Fantasy Kingdom XXI Read online

  copyright 2010 by Lisa Anne Nisula

  Smashwords edition

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  This is a work of fiction; any resemblance to actual places or persons is purely coincidental.

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  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 1

  Charles Mayfield was turning thirteen today and clearly too old to be called “Charlie.” Unfortunately, he seemed to be the only one who thought so. Mom had gone so far as to say that, if he was too old to be Charlie, then maybe he was too old to have birthday presents. That was clearly not true, so he thought he was bearing up quite well when Aunt Hepzibah pinched his cheek and called him “Little Charliekins” as soon as she arrived. He even put up with her asking if he’d done finger painting in art class, but when he opened his present, he wondered if it was all worth it. It was a sweater.

  At first Charles thought it was a girl's sweater; there was too much lavender. But the shoulders seemed awfully wide when he unfolded it and held it up against himself, and as he looked closer, he did see a lot of blue. In fact, the background started out blue, faded into purple and lavender, then to pink and back to lavender and blue. Over that was a series of little patterns: X’s and O’s, patterns of dots, flower things, stars — all in cream, gold, and gray. It had the slightly uneven look of something handmade, but Charles was completely certain Aunt Hepzibah hadn’t made it herself. The whole effect wasn’t bad. It would have been a nice sweater for a girl who liked pastel colors. No boy who liked the shape of his nose would have been caught dead in it.

  Mom leaned over and rubbed the sleeve. “It feels like real wool.”

  Aunt Hepzibah snorted. “Do you think I would give a cheap sweater?”

  Charles bit his tongue hard to avoid saying anything Mother would make him regret.

  “How thoughtful,” Mom said.

  “Yeah, thoughtful,” Charles said. He hoped it sounded sincere. He didn’t know what Aunt Hepzibah had been thinking when she picked out a girl's sweater for his gift, but something must have been going on in her head.

  “Well, try it on.” Aunt Hepzibah leaned in for a better look.

  Charles didn’t want to have that thing in his birthday pictures. He might actually want to show them to some of his friends. He turned to Mom, hoping for sympathy.

  “Now Hepzibah, I’m not sure that’s a good idea. He might get frosting on the sleeve, and then he couldn’t wear it to school on Monday. Something that special needs special handling in the wash.”

  Charles got the message and dragged the sweater over his head. He was supposed to be science partners with Abigail McClenn on Monday and he wasn’t about to do that wearing this sweater. He could put up with it for a few hours, and drag his arm through the cake somehow. Then Mom could lose the sweater in the wash.

  When his head popped out, Charles could see his mother was smiling. “Now for our gift.” She reached behind Dad and took out a small, flat, thin, rectangular present, five inches by seven inches. It could only be one thing. Charles could hardly wait to pull off the paper. He didn’t need to see the title, just a few inches of the picture.

  “Fantasy Kingdom XXI!”

  Mom was leaning over his shoulder. “Is that the right one? The kid in the electronics department said it just came out on Tuesday.”

  “Yeah. You can be a ninja ranger, with double snake kick and healing. And when you customize your character at level two, you can do all kinds of cool stuff. There’s sixteen noses and Abby said it took half an hour to make her character. Girls get thirty-six hair styles and eighteen colors. Guys only get twenty-six.” Charles could see everyone’s eyes glazing over. He could understand them not getting ninja ranger, which was why he didn’t explain single hand ranged weapons and dominant hand bonuses, but he had thought they’d understand hair styles. “It’s really, really cool. Thanks.”

  “That everything?” Aunt Hepzibah asked, pushing herself to her feet. When no one answered, she turned to Dad. “Where are the cards?”

  “Bridge or pinochle?” Dad was pulling out the table.

  Charles picked up his video game and followed Mom into the kitchen.

  Mom moved the coffee urn from the floor to the counter. Charles pulled the plastic off of his game.

  “Can I please go up and try my game?”

  Mom didn’t look up from measuring out the coffee. “You’re the host.”

  “But Dad and Aunt Hepzibah get to play.”

  Mom didn’t look up from assembling the filter, but she didn’t say no either.

  Charles peeled away the security seal. He could tell he was winning, just a tiny bit more convincing. “I just want to see how it starts. I promise I won’t start designing my character or anything.”

  “It will take twenty minutes for all this coffee to brew and me to get everything set up for cake, so you’ll come down as soon as I call you, right?”

  “The second I hear you, I’ll go to the nearest save point and be right down.”

  “All right.”

  Half-way up the stairs, Charles looked back. “What if Dad and Aunt Hepzibah don’t come when you call?”

  “We’ll give them five minutes and if they’re not here, you can go back up and play until the party ends.”

