Quen Nim (10 page)

The Cloud Castle Princess drifted in wisps touching the soil, tassels of oats thick above her. In no time at all she noted a hutter standing rooted in the road. Had she not been fog, she surely would have shown a rare smile. But fog she was, and the impulse passed. Behind the immobile hutter she gathered, rising in a column and jelling to solid magnificent Nimble Missst. She reached for the hutter's black-haired head and clutched at the air, pulling up.

“Hah! Ridiculous Prince!” she cried in triumph.

Zootch spun around grabbing at his chest as his nose widened and flattened, his chin squared, his hair curled, his fingers lengthened, his hutter garb changed from tunic and tannerbritches and scuffed field boots to battered silver tunic, battered silver leggers, and pummeled gold boots.

“Good. Finally. It took you long enough,” said Zootch, showing true snapjaw ability to recover from shock.

“So ye are Zootch, are ye?” said Nimble Missst, and she thrust her face forward, opening wide her startling violet eyes to stare deep and close up into Zootch's own common and brightly brown eyes.

Zootch, in response, thrust his face forward. So such were they nearly touching, nose to nose, battling in silence, gaze to gaze, staring unblinking a good span of time until the Blossom Prince blinked.

“Hah! Snapjaw indeed!” snorted Nimble Missst.

“Snapjaw enough to be Kig!” returned Zootch.

“Kig?” said Nimble Missst, taken aback.

“I'll have no ‘n's!” shouted Zootch, flustered, flummoxed and almost flattened by the glory of the princess seen so such standing not a pace away.

“Kig,” said Nimble Missst mildly. “That's good. That's quite good. Kig. Kig Zootch. It's not ridiculous. I myself am to have one ‘e'. I'm to be Quen.”

“Quen is good,” offered Zootch simply.

“Go to the Castle and wait. And take your ridiculous Cap of Cloak. I've got work to do,” instructed and announced Nimble Missst. She pushed the invisible Cap into Zootch's chest.

“Work?” questioned Zootch, taking one step back and fumbling successfully to grasp the Cap.

“Yes, work. The ridiculous Queeeeeeeeeeeeeeen must be retrieved for the ceremony. Cloud Castle City must be informed and prepared. I'm giving ye the task of dealing with the Castle, or must I do that as well?” said the stern Nimble Missst.

“Oh, I'll go do the Castle. I'll do the Castle. I can do the Castle,” said Zootch.

“Well, do it then!” snapped Nimble Missst.

“Right,” said Zootch, setting off, looking back, stumbling.

“Ridiculous,” said Nimble Missst.

Chapter Thirty

Retrieving The Queeeeeeeeeeeeeeen

In the High Throne Room of Cloud Castle City the scene continued to boil as it had since the dawn departure of the retiring Royals, Zilp and Forr. The tapestries fluttered as Lady May whizzed by ‘em. Old Dabber sat glum and thoughtful. Lord Jay Dot wondered, “What about the Boad, All Fidd and Leee Combined?” Rindle Mer paced grimly. So flustered were all of ‘em every one that they failed to notice the object of their distress flying through the open skylight and dropping neatly onto the High Throne above ‘em. Nimble Missst, lightly amused and struck tender, watched her ridiculous family.

“I've done it,” she finally announced simply.

Lady May flipped sideways, crashed into a tapestry, and sagged to the frosted blue carpet. Old Dabber stepped to her aid while looking happily up at his granddaughter. Rindle Mer stopped pacing and folded her arms across the chest of her ragged tunic. Lord Jay Dot opened his mouth to speak.

“Father, if ye say ‘What about the Boad, All Fidd and Leee Combined?' I'll shriek,” said Nimble Missst calmly.

Lord Jay Dot closed his mouth.

“Good. Now listen. The ceremony will take place tomorrow,” explained Nimble Missst. “Don't speak! Just listen.”

Lord Jay Dot again closed his mouth.

“Why did it take so long for me to find him? That's what ye all want to know,” resumed Nimble Missst. “Well, I gave him too much credit. I overanalyzed his simple ridiculous clues. The first one was almost clever, I admit. It genuinely sent me to Sadlar's Gardens. Oh, ye ask with your fidgets and eyes, where is he now? He's informing the Castle's citizens. I sent him. Now I must retrieve the ridiculous impatient Queeeeeeeeeeeeeeen and Kinng. I'll turn the carts around. And all of ye, don't stand there gaping. Do what ye must. Ceremony tomorrow. I have no more time to waste, and neither do ye.”

So saying, she launched herself up and out of the roofless Throne Room and sailed away. Over the oat fields she skimmed. Hutters stopped whatever they were doing and pointed her out, one to the other. She headed north, scanning the freshly made vedling cart wheel tracks, double lines on the road. When the road was swallowed by the first of the Innerest Orchards, Nimble Missst zoomed forward over the feather frond canopy of palmpear trees, calculating to the thinnest sliver of time when she should drop down so such that she would be ahead of the caravan of carts.

