Frank was disturbed at the blank look he got from Sebastian Wollherz. ‘It’s me!’ he piped as he tugged the man’s sleeve, ‘Frank Potts! Are you alright? What happened in there?’
Bastian furrowed his brow. ‘Frank Potts?’ he mused. ‘But you’re a child! Don’t be ridiculous.’
‘What happened in there, Bastian? You don’t seem with it. Come back to the embassy with me.’
Frank suddenly realised there was another boy at his shoulder. To his relief, it was Jonas Niemand, once more in his dated servant’s livery. ‘He’s not all there, Pottie,’ the elf said, ‘literally.’
Karl Abentauer and his gang now trotted up. Karl sized up the elf. ‘Who’s this weird kid? What’s he wearing?’
‘This is my best friend, Jonas,’ Frank declared. ‘Look, we need to get this man back to the embassy. He’s a friend of Lord Burlesdon.’
‘Is he drunk? He looks out of things.’
‘I don’t think the embassy is the best place for him at the moment,’ Jonas said. ‘Something really weird happened to him in that church.’
Frank frowned. For Jonas to declare a thing to be ‘really weird’ was ominous to say the least. ‘So where do you think …?’
There was a silent flash and Frank’s little heart beat high, for he was no longer in the damp and night-time streets of Munich but in the broad and magical daylight of Eden, and with him was not just Sebastian Wollherz but the Karl Abentauer gang, staring around in amazement.
‘What the fuck have you done, Jonas!’ Frank shrieked.
‘What I had to,’ the elf declared, ‘and what the Dead wanted me to do, damn them. You explain this place to the lads.’
The other boys looked wide-eyed around them and then focussed on Frank. ‘Er …’ he began, ‘this is Faërie, and my friend Jonas is an elf.’
‘Wow!’ murmured Karl appreciatively, ‘I thought you were a bit strange, Pottie, but this …’
Frank smiled around him. Being in Faërie was if nothing else, reassuring. ‘Great isn’t it. Not many people ever get to come here. Don’t worry, Jonas will send you back home before you’re missed. He’s good through and through. By the way, if you never want to have a toothache, bad stomach or dripping nose ever again, go and splash about in that stream and take a drink from it. It’s magic. All this place is.’ ‘Magic? Who’d have guessed?’ Karl laughed. ‘Lads! Strip off. It’s summer here, let’s take a swim! Bet it’s nicer than the dirty old Isar.’ Five naked boys were soon cannon-balling into the River of Life, yelling with excitement. Frank didn’t immediately join in. He was gripped at the developing confrontation on the green lawns of Eden between Jonas and the man who looked like Sebastian Wollherz but was not, quite.
After sizing the man up, Jonas gave a grunt and clicked his fingers with a loud snap. The man was suddenly obscured by a whirling cloud, becoming no more than a dark shadow within a grey turning mist, but soon the one shadow became two, and when the mist cleared a small boy and small girl stood there, twins of about eight years of age. They looked around.
The girl twin frowned. ‘Back here again …’ she said with a disdainful sneer, ‘ and I suppose you must be Jonas Niemand.’
Jonas looked impressed at her defiance. ‘Yeah, that’s me. Time’s up for you, Antonin girl. You’ve proved you’re not safe to leave with the powers Wilchin gave you. So you don’t have them any more.’
‘You little trash!’ Bessie shouted. ‘You have no right. How dare you!’
‘What are you going to do about it?’ Jonas scoffed.
‘This!’ she shrieked, launching herself at Jonas and grabbing fistfuls of the elf’s dark hair, tugging hard at it.
‘Get her off me!’ the elf squealed.
Frank raced to disentangle her little fists from the elf’s dark locks. It was not easy. ‘Thought you were the Destroyer,’ he observed though gritted teeth, as his magical friend yelled and struggled. The mêlée carried on until another small pair of hands joined in the struggle. Eventually Jonas was free. ‘Thanks … er … Bastian?’ Frank offered.
‘Yes, it’s really me … I think,’ the boy said. He turned to Jonas. ‘Thanks for saving me, master elf,’ he said. ‘But what happened?’
Jonas growled. ‘The Dead thought they’d found a solution to the twin problem, except it wasn’t. They made one person out of the two of you. How stupid can anyone get?’ He was seething. ‘Even I know how wrong that would be. For a while you were both a girl and a boy and you and your sister shared a brain.’