  “Cool.” Charles ran up to his room before she could change her mind. He had the game up and running in no time, then sat on the bed watching the opening credits. He tried bypassing them, but none of the buttons seemed to do it. Then the opening movie. He had to watch that to get the plot, but it was cutting into his twenty minutes. The king was showing his castle, explaining the threat to the throne, then he was attacked. Charles sat up as he took control of the king. It was easy enough, just a few giant rats, but it also showed him the basic controls for fighting. If he could get through the intro level, he should hit a save point in time to go down for cake.

  Charles had just learned the defensive parry when he saw a bit of movement out of the corner of his eye. He hit “START” and looked around. Nothing. Probably a floater in his eye.

  He unpaused the game and practiced the slashing attack. There it was again. He looked around fast. It was bigger than a fruit fly. Maybe a moth. Hopefully not ants. He didn’t like those, or thousand leggers.

  It didn’t come back until he was practicing fierce attacks. Charles saw it out of the corner of his eye, and then it was in front of him. A tiny person. Male, looking too young to call a man and too wise to be a boy. His slightly pointy face wa
s unlined, with large brown eyes and thick brown hair under a small, acorn shaped hat. On closer inspection, Charles realized the hat wasn’t an acorn at all, but a knitted cap made to look like an acorn. The tunic he was wearing was knit too, only it was patterned to look like bark, like his hose. Only his little shoes didn’t seem to be knitted; they were felt. He was clearly hovering in the air, but Charles didn’t see any wings.

  Charles slammed his thumb on the start button and stared. He’d clearly gone nuts. Then the little person spoke. “This is bad.” His voice was small, but not high or shrill as Charles would have imagined.

  Charles managed to avoid asking the first question that popped into his head (“What are you?” sounded rude) and instead asked, “Who are you?”

  “My name is Bobble and I am one of the sprites working on the King’s grand plan to defeat the evil Necorious.”

  “I’m Charles.” It seemed a bit inadequate even if it was accurate.

  “It is a great pleasure, Master Charles, and I would enjoy the opportunity to get to know you better, but I am on a mission and I must complete it.”

  “Sure, I understand.” What Charles couldn’t understand was why the sprite was here if he had a mission.

  “Then if you would kindly give me the sweater, I will be on my way.”

  “My sweater? You can’t take that. Mom’ll kill me.”

  “Surely she would not...”

  “Look, I’ve got to get to this save point so I can start there next time and not have to re-watch the intro, then go down for cake.”

  “And I too must return, so if you would just...” Bobble held out his little hand.

  “I can’t. It’s a birthday present from Aunt Hepzibah.”

  The sprite’s face fell and Charles wondered if he knew Aunt Hepzibah.

  “It was gifted to you?”

  “Yeah, I guess. I mean, it was a birthday gift. Do you need to sit down or something?” The sprite really wasn’t looking well.

  The sprite sat on the edge of a bookshelf. “Gifted. How could it have gone so wrong? Gifted.” He started rocking back and forth, whispering, “Gifted. It was gifted.”

  “Do you want some water or something?” Charles had no idea what to do to help the little guy.

  “No, no. You’re very kind.”

  Charles wasn’t sure what to do, so he tried an all purpose, “I’m sorry.”

  “That’s quite all right. It isn’t your fault. You did not ask for the gift, did you?”

  “No.” Charles put down the controller and went to the shelf. He knelt a little so he could keep an eye on the sprite, just in case he started to look worse. “Why does it matter so much? That it’s a gift I mean.”

  “With a magic item like that one, something to be used personally by the owner, it needs to be gifted. Then it will take on the properties that will make it work for the owner. Of course that means that it will not work properly for anyone else. You see the difficulty.”

  This sweater being magic was even harder to believe in than Bobble. “So if I gave it to you, it wouldn’t do you any good anyway.”

  “Exactly.”

  “If you waited until the party’s over, I could give it to you as a gift. Would that work?” Even as he said it, Charles knew that was too obvious.

  “No, it is a good idea, but the gift has attached itself to you. It will not take a new owner until you die. Then it is fair game. That is why adventurers go looking for artifacts of dead heroes; they will attach themselves to anyone once the original owner has died, although the connection will never be as strong.” The sprite grinned and launched himself off of the shelf, “But I do think it would be rude to kill you on your birthday.”

  Charles smiled. “That’s a relief.” He hadn’t really believed that the little guy would hurt him, but it was nice to hear.

  The sprite flitted back and forth in front of Charles, twisting his little hands. “Well, I’ve found it. That’s something. They can’t fault me for losing it. What am I saying, of course they can. This is a disaster.” He started flitting faster. He reached into the pouch at his waist and pulled out some knitting. He stopped wringing his hands and started knitting instead.

  Charles straightened up. “Who are you afraid of?”

  The sprite turned to him and slowed down, still knitting. “Not afraid, not really. I mean he’ll be mad, but he is fair, even though they were counting on this. I mean, anyone would be mad... But I am not afraid of King Regulous. Not really. Just...” He flung his arms in the air, almost throwing his knitting across the room, then started knitting again.

