“So our Quest is done,” she said in wonderment. “My sister promise is completed too. Denholm is back to being human. Allies have been found. Duke Rikard has been defeated.”
“Yes,” said Tanitha. “You did it, Anya. I always knew you would.”
“So did I,” said Ardent loyally, his tail thumping.
“Really?” asked Anya. “I didn’t.”
“Well, most of the time I did,” said Ardent, and licked her open palm.
Duke Rikard’s trial was held soon after dawn the next day, because everyone agreed that it was better to get unpleasant things out of the way early. Though no one had been able to find a prism to read the laws in the Only Stone, Dehlia, Tanitha, and Parengoethes between them could remember most of the applicable clauses. The Duke was charged with many crimes, including murder, forcible transformation, and improper cackling.
Bert, Sir Havagrad, Tanitha, Sleipjir, Holkern, and the two wardens sat as judges. They had barely gathered behind the table in the courtyard where the trial was held (since everyone wanted to watch), when the unicorn came trotting through the gate and came to stand by them. She even let Anya pat her neck, though only twice.
Rikard was brought out in chains, the dwarves not being satisfied with mere ropes. He was gagged, but the gag was removed when he sat in the single chair facing the judges. He immediately started to gabble a spell, but stopped and howled instead when Anya held the Only Stone against his back for a split second. In any case, it seemed Merlin was right about him having used up his power, because that partial word hadn’t sizzled or boomed as it left his mouth.
The evidence was quickly presented. There were many witnesses to Rikard’s evil deeds, so many that the counts of murder and forcible transformation were quickly proven, the unicorn confirming with a stamp of her hoof and a lift of her horn that everyone spoke truly. Except for Rikard, of course, when he talked in his own defense. The improper cackling charge was sustained on its own merits, since Rickard couldn’t stop himself even during the trial.
So the Duke was found guilty, and the judges conferred on a suitable punishment. After a few minutes, they called Anya over and asked her if she had any suggestions. The options were limited, given that nearly all the old punishments were no longer possible following the Deluge. No one now knew where the Crystal Prison was, for example, where sorcerers and the like could be held harmlessly in stasis for decades.
“How about banishment?” asked Anya. “Send him to Tarwicce. No, better still, some far, distant island where no one lives. Take him there under guard in stages by flying carpet and leave him there.”
The judges agreed that this was not only just, but merciful. The dwarves agreed that the Good Wizard would lend them a carpet for such a cause, though they declined to take on the job themselves, as they never traveled by carpet, even though they crafted them. Too cold and dangerous, Erzef told Anya with a shudder. But Sir Havagrad and several of the former frogs happily agreed to take on the task.
So Duke Rikard was banished to a remote island where there was very little chance he would ever be able to leave. Unless he got his sorcery back, which was very unlikely.
Though not totally impossible.
The funerals for those slain in battle came next, at the small cemetery on the lonely hill between the castle and the forest, where wildflowers grew between the graves. Hedric and the other druids spoke of the circle of life and death, the bare soil of winter and the green shoots of new life in spring. Then they sang a song that was warm and cold in turns, but ended with a gift of peace. It was all very sad, and everyone left weeping, and thinking deep thoughts, and there were many who came to the Great Hall that night to lie in a heap with the puppies and listen to Tanitha tell stories.
But the next day was a happy celebration, because it was Anya’s coronation. Anya wore her best purple kirtle, her mother’s red woolly, and the Only Stone. Ardent, Smoothie, and Shrub followed behind her as she walked the length of the Great Hall and up to the dais where she expected to be crowned by Hedric, since this sort of thing was normally done by a druid or a priest.
But it was the Good Wizard who stood waiting to put the simple twisted-gold-wire crown of Trallonia on her head. Anya paused for a moment when she saw her in full regalia: hat, snowy white beard, and staff. She smiled and walked the rest of the way to kneel in front of the Wizard.
“This isn’t interfering,” whispered the Good Wizard. She hadn’t taken a voice-changing lolly, which was just as well since that deep bass voice probably couldn’t whisper no matter what. She put the crown on Anya’s head and tapped it a couple of times to make sure it was straight. “Just being neighborly now that all the hard work has been done by you and your friends.”
“Thank you,” said Anya. “Thank you for everything.”
She hesitated, a vision of the vast library under the hill clear in her mind, and added, “Do you think I could still be a wizard? One day?”
