Jack (19 page)

“Not likely,” I said. “From all I've seen, the queen is right about him. We'd best stay hidden. Hopefully the king will reveal where Papa is. If not, we should follow him and try to get inside his chambers.”

“Yeah,” said Tom. “We can hang on to the hem of his robes.”

I glared at Tom. “I thought you were going back to Martha to eat cheese.”

Tom's cheeks reddened, and he mumbled something about wanting to see the Golden Court. I shrugged him off. He could come if he wanted, but I wouldn't mind if he got spotted as a pixie and swatted away.

The queen emerged from behind her screen dressed in a gown of pure gold with a high collar, embroidered bodice, gaping sleeves that dipped to the floor, and the skirt full and trailing at the back like a golden river.

“How beautiful she is!” said Annabella.

“You could look like that, too,” I said. “You just have to be okay with fly suppers and a frog tongue. Maybe Gusta has a son you can marry.”

“Har har,” said Annabella.

When the queen caught sight of herself in the mirror, she covered her eyes as though she had seen a monster. She scooped up her baby protectively. “Don't worry, Archie, I won't let anyone harm you again! Never ever!”

“Fum!” said the baby, and he tugged on his mother's long braid. The queen then put a gold romper and cap on Archie. I wondered what King Barf would do if they showed up to the court in anything but gold.

“Now, little elves, I think the best way to keep you hidden in the court will be inside my crown.” She took a set of keys from a drawer in the table and unlocked a chest. She pulled out a box and unlocked that, and then unlocked another box and finally pulled out a crown made of gold filigree. It had five points that were high enough to cover us. “It feels like I'm wearing a curse,” said the queen, and she shivered as she placed the crown upon her head. She then lifted us up, and we kneeled
behind the three middle gold points. The filigree had enough holes that we could see through, but the giants wouldn't see us.

“Now, take care, little elves! I hope you do not come to regret asking for my help.”

With Archie still in her arms, the queen exited her chamber and glided down the grand golden staircase. Servants, lords, and ladies stopped to bow as she passed. There were stares and whispers. Clearly the queen did not get out much.

She made several turns and walked down many long corridors. I would never remember the way, but hopefully it wouldn't matter. We were getting closer to Papa—I could feel it.

T
he queen took a deep breath and knocked softly on a giant golden door. It swung open.

The Golden Court was just what you'd expect: golden. The walls were gold, the floors and ceilings were gold, and the tapestries and draperies were woven in gold brocade. The mirrors and the window frames, the tables and chairs and vases, were all gleaming gold, and a golden chandelier hung from the ceiling like an upside-down tree, lit with a hundred twinkling candles. Gold dust must have been mixed into the wax, because the candles were gold, too.

Sentries dressed in gold livery stood at attention by the door with gold spears crossed to bar entrance. They lifted the spears to let us pass and then slashed them back into position.

There was music playing, a harp and a lute. It took me a moment to see who was playing them because the musicians' gold outfits made them blend in with the rest of the room.

Gold statues lined the walls of the court. There was King Barf perched atop a rearing stallion. King Barf dressed in full armor with a sword raised and ready to strike. King Barf holding sacks of gold coins, tossing them to bowing beggars. Obviously these were not true likenesses. The statues also made the king look taller and stronger than he actually was. The sculptor probably guessed that the king would not be pleased with an exact representation.

The real King Barf sat upon a golden throne on a dais. I nearly mistook him for a statue, since he was covered head to foot in gold. But then he sneezed and his brown hen—quite drab among all the gold—clucked.

The hen looked scrawnier than the last time I'd seen her, but the king still held her in his lap and petted her as though she were the most precious thing in the world.

A pixie with purple hair and wings fluttered up to the hen, chirping excitedly.

“Servant!” shouted the king. “Remove the pixie!”

A servant rushed forward and smacked at the pixie with a gold paddle while the hen squawked and flapped hysterically. The pixie dodged the first few thrashes until
finally the servant smacked her squarely from behind. Annabella gasped softly beside me. The pixie shrieked and fell down. She tried desperately to flap her damaged wings, but to no avail. The servant scooped up the pixie and flung her out the window.

