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THE LESSER OF TWO EVILS

His Eminence, Craswell Crabbit, sat at his oversized desk in his overblown office contemplating a list of the secret books he never let anyone see, not even Rufus Pinch. Some time back, when his grand scheme was first taking shape, he had decided there was no reason to share such information with someone who might one day outlive his usefulness. The Throg Monkeys had seen the books, but they were dull and incurious creatures and no threat to his plans. They knew to find the books, to bring them to him for cataloging, and then to take them down into Abaddon. They had no real idea of their purpose or their worth.

Only he understood that.

Only he knew that these were books of old magic and ancient conjuring with power enough to alter entire worlds.

The list in his hands contained the names of those books, but not their locations. Over the years, the books had been scattered throughout the Stacks by those who had owned them previously and brought them here to store. Some had been placed haphazardly, some given false titles, and some deliberately hidden in more creative ways. Finding them anew and collecting them was the trick. It was, although young Thom didn’t realize it, the task to which Crabbit had set himself when he had put the boy to work cataloging inventory. While seemingly organizing the library, he was secretly searching out the missing books of magic and transporting them down into Abaddon.

At first blush, that might have seemed self-defeating. What was the point of finding all these books only to turn them over to the demons? Wouldn’t he have been better off keeping them for himself? The answers were not immediately obvious. Keeping the books in his personal possession would have been the ideal choice. But he needed the demons to achieve the goal he had set himself, which meant letting them have access to the books and their spells. It was a clear quid pro quo. The demons wanted a way out of Abaddon, and there were spells in the books of magic that could give them that. He wanted Landover’s throne, and the demons could give it to him.

Well, to a large degree. They could give him the army he needed to take control of the Kingdom once Ben Holiday was out of the way. They could give him power over the Lords of the Greensward and the River Master and his once-fairy and all the rest.

And then he would rid himself of the demons by sending them outside of Landover into the myriad worlds to which she was linked.

This last was the tricky part, of course, but he believed he had worked it out. Demons, by nature, were never satisfied, and if they could be freed from Abaddon’s prison they would migrate willingly to other places.

He allowed himself a satisfied smile. A fair-minded man would have blanched at what he was planning, but he was not a fair-minded man by any stretch of the imagination. Such men littered the pages of history books under the category heading “Losers, Failures, and Weaklings.” He had no intention of being remembered as one of these. He would be remembered as a great and powerful man, a leader, a ruler, and a conqueror.

He was contemplating his place in history, visualizing lesser men reading of his prowess as they pined over their own inescapable shortcomings, when Rufus Pinch appeared in the doorway, wild-eyed.

“Craswell, we have a serious problem!” he exclaimed breathlessly and collapsed into an overstuffed chair to one side, mopping a bright sheen of perspiration from his wrinkled brow. “A very serious problem,” he added.

His Eminence, who did not like serious problems unless they belonged to someone else, looked stern and unforgiving. “Get to it, Mr. Pinch. And what did I tell you about the proper form by which to address me?”

Rufus Pinch glared at him. “You have much bigger problems than what I choose to call you, Mr. Craswell Crabbit, Your Esteemed Eminence!” He spit out the names with such vitriol that Crabbit was taken aback. “Now do you want to hear what I have to say or not?”

His Eminence exhaled wearily and gave an assenting gesture. “Proceed.”

“Berwyn Laphroig, Lord of Rhyndweir, is standing at the front door and demanding to be admitted. He wants you to come out to speak with him.”

“Did you tell him that no one … ?”

“… is to be admitted, yes, of course, I told him! But he didn’t care for that answer, and he has threatened to gain entry by force if denied it by acquiescence. He has fifty armed knights and a battering ram to back up his threat, I might add.”

His Eminence stared. “Did he say what he wants?”

“Yes, Your Eminence. He wants you. Downstairs. Speaking with him. Right away. If you refuse, he will break down the doors, seek you out, and do things to you that I don’t care to repeat!”

The other man frowned anew, not at all pleased with this bit of information. He thought momentarily of summoning magic enough to melt the entire attack force into lead dumplings, but discarded the idea as too radical. Better to talk to Laphroig first and see what it was he wanted. He could always fry him up for dinner later.

