by Patty Jansen
Several things happened at the same time. A loud crash came from the doorway as Esme made her way into the hall, ripping the doors from the frame. Mustafa hung onto the back of the saddle. Several horses burst in. The dragon flew towards the dais.
Bruno cowered in his seat, covering his face with his arms.
“Come on, help us!” called Nellie.
Casper grabbed a carving knife and jumped onto the table. He lunged for the fire dog when the dragon flew over.
Nellie approached the shepherd from behind. He held his hands raised, chanting evil words at the top of his voice.
Nellie swung the coat stand.
She didn’t think about him being the leader of the church she loved. She didn’t think about the beauty and serenity of the big church with its arched ceiling, scent of candle wax and incense and rows of pews full of friends and trusted people.
She only thought, This evil needs to be cut from the church.
She brought down the coat stand.
At the same time the shepherd turned around.
The coat stand came down. Nellie couldn’t stop it anymore. Henrik yelled behind her, but she couldn’t hear his words.
The shepherd held up his hands to protect himself from the blow. Magic burst from his hands and engulfed the metal stand. Nellie had to let go of it.
But when this happened, the shepherd lost control of the fire dog. It stopped biting and scratching the dragon.
“You insignificant little woman,” snarled the shepherd. “How dare you attack me!”
Nellie was so scared she felt numb. And the numbness reduced her fear. While standing there, facing this terrible man with the skull-like face and the blood of people on his hands, she felt serene. He could kill her if he wanted, but for that moment she didn’t care, because he was wrong and the Triune would punish him.
“You worry about wrong and right, and about the real church,” she said, her mouth stiff with nerves. “We are the real church, because the Triune loves us all and dislikes cruelty. In fact, it took cruelty into itself and suffered on our behalf so that we didn’t have to. We are the church, and you’re just a selfish tyrant.”
He was going to reply. He was going to smite her with the magic that was flowing from his hands like smoke, but the dragon was flying up the middle of the hall, coming straight for the shepherd with a ball of flames in its paws.
He must have seen the shock in Nellie’s eyes, and noticed how she stumbled back. He turned around.
Too late.
The dragon dropped the flaming ball—the magical essence of the fire dog—on top of the shepherd. It exploded in a big ball of fire.
Nellie ducked. For a moment, she could see nothing in the brightness of the magical fire.
The flames crept up the dais, consuming the carpet and licking at the table that stood there. Strands of magic encased the inferno, dousing the flames, but some of it still leaked out.
Esme trotted across the hall, with Mustafa still trying to climb into the saddle. She stuck her nose into a bowl that contained water for washing one’s hands. She then spurted the water onto the burning carpet. The fire went out in a cloud of smoke.
And when the smoke cleared, Bruno sat straight-backed on his throne, as if nothing had happened.
“All hail the king,” someone yelled.
Someone repeated the acclamation, and it went all around the dining hall. People from the foyer rushed into the hall. In their hurry, they trampled the dust—all that was left of Shepherd Wilfridus—into the carpet.
A little spark of gold flew across the devastation and settled on Nellie’s hand. The dragon had shrunk so much containing the fire that he was barely bigger than a mouse. Nellie used her index finger to stroke his back.
“Thank you,” she said, because you always had to be nice, even to a dragon.
Amid the chaos and cheering, Bruno came down the dais. When he stood next to Nellie, he again was the little fragile boy she rescued from the crypt. He had left the crown on the seat of the throne and the sceptre leaning against the armrest.
“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice soft.
“It all ended up fine,” Nellie said.
“Yes, but that wasn’t because of anything I did. I was silly and impatient. I’m only alive because people helped me, and you helped me most of all.”
He held the dragon box out to her.
Nellie took it, opened it and let the dragon flutter inside. Then she shut the box and handed it back to Bruno.
He shook his head. “It’s yours.”
“It is your dragon. Your father gave it to you.”
“I don’t know how to use it. It won’t listen to me anyway. I thought I knew how to control it, but I don’t.”
“Then you should learn.”
Chapter 25
* * *
WHILE EVERYONE WAS celebrating victory—or merely confused—Master Thiele’s men moved into the palace.
The master himself was not there, but Nellie recognised several of the dark-clad men who came into the hall. They sealed the entrances. They made sure the servants went back downstairs and all the people who had streamed into the palace left again.
Master Thiele himself came in later, in the company of three heavily armed guards. By this time, Casper and the noble youngsters had already cleaned up a good deal of the mess: the broken plates, the spilled food, the remains of burnt items. Wet carpets were replaced with dry ones, and the tables put back in orderly fashion.
Nellie helped with this, although her dress made the work uncomfortable because one side kept slipping off her shoulder.
But when Master Thiele came in, the table was ready. He sat down and gestured for everyone in the hall to do the same.
“Us, too?” Nellie asked.
“Especially you,” he said.
