The Kingdom on the Edge of Reality (13 page)

"Nah, I just go to a lot of movies."

"Moo . . . What was that now?"

"All right, you got me there, Harvey," I said, pushing back my sleeve. After I had received my punishment, we shared a moment of mutual appreciation for just how crazy life can be.

"Are you ready for your next surprise?" he said.

"No, I'm not, so just forget it."

"Glad to hear it. I'd like to present the Earl and Lady Dugdale."

The person he was indicating was another man our age, slim, blonde, and aristocratic. He put out a diffident hand. "Nice to see you again, Darcey." I took the hand, which was just a shade limp in the grip, and stared. "Alton Dugdale?" I asked. He nodded as though he was pretty sure that was his name, but not positive. It was the name of yet another boy from our class, but my memory contained no face to go along with it. If this was the same person, then I had sneaked into his dormitory room one night and filled it with the contents of two feather pillows. While he slept, I had scattered feathers in his closet, stuffed them in his drawers, and even sprinkled them on his bed. I couldn't remember why I had picked him out for that prank. I couldn't remember anything at all about him except for his name.

"I'd like you to meet my wife, Lady Dugdale. My dear, this is Sir Jack Darcey."

"Lady Dugdale," I said, making her a slight bow.

"Oh, please call me Charlsey. We're very informal here. That's probably the understatement of the year, unfortunately, but there it is. We do the best we can, don't we, Alton? I'm
so
pleased to meet
you,
Sir Jack. I heard that someone new was arriving, but I didn't realize until Alton told me just now that you were an old school friend of his. Imagine! Another person from his old school, that's quite something, isn't it, Alton? We don't see very many new faces here. Actually we
never
see a new face from one year to the next, do we? But yours is a new face, and I certainly hope—in fact, I insist— I mean you really must come visit us soon. Anyone can show you the way, anyone at all, just ask for the Dugdale manse, the market road goes right past our door, you can't miss it."

She had put out her hand to me, palm down, and I had taken her fingertips in mine, and was holding her hand while she talked. She had short, curly brown hair and a rosebud mouth, and she must have been a knockout when she was a co-ed. She was still very pretty, but there was an air of desperation about her, as though she couldn't understand where the years had flown or why. It also seemed like she would never stop talking unless someone did something to break her rhythm, so I doffed my hat and leaned over to kiss her hand. "Your servant, my lady," I said.

"Oh, thank you!" she said, delighted. "Alton, did you see what he did? It would certainly be nice if
you
did that once in a while. Do you think you could?"

"Of course I could, Charlsey, if that would make you happy."

She put out her hand and he took it very gently and kissed it as though it was fragile and priceless. It was clear that he cherished her, and I wondered how much she was inclined to take advantage of him. Their eyes met over her hand, and for just a moment in both their faces, there was such a naked look of pain and bewilderment that it shocked me right out of being cynical about their relationship, and made my heart go out to both of them.

Had Harvey Griswold seen what I had seen? No, he was busy smirking away at the world, something he had been doing since I first met him on the playing fields of Chesham. "That was a nice surprise, Harvey. Got anything else up your sleeve?"

"Oh, yes," he said with a grin, "but first a pop quiz." He licked two fingers. "Is a mere landless knight allowed to call an earl by his first name, especially in front of the townies?"

"Town-what?" said I. It was pretty thin but I thought I would give it a try. We preppies used that word to refer to the people who lived in the little town near our school, especially the girls. It was mildly derogatory. Harvey had used the word to evoke our old school days, and we had been modern boys. So didn't that make it a modern word? I licked two fingers.

"I think not," said Harvey.

"Referees!" I called out.

"Dugdale," said Harvey. "Can Darcey lick me up for saying townies?"

"As in town girls?"

"Yes, Duckie."

"Well, no, I don't think so."

"Towns haven't been invented yet," I pointed out.

"Good try but not quite," said Harvey.

"Kindly show me the way to the nearest town," I said to Dugdale.

"There isn't one."

"See?"

"No way. Dugdale is the referee and he says no."

"If this earl votes in your favor, my lord earl, I'm going over his head to the king."