“Come with me,” he said, getting to his feet and coming around the desk. He got as far as the door before he changed his mind. “No, wait. Stay here. Keep an eye on our little friends in the storage room, just in case. Whatever happens, we don’t want them getting out and stirring up additional trouble. Not that I think they will, but it doesn’t hurt to be cautious, Mr. Pinch.”

Grumbling about everything in general and nothing in particular, his associate trundled away in a huff. His Eminence watched him go, thinking anew that perhaps the value of their friendship was diminished sufficiently that it was time to sever it. Relationships gone sour should be ended swiftly and completely. It was a harsh, but necessary, rule of life for great men.

It occurred to Craswell Crabbit, as he crossed from his office to the entryway of the building, that the reason for Berwyn Laphroig’s visit could have to do with the fact that he had discovered his younger brother was alive and hiding at Libiris. How he had found that out was anyone’s guess, but it would certainly explain his insistence on being allowed entry. If that were the case, His Eminence reasoned, he might well be forced to give up young Thom just to avoid the unpleasantness that would almost certainly follow otherwise. He had hoped that Thom might one day prove valuable as a bargaining chip, a way to gain leverage over Rhyndweir’s Lord should that prove necessary. But the boy’s presence couldn’t be allowed to interfere with his current plans, so if push came to shove young Thom would have to go under the ax. Literally.

He reached the entry, passed through, and, taking a moment to compose himself, opened the doors to Libiris.

Bright sunshine spilled out of a nearly cloudless blue sky, momentarily blinding him. He squinted through the glare at the dozens of armored knights sitting their horses in tight formation not two dozen yards from where he stood. At their forefront, rather incongruously, two hapless-looking G’home Gnomes sat trussed and bound atop a single charger. Craning his neck in order to make himself even taller, His Eminence searched for Laphroig. Instead, he found a stick-thin fellow standing just off to one side of him looking exceedingly distressed, rather as if he needed help with loosening pants that were too tight. His frantic movements, constrained and half formed, were puzzling.

“Crabbit!” barked a voice directly in front of him.

He jumped back, startled, and discovered that Berwyn Laphroig, a man barely taller than Crabbit’s belt buckle, was staring up at him. “Good day to you, Lord Laphroig,” he offered, recovering his equanimity. “I understand you wish to speak with me?”

“You took your time getting here!” the other snapped. “We must talk, just the two of us, alone. It concerns your guest.”

So there it is, His Eminence concluded. He’s found out about his brother and come to take him away. Shrugging his reluctant agreement, he led Rhyndweir’s diminutive lord inside the entry way, closing the door behind him. He stopped him there, blocking his way forward.

“So, then?” he asked, testing the waters. “Of whom do you speak?”

Laphroig was incensed. His face colored and his neck tendons strained. “You know perfectly well who, Craswell Crabbit! Mistaya Holiday, Princess of Landover! You are hiding her here, presumably so that her father cannot find her. But I have found her, and I intend to take her back to Rhyndweir with me.”

His Eminence stared at him in surprise. This put a different twist on things. Apparently, Berwyn Laphroig still knew nothing of young Thom, only of the Princess. “You wish to return her to the High Lord?” he pressed, trying to navigate murky waters.

“What I wish is my business and none of yours!” the other snapped.

“Well, she is here for safekeeping and under my protection,” His Eminence advised. “I don’t intend to turn her over to you or anyone without a very good reason for doing so.”

The Frog glared. “This isn’t a request, Crabbit. It is a demand. From a Lord of the Greensward with fifty armed knights looking for an excuse to break down your front door. You will give me the girl or I will simply take her.”

“By force of arms? From me, a trained wizard?”

“I don’t care what it takes or what you are, the girl will be mine. I am determined on it. She is to be my wife.”

Ah, thought His Eminence, the light begins to dawn. He wants the Princess of Landover for his bride.

“You are already married, are you not?” he asked, using his most solicitous tone of voice.