Nellie felt nervous. She had to remind herself that she was no longer Nellie the maid, and that hiding in the kitchen was such an easy thing to do.
When everyone was seated, Master Thiele gave a quick explanation of who he was. He told the gathered young nobles that in the chaos following the king and queen’s deaths, he had taken care of the crown and sceptre, planning to bring them out when a rightful heir to the throne appeared or was appointed with the approval of the citizens.
But since Bruno was too young, and not properly prepared, a temporary solution must be found. “We need to resolve the regency quickly and peacefully.”
Everyone looked at Bruno, whose face was pale and who appeared very small.
He spoke only a few stammering words, his cheeks red. Ten years locked up in a dungeon was no way to prepare a young boy for a task as important as this.
“He will need our help,” Master Thiele continued. “He is alone and too young. Until he is older, we need a strong leader—a group of leaders. Ideally, we need to write a council of advisors into the laws.”
Casper said, “I can help.”
“You’re too young, too. For the stability of the city, we need someone older and more experienced to establish proper procedures.”
“The mayor,” Henrik said.
“Someone whose honesty is not compromised by ties either with the Regent’s family or any of the competing noble houses or countries.”
According to the law, the Regent was appointed by the church, and none of the Regent’s powers transferred to the Regent’s family after his death. The church assumed the power instead, but the law said nothing about what happened in the absence of the leader of the church. This was why Master Thiele had sealed the palace off and insisted that no one leave the hall until they found a temporary solution.
The discussions went on well into the night. Instead of allowing the influential families to come in together and argue, Master Thiele invited them one by one and asked them very specific questions. He explained, in between interviews, that he was looking for people who were willing to consider the welfare of the city over their own or that of their business.
From the
se visits, he produced a list of names of candidates for council positions, which the attendees in the room approved.
By now, it was very late, and the young people in the hall looked worn out. To be sure, Nellie felt worn out. It had been a long day.
But Master Thiele insisted the younger generation be included in the meetings, because the carrying out of the agreement would rest on their shoulders.
They agreed that over the next few days, they would put together a governing council that would take control of the city until a more permanent solution could be negotiated.
The council would include representatives from each industry, as well as elected officials, such as the mayor, and the heads of the major organisations. Surprise suggestions were Master Beck from the Science Guild and the leaders of the Baker’s Guild and Tailor’s Guild. No noble representatives were to be included solely on the basis that they were noble. Many names from the nobility were on the list of possibilities, but it was clear why each person was there: because of their trade or their knowledge. There would be a position for the church, but Master Thiele would let the church find a candidate to fill it. That would take some time.
After this, Master Thiele ordered the doors opened. A guard carried a copy of the agreement across the palace forecourt, and attached it, as traditional, to the door of the church.
When everyone was leaving the room, going back home or finding places to sleep, Nellie felt a deep sense of fatigue come over her.
“I guess it’s time I find that little cottage and start my vegetable garden,” she said.
“Bruno has asked us to stay,” Henrik told her.
“Stay here?” Nellie looked around.
She had spent a good deal of her life in the palace, both as servant and queen’s confidante. The place was full of memories, good and bad.
“He says that he doesn’t have parents. We can be his parents.”
“He has his father.”
“Who know where he is or when he’s coming back?”
“Please, I want all of you to stay,” Casper said from behind her. He looked taller than he had seemed the last time she met him, and the blue suit didn’t look as ridiculous on him as it had looked before. His younger brother was with him. “We don’t have anywhere to go.”
“What about your mother?”
“She wants to go back to Lurezia.”
“But she said she was proud of you.”
Frederick said, “She did, but she doesn’t want to live here anymore.”
Casper looked down. “I want to have a real business, with ships and captains and . . . people who can look me in the eye and tell me I’m a respectable person. People who would defend me and the business because they believe it’s a good business. Not because they like my banquets. I want a wife whose family thinks I’m a good person. Can you help me with that?”
“Of course.” Heavens, poor young man.
The story of what had happened here over the past few days would no doubt be told later, but it had a profound effect on these young people.
And the idea of staying in the palace appealed to Nellie.
After spending the night at Henrik daughter’s house, she returned to the palace the next day to oversee cleaning up the royal family’s living areas. She took great pleasure in removing the Regent’s dreadful furniture and dusting off Queen Johanna’s elegant furnishings and restoring them to their former positions. She made sure that all the rooms were well-furnished and welcoming.
In the evening, she and Henrik shared a meal with the three boys. From not having a family, Nellie had gone to being a favourite auntie for three lost boys.
Nellie didn’t venture into the kitchen until a few days later. To her sadness, Dora was gone. Apparently the Duke of Aroden had needed a cook. Nellie intended to write to Dora, but in a way, she was afraid to find out just how much her friend had been involved with the shepherd and whether she had betrayed Nellie, and if so whether it had been by choice or because she was scared. Maybe it was best to leave things as they were.
