Low tide the next day wasn’t until ten o’clock. The council agreed to meet before then to settle the question of kings once and for all. Orvis spent the night drilling Nele until he was sure that if the halfwit would just keep to the script, then Orvis would be the next prime minister and the power behind the throne.
At eight-fifteen the following morning, he checked to make sure that all the councillors were in their seats and waiting for the prime minister to call the meeting to order. He threw open the council room doors and marched in with his purple ministerial robe billowing behind him and announced, after waving one arm in a theatrical manner that produced a satisfying shushing noise from the robe, that he had found the king.
He swept up and down the council chamber as he explained the peculiar but providential intuition that made him think that the absent king might in fact be under their very noses.
“And so,” he said, waving his arms as he spoke, because waving made him feel grand and impressive, “I have carefully scrutinized each citizen of our kingdom, examined each and every one, from the oldest to the very youngest, looking”—he put on his most sincere expression—“for our dear lost prince.” He shook his arms one more time. “And I have found”—he paused—“our king.”
The minister of finance sat with his arms crossed and looked unimpressed. The prime minister looked very grave.
“So,” said Orvis briskly, “we can skip the vote electing a new king and move right to calling out the militia.”
“Doesn’t the king want to do that himself?” asked one minister.
“Couldn’t we, uh, meet the king?” asked the minister for trade.
“Like to, uh, discuss a few things with him,” said the minister of the armed forces.
“Like what he’s going to wear to the coronation,” mumbled the minister of the royal wardrobe to himself.
“Like where he’s been for nine years,” said the prime minister.
“Right,” said Orvis. “I’ll be back in a moment.” And he stalked back out of the council room doors toward the anteroom where he had left Nele. He was followed by every single councillor, because none of them wanted to wait to meet this unknown king.
When the whole crowd of ministers had squeezed into the anteroom, they found that besides themselves, it was empty. No one else was there. The councillors looked askance at Orvis, who swore that the king had been left there moments before he, Orvis, had gone to address the council.
“God help us, we’ve lost him again,” said one minister.
“Quick,” shouted Orvis, flapping his arms in their purple sleeves, “everyone spread out and look for him! He has to be here somewhere!”
Monemvassia’s council building was only slightly larger than the royal residence (it was likewise distinguished by its fine garden), so there were not many rooms to search. Nele was quickly found in the throne room bent over the throne and examining it closely. He turned to face Orvis when he and the other ministers crowded through the door.
“You know,” said Nele, “there’s a terrible curse on this chair. I don’t think I want to sit on it after all.” And he pushed past the ministers and out the door. “Sorry,” he said to Orvis as he passed.
Well, all the ministers knew about the curse, of course. It promised death and destruction to any usurper who sat on Monemvassia’s throne. No one was sure if it was just a story or not, but even if it was a real curse, surely it wouldn’t bother the true heir to the throne…if he was the true heir to the throne. The ministers turned as one to look at Orvis.
Orvis turned pink. “Perhaps,” he said in a very small voice, “I was incorrect.” But he got no further with an explanation before Spiro the Unpopular arrived, pushing his way through the crowd of purple robes much the same way he had pushed through the tide before it had left the sandbar completely. He was wet to the knees and not in a happy mood.
“At least,” he said, “you are waiting for me in the throne room.”
No one explained why, because no one had time. Spiro stamped to the front of the room and up the steps to the throne.
He said, “I, Spiro the Popular, declare myself king of Monemvassia, henceforth to be known as Spiroland,” and he plumped his ample bottom down on the seat cushion.
Almost immediately he fell over dead, bitten by the cliff snake that Nele had left sleeping right there on that cushion. The snake had not been happy to have his sleep interrupted by anything as ample and invasive as Spiro’s bottom, and after sinking both fangs into a particularly fleshy part of it, the snake slipped off the edge of the cushions and under the seat of the throne to continue its nap, hidden by the drapery. No one but the prime minister saw it go.
The king’s ministers one and all stared at Spiro. Clearly the curse was a real one and very powerful, too. Very quietly they returned to the council chamber to review their options. Both candidates for the kingship withdrew their nominations.