“News travels slowly in this part of Landover, I see,” the other snapped. “My wife and son are dead, more than several weeks now, and thus I am left with neither spouse nor heir to my throne. Mistaya Holiday will provide me with both.”

And so much more, His Eminence added silently. “But why would she choose to marry you, if you don’t mind my asking? Not that any girl in her right mind would pass on such an opportunity, but I have discovered that this particular girl can be most obstreperous.”

Laphroig squared his shoulders, sweeping his black cloak behind him dramatically. “I will tame her. She will come to see that I am the right husband for her. It is an excellent match, Crabbit. I will give her freedom from her parents, which she obviously desires, and she will give me sons to rule!”

She will give you a foot in your backside, His Eminence thought but did not say. “Time is an issue here, is it not?” he said instead. “Her father will learn of her presence at Rhyndweir and come to take her home. Likely, she will agree. What to you plan to do about that?”

Laphroig looked momentarily nonplussed. “He won’t find out about her right away. I will have my chances to win her over.”

“But winning over a girl of fifteen might take some doing, especially if she is a Princess of Landover. If you force her in any way, she will go straight to her father and your head will be on the block.” His Eminence saw his chance now and determined to take it. “Suppose I was able to persuade her to accept you as her husband and to enter into marriage with you immediately? You cannot force a girl of fifteen to marry you, but if she signs a valid consent the marriage is binding. What if I were able to produce such a consent? Even a King would be bound by such a document.”

The Frog frowned and shook his head. “How could you manage this, Crabbit? What sort of hold do you have over her?”

His Eminence shrugged. “She came to me for shelter and I provided it. She has come to trust me. I am persuasive when I need to be.”

“You are a purveyor of horse pucky, is what you are. Come to trust you, has she? Persuasive when you need to be, are you? Nonsense! You must know a spell that will bind her to your command. You must have a way to trick her using magic.”

His Eminence glared. “Do you want my help or not? Because if you don’t, then let’s put an end to this. You risk everything by insisting on taking her by force, but that is certainly your choice.”

The Frog considered. “What do you get out of all this? You wouldn’t expect me to believe that you are helping me out of the kindness of your heart, would you?”

His Eminence smiled. “Let us be perfectly open with each other, Lord Laphroig. Your intentions go well beyond the obvious. You hunger for Landover’s throne, and by marrying Mistaya Holiday you put yourself in a position to claim it. If the royal line should diminish sufficiently, rule of Landover could fall to you.”

He held up his hands in warning as the other started to object. “Wait, wait, I am not being in any way critical of your ambitions. I, too, would like to see Ben Holiday removed as King. Having his daughter here furthers that goal. But I think it might be in our best interests to work together on this. Essentially, we both want the same thing. You want access to Landover’s throne, and I want Ben Holiday off it. What if there was a quick and easy way to make that happen?”

Berwyn Laphroig pulled his black cloak closer about him and glanced around uneasily. “You are speaking treason, Crabbit.”

His Eminence had endured being called “Crabbit” just about as long as he could, but he forced himself to stay focused on the matter at hand. “Yes or no? Where do you stand?”

“How would you make this happen?” the other whispered, leaning close enough that His Eminence was forced to take a step back to avoid his rather noxious breath.

“Mistaya Holiday will acquiesce to your marriage and sign a consent in the bargain. I will perform the ceremony myself; I am authorized to do so. You shall remain with her at Libiris when the nuptials are concluded; your conjugal rights shall be concluded and an heir assured. Her father will come to rescue her, but when he does he will find a rather unpleasant surprise awaiting him—a rather long drop down a deep hole. It will be over before he realizes what is happening. A trap has been set and remains in place. His demise will be swift, and your path of ascension to the throne of Landover will be cleared.”

He paused, doing his best to look humble. “All I ask is that I be given free rein to continue my work here as royal librarian.”

“I become King and you become royal librarian?” Laphroig did not look convinced.

His Eminence shrugged. “With certain guarantees. I would also be granted immunity from prosecution for my continued experimentation with magic. There are certain … ah, conjurings I would like to attempt that could have rather unpleasant side effects for the people involved. Of course, I would only use peasants and the like, creatures of no value.” He paused. “You would be welcome to attend at your convenience. You might enjoy it.”

