A Hidden Magic
Page 5
"No," Norman decided. "We'll save it for when we really need it."
The jinni bowed and was gone, leaving only a pinkish haze that settled to the ground with the faintest jingling.
"Oh, my," Jennifer said.
"Indeed," Norman agreed.
A Second Plan
IF JENNIFER HAD FOUND Norman's first plan to be a bit vague and shaky (and to be perfectly honest, she did), that was nothing compared to what she thought of his next plan.
To get the jinni from the Old Witch and just see what happened from there was haphazard enough, but she couldn't believe she had heard correctly when he told her his new idea.
"Excuse me, but I think there's something wrong with my ears," Jennifer said, tapping one of them. "I thought you said, 'We're going to try to find Malveenya herself.'"
"Forget your ears," Norman said. "There's nothing else we can do."
Obviously methodical planning was not one of Norman's strong points. But in this case he was right—they faced the choice of forgetting about Alexander or of confronting Malveenya. And when she thought back to Alexander's arrogant, selfish ways, Jennifer had to admit to herself that the idea of letting sleeping princes lie was very appealing.
But she knew she couldn't do that, and she realized she couldn't come up with any plan better than Norman's, so she had to agree.
"Should we get some help from my father's army?" Jennifer asked. She was afraid to think how worried the old king would be by now, and drew a mental picture of him sending out the troops to look for her. Unfortunately, the kingdom had been at peace for so long that there was no full-time army, only the reserves MS who met for parades and grand openings and such.
Jennifer recalled the last time she had seen them in action. "Parade, march!" the sergeant at arms had called so loudly that a boy who normally worked on his father's farm dropped his rusty shield, which tripped the part-time basket weaver carrying King Frederick's standard, which bopped the head of the stable hand in front of him who wasn't wearing his helmet because he was busy trying to fix its leather chin strap. The stable hand immediately gave a terrific yell, which caused two-thirds of the army to drop shields and swords and jump into the bushes. The men remaining weren't necessarily the bravest, but they were wearing ill-fitted helmets that pressed against their ears and prevented them from hearing anything. So they stood milling about saying, "Whazzat? What happened?" Her father's army would hardly—Jennifer admitted to herself—be a decided advantage.
"We could go back and get them to help us," Norman was saying, "but this is probably a situation where we need quickness and cleverness rather than brute force."
The army certainly didn't have brute force, and considering the alternative qualities Norman had named, Jennifer decided to forget the subject entirely. "What exactly are we going to do?" she asked.
"I thought we'd just find Malveenya and see what happens from there."
Jennifer didn't mention that this was what she'd been afraid he would say, but asked instead how they'd find Malveenya.
He explained that her main home was in a place called the Valley of Darkness and Despair. Norman knew the general direction, but warned that the forest road sometimes seemed to have a mind of its own—which was something Jennifer had begun to suspect the day before.
"Right, then," she said, with what she hoped was a determined and ready-for-anything expression, "we're off."
So, with Jennifer carrying the magic bottle in one of the huge pockets in her gown, the two of them set out hand in hand to find the most powerful evil creature in the forest.
The forest road ended.
One minute it was twisting and turning in its usual infuriating way; the next it was abruptly gone. The bricks led to a thick wall of trees, then stopped. There wasn't the faintest indication of a dirt path or a chipmunk trail or even a spider track (although Jennifer had to take Norman's word for this last one). Dead end. Nothing. Nowhere to go.
"What now?" Jennifer asked.
The sorcerer, who had been even quieter and more withdrawn than usual for the last hour, didn't answer immediately. He studied the angle of the sun and tried to see how far the thick growth of trees that faced them stretched on either side.
"If my bearings are correct," he finally said, "this is it."
"The Valley of Darkness and Despair?"
Norman nodded.
"Where do we get in?" Jennifer's voice was faint because she still wasn't exactly sure she wanted to get in at all.
Norman tugged on his beard a bit. "My first guess would be right here. I know it doesn't look very likely, but I think it doesn't look any more likely anywhere else."
Jennifer remembered what Norman had said about the road having a mind of its own. "It seems to have led us here," she said. "Doesn't it?"
"Yes," he said. With that, he pushed aside a branch and stepped through the row of trees that marked the edge of the Valley of Darkness and Despair.
In the Valley of Darkness and Despair
A REGULAR PATH never reappeared, but the position of the bushes, trees, and undergrowth didn't allow them to make any decisions about which way to go. In a sense this was an advantage, since the trees blocked out the sun and they quickly lost all feeling of north, south, east, and west. The only directions they could be sure of were up and down. And it was soon obvious that wherever they were going, it was gradually, but unchangingly, downhill.
Jennifer was just beginning to wonder if there was no more to life than lifting one foot after the other over thick tree roots and squeezing between the clinging branches of tall, scrubby-looking bushes when, suddenly, she realized that the trees up ahead had a different light to them.
Norman had noticed, too, but there was no need to say anything, for this seemed to be where the forest was leading them.
A second later Jennifer saw that the new light was coming from a clearing.