“Perhaps,” said the Good Wizard. “I was a princess myself once.”
“You were?” asked Anya. “How—”
“Shhhh,” said the Good Wizard. “That’s another story. You have to stand up and wave now.”
Anya stood up, turned, and waved. Everyone cheered and clapped and whistled and barked and made celebratory noises. Two magpies flew in and added their song from the rafters, and the castle cats, though they had expressed their independence by not coming down from the attics, set up a great cheerful yowling. Outside in the moat, the frogs began to croak in unison, keen not to be left out. Some of the knights inside croaked too, forgetting themselves.
Somehow, despite all this racket, the young Gerald the Herald could be heard:
“Frogkisser Crowned Queen of Trallonia! Rikard the Evil Sorcerer Defeated and Banished! Only Stone Found! All-Encompassing Bill of Rights and Wrongs Reestablished! What Could Be Next for the Frogkisser?”
All authors are influenced by the work of all the writers they have read, for good or ill, and most particularly those read between the ages of say eight-ish and twenty-something. Sometimes this influence is easily observed, sometimes it is in small things not so easily spotted, sometimes it is not apparent to anyone else at all. With this book, I would like to particularly acknowledge the inspiration and positive influence that came from my youthful reading (and frequent rereading in later years) of the works of Lloyd Alexander, Nicholas Stuart Gray, Diana Wynne Jones, Robin McKinley, James Thurber, and T. H. White. There are many other writers who have influenced my work, of course, but I think for Frogkisser! these five deserve special mention.
As always, I am very grateful for the help, hard work and guidance of my agents and publishers: Jill Grinberg in New York, Fiona Inglis in Sydney, Antony Harwood in Oxford; and David Levithan at Scholastic in New York, Eva Mills at Allen & Unwin in Melbourne, and Emma Matthewson at Hot Key in London.
Garth Nix is the New York Times bestselling author of the Old Kingdom series, a modern classic of fantasy literature that includes the novels Sabriel, Lireal, Abhorsen, and Clariel. He is also the author of The Keys to the Kingdom series, Shade’s Children, A Confusion of Princes, Newt’s Emerald, and (with Sean Williams) the Troubletwisters series, among other novels. You can find out a whole lot more about him at www.garthnix.com.
Also by
GARTH NIX
THE SEVENTH TOWER SERIES
The Fall
Castle
Aenir
Above the Veil
Into Battle
The Violet Keystone
THE KEYS TO THE KINGDOM SERIES
Mister Monday
Grim Tuesday
Drowned Wednesday
Sir Thursday
Lady Friday
Superior Saturday
Lord Sunday
THE TROUBLETWISTERS SERIES
(WITH SEAN WILLIAMS)
The Magic
The Monster
The Mystery
The Missing
Spirit Animals Book
3: Blood Ties (with Sean Williams)
Copyright © 2017 by Garth Nix
All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Press, an imprint of Scholastic Inc., Publishers since 1920. SCHOLASTIC, SCHOLASTIC PRESS, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.
The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Nix, Garth, author.
Title: Frogkisser! / Garth Nix.
Description: New York, NY : Scholastic Press, [2017] | Summary: Princess Anya has a big problem: Duke Rikard, her step-stepfather is an evil wizard who wants to rule the kingdom and has a habit of changing people into frogs, and her older sister Morven, the heir, is a wimp—so with the help of the librarian Gotfried (who turns into an owl when he is upset), and the Royal Dogs, she must find away to defeat Rikard, save her sister, and maybe even turn Prince Denholm back into a human being.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016026559 | ISBN 9781338052084 (hard jacket cover)
Subjects: LCSH: Princesses—Juvenile fiction. | Sisters—Juvenile fiction. | Wizards—Juvenile fiction. | Magic—Juvenile fiction. | Dogs—Juvenile fiction. | Adventure stories. | CYAC: Princesses—Fiction. | Sisters—Fiction. | Wizards—Fiction. | Magic—Fiction. | Dogs—Fiction. | Adventure and adventurers—Fiction. | GSAFD: Adventure fiction. | LCGFT: Action and adventure fiction.
Classification: LCC PZ7.N647 Fr 2017 | DDC 823.914 [Fic]—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016026559
First edition, March 2017
Jacket art © 2017 by Jim Tierney
Jacket design by Christopher Stengel
e-ISBN 978-1-338-05210-7
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012.
Garth Nix, Frogkisser!
(Series: # )
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