by Ben Zackheim
“Did you know?” Simon asked. “I mean, did your parents tell you about this place before you were...scooped up?”
“Sure. If yer parents didn’t tell you, then how would you know enough to make it past Hexter?”
“What’s Hexter?” Simon felt the silence as soon as the question left his mouth. Josh and Russ looked at each other, then at him.
“You mean yer parents didn’t tell you who you are?”
“No,” Simon said, a little bit more than a little miffed.
“Hexter is the trainer here. He turns us into knights,” Josh whispered.
“He’s the strictest, meanest guy you ever met. Works us to the bone. That’s why we’re all such a mess right now. I almost lost my finger today.” Russ held up a bandaged hand.
“Some kids don’t make it,” Josh said. Simon didn’t like the sound of that. “It’s usually just the ones who didn’t get the basics down before they show up.”
Nothing could have explained Simon’s situation better. He wanted to sink into the mattress forever.
“I’m not here to get trained,” Simon mumbled.
The doors to the room flew open with a BANG! Someone had entered faster than a cat chasing its tail.
“Shoo!”
The boys scattered like mice. One glance at the advancing woman and it was clear to Simon she was the nurse Josh and Russ were talking about. It was also clear she was the prettiest woman Simon had ever seen.
“Go on. Away with you,” she barked.
Josh and Russ backed away from the bed. The nurse placed a stick on Simon’s head and it glowed red. Simon realized, after she stuffed it into her belt, that it was probably a wand.
“As I thought,” she said. “Quite a fever you have on you, descendant of Lancelot.”
“Simon.”
“Yes. Simon.” She smiled kindly. “Now you lean back, Simon, and rest. Swallow this whole and make sure you taste it. Taste is where the healing is.” She handed him a flask of brown liquid. “You’re lucky to be with us. That was a nasty hex thrown your way.”
“We told him you saved him, Nurse Deidre,” Josh mentioned in passing.
The nurse blushed a little, but humility didn’t fit. Simon had only known her for a couple of minutes and he could already tell she knew her stuff.
He took the liquid down in one gulp and tried not to plug his nose so he could taste it. It was a combination of solid lard and rotten eggs. His eyes went wide and the boys smirked.
“Ewwwww,” they said for him, in unison.
The nurse smiled and tucked the sheets tighter around Simon so he could barely move.
“Now, you should be all set to make trouble in a couple of days. You think you can lay low that long?”
“Yes ma’am.”
She smiled. “So polite. You curs could learn a thing or two from Simon here.” She winked at him and left.
Not a single eye in the room was on Simon anymore. It was as if the door she’d left through was the most fascinating thing they’d ever seen. Simon had a hard time pulling his eyes off it, too.
So when Maille walked through the same door and found the entire room of boys gawking at her, she did her best to keep her composure. She pulled her wand out and waved it at everyone.
“What are you looking at?” she barked. “Go ogle your messy drawers or something!”
The boys scrambled back to their business as fast as they could.
Maille backed her way up to Simon’s bed, and put the wand away when she was sure she’d made her point.
“You look like packed meat,” Maille mumbled. “Nurse Deidre tuck you in?” Simon nodded. “That would explain the state of scatterbrainity in the room!”
Simon managed a weak smile. “How are you feeling, Maille?”
“Much better than you, I’ll tell you that. I’m happy to see you awake.”
“So, are you allowed to tell me who attacked us?”
“You’re half-conscious and giving me attitude? If you’re going to be like that I’ll come back when the furnace is cooler.”
“I’m sorry, Maille,” Simon said. She clearly didn’t buy it. “Really. Any idea who the dead-looking guy was?”
She leaned in and set her voice at a notch above a whisper. “Well, he called himself Rukkush and he claimed to be an apprentice to Merlin. But the old man’s not talking. No surprise there.” She cleared her throat, as if she wanted to say something. Simon waited. “I, uh, gather he knocked me out first.”
“That’s because you fought first,” Simon said.
