Free Quen Nim by Steve Shilstone Page B

Let me hear ye laugh!” shouted Nimble Missst, triumphant.
    A whooshing chuckle swept by the Cloud Castle Princess and rippled the pond to spell, “My stubborn Rin’s daughter, ye seem saucy this morning. Have ye then captured that Blossom Prince ye’ve been seeking?”
    â€œAs if ye didn’t know all and everything,” snorted the princess. “A fine plot ye built to baffle my mind. Well, I tell ye, it did not work! Not by a grain pebble! I will be Quen before sunsink tomorrow. Then I will be gone onto new adventures in different places where it won’t be so easy to find me. Ripple me this, Riffle Sike, how long ago did ye hatch the plot?”
    â€œPlot? What plot? I be free of magic now. I be a breeze,” rippled the pond in all innocence.
    â€œRidiculous! So ye would have ME spell it out then, would ye? Very well,” said Nimble Missst, and she began to pace back and then forth as she so such DID spell it out with snapjaw precision. “Zilp, the Ridiculous, announced that she and Kinng Forr would retire. She decreed that the Blossom Prince Zootch would be wed to me and that we would rule the Boad, All Fidd and Leee Combined. Ridiculous Zootch thinks that he has a snapjaw mind to match mine. Hah! He thought to lead me a chase. How to do it? A simple Blossom Prince with no magical abilities, he had nothing but a primitive snapjaw intellect to build on.
    He needed the help of magic. Where to find it? Oh, I don’t know, what about right here at this beckoning pool! He knew ye. Ye knew him. Ye were vague, oh yes, ye were vague when I questioned ye the other day. Flash clear I could see that ye were lying, but I had no time to waste. I followed the clues. They got simpler, then too simple. One question nagged at me. How was Zootch traveling hither and yon, powerless Blossom Prince that he is? It was something ye supplied, of course. But what? What would a ridiculous waterwizard who was about to turn himself into a breeze give to a Blossom Prince? I’ll tell ye when I knew. I knew flash clear when my hollowite Motty rested her cool compress hand on my forehead in the Chack Tree Forest. Cap of Cloak!”
    The pond shivered ripples, “How did ye ..? No one knew …”
    â€œThose without snapjaw minds didn’t know,” said Nimble Missst, raising her chin to a pose of superiority. “It had to be. The magicless Prince disguises himself as a hutter. How? Some sort of a cloaking device of disguise. What other possibilities? None. All rejected by my snapjaw mind. A cloaking device of disguise for certain. What sort of device? A device of travel as well. A cloaking device of travel, a cloaking device of disguise, all in one combined together. What form would this clever device take? Cape? Robe? Hooded cloak? Talisman? Amulet? I think not. I know all about ye, my Mother’s uncle. Ye have ever been jealous of my ridiculous grandfather, your brother, since the day he succeeded in transforming himself into a river. How often has my Mother told me about your boasts and complaints? I have a snapjaw mind. I remember all. Didn’t ye boast on one of her visits about having a secret that your headless brother could never use? Headless brother. Strange way to put it. Logically then, if he had a head, he could use it. Simple deduction. What goes on heads? Caps! Of cloak!”
    The pond rippled, “SNAPJAW!”, and the wind whooshed off laughing.
    Nimble Missst allowed herself a rare satisfied smile before turning, stern visage reestablished, to Motty. Motty still dreamed, slumped in slumber, her tongue rolling in and out with each breath she breathed.
    â€œMotty! Up!” ordered Nimble Missst. “To the Castle Boad, where the ridiculous Blossom Prince is waiting disguised as a hutter!”

Chapter Twenty-Six
    At The Castles
    The ridiculous Blossom Prince, tell true, slept in an oat field. So such, he was unaware of the bustling frenzy taking place