Disclaimer: All characters belong to Tamora Pierce. This parody is based off a song that belongs to Weird Al Yankovic.

Author's Note: So, I originally wrote this song parody a long, long time ago and took it down because it wasn't very good. I still had the original copy, so I sat down and revised it, and voila! I decided to post it back up! Anyway, this is a parody of the song "Albuquerque" by Weird Al, told from Daine's perspective. (If you've never heard the original song, then I highly recommend listening to it because it's absolutely hilarious.) Enjoy!


Land of Tortall

Way back when I was just a little wild mage living in a shack all alone in a land full of Gallans right across the road from some giant wolf den

You know the place

Well anyway, my life was like crap and everything was just FREAKY!

Except, of course, for the undeniable fact that every single day

This lady named Onua would drag this big ol' herd ponies over to me

Aww – Big herd of ponies!

Every freakin' day!

It was driving me crazy!

I said to Onua

I said, "Hey Onua, what's with all the ponies?"

And my dear kind employer

She looked at me like Raoul looks at an upcoming party

And she leaned right in my face

And she said, "DON'T MAKE ME FIRE YOU!"

And then she tied me to a saddle and stuck a claw around my neck

And forced me to drive those ponies every single day until I passed out from exhaustion!

That's when I swore that someday

Someday I'd get outta that Galla and run off to a magical faraway place

Where the spidrens are always feeding and girls can become knights

And the mages are oh so storky!

Where the hurrocks and the Stormwings eat the corpses all day long

And any weird guy on the street of Corus will gladly steal his own mother's teeth!

Wacka wacka doodoo yeah

Well let me tell you, people, it wasn't long at all before my dream came true

Because the day after that, the local wolf pack had this contest

To see who could correctly guess the height of Alanna the Lioness

I correctly guessed three foot two, and so I won the grand prize

That's right, a first class one-way trip to

Laaaaaaaand of Tortall!

Laaaaaaaand of Tortall!

You know, I'd never been with the real Queen's Riders before,

And I gotta tell ya, it was really great

Except that I had to ride between two peasants with really really terrible tooth decay

And Evin and Miri in back of me kept snogging the whole time

Everybody ran out of shampoo and conditioner

And the entertainment provided was a crappy skit done by Alanna

And oh yeah, three Stormwings attacked us

And we trampled their feathers and tripped over a hawk

And the horses ran off to Scanra and everyone was lost!

Except for me

You know why?

'Cause I had my badger claw on

And my pony moving in the right direction

Had my badger claw on

And my pony moving in the right direction

Had my badger claw on

And my pony moving in the right direction

Ah ha ha ha ha ha ahhhh

So I rode from those crazy Queen's Riders

I rode on my cute little pony for three full minutes

Draggin' along my big super bow and my spare breeches

And my badger claw and my hundred pound shampoo bottle

And my lucky, lucky speech-impaired dragon named Kitten

But finally I arrived at the super comfy Tortall palace guest lodging wing!

Where the mages are oh so storky!

And you can spend the night in the stables if you wanna

It's ok, they're clean

Well, I checked into my room and fed my little pony

And I turned on the bath water

And I'm just about to polish that badger claw that I love so very, very much

When suddenly, there's a knock on the door

Well now, who could that be?

I say, "Who is it?"

No answer

"Who is it?"

There's no answer

"WHO IS IT?"

They're not sayin' anything

So finally I go over and I open the door and just as I suspected

It's some dumb emperor of Carthak with a flock of dying birds and only one nephew

Oh man, I hate it when I'm right!

So anyway, he bursts into my room and he grabs my dragon Kitten

And I'm like, "Hey, you can't have that! That Kitten's been just like a Kitten to me!"

And he's like, "Tough."

And I'm like, "Give it."

And he's like, "Make me."

And I'm like, "Okay!"

So I ripped out his earrings and he plucked my eyelashes

And I kidnapped his birds and he chewed on my smoky-brown curls

And I took out his nephew's kidneys and he gave me a case of mad cow disease

Yes indeed, you better believe it

And somehow in the middle of it all, the badger god showed up

And twenty seconds later, I heard a deep voice

And you know what it said?

I'll tell you what it said

It said

"If you'd like to be a mage, please give up and try again

If you need help, shut up and call the nearest Stork-man!

If you'd like to be a mage, please give up and try again

If you need help, shut up and call the nearest Stork-man!"

Laaaaaaaand of Tortall!

Laaaaaaaand of Tortall!

Well, to cut a long story short, he got away with my dragon

But I made a solemn vow right then and there that I would not rest

I would not sleep for an instant until that dumb emperor was brought to justice

But first, I decided to buy a new bow

So I got on my pony and I rode over to the weapons shop

And I walked on up to the guy behind the counter

And he says "Yeah, what do ya want?"

