Rules of Enchantment

by Mizhowlinmad (HBF), 2010

Rating: PG for mild innuendo and violence

Disclaimer: TAT belongs to SJC and Universal. Many references are made to classic and modern classic fantasy tales from The Chronicles of Narniaand The Wizard of Oz, Coraline, Enchanted, and Alice in Wonderland, all of which are the properties of their respective creators. I don't make a penny from this and I do it for fun.

Chapter 1: Once Upon a Pomegranate

The candles had burned down to nubs. Their remaining light cast a warm, ruddy glow across the cold stone walls of Eyder Keep. At the massive desk in the center of the circular room, the old woman's head drooped low over the pages of a heavy leatherbound volume. To an outsider entering the room, it might have appeared that she was deep in concentration. But the snore that issued from between her lips would have quickly dispelled that notion.

She snapped awake just before a drop of her own saliva had been about to fall onto the precious hand-lettered pages. Annoyed, she snapped the book shut and then dabbed at her face with a fold of her cloak. I'm getting old, aren't I? she thought.

Dawn would not come, according to the hourglass, for another two hours at least. She'd always preferred the quiet comforts of the evening, and the books weren't going anywhere. She took a sip of her herbal tea, which had gone cold by now, and blinked her eyes.

After all these years, she still hadn't quite adjusted to her life at Eyder. Its comforts were many: soft beds, any sort of food she'd ever want, a roaring fire stoked by servants throughout the night. Yet there was always the thought at the back of her mind, borne from many years outside the castle walls, that any knock at the door or peripheral movement might have been that of a wild animal from Grimthorne, or worse, a Jackal. Not all the bloodthirsty creatures in this world walked on four legs.

These days Grimthorne was faily civil, mostly, and the Jackals had been gone almost as long as she'd made the Keep her home. Just the memory of them was enough to make her shudder.

But Queens did not shudder. Should not.

It was Sixthnight tonight, her night. The only part of the week when she could tell the courtiers and ambassadors and squabbling chicken farmers that their business could surely wait until Seventhmorning. Queenship had its many responsibilities. That part, at least, was easy enough to handle. She'd always been the responsible type, trying to solve others' problems and organize the troops. The people adored her, the Royal Host admired her, even crusty old Ambassador Kyll had come to respect her. She was popular and well-liked, and reigned in a time of lasting peace.

She still needed her time alone.

The place she'd left off in the book…ah, yes, it was a good one. It told the story of the Third Moordeb War, and how the unlikely hero-monk Brother Juur had outsmarted a fierce manticore…

"Gran?"

She didn't need to look to know the voice. Fergall, her favorite grandson. He shuffled sleepily into the library, a candle in one hand and his favorite stuffed griffin in the other.

"Can't sleep, Gran," complained Fergall, yawning. "Fyr is snoring AGAIN and Tupo keeps teasing me about my 'stuffie,' says I'm too big for him…"

"They are your cousins, love," she said, trying not to smile. "I'm sure they didn't mean to hurt your feelings…"

"I wish I was big and strong. Then I'd teach 'em to respect me."

The Queen did smile. There was so much of herself she could see in Fergall. The defiant jut of his chin, the way his brown eyes flashed when he was being stubborn, the knobbiness of his seven-year-old knees and elbows. She sighed and marked her place in the book. There was a story the boy needed to hear, now that he was old enough.

"Is that so? Do you want me to tell you a story about brave men who were big and strong, but most of all, clever and wise?"

Fergall yawned. "As long as it's not one of those boring ones about bards or monks." He tucked the stuffed griffin under one arm and climbed into his grandmother's lap.

"Did you know that our kingdom wasn't always free? And I wasn't always Queen?" she began. She was a natural storyteller, able to captivate with words. From Fergall's surprised expression, she guessed he hadn't heard this story before.

"But you were always Queen, Gran…"

"Not always. Did you know I once needed the help of not one, not two, but four brave knights from a faraway land to save the kingdom from an evil princess?"

She had hooked him instantly with the mention of the knights. Fergall turned to face her, his eyes no longer sleepy. "Knights? Like Sir Varam?"

"Even better than him, lad. Now…once upon a pomegranate…"

"A what?"

"Let me explain, lad…"

Grey.

Everything was a shade of it, from the sky to the rock quarries and even what little vegetation still grew. The mood of the people, more importantly. Hope had migrated from the kingdom long ago and left behind only despair.

The young woman who trotted down the path wore a dress that might have once been rich brown, but was now a mottled patchwork mess. She thought it just as well. If the Jackals ever found out what she'd been up to for the past year or so, she would be an easy target for their arrows and would die relatively quickly.