She reached into her pocket to touch the magic bottle and quietly followed Norman out of the shadow of the trees.
Before them was a thatched-roof house that took up most of the clearing.
As soon as her mind registered this, Jennifer corrected herself. Something was out of scale; the perspective was all wrong. She closed her eyes, counted to five, and looked again.
The house was not right there before them; it was still some distance away. And the clearing was enormous; it just looked small because the house took up so much of it.
The chimney reached as high as the trees, and the windows were almost as tall and wide as Norman's whole cottage. Each post of the white fence around the house was made from a hefty tree trunk pounded into the ground. There was a cobblestone walk starting where they stood and going to the front door, but it was much wider than the main road in Jennifer's village and it ended in a step that was almost as tall as she was.
"Oh-oh," Norman said.
Jennifer couldn't have put it better. She was about to take a step back into the cover of the trees when a rough, dry voice bellowed, "Hey!"
The two of them turned around and found themselves staring at the top laces of someone's boot.
Jennifer tilted her head, and leaned back, and looked up, up—till she reached the man's face, almost ten times as high up as where she would have found it on an average man.
Now giants have never been known for their beauty. Even to other giants, they aren't very appealing. But this giant was especially ugly. He had longish, straggly hair that left greasy stains on his collar, and his huge belly strained at the belt, from which hung a ten-foot-long hunting knife. In shape, color, and texture the giant's nose resembled a moldy potato; even his ears had warts.
He leaned way down to place his face close to theirs and tapped a finger with a cracked yellow nail on Norman's chest. "What," he demanded, "do ya think yer doing here?"
The sorcerer met his red-veined eyes without flinching, though the giant's "tap" had almost knocked him over. "Just passing through," he explained.
"Well, ya can't."
"Okay," Norman agreed readily, more than willing at this point to forget everything and go back home.
"Not so fast," the giant said. "Here youse are trespassing on my land, just traipsing through without a by-yer-leave, or an apology, or nothing."
"Sorry," Norman said.
Jennifer nodded to show she was sorry, too.
"Sorry don't pay the taxes. Now that yer already here, I gotta charge ya the toll."
Norman and Jennifer exchanged a worried look. "We don't have any money."
The giant shook his huge head in disgust. "People!" he muttered. "Always trying to get away with something. All right, I'll tell ya what I'm gonna do." The dirty finger found Norman's chest again. "I'll let you go and get the money if ya leave the girl behind as security."
Jennifer gulped.
Without hesitation, Norman said, politely, "No, I don't think so."
"Then it's into the supper pot with both of youse," the giant said, and tucked each of them under a hairy arm.
He carried them into his house and put them in a huge pot on the kitchen table while he got the fire burning brightly.
Jennifer started to pull the magic bottle out of her pocket, but Norman shook his head. "We'd better save that in case we need it later," he whispered.
"I don't know much about these things, but just as a guess I'd say we need it now." Jennifer whispered also, but the giant was whistling to himself as he peeled watermelon-size potatoes, so he couldn't hear them anyway.
"No, not really," Norman said, raising his voice considerably and standing on tiptoe to see over the edge of the pot. "Giants are very stupid, you know."
Somehow this didn't seem the right thing to say, considering the circumstances, and Jennifer put her finger to her lips even though the giant gave no indication that he had heard.
"No, really," Norman insisted even more loudly. "There are a lot of stupid creatures in the world, but none more stupid than a giant."
"Eh?" the giant asked, as Jennifer made frantic shushing motions. "Were youse guys talking to me?"
"I was talking to Jennifer," Norman explained.
"Oh." The giant started to turn back.
"I was telling her how incredibly slow giants are."
Jennifer groaned.
"Slow?" the giant said. "How do ya mean, slow?"
"Dull. Stupid. You know, slow."
"Not to start an argument or nothing," the giant said, his feelings somewhat bruised, "but yer the ones in the soup kettle."
This was a good point, but Norman ignored it. "Exactly." He turned to Jennifer and said, louder than necessary, "Would you look at that? He's peeling potatoes and carrots. Giants have no sense of class. Do you know what the head waiter in a fancy restaurant says when he sees a giant coming?"
Jennifer shook her head.
"He says, 'Bring out the leftovers. Get the wilted lettuce and the day-old bread. This one's too stupid to know the difference.'"
"Is that what he says?" Jennifer asked, although her heart wasn't in it.
Norman nodded somberly. "Giants are a laughingstock. Nobody takes them seriously. Potatoes and carrots, indeed!"
The giant came over and pulled the two of them out of the pot. He set them on the table where he could see them better. "What's wrong with potatoes and carrots?"
"Well, if I have to be somebody's dinner," Norman said, "I should hope it would be in a meal with a little more sophistication than potluck stew."
The giant wasn't really all that bad a fellow, and he didn't want to hurt Norman's pride, so he explained, "But I like stew."
"You like stew," Norman repeated. He turned to Jennifer. "There you have it. Potatoes and carrots. Well, it's his upbringing, I imagine. He can't help it. I suppose he doesn't know any better."
