Enchantress 6 - The Reluctant King

That is why it was highly unusual to see a witch fly a broom over the wall and gently touch down in the center of the quad. She straightened up from her long flight, one could hear the joints crack and pop into place, then she strode into the main building. Stooped to the point of being hunchback {on both shoulders} the witch stopped in the center of the main corridor and banged the butt of her broom three times on the ancient stone floor. The broom shouldn't have made more than a soft thunk, but the third and final thunk echoed throughout the building.

"Can I help you mum?" asked a third-year student.

"Yes, I shall require a room, some tea, proper tea, not this piddly stuff they drink in the city, and I require the head of this institution. In that order if you don't mind, thank you."

She looked the student in the eyes and immediately he began to give her information on where she could find the nearest exit, but instead he heard himself saying, "Yes mum, right away."

The student led her to the faculty condominium where she asked the door keeper for her key. The door keeper planned to tell her where she could find her bloody key, but instead he opened the door to the landlord's office and took a key from a large keyboard and held it out to her. She gave him a look that clearly {and silently} said, "You should know better." The door keeper led her to a currently unused suite on the ground floor, a floor reserved for the most senior of instructors.

Twenty minutes later a breathless instructor burst into the archchancellor's office. "What is it Gnost? I don't have all evening," barked the Archchancellor as he thumbed through the current issue of the Ankh-Morpork & Sto Plains Hygienic Railway Trainspotters Gazette. The man was not the first, but he was the most prodigious "foamer" on the disk. {Foamer is the term used by railroad men, the Railway Watch, and everyone else to describe what other worlds call "Train Nuts." It is short for Foaming at the mouth mad.}

Archchancellor Sebastian Dashwood's office was filled with railway memorabilia of all forms. Schedules and punched tickets were framed on the wall as were iconographs of each locomotive that ever lived to chuff steam on the discworld. Glass shelves were lined with model locomotives, carriages, cars, and other items that make the railway run. The class bell for the university has been replaced by a steam whistle from old #34 that met its end at the apex of Dead Man's Curve. The Archchancellor's personal Wizard's Cap was made from white and blue stripe mattress ticking. He has the only wizard's robe in existence that has a vest and conductor's watch.

He teaches two classes to the seniors, Ferroequinology, and Railway Iconography.

The little round man took a moment to catch his breath then Regenald Gnost said, "a witch moved into Professor Loveprang's suite."

"Has it been properly fumigated?" asked the Archchancellor as he turned the page and made a notation on his pad that Locomotive #1, the Adora Belle Dearheart was scheduled for a major rebuild and may not be seen gracing the rails for several months.

"Yes sir, but..."

"But what man! Get on with it."

"She's a witch!"

"That may make a bit of a difference being a woman, but she's not part of the faculty which is clearly against the rules. Make her go away."

"I tried sir."

"And...?"

"I ended up making her tea."

"What about security?" demanded the Archchancellor.

"They were looking for biscuits for her."

Archchancellor Dashwood rolled his eyes up and shook his head. "Fine. I will deal with it. It appears no other wizard has the backbone to deal with the slight matter of a weak woman squatting on our fair campus..." he pulled the watch out of his pocket and checked the time against a clockwork train that travelled around his office on a shelf just above doortop level. "Right on time," he said with a smile and a nod as the train pulled into the station area above the door. Maybe he should hold a class on quarter inch scale schedule making.

"Let's go see who is sipping your tea, shall we Professor Gnost?" and with that he stepped out across campus. Like his predecessor, Mustrum Ridcully, the new Archchancellor was an outdoorsman, but one day while trout fishing on the Gjorgiev River he heard the call of the lonesome whistle, and while he didn't stop hunting and fishing {one must have something to eat while sitting at trackside waiting to get the perfect shot} he never looked back.

He stepped into the faculty suite in question and glared at the witch who sat in Professor Loveprang's rocking chair and entertained several junior members of the faculty with stories of her home in the mountains. "Agness... really?"

"Is that how you address me?" demanded the witch. There was iron in her words calling the recalcitrant to heave to.

"Aunt Agness... to what do we owe the honor of your visit?"

"The King of Lancre has chosen a witch as his heir," said Agness Dempsy angrily, then suddenly smiling she turned to the underclassman standing at her shoulder. "Could I have a spot more of tea? Thank you luv."

