The Idiot King

by Patty Jansen

  “And what do they do with them there?”

  “Make machines.”

  “But whatever for?” Also, she had come up that river, but had not seen the abbot’s summer residence, unless it had been around the bend from where the bandits had captured them.

  Maybe . . . her thoughts whirled.

  Maybe the abbot hadn’t wanted anyone to see whatever happened at his summer residence and maybe that was the real reason they had been captured.

  If that was the case, then it made sense that the men who had travelled down the river had never reached Saardam.

  But there was no time to contemplate it further, because something was happening at the main building now.

  A door had opened in the wall that faced the forest and a group of men came out, walking in a long line over the path. There were at least twenty of them, all dressed in robes. The first few in the group carried something between them that looked suspiciously like a body on a stretcher. Several of the men in the tail of the procession held candles, and the glow from the flames was reminiscent of fireflies: little pinpricks of light that did little to dispel the darkness.

  When they had reached the end of the path between the vineyards, the stretcher-bearers turned towards the pond.

  Lying on her belly on the ground, Johanna shuffled backwards so that they wouldn’t see her. She sensed Roald and Karl behind her.

  The line came closer and stopped at the edge of the pool, where the group gathered around their leader. He spoke, but his words were drowned out by the water rushing over the ledge and falling into the pond below. The mist that rose from the pond was rendered almost luminous by the moonlight.

  They group shuffled aside to let the men with the stretcher to the water’s edge. The thing under the cloth was definitely a body. The shape of the toes and the head pushed up the fabric.

  Two other men dropped two planks of wood across two rows of stones that protruded from the water. The stretcher-bearers walked across these and lowered the stretcher into the water. One of the men pulled the cloth away.

  The dead man’s pale gown glowed in the moonlight. His skin was waxy pale and bore darker scars and spots as if he’d died of pox. Johanna shivered. Father had told her of the ravages of the pox epidemics in Estland and Gelre. For some reason, the disease had never done much in Saardam, but that could easily change.

  The monks on both sides pulled the stretcher out from under him.

  The body floated.

  A man stepped forward from the group of spectators. Whereas most of the monks wore grey robes, his cloak was very dark brown or black, but unadorned, so he was not the Burovian prince, who, she thought, was still at the shed in the forest.

  While the others watched, he raised his hands and started some sort of incantation. From her position at the top of the waterfall, Johanna couldn’t make out any of the words.

  For a while, Johanna thought this was a ritual for a monk who had died. She thought that once they had cleansed the body, the men would cover it up, carry it away and bury it elsewhere.

  And damn it, now she noticed how the clanking of the water wheel and the whoomping of the bellows behind her had stopped, and the voices of men rang through the forest. The work party was about to stop for the night. They would walk over the road to the main building and now it would be difficult to attract the attention of Shepherd Carolus and the two others, let alone allow them to escape, with all these people here.

  “Look!” Karl whispered.

  Because something happened in the pond as well.

  Tendrils of mist rose from the water and enveloped the body until it was encased in a misty gown. Slowly, the body sank under the surface with sucking and wet crunching sounds as if some sea creature was chewing it up. But the water was perfectly still.

  The dark-robed man continued to stand at the bank with his hands raised towards the heavens. The monks watched, silent sentinels to this macabre spectacle.

  Johanna was feeling ill to the stomach.

  The mist released the body which bobbed back up. After hearing those sounds, Johanna was half-surprised to see it intact.

  The body kept rising and rising until it came free of the water and floated in the air. The black-robed man held his hands higher, as if pulling it up by invisible strings. His voice rose into a crescendo, but although the words were clear, the meaning of them was not. Johanna didn’t even know what language he spoke.

  The body twitched. Eyes opened. Hands jerked. The man sat up, looking out of hollow, empty eyes. His mouth opened and he sighed out a hissing breath, but no other sound came out.

  Karl, on the ground next to her, let out a muffled squeak.

  “Be quiet!” Johanna whispered.

  The apparition floated away from the bank and until it hovered over the middle of the pond. Like Princess Celine, it didn’t look ethereal enough to be a ghost, and the colours of the skin and hair were too washed-out for a real person.

  The black-robed man asked a question. The apparition turned away from him.

  The man asked the question again.

  The apparition now floated to the other side of the pond, closest to Johanna, Karl and Roald. Its skin shone with pale luminous light.

  Judging by his finely-made nightgown, the man had been someone of higher standing in real life. Someone who would have died suddenly of a hidden illness and whose family would have the means to allow magicians to experiment with trying to return him to life?

  But this man wasn’t alive, and he wasn’t a ghost with unfinished business to take care of, like the ghosts of people who had been murdered or died violently.

  The man in the dark robe was now yelling at him from the far edge of the pond, the volume and tone of his voice rising, but the apparition did acknowledge him in any way.

  The robed man gave a roar of frustration, balling his fists at the sky. He kicked the water, grabbed a stick and whirled around. All the surrounding monks backed away. He whirled at the pond, lifting the stick above his head and slammed it into the water. A great spray of drops flew up, glittering in the moonlight.