Death was inevitable in Occiasilva. Whether it was exhaustion from brutal physical labor in the quarries, or slow, gruesome starvation, or the blade or arrow of a Jackal who might have just been drunk or bored. How she'd ever managed to escape its cold reach for more than twenty summers, she did not know.

She was one of a handful of specially-trained Gleamwrights, which might have had something to do with it. The Lady Regent valued their guild above all others and gave them extra rations. But the girl in the mottled dress was still lean, her skin nut-brown. Every extra scrap she got went to the Resistance. Keeping it all to herself would have been wrong.

With every stride, she kept thinking. Today, she'd managed to talk another worker into at least consider joining. That made the grand total of Resistance members…fourteen, not counting herself.

So deep in thought was she, that she narrowly missed a shrump hole with her left foot. The little furry mammals thrived out on the open plain despite everything. Like herself, they were survivors. She had to admire them, even if they were hard to catch and didn't have much meat on them. They found a way. Just like she knew she had to.

It was nearly dark by the time she reached the stone cottage. Workdays, even for Gleamwrights, were long, and she was exhausted. Leave at sunrise, run to the quarry, work all day, come home as night fell. It was a familiar routine.

Inside the cottage it was almost completely dark. She reached into her apron pocket for one of two distinctly silver stones and shook it. It began to glow, and she immediately saw what was out of place.

Dinner was ready. A cauldron simmering over hot coals. If there was an intruder, he or she had gone out of their way to cook her evening stew.

"Is that a shiningstone in your pocket, or are you merely happy to see me?" The voice was boyish, familiar, and put her immediately at ease.

"Plink, you devil, don't you ever bother to knock?"

The speaker, also holding a shiningstone, emerged from his hiding place behind her overstuffed armchair. He was still more boy than man, all arms and legs with a shock of sandy hair and a spray of freckles across his face. The clothes he wore were as bright as the smile on his lips.

"My dear Anise, if I were to inquire as to the 'knockers' of your fair sex, I do think you'd jingle my bells permanently, wot?"

Anise laughed. It was hard not to laugh at a jongleur. Especially one with a natural gift for the art like Plink. She decided to humor him a bit.

"I don't suppose you have Plonk with you tonight?"

The jongleur feigned surprise, falling backward and gasping. When he recovered, he held atop his left hand a smaller, cloth version of himself, complete with scepter.

"When I 'eard Anise woz cooking tonight, love, I just 'ad to see for meself…and taste it 'fore my dear master dropped dead, yes…"

Anise shook her head. He never let it go that she was such a terrible cook. When you're a Gleamwright, who needs to worry about cooking anyway? She hastily tried to change the subject. "So, did you…or Plonk…get any news today?"

Jongleurs were an unusual, and unusually useful, guild. They were given full access to the Keep and were free to roam the grounds without too many questions. Best of all, because everyone thought of them as fools, they were excellent at overhearing things. She'd been Plink's friend for the past year; he was apprentice to the master Jongleur Rhyal and had a keen eye for detail.

"Lessee…nope, definitely not," said Plink, producing a live chicken from somewhere within his tunic along with a knotted piece of rope, a lump of coal, several pine cones…

"Plink." Anise hated his fool's act sometimes. "Did you get anything useful? Other than the hen?"

"Ah, here 'tis." He held a scrap of parchment to her. "Mind you, I never did read that well. It's Plonk that's the literary one. You'll 'ave to read it, love."

She grabbed it, heart pounding. Any news was exciting. And this news, she knew, had been stolen from one of the books at the Keep's library. Plink, among his other talents, had an uncanny talent for picking locks and sneaking around unseen.

The writing on the page was spidery and ancient. Anise squinted at it. It was written in the old dialect of Occiasilvan, in the form of a rhyme.

She comes to the throne

But lo, is a pretender

And will the farmer and the smith

Ever willingly defend her?

Until the one emerald be found

Cut and polished, in her crown

Her reach not doth extend

From Western Woods to world's end

The princess, she will only fall

From her tower, if at all

With the help of…

It was several moments before Anise realized she was holding her breath. The few lines she had just read were the prophecy, the prophecy that had been rumored for so long but never spoken aloud by anyone. Even Yarran's books, she was sure, didn't have anything like this in them.

"Where…" Her breath came out in a loud whoosh, "did you get this, Plink? Think hard."

"I don't have to think hard at all, my dear. It was on the third floor, second corridor. The bloody librarian was in the privy, so I just helped meself."

She looked at the paper again. Her heart sank. The entire part after the word "of" was torn, as if Plink had too quickly taken it out.

"You don't have any more? This is it?" Anise asked her friend, already knowing the answer.

"Knowing the shortage of privy paper at Ironloch, my dear…"

"Plink." She set down the paper on her table. "This is important. This could be the key for the entire Resistance, and you're making ruddy jokes about privy paper?"