‘You mean Bastian had boy and girl bits?’ Frank was aghast. ‘So what did you do?’
Jonas shrugged. ‘I brought them back to when they were last here, before the girl twin had her powers. Eden remembered them and it put them back as they were then. Strange things like that can be made to happen here. Now she has no power, which is what everybody wanted. But that only gives me another problem, one that the Dead expect me to deal with now. The power has to go somewhere. But where? Do you want it, Pottie?’
***
Lord Burlesdon was in council with his senior staff when a further visitor was announced, the man himself followed on behind swathed in his travel cloak. James leapt to his feet. ‘Dear God! Heinz! What on earth brings you here?’
‘Nothing good, Jimmy. An assassin took a shot at our father on the Platz first thing yesterday morning.’
‘Good God! Is the king safe?’
‘The bullet took him in the shoulder, but he’s not seriously harmed. The assassin was brought down by one of his escort. That’s why I’m here. We got the felon to be very forthcoming. Rather more than is comfortable for us, I have to say.
‘Let me take a seat. I’ve been riding post since Vater sent me here yesterday. Could you get me something refreshing to drink? I have a good deal of talking to do.’
Herr Abentauer answered the call with a glass of amber liquid. The prince smiled as he sniffed at it. ‘Hah! North British usquebaugh, I do believe. Just what the situation demands.’ He downed the spirits in a gulp. Then he coughed and his eyes filled with tears. ‘My God! Stronger than I remembered.’
After he had regained control, Prince Henry began his news. ‘The assassin was all too obliging in unveiling his motives. In fact I suspect that for him getting caught was more important than killing the king. He was a Glottenburger officer in the service of the Elector. He told me to my face the Elphbergs were the obstacle to the unification of the Rothenian people. Once we were disposed of, Willem Stanislas would ascend to his grandfather’s throne and Ruric would thus come again amongst his people, who would become the greatest among the races of Europe. He seemed unware that if he and his conspirators cleared away Vater, me and Ferdy, there would still be you, old fellow: the last of the Elphbergs. Amusing, what?’
James shook his head. ‘Not in the least, Heinz. Is he one of these Illuminati? Have you heard of them?’
‘Oh yes. We’ve rounded up a whole coven of the fanatics. That’s part of the problem. There were a lot of Bavarians amongst them, so many that it is difficult to believe anything other than that Elector Max’s government is somehow involved in the conspiracy. It’s almost as if they wanted us to make the connection.’
‘I think they did,’ James said. ‘It’s not so much King Rudolf’s death their leader wants, but another war between Ruritania and the Electorate.’
‘It seems to me you know a good deal more of this business than I do, Jimmy. Anyway, it’s why I’m here. We know you and the Elector have very good relations, and at this critical moment you can do your family and your own King George a great service by helping defuse the deadly crisis these Illuminati are attempting to make happen. Perhaps you should tell me what you know … and how you came to know so much, my dear. I am impressed no end.’
***
The Electoral court had moved down the Isar to Landshut for the Christmas season. The distance from Munich and the urgency of the situation persuaded James that he had best take the ambassadorial coach and six and ride directly to seek an audience from Max Joseph in person. Prince Henry accompanied him, saying it was no trouble, in that the trip to Landshut would take him half way home to Ruritania.
Snow began falling as they entered the town of Landshut. The elector was in residence in the great castle of Trausnitz on the cloud-swathed hill above the town. So Teddie Carfax was sent on ahead to notify His Most Serene Highness that the British Ambassador and the Prince of Ruritania desired the grace of an audience. Somewhat to James’s surprise an immediate and cordial assent was sent down from the castle.
‘The fellow must be bored,’ Henry commented.
‘That, and probably also intrigued,’ James added.
The coach laboured up the hill through the drifting snow, Freddie Winslow getting thickly caked with ice as he sat up with the coachman on the box. Torches and flambeaux flickered around the looming gatehouse, where cloaked guardsmen paced.
‘A lot of soldiers,’ James commented to his brother.
‘It’s a state prison as well as a palace,’ Henry replied. ‘And it puzzles me why the Elector should have come here for this joyous season. Perhaps he really does know something we don’t.’
