Magic, page 14
No one ever lost their temper with him, though, because he had all the gifts that the other fairies had given him. He was of a sunny temperament, understood what everyone said to him, was obedient, clever, sweet and all that was delightful—except for his gracelessness.
It’s not surprising, then, that he had been named Prince Delightful by his delighted parents, and that’s what he was to everyone. Even while he was breaking every priceless piece of crockery that he could place his hands on, everyone found him delightful.
The fairy, Misaprop, was consulted, you may be sure, and the queen asked very politely (one must always be polite to a fairy as some of them are dreadfully short-tempered) what had gone wrong.
Misaprop turned quite red and said, “There, now, I must have managed to get the wrong end of the wand in my hand.”
“Well, then, dear,” said Queen Ermentrude, coaxingly, “can’t you put the right end of the wand in your hand and try again?”
“I’d love to,” said Misaprop. “I would do it at once, but it is quite against the fairy rules to try to cancel one’s own spell after it has been made in good faith.”
“If you don’t,” said the queen, “you will leave us in a dreadful position.”
“If I do,” said Misaprop, “I will be expelled from the Fairies Union,” and of course there was no answer to that.
Things continued to get worse. When Prince Delightful was thirteen, he was placed in the hands of a dancing master, for one of the prime duties of a prince was to attend the royal balls. There he would be expected to dance with the ladies of the court and to be perfect at gavottes, minuets, and all the other latest steps.
It was just hopeless. Prince Delightful would have been better off dancing on his hands. Whenever he was expected to extend his right foot, he would extend his left and vice versa. Whenever he bowed, his head would hit that of his partner. When he whirled, he invariably staggered into someone else. And he simply could not keep time.
The dancing masters, fearing to offend a royal personage, invariably told the prince’s parents that he danced like an angel, but of course, they could see he danced precisely as if he were a tipsy sailor.
It was even worse when he had to learn to handle arms. At swordplay, the cleverest footwork of an opponent could not prevent him from striking the prince with his épée. At wrestling, even when his opponent tried manfully to hold him upright, Prince Delightful managed to step on his shoelaces and fall down.
King Marcus was quite in despair. “My dear,” he said to Queen Ermentrude, “our beloved son, Prince Delightful, will be twenty tomorrow, but we can’t give a ball to celebrate it, because he can’t dance. We can’t hold a tournament because he can’t fight. Indeed, I don’t even dare hold a procession for he is liable to fall down.”
“He might ride a horse,” said Queen Ermentrude, doubtfully.
“You do well to say that doubtfully, my dear, for you must have seen him on a horse.”
“I have,” admitted the queen.
“You know that he jounces up and down, in no way keeping time with the horse’s natural movements.”
The queen sighed. “What are we to do?”
“What can we do? We must send him out to seek his fortune.”
“Oh, no,” said the queen. “Not our only son.”
“What do you mean, not our only son. The usual practice, I’ve always understood, is for kings to have three sons, and to send out all three, one after the other. We’ll be sending out only one—because you always refused to have any more.”
The queen burst into tears at once. “That’s a cruel thing to say,” she said. “You wouldn’t say it if you had to have them. I’d like to see you have a baby, if you think it’s so much fun. I’d like to see any man—”
King Marcus said, hastily, “Now don’t weep, my dear. That was thoughtless of me and I didn’t mean it. But just the same, we do have to send out Delightful. It’s customary.”
“He’ll get hurt. He can’t help it. He’s just not graceful, because that stupid Misaprop—”
“Quiet,” said the king, quickly, “she might be flying about, invisibly, and she might hear you. Besides even if Delightful is graceless, he has all the other virtues, and they may suffice. He may go out and slay a dragon and marry a beautiful princess; then defeat an enemy army for his father-in-law and gain that kingdom as well as ours. He’ll become a great king and conqueror. If you read history, you’d see that it happens all the time.”
“But where will all this take place? There are no dragons about here that I know of. There haven’t been for years.”