The king comforted the hen with gentle strokes. “There, there my Treasure. I won't let those nasty pixies harm you.”

The queen approached the dais.

“What are you doing here?” The king seemed annoyed. “Why have you brought that…that
creature
into my court?”

Annabella gasped beside me. “Has he seen us?” she whispered.

“We can jump now if he has,” said Tom. “We can slide down the queen's gown and make a run for it.”

“No,” I said, remembering how the king had spoken of his son at supper. “He's talking about the baby.”

The queen sat down on the smaller throne next to the king and held Prince Archie on her lap. “I thought our son should know how a kingdom is ruled,” she said, “since it will be his kingdom one day.”

“That won't be necessary,” said King Barf, sneering at the baby. “I've decided I shall never die.”

“How will you manage that?”

“Magician will see to it.”

Kessler the magician was juggling three golden eggs and singing a song about marrying a bird. His fingers on his left hand were still carrots, though two of them had been nibbled down to normal size.

“All magic comes with a price,” said the queen. “Even gold.”

“Aha! I knew it!” shouted the king. “You are jealous of my gold. Jealous that you can no longer make your own.”

“No! I want nothing to do with your gold,” said the queen.

“You lie!”

The queen trembled. She seemed to have forgotten why she had come at all. I tapped her on the head to remind her that we were here. That seemed to help.

“I only wanted to ask a question,” said the queen. “You see, I heard talk about some elves—”

There was a knock at a door, a different one than we had come through.

“Your Goldness!” said the magician. “It is your loyal subjects, come to bring you more gold!”

“Well, what are you waiting for? Let them in, you fools!”

The guards opened the doors, and a stream of people came into the court. Some looked to be nobility and some ragged peasants, but even the lowliest among them had some gold stitched or embroidered on their clothing in honor of the king. They all carried sacks and baskets full of gold—gold coins, gold trinkets and chains, gold boxes and statues and tea sets. The guards sorted the people according to who had the most gold.

The first to approach the king was a nobleman wearing blue velvet robes with gold embroidery and a poufy golden hat. He snapped his fingers, and two servants
brought forth sacks of gold. They dropped them at the king's feet and some coins spilled out. The king smiled.

“Very good. Next!”

“But—but, Your Highness,” stammered the man.

“Your
Goldness,
” corrected the magician.

“Your Goldness. Some food, perhaps? I've eaten nothing but watery gruel for
months.
”

“Whatever for? You look rich to me,” said the king.

“I am,” said the man. “I mean I think I am, but in all my acres of land—”

“You mean
my
land,” said the king.

“Yes, of course, Your Goldness. In all the acres of
your
land that I oversee, I can't grow a single stalk of kale.”

“What is kale?” asked the king.

“You know,” said the farmer. “A leafy green vegetable.”

“Oh, how horrid!” The king shuddered. “Why do people eat
leaves
? And green ones, too. It's disgusting!”

“Well, in any case, the kale is dead,” said the man. “Shriveled up as though poisoned!”

The king sighed in relief. “Well, of course it's dead! This is a
golden
kingdom! Not a green one. Plant something gold next time.”

“But might we have some food, Your Goldness? To tide us over in these difficult times?”

The king gave a long-suffering sigh. “Very well. Magician, the food.”

The magician brought forth a sack and swung it around his head a few times before he dumped it at the man's feet. A good amount of food spilled out of the
sack, but not giant food. The man bent down and picked up a handful of tiny potatoes. He stared at them.

“Th-thank you, Your Majesty,” said the man as his servants scooped every bit of spilled food back into the sack.

“Next!” bellowed the king.

Another giant stepped forward, this one dressed in breeches that were cinched at the waist with rope, as though he'd recently lost weight. He bowed low and placed a golden urn at the king's feet. “Your Goldness, I have just come from my fields—”

“You mean
my
fields,” said the king. “Unless of course, they're
green.
”

“Of course, Your Goldness. Your fields. In the spring I planted wheat and barley, as I do every year. The grass sprouted and grew tall and turned golden.”

“Oh good, very good. Go on,” said the king.

