These Foolish Things: The Complete Boxset

by J Battle

  ‘Does that help at all?’

  ‘Due to their relatively low birthrate, it is incumbent on all committed and secure couples to produce offspring.’

  ‘And…?’ I know exactly where he’s going with this, but I’m not going to help him out.

  ‘Whilst you are physically compatible, you are not biologically capable of having children together.’

  ‘I knew that already,’ I say, and I did, because she’d told me the other night, and there was something melancholy in the way she’d scrunched her shoulders.

  ‘So, what do you think?’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘About leaving.’

  I’m standing up now and, even though this branch is swaying a little, my balance is perfect.

  ‘Why do you want to leave?’ There, he didn’t expect that.

  ‘There are a number of reasons I could point to, Philip, but I hope you believe me when I say that the first priority for me has always been your own personal happiness.’

  Now, am I being played here? What do you think? Because that’s what it feels like to me. In all the time he’s been in my head, he’s never paid a moment’s attention to my own personal happiness. Why would he start now?

  ‘OK, Neville, assuming I would be happy to go home, why do you want to go?’

  ‘The What If Something Really Bad Happens? AI has invested a great deal in our partnership, Philip, and it is judged that a greater return on our investment would be most desirable.’

  ‘But I saved the world from the clutches of the evil LOrd!’

  ‘And we are more than grateful for your part in that operation.’

  ‘Part in that operation? I was that operation.’

  ‘Be that as it may, you are little use to Humanity all the way out here, sitting in a tree.’

  ‘No, you’re not doing that to me. I’m perfectly happy here, and I’ve paid my dues, and I owe nothing to Humanity. Me and Aely-lel, are great together, and, if we can’t have kids, then we’ll manage.’

  ‘I don’t believe you understand the pressures on a young, healthy Felari female, Philip.’

  ‘With me holding her hand, she’ll be fine, trust me.’

  And here she comes now, my beautiful Aely-lel, skipping from one branch to another as she climbs towards me. Felari don’t wear very much at home and that’s fine by me, as I stand and watch as she gets closer.

  ‘Philip,‘ she gasps, breathlessly, from three branches below. ‘We need to talk.’

  I feel a sudden chill and my legs go weak and my balance on this branch is no longer as sure as it was.

  ‘I told you so,’ says Neville, with a smirk in his voice.

  ‘She might just want to talk about dinner.’

  ‘Does she look as if that might be the case?’

  In truth, she doesn’t. She looks all serious, and sad at the same time, and I want to hug her and tell her it will be OK, but will it?

  ‘Neville, if you’re right, and this is the end, I’m still not going back home. I’ll find a tree I can call my own, and maybe spend the rest of my life writing poetry, about loss and betrayal.’

  ‘Maybe a hint of the melodramatic there, Philip?’

  ‘I’m on a planet millions of miles from home, living in a tree, and about to be dumped, what else would you expect from me?’

  Neville sighs, which is not something he usually does. ‘Much more, Philip. Much more.’

  She’s almost reached me now, and I still can’t see the weapon she’ll rip out my heart with.

  ‘Really, Philip.’

  ‘It’s my heart. And, listen Neville, I’m really not going back; not unless people review this book and say that they really, really, really want me back. And it has to be three reallys, because two won’t do.’

  ‘If you say so, Philip.’

  Postscript II

  (Hi there, people, I just wanted to explain why I wasn’t there to write the ‘What Went Before’ section, and to apologise because I hear Neville’s attempt was abysmal.

  I told Phil that I wasn’t available because I had a gig rewriting Jane Austen for the Future Kids, but that was a lie; of course it was a lie, I’d have to be 12 to even understand their patois, and what Future Kid is going to be in the least bit interested in 19th century books about women’s problems?

  No, the truth of the matter is that I am now in a relationship, and I didn’t have the time or the inclination to be involved in this book at that stage.

  We’re very happy together, but don’t mention it to Phil, because, in his egocentric world, he wouldn’t understand. He’d be sure to feel betrayed.

