‘Not at all,’ the inner voice suggested. ‘At the Palace they care for grace, elegance, beauty, charm. Would they be content to be ruled by a hulk like this?’
It was true. The Palace would not be ruled by a slovenly, obese monster, no matter how forceful. Still, it was something to think on before Buttercup went plummeting into Royal society.
Slowly, reluctantly, she tugged dog back onto the trail and led him away, not without one or two muffled and longing ‘whurfs’ from him. He wanted to attack, but Buttercup pulled him firmly along. The voice, whatever it was, had some truth in it. Her concern had to be for other things at the moment, such things as repairing her fortune. Sensalee had taken the greater part of her funds. There was not enough left to get to the Palace in even moderate comfort, much less to keep herself in the town while awaiting time for the challenge.
Her need was answered when she arrived at the inn, as though by some benevolent spirit. Posted on the wall of the courtyard was a flyer issued by the Male Protective League offering a reward, no questions asked, for the whereabouts of several listed males. Among them was Honsl, printer of the village of Rivvelford, missing seven days, last seen … and so on and so on. Buttercup sent a message by a sulky stable boy, giving Honsl’s location. The promised reward arrived by noon. While it was not exorbitant, Buttercup felt it was a good deal more than Honsl was worth.
She went up to her room, recounting to herself that she had learned a valuable lesson. She had learned that duplicity and treachery could be hidden behind a pretty face. She had learned that what had been read in books was not adequate preparation for reality. Most valuable, though most horrifying, she had learned that some males felt Grisls to be fair game though she could not comprehend why this should be so.
‘The Palace,’ whispered her internal voice impatiently.
‘What are you?’ snarled Buttercup. ‘Who asked you?’
‘The Palace,’ the voice said again imperturbably. ‘Never mind who I am. I will leave you at the Palace and you won’t be bothered with me anymore.’
Buttercup left the room in a mood of seething frustration. It had all been almost enough to make her doubt the fundamental rationality of natural law which assigns each sex to its place in the vast scheme of things. She felt … she felt as she had felt when she was only three and Nursey had told her there was not, in fact, a Fang Fairy.
Disillusionment is hard for the young, she told herself. Very hard for the young.
‘No harder than for anyone else,’ the voice snorted. ‘The trouble with you, Buttercup, is that you take yourself entirely too seriously.’
CHAPTER SEVEN
Buttercup arrived at the Palace – or, more precisely, in the vicinity of the Palace – on the day before the Heiress Presumptive was to accept challenge in the Royal arena. Placards were posted throughout the town announcing the event, though only ticket holders would be allowed to attend and only Grisls of the aristocracy and certain males of the bureaucracy had been furnished with tickets. Certain preselected males would, of course, be in the arena itself. To the victor would go the spoils. Public consummation was part of the ritual, after all.
The sound of a familiar voice drew Buttercup’s attention to a small group of males on a street corner, and she was surprised to see the Misters Jonas and Cadmon Thrumm talking with a male who looked, dressed, and acted very much like Fribberle. Had the other two Thrumms also brought Van Hoost challengers to the city? Had they, too, prepared young Grisls to die in the arena, helpless before the assault of the Heiress Presumptive? Or were they merely there for the festivities?
Buttercup, thankful that she had left the dog at her place of lodging, drew her quiet garment about her and approached closely enough to hear what they were saying.
‘I simply can’t imagine what’s keeping him,’ muttered Jonas Thrumm. ‘He said he’d meet us here yesterday, with the candidate – the only candidate! A policy which I continue to maintain is short-sighted and parsimonious – and no one has seen him.’
‘It’s unlike Raphael to be late,’ said Cadmon Thrumm. ‘Of the set of us, he is the most punctilious.’
‘The same with Fribberle,’ said the man who looked like Fribberle, sounding quite put out and distressed. ‘Where was Raphael to meet you?’
‘We have rooms at the Insensitive Galosh,’ said Cadmon. ‘A suite. Raphael was to have joined us there yesterday.’
Buttercup moved away from them into the crowd. Well and well. Perhaps something could be done with this.
