Somehow, Joachim managed to get rid of the priests. They retreated a little way down the valley, highly indignant but still unwilling to say anything openly against the chaplain, and still not in possession of the Holy Toe. The shouting and barking had died down, and it again seemed possible that, at some point, the valley’s dreamy quiet might be restored.
Dominic, with the knights and the still excited dogs, settled down near the base of the waterfall, built a fire, and started making a late breakfast. Diana sat twenty yards away, combing her hair and pinning it up again, her back turned carefully to them.
This must be, I thought, very difficult for her. Nimrod, the man she might have loved in her own way, now appeared a coward, and she had been thoroughly and publicly shamed before the knights of Yurt. Even for the duchess, this had gone beyond outrageous.
Joachim, Evrard, and I went into the grove with Nimrod. The old hermit had retreated to his hermitage. I should be, right now, trying to find the old wizard’s monster. But even with my best magic I feared I would not be able to track it unless I had the tall huntsman with me-I hadn’t even been able to find Evrard’s stick-man when I saw its footprint-and for the moment he couldn’t leave the grove’s sanctuary.
In the meantime, magical or not, I had a problem here that would thoroughly disrupt the kingdom if something wasn’t done, and soon.
“So are you indeed a prince?” I asked Nimrod.
“It won’t be much of a surprise to hear that I am,” he said with a slow smile. “My true name is Ascelin. I know you realized all along that I was not simply a huntsman.”
“And the duchess knew who you were?”
“Of course she did,” he said, seeming much more amused than anyone should be when his life was in peril. “I won’t try to pretend that part of my reason for coming into Yurt wasn’t to see her again.” He glanced in her direction. All that was visible was her hair and firmly set shoulders. “Although I’m afraid that’s turned out very badly.”
His next words showed how very precarious was his apparent calm. “Would she rather have me kill the regent and half the knights of Yurt than to run?” he demanded. It was quite clear he was not addressing any of us. “I could certainly outwrestle Dominic, and I’ve got stag-arrows in my quiver. I could have picked off all of them one by one. Would her honor have been satisfied then?”
“I don’t understand,” said Evrard abruptly into the ensuing silence. “Why does Dominic want to kill you?”
“I thought that was fairly clear,” said Nimrod-or rather Prince Ascelin. “We’d camped on the plateau last night, and were finishing breakfast outside our tent this morning, when Dominic and the knights came into view. Apparently the regent didn’t think my behavior toward my lady the Duchess Diana was the sort of behavior appropriate toward someone he’d planned to marry.” He smiled briefly and bitterly. “If I didn’t intend to kill a lot of men, running seemed my best option.”
I could see Joachim make a conscious decision not to lecture the prince on sin and virtue. “What do you know about Saint Eusebius?” he asked instead. “You said that seeing the duchess was only part of your reason for coming here.”
At this question, Nimrod-as I couldn’t help but think of him-became oddly flustered. I couldn’t tell at first if it was just the abrupt change of subject, or if the mention of the saint was disturbing. He would not meet Joachim’s eyes but looked off instead toward the shrine and reliquary there. “The major church of my city is dedicated to Saint Eusebius,” he answered slowly after a minute. “I’ve been devoted to the saint since boyhood.”
Several things suddenly became clear to me. “Saint Eusebius appeared to you in a vision,” I said. Joachim and Evrard stared at me, but I knew I was right. “He knew you for a remarkable huntsman, and he wanted to get the great horned rabbits out of Yurt.”
Nimrod looked at me almost with relief. “Yes, he did.” He paused, then went on in a much lower voice. “But he’d never appeared to me before. It was- It was not what I’d expected.” His face became distant and almost expressionless. A very short time ago, I had thought the forces of good were always gentle and pleasant, but it appeared I was wrong. Since seeing a saint seemed to be such a soul-searing experience, I was rather glad that saints did not appear to wizards.
“Eusebius has appeared to several people,” said Joachim quietly.
“The Cranky Saint has said something different to every single person he’s appeared to,” I said. “When is he going to make his will clear?” But Joachim did not answer.
I tried to calculate when the saint might have appeared in a vision to Nimrod, counting from when Evrard’s horned rabbits had escaped. “But how did you get here so fast?”
“I set out, I think,” said Nimrod, “within twenty-four hours of when the first horned rabbit reached this valley. I was here four days later.” He managed a smile. “Fifty miles a day on foot was a push, even for me. I must say,” he added after a brief pause, “that when I was asked to come defend the Holy Grove from magical creatures, I had expected something a little more-well, intimidating, than great horned rabbits.”
Whether the saint had told him or not, there was indeed something more intimidating in the kingdom now.
“What,” put in Evrard, “do you have to do, Prince, with the entrepreneurs up on top of the cliff?”
