Magic Kingdom for Sale—Sold! (14 page)

He had consumed a good portion of the bottle before Parsnip reappeared with dinner. The kobold brought a stew made of beef and vegetables, fresh-baked bread, cheeses and pastries. Whatever else was wrong, no one was starving to death, he thought.

He ate a bowl of the stew with pieces of bread and cheese, drank several glasses of wine and thought about Annie and Miles and what he had left behind. Questor and Abernathy argued about everything from the nature of a balanced meal to the role of magic in health care. The kobolds grinned and
ate everything in sight. When it came time for seconds, Questor found the stew too cold and suggested it be reheated. Parsnip hissed and showed his teeth, and Abernathy suggested it was better served cold. Questor disagreed. The argument was resolved when Questor used the magic to reheat it where it cooled in its kettle, and the kettle exploded in flames setting fire to the whole of the tressel table and the linen service set upon it. Everyone jumped up, yelling, hissing and barking all at once. Questor used the magic again, and this time it rained inside the dining hall for fifteen minutes.

That was enough for Ben. Wine glass in hand, Abernathy leading, he retired to the royal sleeping quarters, scorched and soaked and woozy. Tomorrow, he decided as he lay back within the coverings of his bed, would be a better day.

Tomorrow might indeed have been a better day, but Ben Holiday never had a chance to find out.

He dreamed as he slept, dreams of truth and fantasy. He dreamed of Annie and of finding her alive again, his exhilaration at being with her and loving her blunted by a pervasive sense that she could not stay and he must lose her once more. He dreamed of Miles, bluff and cynical as he reminded Ben at every turn on a journey through a Chicago filled with Bonnie Blues that he had told him so. He dreamed of lawyers and courtrooms in which kobolds hissed from jury boxes and judges had the look of shaggy dogs. He dreamed of high rises and concrete parkways and soaring over all a dragon as black as night. He dreamed of demons and knights, of faces in the mist, and of castles that shone like the sun.

He dreamed, and the world slipped away from him.

When he came awake again, it was morning. He lay within his sleeping quarters, a vast chamber of tapestries and silken hangings, of polished oak and heraldic stone sculptures. He lay within his bed, a great canopied sarcophagus of oak and iron that looked as if it might successfully double as a barge. He knew it was morning by the slant of the light through the high arched windows, though the light remained gray and
hazy as the mist without screened away its color. It was quiet within his room and quiet in the rooms without. The castle was like a stone shell.

Yet there was warmth in that castle. Sterling Silver was a dungeon to look upon and it lacked the visual appeal of even the most spartan, avant-garde, chrome-and-steel Chicago high rise, but it had the feel of a home. It was warm to the touch, from the floors that he had walked upon to the walls that he had brushed against. The warmth was in the air, despite the mist and the gray; it flowed through her like a life-blood. She was what Questor Thews had called her. She was a living thing.

Waking up inside of her felt right. It felt secure and comforting, the way it was supposed to feel when one woke within one’s own home.

He stretched and glanced over to the nightstand on which he had placed his duffel and found Questor Thews sitting on a high-backed chair, looking at him.

“Good morrow, Ben Holiday,” the wizard greeted him.

“Good morning,” he replied. The good feelings evaporated in a rush as he remembered the wizard’s gloomy revelation of the night before—that he was a King without retainers, army, or treasury.

“You rested well, I trust?” Questor asked.

“Quite well, thank you.”

“Wonderful. You have a busy day before you.”

“I do?”

“Yes, High Lord.” Questor was beaming. “Today is your coronation. Today you shall be crowned King of Landover.”

Ben blinked. “Today?” He blinked again. There was a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. “Wait a minute, Questor. What do you mean,
today
is the coronation? Wasn’t it just yesterday that you were telling me that the coronation would not take place for at least
several
days because you needed time to inform all those that needed informing?”

“Well, ah … yes, I did say that, I admit.” The wizard
screwed up his owlish face like a guilty child. “The trouble is, it wasn’t yesterday that I said that.”

“It wasn’t yester …?”

“Because this isn’t tomorrow.”