How fresh the tracks? … Hmmmm … Variance of ground hue, tumble of dirt crumble … Hidden beneath the palmpears, they will be just … there! she analyzed.

She dashed straight down through the canopy of fronds and glided to land on the path a pebble toss distance in front of the vedling cart laden with Queeeeeeeeeeeeeeen and Kinng. She folded her arms across her chest so such exactly like as her mother, Rindle Mer, often did. The train of carts halted.

“No faith in me, Royals?” posed Nimble Missst.

“Has you done it?” asked Kinng Forr.

“Am I listening? Am I hearing? Does something sprout?” came a monotonous drone from the bed of the vedling cart.

“Ye hear me. It is I, Nimble Missst of the snapjaw mind. I have retrieved the ridiculous Blossom Prince, your nephew Zootch, as I said I would. He is at the Castle Boad now. Why ye were not there to greet us and perform the ceremony is a great puzzlement to me. Did I not tell ye I would fetch him? Do I not have a snapjaw mind? Return now to the Castle. Ye will perform the ceremony tomorrow. So says the future Quen Nim, speaking as well for the future Kig Zootch!”

Having made so such a grand entrance and confrontation, Nimble Missst made a grand exit. She leaped and swerved a loop with her wide spread full flapping powder blue wings. She zoomed to disappear up through the palmpear canopy.

“Rudeness on full display,” resumed the droning voice from the bed of the vedling cart. “The nectar of retirement almost attained dashed from my parched and bleeding lips. Survival is doubtful, yet duty reigns. The carts shall be turned back to the bleak and empty Castle of my worst nightmare. I have borne delays and delays. Why not another? Why not more thorns jabbed into my tender soul? Oh, when oh when shall I be allowed to take root in my modest thirty-seven retirement villas? Can I bear it? I can't bear it. I will bear it. Quen? Kig? What poisoned nettles shall I be dragged through next?”

The Queeeeeeeeeeeeeeen continued her dull endless monologue, and the vedling carts turned and rolled inbound over their own outbound tracks.

Chapter Thirty-One

Double Moons Night

What a double stroke of convenient fortune it was for both of the moons to be full that night. Buckletar torches blazed in every sconce around the courtyard of the Castle Boad. Red torch light danced in blue moons glow. The bustle of festive preparation whirled throughout the Castle. The scene repeated itself above in Cloud Castle City with streams of craggers and hollowites moving briskly through the gleaming obsidian streets.

In the High Throne Room, Lady May of Orrun perched on the obsidian Throne, muttering to herself, counting on her fingers things to be done before dawn. Rindle Mer grumped below on the frosted blue carpet, scowling at the azure gown she held as far away from her as was possible. When Lord Jay Dot of Orrun made the mistake of saying he liked how she looked in the gown, Rindle Mer almost leveled him with a glare. Old Dabber of the West paced, realizing his granddaughter would no longer live in her round blue room in the Sapphire Tower after tomorrow. Oh, she would visit, yes. Oh, truth, for years she had been more at O'Tan Falls than in the blue room. But yet, such was so that he felt a pang of loss.

In the Queeeeeeeeeeeeeeen's Chamber of the Castle Boad, Kinng Forr fanned the prostrate Zilp with a woven oat towel stitched with the Royal Crest, a purple boot hopping over a rainbow scarf.

“Is my humiliation final?” said the Queeeeeeeeeeeeeeen in her bland dull way.

“Not yet, my dear,” soothed Kinng Forr.

In the Great Hall of the Castle Boad, Motty snored loudly, draped asleep across one of the thrones. Seated on benches and facing one the other across a heavy long wooden table were Nimble Missst and Zootch. Nimble Missst described their neatly planned future with snapjaw clarity. All Zootch could do on his part was to nod in agreement.

“So what ye discovered was the taste of ladgecake and the melt of gadapple blossom petals. Ye realized that to be Kig was not overly bad, except for the ridiculous marriage to me,” explained Nimble Missst.

Zootch nodded in agreement.

“Ye will be Kig, of course, and dwell here and rule and reign and eat and perform ridiculous rites and rituals and ceremonies. I will be Quen and visit twice a year. Two days only. They will be called The Most Royal and Regal Quen Problem Solving Days. Properly formal, don't ye think?”

Zootch nodded in agreement.

“I will solve any and all problems, mysteries, riddles brought forth by citizens of any stripe. There will be a great celebration. I leave it to ye to plan the menu. Ladgecake is fine. Gadapples, too. But ye dare not ignore hoddle and ool. I prefer dreckulan ool with a spill of hoddle, not hoddle with a spill of ool. Ye do plan for dreckulan ool and hoddle, do ye not?”