“Yeah, Merlin always warns me about that tendency. ‘First to swing, first in a sling.’”
“He told me to be ready to die,” Simon whispered.
“Rukkush said that?”
“Well, he said I could die trying to find the truth.”
“Simon, that could mean anything. Hell, that’s the meaning of life in some circles. What else did he say?”
It was hard to remember much more. Maille could see he was struggling. She put her hand on his shoulder. “Save it. You’ll remember when you’re feeling better. I’m going to do some research on this guy. I’ll let you know what I find.” She got up to go.
“Maille?”
“Yeah?”
“Are you a descendant of a knight too?”
“Nah. Merlin talked my pa into letting me come here as his apprentice. It didn’t take much convincing, frankly. I think he just gave him a handful of gold.”
“But, why did he choose you? I mean...” Simon realized how bad that could sound and stopped himself.
“No, that’s okay. He says it’s my winning personality.” She shrugged as if that were the real answer. Simon thought she was joking, but when she didn’t smile he turned his smirk into a cough.
She laughed. “I’m kidding! I’ve given up asking why.”
“He likes secrets,” Simon said, relieved.
“My theory is that’s where he gets his magic. He hoards secrets and extracts their mystery into a soup.” Simon waited for her to laugh again. “No, this time I’m serious. His world is one weird place to be. I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone who thinks they know which way is up or what the color blue actually looks like.”
“But you’re doing well.”
“It’s a day to day thing,” she said with a smile and patted his blanketed feet. “Get some rest. You’ve been through a lot in the last couple days. Probably best if you soak it in for a bit, right?”
“Sure, yeah. Thanks.”
She turned to face the meandering boys and reached for her wand. Some of them scattered. Simon wondered what she’d done in the past to get this kind of reaction.
He could only imagine.
18
The next morning, Simon finally sat up in bed without losing his breakfast. With the room emptied out he decided it was a good time to try to stand up. He was tired of embarrassing himself in front of large crowds. Just as he pushed himself upright, Maille pulled a floating chair through the door. The bulky wooden thing hovered a foot over her head, spitting steam from brass pipes.
“Get in,” she ordered Simon, who had fallen back onto his bed. “We’re going to The Spell, like I promised.”
“What about Nurse De…”
“She’s chasing a herd of vampire moths that mysteriously appeared in her office,” she said with a wink.
Simon had learned it wasn’t smart to contradict Maille. He stepped from his bed onto the chair. Dozens of exposed gears whirled and grinded. It was as tippy as he’d suspected.
He saw steel buttons on the left armrest. The keys had engraved characters that he didn’t recognize.
“The only button you need to remember is the circle with the triangle in it. Go ahead and push it.” He did and he was sprayed with steam from one of the pipes that wrapped around the back of the chair.
Maille Rose got a big smirk on her face. “What are you looking at?” Simon asked. He spotted himself in a mirror right as the question came out o
f his mouth. Only it wasn’t himself he was seeing.
There was an old lady reflected back at him.
“AH!”
“Sssh! Keep it down you wimp!” Maille hissed. “It’s a simple disguise spell. We can’t have everyone seeing you out and about. They’re already talking about you enough as it is. You want to see The Spell or no?” Simon could only manage to nod his head as he stared at himself as a “herself.”
Maille shoved the chair through the door as Simon held on for dear life.
“Just think of a direction you want to go, and the chair will follow,” she instructed him.
It was easy enough to slip out of the castle. Other chairs flew about in the chilly morning mist, so Simon was simply one of the crowd. He hovered three feet off the ground, doing his best to keep up with Maille. He waved to anyone who looked at him.
“You’re not the Queen,” she said. “Stop waving.” Simon put his frail hand down. “There it is. Opening for the day and I bet it’s already packed!” She pointed to a modest cottage down the cobblestone street. Its stone walls supported an odd, copper contraption. The large device wrapped around the thatched roof in a way that made Simon think of a mechanical spider. Steam rose from its tip and floated into the morning fog.
