hand when she nearly fainted.”

  “Why didn’t you tell us?” Christopher asked.

  “I thought it best not to let on so as not to scare Belthasar away,” he replied. “Better for us if I could keep an eye on him without him knowing it. And since Molly was arranging a tour of the museum for Lucy, I thought Belthasar might find it an ideal place to make a move against your family. That would provide me a perfect opportunity to launch my plan to have Belthasar discover that he could recreate another of himself. Luckily, the tour was arranged near the hour when the timedoor reopened, giving Belthasar the added incentive of leaving your world at once.”

  “I had been following you closely that day,” Mr. Smithers said. “I knew the timedoor would reopen then and was assuming Belthasar would make a move. I watched in the museum lobby from behind a newspaper, seeing Artemas, Christopher and Molly rush out of the building. I was about to chase after the three of you when Mina showed up. I eventually followed her and the rest of the Jordans through the timedoor.”