  The apparition turned around in an annoyed way. It hissed, the sound so soft that it was barely perceptible, but it made Johanna’s hair stand up. A cold breeze tracked over the water, disturbing the mist. The black-robed man said something, the tone mocking. Johanna caught something about the meaning of magic. The other monks retreated even further. The robed man laughed at them. There was something eerily familiar about that laugh, but Johanna couldn’t see into the shadow of his hood.

  The ghostly apparition floated towards him. The robed man grabbed waved his stick in front of him. He was still laughing. The apparition lashed at him, but the stick sliced through the ghost and cut off one of its ethereal arms. It hung uselessly in the air. The ghost stared at it, as if surprised. The black-robed man took the moment of surprise to cut the ghost in half at the waist, distributing swirls of mist over the surface of the water.

  The two halves of the apparition drifted down and bled into misty shapes that sank into the surface of the pond. They were absorbed by the water until there was nothing left.

  Next to Johanna, Karl let out a relieved sigh.

  But then the water started to churn and boil. Something long and thin broke the surface: an insect’s leg the thickness of a human arm, with bristles over its surface. And then another leg and another. The creature that rose from the water was not the same as the one as she had seen earlier. It was bigger and had more legs, and as its long body emerged from the water, more and more legs appeared, like a giant centipede. It reared and reared, until its head faced Johanna.

  Karl screamed and ran.

  Roald hid behind a tree, leaving Johanna standing by herself on top of the waterfall. There was nowhere to go and she had nothing to defend herself. She scrambled on the forest floor for a stick of wood, but there was none.

  Slowly, she retreated, step by step, never losing the creature from sight. It swayed and wriggled its l
egs. It would be deadly if it chose to attack.

  The black-robed man yelled, his hands outstretched. The creature twisted its long and glistening body around, and hissed at the man, who didn’t move. He kept his hands outstretched, and kept chanting his strange words. His voice echoed over the water, a strong sonorous sound.

  The creature froze. The luminous mist that made up its body lost its glow. The trees on the other side of the pond showed through its ethereal form. Slowly, its legs became thinner and grew shorter. Its body dissolved in swirls of mist which thinned and merged with the regular mist that hung over the water, until it had disappeared completely.

  Johanna stared at the moonlit mist where the creature had been. There was not a breath of wind, no sound except for the distant call of a bird. The group of monks still stood on the other side of the pond, staring at her.

  Slowly, the black-robed man lowered his hood. His face was surprisingly young, freckled, and his chin had the hint of a beard. He wore his red curly hair tied at the nape of his neck. She knew that face, and had seen that hair before.

  It was Kylian.

  ‎

  Chapter 19

  * * *

  THERE WAS NO further point in hiding. Kylian had seen Johanna, although he might not have seen Roald and Karl.

  She took her time to pick her way down the incline to the edge of the pond. While she did this, she stole glances at the group of monks who had come with him. Most of them looked disturbed and were still staring at the water. Oh no, she didn’t think that the apparition had been killed. Neither had the one that looked like Princess Celine been destroyed when Loesie fought it. They were just waiting under the surface to strike again at Kylian’s command.

  Kylian looked straight at her. “Finally we meet again, little princess. I’ve been looking forward to this.”

  “What are you doing here?” Her heart thudded. No, she didn’t want him anywhere near her. He was dangerous.

  He bowed his head in a mockery of courtesy. “I was waiting to see your pretty face.”

  Johanna’s mouth seemed to have frozen up. All she could think of was how, when she’d attended the ball, he’d swept her up in a dance in the gallery behind the ballroom in the palace and how he’d kissed her.

  Johanna wanted to scream that she didn’t want him near her, that he was an evil magician.

  She wanted to tell the monks about the bodies in the ice cellar, that Kylian was a necromancer, but they probably knew all this already, and saying it out loud would make him angry and more dangerous.

  She wanted to run, but she didn’t think that her legs would support her. It was her own fault this had happened. She should never have come here.

  But now that she had come down to the water, she recognised the Shepherd Carolus as one of the onlookers behind the monks. His eyes were wide and mouth hung open. When their eyes met, his lips moved. “Johanna?”

  Johanna resisted the urge to check over her shoulder to see if Roald and Karl were still hidden, but that would give her companions away, although Kylian might already know about them.

  Kylian walked slowly around the pond until he faced her.

  Johanna wanted to back away, to run from him as far as she could, but she kept her ground, her back straight. If anything, her stubbornness would give Roald enough time to flee, if he was smart enough.

  Kylian was now very close. In the moonlight, his hair looked brown. He reached out a hand to her cheek.

  Johanna stepped back. She didn’t want the hands that had touched a dead body to touch her. She didn’t want to give Roald a reason to come storming down that hill to yell for Kylian to keep your hands off my women.

  He chuckled. “You don’t trust me.”

  “That’s an understatement. Why should I trust you? After this evil magic I just saw you perform?”

  “I saved much of your beloved city.” He put his hand inside his cloak, withdrew a large splinter of wood and held it out to her.