"So... the King of Lancre will pass his throne on to... a queen?"

"No, the witch is a man!"

"What do the king's sons think about that?" asked a confused Archchancellor.

"His sons are dead," said Agness. "They were killed in the Dungeon Dimension."

"Oh my," said Archchancellor Dashwood. "I don't keep up on politics... but still, that's the king's choice, he could appoint a female to be his heir if he so chooses."

"The witch's wife was a student here," said Agness. "She studied under the assumed name of Façade Incognito."

"The king's heir is a witch that's a man whose wife is a man?"

"She's a woman!" Agness almost shouted.

"My dear Aunt Agness, this is an all-man's university. I never forget a student, twelve years ago Façade Incognito was in my Interstellar Spellcasting class..." He slowed to a stop as the thought process kicked in. "Façade had..." and he cupped his hands in front of his chest as if holding a large pair of melons.

"She still does, and she's got six children."

"Are you sure he's a woman?"

"After last Tuesday I'm absolutely positive."

"I don't see where this is any of my problem," huffed Sebastian Dashwood.

"Someday the King of Lancre is going to be a very powerful Witch and his queen, Octavia Worblehat, is the Enchantress, a Sourceress of unlimited power and..."

"Façade Incognito is now the Enchantress?"

"Yes, I just said that, now pay attention... good heavens man, why are you sniffling?"

"It's just touching when your student becomes a success."

"I'm talking about the most powerful magical force the disc has ever seen, sitting on the throne of government. There would be no stopping them if they decided to rise up."

"And what do you want me to do with them?" asked Archchancellor Dashwood.

"Go! Talk to them! See if you can tell what their intentions are!"

For a long moment the Archchancellor thought... Take the #7 train to Hot Dang, switch to train #27 and take the narrow gauge line up the Gjorgiev River valley into the high Ramtops to Überwald... find an excuse to be in Überwald, then take #28 to Hot Dang then catch the coach over the peak to Lancre Town... "I'll do it!"

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The Worblehat-Stein family were spending a week in the palace so Nick and Octavia could learn the job that he agreed to. The king asked Nick and Octavia to live in the palace for one week a month for an unspecified number of months to get used to the building and learn their jobs. They knew the general layout of Lancre Castle but there were so many things they needed to learn about the castle. Of course, the children were ecstatic, this meant they got their own room! They were set up in a row, Prince Marlon, Princess Hollie, Prince Llywellyn, Princess Llywella, and the two youngest Prince Exavier and Princess Gwendoline had a nursery between their parents' room and their grandmother's room. The rooms were big and at Nick and Octavia's request, very plain. Nick and Octavia didn't want the kingdom to splurge on frippery and meaningless dainty decorations so simple tapestries were hung in the rooms just to add some warmth.

The children all had common complaints that night, "The beds are too squishy!" followed by "It's too quiet!" followed by "I'm lonely!" For a couple of hours the first night they trooped in and out of their parents room with their complaints until they finally found a way to get to sleep.

Magdolina was the housekeeper assigned to the Worblehat-Stein family's rooms and she started her day at four AM. She crept down the hallway holding a single candle for light and peeked into the young Prince's room and found that Marlon was asleep on one side of the bed, Princess Hollie on the other side. Next was Prince Llywellyn, in his bed was Princess Llywella. She peered in the nursery and found both the bed and the bassinette empty. Magdolina crept into Nick and Octavia's room to report the children missing and she found them in bed with Nick and Octavia.

At 6:00 AM she was walking down the hall and was almost run over by Lou and Loo-Loo as they dashed from their room to their parents' room leaving the door open. A quick peek into the room showed all the children were in bed with Nick and Octavia.

"Good morning, Magdalina," said Octavia. "Will you be able to show me where I can get breakfast started?"

"Breakfast will be served at 7:00 AM your grace, in the main dining room."

It took nearly the full hour to get the children up and dressed. Lou and Loo-Loo were not the best at getting motivated, but the call of breakfast got them moving. "How did you sleep last night mom?" Nick asked Catrin as he wrestled a squirming Exavier into his clothes.

"It's a little spooky here, but the bed was comfortable."

