Snoozing in their beds, the people of Kemenbar were unaware of much. They didn’t pay attention to the wind slicing through their fields and over their mountains, parting forests of grass as it zipped along. They weren’t aware of the golden sun leaping into the sky and scattering the clouds, which loomed over their majestic land. And it can be assumed that no one knew how important that crisp morning would be.
The supreme ruler of that kingdom was lending his voice to the chorus of snores, which echoed through the castle. And that was a very good thing. King Nate would need his rest. He did not know it but later that day a visitor would spring upon him an adventure he couldn’t refuse. That is another story. Or rather, the other side of this one.
This story begins with a peasant. A peasant who refused to admit his name. This Nameless Peasant strode up to the gleaming castle gates on that windy morning. The sun rose in the sky behind him, casting shimmering lights on the metal surface. The guard snapped out of his stupor. Wary of the odd-looking traveler, he questioned him from a safe distance behind the gate. The peasant claimed he was known as “The Nameless One,” and that he had business with the Queen.
The poor elf at the gate was in a bad mood at being stationed with the “silent” elf. So he admitted the peasant out of spite.
Having been let into the castle, The Peasant meandered through the halls with reluctance. It would seem he didn’t know where to go, except that he never once made a wrong turn. Somehow he ended up in the throne room. It was nearly deserted. Only a bundle of red fur huddled in the corner.
The peasant paid no attention to the bundle of fur. He just bent down and took each of his muddy brown shoes off and flung them a great distance away. To the air, he shouted, “Now what?!”
Silence saturated the room. Off in the corner, the bundle of fur began to get to its feet. An annoyed growl leaked from the dog’s snout. Ever so slowly, the growl grew to a bark. It wasn’t a terribly energetic bark, and spoke more of being bothered by waking up too early, than trying to strike fear in the heart of an intruder. Clifford Jr. hated to be awoken at all, never mind early.
Thankfully, the peasant’s life was saved only by a surly hobbit named Tortellini storming into the room. “What,” he complained, “is that dreadful racket?” Clifford Jr. gave up after a few more barks and returned to his sleeping spot. Tortellini blinked the sleep from his eyes.
He rubbed them. The grubby, poorly-dressed man was still standing there. “Who are you, Grubby Peasant?”
The Grubby Peasant raised an eyebrow. “I am someone who wants to spend as little time as possible in your presence.”
Tired as he was, Tortellini could see an open door for a witty retort in his sleep, which this pretty much was, “That,” he said, “shall be arranged.”
He turned and shouted at the top of his hobbit-y lungs, “Gus!”
The dragosaur rumbled into the room, smoke curling in wisps out of his nostrils. He looked to Tortellini for an explanation of the situation. “Rid us of this pe…”
“As much as I know we’d both love that,” interrupted the peasant, “It’s not that easy. You see, tiny annoying dwarf, I have to stay here for a few moments longer. And you have to let me stay. That’s just how it’s going to happen. We’re better off not fighting it. For example, right now this terrible logic Im using is starting to sound reasonable to both of us, even though it isn’t.”
“It sounds reasonable to me…” mused Tortellini.
“Me too. That’s my point.”
“Im confused.”
“You’re supposed to be.”
“I don’t get it…”
“That’s the way it’s supposed to be.”
“Ahh…I see,” said Tortellini even though he was still lost.
“Do you?”
“No.”
“Listen, none of this really matters. No matter how this headache-inducing conversation plays out, you’ll end up retrieving the Queen for me. So, you might as well save us both some time and go get her now.”
The surly hobbit scratched his chin, pretending to think it over. “I suppose I might as well.”
“I knew you would,” the peasant nodded.
Tortellini padded off in search of a Queen, who was just as sure to follow him as he had been to retrieve her. Upon later inspection, he couldn’t make much sense of the entire situation. Everything he did just seemed like the decent thing to do at the time.
“Queen Meg!” he called from outside her door. His tiny hands wrapped on the maple door. “Queen Meg!”
He was certain that a growl of some kind came from inside the room. The poor hobbit decided it best not to wait to find out if the Queen would come out. She most likely would. After all, hadn’t he done the peasant’s will? Wouldn’t she as well?
With a great fear in his heart, he flew down staircase after staircase and through hallway after hallway until he came into the room where the peasant was inexplicably attempting to gnaw on his elbow. Gus was staring at him and growling.
As soon as he heard the Hobbit-y footsteps, the peasant spun. “Where is the Queen?”
Tortellini shrugged.
“No matter,” continued the grubby man, “She’ll be here.”
“What makes you so…”
“Fate, you ridiculous, pompous dwarf!” interrupted the peasant, for the first time fury saturating his voice. His once peaceful demeanor had fled as if a troll who had been living off of drenched bagels for three weeks straight were chasing it off the side of a very prominent cliff. “Fate makes me sure. It has to happen this way.”
“Why does it have to happen like this?”
“Because then I wouldn’t be here. And it wouldn’t happen like this.”
