He shall not be asked to tumble.
He shall not be asked to jump through hoops.
He shall not be asked to ride aboard a dog or any creature other than a pony or horse of appropriate size.
He shall not be asked to sing, talk in a funny voice, or tell jokes.
He shall be treated with all the courtesy and respect that is extended to full-size adult human beings.
These regulations are issued by me, the Royal Princess Gundersnap of the Empire of Slobodkonia.
Princess Kristen finished reading the document. There was silence for several seconds, and then Gundersnap could hear Princess Myrella’s voice.
“I think she’s right,” said the tiny princess of the Marsh Kingdoms. “My own family hasn’t kept dwarves for years.”
“We never kept dwarves,” said Kristen. “The Realm of Rolm is simply too cold for them. They’d get terrible arthritis.”
“Besides, dwarves are so…so twelfth century,” said Princess Alicia. “Troubadours, your ordinary court jester—that’s one thing—but dwarves—that is so over!”
“Indeed!” said a new voice. It belonged to Lady Merry von Schleppenspiel, the princesses’ lady-in-waiting. She was an immensely large lady with cascading multiple chins. She preferred the words “large” or “ample” to “fat.” “You know Gundersnap is a sensitive girl. She worries about everyone except herself,” said Lady Merry with a sigh.
Gundersnap coughed loudly to give warning and then came through the door. “Dearie,” Lady Merry said, “we completely agree with you about Gortle. He should come for afternoon tea when he arrives. We’ll have a nice game of whist. He shall be entertained and not be the entertainment!” She nodded, and all eight of her chins trembled in fleshy agreement.
At just that moment, there was the loud tinkling of a bell. “Enter,” Lady Merry sang out.
Four chambermaids came in to the salon, each carrying a freshly ironed nightgown. And one also carried a scroll listing the next few days’ activities.
Gilly, Alicia’s personal chambermaid and really the favorite of them all, stepped forward, smiling brightly. “You’ll be glad to hear that if the weather is good, there is to be no makeup class tomorrow with the Duchess of Bagglesnort.”
There was a resounding “hooray” from all four princesses. The Snort, as they called the duchess, was their least favorite counselor. “No, Miladies, something much better.”
“Vot is it?” When Princess Gundersnap became excited, she often lapsed into her heavy Slobodkonian accent, in which “w” became “v.”
“Unicorns!” Gilly replied.
Princess Gundersnap gasped. She could hardly believe it. Hadn’t she thought she had seen the dim outline of such a creature in the unfinished tapestry last session? One of the great mysteries of the castle, which only the princesses of the South Turret knew about, was the magical tapestry in a hidden turret. During that first session of camp, Alicia had been led there by a Ghost Princess who had haunted her bedchamber. The ghost had told Alicia that her spirit could only be put to rest if the three princesses of the South Turret completed the part of the tapestry that had never been finished. Alicia, Gundersnap, and Kristen had begun to sew, and it was as if their hands had been magically guided, for as they stitched a picture began to emerge. Not an entire picture, but one with enough clues so that eventually the spirit of the Ghost Princess and that of her true love, a knight, could be reunited and put to rest.
Gundersnap could remember it all as clearly as if it had happened five minutes ago. Just as Princess Alicia had said, “I guess the tapestry is finished. The story told,” Gundersnap had seen some other lines that were ever so faint. At first she thought it was the figure of a small horse, but the harder she looked, the more it had seemed like a unicorn. Gundersnap, however, being Gundersnap, was a very practical girl, and she knew that unicorns were just made-up creatures from fairy tales. Her mother had said such creatures didn’t exist! And if her mother said something…well…the empress was usually right about everything. Gundersnap had never said a word to Alicia or Kristen about what she thought she had seen. And Princess Myrella did not even know yet about the unfinished tapestry, for she had not been their turretmate then.
But right now Gilly was saying that in the Kingdom of Palacyndra, there had once been many herds of unicorns. “You see, Miladies, unicorn roundups used to be the most popular activity at Camp Princess, but the herds thinned because we’ve had so many frequent and severe winters. The remaining herds migrated far south. There has not been a roundup in the years I’ve been here. But they might be back!”