“Of course not. Princes have been very busy slaying them so that dragons are now an endangered species. In fact, there’s some talk of having all the kingdoms get together and forbid any further killing of dragons.”
“That will be a fine thing for virgins,” said the queen indignantly. “That’s all they eat.”
“I know. The Virgins Union is fighting the movement vigorously. I understand they are sending out appeals for funds under the slogan, ‘Would you rather have a dragon or a virgin at your beck and call?’ I suppose princes can slay basilisks, chimeras, and hydras instead, but those are all endangered species, too. We live in hard times—just the same, there’s hope. I’ve had the sorcerer check the want ads in the Dragon-Slayers Gazette. The kingdom of Poictesme has a dragon they want slain, and the advertisement includes a miniature of his daughter. She seems quite beautiful but the dragon is apparently a large brute and the princes are rather shying away from the task.”
“If he’s a large brute then I certainly won’t think of allowing Delightful to risk his life—”
“But, my dear, I’ve already consulted Delightful. Graceless he may be but he is as brave as a lion—a large-size one, too—and he was very impressed by the measurements of the young lady, something the king of Poictesme had thoughtfully included in his ad.”
“I’ll just never see him again,” wailed the queen. “And I’m sure that hussy of a princess has silicone implants.”
Still, though queens may weep, princes must do their duty.
The prince packed his saddlebags, took an ample supply of gold pieces, and studied the route to Poictesme on the map that the sorcerer had supplied, one that showed all the major highways. He took a pair of twelve-foot lances with him, and his trusty sword, and a suit of armor that the sorcerer said was light and would not rust, since it was formed of a magic metal named aluminum.
He took off, and the king and queen waved at him for as long as they could see him. There were quite a few bystanders along the road, too, to cheer their Prince and to make an occasional bet as to whether he would fall off his horse while he was still in eyeshot. —He did, once or twice.
It took Delightful the standard time to make the trip from his father’s kingdom to Poictesme—a year and a day.
Actually that was the time it took to reach the palace of King Faraday of Poictesme. He had reached the border of the kingdom some weeks earlier.
He was met by an old chamberlain who studied his ID card most carefully, looked up the location of his kingdom in a well-thumbed atlas and called up the Princes Register for a credit rating. It all seemed to go well for the chamberlain nodded sourly and said, “You seem to be okay.”
“Fine,” said Prince Delightful, stumbling over a small projection on the smooth floor. “Do I take a number?”
“A number? Why do you want a number, Highness?”
“So I’ll know my turn—when I may ride out to slay the dragon.”
“Oh, you may do that any time. You’re the only foreign prince on the premises at the moment. We’ve had quite a shortage.”
“A deadly dragon, eh?”
“Who can say? The poltroons barely come within sight when they turn and leave hastily. Not one has had the decency to get himself killed before leaving.”
The Prince clicked his tongue. It always depressed him to be made aware of the decay of good manners. “It will be different with me. I shall pause only to meet the king and obtain his blessing and to take a gander at—to greet the gracious princess. What’s her name, by the way? It wasn’t included in the advertisement.”
“Laurelene, Highness.”
“To greet the gracious Princess Laurelene. Is my future mother-in-law, the queen, alive?”
“Yes, but she has retired to a nunnery.”
“Ah, that’s probably good all around, except perhaps for the nunnery.”
“The nunnery has indeed been complaining, Highness.”
King Faraday greeted Prince Delightful with the deepest skepticism, especially after the prince had leaned on his spear, allowing it to slip out from under him.
“Are you sure you know how to kill a dragon?” asked the king.
“With this spear,” said Prince Delightful, flourishing it a little overenthusiastically, so that it flew out the window breaking a stained-glass panel.
“It goes by itself, I see,” said King Faraday, with another dose of skepticism, and sent a menial out after it.
Princess Laurelene absorbed Prince Delightful’s looks and muscles and smiled most fetchingly. “Just don’t get killed yourself, Prince, while you’re slaying the dragon,” she said. “You’d be no good to me dead.”
