by Guy Antibes
“You showed us up there too,” the first pixie said.
“I play scout and have gotten lots of practice.” Whit said. “Argien is an angel, and they are all good at flying. We weren’t trying to impress but were trying to learn how to dance in the air.”
“You play scout?” another of the pixies said with some excitement in his voice. “Are you any good?”
“Razz and I played for Herringbone teams,” Whit said.
“I’ll bet you were awesome,” the same pixie said.
“That’s enough!” the first pixie said glaring at his companion.
“I’m just trying to be sociable, Wonn.”
“Is there something else? I’m sorry if we put a damper on the festivities,” Whit said. He glanced at Argien and Razz who looked perfectly satisfied to let Whit do all the talking.
“Now that you have a dose of pixie dancing, perhaps you should get a good dose of pixie magic,” the first pixie said.
Razz stepped forward, but Whit held him back. “Perhaps another time,” Whit said.
“What is this?” a voice called from above and behind Whit.
The faces of the pixies suddenly looked less confident. Whit turned around, and six constables landed behind the three expeditioners.
“Have you foreigners been disturbing the peace of Garri?” one of the constables said. He had green gems sewn into his epaulettes.
“I hope not. We were invited to a dance, and our friends here didn’t enjoy our presence.”
“Were you asked to leave and didn’t?” the constable asked.
“No. The dance is about over. We decided to leave a little early.”
“Do you have permits? Perisia is a closed country, you know.”
“We do,” Whit said, handing the traveling documents to the officer.
The pixie looked at them and then folded them once as Whit had and gave the papers back. “Keep those with you. Can all of you fly?”
“We can,” Razz said.
“Then follow me.” The pixie constables lifted off followed by Razz, Argien, and Whit.
“Why are they leaving the other pixies?” Razz asked.
“They aren’t foreigners,” Argien said. “In closed countries, visitors are presumed to be guilty. We are visitors.”
“Not all closed countries are like that,” Razz said.
Argien shrugged. “It’s like that in Merinda.”
They weren’t in the air very long before the constables pulled on their arms and pointed to a constabulary. They landed and walked inside.
“Foreigners crashed a dance, and the local boyhood wasn’t too happy about it,” the officer said to another of similar rank sitting at a counter.
“That isn’t true,” Whit said.
“You dare to call me a liar?” the officer said.
“I’m afraid you misinterpreted what the pixies said and what we said.” Whit produced his invitation. “We were invited.”
The officer blushed. “You didn’t show me that before.”
“You didn’t accuse me of crashing the party. I said we were invited.”
“Perhaps…” The desk officer looked at the other constables. “Back to patrol.”
The arresting officer was about to object, but after a reproving look at the three dancers, he and the constables left. Whit looked at the officer on duty staring at him blankly.
“Would you mind telling me what this is all about?” the officer said.
Argien walked up to the desk and told him the story.
“Then why are you here?” the constable asked.
“Let’s just say the constables were called to stop a fight, and they removed us from the scene to keep us safe,” Razz said.
Whit nodded. That was quick thinking on Razz’s part. The invitation had ended up in the officer’s hand. “Here take this back and leave. Don’t get into any trouble in Garri.”
“We will try not to,” Whit said pulling on Razz’s sleeve.
“What would they have done to us?” Argien asked.
“I don’t know,” Razz said. “But I’ve had to deal with local officials before as part of my job. As long as you don’t make them look too silly, you can straighten misunderstandings out.” Razz put his hand on Whit’s shoulder. “You did okay for your first encounter.”
“I thought so too,” Argien said.
Whit didn’t know why he was getting the praise, but he’d take it as long as they weren’t sitting in some under-sized pixie jail. “I didn’t pick up any hostility during the dance, did you?”
“I did,” Razz said. “A few of those pixies called me out for not flying. I didn’t want to make a fool of myself.”
Argien laughed at the comment. “And we did?”
Razz thought for a moment. “You both have more control flying in circles and whatever. I’m better in a straight line and so are most sky elves except when they play scout.”
From his own experience, Whit agreed. If he didn’t use the angel flying technique, he wouldn’t be able to dance as well as he did.
“So what did we learn?” Argien asked.
“Not to go to pixie dances?” Razz said. “I think that deserves some further discussion back at the inn.”
“With mugs of ale in our hands?”
“One in each hand for me,” Razz said.
Chapter Thirteen
~
“S
o, not all pixie women are like Yetti and Ritta?” Pin asked with a smile, as the group ate breakfast.
“Who is Ritta?” Deechie said from the far end of the table.
“A pixie I met one night,” Whit said. “Pin knows who she is.”
The human shrugged and went back to his breakfast. Zarl asked Deechie a question about teaching at Herringbone, and Whit didn’t have to worry about his eavesdropping from across the table.
“No,” Whit said to Pin. “The girls at the dance were more fun-loving and pleasant, I would say, than other girls I’ve met. The pixies that accosted us weren’t any different from jealous partners that I have run into before.”
“You have been accosted by ten boys at dances before?”