‘Be careful,’ said the voice inside her. ‘Your birthday isn’t until tomorrow.’
‘My birthday?’ Buttercup said aloud, drawing curious glances from passersby. ‘My birthday?’
‘You will be eight tomorrow.’
‘How do you know? Who are you?’ Buttercup demanded, half angrily. ‘What are you doing sneaking about in my mind?’
‘Not sneaking,’ the voice replied. ‘Merely hitchhiking. Just wanted to warn you to be especially careful…’
Buttercup chose to ignore the voice, birthday or no birthday. She inquired as to the location of the Insensitive Galosh and went there, walking up the stairs hidden in her all-concealing robe and finding the suite with no difficulty at all. It was not even locked.
There was notepaper in the desk. She wrote, scratched out, wrote again, then took time to copy it all over in the clear, anonymous script which Mr Thrumm had advocated for cultivated personal use.
‘My dear Cadmon and Jonas,’ she had written. ‘I have run into a slight contretemps which will keep me occupied with the candidate until challenge time tomorrow. Would you be kind enough to advise the officials of our arrival. Tell them please that one of us will bring the candidate to the arena only slightly before challenge time. As ever, Raphael.’
Buttercup, in her searching through the drawers of Thrumm House had had occasion to read various pieces of Thrumm correspondence. She felt she had Raphael’s style, or lack of it, very clearly in mind and had reproduced it fairly.
She left the suite only moments before the Thrumms returned to it.
‘Now what?’ asked the voice in her head.
‘Supper,’ replied Buttercup. ‘Rare roast, lots of it, and no wine.’
‘Very sensible of you,’ said the voice in her head.
Buttercup spent some time wondering about the voice, particularly inasmuch as it had become more and more obtrusive during the past several days, advising her for and against various courses of action with increasing fervor. Undoubtedly it was the same voice which had been with her since childhood. Certainly it had never harmed her. On occasion, as in the case of Sensalee, it had probably helped her to some extent. Perhaps it was an aberration of some kind. Perhaps it was a guardian spirit.
At the moment, it didn’t matter which or whether. Buttercup returned to her lodgings, ordered a plentiful supper, and consumed it with good appetite. Various of the placards about the town had carried pictures of the Heiress Presumptive. She was portrayed as being quite young. Very slender. Almost, one might say, unformed. Buttercup was more sanguine about her chances of success than at any time since seeing Sensalee in the lap of the giant Wild Grisl.
She slept the sleep of the just.
On the morrow, slightly before challenge time, she presented herself at the Insensitive Galosh and asked for Mr Cadmon Thrumm. When he appeared, she greeted him in a dreamy manner, her eyes wide, her voice monotonous, her gait slightly staggering.
‘Mr Thrumm has sent me, Mr Thrumm. He has been unavoidably delayed. He says you must take me to the … to the arena. We are to watch the battle. Won’t that be exciting?’
Mr Thrumm regarded her with deep suspicion. ‘Where is Raphael?’
‘With … with his … with a male,’ she murmured. ‘I will tell you his name if I can whisper it.’
Mr Thrumm turned quite pink. ‘At it again, is he! Tell me,’ and leaned forward to receive the tip of her fang just below his ear.
‘Take me to the Palac
e,’ said Buttercup. ‘I believe they are expecting us.’
The whole town was expecting them! There were banners across the streets, balloons clustered on lampposts, drifts of confetti, and small wandering bands making frenzied music. There were platoons of uniformed Nurseys marching to and fro with a rat-a-tat of drums. There were booths selling roast fleeb nuts and seed pies and ice cream. There were vendors of illustrated books of the adventures of Great Grisl among the savage Earthians. There were salesmen of mugs with a picture of the Heiress Presumptive upon them and pillows with a picture of the Heiress Presumptive upon them and toilet seats which played the national anthem when one sat down. Indeed, the Heiress Presumptive stared at the merrymakers from every conceivable surface, including some which were in questionable taste.
Cadmon Thrumm led Buttercup among crowds which grew ever thicker as they approached the arena walls. On the higher roofs surrounding the arena were crowds of males and Nurseys who had paid dearly for the privilege of watching the challenge ceremony through telescopes from these lofty vantage points.
