Let Slip The Princesses of War

by David Schenck

  Then Jinjur is on me. I’m essentially weaponless. I have my sword and my gun, but I don’t have my whip. I pull the gun and point it at Jinjur, but she knocks it from my hand with the flat of her sword. She smiles. She’s toying with me. She could have taken my hand. I jump back and pull the sword. She meets my blade and turns it. She slashes at my feet, but so slowly it’s an insult. I look at Beauty, she’s down to just twelve guards. If I can hold out for just a few minutes, she can help. Unless Mallory acts. Right now, she’s just watching. Like it’s a puppet show, especially for her amusement. I remind myself to be nicer to the jesters. Amusing is hard work.

  I should be paying more attention to Jinjur. She twists her blade and flips it down under the cross piece of my sword and with flip she rips the sword from my hand, along with one of my fingers.

  No time to wait for Beauty. I slap the flat of her blade and step into the punch. The pain in my bloody hand is like nothing I’ve ever experienced, still it’s a solid blow to her jaw and her head snaps back in a particularly satisfying way and blood spills from her mouth.

  But, she slashes at me with a dagger in her left hand and I have to dance away. She faces me with her sword and her dagger and her bloody smile. She’s smiling because she knows I’m doomed. I know it too. I look for Beauty again. Not for help. I want to tell her I’m sorry. I know I’ve killed us both and our mission is a failure.

  They say that when you are about to die your life flashes before your eyes. Mine didn’t. Not my past. Instead, I see my lost future. I thought of Pea and Cindy who I would never see again and I though how happy I was that there weren’t there to add to my sins. I thought of Ben. I really did love that dog, and now we would never travel together, never right wrongs together. I was about to think of Ms. White, and how she’d given meaning to my life when I was lost, but I never got to that part, because we, Jinjur and I and probably everyone else in the throne room, we were distracted by the stained glass window, behind the throne, as it suddenly shattered and in the air above the throne, spinning in the air, blades flashing, was Emily! She landed alongside Beauty, two short swords clutched in her hands and instantly killed two guards.

  I turned back to Jinjur, wanting to kill, ready to die. The drama of Emily forgot. We have our own business. She lifts her sword, ready for the final strike. I’m ready too, then Ben is there and his teeth close on her wrist and bite clean through and the sword, with her hand still attached goes spinning away. And through the window come Pea and Cinderella and suddenly we’ve won!

  Except for Mallory. Who rises from her throne, clapping. “Oh well done! Well done! I do love a last minute rescue! It almost makes it a shame that I have to kill you all now. But, well, you’re all royalty. You, better than anyone, understand the demands of state.”

  And just like that I’m frozen in place. I can’t move a muscle. I’m looking right at Pea and I can see that she’s frozen too. I assume that everybody is.

  Mallory makes a little twirling motion with her hand and we all spin in place so that we’re facing the throne. “But,” She continues, “Just because I have to kill you, doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy each other’s company for a bit.” She waves her hand at the beam where Flynn is safely wrapped and my whip unties itself and Flynn drops, hard, to the floor. Groaning, he rises to his feet and walks to stand at Mallory’s side. Jinjur, the stump of her arm wrapped in a bloody cloth, joins them. They’re all smiles.

  Mallory crooks her little finger at me and I slide across the floor until I’m just a few feet from her. From Flynn.

  “Look darling.” She strokes his jaw with her hand. “You’re sweet mother has come to help us with your coronation. I was going to use blood from a goblin, but how much more appropriate the blood from your own dear mother, spilled by your own hand.” She passes him a jeweled dagger. “But wait! What an unexpected pleasure!” She waves her finger again and Ben raises into the air and floats, immobile, until he rests at my side facing Mallory.

  She claps her hands. “Yes, this truly is a day of marvels! Prince Dock! What a naughty dog you’ve been! I’ve been looking all over for you.”

  Prince!? What the fuck is she talking about?

  Mallory continues, still talking to Ben “If that horrid gnome had killed you, he would have claimed your kingdom. After all my hard work, I can’t have that.” She turned to Flynn. “Flynn darling, how would you like to have two kingdoms to rule over in my name?”

