He strode around to the front of the cottage with Lazy Susan trailing him. When he spotted Olympia in the wheelbarrow at the end of the path, he waved to her and then beckoned for her to join them. She didn't move. He beckoned again.
"I'll go get her." Lazy Susan sighed. By the time they'd eaten, that would make two round trips on that same path, which was more walking than she normally did in several days.
"Where's the food?" Olympia asked as Lazy Susan approached the wheelbarrow.
"He wants us to come inside. He'll feed us in there."
"Are you crazy? We don't know anything about him. These parts are full of fairy folk and sorcerers and gremlins. If he's one, and knows who I am, who can tell what he'll do."
Lazy Susan had had enough. "I'm sufficiently hungry to take a chance. You decide for yourself."
The front door was wide open as Lazy Susan came back along the path, and the white-haired man waited on the threshold, his arms spread expansively.
"Bok, daw-daw, and nark!" he exclaimed.
Lazy Susan stopped. Maybe Olympia was right—apparently these parts were inhabited by some very strange sorts. "I'm sorry?" she said.
"I'm welcoming you," he said. "Bok is Croatian for hello, daw-daw is Jutlandish for hello, and nark is Phorhépechan for hello."
"Oh."
"I could have said aloha but that also means goodbye. As does ayubowan—that's Sri Lankan—and I don't want to be telling you good-bye so soon. Not at all."
"I see. And how is it you know all these words?" She stood unmoving on the path.
"I've lived alone here for a long time. Tending my garden and making little knickknacks in my workshop has passed some of the time, but learning languages, for which I seem to have a great facility, has filled the rest of it. It's been mentally stimulating, as well as allowing me to converse with any odd stranger who passes by on the road. And some of them, I assure you, have been very odd."
Lazy Susan exhaled the breath she'd been holding, and started walking again.
"Forgive me for not introducing myself," he said as she reached the door. "My name is Stan Lucasa. And you are ...?"
"I'm Lazy Susan. Sleeping Beauty is my half sister. Do you know her? She married a prince who fell in love with her while she was asleep. Doesn't that strike you as peculiar?"
"I'm sorry. I can't say that I know her or her prince. And love is a mysterious thing—something I appreciate and never question. Well, welcome, Susan." She noticed that he didn't use her adjective. He pointed to the wheelbarrow where Olympia still sat. "Your companion isn't coming?"
"I don't know," Lazy Susan said. "But we don't have to wait for her."
The inside of the cottage was a complete surprise. Lazy Susan had been expecting a bachelor environment—sparse furnishings, piles of dirty laundry, and inches of dust. Not only was the place immaculate, it was tastefully filled with lively objects that were decorative as well as functional. The walls were lined with shelves of carved birds and animals in fanciful shapes.
The round table was covered with an embroidered cloth; platters overflowed with delicious-looking concoctions. She stopped, her mouth open. "How in the world—"
Mr. Lucasa pulled out a chair with an elaborately carved back and a seat cushion made from a cheerful striped fabric. "I like to cook," he said. "Have a seat."
She sat, still speechless. Mr. Lucasa apparently liked to cook fast. She'd seen enough magic in her time to be glad that if his methods were magical, they produced delicious-looking food instead of noxious smoke or lightning bolts.
He handed her a heaping plate, then filled a plate for himself and sat across from her. He ate quickly and tidily, and was on his second plateful while she was still savoring her first.
Suddenly the front door was flung open so hard it hit the wall and bounced back. Olympia pushed it open again, and stood on the threshold in her stained and rumpled gown, Fenleigh draped over the shoulders. "You left me," she said, glaring.
Lazy Susan shrugged, her mouth full of delectable roasted meat. "You didn't want to come," she managed.
"Were you intending to bring me something? Or were you going to eat it all yourself?"
Mr. Lucasa had come to his feet, a large napkin in his hand, when the door banged open, but Olympia ignored him.
"This is Mr. Lucasa," Lazy Susan said, gesturing to him with her fork. "He made this feast. It's good."
"Madam," Mr. Lucasa said, "please join us." He waved his hand over the table, on which there remained plenty to eat.