The giant couldn't understand what all the fuss was about, so he just shrugged and started to turn back to his preparations.
"The least you could do," Norman said hurriedly, before he lost the giant's attention completely, "is add some"—he tried to think of something with the sound of fancy gourmet cooking—"some chopped essence of creme-de-menthe parfait."
Of course, there was no such thing in those days any more than there is today. It's something the great chefs of the world have simply never bothered to invent, but it was the best he could come up with on the spur of the moment.
Jennifer gave him a startled look but said nothing.
The giant had no idea what Norman was talking about, but he certainly wasn't going to admit that.
Norman broke the silence. "Haven't you ever heard of...? No, of course not. Sorry I brought it up." He smiled sweetly.
The nature of giants being what it is, he answered indignantly, "Of course I heard of it. It's, uh, chopped. And it's, ahm..." He couldn't remember any of the other words Norman had used. "It's for cooking. Comes in a little box." He figured this description was probably general enough to fit just about anything and hoped it would convince these two that he wasn't all that dumb.
Indeed, the old man was looking impressed. "I'm surprised you've heard of it." He gave another sweet smile. "I don't suppose you've ever actually tried any."
"Oh, yeah, sure," the giant said, determined no not to let Norman get the upper hand. "I eat it all the time. Never start a meal without it."
Norman nodded as if he approved, then said, "Well'
The giant considered. "Oh," he said. "Ahmmm." Then he snapped his fingers as if disappointed. "Wouldn't ya know—I just ran out of my last box of it this morning."
Norman turned to Jennifer with a triumphant cry. "There! See! What did I tell you? Giants try to act as if they've got class, but inside they're all the same."
"Sorry," the giant said. Even if he was about to eat these people, he didn't want them thinking badly of him. "I woulda gotten some more, but, ahm, I didn't know where to get any this time of year."
"Oh," Norman said. "In early spring? Barcelona."
"Barcelona?" the giant croaked.
"You have heard of Barcelona?"
"Well, yeah, but the distance..."
"For a giant of your size?" Norman said. "A hop, skip, and a jump away. You'll be there and back in no time."
Every giant likes to think of himself as being the biggest and the best, and this one was no exception, so he didn't really want to argue the point. "I dunno," he started doubtfully.
"The other giants'll be green with envy."
The giant scratched his head and wondered how he had gotten into this. "Barcelona, huh?"
Norman nodded. "And that will be just long enough for us to take a nap before supper." He gave a great yawn as he sat down on the table with his back resting on the kettle. "We've been traveling all day, and we're very tired."
When Jennifer continued to stand there, just looking at him, he glared at her and repeated, more slowly, "Very tired."
"What?" Jennifer said in a slow, lazy voice. "I'm sorry, I'm so tired I wasn't listening." She stretched and yawned, then slowly sank down beside Norman.
The giant rubbed the stubble on his face and fought back a yawn of his own. "You'll show me how to cook this stuff?" he asked, putting on his coat.
With his eyes closed, Norman nodded. Jennifer sat very quietly by his side and worked on looking sleepy and helpless.
"I really appreciate this," the giant called from the door.
"No problem," Norman assured him. "Believe me, it's my pleasure."
He remained very still until the giant's heavy footsteps could no longer be heard, then he sprang to his feet and ran to the edge of the fifty-foot-long table.
"It's sort of high, but not too bad," he told Jennifer, pointing to the chair that was pulled up nearby.
They jumped from the table to the chair, and then climbed down the chair leg. The giant had made the furniture himself, and since he wasn't a very careful craftsman, the chair leg wasn't sanded down smoothly; there were plenty of ridges to give Jennifer and Norman firm footholds to make their descent easier.
Norman scampered back up the chair (tripping over his feet several times until he divided his beard in two and tied it around his neck like a woolly scarf so that he could see). From there he was able to reach the doorknob, and after considerable strain, he managed to turn the dartboard-size knob with both hands.
Jennifer, pushing against the door, felt it give, and she fell headlong into the backyard.
Then Norman was by her side and the two of them made a dash for the trees, hoping that once they got back into the cover of the forest the giant would never be able to find them.
All the while they ran, Norman kept calculating: If the giant spotted them now and started chasing them at this very instant, could they make it to the distant trees before he reached them? How about now?
Jennifer kept one hand pressed against her aching side and the other in her pocket, clutching the magic bottle, and wondered—since their progress seemed so slow—if they were running without moving, the way it happens in dreams.
Finally they were there—among the safety of the trees, and still there was no sign of the giant. The two of them ran several steps more before tumbling, exhausted, to the ground.
Still in the Valley of Darkness and Despair
THEY STILL COULDN'T SEE the sky, but they could tell from the increasing dimness that night had almost caught up with them.
Around them they could hear the underbrush crackle with the movements of unseen creatures. Sometimes, out of the corner of an eye, one of them would spot a dark streak jumping for cover as they passed. Birds were bringing the last meal of the evening to their chicks. All the small animals who scamper about in the sunlight were settling down for a comfortable sleep in their nests or burrows. The night predators were getting ready to prowl.