He could see that Laphroig was already envisioning himself as King of Landover and that none of the rest of it mattered. He would wed Mistaya Holiday, engender an heir, and then rid himself of the girl. Ben Holiday and his Queen would be dead and gone by then, the royal family wiped out save for his newborn son. As husband of the Princess and father of the only surviving heir to the throne, he would have an indisputable claim. No one would be able to challenge his right of rule once the boy died, too.

What he didn’t know, however—what he would never know until it was too late—was that he would be dead, as well. Craswell Crabbit did not much care for partnerships, especially with creatures like Laphroig.

Moreover, he would do much better as King of Landover than Rhyndweir’s unstable and unpopular Lord.

“Do we have an agreement?” he asked brightly, beaming down at the smaller man.

Berwyn Laphroig nodded slowly. “We do. If, Crabbit, you can persuade the Princess to marry me right now and without argument.”

“Please wait right here,” His Eminence said, thinking as he turned away that this was the last time Berwyn Laphroig would get what he wanted in this life.

Neither caught sight of the black-and-silver cat sitting quietly and unobtrusively in the shadows, licking its paws.

Mistaya and Thom were sitting side by side on the pallet in the candlelit storeroom, lost in silent contemplation of their predicament and puzzling through methods of escape, when they heard the rasp of the lock bar being drawn back. They rose as the heavy wooden door opened and His Eminence stepped into view. He glanced from one to the other and back again, smiling.

“Well, you both seem to be holding up well enough. How would you like to get out of here?”

The girl and the boy exchanged a suspicious glance. “You know the answer to that question already,” Mistaya replied. “What do you want from us now?”

His Eminence rubbed his hands eagerly. “To begin with, I would like to have a private conversation with you. Thom, would you mind stepping outside and waiting in the storeroom next door? All I ask is that you make no attempt to escape while you are there. It would be a huge mistake for you to try. Mr. Pinch will be there to reinforce the point.”

Thom looked at Mistaya questioningly. “I’ll be all right,” she told him. “Won’t I, Your Eminence?” she added, giving Crabbit a meaningful glance.

“Perfectly all right. This won’t take but a few minutes.”

A reluctant Thom went out the door, closing it behind him. His Eminence waited a few moments more, cocking his elongated head to one side, giving it a Humpty-Dumpty-sat-on-the-wall look. Then he moved closer to Mistaya and stood staring at her. She could tell from the look alone that whatever was coming was going to be bad.

“I will make this brief and to the point,” His Eminence declared. “You deserve that much, at least. Berwyn Laphroig has discovered you are here and has come to take you to Rhyndweir. He intends to make you his wife and the mother of his children. Of his sons, if all goes well. I have argued with him, but to no avail. The matter is complicated by the fact that he also knows about Thom. The one concession I have been able to wring from him is that if you marry him voluntarily, executing a viable written consent to the match, he will leave Thom in my safekeeping. Otherwise, he intends to dispatch Thom immediately. Am I being perfectly clear on all this?”

Mistaya nodded wordlessly. If she didn’t marry The Frog, Thom would be killed. If she did marry The Frog, she would have to kill herself. Figuratively, anyway.

She gave him a chilly smile. “No one has the right to tell a Princess of Landover whom she may wed. Not even my parents. Certainly not you. I will wed when I am good and ready and not before, and I will wed a man of my own choosing. I refuse to be married to The Frog. What’s more, if any harm comes to Thom, I will see to it that your head is posted on your own gate until there is nothing left of it but bone. Am I being perfectly clear on all this?”

His Eminence stared at her silently, shaking his head. “You do live in a fairy-tale world, don’t you, Princess? All you see is what you want to see. If you don’t want to think about something or face up to something, it simply doesn’t exist for you. Goodness. But this is the real world, not some make-believe story in which you are the heroine. So perhaps you ought to rethink your situation before you start making threats.”

He snatched the front of her tunic and pulled her close enough that she could feel his breath on her face. He towered over her, and she could see the anger in his eyes.

“You are my possession, Princess!” he hissed softly. “You belong to me. I can do with you what I want. Do you understand me?”

