37 - The Lord of the Things and His Game of King Chairs
Helfra’s Gates, 28 Days After the Festival
Babalador waved goodbye at the edge of the forest, which was just outside of Helfra's gates. Jonathan gave the Fae sprite such a big hug that he almost killed the thing. The elder fairy grumbled about taking a few millennia off his life, but "it was worth it for that smile from the oafish toddler."
Petra, Tim, Annelise, and Jonathan walked from the woods to the main road that skirted the edges of the trees. Humans didn't enter the woodland if they knew what was good for them, so it was natural for the merchants along the road to eye the four of them warily as they made their way toward the line forming at the gate.
People whispered and pointed at the group. They either knew it was some of the Silent Legion, or they were gauging just how unhinged the group had to be to have taken a nature stroll in one of the deadliest areas in all of Carnt.
Either way, they weren't bothered until they made it to the gate, where a guard said in an Irish accent, "Suzy? Is that you?"
The group looked at each other in confusion.
The guard pulled Annelise closer and said, "Suzy, it is you! How's capital life treating ya?! Yer man there. Is he your husband? Is he treating ya right? Are you treating her right?"
"The hat is silver!" Jonathan yelled and pointed to the guard's helmet.
Petra grinned and pulled the toddler's hands away from the shiny metal object. "They are not married."
The man regarded the group. "Bah. You didn't marry a dwarf, did you? You can't trust them, not an inch."
"I'm sorry," Annelise said. "You must have me mistaken for someone else."
The man brushed her hair away and revealed a scar on the base of her neck. "Explain that scar, then. When we were kids, we thought we'd climb one of those trees, the kind that takes a swing at ya. Clobbered you good on the back of the head, it did. Almost smashed in me brains, too. I was lucky it was Poor Day at the local healer."
"Poor Day? The local healer works on the poor only one day of the week?" Tim said, aghast.
"What are you talking about? One day of the year. You think healthcare grows on trees? Wait, don't answer that. It kinda does. Fae medicine and all. But still, the king is nice enough to share his healer once a year with the public."
"Oh, right," Annelise said. "The injury. Really messed with my memory. I go by Annelise now."
"You didn't tell me you were from Helfra," Petra said.
"Why do you think I didn't want to go back?" Annelise said. "Bad home life here."
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"But you loved your mother," the guard said.
"It was my dad."
"But he's the king!"
"What?!" Petra and Tim exclaimed, almost at once.
"He'll be happy to see ya," the guard said. "I'll get you an escort to the castle. Get some proper clothes for ya, and your lads.”
"Great," Annelise said, "It's, um, good to be back. I think."
They were escorted into the city and immediately noticed the stark difference between Helfra and all the other places they had visited. Earth artifacts were everywhere. There was a rickety wooden stall with Tickle Me Elmos, Furbies, and Cabbage Patch kids, answering the age-old question of where those toys went at Christmas time. A man whose wardrobe mainly consisted of burlap was break dancing while wearing headphones attached to an old iPod. Kids were on the street playing with Pogs.
It was as if a portal had sucked all the discarded consumer crap from American culture and deposited it onto a medieval kingdom. It was like they were walking through a reverse renaissance fair where people from the Middle Ages were selling their trinkets. They were definitely in the right place if they wanted to find a way home.
However, Petra didn't understand why Annelise wasn't very forthcoming about her parents. While she understood parents being awful people too well, she still wouldn't hesitate if one of her friends needed help that her mother could solve. Not that she really had been in any situation where her friends required legal counsel, but she wouldn't hesitate to call her mom if the case merited it.
Petra was determined not to judge the situation. She didn't really know the dynamic between the runaway princess and the king. Annelise had high-tailed it to another city and changed her name. She had even tried to play dumb at the gate. There was something the woman was hiding, and Petra felt sympathetic.
When Petra had first discovered that she was pregnant, she had hidden it from her parents for the longest time possible. It wasn't till the local big box store had sent her a coupon for prenatal vitamins in the mail that her mom went on the warpath to demand the store make an apology to her daughter. Turned out to be Petra's mom who needed to do the apologizing.
Estranged parents and secrets were Petra's MO. So, she told Annelise not to worry, that they would figure it out. But, in the meantime, she was also excited. Whatever process brought the modern objects to Helfra had to work both ways. Whoever was buying all the Crystal Pepsi and bringing it here had to know how to get them back into their own bodies.
The nightmare was coming to an end. While tossing daggers that could pin a man's hand to a tree was fun for a while, sleeping on rocks, being unable to bathe for days on end, eating squirrel, and all the other survivalist crap had gotten to her. She was ready to go back to where the biggest concerns of her life were whether or not Netflix would cancel her favorite show and making sure her son didn't off himself by sticking a fork in a light socket.
She had lost count of the times her toddler had tried to do himself in and was amazed that humanity even survived at all. A month before getting sucked into the past, Jonathan had tried to walk into the Willamette River, run onto a busy highway, climb the tallest tree in her yard, eat berries of an unknown species, climb into the oven, and jump from the top of the stairs. She had asked her mom if there was ever an end to the phase of kids doing stupid things to get themselves seriously injured or killed. Her mom had replied, "Just wait till the teenage years."
Yet, despite everything, it was worth it for the grin when she was about to tickle him or when his mind was blown by the very concept of flowers. The Portland Rose Garden was like Disneyland for her kid. For someone whose joy out of life involved identifying colors, the Rose Garden had an endless bounty across the whole spectrum and the added benefit of no creatures lurking about the place attempting to kill them.
It was hard enough to keep her normal three-year-old alive, let alone the lumbering giant her son had become. The entire group had to tackle him just so he wouldn't walk off a cliff when they got too close to a canyon. She had to make a campfire-toasted squirrel dance, so he would eat it. She had to remind the hulking man to go potty every time he started dancing around holding his crotch.
She was ready to have the size advantage back again, so if she needed to play counselor to a broken princess, she'd do it. At least it explained the necromancy and the general weirdness of Annelise. Being a royal has got to screw a person up, and if Petra had the option to practice blood magic to piss off her parents, she would have done it, too. At least, Petra thought, Annelise was beginning to make sense in this screwed-up world, as they passed a pirate holding a Pound Puppy.