  Johanna covered her hand with her cloak before taking it from him.

  He chuckled. “I see you’ve learned.”

  “What’s this?” She held up the splinter meeting his eyes over its pointy end.

  “Touch it. You will see.” His expression was intense.

  She lowered her hand. “I don’t think I will. I’ve already seen far too many things I never wished I had, starting with that night in Saardam. I have no desire to see more blood or more fire or more dead bodies.”

  She held the splinter out in the space between them and dropped it. It fell, point first, into the mud.

  Did he flinch or was that her imagination?

  “You don’t want to know what I did to save much of your city?”

  “No, because I don’t believe you. You came to Saardam to take possession of it. You took Alexandre Trebuchet and then washed your hands of him. But in truth, though you and your family may not like him, he’s your minion more than anyone else’s.”

  “You should learn the facts before you accuse people. Did we not see the fire demons from the back of the palace? Did I not run from the garden to help fight them? I knew none of the locals had any aptitude with magic, so I went to fight it. Magic is drawn by magic, as you will well understand.”

  “I have no idea what you did.”

  “Then pick up that piece of wood, and it will show you.”

  Johanna glanced down, but couldn’t see it in the grass. She hesitated. Should she look for it? But no, she didn’t trust him. And wood showed things that happened in the place where it was part of a table or a door. It showed snatches of conversation, people walking past. It rarely added up to a coherent story, unless he’d carried this piece with him for the purpose of telling the story, in which case she definitely didn’t trust him. “Anyway, why would you fight it? You weren’t in your town.”

  “We were in Saardam as guests of the king. Royal families help each other, as you will probably still need to learn.”

  Was that an underhand jab?

  Why was he even at the ball? The ties between the Baron, the royal family and this monastery that was a place for unruly royal sons were far from clear.

  “What were you doing in the middle of the night at Duke Lothar’s castle? What were you doing, trying to interrogate my maid, but clearing out before you could speak to me? If you were so helpful, you might have introduced yourself to the new king of Saarland.”

  “I was there on other business, visiting a mentor in an outlying town. I often go to the Duke’s castle to stay overnight when I’m travelling. He’s my uncle.”

  “He tried to murder your father.”

  He laughed. “Oh, you’ve heard that story.”

  “What’s so funny about it?”

  “It was a practical joke. My uncle and my father are not enemies at all.”

  That was not how she understood it.

  “My uncle helps my father quite a bit. Seeing as you like to talk about how we all have court magicians, my uncle could be called my father’s court magician.”

  And who had told him that she’d been talking about court magicians?

  “I don’t believe that at all. The Duke and his son were very clear about where they stand. Where is your father anyway and why won’t he talk to any of us? Why do you keep people here against their will? What are you doing here in the middle of the night with dead bodies?” She had to stop to draw breath. There were so many more questions she could have asked.

  But it didn’t matter, because he wasn’t going to reply anyway. He was just going to dance around the issue and play with her as a cat plays with a mouse. That mouse again. She glanced at Shepherd Carolus.

  “I’m here to say that you won’t need to put up with me much longer. We’ll leave as soon as possible, something we should have done long ago. Whatever is going on in Saardam, and you’re not telling us, is not going to be fought from here.”

  She turned away from him but took only one step before he grabbed her upper arm in a strong grip. />
  “Not so fast, princess, where do you think you’re going?” He was close enough that she could see the moonlight glisten in his eyelashes. The light fell sideways into his eyes and brought out all the intricate bumps, flecks and veins in his irises.

  “I’m going back to the Lady Sara. We’re going home.”

  “You think you can handle fire magic now? Do you have that magician you were looking for so desperately?”

  Seriously, had Magda told everyone in town? “No, but is battling him without magic any worse than sitting here until we die and then being consumed by ghosts? This land is rife with magic. None of our people can handle it, and it’s like we’re slowly being poisoned.”

  “How about I help you?”

  “You?” She met his eyes and for a moment, wanted to say yes. Because he might not yet be fully versed in necromancy, but she knew no one near as powerful.

  But what was his relationship with Alexandre?

  “You’re still distrusting? I told you then that I could help you and I’m telling you now.”

  “A lot has changed.”

  “Nothing has changed in the world of magic at all. Magic is attracted by magic. You can feel magic in me. You are attracted to me.”

  “You have far too high an opinion of yourself.”

  “Why did you marry the Idiot Prince? Why, when you should have come with me and received training in magic?”

  “And then what? What are you anyway? How do I know that you don’t have anything to do with Alexandre Trebuchet? How do I know that you didn’t send him? How do I know what the lot of you want from us? I do not believe that Alexandre acted by himself of his own accord, and I don’t believe that you don’t know what is going on. Now let me go and keep your hands off me.”

  “All right, all right.” He stepped back, holding up his hands.

  Johanna rubbed her upper arm.

  “Then don’t believe me. I can’t make you. After all, someone who believes in that hideous three-headed monster has clearly lost his mind. Go on being a happy little queen without an heir.”