“Im confused.”
“Im not surprised.”
All of the living creatures in that room noticed at the same time that even silent objects grew more silent. It’s nearly impossible to understand unless you’ve been around a truly furious Queen. Believe me, it isn’t something you want to understand. Gus shuddered even though he wasn’t actually in trouble.
“Who is he?” asked Queen Meg.
“Who is who, Your Majesty?” piped up the hobbit, obviously with very little regard for his life.
She looked at Tortellini with great contempt, “That red dog lying in the corner,” sarcasm dripping from her voice, “No, the grubby man, Tortellini! Who is he? And is that why you woke me up?”
“Well, he is…um…his name is…Frankly, Your Majesty, I haven’t the slightest clue who he is.”
“Then why is he here?”
“He wished to speak with you.”
The Queen turned to the grubby man, “About what exactly?”
“About your fate, Queen Megan,” answered the peasant, trying his best to be respectful.
“What about it?”
“It involves following me. Other than that, I know next to nothing.”
“I’m to follow you? What makes you think that?”
“I don’t think it. I know it…You just will.”
Meg harrumphed. She didn’t appreciate being told what she would or would not do. Hence the harrumph. It was her greatest sign of displeasure. That she wasn’t happy. “I won’t,” she put her foot down, “Not in a million years. Im not going anywhere.”
“Fine,” said the peasant, walking out of the room very casually. He neared the door, half-turned around, and said “Then King Nate won’t survive until sunset.” And with that, he walked out of the room and continued out of the castle.
Meg was dumbfounded. She shook her head. But it wasn’t all a crazy dream. “Gus!” She called. “Can you retrieve that cursed peasant for me?”
Gus nodded. His ginormous, scaly tail was practically wagging at the thought of obeying his Queen’s command. After a few short minutes, He came back in prancing with the grubby peasant firmly in his snout.
Queen Meg began to interrogate him. “What was that you said?”
“You heard me. If you don’t follow me, which you will, King Nate will die.”
“Listen to me…uh…what’s your name, grubby peasant?”
“Apparently, it’s unimportant because you all insist on calling me such a demeaning name like ‘grubby peasant.’”
“If I may add my opinion,” chimed in Tortellini, “It does suite you.”
The grubby peasant glowered at him, “It’s childish.”
Meg shrugged, “That’s not really news to us.”
“You rule a kingdom?”
Meg shrugged again, “Honestly, it surprises me too.” She shook her head, “As I was saying, Listen to me, you grubby peasant, I don’t know what makes you think you can just threaten the King’s life. I could have you thrown off a cliff in 30 seconds flat. Choose your next words with the utmost care.”
“It doesn’t matter how I choose my words. You’ll follow me and I’ll stay alive. Nothing can change that.”
“That’s it,” sighed Meg, “Gus! Drop him off a cliff.” Gus scooped him up and as a group they all headed out into the open air. Gus led them all to a cliff which seemed to have come out of nowhere. “Wow,” commented Meg, “I don’t remember this being here…”
They all shrugged at once. Gus stretched the poor peasant out over the ledge. Strangely, the grubby man didn’t seem bothered. He just waited to be let go. After a moment to build up suspense, Meg said, “Drop him.” And drop him, they did.
He dropped, just like you would expect. Until he stopped dropping, just like you wouldn’t expect. A giant fluffy pillow popped out of thin air and caught him before he smashed against the hard, unforgiving ground.
When Gus retrieved him again, the peasant just sighed and said, “It’s no use. He won’t let me die.”
Meg raised an eyebrow, “Who is ‘he’?”
“The wizard Im taking you to see. Now, have you seen enough? Can we leave now?”
Meg sighed an I-give-up kind of sigh. “I guess…Gus? You stay here and make sure Nate doesn’t worry. Oh and don’t let him be harmed. At all. So help me, if he ends up dead you won’t get to garden for a WEEK, Mister.”
(Let me jump in here for a moment. I know it sounds bad. You’re probably wondering why she’d use such a lame threat to keep me alive. But it’s actually quite effective. You see, Gus loves gardening. He thinks about it all the time. He dreams about it all the time. When he’s not doing that, he’s thinking about dreaming about it. Or dreaming about thinking about it. Every once and a while he likes to mix it up by dreaming about thinking about dreaming about it. Or by thinking about dreaming about dreaming about thinking about dreaming about saying the word “garden.” I guess you could call it an obsession.)
Gus staggered back at the mere thought. He would give his life for King Nate with that threat looming over him. Though he was a little hurt that Meg had to stoop that low.
Meg turned to the peasant, “Where are we going?”
“Nowhere, yet. First we need to do some things.” He walked over to a bush and began pulling out random costumes seemingly out of nowhere. “You’ll need to have your friends put them on.”
Meg groaned and went in search of Steph, Johanna and Kristen. About twenty minutes later, they all came out of the castle each in their very own costume. Meg was wearing a cowboy costume. Steph was wearing an astronaut costume. Johanna was wearing a queen costume, which made things a bit awkward between her and Meg for the rest of the afternoon. And Kristen was wearing a robot costume.