Dugdale looked uncomfortable. "I still say no," he said, pulling his shoulders back. "One more word and you get an extra one for being a poor sport, Darcey."

"Double and quits or I go to the king."

"We don't play double and quits," Harvey said. "Anyway, the king's busy."

I looked around the crowd at the castle steps for Albert and spotted him talking very earnestly with a trio of men.

"Pray prithee and pardon me, your majesty," I said, walking up to him, "but what sayst thou? Have towns been invented yet or not?"

Albert turned to look at me, but it was a few moments before he could sort out his thoughts. Finally he said, "What's come over you, Jack? You look positively giddy."

"Those two earls aren't playing fair and I need some help."

Albert gave his head an exasperated little shake. "What is it about? I'm quite busy right now, Jack."

"Just tell Griswold I can lick him up or go double and quits."

"I can't stop for games now," Albert said impatiently. "Come see me another time."

His impatience made me stubborn. "Oh, come on, my liege. Bring your friends and we can all play."

Albert leaned over and looked me straight in the eye. "Kindly leave us immediately unless you want to go sit in the dungeon."

There were a number of people watching us now and that made me even more obstinate. Who did this guy think he was, anyway?

"Lighten up, Albert," I said.

There was a dead pause in the air around us, a kind of silent gasp from the people who were watching. I realized right away that I had done something foolhardy. A look came into Albert's face that made me wish I could retrieve the moment and make a different choice.

Albert turned in the direction of the castle and called out in a voice that was surprisingly deep and resonant, "Guards!" In no time at all I was gripped by several strong and heavy hands. Albert didn't even have to speak to them. He just gave his head a little jerk.

The guards took me down a flight of stone steps below ground level. One carried a torch, which was the only source of light down there; two others held me by the arms. They weren't mean or pushy, and because I knew I had been really stupid, I went along quietly without a fuss.

The dungeon door was made of wood and iron, and it was so short that I had to stoop down to go through it. The guards slammed it shut and threw a couple of bolts on the outside, and there I was in the pitch dark. I pulled my cloak tightly around me, and just stood there feeling numb inside.

I knew that my experience in the dark underground wasn't going to be pleasant, but I also knew that the time would pass. Albert would let me out of there sooner or later, and next time I would obey him when he told me to get lost. In the meantime there was not much I could do to improve my situation, or to make it worse for that matter, so I just stood there wrapped in my cloak and waited.

How had I ever gotten myself into this mess? I'd been farting around with Griswold and Dugdale like we were teenagers again, and I had taken a leave of my senses. I had forgotten where I was. Given the changes I had experienced over the past three days, I wasn't doing that badly, was I? How could anybody be expected to keep track of all his marbles after a journey of a thousand years into the past?

Off to my left I heard a scurrying sound and I hoped that there weren't very many of them.
Filthy and stinking and rat-nipped:
that had been Albert's description of how people came out of his dungeon. Yes, it was certainly redolent of all kinds of human by-products, along with rotten straw, mildew, and rat stink. I could already tell why people avoided a second visit.

I don't keep a person in there any longer than I think will do him good.
How long would Albert think it would do me good to stay in here? A few hours? Overnight? It was amazing to me that my friend actually had the power to stick me in here in the first place.

Standing there in the darkness with the rats and the stink, I recalled some of the questions that the abbot had asked me the previous day. Unhappy with my prospects and thoroughly smitten by a lovely woman, I had decided to come to Albert's kingdom without asking a single important question about what I was getting myself into. Becoming a knight, dressing in fancy clothes, and riding alongside the king had all been good fun, but being slammed suddenly up in an honest-to-God dungeon at a nod of Albert's head was giving me second thoughts. Did the kingdom have a bill of rights? Were there any real laws at all, or were all decisions simply made according to Albert's whimsy? Suppose he got really pissed off at me for slapping his boy around, or worse, for screwing around with Jenna. Could he just put my head on a block and order someone to chop it off?

I decided to go exploring. I wanted to know how big the cell was, and whether there was something to sit or lie down on. By inching forward with my arms outstretched, I found one wall, and then I began to work my way around the perimeter.

