“It might help you, my dear, but it couldn’t possibly make the slightest difference to me. I shall be in the sky.”
“Anyone would think you’d been turned into a chicken instead of a swan,” Carole said. “But if you’ll swim, I’ll swim. That way there won’t be so many in the boat and you can’t say I’m not taking the same chances you are.”
“I am not taking any chances.”
The conch shell blew the all-clear, and behind them, the town began to wake.
Jack mentioned in a casual way the conversation he had overheard in the inn, when Murdo proposed that the men go after a certain bird at dawn with sharpened knives. Jack also mentioned how he had risked his own life to warn the bird in question. Was this how she repaid him, by risking his life again, and the lives of their friends? If this was how royalty acted, he was glad he was only a poor gypsy.
Several villagers left their houses and began walking toward them.
“On second thought, Carole, your suggestion has considerable practical merit,” the swam said hastily, adding to Bronwyn, “Well, what are you waiting for? Do you think I can pull that silly harness on with my pinfeathers?”
Bronwyn sat on one side of the water-worthy chariot, Jack and Mistress Raspberry balancing her weight on the other side.
“Well done,” Mistress Raspberry whispered out the side of her mouth to Jack. “You can be quite persuasive.”
He shrugged. “It is only that I have this way with animals.”
“Do you speak with them often?” she asked, surprised to find that she had something in common with a grubby male of Jack’s tender years.
“Only the usual things: jump, whoa, giddyup, down, roll over, sit. Though the Princess Anastasia is naturally a special case.”
“How dreary! Why have you never bothered to learn to speak with them properly?”
“It is beneath a man to speak to beasts who cannot speak a proper human tongue,” he said, folding his arms across his chest and looking extremely superior. “How is a man to retain control if he lowers himself to saying bow-wow or bubble-bubble like those ridiculous fish women talking to their snake?”
“Very well then, if you have that sort of an attitude, I certainly won’t press you to learn Pan-elvin. I had thought it might amuse you. My father and I converse regularly with all sorts of animals—his closest companion, in fact, other than myself, is a raven named Jack and I must tell you that that other Jack once held the same reservations about communicating with humans as you do about speaking with non-humans. I can’t say that I blame him. Personally, I often find the society of animals a tremendous improvement over that of certain so-called people.”
“You converse with animals? Like the fish women?”
“Certainly. But I can converse with any sort of animal, not just sea creatures. I’ve even been known to change into one or more species occasionally, though I can’t do it as easily as my father. I was trying to determine the best way of changing into one of those hidebehind things when you interrupted me at the inn.”
“Oh. I thought you were trying to eat them.”
“Both father and I are almost strictly vegetarian by dietary preference,” she said primly.
Jack was fascinated, but his pride warred with his curiosity. He glanced at Bronwyn. She lay with her head over the side of the boat, her mouth open, sleeping. Carole and the swan stroked ahead of them. Who was to know?
“Surely a fine lady such as yourself would let not the natural pride of a poor and ignorant but promising boy keep you from teaching him a skill he should know to be a better man? It is your duty as an adult to force me to learn such things. Very well, I submit myself.”
The day rolled on. Bronwyn woke only long enough to complain of hunger. Carole swam, also complaining of hunger. Even Anastasia complained of hunger, since, as she said, she wasn’t likely to dive for plants in this sort of place, even if she were not occupied with the business of transporting passengers. Mistress Raspberry and Jack joined the complaints in a companionable way, but Jack was so interested in his lessons he could almost forget he was hungry.
At least Carole and Anastasia were not troubled by water monsters, a fact with which they comforted each other. Whatever malformed fish or other undesirables lurked in the river stayed decently covered by the water and made no attempt to accost them.
They passed the first place Teeny had mentioned in mid-afternoon.
“She didn’t say we couldn’t stop there for lunch,” Carole said longingly. “She only said not to stay the night.”
“She did say the prices were high, however, and I have only gold, which I do not intend to squander despite the local preference for iron,” Mistress Raspberry replied. “The cottage she recommended can’t be far.”