Footmen with torches lined the way across the galleried courtyard to the Electoral apartments. Chamberlains ushered them inside into the warm and took their cloaks.
The Elector Max Joseph was awaiting them in the palace chapel, attended by an army officer and his minister of police. The Elector was a tall man, still in his forties and with a youthful, dynamic air about him. He greeted his unexpected guests with friendly courtesy and a raised eyebrow.
‘My dear Prince Henry,’ he commenced. ‘I have heard the news from Strelsau. I hope you bring good news about your respected father?’
‘Yes sire,’ Henry replied, ‘the bullet’s force was spent before it hit him in the shoulder. He has a bad bruise and, no doubt, will be nursing a stiff arm for a week or two. If I may observe, sire, you seem very well-informed.’
The Elector shrugged and gave a small smile. ‘What happens across our frontier in your homeland has long been of great concern to Bavaria, and I mean that in no hostile sense, my dear Henry.’
‘I understand that, sire. However, it seems to me that there is an air of – dare I say – alarm about your court at the moment.’
The Elector turned to James, without answering the prince. ‘Of course, my dear Lord Burlesdon, you must have been as distressed at the news from Strelsau as any other of the friends of King Rudolf.’ James did not imagine the stress that the Elector had placed on the word ‘friends’.
‘Indeed your most serene highness. But that is not the particular reason I accompanied his royal highness to Landshut.’
‘And what would that be?’ the Elector asked mildly.
‘Sire, I know you have heard of Professor Weishaupt. Perhaps the good Ritter von Tolz has informed you that he and his followers are not quite as innocent in their aspirations and ambitions as they try to appear.’
The Elector caught the eye of his minister of police. ‘That may be so, gentlemen.’
Prince Henry butted in. ‘We know for a fact they were behind the attempted murder of my father. And I would guess that similar concerns are what bring you to this fortress for Christmas.’
‘You are blunt, your royal highness, but not inaccurate. The minister has had concerns about Weishaupt for over a year. One of his most loyal and trusted aides, who was lured into Weishaupt’s clique, attempted to knife the minister himself two days ago, so you might say it’s concern for him as much as myself which bring us here to the security of the Schloss. As we speak, the more trustworthy of the good minister’s lieutenants are rounding up and securing as many as we can ascertain to be these “Illuminati”.’
‘My father has done the same in Ruritania, sire, where I regret to say that the net has caught up many of your subjects. The king’s would-be assasssin was a Glottenburger officer of your own army.’
‘So gentlemen, it appears that the same conspiracy threatens us both. I assume you do not consider me as in any way connected with these serious events.’
‘No sire,’ responded James. ‘But the world in general may suspect otherwise, a conclusion I am assured you must fear as much as does my royal master in London. I came here with Prince Henry to add my weight to what he has to say about events in Ruritania, and Glottenburg.’
‘Glottenburg?’ the Elector queried. ‘How is the duchy linked to this? When last I heard it was securely under the rule of King Rudolf’s sister.’
James carried on. ‘At the root of Weishaupt’s mysticism is a belief in a Messiah who will arise out of the Rothenian people, and to fulfil his destiny the Rothenian people must be united. They fix their hopes on the child-duke Willem Stanislas, who is of course in the line of succession to the Ruritanian throne.’
The Elector shrugged. ‘But not that high in it, I believe.’
‘High enough to inspire a faction within the kingdom,’ Prince Henry said. ‘And there are factions in Ruritania which would welcome his succession, not just these mystical zealots. As we have seen, there are already enough recruits available to attempt the assassination of the king. We do not think they will stop there.’
The Elector took up a handbell placed on a side table, and rang it. The servant who appeared was instructed to have a meal readied for his guests. As he departed, the Elector commented that they must do some serious thinking about how to address this unexpected crisis.
***
Frank gaped at Jonas. ‘What! You’re seriously offering me Bessie Wollherz’s powers?’
The elf shrugged. ‘Why not? You’re honest, and sane enough not to want to use them.’
Bessie struggled in the arms of her brother, who was pinning her down on the grass. ‘Who are you calling insane!’ she yelled.
Jonas shook his head. ‘Do I need to answer that?’ he scoffed. ‘What made Wilchin safe with all that power was that he only used it at need, and he almost always told me what he was going to do. You and the Elphberg abbess lady think you know best. But you don’t have a clue what’s really going on, Antonin girl. Little Willem Stanislas is not the One foretold. The Dead know that person is yet far in the future and that he will be an Elphberg.’