A painted sign on the side of the building read,
Simon was getting used to being in awe. Trolls, wizards, New Camelot. Wasn’t it just a few days ago that he was stuck with an uncle who didn’t like him? And a week ago he was trapped in St. Mary’s.
But nothing had prepared Simon for what The Spell had in store.
The inside of the building was unimpressive at first. A little entryway led to a small room where a pleasant old lady sat on a chair and welcomed customers of all ages. The walls were covered in paintings of Merlin in various states of peevishness. One even showed Merlin yelling and shaking his staff at a crying toddler.
The customers weaved through a line and, one by one, emerged into a massive factory surrounded by dozens of balconied floors. It seemed impossible to Simon that the small cottage could hold so much space.
Everywhere he looked, a complex web of tubes and gears crisscrossed from floor to ceiling. A large metal wheel spun slowly in the middle of the space. It was the hub from which the other gears in the room moved. But as hard as he tried, Simon couldn’t make out what the contraption was doing, besides making a tremendous amount of noise.
Small teams of people were hard at work on every level. Simon could make out one team working on the toy knights he and Maille had enjoyed.
Children and adults wandered through the factory, watching things being made. The kids gathered around toys. Adults oohed and aahed over the flying chairs and some objects that Simon couldn’t even begin to identify.
One woman reverently took a large, gelatinous ball from one of the workers. She dropped it on the floor and clapped, delighted, as it rolled around. From the clean floor it left behind, Simon guessed the blob was some kind of vacuum cleaner.
“Pretty cool, huh?” Maille asked, beaming. “They make wands way up there. I helped Merlin design the latest models.”
“Merlin makes all this?”
“No Merlin designs it and the real talent makes it. People from all over the world shop here. He also does pro bono work, of course, because he’s a sucker for gold. I think he did the secret ingredient in Coke.”
A young salesman sprayed Simon with a mist. “Something for the skin, ma’am. Merlin promises you’ll look 20 years younger!”
But the man’s beaming face turned to horror as the perfume distorted Maille’s spell. Simon appeared part human, part cocker spaniel.
“The button,” hissed Maille.
Simon pushed the button on his armrest and, with a spit of steam, he went back to looking like an old lady.
“Sorry ma’am,” the worker said, horrified. “LOUIS! We have a problem with this batch!”
“What’s with all this steam?” Simon asked, as the man ran off.
“It’s what makes all our technology run. If it moves it probably runs on steam. Only the really expensive stuff runs on magic alone.”
“So you’re saying this is magic steam?” Simon was doing his best to stay skeptical.
“No, I’m saying that steam is what carries the magic through the products and makes them work. When electricity showed up, Merlin knew he’d have to come up with an alternative for his people. He never wants us to be tempted by the outside world. Well, human magic loves water, so Merlin realized an Animate spell could be magnified a thousand times when steam is the vehicle. Brilliant really. One of his last trailblazing moments before he got super grumpy and prone to laziness.”
“Who do we have here, Maille Rose?” came a tinny, singsong voice nearby.
Simon gasped, which fit well with the old lady visage he was wearing.
The thing in front of them was a robot of some kind, with an incomprehensible web of exposed, slender silver tubes. Every joint on its two arms and two legs was a bolt of mahogany. Each limb was an impressively thick slab of steel. But it was the head that made Simon’s heart skip. Embedded on top of the robot’s shoulders was a fishbowl with a single goldfish floating inside.
Was it smiling at him?
“Oh pardon me, Miss. I sometimes forget that my appearance can be disturbing,” the fish said. “I believe it’s something Merlin did by design, if you catch my meaning.” The voice was coming from a paper thin, tin plate in the creature’s chest.
“Uh, Little Boo,” Maille said. “This is Mrs. Smith… en… heim… en… um.” Maille was a lot of things, but she obviously wasn’t a very accomplished liar.
