So Cimorene is a sorceress, as well as a cook and librarian and goodness knows what else, Mendanbar thought to himself. Every time he thought he had her figured out, she surprised him again.
"It's a good idea, but please warn me if you're going to do anything like that again," he said. "I'm not in the mood for being startled, if you know what I mean."
Cimorene nodded, frowning slightly, and asked just what it was about the spell that had startled him. This led to a long, technical discussion of the various ways of casting spells, detecting spells, and comparing spells other people had cast. Mendanbar found it both interesting and informative. He had always known that his own methods of working magic were not much like anyone else's, but he had never had time to study other styles.
Cimorene knew something about most kinds of magic, and she was naturally very well informed indeed about dragon magic. She was as interested in Mendanbar's system as he was in everything else, and the conversation lasted all the way to Flat Top Mountain.
The sun had slipped behind the mountains and it was almost dark when they came to the foot of the last slope. Mendanbar could see the giant's castle at the top, large and dark and ominous against the graying sky. A broad road wrapped three times around the mountain as it wound its way to the castle gates.
"Are you sure this is the right place?" he asked.
"Quite sure," Cimorene said. "I've never been here myself, but Kazul has described it often enough. And that's certainly a giant's castle."
"Exactly," Mendanbar said. "But is it the right giant?"
"We won't find out standing here. Come on."
Cimorene marched confidently up the mountain. Shaking his head, Mendanbar followed. By the time they reached the castle gates, the stars were beginning to come out and it was getting hard to see.
"There ought to be a bellpull or a knob," Cimorene said. "You check that side of the gate, and I'll take this one."
"All right, but what-" A loud grinding noise interrupted Mendanbar in mid-sentence, and the gates swung open. Yellow light spilled across the road, making Mendanbar and Cimorene squint.
"Come in, travelers," a woman's voice said, much too pleasantly.
"Come in, and make yourselves comfortable for the night."
Neither Mendanbar nor Cimorene moved. "This was your idea in the first place," Mendanbar said softly to Cimorene. "What do we do now?"
"Ask questions," Cimorene replied just as softly. She raised her voice and said, "Thank you for your kind hospitality, but we're not just traveling.
We're looking for the giantess Ballimore, and we're in a hurry. So if you're not Ballimore, we'll have to go on."
"I am Ballimore," said the voice, still in an artificially pleasant tone that made Mendanbar's skin crawl. "Who are you?"
"I'm Princess Cimorene, Chief Cook and Librarian to Kazul, the King of the Dragons, and this is Mendanbar, the King of the Enchanted Forest," Cimorene answered.
"Cimorene?" said the voice in an entirely different manner. "Oh, good. I've been wanting to meet you for the longest time. Come on in, you and your friend, and I'll have supper ready in a jiffy."
Mendanbar and Cimorene looked at each other. "I think it's all right now," Cimorene said after a moment.
"Well, we won't find out standing here," Mendanbar said. He held out his arm. "Shall we go in, Princess?"
Cimorene gave him a bright, almost impish smile, and laid her fingertips on his arm as if they were walking into a court ball. "I should be pleased to accompany you, Your Majesty."
Together they walked through the gate. The courtyard inside was high, wide, and empty except for two rows of blazing torches in iron holders lined up on either side of the path. Mendanbar and Cimorene paced slowly up to the door, which swung open just as the gates had, only without the grinding.
As they went in, they heard the castle gates crunch shut. A moment later, the doors closed silently behind them.
They stood in a stone hall three times the size of any Mendanbar had ever seen. A wooden table, surrounded by high-backed chairs, stretched the length of the hall, At the far end of the room a large fire burned in an open hearth. High on the walls, more torches lit the room. A brown-haired woman in a pale blue dress was bending over a cauldron that hung from an iron hook above the fire. It all looked very ordinary, until Mendanbar noticed that the seats of the chairs were level with his eyes and everything else was similarly oversized.
The brown-haired woman sniffed at the cauldron, nodded to herself, and straightened. "Welcome," she said, coming forward. "I'm Ballimore.
You must be Princess Cimorene. I'm so pleased to meet you at last, after all that Kazul has told me about you."
The giantess bent over to shake hands gently with Cimorene. She was at least three times as tall as Mendanbar, but she moved with a grace that suited her size. Cimorene returned the handshake gravely, and said, "I hope Kazul hasn't given you the wrong idea about me."
"Not at all, I'm sure," said the giantess. "Is this your young man? You're not running away from the dragons after all this time, are you?"
"Certainly not," Cimorene said with unnecessary vehemence. "I'm very happy with my job."
"Of course," Ballimore said, sounding disappointed. She gave Mendanbar a speculative look, then leaned toward Cimorene. "If I were you, I'd reconsider," she said in a loud whisper. "Your young man doesn't look like the patient type."
"No, no," Cimorene said, reddening. "It's not like that at all. This is the King of the Enchanted Forest, and he came to see Kazul, only Kazul has gone to visit her grandchildren and isn't home. That's why we came to see you-to borrow a magic carpet, so we can find Kazul."
"Oh, I see," said the giantess. "Strictly business. Well, you'll have to wait until after supper. Dobbilan will be home any minute, and he hates it when his meals are late."
"Dobbilan?" Mendanbar said with some misgiving.
"My husband," Ballimore said.
There was a loud crash from the courtyard outside, followed by the thud, thud, thud of heavy footsteps that shook the castle.
Ballimore straightened with a happy smile. "Here he comes now."
Mendanbar and Cimorene turned to face the castle doors as the footsteps drew nearer. A moment later, the doors flew open and the giantess's husband stepped into the hall. He was a giant's head taller than she, with wild brown hair and a beard like a large, untidy broom's head. He carried a club that was as long as Mendanbar was tall.
Just inside the door, the giant stopped and sniffed the air. Then he sneezed once, scowled ferociously, and said in a voice that shook the torches in their brackets: "Fee, fie, foe, fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman.
Be he alive or be he dead, I'll grind his bones to make my bread."
Ballimore shook her head. "Nonsense, dear. It's just Princess Cimorene and the King of the Enchanted Forest ."
"And neither of us is English," Cimorene added.
The giant squinted down at her. "Are you sure about that?"
"Positive," Mendanbar said.
"Well-" The giant sniffed again, experimentally, then lowered his club with a sigh. "That's all right, then. I wasn't in the mood for more work tonight, anyway. Sorry about the mistake. It must be this cold in my head."
"I told you yesterday to take something for it," Ballimore scolded.
"And I told you this morning to wrap some flannel around your throat before you went out. But do you listen to me? No!"
"I listen," the giant protested uncomfortably. "But I can't ransack villages with a piece of flannel around my neck. It wouldn't look right."