Once at the arena itself, they found their way to a small side door guarded by two monstrous Nurseys. ‘Cadmon Thrumm,’ her putative escort announced. ‘Bringing the candidate as arranged.’
‘Supposed to be Raphael this time, Thrumm,’ opined one of the Nurseys, giving him a keen glance. ‘Where is he?’
‘Indisposed,’ said Cadmon. ‘A digestive upset of some kind. Jonas and I decided I should bring her on ahead. We were afraid Raphael might not recover soon enough.’
‘The candidate all prepared, is she?’
Cadmon nodded. ‘She’s been at Thrumm House almost since birth.’
‘Fribberle get there in good time, did he?’
Cadmon nodded again. One of the Nurseys reached out and lifted Buttercup’s veil away from her face, remarking, ‘That’s the Van Hoost chin, all right. Can’t mistake it. Did his usual good job with the spurs, did he?’
Buttercup remained passive with enormous effort. When this was over, she was going to bite whole battalions of Nurseys!
‘Well, go on in. Third room to the right. The garb’s all laid out.’
They went through the gate. The third room on the right had a grated window which looked out on the arena itself, a sand-floored circular space surrounded by a head-high wall. Above the wall were rows on rows of seats, filled for the most part with robed Grisls and soberly dressed functionaries.
Buttercup disposed of Cadmon in a closet, instructing him not to move until she told him to and resolving never to tell him to move in a million years. This room probably wouldn’t be used until the next challenge, and he could sit there and rot until then, reward or no reward.
The caparison she was to wear was, indeed, laid out. Delicate, silken veils for head and shoulders. Glittering jewels for neck, wrists, and ankles. Even in this they had played false. The necklace was so tight that it would cut off her breathing if she wore it. The bracelets were loose and jangling and would prove to be a distraction. The gemmed footlets would have fouled her spurs in moments. With her face set, Buttercup removed the robe, laid it on the bed, and then dressed herself in the abbreviated veils, leaving the ornaments where they were.
Through the window she could hear the band. A roar from the crowd as the Heiress Presumptive arrived in the Royal box, then again as she left the box to descend to the arena floor. Buttercup peeked out. The heiress was there, seated at the far end of the arena, bowing, left, right, lifting her hands to wave, left, right. Fanfare.
Fanfare.
The entry of the challenger. Her entry.
Buttercup turned to the mirror to check her appearance one last time, feeling as she did so a shiver as though something had torn loose within her, as though something had ripped away, as though half her being was being amputated from her.
Suddenly beside her in the mirror was a small green creature with whiskers and round ears. Buttercup whirled.
‘You look very nice,’ said the familiar voice as the green creature looked up at her, wrinkling its nose. ‘Happy Birthday, and go give ’em hell. But I need my matchbox first.’
Another, irritated-sounding, fanfare.
‘Who are you!’ Buttercup demanded.
‘You don’t have time to find out,’ the green creature whispered between its two huge front teeth. It cocked its round ears toward the window. ‘That’s your entry, Buttercup. Let me have the box, quickly, then you’d better get cracking!’
Hypnotized, Buttercup fished the box from the pocket of her robe where she had carried it. The green creature opened the gold box, took two cubes out of it, then knelt and rattled the cubes in its paw – cubes with dots on them…
Fanfare once more. An impatient roar from the crowd.
Buttercup opened the arena door. On a low dais across the arena the Heiress Presumptive sat waiting, rising now to a roar of acclamation and excitement. She was about Buttercup’s size. Maybe even a little larger. She had an excellent set of spurs. And her fang was even longer than Buttercup’s fang.
With a stagger which was not altogether feigned, Buttercup went forth…
Behind her the dice tumbled and came up two and one.
‘Three,’ said Marianne, the malachite mouse.
‘You will forgive me, won’t you?’ pled Great-aunt Dagma from her bed. ‘I wasn’t thinking. I never intended it to happen that way.’