None of them looked particularly pleased. “Why,” complained Steph, “do we have to wear these, again?”
The peasant just shrugged. “Im merely doing as Im told.”
“What psycho is telling you to do all this stuff?”
The peasant looked around nervously. In a hushed voice he said, “Someone who doesn’t appreciate being called a ‘psycho’.” He clapped his hands together, “Shall we be off?”
No one objected. So they began a long trek of hiking through the meadows and valleys for the rest of the day. The sun beat down on their shoulders (except for Megan’s right shoulder…) all day. Soon they began to complain of the constricting costumes. But the peasant wouldn’t relent. He refused their pleading to take them off.
They trudged all day long, while the peasant occasionally muttered to himself. Eventually, they came to a hole in the middle of a field. It wasn’t a particularly large, but not very small either. The peasant stopped and stared down into it. He seemed to be waiting for something, so they all crowded around it. Just as they were all working up the nerve to question him on it, a small, fuzzy gray head popped out of the hole.
“’ello!” It beamed. “How are you doing today?”
All of them were dumbfounded. Except for the peasant. He just seemed irritated. The head grew a torso and then limbs. Once fully out they realized it was a koala. “It’s good of you to join me. My name is Stan. And this…” He pointed towards the peasant, “is Drake.”
Suddenly, the peasant, who was now known to be Drake, morphed into a panda.
Stan grinned, in an all-too-giddy-for-any-sane-person’s-taste kind of way, “I’d explain why you’re here, but…I’d rather not have to explain twice. So, I’ll just see you in a few hours. Goodni...”
None of them heard the end of that sentence, because they all blacked out.
When they awoke, they were tied up in ropes and chains. A mob of fuchsia-scarf-wearing bandits surrounded them. Much to their surprise, King Nate and Gus were tied up.
“How did you guys get…” Johanna started to ask.
Gus just sighed. And Nate said, “You don’t want to know.”
The group of them stayed sullen and silent, until Stan showed up cackling with delight.
“Now,” He began, “I would like to explain my story without any interruptions, so please, keep your mouth closed. It’s better for everyone that way.”
Rubbing his furry little paws together, he paced around the circle of them and began to elaborate on the reason for this whole escapade, “It all started years ago when my rival wizard Drake, the panda, mocked me. He said I would amount to nothing. That my spells were useless and idiotic. He said that I was so inferior to him; he might as well have created me. He said it would take a cowboy, an astronaut, a queen and a robot telling him otherwise for him to believe that I was of any value whatsoever. He didn’t think I was worthy of the title of Wizard. So I set out to prove him wrong.”
He grinned, “I tried the one spell that no one else had ever tried. I erased myself. Memories people had of me, my effects on the world no matter how small, even my family, I erased it all. Well, almost all. I kept one thing. I left this tiny corner of Drake’s brain open to my command on a certain day far in the future. That day was yesterday. And yesterday, I got him use the only spell that would bring me back. That was only part of my plan. Now I must finish it.”
Stan strolled over to Queen Meg. “Stand up, please.” At his words, the chains disintegrated. She stood, unsure of what else to do. “Now,” he said, his voice booming, “Tell me that I am a great and powerful wizard!”
Meg froze. “That’s it?”
“Yes. Yes, of course.”
“You went through all that just for me to call you a ‘great and powerful wizard’?”
Stan shrugged. “Why not?”
“Ok…” Meg sighed and said, “You, Stan, are a great and powerful wizard.”
“NO! NO!” Stan complained, “That was all wrong! Say it with feeling! I’ve been waiting hundreds of years to hear you say it. The least you can do is say it like you mean it!”
Queen Megan tried it again, “You, Stan, are a great and powerful wizard!”
He applauded, “MUCH better.” Then he turned to Drake, “Did you hear that? Did you hear what she said? I TOLD you I was a great and powerful wizard. And YOU didn’t believe me.” This sort of thing went on for nearly half an hour, while Drake just sighed and looked defeated. After he got all that out of his system, Stan turned to the group and said, “You guys are free to go now.”
They didn’t have time to thank him because no sooner did he finish saying that, and they were all standing inside the castle. No one spoke for several minutes. Gus got bored and trudged off to find his garden. Still, no one spoke. Until King Nate’s stomach growled and he said, “I could really use a sandwich…” So he trudged off to make himself one. Most likely with bacon on it.
When she could take the silence no longer, Queen Meg uttered one word, “Awkward…” And they all spent the rest of the evening laughing about how insane their lives had turned out to be. They even wondered aloud what their lives would have been like in a boring, reasonable place. Kind of like an alternate reality. So they named that place “Earth” and even began telling stories about it. Which King Nate wrote down in his spare time.
On cold, drizzly nights they would sit around reading those stories and laugh about how their alternate selves could turn a boring planet into a magical one.
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