Whit shook his head. “No, but they were a group. I think at least one of them would have liked to talk about the game of scout rather than our dancing in the air.”
Pin chuckled and nodded his head. “It was worth it for the experience, then. You even got a taste of pixie justice.”
“Legal or illegal?” Whit asked.
“Both!”
A uniformed messenger entered the dining room and handed an envelope to Pin. He smiled as he read the letter.
“It looks like you will get to wear your fancy clothes this afternoon. We have an audience with the king.”
Whit stood. “At last! We have an audience with the king. Who should go?”
“I can work the rest of the day on my clothes,” Zarl said. He furrowed his brow. “The king? Maybe it would be better for me to stay behind. My seamstress skills are not particularly noble.”
“I’ll stay behind,” Deechie said.
Deechie’s withdrawal surprised Whit. He thought the magician would want to sabotage their meeting.
“I’m not a royal kind of gnome,” Fistian said.
“Count me in,” Argien said. “I’m interested to meet a king.”
“I’ll keep Fistian company,” Razz said.
“That leaves Pin, Laring, Argien and me. Yetti will have to miss out,” Whit said.
“A tidy group,” Pin said. “We will take a coach to the palace rather than walk. Make sure your clothes are spotless. I have to do the same and will join you for lunch, dressed, and I’ll bring the carriage.
Whit made sure his outfit was spotless and his hair was brushed so it didn’t show his emerging roots. He reviewed his notes and made sure he had his documents and his copy of the expedition application.
He paced in the room, unexpectedly nervous. King Quiller would be the first monarch he had ever met. His thoughts were
interrupted by a knock on the door. Whit turned the knob and looked at Deechie standing looking from side to side.
“Can I come in?” Deechie asked.
Whit hadn’t expected Deechie to ask his permission to do anything. He opened the door wider and let the human step into his room.
“I have spoken to the king before,” Deechie said.
Whit knew that, but he had never mentioned it to Deechie. “And?” Whit asked.
“I talked to him about the college’s entry, not yours.”
“He doesn’t know we are from the College of Engineering?”
Deechie took a deep breath. “He knows that, but he might not think much of your expedition. I wanted you to know that.”
Whit kept from smiling. Deechie couldn’t keep his dirty moves a secret, this time. It didn’t make up the disparagement, but Whit had a solid program, and he could give the king more details and proof that Parus Porch couldn’t.
“I’ll bear that in mind,” Whit said. “I still think it would be better if you left our group.”
Deechie was on more solid ground, it seemed. “No. That’s not going to happen. I’m sticking to your group like a leech.”
“More like a millstone,” Whit said. “You can leave my room now.”
“What if I don’t want to?” Deechie said, getting a backbone, all of a sudden.
“Then I’ll call Zarl in, and between the both of us, we can remove you. Don’t blame us if you get a broken bone or two.”
“You can’t threaten me!” Deechie said, becoming his full-throated unpleasant self.
“I just did.” Whit held the door open, and Deechie glared at Whit on his way out.
Whit sat down and stared across the room. He vowed to talk to Gambol to see if there was anything they could do to get Deechie off their team other than murdering the foul human, and Whit couldn’t do that.
The time finally came for lunch. Whit made sure all his papers were hidden in his room, other than the ones he would take with him when he visited the pixie king. Whit barely ate his lunch, but the meal finally ended, and they piled into a waiting coach. They arrived at the palace, and Pin insisted they ride the carriage to the king’s quarters.
They were shown into what was called the audience room. King Quiller sat on an elevated dais behind a table, filled with documents and portfolios.
A chamberlain announced them.
“Piesson Nistia,” King Quiller said. He was much younger than Whit expected. “You are quite insistent for someone who left Persia when I became king.”
Pin gave the king a deep bow. “I felt it better to leave Perisia for a time when you ascended to the throne, but the situation has changed.”
“I never pursued you, and yet you have remained outside of our country,” Quiller said.
“I didn’t return because of you, but because of others.”
The king nodded his head. He wore a thin gold circlet, and his thick curly hair kept it in place. “I know that,” Quiller said.
Whit wondered why the monarch even mentioned it if both parties knew the situation.
“I have come as an advisor to an expedition from Ayce.”
Quiller nodded and held up a letter. “I have received a message from the official advisor, Greeb Deechie.”
“That was before we arrived,” Pin said.
“No. I received the letter this morning. It says three of your group imposed themselves at a dance last night, and they were retained by the Garri constabulary. They upset some of our young men and ladies by their crude exhibitionism,” the king said.
Whit couldn’t believe his ears, but he could believe that Deechie was capable of so many lies.
“The story is quite different from what Greeb Deechie documented,” Whit said.
“And who are you?” the king asked.
“I am Whit Varian, the leader of the expedition.”
The king narrowed his eyes. “You were one of the perpetrators?”
“I wouldn’t call myself a perpetrator, your highness. We had an invitation to the dance and were asked to dance. It would have been rude not to have accepted offers to dance by some pixie girls.” Whit hoped that would mollify the king without going into any detail.