It wasn’t.
No palace had ever looked finer than the iron-banded hovel. Inside were two beds of straw with real blankets, and food: cakes, stale but hearty, dried fruit, nuts, and some of the gray-white porridge congealed in a pot over the hearth. They didn’t touch the pot or the porridge. There was not, they noted gratefully, any sign of a trap door.
Bronwyn, who was tired of sleeping, said she would stand watch, though there was nowhere to watch from, since the door would have to be closed to keep out hidebehinds and other creatures and the hut had no windows.
Anastasia tucked her head under her wing and fell asleep immediately and Carole, exhausted after a night of magic and a day of swimming, was also soon asleep. Mistress Raspberry fiddled with a few items in her valise, and made some notes in a book, before curling up with her cloak for a pillow and settling down beside Carole. Jack was still repeating his lessons in the language that would make him the greatest trainer of trick horses and the most magnificent dancing partner of bears ever known to his tribe when he too drifted off.
The woods seemed quiet, compared to the village, and even Bronwyn was lulled to sleep by the peacefulness.
At dawn, after cramming as much as they could carry into their pockets, the five of them pulled the boat back out into the river. Jack stepped in something and slipped, sliding halfway into the river.
The something was red and of the consistency of mashed potatoes, except for the odd bone here and there. Jack jumped back, dropping his end of the chariot.
“Wha—what’s that?” Carole asked, gagging.
“An animal of some sort,” Mistress Raspberry said, poking it with the pointed tip of a fingernail and rolling it over. “Indistinguishable, unfortunately.”
“Too bad,” Bronwyn said, making a sweeping gesture up and down the banks of the river, which were littered with similar gruesome remains, as was the river water. “There don’t seem to be any more.”
But the smashed shapes were too formless for the travelers to tell what they might have once been, except that they had been alive and animal in nature—some had bits of fur, some a recognizable eye or limb. Mistress Raspberry’s companions disappointed her by vetoing her desire to inspect the grisly debris more closely.
“They are dead, my dear,” Anastasia said. “What they were when living I would rather not know if I am to spend my day swimming among them.”
“All the presence of these things proves really,” Bronwyn said, “is that it was every bit as safe out here in the woods last night as it seemed. We were much safer than in the village.”
Anastasia and Carole were pleasantly surprised later in the morning to learn that they would no longer have to dodge mangled flotsam. Two boats floated towards them, downstream, a net strung between them. The boats were of royal blue, bearing the red and gold crest of Loefwin Patebreaker, a crowned skull with a sword cleaving it.
The men in the boats wore handsome livery and demanded that the chariot and swimmers leave the river until the boats had passed. As the net swept by, Bronwyn saw that it was clogged with red shapes.
“Tidy lot,” Mistress Raspberry remarked, as she climbed back into the chariot beside Jack.
They reached the capital in late a
fternoon, after passing through a forest followed by a strip of charred earth bordering the outer walls of the city.
The walls were fortified, but apparently not against people. No one questioned them when they dragged their boat out of the river and onto the bank. A barred iron gate separated the river inside the city walls from the river outside.
The city was a new one, built around the river. One channel flowed through it, between the stubby iron-banded houses and business establishments. The smaller, right-hand channel was dammed up to feed the moat surrounding the shining castle.
The castle’s silver and gold shingles mirrored the rose of the setting sun. “But it’s so beautiful!” Carole wailed. “I can’t go in there like this. I’m dripping wet.”
“They don’t seem to be very free about allowing through traffic anyway,” Mistress Raspberry remarked. The drawbridge was raised, making a forbiddingly blank wall between the two guard towers.
“Do you suppose we need an appointment?” Anastasia asked. If they did, they appeared to be late. All around them shops were closing and people were locking themselves inside their houses.
“We probably only have to call to get them to let us in,” Bronwyn said.
“That will be none too soon for me,” Jack said. “My belly would very much appreciate a hot meal.”