Almost everyone else was back working there, including Maartje, who looked like she had received a significant promotion out of the scullery and into the main kitchen. She was, she said, training to be a baker.
Nellie asked about Els, when she noticed that Maartje’s older sister was not there.
After his unwitting involvement in the poisoning of citizens for the shepherd had become clear, Mr Oliver had declared he had enough of ruling the shop. Who better to take over his legal gin distillery than someone who already knew everything about making gin?
Nellie had to smile when she heard people talk about “the handsome young Lurezian man” who now ran the distillery with his “fair-haired Scandian lady.” Gisele was more comfortable facing the world as Gerard.
Madame Sabine left the palace without further ado. After having boasted that she would go back to Burovia and her influential friends, or to Lurezia and her family who was related to the king, she chose to stay in town, moving into a stately house in the noble quarter. She was a strange woman.
The two boys continued to live in the palace and take lessons with Bruno. The council also wrote to neighbouring countries to find a magic teacher for the young prince.
Mistress Luisa came all the way from Senoza and arrived in town in the middle of a wave of people returning to the city after having fled on the shepherd’s strong “suggestion”. Her skin was as dark as Mustafa’s too-strong tea and her hair black and bushy. She spent long days with Bruno in a room in the palace cellar and he was always very tired after those sessions. He had so much to practice, and a lot looked like training the dragon like a dog: walk behind the prince, sit still when waiting, don’t frighten visitors.
Mistress Luisa assured Nellie that flying on the dragon’s back was a long time away, a feat reserved for only the strongest magicians.
Nellie had to smile at hearing that.
Other people who returned to town included Jantien’s husband. He brought stories of having fled murderous mercenaries. He’d been very lucky to survive. Many of the other refugees had never made it to their intended destinations.
After the death of Shepherd Wilfridus, two of the church’s senior deacons fled the city, leaving the church in the hands of a junior deacon and a couple of visiting monks. The church was in disarray.
Nellie went to the main church every day. She helped to clean and to pack up all of Shepherd Wilfridus’ possessions. In his house, at the back of the church, they found many books on magic.
A few days later, when she came to the church, a familiar figure greeted her.
“Shepherd Adrianus!” She ran to him and hugged him.
He told her he’d been taken to one of the monasteries and had seen with his own eyes how the Regent’s men stopped people leaving or entering the city. “They said it was because they wanted to stop magic, but that did not justify the cruelty I saw. I’m deeply ashamed that I ever supported such a man. I will need to beg the town for forgiveness.”
He did just that a week later, when during the ceremony that saw him elevated to head of the Church of the Triune, he sank to his knees facing the audience—and the church was full to bursting—and pleaded with them to forgive him and not to hesitate to tell him if he ever strayed from the path again.
Nellie and Henrik sat in the front row with Bruno, and after the service, they went to the shepherd’s house to ask him for a favour.
The following spring, everyone returned to the church for a service of a very different kind.
Before the eyes of the town elders and the packed congregation which included the young king, Nellie and Henrik exchanged their vows of marriage.
As recently instated head of the palace guards, Henrik wore his uniform. He’d decided that his beard was going to stay.
Nellie wore a pretty and elegant dress in pale blue, with hundreds of little beads adorning the skirt.
Henrik’s daughters and Master Thiele were witnesses. Casper
and Frederick led the parade. Having just turned fifteen, Bruno signed the document.
He was fast turning into a knowledgeable young man, and rarely went anywhere without Mistress Luisa, who was about to start teaching other children. Nellie had been happy to hear that Anneke was one of them.
Their troubles were far from over. For one, where there were nobles and priests, there were scandals and scheming. That would never change.
The church had received a letter from The Most Holy Father of the Belaman Church, demanding that reparations be paid for the damage to the recently reopened church building in Saardam.
Madame Sabine had taken off suddenly. Rumours went that she had gone to make reparations with the Burovian king’s brother, whose new young wife Baroness Hestia had unexpectedly given birth not three months after their wedding. The nobles were outraged.
And people continued to be outraged at the newfangled exploits of the Science Guild.
But Mustafa reopened his animal garden and many people came through the gates to see and hear the foul-mouthed parrots. He even bought a plot of land opposite the entrance, where he built a house especially for Esme. At all times—except when she was taking children on rides through the city—she could be seen through the windows, and she would stick her trunk through the gaps to beg for carrots. And, in a happy ending for her, Mustafa hired Koby to help him.
The river traders started to return to the harbour.
And in summer, a letter arrived at the palace that spoke of an upcoming visit from a ship of the Eastern Trader office. The letter was short on detail, but Bruno was sure his father would be on board.
Saardam once more took its place as a hub where the world met and occasionally disagreed, but mostly got along just fine.
Thanks for reading
Thank you for reading the Dragonspeaker Chronicles. Have you read the Ghostspeaker Chronicles yet? That series covers the story of Queen Johanna and King Roald.
