In that stunned moment, Zyzzyva muttered something and Terry’s arms dropped powerlessly to her side. The sand serpents rose from the arms of the great throne and coiled themselves around her. Zyzzyva uttered something else and Maurice’s wand rose in the air, then snapped in two, while Arabelle’s platinum wand flew into his other hand. Zyzzyva grasped the wand eagerly, then drew it into his sleeve.

“Will you—destroy them?” Talia said eagerly.

“No, my dear,” Zyzzyva said. “We must do everything according to the law. The three of them will be tried as traitors and executed. Isn’t that right?”

“Er—quite,” the old king said, while the queen buried her face in her hands.

“Mother!” Teresa said.

“Don’t you try to upset her on my wedding day!” Talia said.

In a few brief moments, it seemed the war was over. Maurice, Teresa, and Arabelle were marched into a wooden cage with a great hook on top, not unlike the cage that held them in the giant's lair. Four human soldiers picked up the cage on sticks and marched it out into the sand outside the castle, where they sat in the stifling heat for a few moments, unsure of their fate. Then Zyzzyva exited the castle and gestured an ogre over to them.

“Take them to the royal dungeon,” Zyzzyva said to the ogre. “And do not eat them, or I will kill you.”

The ogre took the hook of the cage in his meaty paw, then held it far from his body.

“I carry like this,” he said. “No smell them.”

“Yes, good idea," Zyzzyva said. "No smell them. Just run through the forest, drop them at the castle grounds and come right back.”

The ogre picked up the cage and crashed his way forward, at first through the more sparse trees of the eucalyptus forest, then through the denser, older forest that separated the ocean from her father's castle. He held the cage as far from him as he could. Every once in a while he would yell, “No smell! No smell!” as if to remind himself, and Terry wondered if they’d make it to the royal dungeon at all. It was only after they were arrived and shackled by a shocked but cowed royal guard—there were tears all around—that Terry could even take a moment to think about what had just happened.

“My sister—is marrying Zyzzyva?” she said, sitting on the dungeon floor, her hands shackled above her head.

“They’re probably married by now,” Arabelle said, sitting at the opposite wall, similarly shackled.

“Yeah,” Maurice added. “Congratulations on your new brother-in-law.”

“Hemdale was right—I don’t know politics,” Terry said. “It never occurred to me that Zyzzyva might try to move in on my dad and not just take over with sand beasts or wraithlords.”

“An enemy can have a lot of weapons,” Maurice said. “Besides, what’s more evil than politics?”

“Yes, very wise,” Terry said. “Not sure how that wisdom is going to benefit me when I’m dead.”

Arabelle sighed. “My wand. I loved that wand. He doesn’t even want it—he just wants me not to have it. Do you think it’s going to take them a long time to kill us?”

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“Yes,” Terry said. “We’re traitors. We’re the worst of the worst. Ugh—and then Gregor is out there right now raising an army of miscreants that’s actually more proof of me being a traitor. They’ll defeat him in battle, surely. He’ll be sick at heart when he realizes that we’re gone, and won’t be able to fight.”

“Maybe he’ll defeat them all, and start a new dynasty,” Maurice suggested.

“I hope so. We sure won’t know. Because we’ll be dead.”

“Wait a minute,” Arabelle said. “Do you hear that?”

Terry listened for a moment. It was faint, but clearly the sounds of battle were reaching her ears. She could hear cannon fire and shouting, and the noise of horses. It grew louder each minute.

“Oh, no,” she said, “that’s Gregor’s army, fighting the army of my father’s! I just triggered a civil war!”

“On the bright side,” Maurice said, “they might get us out of here so that we don’t get executed as traitors tomorrow.”

“Can you do any magic at all, Arabelle?” Terry asked.

The royal magician looked unhappy. “Not very much, I'm afraid. All I have are minor mindtrick spells, but there’s no one to try them on.”

"What do you mean, mindtrick spells?" Terry asked.

"You know, little things to make people do stuff that you want."

“You mean you could tell someone to unlock us, and they would?”

“Maybe,” Arabelle said. “Depends on how strong-willed they are.”

“If the battle gets close enough, someone will come down and check on us,” Terry said. "So you might get your chance. We all might."

They sat and waited, listening to the noise of the battle. The wizard was presumably busy with his nuptuals, as this fight seemed to be almost entirely fought by humans.

“Do you think Gregor has any clerics with him?” Maurice said.

“Maybe,” Terry said. “Do you think my father’s army does? It seems like clerics would not volunteer to fight for a wizard like Zyzzyva.”

“Maybe they don’t know, yet,” Maurice said. “Maybe they think they’re fighting for the king.”

"They are fighting for the king," Terry said. "Oh, God, this is such a mess!"

The battle waged on, and over the next several hours it became increasingly loud, until the three prisoners could hear footsteps over their heads and shouting through the walls.

“Be ready,” Terry said to Arabelle. “It won’t be long now until someone decides we needs to move, or just wants to see that we’re in the same place.”

As she said it, the heavy dungeon door creaked open and a young, harried soldier stood in the doorway. “Prisoners!” he shouted. “You shall be moved to the general’s headquarters, in the castle.”

“No, we shan’t,” Arabelle said softly.

“Eh?” the young boy said, and shook his head, as if to clear it. “No, of course not,” he said, with a dawning realization. “You’re to be set free, yes, I remember now.” He went to the three of them, unlocked their foot and arm restraints, and then lied down on the dungeon floor. “I’m going to sleep now,” he told Arabelle.

“Yes, exactly,” Arabelle said. “Sleep for a nice, long time. Peaceful sleep.”

His face dropped into the slackness of deepest unconsciousness, and the three of them ran out of the dungeon and into the smoke and confusion of battle.

“We must find Gregor!” Terry said.

“We must stay alive, first,” Maurice shouted.

The battle raged around them, and Gregor’s human troops had far more experience in violence and mayhem than the farmhands and villagers conscripted by the king. Terry drew her saber, but no one engaged them and they slipped through the battlefield towards the forest where Terry had begun her adventure so long ago. They rushed through the forest, noticing that these were mostly Gregor’s troops, now, rushing to the front, with an occasional skirmish.

“Where is Gregor?” Terry asked one soldier, grabbing him as he ran. All he did was point backwards and keep running. “For glory!” he shouted.

Finally, they came upon a clearing and saw a very small tent, with Gregor standing in front. His eyes grew in his massive head as he saw his three companions rush up, and their greeting was as happy as it could be in the circumstances.

“Do you know why they fight us?” Gregor said. “They said they were the wizard’s troops—but they’re all village boys!”

“My sister just married the wizard,” Terry said briefly.

Gregor’s jaw dropped. “Then we’re traitors,” he said, in a soft, disbelieving voice.

“We are not traitors!” Terry said. “Not yet. We still have the same mission—kill Zyzzyva! He’s still clearly as evil as he was before he became my brother-in-law. We have one chance—kill him or indeed be executed as traitors.”

“I’d rather fight than be a general,” Gregor said.

“And we have to be four,” Terry said.

“But how can we fight him when we don’t even know where he is?”

An astonishing lightning bolt ripped up the sky.

“I don’t think that’s going to be a problem,” Terry said.