Olympia's eyes glittered hungrily. "Very well." She made her way regally to the table, where she, and Fenleigh, too, ate like lumberjacks.
This pleased Mr. Lucasa immensely. "That is a special dish I invented," he said. "Squab with flab and moron."
Lazy Susan dropped her fork and coughed. "Flabs and morons?"
Mr. Lucasa laughed a hearty laugh. "Flab is Gaelic for mushroom, and moron is Welsh for carrot. Perfectly harmless, I guarantee it."
"And very good, too," Olympia said, her mouth full. "Quite excellent. Would you like a job at Beauri-vage Castle? We can always use another chef in the kitchens."
"We don't know anything about him, remember?" Lazy Susan reminded her primly.
"I know enough." Olympia waved her hand dismissively. "He can cook. That's all I need to know."
"I do like to cook," he agreed. "You said Beauri-vage Castle?"
"Where else did you think Queen Olympia would live?"
"You're a queen?" he asked. When she nodded, still chewing, he cast a glance out the window to where the mules stood, eating the flowers by his front gate, the wheelbarrow on its side.
Olympia saw the look, and drew herself up so haughtily that she could have been wearing a crown instead of a tattered and dirty dress. "I may not appear very royal right now, but I've just been through an extraordinary experience. I assure you that once I get you back to Beaurivage Castle you will see how regal I can be."
He laughed and gestured around himself. "I live here. I'm not looking for a job."
"Trifles." Olympia sniffed. "I'll send some of my minions to tend to things while you're away."
"Your minions?" he said.
"You know. Lackeys. Flunkies. Underlings."
"I know what they are," he said.
Lazy Susan could see him thinking, looking around his pretty cottage as if imprinting it on his mind, making a picture he could take with him. She'd done the same thing (only much faster) when she left her familiar surroundings in Granolah.
"You can do that?" he asked. "Send someone to take care of things while I'm gone?"
"With the wave of one hand," Olympia said, demonstrating by waving the wishbone from the squab. Then she pulled the wishbone apart with both hands and crowed, "I win! I get my wish!"
Both Lazy Susan and Mr. Lucasa refrained from reminding her that you always win when you're the only one playing.
"I haven't been away from here in a very long time," he mused. "It might do me good. I can always come back." He trailed off into muttering in some other language.
Suddenly he sat up straight and said, "All right. I'll do it."
Olympia pushed her empty plate away and rose, picking her teeth delicately with her pinkie. "Let's get started," she said.
"Not so fast. I need to get ready," Mr. Lucasa told her.
Olympia sat again and took a spoon to the dish of marshmallow mousse. "Well, hurry up."
Mr. Lucasa didn't. He took his time packing up the leftover food and washing the dishes. Then he got together some clothes and other necessities in a leather satchel. By the time he was ready, Olympia had finished the marshmallow mousse and was tapping her foot.
"You can ride on the other mule, I guess," Lazy Susan said, leading the way back to their transportation.
Mr. Lucasa tied his bundles onto the mule carrying Lazy Susan's things, and said, "I believe I'll walk." He patted his round belly. "It'll be good for me. At least until I start to tenjack. That's 'to limp' in Malays
ian."
FOR SEVERAL DAYS they traveled, living on the excellent provisions Mr. Lucasa had brought from his kitchen. Then, plodding along an unusually wide lane through rolling countryside, Olympia ordered, "Stop!"
Lazy Susan pulled the mules to a halt and looked back to see Olympia standing up in the wobbly wheelbarrow, looking around her. "I know this place," she said. "I've been here before."
"I have, too," Lazy Susan said. "Beaurivage is near."
"I was here once on a picnic during a fox hunt," Olympia said. "We're getting close to the castle."
"Fox hunt?" Mr. Lucasa repeated. "You mean ... to kill them?"
"It's a sport," Olympia said. "Nobody cares about the foxes. It's all for fun."
"Not much fun for the foxes," Mr. Lucasa said, giving Olympia a hard stare. "I'll bet the foxes don't like that sport at all."
"Who cares what the foxes think? I do love a sport that requires a costume. You should see my favorite Riding to the Hounds outfit. Bronze taffeta with bright blue buttons and lapels. So stylish. And the hat has a little foxtail on it."