"Verence told me that this is the longest inhabited castle in the world. I don't know whether that's accurate or not, but I can feel the history," said Octavia. To her the castle felt welcoming, like it was waiting for her to move in. "It's a sad old castle, it misses children."

They met the King and Queen and Princess Esme for breakfast and the meal was set up buffet style alongside the huge banquet table. There was everything that Nick could possibly dream of for breakfast, sweet rolls, donuts, scrambled eggs, hot cereal, steak, bacon, sausage, and pancakes, which were Hollie's favorite.

After settling the children Nick fixed himself a plate of scrambled duck eggs {tomorrow is Soul Cake Tuesday and the opening of Duck Season!} and bacon when his mom sat a bowl of hot cereal in front of him. "What's this?"

"Try it and tell me what you think." Nick tried a spoonful and was surprised at the nutty sweet flavor but also of the memories it brought back, cold winter morning eating next to the stove, wrapped up warm and hoping for snow to play in. "Barley porridge with molasses, I used to make that for you every cold morning."

"I... I remember the flavor... nutty, malty... barley takes hours to make. You were up for two hours every morning to make it?"

Catrin shrugged, "it's all we had money for, your father thought the molasses was splurging but you loved it."

"He's gone, he got what he deserved." Nick held his mother's hand and he said to her and Jutta, "If any man says or does anything untoward to you let me know, and I'll have a talk with him. We'll have a public flogging... or set you up on a date."

"Oh, stop," said Jutta.

"You two are turning heads," said Octavia. "There's more than one man in Creel Springs that is interested in you."

Jutta and Catrin held hands under the table and Jutta said, "That part of our lives is over, but thank you."

Just then Harold entered and stepped up to the king. "The morning castle report sir." The castle is so old that pieces tend to fall off in the night. Harold walks around the castle every morning and reports on what fell off. They don't have the money to make major repairs, so they rope off parts that become dangerous.

"Did we lose anything major?" asked King Verence.

"No sir. In fact, the hubwards tower on the widdershins end has... it... it's back sire."

"Have you been drinking Harold?" asked the stunned king. "Because if you have, I would like to try some of that," then the king saw Nick looking at Octavia.

"Well," shrugged Octavia, "All the stones were just lying there, you couldn't get around that corner of the castle on the outside because of the stones blocking the walk, so I kind of put it back together." The king and queen looked shocked, but Nick was used to this, such is the power of his Enchantress. Weight, mass, size, none of that matters to the most powerful magical being on the discworld. Moving things from one place to another was not difficult, and what she did last night will have scientists in the future scratching their heads and claiming that aliens made it. She reduced all the stones to their basic components and rebuilt the tower out of those components making the tower one massive, hollow, tower shaped stone with windows, spiral stairs, rooms with fireplaces and internal plumbing. "Future kings will need a castle that won't collapse on them," she said softly.

Octavia plans to make the future Duke of Wægn's manor the same way, but out of wood. She's already amassed a huge pile of stone for the ornamental wall out of field stones from many of the local farmer's fields. Due to her efforts, the fields of Tallywiffle County, Lancre have become the easiest to plow fields on the disc because there are no rocks in the fields to hit.

Trying to change the conversation, she said, "This was wonderful, but I suspect that breakfast isn't like this normally."

"Heavens no," said Queen Magrat, "I wanted to give you a taste of what our kitchen can do. This breakfast is what we serve when we have dignitaries visiting. Lunch and dinner will be similar, then we return to normal tomorrow. We try to find a reason to do this monthly to keep the kitchen staff in practice."

When breakfast was complete, King Verence, Nick, and Marlon planned to go over the constitution and the standing treaties with the different governments, while Queen Magrat planned to give Octavia, the grandmother's and kids a tour of the castle and the gardens. First, they headed back to the bedrooms to change the babies and soon it was time to tour.

"Llywellyn! Llywella! Where are you two?" called Grandma Jutta, but she was answered with giggling. "Remy, can you find my grandchildren for me?" she said in exasperation.

The wolf sniffed the air and walked out of the room sniffing, but he was more interested in finding Nick and going outside. He would quite often help Jutta and Catrin, but he would occasionally forget what he was doing and wander off and curl up for a nap. The only human that he really listened to was Nick, but that didn't stop the wolf from breaking for a nap.