Ben flushed and sat up quickly in the bed. “Just what in the hell are you talking about?”

Questor Thews smiled. “High Lord, you have been asleep for a week.”

Ben stared at him in silence. The wizard stared back. It was so quiet in the room that Ben could hear the sound of his own breathing in his ears.

“How could I have slept for a week?” he asked finally.

Questor steepled his hands before his face. “Do you remember the wine that you drank—the wine I provided?” Ben nodded. “Well, I added a dash of sleeping tonic to its content so that you would be assured of a good night’s rest.” He gestured with his hands. “It was in the magic I used, just an inflection of the voice and a twist.” He demonstrated. “The trouble was, I overdid it. The dash became a thimbleful. So you have been asleep for a week.”

“Just a little mistake of the magic, is that it?” Ben was flushed with anger.

Questor fidgeted uneasily. “I am afraid so.”

“Well, I am afraid not! What sort of fool do you take me for? You did it on purpose, didn’t you? You put me asleep to keep me here!” Ben was shaking, he was so mad. “Did you think I had forgotten the ten-day withdrawal clause in my contract? Ten days were allotted me to return to my own world if I wanted my money back, less the handling fee. Don’t tell me you didn’t know that! Now eight of those ten days are gone! It’s all rather convenient, don’t you think?”

“One minute, please.” Questor had gone stiff with indignation. “If it were truly my intention to keep you in Landover, High Lord, I would not have bothered to tell you about the sleeping potion or the lost days of sleep
at all!
I would simply have let you think it was still only your second
day in Landover and all
ten
days would have passed before you realized differently!”

Ben regarded him silently for a moment and then sat back. “I guess you’re right about that.” He shook his head in disbelief. “I suppose I owe you an apology, but frankly I’m too mad to apologize. I’ve lost a whole damn week because of you! And while I’ve been sleeping, you’ve gone right ahead with the plans for making me King—sent out the invitations and everything! Good thing I woke up on time, isn’t it, or you would have been faced with a bedside coronation!”

“Oh, I knew you would awake on time after I discovered the problem,” Questor hastened to assure him.

“You mean you
hoped
you knew,” Abernathy interjected, appearing through the bedroom door with a tray. “Breakfast, High Lord?”

He brought the tray over and set it on the nightstand. “Thank you,” Ben muttered, his eyes still fixed on Questor.

“I knew,” the wizard said pointedly.

“Beautiful day for a coronation,” Abernathy said. He looked at Ben over the rims of the glasses. “I have your robes of office ready. They have been altered to fit exactly as they ought to.” He paused. “I had plenty of time to measure you while you slept.”

“I’ll bet.” Ben chewed angrily on a piece of bread. “A whole week’s worth of time, it appears.”

Abernathy shrugged. “Not quite. The rest of us drank the wine as well, High Lord.”

“It was an honest mistake,” Questor insisted, brows knitting.

“You make a lot of those,” Abernathy sniffed.

“Perhaps it would please you if I simply quit trying to help at all!”

“Nothing would please me more!”

Ben held up his hands pleadingly. “Hold it! Enough, already!” He looked from one to the other. “I don’t need another argument. As a lawyer, I got my fill of arguments. I need answers. I said last night that I wanted to know the
whole story behind the sale of this Kingdom—well, not last night, but the last time we talked, anyway. So maybe this is the time for it, Questor.”

The wizard rose, cast a dark glance at Abernathy, and looked back again at Ben. “You shall have your explanation, High Lord. But you must settle for hearing it as we travel to the Heart. The coronation must take place at noon, and we must leave at once in order to be there on time.”

Abernathy headed for the door. “His anticipation knows no bounds, I’m sure, wizard. High Lord, I will return with your robes shortly. Meanwhile, try eating a bit more of the breakfast. The castle’s magic continues to fail, and we may all soon be foraging the countryside for sustenance.”

He left. Questor glared after him, then turned hastily to Ben. “I will only add, High Lord, that, with two days remaining, you have sufficient time to use the medallion to return to your own world—if that should be your wish.”