Mr. Lucasa continued to give her that look. "Some fox probably needed that tail."
"Not anymore he doesn't," Olympia said. "Keep going. We're almost there. And I have a lot of unfinished business to take care of."
6
Edric had been trying to get up the courage to ask Wendolyn's father for her hand for several months. He'd loved her for years and, though they were both trolls, who lived a very long time, he was tired of waiting to declare himself. But whenever he thought the time was right, something would happen. A storm would prevent him from paying the visit, or he'd get a toothache, or a cold—but the truth was he was just plain chicken. He thought her father would say yes. After all, Ed's Tooth Troll business, which had replaced the Tooth Fairy's inept operation, was doing very well, and he was on best-friend terms with King Swithbert of Beaurivage, in whose castle he lived. Wendolyn's father would surely find Ed an excellent prospect for a son-in-law.
Ed just wasn't sure he was such an excellent prospect as a husband. He was old (which wasn't unusual for trolls), he was ugly (though not any uglier than most trolls), and he was horribly shy when it came to girls (though not shy at all with anybody else).
He'd watched how Christian and Marigold were together—so splendid to look at, so loving and kind and playful with each other, so helpful and respectful, and such good rulers of Zandelphia across the river. But he couldn't imagine being such a perfect spouse day after day. He made too many mistakes, lost his temper too often, and cheated at cards (but so did Swithbert, who was the only person Ed played with, so it usually worked out okay).
One morning he woke up and thought, Today's the day. Nobody's perfect. I love Wendolyn. I'll let her decide if she wants to get married to me. If I don't ask, how can she tell?
He whistled while he dressed and went down to breakfast, ignoring Bub and Cate growling at each other in one of the side passages of the castle. He stopped to pick up a blue squeaky toy lying on the stairs and put it in his pocket. Somebody might trip over that and fall down the steps.
"Morning, Ed," King Swithbert said from the head of the long table where he was giving an egg in an eggcup a good whack. His ruddy cheeks and bright eyes belied his advanced age. In fact, in the year that Olympia had been gone, he seemed to have become younger. "Blast! A runny egg again! When will that cook learn to get it right?"
"You could send it back," Ed said. "You are the king."
"Oh, I know," Swithbert said. "But I don't want to make him feel bad." He sighed and took a bite of the runny egg, making a face.
"The pigeons are flying again after all that rain, so I'm sending a p-mail to Wendolyn's father today," Ed said, "asking for her hand. And the rest of her, too."
"High time," Swithbert said. "I'm not the best person to be giving marital advice, considering what a disaster my marriage to Olympia was, but I hope it works out for you. What else would I wish for my best friend, and the most enthusiastic card partner I've ever had?"
"Just take a look at Marigold and Christian if you want to feel encouraged about marriage," Ed said. "So it seems to be six of one half, a dozen of another."
"Whatever you say, Ed. Good luck. And yes, Chris and my daughter do seem to have figured out how to do it right."
At that moment Christian came into the dining room panting as if he had run all the way from Zandelphia to Beaurivage. "I don't know what to do," he gasped. "Marigold is threatening to kill me."
MEANWHILE, Marigold sat in the golden-crystal library room in her cave-castle, crying her eyes out. How could she and Chris have said those things to each other? How could she have threatened him like that? And worse, how could she have meant it? He was her sweetheart, her best friend, her bulwark against life's tribulations. And for a few minutes at breakfast, she'd really wanted nothing more than to have him hit with a curse so big and so black that it would take years for him to recover. Did decent people really feel like that about their loved ones, or was there something horribly wrong with her, the way Queen Olympia had always said there was? Had all those years of criticism left her with some scarred and rotten place on her soul?
She erupted into a fresh flood of sobbing that brought Flopsy, Mopsy, and Topsy clustering around her, putting their paws up on her knees, and finally baying along with her.
OLYMPIA'S ENTOURAGE came out of the trees at the edge of the forest. Before them was a long undulant meadow dotted with wildflowers and grazing sheep, all so artfully distributed that it seemed some giant hand had arranged it just for the queen's arrival. In the distance were the hazy towers of Beaurivage Castle, colorful flags flying from the battlements.