Zootch nodded in agreement.

“Not much, mind ye. I need but a taste, such as I am. Otherwise, I trust the rest to your almost snapjaw mind. Else? Let me see. The ridiculous ceremony tomorrow morning. We will bear it. Then the ridiculous Zilp carted off for all and good into retirement. Then Cloud Castle City sails off to return to Orrun Mountain Hollow. I set off for somewhere I haven't decided yet.

Ye assume the Kigship and proclaim whatever

ridiculous decrees that ye can, will or may.”

Zootch nodded in agreement.

“I believe that ye will be a good Kig. Less ridiculous than others before ye. Your mind is truly somewhat snapjaw. And when in the passage of bar weeks and months it becomes time for the first Most Royal and Regal Quen Problem Solving Day, I will send to ye in some manner a week's advance warning of my arrival. Are ye satisfied with these arrangements?”

Zootch nodded in agreement.

“Then say so!” snapped Nimble Missst.

“I am,” said Zootch, and he was, most emphatically.

So such agreed, they parted. Zootch deployed himself to a Regal room of splendor which had been prepared especially for him between the drawbridge towers. Nimble Missst, after summoning Motty from dreams, flew to her round blue room in the Sapphire Tower of Cloud Castle City, where, howsoever, she did not long remain.

Chapter Thirty-Two

After the Moons Sank from Sight

In cartjagger shops all along the edge of the courtyard, cartjaggers slept exhausted after spinning out goodnight tales of the Great Green Va to their insistent offspring. In the Visitor's Tower every room was crowded with slumbering forms. Groaning, rasping, buzzing snores decorated the halls and stairwells. In the kitchens, assistant crapes read from batter-smudged recipes written in the hand of the legendary Old Prince Chef Larry, who four generations earlier stirred pots, prepared pans, shredded herbs in these very kitchens. Sculgers scurried to follow the instructions. The Queeeeeeeeeeeeeeen slept like as a carved stone monument, the Kinng like as a restless breeze. Hutters in their conical cottages slept as fast as they could, so such excited were they about the Blossom Prince and the Cloud Castle Princess and what would take place in the morning.

In Cloud Castle City, floating in position above the selfsame oat field where it had hovered for days, hollowites snored, rolling their tongues across the floor and back. Craggers, with their spidery hands limp and twitching, sprawled near the levers and dials and cogs and gears and switches of the flying city's engine room. Lady May of Orrun slept deeply, as was her habit. Days spent nervously flitting and darting led naturally to nights of deep slumber. Lord Jay Dot of Orrun slept peacefully. No longer was he worried about the Boad, All Fidd and Leee Combined. Rindle Mer stalked while Jay Dot slept, throwing glances of hatred now and again at the azure gown flung across the back of a chair. She would wear it again for Nimby's sake. Then she would burn it. Her eyes flashed orange fire, but inside she was pleased. Her daughter was strong and Royal. Old Dabber's place beside Lady May was unoccupied. He was with his granddaughter in the Happy Dungeon of the Amethyst Grotto.

Nimble Missst sat on the cupped slab bench. She hugged the curving cushion. She was wrapped in the silver cape. Old Dabber of the West gazed with adoring ash blue eyes upon his granddaughter.

“You want to hear it one last time?” he said softly, a small crack forming to break his heart. “Why last?”

“I will be Quen tomorrow. Too old for stories. Ridiculous,” said Nimble Missst shortly.

“Oh,” said Dabber, feeling unsteady in the knees and empty in the chest. “I had best tell it well then.”

Nimble Missst nodded mutely so such like as she was lost in thought.

“Well,” said Old Dabber, straightening and gathering himself together. “Such a day it was! I remember. I remember the wind, cold and cutting, but not unpleasant, no. Not unpleasant at all. There I was flying through the air! How? Why? I did not know. I knew only that I was. ‘I am Dabber of the West,' I said, shocking myself with my very own voice. I threw my hands to my throat. Strange sensation to speak! My hands! I looked and saw that they were emerald green. Was that a silver flutter at my shoulder? I glanced. I did not know what was wrapped around me, but it was the silver cape! I touched my face. I felt the tiny soft wisps of the beard on my chin. I tugged it for the first time. I became aware of what was below me. A river tumbled down to leap in a falls from a mountainous height. I swerved. I found that I could control my movements. Down to the river. Down to the falls. Oh, the roar! The thunder. I saw the ledge! I swooped to land there. The cape came unclasped and fell at my feet. Wings! I had wings! Great membraned wings! I threw myself from the ledge and flew. I flew up, down, through the falls. I splashed to the river and swam. Back to the ledge I dove. I picked up the silver cape and held it in both of my hands. ‘I am Dabber of the West,' I said. ‘I am home.'”