Kristen was about to jump out of her kirtle from excitement. But Gundersnap was simply astonished. I wonder, Gundersnap thought, if they really do exist, if they are magical too, like the ones in fairy tales? Ach, never!
“By Saint Guy, this is exciting!” Kristen was exclaiming.
“Guy? Guys?” said Alicia vaguely. “Guys like boys?”
“No, like Guy of Anderlet, patron saint of horses and things with horns. It’s so totally ice.”
“Totally ice” was one of Kristen’s favorite expressions. The people of the Realm of Rolm, where it was very cold, had many odd expressions that involved ice, snow, and harsh weather, which the inhabitants seemed to love and find bracing. “Totally ice” was one of those expressions especially popular among the younger generation in the realm.
Kristen turned to Gilly. “Will there be a real roundup where we go out and sleep in tents and follow the herds?”
“Maybe.” Gilly smiled. “Weather permitting, that is. But in the meantime, in arts and crafts you shall be making satin ribbon lanyards in preparation. These will be your lariats for lassoing unicorns.”
“Great!” said Princess Kristen. “I am so darned sick of making those stupid diamond barrettes!”
“So to bed with you all.” Lady Merry was waving them toward their chambers and Myrella toward her closet. “If you are to go on unicorn roundup, you will need all your energy.” She continued, “For you shall be riding for hours all day over the plains of Wesselwick. Sleeping in tents, eating camp food. Very tiring. And none of this breakfast in bed stuff.”
“Uh-oh!” said Princess Alicia.
“Yes, yes, Princess Alicia. You’ll have to toughen up.” Lady Merry shook one of her plump beringed fingers at the princess.
“My mudder, the empress, goes to battle,” Gundersnap added. “No breakfast in bed, and she eats the same food as her soldiers. She always says, ‘Schlobenspuk besmutch da besmutch schlobenspuk.’”
“Can you translate that, Gunny?” Alicia asked.
“Yes, it means ‘When the going gets tough, the tough get going.’”
Each princess bade the others good night. In the princesses’ bedchambers, the chambermaids got busy. First they sprayed a lovely night scent of perfume about. It was called Sweet Royal Dreams. They lit reading candles and arranged small mountains of lace pillows—except in Kristen’s bedchamber, since she preferred plain cotton ones edged with canvas ruffles. They reminded her of her favorite sailing vessel, the Glory Be, in which she had won the junior division of the Realm of Rolm Regatta. After the chambermaids had unhooked an average of one hundred and thirty-two hooks, unbuttoned seventy-five buttons of the princesses’ gowns, and unlaced at least twenty feet of strings and ribbons that held up various petticoats and under-petticoats, their royal charges were at last ready for bed.
Princess Kristen now clasped her hands in prayer as she knelt by her bed. “Oh please, dear Lord, and Saint Guy of Anderlet, may the weather be permitting, and may we get to go on the roundup.”
“What about Camp Burning Shield, dear Lord?” Princess Alicia prayed. “Any chance they might be going on the roundup? Oh please please please! We haven’t even had a dance with Camp Burning Shield yet! So a roundup would be nice. Amen. Oh, P.S., bless Mum and Pops and my dear sisters Lorelei and Isabella. Oh yes, Isabella has pinkeye and poison ivy—royal bummer! Make it go away. Love and
kisses, and don’t forget about Camp Burning Shield. Amen again.”
Princess Myrella dropped to her knees and asked the Lord for nothing, but only thanked him over and over for answering her prayers that she could live with Alicia, Gundersnap, and Kristen, and finally be out of the North Turret and away from the awful Princess Morwenna and Princess Millicent. They were not only the meanest princesses in the entire camp, but they cheated as well—always up to dirty tricks in every camp competition. “Thank you, thank you, Lord, thank you so much for delivering me from those vile, horrible girls and letting me join this turret with the very best and kindest princesses of the whole camp.”
Princess Gundersnap furrowed her brow and then, kneeling, began her prayer.
“Dear Lord, bless Empress Mummy and the rest of the lot. I don’t have time to go through all the fifteen names of my brothers and sisters—or is it sixteen now, did Mudder have another—well I’m sure you know who I mean by now, and please please please bless my dear pony Menschmik.”