“Shouldn’t be any problem,” Bronwyn said blithely. “Why, Mistress Raspberry’s mother, now that she’s had time to think it over, will no doubt just give me the counter-curse, once she sees I’m a friend of her daughter’s, and we can all go home again. After all, she hasn’t anything against me personally.”
“Remember, you said that,” Carole reminded her grimly.
“I’m rather afraid it won’t be that easy,” Mistress Raspberry said. “Mother doesn’t conduct her affairs with regards to personalities. You shall be very fortunate, Bronwyn, if she can be persuaded that some advantage will accrue to her if she lifts your curse.”
“I’ll give her an advantage,” Bronwyn growled, grasping her sword hilt.
“Remember, my Princess, the ogress is Mistress Rusty’s mother,” Jack said, subtly showing the others who was really the familiar friend of the Empress’s sister, and worthy to call her by her nickname.
“Sorry,” Bronwyn said unrepentantly. The only thing she was sorry for was that Belburga was her friend’s mother.
“I must admit I’ve felt the same way at times,” Mistress Raspberry said, “But perhaps she’s mellowed. I hope so, for the sake of all concerned. Right now I just wish she’d answer the door.”
“Maybe if we all yell at once, the guards will hear us,” Jack suggested. The five of them agreed on what to yell, counted to three and bellowed, “Hello, the castle!”
Nothing happened.
“It’s getting very late,” Carole said, noting the ruby hue of the sky, mirrored by the moat. “Look at the sunset. If we’re out much later, it will get dark and the monsters will get us. Perhaps I should swim the moat and tell the guards we’re here.”
“Yes,” Bronwyn agreed. “You may have to tap on their helmets to get their attention. They seem to have put wax in their ears like Jehan’s pirates.”
“Or maybe they have all gone inside to eat their suppers and go to bed,” Jack said, a little tremulously. “If I were a soldier in this country, I should not like guarding things after dark.”
Except for its red color, the moat looked a great deal cleaner than the river. Carole jumped in, feet first and scrambled, dripping, back up on the bank again as the water boiled furiously and the redness in the water gathered itself together into a great flat ribbon as long and wide as Ollie the sea serpent. The ribbon had a head, also flat, but peeled in two thin layers at the front to form a mouth. Its eyes hung from two little stalks. The head hovered halfway between the travelers and the gate.
Mistress Raspberry addressed the beast in Pan-elvin. “Kindly let us pass,” she commanded. “We have business with the Empress.”
“Not until you’ve followed proper procedure. Have you been summoned? If so, have you the proper forms and identification? Also, it is my duty to inform you that you are in violation of Statute 7.21 which prohibits humans from addressing beasts and subsection D which specifies that humans are not to converse with great tapeworms.”
“I beg your pardon. We are Argonians, and not familiar with all of your statutes. However, I’m positive that the Empress, who is my sister—”
“Have you verification to that effect?” the worm asked.
“Will dental records do?” she asked, baring her teeth.
“No. We need proper positive identification. You should have filled out forms 670 and 1083, had them processed and already paid the appropriate tributes and fees before approaching the castle.”
As it spoke, the worm folded and pleated itself until what would have been coils on a round worm formed sharp-edged tangles and snarls as high as the banks of the moat. Its head thrust forward and leveled nose to nose with Mistress Raspberry’s.
“Don’t be so stuffy, my good beast. I am the daughter of Belburga, and sister to the Empress. You have only to inquire within. Now kindly let us pass.”
“It is not my function to inquire within. That is the function of the herald. It is my function to prevent intrusions into the castle by persons not pursuing proper channels and therefore not crossing the drawbridge.” With each additional word, its body fan-folded against the existing tangle to build a thin but complex construction of flat red worm halfway up the castle gate.
“All right,” Mistress Raspberry said angrily, jerking open her valise and pulling forth her big book and pen, the tip of which she stabbed angrily into an ink bottle somewhere in the depths of the bag. “That’s quite enough out of you. What is your name and who is your immediate superior?”
“I am the Great Tape, guardian beast of the official government of Greater Frostingdung housed within this fortress and I answer to no one and you’d better believe it,” the Tape said with a vicious snap that sent another tier of tangled red edges and surfaces as high as the battlements.
