'Yes, Your Majesty. But-' 'But nothing. If that's everything, you may go. And take that list of princesses with you!'
'Yes, Your Majesty.' With a final, fierce scowl, Willin bowed and left the room, every inch of his two-foot height reeking of disapproval.
Mendanbar sighed and dropped his head into his hands, digging his fingers into his thick, dark hair. Willin meant well, but why did he have to bring the subject up now, just when it looked as if things were going to calm down for a little while? The feud between the elf clans had finally been settled (more or less to everyone's satisfaction), the most recent batch of enchanted princes had been sent packing with a variety of improbable remedies, and the giants to the north weren't due to raid anyone for another couple of months at least. Mendanbar had been looking forward to a quiet week or two, but if Willin was going to start nagging him about marriage, there was little chance of that.
'I might just as well go on a quest or hire some dwarves to put in another staircase for all the peace I'm likely to get around here,' Mendanbar said aloud. 'When Willin gets hold of an idea, he never lets go of it.'
'He's right, you know,' said a deep, raspy voice from somewhere near the ceiling. The King looked up, and the carved wooden gargoyle in the corner grinned at him. 'You should get married,' it said.
'Don't you start,' Mendanbar said.
'Try and stop me,' snarled the gargoyle. 'My opinion is as good as anyone else's.'
'Or as bad,' the King muttered.
'I heard that!' The gargoyle squinted downward. 'No thanks to you, I might add. Do you know how long it's been since anyone cleaned this corner? I've got dust in my ears, and I expect something slimy to start growing on my claws any minute now.'
'Complain to one of the maids,' Mendanbar said, irritated. 'We weren't talking about hiring a housekeeper.'
'Why not? What are you, cheap or something?'
'No, and I wouldn't discuss it with you even if I were.'
'King Mendanbar the Cheapskate, that's what they'll call you,' the gargoyle said with relish. 'What do you think of that?'
'I think I won't talk to you at all,' said Mendanbar, who knew from experience that the gargoyle only got more unpleasant the longer it talked.
'I'm leaving.'
'Wait a minute! I haven't even gotten started yet.'
'If Willin asks, tell him I've gone for a walk,' Mendanbar said. As he left the room, he waved, twitching two of the invisible threads of power that crisscrossed the Enchanted Forest. The gargoyle's angry screeching changed abruptly to surprise as a stream of soapy water squirted out of the empty air in front of it and hit it squarely in its carved mouth.
Mendanbar smiled as the door closed behind him, shutting out the gargoyle's splutters. 'He won't complain about dust again for a while, anyway,' Mendanbar said aloud. As he walked down the hall, his smile grew. It had been a long time since he had taken a day off. If Willin wanted to grumble about it, he could go ahead and grumble. The King had earned a holiday, and he was going to have one.
Getting outside without being caught was easy, even without using any invisibility spells (which Mendanbar considered cheating). Willin was the only one who might have objected, and he was at the other end of the castle somewhere. Mendanbar sneaked past two maids and the footman at the front door anyway, just for practice. He had a feeling he might want to do a lot of sneaking in the near future, especially if Willin was going to start fussing about Queen Alexandra's daughters again.
Once he had crossed the main bridge over the moat and reached the giant trees of the Enchanted Forest, he let himself relax a little, but not too much. The Enchanted Forest had its own peculiar rules, and even the King was not exempt from them. If he drank from the wrong stream and got turned into a rabbit, or accidentally stepped on a slowstone, he would have just as much trouble getting back to normal as anyone else. He still remembered how much bother it had been to get rid of the donkey's ears he'd gotten by eating the wrong salad when he was eight.
Of course, now that he was King of the Enchanted Forest he had certain privileges. Most of the creatures that lived in the forest would obey him, however reluctantly, and he could find his way in and out and around without even thinking about it. He could use the magic of the forest directly, too, which made him as powerful as any three wizards and a match for all but the very best enchanters.
'Magic makes things much simpler,' Mendanbar said aloud. He looked around at the bright green moss that covered the ground, thick and springy as the finest carpet, and the huge trees that rose above it, and he smiled. Pleasant as it looked, without magic he wouldn't have wanted to wander around it alone.
Magic came naturally to the Kings of the Enchanted Forest . It had to; you couldn't begin to do a good job of ruling such a magical kingdom unless you had a lot of magic of your own. The forest chose its own kings, and once it had chosen them, it gave them the ability to sense the magic permeating the forest and an instinct for using it. The kings all came from Mendanbar's family, for no one else could safely use the sword that did the choosing, but sometimes the crown went to a second son or a cousin instead of to the eldest son of the king.
Mendanbar considered himself lucky to have followed his father onto the throne.
Uneasily, he glanced back toward the castle, then shook his head.
'Even a king needs a day off once in a while,' he told himself. 'And it's not as if they need me for anything urgent.' He turned his back and marched into the trees, determined to enjoy his holiday.
For a few minutes, he strolled aimlessly, enjoying the cool, dense shadows.
Then he decided to visit the Green Glass Pool. He hadn't been there for a while, and it was one of his favorite places. He thought about using magic to move himself there in the blink of an eye, but decided against it.
'After all,' he said, 'I wanted a walk. And the pool isn't that far away.'
He set off briskly in the direction of the pool.
An hour later, he still hadn't reached it, and he was beginning to feel a little cross. The forest had shifted twice on him, each time moving the pool sideways or backward, so that not only was it farther away than it had been, it was in a different direction as well. It was almost as if the forest didn't want him to find the place. If he hadn't been the King of the Enchanted Forest, Mendanbar would never have known he was going the wrong way.
'This is very odd,' Mendanbar said, frowning. 'I'd better find out what's going on.' Normally, the Enchanted Forest didn't play this sort of game with him. He checked to make sure his sword was loose in its sheath and easy to draw if he needed it. Then he lifted his hand and touched a strand of magic floating invisibly beside his shoulder.
All around him, the huge tree trunks blurred and faded into gray mist.
The mist thickened into a woolly fog, then vanished with a suddenness that always surprised him no matter how many times he did the spell.
Blinking, he shook his head and looked around.
He was standing right where he had wanted to be, on the rocky lip of the Green Glass Pool. The pool looked as it always did: flat and still as a mirror, and the same shade of green as the new leaves on a poplar.
'Oh!' said a soft, frightened voice from behind him. 'Oh, who are you?'
Mendanbar jumped and almost fell into the pool. He recovered his balance quickly and turned, and his heart sank. Sitting on the ground at the foot of an enormous oak was a girl. She wore a thin silver circlet on her head, and the face below it was heart-shaped and very lovely. Her long, golden hair and sky blue dress stood out dearly against the oak's brown bark, like a picture made of jewels set in a dark-colored frame. That was probably exactly the effect she had intended, Mendanbar thought with a resigned sigh. Somehow princesses, even the ones with less wit than a turtle, always knew just how to appear to their best advantage.
'Who are you?' the princess asked again. She was examining Mendanbar with an expression of great interest, and she did not look frightened anymore. 'And how did you come here, to this most solitary and forsaken place?'
'My name is Mendanbar, and I was out for a walk,' Mendanbar replied.
He sighed again and added, 'Is there something I might do for you?'