The sound of running footsteps and giggling filled the air as Lou and Loo-Loo raced down the impossibly long corridor, laughing and giggling until they bumped into their grandmothers. "Found 'em for ya," called out Remy who curled up for a nap.

The twins ran circles around Jutta and Catrin then took off down the hall running full bore until they bumped into Princess Esme. The twins looked up at her, and she looked down at them, then with unspoken agreement the three took off running together, Esme's pink gown trailing behind her as they ran. They ran laughing and giggling until they reached the end of the hall and turned and there was Queen Magrat and Princess Octavia walking toward them. "My goodness, what are you silly twins doing?"

"We found a friend mommy!"

"Friend!" said Esme with a large grin.

"Your mother tells me that you have some pretty butterflies, can you share them with us?" asked Octavia. Esme nodded her head and turned to run, but Octavia was able to slow her down. "I can't run with the baby," so Esme slowed, and the twins held a finger on each hand, and they walked to the meditation garden that Octavia created for them.

"That's the first actual word she's said since..." and Queen Magrat broke down in tears.

Octavia hugged the queen as best as she could as Magrat wept bitter tears for all that was lost - her two boys and her beloved daughter's sanity. "I want you to know, my queen, that if anything happens, Princess Esmirelda will be part of our family and we will care for her every day."

"You don't have to..."

But Octavia interrupted her. "It's what friends do."

Feeling hugely relieved that her daughter's future was secure they entered the meditation garden. "Oh my!" gasped Octavia. "It's been a long time since I've been in here, it's really filled in!"

"This place gives me such peace," said Magrat as they followed the graveled path. "And you can see, Esme truly loves it." Ahead of them on the path Esme was showing Hollie and the twins how to get a butterfly to land on their fingers like a pet bird. Little Exavier was crouching by the goldfish pond watching the fish swim about and both grandmothers hovered nearby nervously, probably scaring away the fish.

"I need to fill this one up, she didn't have much breakfast," said Octavia as she sat down on a bench with Gwendolyn. Magrat sat with her on the bench and the baby sleepily nursed as the stream gurgled past.

At some point the baby stopped nursing and started looking around, the gurgling of the brook stopped, the giggling of the twins stopped. Octavia looked around nervously but as she was about to stand up, a woman walked around the corner with an "I know who you are!" kind of smile. She was tall and slim with straight jet-black hair, and she was very pretty, her almond shaped brown eyes made her look like she was from Agatea.

"You're here, do you like it?" asked the woman. She was wearing a form clinging black and red dress and when she walked her hips swung from side to side like a metronome.

"The garden? I made it about ten years ago."

"And you're seeing what it looks like now that I've touched it."

"I'm sorry," said Octavia, do I know you?"

"Yes, but we've never spoken before, you might say that I wait for no man."

"You're an anthropomorphic personification." Octavia wasn't asking or guessing, there's something about an anthropomorphic personification that screams "I'm real!" but whispers "I only look like this because you want to see me."

"Yes, you live in my domain, you have travelled through it quite regularly, and you've even taught your husband to do it, but he's not as skilled."

"You're the anthropomorphic personification of L-Space?" Before the woman could react, Octavia said, "no, there's not enough people who know about it for L-Space to have an anthropomorphic personification. You're space? No, the anthropomorphic personification of Space would probably be rotund..." Then Octavia realized who it was and suddenly she was afraid. "Time?"

"Yes! You guessed! How delightful! You're the first to do it."

"You're here to collect a debt that I ran up... right?"

"NO! Don't be silly. Now Alberto Malich, that guy owes me!"

"Who?"

Time created a bench in front of Octavia and sat down. "A wizard, what else?" sighed Time. "He was supposed to die in the year..." Time rolled her eyes up in thought, "On your calendar that would be the year... forty-two."

The current year was 2017. "Why does he owe you? Me, I bounce around in time, but I don't owe you?" Octavia constantly slipped back and forth in time to get everything done on time. She did her time traveling by passing through L-Space

"Because you don't stop your aging. If you had twenty-five years left to live, and you had jumped back twenty-five years you would die today because you haven't stepped out of the time stream, you've waded around in it some, but Alberto has stepped outside of time. Occasionally he comes back into the time stream and the seconds tick off, but he lives at Death's house where there is no time."