In a Weary World

Chapter XXIX: The Magician Again

"I will not stand here to be insulted by you, hedgepig," Mangiz fumed.
"Then stand somewhere else and I'll insult you there, featherbag!" -- Brian Jacques, Mattimeo

As it turned out, the Magician didn't cast any more curses. He appeared in person.

It was late in the afternoon, as the day was turning to evening. Rigmor had finished recounting her story for the umpteenth time. Queen Maibrit had started drawing up plans of how to attack the Magician, helped by interjections from King Severin and Solvej. Hjalmar and Rigmor found themselves sitting on the windowseat, listening to everyone else airing their opinions.

Hjalmar felt he ought to say something. He just didn't know what.

"Are you--" he began, then changed his mind. "Do you feel better?"

Even as he said it, he saw how ridiculous that question was. He turned red and wished he hadn't spoken.

Rigmor smiled. It was a rather wan smile, but still, it was a smile. "Much better, now that there's no one else in my head."

There was nothing he could think of to say to that.

"What's happened since... since?" Rigmor didn't need to explain what she meant. "I know you broke the curse, but how?"

"Solvej did it." Hjalmar thought back over the last few months. "She made a cloak that turned her invisible, then she flew around eavesdropping on the Magician."

Rigmor stared at him as if he'd grown a second head. "She did what? How can a cloak make her invisible?" She paused, thinking this over. "On second thoughts, that's not much more unbelievable than some of the other things that have happened recently. I heard that Solvej turned the stairs into a slide. Did she really do that?"

Hjalmar winced. "Yes. She had almost every child in the palace sliding down the banisters. I think they turned it into a competition to see who could go down fastest."

"Oh, down the banisters!" Rigmor looked relieved. "I thought she'd actually transformed the staircase into a slide."

Hjalmar considered what the King and Queen would have said if that was what Solvej had done. It didn't bear thinking about. "No, she wasn't mad enough to do that. And then--"

He broke off. His eyes widened as he stared at something behind her.

Rigmor paled. She knew what she would see before she turned to look.

She was right. The Magician glared at her through the window.

There was a shout from behind her as her parents and Solvej realised they had a visitor. The Magician's eyes swept over the occupants of the room, his mouth twisted into a sneer.

"So, you think you've broken my curse?" he growled.

There was a muffled exclamation as the King tried to say something, only for the Queen to cover his mouth with her hand.

"Yes, we do think that," Solvej said. "And more importantly, we've done it."

The Magician's face turned red. For a moment Hjalmar thought he was going to try to jump through the window. He was riding that monstrous "horse" again. It pranced back several steps as if preparing to take a run at them. Hjalmar jumped away from the window.

Rigmor got up and turned to face the Magician fully. She folded her arms and stared him in the face. "You have no power over me now. I will never be your pawn again. Begone!"

The Magician bellowed like an angry bull. The windows seemed to rattle in their frames. Hjalmar winced and clapped his hands over his ears.

"You will not escape me so easily!"