  “To please you, my Queen, is all I desire.” His eyes never leave mine.

  She clapped again. I was getting pretty fucking tired of all her clapping. “Splendid! Kill mommy’s dog.”

  Flynn unsheathed the dagger. Its steel blade gleamed. He stepped in front of Ben (or Prince Dock! What the fuck!?) and lifted his chin to expose his throat.

  I wanted to scream. I wanted to stop him! I wanted to turn away. I wanted to do something! Anything! But I could do nothing. I couldn’t even close my eyes.

  Then I felt something in my mouth. On my tongue. Something small and hard and round. Something that tasted wonderful. Like summer and winter and roses. I rolled it around with my tongue. I could move my tongue! My eyes closed as I remembered. I remembered everything. I saw it all in context. The good and the bad. My triumphs and my disasters, my mistakes, my moments of cowardice and of bravery. Sweet Pea and my King and Cinderella and Lil’ and everybody. But mostly my children. And I could feel it knocking at the edge of my mind. Understanding. All I had to do was to swallow the Goldenberry and it would all fall into place. Everything would make sense. And I wanted that. I wanted that so much.

  I opened my eyes. I didn’t know how long had passed. Maybe Ben was already dead, blood pouring out in a waterfall to pool at my feet. All I could see was Mallory. Her eyes fixed, her mouth open in a wide mocking laugh. And I spit the Goldenberry right into her mouth. I finally had good spit aim.

  Somethings take a long time, like digesting dinner when it’s my night to cook, and somethings don’t take anytime at all, like a glass shattering on a stone floor. This was more like a glass shattering. As soon as the Goldenberry entered her mouth, Mallory began to shriek, we were instantly free, the castle began to tremble. Cracks appeared on Mallory’s skin. Like she was made of plaster or egg shell. She grew thin, almost transparent and began to waver in the still air. She was shrieking and we all covered our ears. Even poor Ben, whose throat had not been cut, tried to cover his ears with his paws.

  Flynn dropped the dagger and rushed to hug Mallory. There was a tremendous pressure building in my ears.

  Then Ben began to howl. And Mallory, wrapped her increasingly insubstantial form around Flynn and Jinjur and the Magic Mirror and there was a loud bang and they winked out of existence.

  “NO!!!! NO!!!! NO!!!!” Someone was shouting NO over and over. It was me. I’d lost him again.

  I must have lost consciousness because I woke up. I was surrounded by the faces of my friends.

  “I had the strangest dream, but it wasn’t a dream. And you were there.” I said to Pea, “And you, and you were there.” I said to Cinderella and Beauty. “And you too.” I said to Emily. “But not you.” I said to the strange man who was holding my injured hand. He had an odd face. Wolf-like and thin, but not unattractive. And long reddish-brown hair that fell over his face.

  “I’m, um, I’m Prince Dock. Er, that is I’m Ben.”

  And I must have lost consciousness again, because I woke again and I was still surrounded by the faces of my friends, but the strange man was gone and there was good ‘ol Ben.

  “If you hadn’t woken up I was going to put you into the glass casket.” Albert hadn’t abandoned us (or worse)! They helped (more like carried) me through the mines and onto a boat, which, just as Albert said, was waiting and ready to go.

  Cindy set up the tent and we settled inside to share our stories.

  I let Beauty tell them everything that had happened to us. I was too tired, too drained. Her version of the dragon slaying was slightly, just a
skosh, just a smidgen, different from the way it actually happened but, well, we all have our own ways of coping.

  Then Cinderella told us their story.

  “So, we were waiting for you two to return from the castle when Jinjur and a company of soldiers arrived. Someone must have seen the smoke from the thorns and reported it. We were safely inside the tent, but you were going to just walk into an ambush unless we did something. We knew you could handle it, but we were worried that the mystery prince, (well dwarf, but we didn’t know that at the time, did we?) might get hurt in the battle. So we decided to attack. Not much to tell. Ben, err Dock and Emily don’t follow orders, but who’s surprised by that?” She gave Emily a look, followed by a smile and ruffled her hair.