  Before Charles could think of another question, there was a creaking sound. Charles ignored the noise. “Look, I’m really sorry you’re in some kind of jam, but...”

  The creaking sound got louder, and was now accompanied by the rattling of every frame, book and action figure resting against the wall. It was impossible to ignore that. Charles turned away from Bobble and tried to figure out what was going on. The sound seemed to be coming from somewhere above the wall that was shaking violently. As Charles watched, a crack began to develop along the join between the wall and the ceiling.

  “What are you supposed to do in an earthquake? Is that where you stand in a door frame?”

  But the sprite was giving him a blank look like he’d just asked if it was easier to get to Mars by boat or by car.

  Charles looked around the room, wondering if he should run downstairs, and then it was too late. The ceiling was shaking so hard that little bits of plaster were flaking off and falling as a fine powder onto the floor. The crack was getting wider, growing along the seam between the wall and the roof, tiny cracks splintering off it. Charles looked around, hoping to see something that would protect him if the roof fell in. Maybe under the computer desk?

  And then there was no roof. Charles stood there, dazed, staring up at the starry sky. It took him a moment to realize that the roof had not caved in on him as he’d expected, but peeled up. He wasn’t sure if he should run and hide or stay and try to figure out what was going on. Before Charles could decide if he was more scared or curious, there was a huge eye the size of a football looking over the edge of the ceiling. Charles stood there, trying to get his feet to move, as an enormous hand came through the hole in the ceiling and closed around him.

  “No, Glorf!” Bobble called. “Not yet!”

  That woke Charles from his stupor. He started to struggle against the hand, kicking, punching, and trying to twist around and bite the fingers.

  “Slippery little thing, aren’t you?” growled the giant, but he didn’t loosen his grip.

  Bobble flitted around, wringing his hands and saying, “No, no, not yet.”

  And then everything went dark.

  Chapter 2

  At first Charles thought he’d fainted, but he was still able to hear the sprite muttering, “No, no, not yet,” over and over again, and there was a rush of wind in his face. And then, just as suddenly, it stopped. Charles blinked a few times and looked around.

  Bobble was flitting around, still snapping at the giant, but not doing anything to help Charles get free. Charles doubted there was much the little guy could do against a giant, but he would have appreciated the effort.

  They weren’t anywhere near his house. They weren’t anywhere near anywhere Charles had ever been before. It was a town, that much was certain, but the buildings were small, only a couple were more than two stories tall. All the rest were half-timbered, with shops on the ground floor and curtains drawn in the windows above. Bobble and the giant did not stop on any of the streets, but made their way to the center of the town. If this were Fantasy Kingdom, they'd either be going to the castle or the enemy’s stronghold.

  The castle came into view over the buildings. It didn’t look like an enemy stronghold, but Charles knew it was a mistake to judge it until he saw the residents. The outer walls of the castle were thick stone with round towers every few yards. Through the open gates, Charles could see the kee
p, with thinner walls, more windows, and wooden doors that were large enough for Charles to see even from as far away as he was. They had gone several yards before Charles could begin to make out the guards, looking like toy soldiers left by the playroom door.

  They passed through the first set of gates and into the marshaling yard. No one paid any attention to them. Normally Charles would have been very interested in the squires polishing their swords and the knights practicing some moves off to the side and the archers on the walls watching everything, but being kidnapped by a giant made things like that a bit less interesting.

  They were passing into the inner courtyard when the giant stopped and Charles felt himself being lowered.

  “Can’t go on. You’ll have to take him,” the giant grunted to the sprite. It would have been funny if Charles hadn’t been so worried about what was coming.

  Bobble seemed surprised by this change. Or maybe it was just that the giant had spoken two sentences together. Bobble was definitely the less scary of the two kidnappers. If nothing else, Charles was pretty sure he could flick Bobble away. But Bobble didn’t seem to want him here anymore than he wanted to be here; maybe it would be easier to go along with Bobble and try to convince the sprite to send him home.

  With that decided, Charles became a bit more interested in the castle’s defenses. As he followed Bobble inside, Charles tried to look for signs of the spell or defensive weapon that was keeping the giant out, but he quickly realized it was much simpler than that. Only one side of the second pair of gates was open and the giant couldn’t fit through the opening.

  Bobble kept on talking, switching to Charles since he couldn’t keep nagging the giant. “It takes four men to open the gates, and Glorf is always afraid he will break them if he tries. He doesn’t know his own strength, or the strength of the doors. Welcome to the home of King Regulous of Pelimaa.”

  The guards in purple and gold moved to block their way until Bobble flitted forward calling, “King’s business, let us pass.” The guards stepped aside at once and saluted as Bobble entered the castle.