The elf suddenly fell silent and stood rigid in thought, before bursting out. ‘That’s it! The answer!’
He vanished abruptly, leaving several alarmed children abandoned on the lawns of Faërie.
‘Get off me, Bastian,’ Bessie ordered. Her brother let her up now Jonas was gone.
A dripping wet Karl Abentauer trotted up from the direction of the river, his gang tailing after him. ‘Where’s the weird elf boy gone?’ he asked.
‘No idea,’ Frank sighed. ‘He does that sort of thing. I expect he’ll be back soon enough.’
Karl showed a remarkable composure in dealing with the very odd situation he found himself in. He ordered his gang back into their clothes, and surveyed the surroundings, while interrogating Frank on what he knew about the place they were temporarily marooned in. Frank did his best with the small stock of knowledge he possessed.
‘So, this is a place beyond the world,’ Karl concluded, ‘where time stands still, or moves slowly, and the weird boy in the old fashioned coat is a being of great power called Jonas Niemand. I was born and brought up in Strelsau and old people tell stories there of just such an elf on the streets of Strelsau. Never thought I’d meet him. They say he lives at the bottom of a deep pool of water and can give you gold and treasure. Can he, Pottie?’
Frank shook his head. ‘He’s never offered. He certainly doesn’t live here as far as I know. In fact I’m told he’s not supposed to come here. I do know he’s not the only being who you can meet here. In fact I’d like to meet some of those. There’s a kingdom of winged horses who live off in the woodlands down there, across the stream. Is that right Bastian?’
The gang of Munich boys immediately resolved that winged horses were something they very much had to see. They marched off, leaving Frank and the Wollherz twins beside the river, Frank saying to Karl before he left that someone had better stay there in case the elf came back and wanted them.
‘Are you alright?’ Bastian asked his sister.
‘I’d like some clothes,’ she observed.
‘From what I hear,’ Frank said, ‘one thing you can do here is wish for a thing, and it appears. So wish for a dress or something.’
‘I notice you didn’t tell that to the Bavarian boys,’ said Bastian. ‘God knows what they would have created.’
‘Probably something explosive, I’m sure. Ah! So it works.’ The twins were abruptly clothed, both however in young male attire.
Frank addressed Bastian. ‘So, you and Freddie Winslow …?’ he began.
Bastian rolled his eyes. ‘We share more than a house, is that what you mean?’
‘It seems logical now. I thought he was mooning after your sister, but it was you all the time.’
Bessie scoffed. ‘Freddie was open to almost anything when he arrived in Munich,’ she said. ‘He’d had sex with both of us within a fortnight, simultaneously too. He may seem an innocent, but believe me that he’s open to most things.’
‘Well damn me,’ Frank said, reflecting on the bizarre nature of this conversation between three small children, ‘I did not read the boy well at all.’
‘It runs in the family,’ Bessie grinned
‘What do you mean?’
‘His little brother Charlie was quite up for it when I told him and his friend what was available down by the Isar. Now they were very much into each other.’
‘Dammit Bessie!’ Bastian swore. ‘Did you make them do it for you?’
‘Only a little nudge was all that was needed. They’d clearly done it before. Charlie was quite practised in taking his friend’s fat cock, and doing it with me watching got him very excited judging by the effect on his own schlong. The energy and insatiability of the young is indescribable.’
Her brother glared at her. ‘I’ll keep that information to myself, while cursing the necessity. I have a feeling that what Jonas did to remove your power over others won’t affect your general behaviour much.’
‘Hmm. That depends if he’s finished with me. I fear he is not.’
***
Prince Willem Stanislas looked up from the table where he was working on mathematical exercises set him by his tutor. His grandmother had come in. ‘Any more news about Great Uncle Rudolf, granny?’ he asked.
Princess Osra Madeleine smiled down at the boy and ruffled his golden hair. ‘A messenger came in an hour ago, saying that the king is not too badly hurt but that the city is in a turmoil. I’m sorry to have to say though that the man who shot him was from Glottenburg.’
‘What!’ the small boy cried. ‘That is terrible. People will think I ordered him to do it.’
‘No. Don’t you worry about that. What I would very much like to know is who it was who did get him to make the attempt on the king’s life.’