“You’re the best reason I have ever met for staying alive,” said Prince Delightful, flourishing his hat as he bowed and catching its feather in the king’s eye.
The next morning, he received directions from King Faraday’s sorcerer, who also had a map. He then set out, waving jauntily at the king and his daughter.
The king waved back and said, morosely, “He may kill the dragon with his self-flying spear, or with his even more deadly hat.”
“Think, Father,” said Laurelene, who was as beautiful as the day and who had long blond hair that she barely had to touch up, “if he slays the dragon, all the virgins in the kingdom will be safe once more.”
“And you, in addition,” said King Faraday.
Whereupon Laurelene, with a roguish smile, said, “Now, Father, what would Prince Delightful think if he heard you say that?” and she stamped on the old man’s foot.
Prince Delightful followed the indicated course for a week and a day and found himself in the depths of a dark forest.
He began to suspect he might be in the vicinity of the dragon when his horse’s ears began to prick upward and his horse’s nostrils flared.
His own ears began to prick upward as he heard the sound of rusty snoring, precisely like the sound described in his Dragon-Hunter’s Handbook. It had a deep sound, one that seemed to presage a large beast.
Furthermore, the prince’s own nostrils flared as he detected the unmistakable smell of dragon musk. Not a pleasant odor.
Prince Delightful paused to consider strategy. From the snoring, it was obvious that the dragon was asleep, and according to the Handbook, its sleep was deep and it was difficult to disturb. That made sense since dragons had no natural enemies except princes and could usually sleep securely.
It seemed only fair to begin by pricking the beast with his spear until he woke it up. He could then fight it fair and square, wakefulness to wakefulness.
On the other hand, thought Prince Delightful, was that truly fair?
After all, the dragon was much larger and stronger than the prince was even if the princely horse were counted in. And the dragon could fly. And it could breathe flame.
Was that fair? No, thought Prince Delightful.
Did the dragon worry about that? No, thought Prince Delightful.
Since the prince had studied logic under the sorcerer, he concluded quite correctly that the balance would be somewhat restored if the dragon were asleep. If it slept, it could not fly or breathe flame, but it would still be far larger and stronger than the prince, so it would still have the advantage on its own side.
Prince Delightful urged his horse forward until it entered a clearing in which he could clearly see the sleeping dragon. It was large indeed. It was nearly a hundred feet long and was covered with tough scales that, the Handbook told him, could not be pierced by an ordinary spear. The thing to do was to aim at an eye which, fortunately, was closed.
Prince Delightful leveled his spear and slapped his spurs against his horse’s flank. The loyal horse now charged forward, and the prince kept his own eye firmly on the closed eye of the monster.
Unfortunately, though the prince’s eye remained firm and steady and true, his spear did not. The effort to keep both objects, eye and spear, aimed correctly was too great for the prince’s inherent clumsiness and the spear dipped. It struck against the ground and the prince pole-vaulted high in the air.
The pole wrenched itself out of his hand and the prince came down on something hard and scaly. Instinctively, he clutched it in a death grip and found himself hugging the dragon’s neck just behind its head.
The shock woke the dragon and its head lifted twenty feet into the air. Prince Delightful shouted involuntarily, “Hey! Hey!”
The dragon struggled to its feet, and the head shot up another ten feet. The horse, noting that its master was gone, wisely decided to go home. It turned and fled, and Prince Delightful felt deserted.
The dragon turned its head, looking apparently for whatever it was that had made the sound, and was now resting as a small weight upon its neck, but, of course, it could see nothing. There was no way it could turn its head through an angle of a hundred eighty degrees.
Finally, it said, in a deep bass rumble, “Hey, is anybody dere?”
Prince Delightful’s eyes opened wide. None of the vast literature on dragons that he had read in the course of his princely education had stated that dragons could speak—and in what was definitely a lower-class accent.
He said, “Why, it is I. It is Prince Delightful.”
“Well, whatcha doin’ up dere. Get off, will ya. Get out of my scales.”
