Banquet

Steven sat staring at the King, who fell to eating his bowl of soup with vigor. It suddenly dawned on him that he was not here to simply tell stories with the King. He was here because the King expected him to go to this Rich Reach—wherever that was—and master whoever or whatever was terrorizing it. Whatever was terrorizing Rich Reach, was also now terrorizing Steven.

“Your Majesty!” Steven exclaimed. “You can’t mean to say that you want me to go hunt an unknown terror! I’ve not actually slain a dragon. I’m really just a storyteller. I have no skills in knowing what the terror is that you seek. I can’t…”

Steven stuttered to a pause, too overwhelmed to speak.

“Relax,” said the King. “It’s just a story. You don’t expect everyone to believe there was really an ogre threatening a village that was overcome by a ridiculous hat, do you? Or that a miser gave up his hoard of gold to a thief in exchange for a cup? They are just stories.”

“How do you know the stories that I have told?” asked Steven.

“Oh, stories travel much faster than people,” Magnus replied, laughing. “Let’s see, there was a war a few years ago. Now unlike bridges, wars are a great boon to commerce. There were certain knights captured who had come across a dragonslayer who told magnificent stories. They, in turn, traded the stories for a better place in the prisons. A merchant came to negotiate the truce and he told of a dragonslayer who told stories. He traded a story for the release of our prisoners of war. Ah… Then there was the thief.”

Just at that point servants interrupted to clear the soup bowls and a procession of cooks with silver platters began from the kitchen to the tables. The chief cook approached the King’s table himself and with a flourish removed the cover of his tray.

“Duck!” the King exclaimed.

Steven dove under the table.

Seeing Steven dive for cover, Magnus dove under the table as well. When the King disappeared beneath the head table there was a shocked silence, then every guest in the hall took cover. There was a loud clatter as silver trays hit the floor and cooks crammed themselves under the closest tables. Busker and all the King’s guards rushed to surround the King’s table with swords drawn to defend their liege. At last the room was silent as the guards surveyed the surrounding area with their eyes.

Under the table the King uncovered his head to look at Steven who cowered there shaking. Steven slowly looked up into the King’s eyes. As one, they both spoke.

“Is it safe?”

They crept from beneath the cover of the table.

“Sergeant Busker!” barked the King. “Is it safe?”

“We don’t see anything up here, Your Majesty,” the sergeant replied. Cautiously, the King and Steven regained their seats. The guests crawled from beneath the tables and worriedly sat in their chairs. The cooks quickly scraped the ducks back onto their trays, placed them on the tables, and then fled to the kitchen. Busker leaned in toward the King’s table, still not taking his eyes off the surrounds.

“What was it?” asked the King quietly to Steven.

“I don’t know,” answered Steven.

“Was it a shadow?” asked Busker. “A premonition? A sudden movement?”

Everyone looked at Steven.

“You said ‘Duck,’ Your Majesty.”

The King looked at Sergeant Busker, then at the silver tray before them, the lid still partially covering it. Busker lifted the lid cautiously with his sword pointing at it.

“It’s a duck,” whispered Magnus.

“Oh,” said Steven.

“Ha!” laughed Busker. “Now that will make a story even I would listen to!”

The guards returned to their posts and as the story spread through the great hall, nervous laughter rippled in its wake. As everyone tore into the only slightly soiled fowls on their table the mood began to relax throughout the hall and the laughter became louder and almost hysterical.

“Do you see what this terror has done to my Kingdom?” asked Magnus. “That is why we don’t speak of it aloud. Even though the attacks have occurred leagues away from the city, everyone is nervous. Even me.”

“I was going to take the southern route along the sea,” Steven said forlornly. “I didn’t intend to come here at all.”

“No one intends to come here,” the King replied. “Eat your… duck,” the King whispered, “before you tell us a story. Perhaps you can point the way to how we can master our terror.”

“When I have told my story,” said Steven, “May I return to the South Road along the sea?”

“Yes, of course,” said the King. “But I don’t think you will want to.”

“Why is that?” asked Steven. He had already mastered a dragon and been faced by the bear. He could not see what else could lie along the South Road that would be more dangerous than continuing to Rich Reach to face the terror.

“Well now, that would be another story,” said the King, “but the gist of it is this. In Rich Reach there awaits a reward for the person who masters the terror. I know that you are not tempted by rewards or I would have offered gold. But you may wish to reclaim certain property that stories say was taken from you years ago. Prince Montague Valentine of Rich Reach has promised a sword and dagger—each etched with the figure of a dragon so fiery it glows from the steel—to the man or woman who masters the Terror of Rich Reach.”

Steven let his mouth fall open at the words. He had trusted Pablo Bárcenas Ibin Ariaga, the thief. In the morning, he had awakened in a stable. His horse, his coins, his sword, and the dagger that Armand Hamar the Tinker had etched for him were all gone, and in their place was a donkey. The humiliation Steven felt when the guards escorted him to the city gates, gave him three silver coins, and told him never to return to Byzantium, still stung The Dragonslayer’s eyes.

“How did the Prince come to have this sword and dagger?” asked Steven.

“Let us just say that a certain thief was captured and his property confiscated,” said the King. “That is a story you may find along the road to Rich Reach, but is not one I am inclined to share.”

Steven finished his dinner in silence, excusing himself as thinking about the story he was about to tell. Understanding the temperament of “the artist,” the King excused the silence. He confessed that he, too, often brooded in silence before a particularly difficult public address. In the meantime, the King and all his subjects helped themselves to more wine and were in a riotously good mood when Steven finally rose to tell his story.

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