‘Get Bessie to find out. She can do anything.’
‘Yes well, unfortunately the Baroness is back in Munich at the moment and out of reach. Come along Staszek. The lady prioress Maria Radegunda has ordered a mass of the whole community for the king’s safety and recovery. We must head across to the church to attend.’
The boy hopped down from his seat and took his grandmother’s hand. She led him down the grand staircase of the abbess’s palace. The palace opened on to the great cloister and the pair walked its north alley to reach a splendid Gothic door into the south transept. The princess encountered her friend the prioress at the door and the two women stopped to exchange news.
Staszek didn’t take long to conclude that their chat was no business of his, and he wandered on into the great church. He knew where to go and trotted across the flagstones under the crossing to enter the empty choir. Once through the screen he scrambled up the south side nuns’ stalls to reach the canopied throne reserved for the king of Ruritania whenever he was present at a mass of the community. The boy already had enough confidence in his position to conclude that he had every right to sit where the Elphberg monarch otherwise would. Staszek settled on the plush cushions and looked around, kicking his legs. The prince very much liked Medeln Abbey, though he would have been hard put to describe why it seemed so like home to him, for like most young princes and aristocrats he lived a very mobile and unsettled life. But whether it was the constant kindness and evident affection of the nuns, the feeling of this being very much a place formed by his own family, or something more spiritual, he could not have said. All Staszek could say was that he felt at home here in a way he did not anywhere else, not even in his own duchy of Glottenburg.
One thing he did not like about Medeln was that his granny had told him that Jonas could not visit him there. Granny did not like his friend and Staszek was beginning to realise that she spent so much time in the abbey in part because it meant he could not receive the secret visits Jonas used to make. So the child was as surprised as he was delighted to look across the abbey choir and see a hand waving and a familiar, grinning face peering at him through the north aisle screen.
Staszek hopped up and off the throne, and hastily made his way back down into the choir, out through the screen and round into the north aisle. There was Jonas above him, clinging on to a strut of the screen. The elf took a leap and floated slowly down to the floor, as gently as a feather. Staszek ran over and hugged the bigger boy.
‘Jonas! I thought you couldn’t come here!’
‘Who said? Oh, your grandma I suppose. Well it’s true I’m not welcome here with some of its residents … the ones mortals can’t see. But at the moment we’re friendly so they let me in. Now, Staszek, I’ve had a brilliant idea. You know Bessie Wollherz had magic. I’ve had to take it away from her as she went a bit mad. It’s got to go somewhere else. How would you like it?’
***
The Munich gang trailed back from their expedition into the Unlikely Forest. They had not found the winged horses, though they had spotted a pair of unicorns in the distance, or they thought so at least.
Karl Abentauer took a seat by the river bank with a sigh. ‘Funny thing,’ he observed, ‘ we have to have been here for hours, but I don’t feel hungry or thirsty.’
His friends agreed, though one said he did feel a bit sleepy. They wanted to know when the elf would be back, but Frank and the Wollherz twins couldn’t help. A couple of the Abentauer gang were clearly getting uneasy about the situation and one was weepy. This growing unhappiness was obvious enough to the twins. Bastian leaned into Bessie and whispered something urgent. When he sat back the twins were holding child-sized guitars, which they strummed briefly before moving into a clever and elaborate duo which quickly entranced and distracted the other children.
The tension went out of the air and the boys relaxed on the grass caught up in the tuneful skill of the twins. They were so at ease that no one noticed the quiet reappearance of Jonas Niemand, perched on a boulder downstream.
The elf’s reappearance was not registered until a shout from Karl Abentauer brought everyone’s attention to the eaves of the Unlikely Forest. A herd of pegasuses was walking out from between the trunks, drawn perhaps by the music. But the great chestnut mare that led them headed straight for the elf, whinnying gently. Jonas hugged her head and kissed her nose. He beamed around the group.
‘This is Brunhild the Great, Empress of all Equines and Queen of the Pegasuses. She’s my good friend.’
Sebastian and his sister put down their guitars and walked over, to bow low to the famous mare, who they well knew was the foundation of their family’s fortunes. Brunhild walked on to Sebastian, snuffled him and gave his face a lick. She stared down at Sebastienne however and simply snorted and tossed her head.