I shuffled through some straw which was damp to the touch. Something climbed up on my boot, and I hurled it away with as much force as possible, though I doubt I did it much harm. I found a wide bench that hung from the wall by two chains and a rickety three-legged stool. After I had been around all four walls, I went around a second time to pace it off. The dungeon was roughly twelve feet on a side, which was bigger than I had expected. Finally I crisscrossed the cell several times, but I didn't find anything else. No bread, no water, no table, no candle. It was about as basic a dungeon as one could imagine.

I found the bench on the wall again and clambered up on it, making sure my cloak wasn't trailing on the floor. Could the rats get up there with me? Very soon I discovered they could. One fat horror dropped down right on my belly, and caused a scramble in the dark that left me breathless and shaken.

The guards had taken my sword and dagger, so I wrapped my belt several times around my hand with the intention of using the heavy buckle as a club. It did not work well. In the dark I was just as likely to hit myself as anything else, and after I had knocked myself a good one on the knee, I gave up. The rats were not really attacking me; I didn't need to fight them off. The problem was that they wouldn't leave me alone for very long, and it prevented me from ever relaxing.

After what seemed like many hours, I managed to achieve a kind of tense balance between sleeping and waking which was less like resting than it was like being in hell. I did my best to ignore the rats, but when one of them bit me, I had to flounder around and shake it off. Finally the guards came to take me to Albert, and I knew by their faces that the smell of the dungeon had seeped right into my clothes.

The throne room was a hexagonal hall with sconces on the walls. Albert sat comfortably on his throne with his chin in his hand and gazed at me for a short while before dismissing the guards.

"You look awful," he said. "And you smell. I'll have someone show you where you can bathe and have a nap. Your clothes will be washed and they'll be ready for you when you wake up."

"Thank you, my liege."

"Then I want you to take a few days and just ride around. See the kingdom. Follow your nose. Talk to people. When you get back, I want you to tell me your thoughts, and we'll discuss what it means to be a knight in this kingdom."

"All right, Sire."

"You don't need to be embarrassed about your time in the dungeon. Quite a few people have had to learn their lesson in there. Griswold has been in the dungeon twice, and so far that's the record. Like you, he has a childish inclination to thumb his nose at authority."

"How long was I in there?"

"You went in sometime yesterday afternoon. It's mid-afternoon now. That was a bad thing you did, Jack, back talking me in front of those people. A little seed like that could grow a lot of evil."

"I apologize."

"All the rules in this kingdom are as clear and simple as I can make them. Their purpose is the survival and prosperity of the whole community. There are no lawyers, no loopholes, no appeals, and no plea bargaining. Our kind of justice is far from perfect, but it is fairly consistent, and most of the time fairly efficient. We don't allow people to flout authority here because chaos in the commonwealth means starvation and death. I don't allow people to back talk me because I frankly don't have the time or the patience for it, and because I myself take responsibility for everything that goes on in this whole kingdom."

Albert's eyes were flashing now; I had never seen him like this. And though I was dead on my feet and just wanted to lie down someplace where I wouldn't be disturbed, I couldn't help feeling very proud of him.

"Now go get a bath and rest. Talk to Sir Leo before you leave on your quest. He'll see that you have everything you need. Rescue some fair damsels. Get some cats down out of trees. Let your guide be your own high sense of ethics. Any questions?"

Something in what he said made me wonder whether he had already heard about the incident with the girl in the woods. I still needed to talk to him about that, and I promised myself I'd catch him in the morning before I left. "Not right now, your majesty."

He rang a little bell and a young maid came in. She seemed to know what to do without having to be told. "Will you please come with me, sir?" she said, and I followed her out of the hall. She was very efficient in a polite and friendly way and didn't wrinkle up her nose or ask me any questions, but just steered me into a tub of hot water and made off with my clothes. I lay in the tub and soaked and snoozed. When the girl came back, she washed my hair with some pleasant-smelling soap, helped me into a robe, and led me to a little room with a pallet bed. As I slipped under the blankets, she said, "You poor thing, you got quite a many bites. I'll find the mage and tell her where you are. She'll come look in on you."