“When I went to harvest the wheat, I noticed the strangest thing. There were no seeds, no wheat kernels at all!”

“You must have a pest problem,” said the king. “Pixies, probably.”

“But I haven't seen any pixies in ages,” said the giant. “They've all come here, where the real gold is.”

“Yes, the pests!” growled the king. “I shall purge my kingdom of them all.” He found a pixie fluttering near his hand and flicked it toward the giant, who dodged it as the pixie went sailing past.

“It seems,” said the farmer, “as though my wheat somehow…disappeared.”

“Ooh! Magic!” said the magician. “I can make things disappear! Once I disappeared my own head!” He took a bite of his pinky carrot finger.

“How did you get it back?” asked the farmer.

“I didn't! It's lost! Hehehehahahahaaaa!”

“Next!” said the king, sending the farmer on his way with a sack of food.

Person after person came to the king, each with an offering of gold and all with similar problems. Their crops had failed, or even disappeared. One farmer said he sowed seed for melons and they never sprouted, and when he dug in the dirt, the seeds were gone.

The king did not seem very concerned. He simply advised each of his subjects to eliminate pixies and green things of all kinds. Frederick and Bruno would then give them a basket of food, which contained a whole winter's worth of food for me but very little for the giants. One man picked up a good-sized pumpkin between his thumb and forefinger and squeezed it so it squirted in his eye.

Finally a woman approached carrying not an offering of gold but a simple earthen pot, and in the pot was a young sapling, tender and green. She bowed low before the king and held out the plant with trembling hands.

“What is that?” said the king with a sneer.

“Your Goldness, I have guarded and cared for this young sapling in the hope that it might one day bear fruit to feed my family, but we have no other food. I beg of you to take this young tree, and give me food in return so that I may eat and not die.”

“Who let her in?” the king demanded of his guards. “How dare you bring me such an offering!” The king knocked the plant out of the woman's arms so it crashed to the floor. The woman stared at it in horror.

“Out! Out!” shouted the king. “Leave me in peace! All of you!”

The guards immediately herded the people toward the exit, pointing spears at them to force them out, then slammed the doors.

The king let out an enormous sigh. “That was awful. I need something to refresh me. Let's make more gold! Treasure, lay!”

Bergeek!

The hen froze up for several seconds and finally released an egg. The king slipped it into his pocket. “Lay! Lay! Lay!”

The hen laid three more eggs, though it seemed to cause her great pain.

“Jack, look!” said Annabella. She pointed down at the king's feet, where the sapling lay. The tender green leaves were browning and shriveling before our very eyes. Finally it was nothing more than a dried-up stalk in a heap of dirt.

“Lay!” the king commanded, and with a pitiful cluck the hen gave one final egg and then flopped unconscious in his lap. “What is wrong with this creature?” spat the king. “She used to give much more gold.”

“Oh, we just need to feed her some magic,” said Kessler. “Magic makes the gold!”

“Then feed her,” said the king. “I want to turn this
entire palace into gold, Magician! The entire kingdom! If I am to be the Golden King, then I need a Golden Kingdom to rule, and therefore I must have more gold!”

“Jack, do you think…,” whispered Annabella. “Do you think all the king's gold has something to do with the famine?”

“How could it?” said Tom. “It's just gold. Not poison.”

“But didn't you just see that plant shrivel up and die?” said Annabella. “And right while the king was making the hen lay eggs.”

“Coincidence,” said Tom.

“Or not,” I said. As much as I didn't like to admit it, Annabella could be onto something. But what was I supposed to do—kill the king's pet chicken? Somehow I didn't think that would induce him to tell us where Papa was.

“I think the queen has forgotten us again.” I rapped on her head to get her attention. She started and then said to the king, “I heard that you found an elf in your stocking drawer. That must have upset you.”

“Yes, the little thief was trying to steal my gold. I took care of him.”

“In what way?” said the queen.

I held my breath.

“Why I threw him in the— STOP him!” The king was pointing at Archie. “He's eating my gold!” The baby prince was crawling around in the pile of gold offerings, sucking on a coin like a pacifier.