And then Princess Gundersnap prayed that dear Gortle’s arrival not be delayed because of the crazy weather in Palacyndra.
Chapter 2
THE AGONY OF PRINCESS GUNDERSNAP
There would be no roundup or unicorn activities yet, because outside a blizzard raged. It had begun suddenly, in the middle of the night, as storms so often do in Palacyndra. But in the Princess Parlor, there was a large roaring fire and the princesses were toasting marshmallows, then putting the melted marshmallow between two biscuits with a chunk of chocolate. These special treats were called s’moroyals, or s’morls for short. So despite the blizzard, everything in the parlor was cozy, and all the princesses cheerful as could be. Except, that is, for Gundersnap, who sat in the window seat looking mournfully out the window, eating s’morls and wondering if Gortle would ever make it through the snowdrifts. “Now come on, Gundersnap,” Alicia urged. “Listen to this!” Princess Alicia sat curled up in a plush winged chair reading the latest issue of The Royal We.
The Royal We was a gossip magazine that specialized in tittle-tattle of the major kingdoms’ courts. “Listen to this and take your mind off Gortle for a minute. You’re going to make yourself sick with all those, by the way.”
“Vot is it?” asked Gundersnap, stopping mid bite. It was her twelfth s’morl of the morning. Alicia held up the magazine. There was a portrait of King Harry of Britmoria and a glamorous-looking woman laden in diamonds. The words shrieked from the page “HARRY AND QUEEN TO SPLIT!”
“The man has had five wives already. What’s his problem?” asked Princess Kinna of the Queendom of Mattunga—a tall, slender princess with skin the color of cinnamon.
Gundersnap was out of her chair immediately. “Gunshuch mygott! My mudder was going to marry off my sister Brunhilda to him. But he thought she wasn’t pretty enough and instead took this woman—a commoner, but quite beautiful. Vot happened?”
“She’s a witch!” Princess Zelenka said.
“Get out!” Alicia said disdainfully. “You haven’t even read the story. It says here, and I quote, ‘Vivacious court beauty Katrina Beaufort is said to have caught the notoriously roving eye of King Harry. Katrina, a tireless dancer as well as a tireless flirt—see box on her simultaneous romances with the Duke of Bottomsley and the Prince of Argylle—when asked about her romance with His Majesty, replied, “No comment.” Will the fetching Katrina be the sixth Mrs. H.?’”
In the midst of Alicia’s reading, the parlor door was flung open and a small, rugged man came whirling in like a high-speed snowball.
“Gortle!” Gundersnap yelped, then jumped up and ran toward the dwarf. She bent over to hug him fiercely. She hoped that the other princesses saw that she did not pick him up. People were always picking up dwarves as if they were toddlers and tossing them about. Her mother the empress loved scooping up the small man and bouncing him about as if he were a large rubber ball. But he was a man, not a toy.
“Oh Gortle! Gortle! I am so glad you made it through the blizzard.”
“Strange weather for late July, I do say,” he replied, brushing snow from his cape. He removed a funny little cap with earflaps to reveal a thick mass of deep rusty-red curls. His mustache swooped up in twists on either side of a broad nose that reminded Gundersnap of a breakfast bun. He was short, the top of his head not an inch above Gundersnap’s waist.
“Oh, that’s Palacyndra for you,” Kristen said.
“Oh Gortle.” Gundersnap turned toward Kristen. “These are my turretmates, Princess Kristen, Princess Alicia, and Princess Myrella.”
“Heard all about you, Princesses,” he said with a merry glint in his bright blue eyes. Kristen shook his hand, bending over slightly in just the manner Gundersnap had instructed them to use when greeting a dwarf. But Myrella, who was just his size, perhaps an inch or so taller, walked up and gave him a firm handshake, looking him straight in the eye.
“So pleased to make your acquaintance.” She heard Princesses Zelenka and Millicent snicker. Gundersnap shot them an absolutely poisonous glance.
“Any news from Mummy and the invasion? Hottompot, isn’t it?” Gundersnap asked.
A fleeting shadow crossed Gortle’s face. “Oh, I’ve brought a letter, but plenty of time to read that later,” the dwarf replied.
“Come have a s’morl,” Alicia offered.