I said, "You got any wooden bows?"

He said, "No, we're outta wooden bows!"

I said, "Well, you got any crossbows?"

He said, "No, we're outta crossbows!"

I said, "You got any quivers of arrows?"

He said, "No, we're outta quivers of arrows!"

I said, "You got any bow strings?"

He said "No, we're out of bow strings!"

I said, "You got any throwing knives?"

He said, "No, we're outta throwing knives!"

I said, "You got any slingshots?"

He said, "Wait a minute, I'll go check."

. . .

"No, we're outta slingshots!"

I said, "Well, in that case - in that case, what do you have?"

He says, "All I got right now is this jar of one hundred crazy little darkings."

I said "Ok, I'll take that."

So he hands me the jar and I screw off the lid and the darkings jump out

And they immediately crawl in my hair and start tickling all over

Oh man, they were just going nuts

They were tickling me to death

You know, I think it was just about that time that a little ditty started goin' through my head

I believe it went a little something like this . . .

HELP! HELP! GET 'EM OFF ME! GET 'EM OFF ME!

I ran out onto the road with these grammar-impaired darkings in my hair

Wavin' my arms all around and just runnin', runnin', runnin'

Like a spider infested Alanna

And as luck would have it, that's exactly when I ran into the mage of my dreams

His name was Numair

He was a meditation fanatic with a stork-like figure and arms and legs the length of Tortall

I'll never forget the first thing he said to me

He said, "Hey, you've got darkings in your hair."

That's when I knew it was true love

We were inseparable after that

Aw, we battled together, we magicked together

We even shared the same hair tie

The world was our unicorn

So we got married and we bought us a house

And had two beautiful children – Sarralyn and Rikash

Oh, we were so very very very happy, aw yeah

But then one fateful night, Numair said to me

He said, "Magelet pumpkin? Do you wanna join the Scanran raiding party?"

I said, "Woah, hold on now, baby! I'm just not ready for that kinda commitment!"

So we broke up and I never saw him again

But that's just the way things go in

Laaaaaaaand of Tortall!

Laaaaaaaand of Tortall!

Anyway, things really started lookin' up for me

Because sometime later I finally achieved my life-long dream

That's right, I got me a part-time job in the stables

I even made hostler of the month after I cleaned up that pony crap with my bare hands

Aw yeah, everybody was pretty jealous of me after that

I was gettin' a lot of attitude

Ok, like one time, I was out in the palace courtyard

Trying to scrub horse droppings out of my hair with Thayet's dress

When I see this Stormwing named Zhaneh trying to carry a carcass all by herself

So I say to her, I say, "Hey, you want me to help you with that?"

And Zhaneh, she just rolls her eyes and goes

"No, I want you to chop off all my feathers with a battle axe."

So I did

And then she gets all indignant on me

She's like, "Hey man, I was just being sarcastic!"

Well, that's just great

How was I supposed to know that?

I'm not a psychic mage for crying out loud

Besides, now she's got a really cute nickname – Baldy!

So what's she complaining about?

Say, that reminds me of another amusing anecdote

This thief comes up to me on the street and says he's so hungry he could eat a horse

Well, I knew what he meant

But I was pretty ticked off, so I went and charged him with animal abuse

And he's begging and pleading and crying for his mother

And I'm like, "Hey, come on, think of the horses!"

But he's just groveling in front of me, begging and pleading

You know, just completely missing the whole point of this lesson

Man, some people just can't take a joke, you know?

Anyway, um, um, where was I?

I lost my train of thought

Uh, well, uh, ok

Anyway I, I know it's kinda been a roundabout way of saying it

But I guess the whole point I'm tryin' to make here is

I...HATE...VARICE!

That's all I'm really tryin' to say

And by the way, if one day you happen to wake up

And find yourself in the country of Galla

Full of bigotry and ignorance

And you're mad at your mom because it's her fault you're living there in the first place

At least you can take a small bit of comfort in knowing that

Somewhere beyond those crazy borders of Galla

There's still a little place called

Laaaaaaaand of Tortall!

Laaaaaaaand of Tortall!

Land of Tortall, Land of Tortall

Land of Tortall, Land of Tortall

Land of Tortall, Land of Tortall

Land of Tortall, Land of Tortall

I said "T" (T)

"O" (O)

"R" (R)

"T" (T)

"Tortall!" (Tortall!)

Tortall, Tortall, Tortall, Tortall

Tortall, Tortall, Tortall, Tortall

Tortall, Tortall, Tortall, Tortall

Tortall, Tortall, Tortall, Tortall

Land of Tortall!