which both of the Empires were so famous. The emperors there try to outdo each other in their display of luxury. Our own glorious Stalkon, may he sit on this throne for another hundred years, preferred to put his gold into the army, not into gorgeous playthings of dubious value.
Paying no attention to the mute guards, the jester climbed up onto the throne, picked up the royal scepter (which looked more like a heavy staff, the kind you could easily use to beat off attackers) off its velvet cushion, and jumped back down onto the floor.
“Don’t hurt yourself now,” I jibed, which earned me a contemptuous glance.
Kli-Kli did put his new toy back on the cushion though, only he added the stump of the carrot to it. He stepped back, holding his head on one side, like an artist admiring the work he has created, and then, pleased with the result, he beckoned me onward. At the very end of the hall there was another pair of doors exactly like the ones through which we had entered so recently. The jester kicked them as if he were the master of the house.
“After you!” he said, gesturing for me to go through.
I found myself in the room to which Frago Lanten had brought me the time before. I already knew everyone there, so no introduction was necessary. I bowed politely. When I looked up, I was looking straight into sparkling golden eyes. We acknowledged each other and looked away.
“Enough of that, Master Harold,” said the king. “Let’s leave your dubious etiquette to my courtiers. Have a seat. What took you so long, Kli-Kli?”
“Why ask me?” the jester asked, pulling a sour face. “It’s so hard to get Master Harold to move. . . . It took me at least fifteen minutes to persuade him to come.”
I choked on my indignation at this barefaced lie, but controlled myself and decided to ignore the king’s jester.
“Thank you, Your Majesty,” I muttered.
This time Stalkon didn’t look anything at all like a genial innkeeper in a sweater and soldier’s trousers. I thought the expensive clothes and the narrow ring of the crown on his head suited this man far better.
“Master Artsivus has informed me that your endeavors have been crowned with success,” said the king.
Artsivus frowned. He was obviously out of sorts. One of my friends used to have an expression like that when he was tormented by constipation. I just hoped that the archmagician had a different reason for his bad mood. He gave me a look that wasn’t exactly the friendliest, but he didn’t say anything.
“Yes, Your Majesty, I have completed all the preparations for our . . . er . . . little undertaking.”
“I have many questions. Would you be so kind as to tell us once again what has happened to you?”
The king’s wish is the law. I sighed and for the umpteenth time that week started telling the story of my adventures, only on this occasion I kept nothing back. Well, almost nothing. I didn’t say a word about Valder this time, either.
Halfway through my narrative, my throat finally dried up and I began talking more and more quietly. Noticing this, Stalkon clicked his fingers casually, and the attentive jester poured me some wine. I kept my eyes on him to make sure there was no laxative in the glass. Then I went on with my story.
Artsivus merely raised an eyebrow every now and then, usually when he heard something for the first time. Something I had kept secret from him during our ride in the carriage. The most interesting thing was that no one interrupted me and my listeners were not bored by my interminable story. But everything comes to an end sometime, and eventually I was able to sigh in relief and wet my throat once again with the remarkable wine from the king’s cellars.
“A fine kettle of fish,” said Kli-Kli, the first to break the silence.
“You put it too mildly, fool,” Alistan Markauz blurted out. This time he was dressed in an ordinary guards’ uniform. The famous armor that had become a legend among the warriors of Valiostr must have been taking a rest that day. “The kettle is boiling over, my dear jester, and we can only hope that we won’t get scalded. Forgive me, Your Majesty, but despite all our secrecy the forthcoming expedition has become known to our enemy.”
“Not only to our enemy,” Miralissa purred. “You are forgetting about the Master.” For a moment I wondered how such a sinister sentence could sound so pleasant. The race of elves were known to have good voices. Where had I heard that bit of wisdom?
“Have you heard of him before?” the king asked the elfess.
“No.”
“The archives will not be of any help to us, either,” the Rat added morosely. “The royal sandmen have searched for days and found nothing.”
“Not exactly nothing,” Stalkon objected. “They have found
“Ah,” the captain of the royal guard said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “That’s nonsense.”
“What are you talking about?” asked Artsivus.
“You see, Your Magicship, as we were plowing through the old chronicles, we came across the interrogation of a certain Djok Imargo. The man whom everyone knows under the name of Djok the Winter-Bringer. He claimed that he had been deliberately framed for the murder of the Prince of the Black Rose, which was committed by the Master’s henchmen. Of course, no one could find any Master, nobody had ever even heard of him, and Djok was handed over to the elves.”
“Did he tell you anything about this, Lady Miralissa?” the archmagician inquired.
“I’m sorry, milords, but I don’t know that piece of history very well,” Miralissa said with a shake of her head. “And in addition, it was an internal matter of the House of the Black Rose, so the House of the Black Moon did not intervene. I will ask Ell. He is one of the elves accompanying me, from the House of the Black Rose.”
“Very well. Let us consider the Master to be perfectly real and just as dangerous as the Nameless One—if not more dangerous. After all, we still don’t understand what it is he wants,” said the king.
“A retarded ogre could understand what he wants,” Kli-Kli objected. “He doesn’t want the Horn to fall into