‘I will forgive you, of course,’ said Aghrehond. ‘Though what my forgiveness might mean to you, madam, or what currency it might have in the world at large, I am at some difficulty to identify. And as for my master, Makr Avehl, whether he will forgive you is another matter yet. Still, from what you tell me, she didn’t mean to do it…’
‘She didn’t. I know she didn’t. She was simply going to demonstrate how the game should be played. It was a matter of here one moment, gone the next, and she didn’t plan it, I’m sure.’
‘There is a young Kavi who attends upon the Cave of Light, in my home in Alphenlicht, you understand? Ah, I was sure you did. Her name is Therat, this Kavi, an innocuously floral name for someone so omniscient, and she has eyes like a hawk, all seeing, far seeing, only sometimes they do not see what one wants them to look at. So, before I left with my master’s wife, it was Therat who told me something awkward would probably happen. She spent all night consulting the lectionaries, and when she could not find what she sought – well, she was surprised and then upset. Still, what was there to do about it? We could not say, Therat or I, that Marianne should stay in Alphenlicht and let her loved relative die! Who could say such a thing. So, one comes and one hopes, only to have one’s hopes dashed and the danger comes anyway. Alas.’ Aghrehond rubbed his large head, shaking it to and fro. ‘I should have come up here with her to visit you instead of staying below in the kitchens.’
‘I doubt you would have moved fast enough even if you’d been standing right beside her,’ whispered Dagma from her bed. She was desperately tired and worried, and her voice was feeble. ‘She just did it, suddenly, all at once.’
‘Tell me, Madame Zahmani, how long has Marianne been gone?’
‘Only about fifteen minutes, Aghrehond. I haven’t said anything to Arti, that is Marianne’s mother, yet. She would be sure to have hysterics. She would think Marianne had fallen victim to the local epidemic of vanishment.’
‘An epidemic? Ah, so it is happening here, as well? I had not known that. It is possible Marianne is a victim of it.’
‘Well, don’t tell Arti. She would not be able to hold herself together.’
‘I have told no one yet except Makr Avehl himself, and for him I have had to leave a message because he is not near a phone. Now we must decide what to do, Madame Zahmani.’
‘Please don’t call me “Madame Zahmani,” Aghrehond, or I shall have to call you “Mr Aghrehond,” which is too formal for the occasion. “Madame” is a courtesy title, in any case. I was never married.’
‘Very well, Great-aunt. Tell me about this epid
emic.’
Dagma did so, as much as she knew. ‘According to the statistician, it’s been going on for decades. According to the governor’s office, the whole thing is a computational error!’
‘For decades, ah?’ Aghrehond sighed. ‘And when Marianne threw the dice, how did they come up?’
‘I heard her say “snake eyes,” and I blinked. When I opened my eyes she was gone. And so was the malachite mouse. And the matchbox, of course.’
‘Of course,’ Aghrehond brooded over the game diagram. ‘It could only be that, could it not? Everything that happens has purpose, or so I have always felt, and when one is caught in a net such as this, things happen as they must. Ah, well. It would do no good at all to play in behind her. We must try to get ahead of her, then wait for her. But, she could leapfrog right over us. What was on the second square?’
‘Before Marianne threw the dice, it said, “Buttercup, Birth to Eight Years.” Now it says, “Queen Buttercup, the first month of her reign.”’
‘So it does,’ said Aghrehond. ‘Which means Marianne must have done something in that square to change things there. She has that quality, does she not? Always busy, upsetting apple carts, turning over kettles. I have seen her – well, of no matter. That was in another time and place. She will have gone past the Buttercup point by now, so there is no point in discussing it. And that raises the point of how she got past that point. The dice are still here.’
‘There was something rattly in the matchbox,’ Dagma offered.
‘Rattly. Well, of course. Game makers must provide for those who play. Dice available here to start the game. And if there are none in there to continue playing with – then perhaps one is trapped? Who knows. Let us suppose she had two dice with her. Using two dice, she could not throw a one, which is fortunate. The square after the Buttercup square is labeled “Forever.”’
‘What does that mean?’
‘It probably means exactly what it says. If she had thrown a three, she would have landed in Forever and no matter all our machinations, Great-aunt, there is no doubt we would not have seen our Marianne again, weep though we might and wait at the horrors of fate.’