  Quite without justification, I think.

  He didn’t call her when he said he would, and then he went off on his travels and fell for his exotic new love interest, and he left her hanging around waiting for his call. In my humble opinion, that is no way to treat a lady. Especially when that lady is Emily. So I made the call, and we got together, and the rest is history.

  Your friendly neighbourhood Narrative Facilitator – now fully loved up.)

  ***************************

  ********* THE END ********

  ***************************

  (Shush…exclusive bonus content – don’t tell anyone! NF.)

  The Eventual Glistening

  Volume 1 (of 27)

  Part 1 (of 17)

  (Hi everyone, I slipped this in when they’d all gone home, and I’m sure none of them will look at this dire tome again, so here is my gift to you. Read it and try not to regret the time you have wasted reading the tiresome Phil books when you could have been reading something as magnificent as this. Sit back and enjoy, and if you should have the misfortune to meet Phil, don’t tell him about my little trick. NF)

  Chapter 1

  His long fingers rubbed the curved stem of his pipe, and he smiled in anticipation. It had been such a long day or, to be more close to precision, a long week for him, and now he was relishing a quiet moment alone, with his pipe and his slippers before his fireplace of Mordloden granite, hewn from that inaccessible place by Munleerdor, the dwarf stone-hewer of Magreb.

  The fire was lit and the flames jumped and fluttered just the other side of the broad hearth, with just a little smoke leaking from the side of the fireplace to give a little substance to the atmosphere.

  Slowly, he pressed his thumb into the bowl of the pipe, making sure that the sweet heather-infused baccy was just right.

  He stretched out his long legs, clad in thick blue tights and finished off with over-sized green fluffy slippers, and he sighed.

  These days he no longer worried what the length of his legs said about his ancestors, though the other inhabitants of Crystal Valley seem less than reluctant to discuss his size and what that meant.

  ‘You don’t grow that tall,’ would say Mellin, the combined blacksmith and grocer, ‘without more than a drop of human blood in you, that’s all I’m saying.’

  Indeed, Prince Lexicana was head and shoulders above any other pixie; even Gerald Longshanks of Everglade, who was so tall he could pick Ellenfruit from the very branches of the Ellentree

  With a flick of his tinder stick, he lit his pipe. As he drew the sweet smoke deep into his lungs, his eyes stared deep into the flames.

  He barely moved when the door slammed open and young Sally Sadly rushed in, all of a bustle.

  ‘It’s happened!’ she gasped, pushing a stray lock of golden hair from her face.

  He dropped his pipe into his lap and stared at the distraught girl.

  ‘Already? But it’s three days too soon. The soothsayer saw that it would be Wodensday. It’s only Mournday, unless my calendar lacks truth.’

  ‘You’re right enough, Sir, but even soothsayers can be wrong. So, Sir, we don’t have much time, do we, Sir?’

  He smiled at her, and he put his pipe on the hearth.

  ‘Worry not, child. You do have the Sparkly Thing with you, don’t you?’

  ‘Of course, Sir. I never goes
anywhere without it, but I won’t show it in the light; not unless it can’t be helped.’

  ‘It will not come to that if we are quick and decisive. Fetch me my boots, will you?’

  By the side of the granite fireplace stood a pair of deep red boots, each boot as tall as her waist. They were twice-named Kilron the Well-shod by the Silesion cobblers of Des-Ray, and Prince Lexicana believed that they would always keep him on the right path.

  ‘And I’ll need my cloak, for where would I go without it?’

  She rushed to the inner doorway and found Sheera, the Cloak of Warmth, cast onto the bed like a mere garment.

  When she returned, she found him before the fire, with the great double-handed Sword of Dismay in his hands, its black blade seeming to soak up the light from the fire.

  ‘Will you really need that, Sir? It is such a scaresome blade.’

  ‘We have to rescue Lady Elvensong before the sun rises, my dear Sally, or else lose her forever to the glee of the Esseldon.’

  Sally spat into the fire for luck at the mention of that fell name.