  “Once it was clear that we were winning, Jinjur, the cowardly bitch, escaped. Sorry about that Rae. We should have made killing her a higher priority. But, you know how it is in a battle.

  So, anyway, after the fight, we were relaxing with a soak and a bottle of wine.”

  “And whisky.” Pea added, hefting her bottle for a drink.

  “Right,” Continued Cindy. “And whisky. Anyway. We might have had a bit to drink. And Emily asked me, if I could shrink the tent while I was inside it. Well, I’d never tried it. But, I figured, what the fuck? So, I shrunk it down. I mean, nothing really changed. The inside stays exactly the same. So, it was a little disappointing, then we turned the tent transparent and, I’ve got to admit, it was pretty cool. Everything was so big!

  “Anyhow, after a little while being small, we wanted to go back to being big, but it didn’t work. I tried a bunch of times, but nothing worked. Finally I had to call for help. There’s a thing, like a button inside the tent and I can press it and one of Fairy Godmother’s people helps me with things. Tess Support, I think is her name. Anyway, I pressed the button and I can hear someone talking to me. I can’t see them, and the voice says, this always happens, can I please wait? So, I say No! I can’t fucking wait! But she ignores me. Just like she always does. So, I’m waiting. And waiting. Every few minutes she tells us that we’re important, like I don’t fucking know I’m important, and tells me to wait. And days go by. We see you pass and we actually run outside and shout, but you can’t hear us. Then we worry that you’ll step on us so we run back inside. It’s freaky being so small!

  “So, you come out and you do your thing and then you leave and we’re still waiting for Tess. Finally Tess is talking to me and she tells me all sorts of things I need to do. I’m jumping up and down, I’m waggling my hands, I’m repeating her words. And after like two days of all sorts of crap, woomp! We’re big again!

  “But you guys are long gone. Luckily, Pea noticed that you had a dwarf with you, so we headed to Dwarf Country! Well, there’s nothing, literally nothing in Dwarf Country except the castle, so it wasn’t hard to figure out where to look. So, the mountain looks hard to climb. I mean really hard to climb. I set up the tent as high and wide as it can go and we bounce up and down on the top until we can reach the giant window. It was a mistake that Emily got there first. It just turned out that she’s better at the whole bouncing up and down thing than we are. And well, you know the rest.”

  I did know the rest. Well, almost the rest. “What’s the story with um, Dock? I thought I saw a man, but now he’s a dog.”

  “Yeah.” Answered Pea. “Right after Mallory exploded, well, more like disappeared, Ben just kind of lifted off the ground and there was light and music and then he just changed into a human. A naked, kind of hot, if he’s your type, which he is totally not my type, human. Anyway, we wrapped him in a tapestry and we waited for you to wake up. You saw him, then you passed out again. And while we were waiting for you to wake up the second time, he just changed back into a dog. So, it’s all good! I think I like him better as a dog. Just my opinion.”

  Ben, who had his head on my lap, looked up at me with pleading eyes as if to say, ‘I’d like to get back to being human if I could’. And I scratched his ears.

  Beauty takes first shift at the tiller and the rest of us settle in to sleep. I took my place on my usual bed and Ben jumped up beside me. It felt a little weird, knowing that he was really human, but it also felt right.

  I woke to take my turn at the tiller (feeling better after a bath and food) and Ben, as always, came with me. It was nice. Out on the open sea, the cool breeze and the millions of stars. Just a girl and her dog.

  We woke Pea for her turn at the tiller and went back to sleep. It was just getting light when I woke again. I felt Ben beside me, warm and smooth and oddly long. I turned around and he was human again! “Ben!” I shook him. “You’re human!”

  He looked at his naked self. “I am!” He shook his head sadly, “but it won’t last.”

  “Why not?”

  “It’s part of my curse. When Mallory is defeated in battle one time, I can return to human form for just 20 minutes a day. Only when she is finally killed will I be fully human again.”

  My head was spinning. Mallory wasn’t dead! And, just maybe, Flynn was alive too! But there was no time to ponder it all. “20 minutes? A day? How long have you been human now?”

  “I don’t know. I was sleeping.” He looked a little embarrassed.

  “Ok!” I shouted. “Everybody out! Out of the tent! Move it! This is not a drill!”