She nodded without speaking, her eyes riveted on his. For the first time since she had come to Libiris, she was genuinely scared. She was terrified.

“Well, then,” he continued, his voice still a whisper, “it ought to be simple for you. I don’t choose to make you do anything you don’t want to do, even though I can. But this is the reality—you hold a boy’s life in your hands. So you need to consider your choices carefully and spare me your idle threats. You need to consider the consequences of those choices. Listen now—here they are again. If you fail to walk out of here and tell Berwyn Laphroig that you will marry him and bear his children, I shall be forced to turn young Thom over to him and you will have the unfortunate experience of watching him die right in front of your eyes, knowing it was all your fault! Is any of this not clear?”

When she failed to answer, he sighed wearily. “I shall take it from your silence that you understand. Now let’s try it again. Think carefully before you speak. Will you agree to this arrangement or not? Will you marry Berwyn Laphroig or shall I send young Thomlinson out for a short reunion? Give me your answer.”

She compressed her lips into a tight line. “My father will never countenance this! He will not let me be used in this way! You had better release me right now!”

His Eminence pulled a face, released her tunic front, and stepped back. “Very well. I shall deliver your answer—and the boy—to his brother. Good luck to you, Princess.”

Without waiting for any further response, he turned for the door. He had reached it and was pulling it open when she called to him. “Wait, no. Don’t do that. Don’t tell him that. Tell him I accept his proposal. But I want something in writing signed by him, something in the marriage contract that says he will not harm Thom now or ever.”

His Eminence turned back and gave her a long, searching look. “Done,” he said finally, and went out the door.

Alone again, she collapsed onto the pallet and stared into space. Tears she was unable to hold back trickled down her cheeks. She wanted to bury her face in her hands and shut out everything, but she couldn’t do so while the magic held them bound. The room was dark and empty, and Thom did not return. She wished she were back in school or home or anywhere but here. She wished she had listened to a whole lot of advice that she had chosen to ignore.

What was she going to do?

She knew she couldn’t let anything happen to Thom, no matter what. If she were responsible for his death, she could never live with herself. The trade-off was horrendous, but she kept thinking that even if she went through with this, her father would find a way to undo it. But what if he couldn’t? What if no one could? She kept thinking that something would happen to stop all this, but she couldn’t think what that something would be.

She stopped crying finally and tried to think clearly about how things stood. She didn’t have the use of her magic and wouldn’t have while her hands were bound. She had to find a way to free them, if only for a minute. She didn’t have the rainbow crush, so she couldn’t summon help. But even if she had it, whom would she summon? Not her father—that was what His Eminence wanted. Questor? No, he had been duped once already, and Crabbit was probably the superior wizard. Her grandfather? No, no! She brushed it all aside as wishful thinking. There wasn’t much chance that she would be allowed back into her room unaccompanied, and that was the only way she could get her hands on the crush anyway. Thom could retrieve it if he knew it was there and was free to go get it. But he didn’t and he wasn’t, so that was that.

She got to her feet and crossed to the door and stopped, placing her hands against the rough wood, her mind racing. How could she stop this from happening? There had to be a way!

From beyond the locked door, she heard footsteps in the hallway.

She thought suddenly of Haltwhistle, whom she might still have been able to count on if she had remembered to speak his name and hadn’t gotten so caught up in her own concerns that she had forgotten him. Edgewood Dirk might have sent the mud puppy away, but she was the one who had made that possible. Was it too late to call him back? Was he gone from her forever?

“Haltwhistle,” she whispered, and it was almost a prayer. “Haltwhistle,” she said again, louder this time.

She jumped in shock as the latch on the door released. She wiped her tear-streaked face on her shoulder. She shouldn’t be crying, she told herself. She was tougher than this. She was better than what she was showing.

“Haltwhistle!” she said a final time, bold and determined.

But as the door opened it wasn’t the mud puppy who appeared but His Eminence, Craswell Crabbit. “Time to go, Princess,” he announced. “Your future husband awaits.”

And with a dramatic sweep of his arm he beckoned her through the open doorway.