Carole took advantage of the beast’s preoccupation with Mistress Raspberry to edge around and enter the water nearest the tail, which the worm had withdrawn from around the castle so that it could use its entire length to build a parchment-thin edifice obstructing the entrance. She was sure she could swim around the creature.
But before she’d swum a stroke, the tail untangled and whipped around her, flattening her arms against her sides and squeezing. “Stop! That hurts,” she cried. “Help!”
Bronwyn drew her sword.
“Cut right through it, Princess,” Jack urged, but Mistress Raspberry said, “No! That’s er—not very diplomatic. Carole, can’t you hum your way out?”
“I’m sure that’s going to be easy for her to do while she’s being squeezed to death,” Bronwyn fumed, but Carole tried.
The worm only squeezed harder, and Mistress Raspberry and Jack heard it say, “In addition to trespassing forbidden waters, you are now in violation of Statute—”
“Tape!” a voice called from above. “You naughty, wicked Tape, you! Cease that at once! Now, I say. Put that child down!”
Though the voice was high and sweet and spoke softly in Argonian rather than Pan-elvin or Frostingdungian, the worm obeyed at once. “You know very well,” the voice scolded, “that you’re not permitted to dispose of people without prior approval.”
“Daisy?” Mistress Raspberry scanned the battlements above the monster, who rapidly released Carole and began to straighten itself out. A plump matron with long curling blond hair waved down at them from the crenellations, and on being hailed, stopped waving, stared hard at Mistress Raspberry, and waved harder and more excitedly.
“Rusty? Oh, can it really be? Rusty, is it truly you?”
“Your worm didn’t think so,” Mistress Raspberry called gaily in return. She was also waving madly.
“Oh! But this is wonderful! Oh, Rusty, darling, I’m
so very sorry—do forgive the Tape. It’s marvelously efficient at its job of confounding and confusing folk and keeping them at bay, but I’m afraid it’s not very bright or discriminating. I’ll be down to let you in this very instant!”
“Everything is under control now,” Mistress Raspberry said, turning to the others, who were dragging a gasping Carole from the moat. “That woman is my younger sister, Daisy-Esmeralda.”
The drawbridge thudded down onto its landing on their side of the bank and Daisy crossed to meet them.
The two sisters embraced, but when Mistress Raspberry started across the bridge, Daisy halted her with a raised hand. “There’s something I must settle first. Tape, do you hear me?” It raised its head enough so that its eye stalks were above the water. It looked thoroughly cowed. “These good people are not only legitimate guests, but this woman is my very own sister. I want you to apologize, and show them how happy we are to have them here at Giltrose Palace.”
The eye stalks waved from side to side for a moment, as if embarrassed or undecided, then a great length of the beast folded itself along the splintery boards of the drawbridge, laying a red strip from end to end. At Daisy-Esmeralda’s insistence, the visitors used the proffered portion of the worm’s anatomy as a walkway. With the eyestalks watching them balefully, their trot across the bridge was gingerly in the extreme.
They passed under a toothy portcullis and into an exquisite garden, walled all around with gold and silver shingles. From an inner courtyard an older woman with hair that vied with the shingles for sheer brilliance rushed to meet them. “Daisy-Esmeralda, a pox on you for worrying me so! The Prince has been calling for you and it’s almost curf—Ruby-Rose!” Without missing a beat she ran toward Mistress Raspberry with outstretched arms. So smooth was her transition and so pretty her surprise that Bronwyn could have sworn she’d known they were there all along and was only pretending to just notice them. Had she been watching while the beast menaced them as well?
“Ruby-Rose, my lost darling! What an appalling dress that is! Must be your father’s taste. And your hair hasn’t been styled in months, by the look of it. We’ll have to do something about that before the feast, but don’t worry, Mother will have you up to snuff in no time. Are you married yet? Good! There are many more suitable young men here in Frostingdung, and we’re so much better connected now. You’ve picked an excellent time to come home and mend the broken heart of your loving mother.”
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