"Sorry." He shrugged, grinning. "Don't know any about librarians."

He was interrupted by a loud knock at the door. Anise and her friend shared a nervous glance. They weren't expecting visitors, and any visit after dark in Occiasilva was never good. "Who is it?" Anise asked, trying to keep her voice level.

"Regent's Guardsmen. Open the damn door!"

Jackals.

How they found her was unimportant. They'd hang Plink if they knew he'd stolen from the Keep. She thought fast.

"Hide. Throw that in the fire. They're not looking for you," she said, unsure as to whether this was true. "Let me do the talking."

"As you wish," he whispered, and found the deepest shadow he could.

She opened the door and found herself face-to-face with a squad of six armored, spear-carrying Regent's Guardsmen. Their distinctive tabards with a jackal's head gave them their nickname, and they looked entirely the part. Their leader, a rangy black-bearded man, smiled at her unpleasantly.

"So, we 'ear this is a den for them rebel scum," he leered, his eyes wandering up and down her lean body. "Mind if we come in, take a look?"

Anise stood her ground. "I'm afraid you're mistaken, Corporal." She was polite but firm. "I'm a humble Gleamwright to Her Ladyship, and I remain her loyal servant."

This was probably going a little over the top. But she knew how fanatically loyal the Jackals were to the Lady Regent, and it never hurt to be too polite to them. Too rude might cost her, or Plink, their lives. She had to be very careful.

At that very moment, the chicken Plink had brought clucked loudly. Anise felt her face flush.

"Wot was that, then, love?"

"N-nothing," she said. "Clearing my throat and…hey!"

The corporal pushed forcefully past her into the cottage. He found the chicken immediately and picked the squawking bird up by its legs.

"Been stealing from Her Ladyship, 'ave you, girly?" The man could barely contain his enthusiasm. The sentence for that was losing a hand, and, for the second offense, an appointment with the gallows.

"No…it's a mistake…please…I'm innocent…"

Anise had gone from firm and determined to pleading for her life in less than a minute. Funny how a squad of Jackals could do that to a person.

It was Plink who saved her. Barreling with all his lanky weight into the nearest Jackal, he howled and flailed.

"You leave her alone!"

The man he'd attacked flung him aside easily after the first moment of initial surprise. The little Jongleur went flying into the stone wall, where he landed with a sickening crack and crumpled to the floor.

"How dare you!" Indignation, and rage, had replaced the fear in Anise. She advanced toward the Guardsmen, who were roaring with laughter at her friend's injury. "You're all just a bunch of thugs and bloody cowards. One day, you'll…you'll…"

Cruelly, the corporal put a hand under her chin, which she swatted away. "We'll what, love? We'll what?" he asked, which made his men laugh even harder.

"You'll pay," she growled. "For all that you've done to our people."

"Ain't that sweet, lads? Little girly here and her fool friend gonna conquer Ironloch all by 'emselves."

She knew they had every right, and needed no excuse, to arrest her, drag her off to Ironloch and let her rot in the dungeons for merely raising her voice to them. But at that moment, she felt something give way inside her. At that moment, she didn't care anymore. She was tired of letting the Jackals, and their cruel mistress, dictate when and how much she could eat, sleep or work. She would not be a slave anymore.

But what could she really do? She was only a peasant girl with a pitiful "resistance movement" whose few members included a fool, a renegade Dwarf, a crazed woodsman who claimed to have been a Necromancer, a long, long time ago…

"We'll be confiscatin' this chicken, love. Be grateful our next stop's the Sagewater Distillery and it's a Fifthnight, otherwise," he rubbed one finger threateningly under his armored coif, "we'd be takin' a bit more, understand?"

And with another roar of laughter, the corporal slammed the door behind him, causing one of the pieces of pottery on the wall to crash to the floor with it.

Her breath still came out quickly in and out. Her heart pounded in her ribcage. It was only the sound of Plink's moans that cleared the red haze from her field of vision.

"Oh, Plink," she said, moving to her friend's side. "What got into you?"

She had to admire his courage. Taking on a full squad of Jackals, unarmed, by himself…

Either he's braver than I thought, or, sweet gods forbid, does he actually like me?

"Don't suppose you've any of that lovely jonpha tea? I hear it's good for the aches and pains, wot." Despite his obvious pain, he was still trying to crack jokes. That was a good sign.

"Here, let's get you up…"

He flinched and moaned when she wrapped an arm around his left side. The left arm dangled limply at his side.

"At least it wasn't me good arm, eh?" he joked.

"What are we going to do, Plink?"

"Before or after we drink the jonpha tea?"