Simon reached out his wrinkled hand. Little Boo gently took it and placed it on the fish bowl, as if to kiss it. Classy fish robot thing, Simon thought.
“Greetings Mrs. Smithenheimenum. What do you think of our shop here? I’m the manager.” If a fish could beam, this was what it would look like.
Simon put on his best old lady voice. “Very impressive. I’ve never seen so much… steam.”
“HA! We have that in abundance.”
Maille put a hand on Little Boo’s arm. “Merlin made Little Boo the boss of The Spell when he showed how skilled he is at managing people.”
“A pet knows humans better than anyone,” the fish stated confidently.
“Merlin can’t abide pets who don’t make themselves useful, so he built Little Boo a body.”
“And an exceptional one at that,” Little Boo said. “Merlin may be a pain but he has impeccable taste in animals.”
“And accomplices,” Maille added.
“Appears they need me at the wand platform,” Little Boo said. “It’s been a pleasure, Mr. Lancelot. I hope our next meeting is more on the up and up.” And with that the fish winked and departed.
“Wonderful,” Maille grumbled. “He figured out who you are. We’re lucky that he’s cool or we’d be in big trouble right now. Let’s get you back to your bed.”
The two of them exited through a shop that sold some of Merlin’s products, but Simon didn’t take much of it in. His brain was overloaded.
MAILLE STAYED WITH Simon until he got his feet under him. It felt exhilarating to walk around, even if he was confined to one room.
“All right! ALL RIGHT! Keep your undies on!” Maille yelled at no one. She saw the shock on Simon’s face. “Sorry, Simon. Merlin barked in my head to get out of here. I think you’re about to get a visitor.”
“Oh, okay. Thanks for, um…”
“Transforming you into an old lady and showing you too much, too fast? I’m sure he’s found out and can’t wait to give me an earful. Later.”
“Maille?”
“Hm?”
“Do you know what happened to my friend Red?”
“Sorry, Simon. I’m sure he made it home fine. I’ll keep an ear to the ground, okay?”
She left him with the silence of the boys’ quarters. But Simon quickly found something to do.
He wal
ked to the wall of swords. He’d always liked swords but had never had a chance to use a real one. He wrapped his fingers around the hilt of a blade on the wall.
“You can choose one of yer own when yer ready.” A man’s voice came from the doorway. Simon turned so fast he almost fell over.
He couldn’t believe it.
“Hector?”
19
His former chauffeur’s large torso was covered in light chain mail. A cloak hung from his shoulders. He looked more comfortable in a knight’s garb than he ever had been in a driver’s.
“I don’t understand. What are you doing here, Hector?”
“This is my home,” Hector said. “I serve Merlin and New Camelot. He’s sent me to train you. We have to get you up to speed on the latest sword techniques, don’t we?” He smiled, and Simon couldn’t help but smile back.
Still, there was a side of him that was hurt. A guy he’d actually trusted turned out to hold the biggest secret yet.
Something that Russ and Josh had said dawned on him.
“Wait a second. You’re Hexter?”
Hector laughed. “You’ve been making friends, then. That’s good. Yes, the boys call me Hexter. And my reputation is well deserved. When it comes to training for war, I show no mercy. Come. Get dressed. Merlin wants to speak with you.”
Simon had a lot of questions for Hector, but his head was swimming. Even putting on his shoes felt like a big victory.
Hector stayed two large paces ahead as he led Simon out the door and through the halls. It was warmer than Simon thought it would be. He’d always heard that castles were freezing, but something was keeping this one comfortable in the morning chill. More magic, probably.
Hundreds of candle chandeliers and torches lit their way. The walls were mostly bare stone with slender windows allowing for a peek at the sky outside. In the main rooms, tapestries and portraits added enough variety to make everything feel pleasant.
The big surprise was how active the place was. Simon had always pictured castles as being big halls of nothing. But scores of adults were going about their busy day. Children played their games. A group of laughing teenagers sat on some cushy couches near a blazing fire. It was a loud and happy home for a lot of people.