“I will investigate this letter before we meet again,” the king said. “I have to trust anyone that I give permission to borrow Perisian treasures, and those who behave so badly,” Quiller waved the letter, “do not deserve my trust.”
“We were accosted by some young pixie males,” Whit said. “You can talk to them, but also talk to the girls we danced with. They may have a different story.”
King Quiller leaned forward. “You can be assured I won’t be doing the talking, but I will get to the truth. I think this audience is over. I’ll be gone from Garri for a time.”
“I take it we will meet again?” Pin asked.
“Perhaps in a week or two,” Quiller said. “You may leave.”
The four of them bowed and were escorted out of the king’s quarters of the palace complex.
The carriage had waited for them, but Pin sent it on its way. “I can’t sit still with that kind of rejection. What an insult!”
“Deechie is automatically believed, and we aren’t allowed to properly defend ourselves,” Laring Gambol said.
Pin nodded. The anger was still twisting his face.
“You don’t like the king, Pin?” Argien asked.
“I don’t like or dislike King Quiller. He isn’t a bad ruler, but he is overshadowed by Ornetta and Lullan’s rivalry. I’m not happy with his reaction to Deechie’s poison letter.”
“Poison is right,” Gambol said. “I honestly don’t think he expects any repercussions from sending that letter.”
“A lot of it is true,” Argien said.
“But distorted and out of context,” Whit said. “I’ve never met a sorrier human.”
“He definitely is the worst,” Gambol said. “We should leave Garri for a week. We’ve talked about doing it. I’d like to see the countryside,”
“I’ll give you a few suggestions. There are some picturesque districts a few days away from Garri,” Pin said.
“Deechie won’t be asked to join us,” Whit said. “We will take the carriages along with our possessions.”
Chapter Fourteen
~
D eechie didn’t seem displeased when they told him he wasn’t included on their trip, surprising Whit a little.
“He knows we aren’t ready to find the parts,” Zarl said. “If we found them, he would report us to the constabulary and do his best to get the parts into the hands of the other group.”
The ogre said what everyone else felt.
Pin met them for breakfast the next morning. Anything they didn’t mind leaving behind went in Yetti’s room, and they left a deposit for rooms when they returned.
“You are ready to go and don’t have a direction, yet. I recommend you go to Lilypond. It is a small town in the hills northeast of Garri. There are ruins in the hills, and if I’m not mistaken, that is close to where Yetti is undergoing her therapy.”
“Then Lilypond, it is,” Gambol said, “if no one objects.”
“I’m just along for the ride,” Zarl said.
The others nodded. After taking a basket of food prepared by the inn’s kitchen, they set off through the east side of the city, traveling through the commercial quarter of Garri.
They drove through less savory businesses on the other side of Garri’s wall and passed a scout stadium, of all things. No one was playing or practicing at the time. Whit remembered the scout enthusiast among the pixies at the dance. After a few miles of the capital outside the formal city walls, the cobbled road turned to dirt. The Perisians had reached most of the way to the capital in their quest for building stone.
Forest sprang out of farmland and they were soon rolling though a very pretty landscape of gently rolling forests and meadows. The pixie dwellings were unique in Whit’s experience, built in all shapes and siz
es. The older villages they rode through had walls made from road cobbles, it seemed.
Everyone was ready to stop at midday when they reached a large village called Piesson’s Crest.
“Pin’s first name,” Fistian said. The center square looked old. A few of the buildings had the multicolored look with centuries of paint chipping off in different colors. They stopped at a large pub.
“A table for six of us!” Gambol said as he walked in.
Surprisingly the pub was mostly full, but the servers pushed two smaller tables together and sat them.
“From out of town?” The serving woman asked.
Whit laughed. “How could you tell?”
She told them what was available, and everyone soon ordered.
A balding man wearing an apron shuffled out to them, drying his hands with a bright yellow towel. “You do have traveling papers?” He said nervously.
“We do,” Whit said and showed them their permit.
The man seemed to relax. “Good. What are you in Perisia for?”
“Ancient artifacts,” Razz said. “Got any around?’
“Not here,” the pub owner said. “There is an old temple ruin, but it is out of the way.” The pixie laughed. “That depends, of course, on your destination.”
“Lilypond,” Zarl said.
The pixie nodded. “Out of your way, then. It is picturesque, sitting on the top of a hill. Many of the rooms are still intact, for a ruin.”
“You’ve been there?”
“A few times. There is a group of caretakers that live on the property and request cooked meals from time to time. It is easier to travel there and cook for them for a day or two. It makes a nice break for the cooks and servers,” the man said, “and we get fresh produce in exchange.”
“I think we will go out of our way, then,” Whit said. “Can you tell us where it is on our map?”
Whit retrieved his map from a carriage and brought it back and noted the pixie’s directions.
The man pointed to a dot on the map. “That village is full of surly pixies. I won’t let them into my pub, but your road goes through the place. Be careful.”