He hesitated, then followed Abernathy out. Ben watched them go. “A whole week,” he muttered, shoved the breakfast tray aside, and climbed from the bed.

They set out within the hour—Ben, Questor, Abernathy, and the two kobolds. They left Sterling Silver and her barren island on the lake skimmer, slipping silently through the murky lake waters to the meadow beyond. From there, they passed back into the forests and the mist.

“It would be best to start at the beginning, I suppose,” Questor said to Ben after they had entered the forest trees. They walked a step ahead of the others, shoulder to shoulder, the wizard with the studied, swinging gait, shoulders stooped and head lowered. “The problem with the throne began after the death of the old King more than twenty years ago. Things were much different then. The old King had the respect of all of the people of Landover. Five generations of his family had ruled in succession, and all had ruled well. No one challenged the old King’s rule—not Nightshade, not even the Mark. There was an army then and retainers and laws to
govern all. The treasury was full, and the magic protected the throne. Sterling Silver was not under the Tarnish; she was polished and gleaming like something just crafted, and the island on which she sits was the most beautiful spot in the land. There were flowers and there was sunshine—and no mists or clouds.”

Ben glanced over. He was dressed in a red silk tunic and pants with knee-high boots and silver stays. Abernathy carried his ceremonial robes, crown and chains of office. “Questor, I hate to have to tell you this but your explanation is beginning to sound like a bad fairy tale.”

“It grows worse, High Lord. The old King died and left but a single son, still a youth, as heir to the throne. The son’s guardian was a wizard of great power but dubious principle. The wizard was more father to the son than the old King, having cared for the boy after his mother’s death and during the old King’s frequent absences from court. The son was a mean-spirited boy, bored with Landover and displeased with the responsibilities his birthright demanded of him, and the wizard played upon this weakness. The wizard had been looking for a way to escape what he viewed as his own limited existence in Landover for some time; he was court wizard then—the position that I now hold—and he thought himself destined for greater things. But a court wizard is bound to the throne and the land by an oath of magic; he could not leave if the throne did not release him. So he employed his considerable skill with words and convinced the boy that they should both leave Landover.”

He paused, and his owlish face turned slightly toward Ben.

“The wizard is my half-brother, High Lord. You know him better as Meeks.”

“Oh-oh.” Ben shook his head slowly. “I begin to see the light.”

“Hmmmmm?”

“Just an expression. And will you quit saying
hmmmmmm
like that? My grandmother in her dotage used to do that
everytime I said something to her, and it damn near drove me crazy!”

“Sorry. Well, the trouble with leaving Landover is that when you go, you take nothing with you. The magic won’t allow it. Neither my half-brother nor the old King’s son could stomach that! So they devised a scheme to sell the throne to someone from another world. If someone from another world were to buy Landover, then my half-brother and the old King’s son could collect the proceeds in that other world and thwart the laws of this one which would prohibit them from taking anything out. That way, they could live comfortably wherever they were to go.”

“How did they decide on my world?” Ben asked.

“Research.” Questor smiled. “Yours was a world in which the inhabitants were most likely to be attracted to life here. Landover was the fantasy that they dreamed about.”

Ben nodded. “Except that it really isn’t.”

“Yes, well.” Questor cleared his throat. “Time passed while my half-brother subverted the old King’s son, while the son grew to manhood, and while they schemed to break their ties with the land. The son never really wanted the throne in any case; he would abandon it quickly enough, whatever the conditions imposed, so long as he could be assured that he would be well looked after. It became the responsibility of my half-brother to find a way to make that happen. That took some thinking and some maneuvering. While all this was happening, the kingdom was falling apart. The magic works on strength of commitment, and there was precious little of that. The treasury emptied. The army disbanded. The laws broke down. The population began to lose its sense of unity and to drift into armed camps. Trade between them all but ceased. Sterling Silver had no master and no retainers to look after her, and she began to fall under the Tarnish. The land was affected as well, withering and turning foul. My half-brother and the old King’s son were left with the problem of selling a, ah … how do you put it
in your world, High Lord? … oh, yes, a ‘pig in a poke’… to some unsuspecting customer.”