“So we can’t call out the royal militia?” said the minister of finance.
“Not legally,” said the minister of armed forces.
“Oh, dear,” said the minister of the royal wardrobe, and for once all the other ministers agreed with him.
“What do you think the bandits will do when they hear Spiro is dead?”
“Loot the town, probably,” said the minister of the armed forces with a sigh.
“We could close the harbor gate and keep them out,” suggested the minister of finance.
“Did that, actually,” said the minister of the armed forces.
“So we’ll starve instead,” said the minister of trade.
“Surely we have fish and olives and grapes to eat?” said the minister of finance.
“Not a balanced diet,” said the minister of health. “The children will all have runny noses.”
“Oh, dear,” said the minister of the royal wardrobe.
A breathless messenger burst through the council chamber’s doors. “The bandits, the bandits,” he gasped.
“Yes, yes,” said the minister of the royal wardrobe, “we already know all about the bandits.”
“They’re leaving,” said the messenger. It seemed that the bandits were a superstitious bunch, and when they heard about the scene in the throne room, they had remembered that they hadn’t been keen to take over a kingdom of fish and wooden spools anyway. They were heading back to the mountains to hold up trade. As for Spiro, he had been called the Unpopular for a reason. No one much cared what happened to him.
After a few moments of relieved discussion, the prime minister asked, “Where’s that boy, Orvis? The one you said was king?”
Orvis with a lot of smooth talking managed to convince the council that it had all been a terrible mistake, an error on his part, an unfortunate misunderstanding. The council decided that they had disposed of Spiro so easily that they really didn’t need a king after all. The prime minister recommended that they keep the position open, nonetheless, just in case the true king someday returned.
That afternoon, Nele had a visitor at the bakery, come to remind him that only members of the council and the royal family knew about the curse.
“Oops,” said Nele.
“I don’t think anyone else has thought about it,” said the prime minister. “I take it that you have enjoyed your apprenticeship?”
“I have,” said Nele.
“You’ll let me know if you change your mind about being king?”
“I will,” said Nele. “Call me if you need me again?”
“Yes,” said his prime minister.
Orvis also came to see Nele. He stopped him after work while he walked down the dark street toward home. Orvis wanted to explain that he wasn’t really the king and wasn’t on any account to mention the king business to anyone. He said everything very slowly, and he said it twice to make sure Nele understood. Once again, he’d failed to notice Bet standing in the shadows until Bet stepped forward and suggested that a gold piece might keep everyone’s mouth shut.
Orvis handed over the gold piece and went home in a terrible mood. When his daughter asked about the puppet show, he snapped that of course they wouldn’t go. Spend good money on a puppet show? He was sick to death of them and hoped never to see another.
When Orvis was gone, Bet said, “He does think you’re an idiot, doesn’t he?”
“He’s got a good reason,” said Nele, and described the scene in the throne room. The two young bakers walked down the street with their arms filled with leftover bread, laughing.
“What shall we do with our gold coin?” asked Bet.
“Same as we did with the silver ones, I think,” said Nele.
They had wine and cheese for dinner every night for a month, and with the money left over they went to the puppet show. The bakers at the Monemvassia bakery still kidded Nele about his brief career as the crown prince and, much to Orvis’s disgust, someone wrote the whole business down and called it the story of the baker king.
About the Author
MEGAN WHALEN TURNER is the author of INSTEAD OF THREE WISHES, THE THIEF, which was awarded a Newbery Honor, and its sequels, THE QUEEN OF ATTOLIA and THE KING OF ATTOLIA. She lives in Ohio. Visit her online at http://home.att.net/~mwturner.
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Also by Megan Whalen Turner
The Thief
The Queen of Attolia
The King of Attolia
Credits
Cover art © 2006 by Brandon Dorman
Hand lettering by David Coulson
Cover design by R. Hult
Copyright
INSTEAD OF THREE WISHES. Text copyright © 1995 by Megan Whalen Turner. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, 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 hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Adobe Digital Edition August 2009 ISBN 978-0-06-196841-9
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Megan Whalen Turner, Instead of Three Wishes: Magical Short Stories
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