  Cindy rose groggily from her bed and started to complain, but seeing Ben/Dock she helped shuttle Emily and the rest out of the tent.

  “Ok.” I turned to Ben. “The clock is ticking!”

  About the Author

  David Schenck has been a lawyer, information technology consultant, Peace Corps volunteer and restaurateur. He currently lives in the beautiful (but largely unknown) city of Querétaro Mexico.

  If you enjoyed this read, please leave a review at the site where you bought the book. Thanks!

  You can follow David at www.facebook.com/BooksbyDavid

  Thanks for reading!

  Excerpt from Malthake’s Tail: A New York Lawyer in the Court of Pericles, Book 1

  Prologue

  I apologize if any of my references to events or people in the past are unclear. So much about the past has changed and my own memories are a confused jumble of the old past and the new.

  For example, I find that the name Al Capone no longer means anything to anyone except me (and presumably Alphonse himself, if indeed, he actually existed or exists).

  Nonetheless, I have tried to tell the story as it occurred to me at the time, including my memories of the old past, so if you find a reference confusing or without meaning, just assume that it meant something to people at one time.

  Chapter 1 – It’s my birthday!

  I was in Athens for my 53rd birthday. I didn’t particularly want to be in Athens, but I also didn’t have anywhere much better to be. At 53 I found myself pretty much unattached. Divorced for 8 years, no kids, an older brother in London, we were close, but not close close.

  I was working as an attorney for an international bank. That’s why I was in Athens. As part of a team trying to negotiate the soft crash of the Greek economy.

  I didn’t particularly feel bad about my lack of connection. But I will admit that on the morning of my 53rd birthday, waking up in my hotel room, I felt like something was lacking, and I wanted to do something to celebrate.

  I wasn’t a particularly important part of the team. My specialty was tax law (It’s more interesting than it sounds, no really), and US tax implications would only play a minor role in the eventual deal. I really think I was there only because I spoke some Greek (thanks Grandma!). Not that the team needed a translator (not that my Greek was good enough to be a translator), all the Greek bankers and government officials spoke English. I was there just to trot out and show that we weren’t all barbarians.

  “Have you met Robert? He’s one of our attorneys, he speaks Greek!”

  I would butcher a few words in my American accented Greek, and the big boys would get on with the real business of butchering t
he Greek economy and protecting the interests of the funds, be they of the hedge or mutual variety.

  My Greek wasn’t actually that bad. It was what you might call conversational, if the conversation was light and mostly about how much things cost or what’s on the menu. Like a lot of people with a second language, I understood more than I could talk. When I was younger, I was actually pretty good (thanks Grandma!). She taught me Greek herself, mostly by refusing to speak English to me, even though I know she spoke perfectly fine English. “So you can talk to your Greek cousins when they come to visit”. They never came.

  So, after the day’s meetings finished, instead of taking the car service back to the hotel with the others, I hailed a cab.

  “Where to?”

  “I don’t know exactly.” I managed in my rusty Greek. “I’m looking for a place to have a nice dinner, something away from the tourists. What do you recommend?”

  In the mirror, I could see him looking at me, in the mirror. I could feel him evaluating me, how much was I good for? My poor Greek marked me out as a foreigner, my nice suit (just what all the bank lawyers wear when meeting with the Finance Minister of a major (if economically troubled, especially if economically troubled) country, marked me out as a potential mark.

  “You OK with a little ride? I know a great place, authentic, fantastic seafood, but it’s a ways outside the city. About a half hour. You’ll love it!”

  I could feel him taking advantage of me, and normally I wouldn’t let him, but I was in this weird mood, so… “Sure, half an hour is fine. Where’s it at?”

  “Little place just outside the city, you probably haven’t heard of it. It’s just what you’re looking for, away from the tourists, authentic, and seafood so fresh it gets off the plate and tries to go back to the sea. There’s a nice patio with a sea view, you can have a drink and watch the fishing boats come in. Nice place you’ll like it. Tell you what, if you don’t like it – the cab ride is free. Both ways. I’ve got some friends nearby, I’ll wait for you and drive you back. Deal?”