  ‘They will not step aside unless they are made to, my dear, and I mean to make them. With the Sword of Dismay and the Sparkly Thing, who can stand in our way?’

  Moments later, they were standing in the doorway, with Sally just a little behind him, as was only her true and natural place.

  He whistled a high jaunty tune, and the air on either side of the doorway seemed to shake and spin, and narrow columns of smoke appeared, one to the left, and one to the right.

  Sally watched the smoky column of smoke she could see past his cloak, her mouth half open in fear or anticipation; she would struggle to say which.

  With sudden flashes of light, the columns disappeared, leaving behind a pair of little faerie-sprites, each no taller than a spread hand.

  ‘Ellon and Ollen, the Lady Elvensong has been taken by the Esseldon. You must seek her out before she is lost to us forever. Be off now, and tarry nowhere for neither food nor drink nor company. Do you hear me now, sprites? Then be gone.’

  With a quick bow, each faerie-sprite was gone in a flash.

  ‘Oh my, Sir. I never thought to see you call them faerie-sprites, Sir. And I was fair frightened to see them, I was.’

  ‘Worry not, Sally Sadly, for they will take nothing from you without my permission.’

  ‘My Ma, she says they’d steal your heart from behind your ribs and sell it back to you the next day, if you were still alive enough to have need of it.’

  ‘Well, Sally, I know your ma, and she has many fine qualities, but, alas, talking any kind of sense is not one of them.’

  ‘I’ll tell her you spoke so kindly of her when we get back.’

  ‘That’s fair enough, Sally Sadly, but I’ve said worse to her face, and she’s always smiled right back at me.’

  He stepped onto the low hill beside his house, and he held his head high, as if he could smell something on the air.

  ‘They’ve found her,’ he said, quickly. ’We must be off now, child, like the wind. Are you ready?’

  She placed her hand between her breasts and felt the Sparkly Thing beneath the thin material of her blouse.

  ‘Ay, Sir. I am, Sir,’ she whispered.

  **********

  The faerie-sprites flew high and wide, more than keen to obey their master’s command.

  Ellen was the first to see the dark mouth of the cave, hidden from all but the sharpest of eyes, but it was Ollen who lead the way into the stygian blackness, the only light provided by the glow of his third eye.

  ‘Come, dear Ellen, we must be quick and we must be clever,’ he whispered, as he flew, ‘or we will fail Prince Lexicana.’

  ‘Indeed,’ replied Ellen, who would never use two words when one would suffice.

  ‘We must not let him down again,’ urged Ollen.

  ‘Did we let him down?’

  ‘Oh, you know what I mean. I know it was I, but that hardly changes things.’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  The cave narrowed to a twisting tunnel that sank ever deeper into the mountain, but the faerie-sprites knew not the meaning of fatigue, so on they went, their little wings a blur, if there was light to see.

  At last their way was blocked and they sank to the ground.

  ‘What is it?’ asked Ollen, his voice filled with amazement.

  ‘It’s a door,’ replied Ellen, distain in her voice. ‘You’ve seen a door before. The prince has several.’

  ‘But not one such as this. So tall, so broad, so black.’

  ‘It’s dark.’

  ‘Yet still we see it. There is some fey magic at work here, unless I’m very much mistaken.’

  ‘We see it because your eye is shining on it. There is no need for magic talk.’

  Ollen pushed his hand against the door.

  ‘It is sealed by more evil magic. See it does not move.’

  ‘Perhaps it is just heavy. Too much for you.’

  ‘No, it must be the strongest of magics, to withstand me.’

  ‘Really? Could it not just be that you are little and weak, and you’ve never been able to push a man-sized door open?’

  ‘We need the Ring of Absolute Power to open it. Do you have it?’

  Ellen hesitated, for she did not care to speak of such things.

  ‘Let us push it together.’

  ‘We could try, but it will not move without the force of the Ring of Absolute Power.’

  ‘What’s it doing now?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean, what is it doing now?’ She pulled him away from the door as she spoke.