At just that moment, Princesses Zelenka, Millicent, and Morwenna approached. Myrella got a dreadful feeling in her tummy as she saw her old turretmates. Here comes royal trouble, she thought to herself.
Millicent stooped down in a crouch. “Tell me, little man, do you tumble?”
“Uh-oh!” Alicia, Myrella, and Kristen all said at once.
Gundersnap was on the Princess Millicent like a cat pouncing on a mouse. And the only tumbling to be seen was a swirl of petticoats and flying tiaras as the two princesses rolled across the parlor floor. When they stopped, Gundersnap leaped to her feet and dragged up the stunned Princess Millicent by her frothy lace collar. “His name is Gortle Zurf, not ‘little man,’ you royal nincompoop. He does not tumble. He does not talk in a funny voice. Nor does he ride a dog for your entertainment, or jump through hoops. He is an adult and my friend. He is here for my companionship and not as entertainment for you. Got that, Princess?” Gundersnap rapped her knuckles on Princess Millicent’s head.
“Yes, yes, of course.”
“I’ve never heard of a dwarf that didn’t tumble,” Princess Morwenna said.
“And I’ve never heard of a pious princess who cheats in Color Wars!” Gundersnap roared at the dour Morwenna. A titter mixed with gasps surged through the Princess Parlor.
“That’s a direct hit!” Kristen whispered.
Indeed it was, for in last session’s canoeing race it had been none other than the excessively pious and constantly prayerful Princess Morwenna and Princess Zelenka who had tried to sideswipe the Purple team, nearly forcing them onto the rocks. Those cheating Crimsons!
Gortle conducted himself with perfect calm, not even seeming to notice Princess Morwenna’s rude behavior. For her part, Princess Gundersnap set about to correct anybody’s notions of Gortle as a source of dwarfish entertainment. First she played chess with him. This was followed by a performance of Gundersnap’s songbird, whom she had taught to sing and march to a rousing Slobodkonian tune called “The March of the Fifth Artillery.”
“Your mum the empress would be so pleased,” said Gortle. Then there were more s’morls and a tour of the castle. Gortle was entertained royally and not the royal entertainment.
It wasn’t until after dinner, when the four princesses were cozy in their own parlor in the South Turret, that Gundersnap remembered to ask for the letter. Gortle looked up nervously from the card game he was playing with Lady Merry.
“Oh yes, nearly forgot.” He reached into his vest and drew out an envelope with the royal seal of the Empress Maria Theresa of Slobodkonia. Gundersnap began to open it.
“Uh…Your Highness.”
G
undersnap now saw for the first time the worry on his face.
“Maybe you should read this in privacy.”
A silence fell over the turret parlor. The envelope began to tremble in Gundersnap’s hand. “What is it?” she said in barely a whisper. Gortle shook his head, but no words would come out.
Gundersnap rushed into her bedchamber to read the letter. What could it be? she wondered. A battle lost? A baby sister or brother had died? Her hands were shaking so hard now that she could barely make out her mother’s bold handwriting. There was a scream. Then…
“She didn’t! NO! NO! NO!” In the parlor the princesses looked at one another in horror. The words were clear, but the sound Gundersnap made was like an animal caught in a trap.
“What is it?” Kristen asked.
“Her mother, the empress,”—Gortle nearly spat out the words, so great was his contempt—“she has taken Gundersnap’s favorite pony into battle. She has made him a war pony.”
“Menschmick!” Alicia cried. They had all heard about dear little Menschmick practically from the hour Gundersnap first arrived at Camp Princess.
Gortle nodded and sighed wearily. “They are quick-moving little fellows in close combat. But ponies never last long in battle. Their hearts give out. They aren’t made for war.”
Princess Gundersnap was now sobbing hysterically. The three princesses and Gortle ran into her bedchamber to comfort her.
Princess Gundersnap had collapsed facedown on her bed. The letter was on the floor beside her. “He was my birthday present! How could she have done that? My little Menschmik in battle! The thought is too horrible.” She beat her fists into the pillow. And when she finally lifted her head, the princesses were shocked. Gundersnap’s plump face looked ravaged. Tears streamed from her tiny, sad eyes.