‘Glad you’ve all met her,’ said the elf, ‘because it’s time to send you back home. Karl and the Munich gang stand close together. But not you Frank. I’ll have to put you back separately.’
Karl and the others all politely shook the elf’s hand and said thank you for the adventure and he was to look them up the next time he was in Munich. He seemed charmed by their courtesy. He clapped his hands and they were gone, but Jonas remained.
‘Well now,’ he said, ‘time to send you back, Pottie. It’s safe for you to be a man again. Shall I send you to the embassy? Right? Good.’
With a click of the elf’s fingers, all of a sudden Frank was back in the familiar space of his garret office at the back of the British embassy. He breathed out, and noticed he was closer to the ceiling than he had been the last time he had been in the room. He was also naked and a quick glance down his body confirmed he was once more fully adult.
The elf seemed not to have been willing to make the extra effort of clothing him. His quarters were next door however, and he was able to get to the press and dress himself without any embarrassing encounters. He straightened his shoulders and went out on to the landing to report his return to his colleagues. But more than anyone else he really needed to talk to Freddie Winslow.
***
Willem Stanislas VI, duke of Glottenburg, did not feel much different after he received the elf’s gift. So he was magical now was he? He raised his hand and commanded fire to come from his fingers. Nothing. He spread his arms and asked for wings to bear him upwards. Not so much as a single feather. So not really much of a gift, he thought in disappointment. Then the boy shrugged and smiled. He went back round to the crossing in time to encounter his grandmother approaching the screen.
‘Ah Staszek!’ she said, ‘You shouldn’t just wander off even in a place like this. Now come along with me. The mass will begin in only ten minutes.’
‘Shall I sit on the big throne, granny?’
‘What? Well, why not. You’ll get a better view I suppose. And of course you are the direct descendant of Duke Waclaw who founded this abbey, so up you go. But remember Staszek my dear. Everyone can see you up there, so no fidgetting.’
The princess paused, looking closer at the boy. ‘Staszek, darling, this abbey is a place where strange things can happen. So … did anything happen in here before I arrived?’
‘Er … like what, granny?’
‘Did you meet anyone … unusual?’
‘What do you mean, unusual?’
‘Oh … someone who may not have belonged to our everyday world, whose appearance was strange to you.’
Staszek thought about it and concluded that Jonas’s appearance was by no means unfamiliar to him so he said with a clear conscience and full conviction, ‘Nobody like that, granny.’
The song of the nuns came from the south transept, as they began filing into the abbey for the mass, and so grandmother and grandson hastily sought their seats.
***
Prince Henry and James took their morning coffees out on to a high loggia which offered a trememndous prospect of the Isar valley, blanketed now with white.
‘I’ll head along home today,’ the prince said, ‘if I can borrow a horse from the Electoral stables. You’d better get back to your embassy, Jimmy. You have letters to write to your foreign minister back in England. It’s all so complicated. Myself I would include diagrams for the poor man’s benefit. But that’s genealogy for you.’
‘I hope I’ve not gone too far in committing King George on the Bavarian succession question.’
‘Whether you have or have not, my dear, you have the weight of King Rudolf’s full support behind you, and that counts for a lot when Frederick of Prussia is in the other camp. Also King George has his hands full at the moment with his American subjects conspiring together against him in Continental Congresses and what have you. I’d imagine the Bavarian succession is an issue he would rather not have to think about. D’you know our old friend Dr Franklin has been chased out of his beloved London because the city has turned on him as a traitor to his king and a supporter of insurrection. He sent me a packet of rather amusing pamphlets on the subject. Poor fellow. Not the sort of man King George should alienate though.’
‘That at least is not my concern. When you see our father, assure him of my thanks and sympathy.’
‘I shall do, Jimmy. Then I shall get on with rooting out these Illuminati from our national life. I do so loathe the irrational zealot above all other forms of insect life, most of which, I assure you, is profoundly useful to humanity, unlike the zealot.’
‘And now you’ll be taking young Mr Winslow away with you to Strelsau. It’s been a joy to work him again for a few days.’
‘He has showed unsuspected talents during this crisis,’ Prince Henry commented. ‘I think I shall be letting him out from my library more often in future. He was very enterprising during the business with the rebellion in Glottenburg. I can use a talent like his now our father is dragging me more and more into the family business.’