The hare found the next jump easily. It sent them to a sunny field dotted with flowers, the king’s castle about an hour’s walk away.
At some point in the forest, Emily had started carrying the hare again. She restrained herself from dropping him outright as they neared their destination, instead gently setting him down in the grass. She felt like she was acting petulant over the loss of Crawburn. Both Dry-Eyes and the hare had chatted pleasantly during the walk as though there never had been a fourth member of their group.
The castle had no door that Emily could see. The hare didn’t seem daunted. He spoke at the wall. “Don’t play with me. I’m here representing the Institute of the Gardens and I have an important scientific discovery for the king.”
The blank stones faded to reveal a troll guard leaning casually in the archway of a door. “Sure, Herr Haas, but who’s the dame?”
Emily blinked, momentarily unsettled by the troll’s choice of words. “Um, hello. I’m a chosen one here to petition the king?” The guard kept staring at her. Emily shifted uneasily, then steadied herself with a shake of her head and whipped her narrowed eyes up at the hulking figure. “I am a lawful chosen one on a quest, part of which is to ask something of the king. You’re a guard who has yet to prove the necessity of my telling you more.” She crossed her arms and made the face she used right before threatening the kids with ‘counting to three.’ They locked eyes longer than Emily thought possible. Finally the guard sighed, levelling themself off the wall.
“Fine, enter.”
They tried to stop Dry-Eyes, but she buzzed past, muttering.
Emily became more and more grateful the hare had joined them as the evening wore on. Throwing his tiny weight around, he got them a room, showed the two around, and figured out how to bring Emily before the king.
“I’m here to tell him about these Polaroids of yours and as it’s your camera you’ll need to come along. While we’re there you can ask what you need to ask, no problem, as part of the whole pitch.” He groomed his whiskers, pleased with himself. “My meeting with the king is in three days, so prepare your argument and have a look around. If anybody hassles you, you’re with me.”
Dry-Eyes, done with her task of bringing Emily to the castle, was ready to return home.
“May I take a picture of you?” Emily felt shy and a little sad. They hadn’t become friends, but she considered the sprite a good companion.
“Only if you waste two shots of your precious film so I can have a copy. It’ll practically be life-size.”
Emily obliged and, after the photo had developed, they looked at the swirls and beams of sunset colours that sparked from the sprite. From what Emily understood of the hare’s studies, Dry-Eyes was much more powerful than she’d ever let on. Emily loosely rolled the photograph and the sprite rigged it across her back like a scabbard. She waved goodbye briefly as she left out the open window.
Feeling at loose ends, Emily tried sleeping in the ridiculous four-poster bed that dominated the room. She found that when you don’t have to sleep, lying still with your eyes closed is very boring. After spending an hour trying to drift off and getting sidetracked thinking about what faeries dream, she gave up.
She wandered the halls of the castle aimlessly, avoiding areas with guards. She found the kitchen, which she thought was strange until she remembered that, unlike sleeping, eating was still fun to do even if you didn’t have to do it. She chatted with the cooks and the salamander that kept the fire. They let her help roll out pastry dough and gave her directions to the hall of portraits.
Stretching about a quarter of a mile, the hall was lined on both sides with images of monarchs and ruling parties, some accompanied by display cases of notable artefacts. Emily’s heart sunk as she realised how little she knew of the Sidhe. She’d read about summer courts and winter courts, seelies and queens. But none of that seemed to apply here. Sure, most of the land she’d seen was in some stage of summer, so maybe that was the domain she was in, but was this king the actual king or some kind of governor or mayor? Emily had never been good at understanding politics. This whole quest seemed to unravel the closer she looked at it. Maybe the grasshoppers had been right to laugh at her.
With a sigh, Emily decided to just go with it. She’d asked to see a king and here she was, due for an appointment with one.
Once she stopped trying to make sense of it, Emily enjoyed the hall of portraits. They were in no chronological order—some were painted, some were sculpted, and there were at least a couple mosaics. She even found one that looked like it was a spot-coloured photograph. It hadn’t been fixed properly and the image was disappearing into a spreading bruise of brown and purple.
Some of the people pictured looked like humans or the dark and sharp elves from European folk tales. There was also good representation of animals, including a portrait of a crow and a bear that Emily became fond of.
She hadn’t been looking specifically for it, but she stumbled across the portrait of the king’s brother. It had only caught her eye because it was a silhouette, featureless and draped in black like some sort of Victorian mourning object. On a little table in front of it lay a looking glass.
Emily picked up the mirror, seeing her own concerned face. She really needed to comb her hair back out; the curls were starting to lock.
“How can I help you?” The mirror clouded as it spoke. Emily was proud of herself for not dropping it in fright.
“Do you know about this king?” She turned the mirror to show it the silhouette.
“Of course, that’s why I’m here,” the mirror sighed. “Do you want a brief history, the saga, what?”
Emily shrugged. “Brief history first, I guess.”
“Alright then. Two hundred years ago—”
“Whoa, two hundred?”
The mirror sniffed. “Give or take. I really hope you don’t plan on interrupting me regularly.”
“No, I’m sorry, I’ll save my questions for later.” Emily sat on the polished floor and listened to the mirror.
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