“I don’t like to, if it means you’re going to eat me.”
“I ain’t gonna eat you. In the foist place, I ain’t hungry. In the second place, what makes ya think ya taste good. Get down and let’s talk. Ya ain’t got no spear, have ya?”
“I’m afraid it’s lost.”
“Aw right, den. Get down and tawk like a civilized dragon.”
The great head and neck lowered slowly and when it was down against the ground, Prince Delightful cautiously slipped off. There was a small rip in his doublet where it had caught on the rough edge of a scale.
He backed off into the woods. “You’re sure now you’re not going to attack me?”
“Cawse not. I said I wouldn’t. I give you my woid. A dragon’s woid is his bond. Not like you lousy princes. Why do you come bothering us for? One of you guys killed my sister. Another killed my father. What do we do to you?”
“Well, you do eat virgins, you know.”
“Dat’s a lie. I wouldn’t touch a voigin. They always smell from cheap poifume. When I was little I licked one in the face. Yech. Powder. Voigins ain’t edible.”
“But then, what do you eat?”
“Nuttin’ much. I eat grass and fruit and nuts and roots, maybe once in a while a bunny rabbit or a kitty cat. And den you guys come after us with spears and swords and horses and we ain’t done nothin’.”
“But everyone says you eat virgins.”
“Dat’s just de voigins trying to make demselves important. Boy, dat makes me mad.”
“Wait a minute,” said Prince Delightful in alarm. “Don’t start spouting flame.”
“Who, me?” The dragon’s lower lip thrust outward and a tear the size of a pint container glinted in its eye. “I can’t spout flame. I’m prob’ly the only dragon that can’t spout flame.”
“Oh? Why not?”
The dragon heaved a large sigh and a somewhat fetid odor filled the air. Prince Delightful held his nose but the dragon didn’t seem to notice.
It said, “Mine is a sad story.”
“May I hear it, uh, sir? What’s your name, by the way?”
“My name? Boinard, but you can call me Boinie. That’s when the trouble started. At my christening.”
“At your christening?” said Prince Delightful, forcefully. “What an odd coincidence. That’s when my trouble started, too.”
“Yeah, but what’s trouble to a prince? Now you listen to me. My old man and my old lady, dey wanted I should get a good start in life with Boinard, a lucky name in my family, so dey invited every fairy in dis kingdom to the christening. And what do yuh know, a foreign fairy from somewhere else came, also.”
“A foreign fairy?”
“Yeah. A nice old dame, my folks told me, but not all dere, you know what I mean? A regular klutz.”
“Was her name Misaprop?”
“Yeah, dat was huh name. Howja know?”
“That same fairy was at my christening.”
“And did she mess yuh up?”
“Very much so.”
“Gee, it makes us kind of pals. Shake, pal.”
The dragon’s gigantic paw extended itself out to Prince Delightful and swallowed up his small hand.
The dragon said, “You know what she did to me?”
“No.”
“After all de other fairies made me big and strong and good-looking with nice scales, she came along to give me a good strong flame-throwing mout’ only she got it all bollixed up. No flames.”
“But I don’t understand. If you don’t have any flames, Bernie, why don’t any of the other knights want to attack you? I’m told they all go away quickly when they meet up with you.”
“Dat’s the sad part. Nobody wants to hang around me. Not even lady dragons. Looka me. I’m big and strong and beautiful, an’ I ain’t had a dame look at me for seventy-five years.”
“Why not?”
“Well, when I get mad or when I get passionate, if you know what I mean, I don’t shoot out flame, I shoot out somepin’ else.”
“What?”
“You wanna see?”
“It won’t hurt me, will it?”
“Cawse not. Just lemme think about de situation, so I get mad.”
The dragon brooded a bit, then said, “Now!” It opened its mouth and exhaled and Prince Delightful dropped to the ground immediately, his hands over his nose. What had come out was the worst, the foulest, the most noxious odor he had ever smelled. He rolled about choking.
