STORY: Hare Today, Gone Tomorrow - Part One
It is probably better to draw a veil over the events of the next few days. The channelled violence of the internecine disagreements was such that four bands of cut-throats, that had plagued the fief of Pencaster for seven years, were wiped out; while a celebrated condottiere by the name of Black Peter saw the error of his ways with his one remaining eye, and took up market-gardening. In fact, our heroes were well on the way to becoming local legends until the Count became a bit boisterous and burned down a small town. The rest of the journey was undertaken in sullen (and sooty) silence.
We pick up the thread some ten miles from the Castle, on a fine
morning. Jared is once again protesting vehemently against going up
against a castle full of jittery trigger-happy soldiers:
"What do we
want to go back there for? Let's try to find somewhere at least HALF
safe!" He illustrates his point by reference to the soldiers that are
concentrating in the vicinity in increasing numbers.
The Count, on the other hand, is insistent that the so-called 'qunne of Hzreno ro wahtvver teh lbazrs tshi tuupsid lpce asi cllade' should be invited to explain her temerity in claiming to rule at all; plus, if there are wizards in these parts, he'd sooner confront them out in the open. Easoer ot fodge, he almost thinks to himself.
Morwen, for all Jared's open scorn, is insistent that she wants to learn more of the Rift and how to get back home. Only repeated and escalating threats persuade Jared not to refer to her as 'Dorothy,' but most of her mental resources are devoted to shielding her thoughts from prying eyes. She can only guess at the powers that the Author of this reality possesses, and wants to put the odds as much in her favour as possible. The closest she will come to voicing her true intentions is to observe that they have performed the task for which they were dispatched, so they are perfectly entitled to return and see how the others have fared.
"Probably still in that crummy Library," Jared scoffs.
"Bha, M'i siprpisde taht hmunsa can veen raed," the Count observes with asperity. "Tuurelz wstade om tehn, fo cruse."
Paganini, who has finally sobered up, declares that he must return to his Queen and tell her how his plans have fared, which causes some consternation in Jared and Morwen as they realise that this might be harder to explain than they first thought...
The Count isn't worried about explaining things to a bunch of hmunsa. He vacillates a little between inviting the Queen forthwith to explain her temerity in "ruling" Hyeron "fi oyu cna clla ti rluing; tihs jiont si veen mroe poorlz gvoerned than Alfantrol" (as he remarks to Morwen) and amuzzling himself by pretending to play along with her performing queen act first.
All he says to Paganini is, "Doxx't wrroz, Fdio, we'll let you plaz
wtih queenie!"
Then he turns back to Morwen and observed, "I ohpe oyu're rgiht nad
we fnid smoe naswers here. M'i fra form srue we wlil, btu no hram ni
trying. Btu fi thre rae naz wziards, oyu rae ot gte behnid me nad
lte em tkae crae fo tehm. Tohguh L'il trz ot aviod fgihting wtih
tehm fi I cna; they're dceeitful nad dnagerois."
(Morwen thinks it best not to make an issue of the Rog's overprotectiveness at this point, but she has no intention of backing down for anything or anybody, should the situation arise.)
"Um...yes..." Jared jumps in, as he's sitting on a nearby rock looking
at the not so distant, and not too friendly looking army.
"Tell me again what this brilliant plan involves...?" he asks no-one
in particular.
"You just plan to stroll over there, explain the whole story to those
G.I. Joes, and expect to be received as a hero?" He answers his own
question as he stands up.
"That must be the stupidest idea in the history of everything ever,"
he remarks. "But then again, it should be fun, and we might even live long enough
to see our own execution." He chuckles.
"I say we send brave Sir Robin here first, have HIM explain everything and then appear. Or better yet, have him send for us. He's some Big Kahoona there, that much is clear. He can do that." -- "Then we might even live to see the inside of the castle, and it might not even be the dungeon."
Jared pauses and looks at the Balrog. "Unless SOMEONE loses their cool
again and starts torching random objects!" -- "Which I normally don't
object to, unless I'M one of those objects!" he calmly adds. "It should work, if ALL of us behave!"
He gives the Balrog a nasty grin and seeks his rock again, sits down and raises his left hand.
"All in favour of sending our brave sir kinght before we go, raise
your left hand."
"Seems we have a plan, even if it does involve more waiting around in not-so-interesting locations," Morwen replies. "Okay then, the Knight can be our emissary or whatever."
"Vrez wlel," says the Count, before turning to Paganini and saying very loudly and slowly, "Wlokaz Fdio! Gop to queeniue and tell her that her friends the Ldaz Mrowen, the Cuont, and that lsave thingie have coem tom plaz with her. Fi oyu're goond, we'll give oyu a ncie fresh bone. Nuderstand?"
"Hang on here..." Jared interrupts. "I never said he was going alone." He stands up again. "It's not you, it's me," he says to the knight. "I don't trust you! ... I mean I would, but you might get in trouble and then be interrogated and say something incriminating and then no-one wins," he says in one breath. "Especially not me," he adds.
Then he turns to Morwen. "It's your time to shine again, Mavis!" he grins. "Can you cook up some mojo so we're not seen too soon trailing our brave sir knight here, or should we just hope for the best!?" He pauses. "And this time you're ALL going!" he threatens.
Then, facing the Balrog, he mockingly asks. "Can you promise me you won't torch anything this time?"
(Jared is clearly patronising the Count but this probably goes right over his head since Balrogs are that way.)
"Fi oyu doxx't wnat ot get trocehd, yuo wloud eb wsire not to rty natagonizgnig eople ho are mroe pweorful than oyu," retorts the Balrog. "Niside the Castle, there woxx't be naz rian shwoers ot ptorect yuo. I'm jsut wrnaing yuo fro yuor own goond."