"Oh!" Olympia said. "Home! You are shortly going to see some very surprised faces." She rubbed her hands together. "I can't wait."
Lazy Susan gave her mule a little kick in the ribs to get him moving again, but Olympia commanded, "Wait! I can't arrive this way. Lucasa, don't you have something to wear besides that long-underwear top? And Lazy Susan, wash your face and do something about your hair. It's a disgrace." She felt her own hair and looked down at her stained dress. "How can I show up looking like this? It just won't do. You two! Think of something!"
"Why us?" Lazy Susan asked. But Mr. Lucasa was already gathering wildflowers by the bushel. Quickly, he concocted a sort of netting woven from the flowers that he draped over Olympia's skirt, and another that he arranged into her hair. Then he did the same for Lazy Susan while Olympia fussed and primped with her new outfit, gazing at her reflection in a roadside puddle, a remnant of the recent rains.
"Genius!" she said to Mr. Lucasa. "I will make you my new chef and my new dressmaker. I believe I'll be setting a style for every woman in Beaurivage. I look so fresh and vernal and youthful, don't you think?"
"Flowers always look good," he said noncommittally.
"Make some wreaths for these mules," she ordered. "Then I can ride one of them into the castle, and you and Lazy Susan can come along with the other one, pulling the wheelbarrow with the bundles. We want to make this look as dignified as we can, under the very unfortunate circumstances. The wheelbarrow was somewhat more comfortable for a long trip, but I think a flower-covered steed makes for a better entrance. Oh, and make a wreath for Fenleigh, too."
Lazy Susan and Mr. Lucasa made the wreaths while Olympia continued to admire herself in the puddle. When the mules were adorned, she hefted herself onto one of them and started off, leaving Lazy Susan and Mr. Lucasa to organize everything else.
Because it was Market Day at the castle, farmers and peasants from all around the countryside were pouring over the drawbridge and under the portcullis. Olympia had no trouble traveling in with them, obscured by the throng, though she was somewhat annoyed that no one recognized her, or appreciated how fresh, vernal, and youthful she looked.
Mr. Lucasa and Lazy Susan followed her through the crowded bailey where stalls were set up for the sale of homemade craft items (most of which were so
ugly and poorly made it was hard to imagine who would want them), baked goods (that were either too sticky, too raw, or too misshapen to be appealing), and local produce (which would probably be all right to eat once the cow patties were washed off).
Suddenly the word "Olympia?" rang out. Olympia turned a wide smile in the direction of the voice, searching the crowd. Her eyes traveled up to a balcony overlooking the bailey—and there stood King Swithbert, his eyes almost popping out of his face. He squeezed them shut, shook his head, and opened them again.
"Olympia?" he asked again, in disbelief and dread.
"Yes, it's me," she called to him. "Surprise! I'll be right up."
Looking around at the crowd of amazed faces now turned toward her, she waved from the back of her mule. "Yes, my loyal subjects," she called gaily. "It is your queen, returned at last."
"It can't be!" she heard. And "I don't believe it." And "What is that she's wearing?" And "I thought she was gone for good." All of which Olympia interpreted in the most complimentary way.
7
"What about us?" Lazy Susan called after her as Olympia headed for the postern that led directly to Swithbert's quarters.
"Oh, yes. You two take the beasts to the stables." Olympia pointed. "Tell somebody there to return them to Granolah. And make sure they take that horrible wheelbarrow, too. Whoever delivers them can go back to Lucasa's home and tend it until he gets back there. Oh—and tell them to send along a bag of gold pieces. I said I'd compensate the owners of the stuff, and a queen keeps her word. pathetic as those animals and that conveyance are, they got me home."
(It would turn out that Mr. Appenzeller ignored his wife's advice for the choice of a campaign slogan and instead used Olympia's generous compensation as the inspiration for the slogan in his next mayoral campaign: elect appenzeller. he can turn your asses into gold. He lost the election.)
"Then," Olympia went on, "go see Mrs. Clover, the head housekeeper. Tell her I sent you, and why." She turned her back on them and vanished.