“I don’t know anything about them,” said Nimrod.
For a moment I sat thinking rapidly. If the huntsman had come to Yurt in direct response to the horned rabbits, then many of the series of strange and coincidental events that had begun immediately upon the king’s departure were linked. And Diana-even if in part unintentionally-was behind them all.
But I still didn’t know what any of this had to do with lowering pilgrims in a basket to see the Holy Toe, and I recalled I had already worked out that the horned rabbits had appeared too late to be behind the priests’ vision, even if they had brought about Nimrod’s. I wondered briefly if the “pilgrims” I had seen before had been the real priests of the church of Saint Eusebius, and if these three were some other people in disguise.
I dismissed this thought as too elaborate. Besides, I doubted false priests could fool Joachim. But Evrard’s horned rabbits-and the inhuman stick-man with which he had next tried to impress Diana-had also led to the monster. And I didn’t have the slightest idea how I was going to catch it.
Too many other people, from the duchess to the hermit to the priests to Dominic to Evrard, had had too many conflicting plans. And now everyone must be formulating new plans, to get Prince Ascelin out of the grove. For all I knew, I might even be caught myself in some complicated scheme put together by the Cranky Saint. If I wanted to leave this perfectly charming valley within my lifetime, it was time to stop being a playing-piece in other people’s games and to have a plan of my own.
And the first priority was to end this deadly standoff, before either Dominic and Nimrod killed each other, so that I could marshal my forces to go after the old wizard’s creature. “Evrard,” I said, rising resolutely to my feet, “we’re going to find the monster as soon as I settle this impasse. I want you to start working on spells with which to bind it.”
To my surprise, his face went white, making his freckles stand out sharply. “It’s all my fault,” he said as though he had just made a desperate decision.
“What do you mean?” I demanded.
“I made the stick-creature at the heart of the monster!”
I shook my head. “Whatever creature you made is long gone. It’s all the old wizard’s now. You’re not a competent enough wizard to create a monster like that single-handed.”
His face went, if possible, even whiter. “The duchess doesn’t think I’m competent?” He turned desperately from me to Nimrod. “She doesn’t think I’ll make a good wizard?”
“I’m afraid she hasn’t been very impressed so far,” said Nimrod reluctantly.
“Then I’ll have to catch the monster,” said Evrard in tragic tones, “or die in the attempt.”
“I think,” I said witheringly, “the duchess has other things to worry about now than whether her ducal wizard meets her expectations.” And I certainly did myself. “Joachim,” I continued, “I’ll leave the Cranky Saint to you with pleasure, but first I need you to back me up.”
“Of course,” he said. The chaplain clearly trusted me to know what I was doing. I wondered if I actually did.
“We’ve got to make it safe for you to leave the sanctuary of the grove,” I said to Nimrod. “I’ll need your help to catch the monster. Joachim, come with me.”
We walked to the top of the waterfall. The track had become churned and muddy from the many feet that had hurried up and down, but the water still gurgled icy and clear.
There was a spell I had learned in school, to make one’s voice carry. After a moment’s concentration, I thought I remembered it. “Listen to me,” I said loudly, too worried to be as pleased as I normally would have been that the spell had indeed worked. “The royal chaplain and I speak to you as King Haimeric’s representatives.”
I certainly had everyone’s attention. Even the duchess turned around. The dogs sat up expectantly, their tongues lolling.
Dominic heaved himself to his feet. The mud on his face and tunic had dried, and he had made some ineffectual attempts to scrape it off, but the effect was still quite horrifying. “You can’t act as the king’s representative, Wizard,” he said, frowning and crossing his massive arms. “I am the regent.”
“But the king said he wanted us to help you while he was gone. And since this is a case that involves you personally, you cannot possibly act as judge.
“It is clear to everyone here,” I continued, turning from Dominic to the knights and priests, “that a serious quarrel has taken place, disturbing the king’s peace, a quarrel that requires a judicial decision.” If I was not a particularly competent substitute for a king, I would be an even less competent justice-giver, but I had no choice. “In the name of King Haimeric of Yurt, I declare this court in session!”
Joachim looked at me sideways and lifted his eyebrows fractionally. I hoped that meant he approved.
My audience stirred and whispered, and the priests moved closer. Behind me, I almost thought I heard a soft laugh that could have come from the wood nymph. But no one else was laughing.
Under a sun far higher in the sky than I had hoped it would be by the time I finally got out of the valley, the knights of Yurt rose to their feet. They arranged themselves almost automatically into the relaxed but watchful stance they took when the king was dispensing justice. The regent gave me a black scowl but said nothing.
“Prince Dominic,” I said formally, “step forward and state your case as complaintant.”