The Wizard Of Never Was (Part 2)

Despite the insipid nature of the rays of sunlight striking its blade, the sword was still an awesome sight. The intricately carved designs on its golden hilt blazed like runes of fire. the jewels set into its pommel glittered more brightly than any stars. The blade’s keen edge threatened to cut the very air and to split the fabric of reality itself.

“Er... Could you just dig a little hole with it over here?” muttered The Wizard, pointing down at the muddy ground.

“What?” demanded the King, who had got himself all worked up to swear some mighty oath or to proclaim the words of an ancient rite.

“Um... Right here will do,” The Wizard said, in an even smaller voice. “Just poke the point in a bit,” he explained, miming a vague prodding gesture with his long bony index finger.

“Is this some kind of joke, Wizard?” snarled the King, worried about the effect on his dignity and authority in front of the gathered populace.

“Trust me, sire,” urged The Wizard, playing his psychological trump card.

Boncoeur regarded him with a cold gaze. Technically, he knew, a King outranked a Wizard and could command him to do his bidding rather than the other way around. On the other hand, he would never have become King without The Wizard’s wise counsel at every stage of his campaign. In fact, he realised belatedly, if it hadn’t been for The Wizard plucking him from a life of obscurity as a junior officer in the Emperor’s household cavalry and filling his head with ideas above his station, then... Well, it was no use thinking about it now.

He plunged his sword into the ground as if he were attempting to stab the poor hill to death, narrowly missing The Wizard’s toes in the process. Then, he wrenched the blade free, sending a divot of mud flying up to splatter The Wizard’s robes.

The King stepped back, smirking at having scored even such a petty blow. The magic infusing his sword ensured that its blade remained clean and undulled. He returned it to its scabbard with a satisfyingly emphatic ‘Thunk!’

The Wizard studiously ignored the stains on his apparel and reached deep inside the voluminous folds of his robes. He rummaged about in secret pockets and hidden compartments, contorting his body in strange shapes and disappearing up to the shoulder in the weird darkness within, almost turning himself inside out with the extremity of his wiggling. At last, a look of success appeared on his bewhiskered, wrinkled face and he withdrew his hand to reveal... Oh, bother! It was a pure white diamond the size of a walnut. Not what he had been looking for at all.

He threw it aside casually and resumed his rooting about inside his mystical clothing, oblivious to the violent scuffle that had broken out in the crowd as they fought over the discarded gemstone.

Aha! He pulled his hand out again, this time to reveal... Oh, double bother! It was a solid gold nugget in the shape of a crab apple.

Exuding a sigh of desperation, he tossed the precious metal in the general direction of the increasingly excited crowd. This ceremony was turning out to be a livelier event than anyone had anticipated. The King’s troop of personal bodyguards wavered uncertainly, not sure whether they should remain in rank to protect their monarch or wade into the crowd to preserve the peace by a bit of judicious bludgeoning with the blunt ends of their axe handles.

“Ulrika!” exclaimed The Wizard as the light of realisation suddenly flashed in his piercing blue eyes. So saying, he snatched his tall pointed wizard’s hat from his head and fiddled about with the lining. His long fingers clasped around the object he sought and he finally held it up for all to see.

The crowd fell silent in anticipation. If this third object was so much more important than gold or diamonds, then it definitely deserved a good look. After all, what could it possibly be?

The Wizard unclasped his skeletal fingers. The object sat neatly in the palm of his hand. It was a rich, glossy, nutty brown in colour, with a lighter patch on top. It was about the size of a conker. It even looked like a conker.

In point of fact, it WAS a conker.

Looking back at this moment from the relatively safe vantage point of the distant future, The Wizard realised that his younger self was already quite old. His hair was already grey, sparse and unkempt, like an abandoned birds nest. His beard was already long and wild, making it look as if he had a badger tucked under his chin. His skin was already wrinkly, as dry and stiff as a screwed up paper bag. He remembered remembering even further back into the past...