"That's not what I meant," she said gently, moving him into a more comfortable position on the armchair. "I mean, the Resistance." The last word came out a passionate whisper.

He blinked. He didn't naturally go against the grain the way she did, but he'd always been an excellent listener. So she continued.

"If this prophecy is true, it means we have hope. It means the Resistance can win." She spoke as if the entire kingdom were listening, not just a single Jongleur. "Don't you want to live in a kingdom where everyone is free? Where they can make their own decisions and live their lives the way they want?"

Plink, with his good shoulder, shrugged. "Don't bloody well see how much it matters, Anise. My life ain't terrible; I get nice vittles and all the grog I want, telling second-rate jokes for a living all day at the Keep. Not a bad life, eh?" His voice had changed from playful and joking to weary.

"What about Knorri? And Yarran? Eana? What about them?"

He sighed. "You know, I only joined the bloody Resistance because you're my friend. You know what they'd do to me if they ever found out?"

It was the first time he'd admitted as much. "Isn't that a good enough reason?" she said, her face inches from his. "Just think about what I said, all right? And drink this." She handed him a mug of jonpha tea, looking for a spark of sympathy in his eyes and finding none.

He drained the mug. In a matter of seconds, his eyes drooped shut. Along with the jonpha leaves, Anise had included a few drops of liquid ekalo so he'd be sure to sleep through the pain.

Only after she was sure he slept did she allow herself to cry.

She so rarely did anymore. It seemed so pointless with all the rain and death and pain and misery that was life in Occiasilva under Lady Malka and her Jackals. But she did now, a harsh and racking series of sobs that made her whole body shake.

What would Yarran do? She thought. He was the closest thing to a father she knew, and while he wasn't what she would consider wise, he was old enough to remember when King Abramond still reigned. Anise always loved it when the old ex-wizard told those stories.

The crying stopped and she imagined Yarran's thin, wheezy voice in her mind.

Always look inside your heart, girl, not your head. The head always gets you into so much needless trouble. Follow your heart and you'll do just brilliantly.

When she'd been little, that always made her laugh. Who could look inside their heart? If the hearts at the butcher's stall were any indication, that seemed to her a pretty strange proposition. And as for following it, well, where in the world could such a thing lead?

Smiling at her youthful ignorance, she touched the spot right above her heart. It was still pumping hard after the encounter with the Jackals and the thought of being arrested. Then, her fingers found something she wasn't expecting.

She'd all but forgotten it was there. It was a small cloth pouch she'd sewn inside her apron pouch ages ago, probably when the garment had been new. She reached inside and detached it now, trying to remember what was inside. Then, it came to her. Yarran, of course.

"Those are magic seeds," the old man had said conspiratorially when he gave them to her. "From a magical green pomegranate. Throw them down a hollow tree on the night of a new moon, turn around thrice, and spit on the ground. Wish for your heart's desire, my girl, and it shall be yours."

Like so many of Yarran's so-called spells, she'd dismissed them at the time as quackery. But, since he was such a good friend, she'd taken them and promised to keep them "close to her heart." That had been six years ago.

She glanced at the sleeping form of Plink on the armchair. He'd begun to snore loudly.

Then, a glance at the door, as if the Jackals might be returning any moment.

It was, she realized, the night of the full moon. And there was a hollow tree somewhere in the woods behind her cottage. What could she possibly have to lose?

Leaving Plink and the untouched cauldron of stew behind, she lit a single candle and, satisfied that no Jackals were lurking, made her way uphill to the spot of last summer's fierce thunderstorm, where lightning had blasted open a massive oak. The poor tree hadn't ever recovered; it was little more than a hollow stump.

Anise stopped just before it, taking the pouch from her apron. She realized that Yarran hadn't exactly told her how this was supposed to work. Were there magic words, or an incantation? Something like that? Knowing him, an omission of a single word (she dimly remembered a spell that sounded a little like "Kladda Baradda Niktoo" going horribly awry) could mean disaster.

But she did know her heart's desire. More than she'd ever known anything in her life. She took a deep breath and moved closer to the dead oak.

Was she supposed to speak it aloud? She had no idea. She guessed.

"Please, we need a hero…." She paused. This was her heart's desire. She had to get it exactly right.

"We don't just need a hero. We need a whole team of heroes to save Occiasilva. We can't keep fighting without help. That's my heart's desire."

She flung the pomegranate seeds as hard as she could down the hollow oak stump, turned around three times, and spit on the ground, just as Yarran had instructed.

What Anise missed on her third turn was the tiny flash of silver light at the bottom of the hollow tree.

To Be Continued…

(Author's Note: Yes, this is an A-Team story, I promise! Our boys will make their grand entrance next chapter. I know this is a little AU and experimental, but I hope it will come out. Any and all comments are welcome.)