  ‘It’s…oh, it’s opening,’ he whispered, in reply.

  ‘And without the use of magic it seems.’

  ‘There…there could be magic…on the other side.’

  ‘Step out of the way. It is a man and he may stand on you.’

  The sprites scurried across the tunnel and pressed themselves against the rough stone wall.

  A light shone on the tunnel, from a lantern held in the hand of a tall dark man, dressed in ragged and filthy clothes.

  ‘There be something here, I’d say,’ he grunted, in a course deep voice.

  ‘Did ye hear something?’ asked another voice from beyond the man.

  ‘No…I didn’t hear anything.’

  ‘Did ye see something?’

  ‘No…I didn’t see anything. But still there be something there.’

  ‘Perhaps you dreamed it. Is that possible? Maybe when you were drinking?’

  ‘I ain’t drunk that much. You know me, Islar. I’m sensitive to things that can’t be seen by ordinary men.’

  ‘If you say so, Bulter.’

  ‘I do, and look ye there. Can you see them, just standing there like I don’t know what?’

  ‘I can’t see past your thick back, so move and let me see.’

  There was some grunting and shuffling and a new figure appeared. Not nearly so tall, and not nearly so scruffy.

  ‘Hold that lantern up high,’ she said, her quick eyes scanning the ground.

  ‘How’s that?’

  ‘That’s…’ Moving as quickly as a very quick snake, she leapt across the tunnel and grabbed hold of the faerie-sprites, one in each hand. ‘Look what I have found!’ she gasped, as she turned.

  ‘I told you they were there, I did. So, I get the credit, right.’

  ‘Ah, but I caught them. You’d still be sniffing the air and saying ‘there’s something strange here,’ and looking stupid.’

  ‘Well, let me have one of them and we can take them to him together, and then we’ll both get some sort of reward.’

  ‘Why would I be doing that? When I have them both.’

  ‘But, we’re friends, ain’t we?’

  ‘Ay, we are, but there’s more to this than meets the eye of a stupid man.’ As she spoke, she held the little creatures up to the light.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘These are fairie-sprites, I’d s
ay, and we know who has such creatures in his service, don’t we?’

  ‘You mean…Prince Lexicana?’

  ‘Yes, I do. And if they are here, it must mean we are found. He could be here any moment.’

  ‘We must tell the Master quickly,’ said Bulter, turning away from the door.

  Just as Islar prepared to follow him, Ellen managed to get her fingers on the Ring of Absolute Power which was hanging by a thin golden chain from her neck. With a puff of purple smoke, she was gone from Islar’s hand.

  Within half a second, Ollen had joined her.

  They appeared together at the entrance to the cave, their wings flapping at top speed.

  ‘What do we have here?’ said a deep, handsome voice.

  ‘Prince Lexicana! Thank goodness you are here!’ gasped Ellen, flying in tight circles above his head.

  ‘We found her, your highness,’ said Ollen, with a little bow.

  ‘We think we may have found her,’ qualified Ellen, with a little sharpness in her tone.

  Prince Lexicana nodded his fine head and looked down at Sally Sadly.

  ‘Are you ready, my dear?’

  She looked up at him and there was determination in her young eyes. ‘I am ready, Sir, for whatever may come.’

  ‘And the Sparkly Thing?’

  She reached inside the neck of her blouse and gripped the glowing jewel.

  ‘Yes, Sir. I am ready to do what needs to be done to save her.’

  ‘Then follow me, and be wary, my dear. We shall save her and win the day, or else history will be made today, for I have never yet been defeated. No-one has stood against the Sword of Dismay and survived, and together with the Sparkly Thing, how can that change?’

  ‘Yes, my lord,’ she said, breathlessly, and her eyes looked on his strong clear face with nothing less than adoration.

  ‘We must just hope we are in good time and not too late to save her. Now, light the way, my dear, and have no fear for I shall be right behind you.’

  Sally Sadly took the deepest of breaths before she took her first step into the darkness. Then she took her hand from within her blouse and a brilliant white light lit up the whole of the cave.