He remembered the first settlers who had cleared this ground, building a crude wooden village out of the felled timbers. Before that, he remembered when the land had been just one huge forest. In the days before there was even an Empire, when people ran about half naked in small tribal groups, when magic was everywhere and in everything, so that it was dead easy to become a wizard.

Those were the days. Not like the modern world, where most people consider magic to be merely some kind of trick and expect every problem to have an easy solution, every question to have a logical answer and every mystery to be solved with a glib explanation.

Meanwhile, back on the hilltop, The Wizard bent down and poked the conker into the hole the King had dug. Then, with an alarming creaking of the joints, he straightened up and fixed the restless crowd with a piercing glare. His eyes seemed to focus on each person individually, which was no mean feat. Especially if you were one of the people standing behind him. There was absolutely no escape from the intensity of his gaze.

The crowd had been milling about, muttering to itself in disappointment at what had seemed to be an anti-climax and preparing to break apart to wander aimlessly home. Suddenly, it fell still and silent again, apart from a bit of uncomfortable squirming beneath The Wizard’s implacable stare.

“Remember this moment,” urged The Wizard, his voice not at all loud and yet remarkably clear. “So that you may tell your children and your children’s children that you were here this day to witness this historic ceremony.”

He extended his right hand with a flourish and his magic staff materialised in his grasp. At least, that was what was supposed to have happened. If the crowd hadn’t been so mesmerised and misdirected, they would have seen him fumbling to get it untangled from the sleeve where it had been concealed, then almost dropping it, before turning it the right way up.

“His Majesty King Boncoeur the First has employed the timeless magic of the sword Hewslice to make his mark upon the earth and claim its stewardship in the name of the people of Karmalot,” he continued. “And now I have planted a seed in this hallowed ground, to represent the founding of our new kingdom.”

He paused to allow the concept to sink in to the minds of those present. He could almost hear the hollow clatter of pennies being dropped. The metaphorical sound was not quite drowned out by the Whoosh! of his words flying over people’s heads.

“So long as the tree that grows from this seed doth stand,” he averred. “So shall the kingdom endure.”

“Er... Steady on, Wizard,” said the King, realising the implications of such a statement. If any of his enemies wanted to bring Karmalot to ruin, all they would have to do is chop down one measly tree.

“Fear not, sire,” The Wizard replied, contorting one side of his face into a grimace that was meant to be a reassuring wink.

So saying, he tapped his staff three times forcefully upon the ground, thereby covering the conker with closely packed earth. On the first tap, the sky went dark as the sun was covered by a thick black cloud. On the second tap, the sky was lit up again briefly by a jagged bolt of lightning. On the third tap, there was a massive clap of thunder, followed by the onset of a heavy downpour of rain.

“Immaculate timing,” muttered The Wizard to himself smugly, as little puffs of smoke rose from his staff, the toes of his slippers and the point of his hat. The hair on his face and head stood on end, fizzing with tiny blue sparks.

The crowd dispersed rapidly, amid much shouting and screaming, as the people scattered in all directions, heading for shelter.

King Boncoeur plodded up to The Wizard, with the rain hammering hard on his armour, until they were standing face to face. The King’s hair was plastered to his head and hanging in lank strands. He had to keep blinking to keep the water from running into his eyes. Large drops gathered on the end of his nose and dripped embarrassingly onto The Wizard’s robes. He was annoyed to notice that The Wizard was otherwise completely bone dry. Somehow, the rain was managing to avoid hitting him.

“Wizard,” he said in a threatening monotone. “Consider yourself fired.”

“As you command, sire,” said The Wizard glibly. With a slight shrug of his shoulders, he disappeared quietly and without fuss, as if the rain had just washed him away.

What the King said next was not relevant and certainly not recorded by historians. Suffice to say that, by the time he had trudged back through the mud to his castle, he had exhausted his plentiful vocabulary of rude words and was reduced to making incoherent screeches of rage.