Morwen manages to keep any surprise she may be feeling about the
vampire's sudden bravery from showing in her facial expression. She
doubts it is bravery anyway; more likely his paranoia is overriding
his cowardice.
"Yes, I do have a spell, or rather an illusion available," she
answers, "and stop teasing the fire demon, Jared, it really isn't
nice." She ignores the glares this gets her from both the vampire and
the Rog, and listens to the latter's tirade with a faint smile on her lips.
"Fi you clla me a demon again, L'il klil you topo, Onldo thrlal," roars the Count. "B'toh fo you ahd btteer strop benig tuspid. Tihs lpace si flul fo dnagers and ecnahntments, nad yuo wlil need ym protectoin. So TOSP PLAZNIG OYUR TUSPID LTTIEL INCRANTE GMAES!"
"Marry, you're a testy lot," remarks the Knight. "Such conduct is unbecoming here. We must all be friends and unite against our common foe. Leave aside your quarrels, I beseech you."
"Wlel, fi thez wloudxx't keep inslutting me when M'i jsut trzing ot be ncie ..." begins the Count. "Lla rgiht. But naz toehr Rog wloud hvae kliled them lnog ago."
Morwen merely blinks.
"Now, are we all ready? You two," she gestures at Jared and the Count,
"stand close together and stay close until we get there, or the spell
won't work."
She makes some gestures and speaks a few words in what sounds suspiciously like the Black Speech. The Rog and the vampire disappear.
Next, she addresses Paganini. "Is everything clear for now? Good. Then let's get moving. We'll be right behind you all the time, so no funny business, and remember, we're in this together."
She then speaks again, this time in Quenya, and she herelf becomes invisible too. "Sorry about that, guys," a voice sounds from the empty air, "I had to use different spells on me and you two, or it wouldn't have worked. Now, follow that knight!"
As they move off following Paganini - at least Morwen assumes the
patch of slightly foggy air moving behind the knight contains the
other two - she mutters something that sounds somewhat like, "stupid
Rogs that let themselves be called 'demon' in Sindarin, but not in
other languages. And needing protection, hah!"
What cannot be heard is her hand clenched very tightly around the hilt
of her sword at the words "Onldo thrlal", though any observant
passer-by would have been wondering about the sense of white-hot anger
emanating from one of two patches of faintly foggy air following
behind a knight walking along on his own.
The Count, meanwhile, perceives Morwen's wrath and unhappily aware of the deterioration in their relationship. On the surface, he shrugs at tuspid incranates inslutting eople nad then gtteing uspet when thez gte inslutted bax, nistead fo ebing brunt alive sa tehy desreve. But deep down inside, he feels badly about the whole thing; and he has to admit, if inaudibly, that Morwen's magical skills are "xxot band, wreallz."
Jared, who is walking next to the Balrog picks up on the bad vibe between the two and casually says: "You're really good at making friends, aren't you?" He smiles.
The Count doesn't deign to reply, but neither does he angrily lash out at the uppity vampire; he's in too much of a funk. According to his cultural presuppositions, he ought to be getting along swimmingly well with Morwen (and perhaps even with Jared, though he doesn't waste any thought on that); after all, they're still alive, aren't they? Then he has an epiphany: clutural pserupposttiions, taht's ti! That si the roont fo the broplem.
"Don't worry, we're still pals." Jared adds innocently. In reality, he's just too close to the fiery demon to be nasty to him. He decides it's best to keep quiet right now, until they are safe or dead. As they approach the troops near and around the castle he announces: "Hold on to your butts folks!"
The demon, for his part, scarcely bothers to frown. Oddly enough, this may be the best he and Jared have ever gotten along.
Paganini strides forward, once more the confident lord of Hyeron. He seems to have dismissed his invisible companions from his mind as he makes his way through bands of soldiers. One look at the blazon on his shield is enough to make the most surly-looking military reprobate straighten his uniform and snap off a textbook salute, which Paganini acknowledges in each instance with an easy grace.
To the mild consternation of the Count, Jared and Morwen (who are having enough trouble avoiding walking into each other as it is), Paganini is attracting a few followers of his own kind. At the gate to the outer walls, he halts and dismisses them with a few words of gratitude. The others can sense the rumours spreading throughout the encampments, and see messengers riding out to nearby headquarters.
Paganini delays the guard at the gate with a few questions about the current state of the castle's defences, allowing the other three to slip through before the gate is shut. They are then confronted by the town that nestles between the walls and the castle itself -- but this seems strangely quiet, almost despondent, and their progress to the castle is made without serious incident. The small fire that springs up in the house of a man who hurls abuse at Paganini is probably just a coincidence.
Paganini raps on the great gates and calls out, "Here is Lord Paganini, bringing news of great import to Her Majesty the Queen!"
Muttered conversation can be heard on the other side, then a voice replies, "Pull the other one, it's got bells on!"
Paganini looks meaningfully at the great gate -- but a "BHA!" has already resounded throughout the courtyard, and the gates burst into flame. Jared can be heard whispering, "Oh, NICE going, Charizard!"
The gates collapse in on themselves to reveal a huddle of scared-looking guards, who do a total double-take at Paganini before descending into paroxysms of self-recrimination.
"You see..." "it was..." "we didn't think..." "we were sure you..."
Paganini waves it all aside. "No harm done, friends!" he declares, magnanimously forgetting about the gates. "Now take me direct to Her Majesty!" They accede in apologetic haste.
The returning hero (and his unseen companions) stands outside the Great Hall while a herald announces him.
"Lord Paganini!" he squeaks, and legs it for all he's worth.
Paganini enters the hall...
...to see Paganini and Padgin in chains before the dais.
His face is a picture. Too bad no-one's got a camera.