Bookweird (25 page)

 

The Unveiling of the Gifts

T
he next morning Norman dragged himself to the chapel once again. It seemed like he'd only just left. Even snugly back in his bed in the granary, he had been unable to sleep. His mind kept wandering back to the decisions he'd made and the words he'd written in the Chronicle. Had he made the right choice for the future of the Mustelid dynasty?

If Malcolm noticed his giant friend's sluggishness that morning, he didn't say anything. The young stoat was unusually solemn. There was none of his usual flitting and chattering. He must be thinking about his father, Norman thought. It must be terrible to lose your father. He remembered suddenly that Malcolm's mother was dead too. He was an orphan now. Norman couldn't think of anything more terrible.

He thought suddenly about his own family. Were his father and mother still looking for a page of the missing poem, or had he changed history twice today? When the page from
The Battle of Maldon
was found, it would not be the same page. The English had lost at the Battle of Maldon because of Norman. There would be no such thing as England, and no Department of English for his father to teach in. His ancestors would have been speaking Danish for centuries. Would he even understand his family when he returned?

The chapel was built atop a rise behind Castle Lochwarren. Half hidden in the pine forest, it was reached by a narrow path strewn with gravel and moss. It was a strange place for a coronation—for that was what this was, though they were a modest group for a royal procession. Four ferret clerics led them up the winding path. Behind the clerics strode two squires carrying the fateful gifts of King Malcolm. The boxes were identical save for their condition, simple wooden boxes with unpolished iron hinges and locks. Duncan's—scratched, dinted and oddly out of square—bore the effects of its fall from the cliff and hasty reconstruction in the early chapters. Cuilean's was clean and tidy but no less austere. You wouldn't guess that one contained a gift fit for a king.

Cuilean and James followed the squires who carried the boxes. They were as silent as Norman and Malcolm. A small party of stoat nobles completed the party. They alone broke the silence. Though they walked some distance behind the clerics and the royal party, Norman could hear them whispering all the way up the hill. More than a few of them marvelled at the outlandish appearance of the giant Norman. The less polite whispered indiscreetly about the half-civilized beast that might at any time turn on them. Mostly, though, they traded speculations as to what the boxes contained and what the old king had decreed all those years ago before marching off to his death at Tista Kirk.

Norman had had a long time to think about the gifts. From what he had read from the book, Duncan had not been impressed with his. The warrior prince would have hoped for a sword or dagger, some weapon to symbolize his strength and leadership. Perhaps that was why he had been so surly and so eager to forget he had a brother. Did Cuilean's box contain the symbol of a soldier's power that Duncan hoped for? It wasn't long enough to hold a sword—but a dagger, perhaps, or a buckler. Norman was nervous now, not knowing for sure what he'd been able to do the night before. Reality could contradict what he had written and expose his fraud. He had tried to be vague, but there was only so much you could
not
say.

The procession had reached the chapel. The royal party entered solemnly, making the sign of the cross as they stepped over the threshold. Only Malcolm hesitated, turning back at the door where Norman himself had inevitably stopped.

“Wish you could come in here.” The little stoat's voice caught as he spoke, instantly making Norman's eyes sting. The young prince looked so alone.

“I'll be watching from the back,” Norman whispered hoarsely. Unable to say anything else, he just nodded toward the front of the chapel, where the rest were waiting. Even then Malcolm hesitated. Norman gave him the thumbs-up sign. A perplexed look crossed the stoat's face, but he smiled quickly and gave the sign back with his own furry paw. The sight brought a silent chuckle to Norman's belly. Malcolm turned and strode confidently to the front of the chapel. Norman watched for just a moment more before standing aside for the rest of the attendees.

The stoat nobles passed through the arched doorway hastily, casting wary glances at Norman as they slipped past him. He resisted the urge to startle them with a lunge or a shout of “boo.”

When they were all settled, the senior cleric stepped to the lectern and cleared his throat. After a pause, he declaimed in a loud but high voice, “Before he fastened his sword to his belt and donned his battle helm to lead the defence of our people at Tista Kirk, King Malcolm dictated his last entry in the Chronicle of his lineage. The King set aside two gifts for his sons by which they would know his intention.” The priest cleared his throat again and gazed down from the pulpit dramatically before continuing. “May I have the boxes please?” he asked officiously.

The two gift bearers stepped forward. The locks on their boxes were unfastened now, and all that remained was to open them. At a nod from the priest, they opened the hinged lids. The cleric gazed down at their contents for a moment, taking in their significance. Norman was holding his breath as he watched. Finally the priest stepped forward and reached into one of the boxes—Norman could not tell whose—and slowly, he withdrew the gift. Stepping
back to his pulpit, he raised the gift in one hand and held it there for all to see.

It was a book. Norman recognized it as the Chronicle of Mustelid Kings that he'd written in the night before. So it had worked. He smiled to himself. Somehow it had worked. He had written that one of the gifts was a book,
this
book, and now it was happening.

The priest had opened the book to the last page and was reading from it. He was reading King Malcolm's last testament—ghostwritten by Norman Jespers-Vilnius.

“In this year of peril for our people it is my responsibility to ensure the security of my people, not only with the sword, but with words. Let them both move true and sure.”

Strange, thought Norman—it was sort of what he had written, but not exactly. He hadn't been that, what was the word, poetic. This bookweird was hard to fathom.

“Should I not return to this fine castle and this ancient seat of our kings, the future of our people does not rest with one man, but one man must be their support, their shield and their defender. One man too must be their memory, their guide and their wisdom. I am fortunate enough to have two sons, two sons of talent and valour, each worthy of this throne and this responsibility. Each could rule and each could lead, and each shall lead in his way. Alas, only one stoat can wear the crown.

“I have left each of my sons a gift. In choosing, I have been mindful that a father must consider what his child requires as well as what he desires. To one I have left this Chronicle, for a king must consider the past if he thinks to determine the future. To the other I have left a gift similarly suited to his responsibilities, for one should lead and the other protect.”

Peering in from the open door, Norman wondered if anyone thought it unusual that he had not named the second gift. There wasn't much he could do now. He thought overall it had come out miraculously well. It not only sounded regal: it had become true.

The priest stepped back down from the pulpit and replaced
the Chronicle in its box. The retainers closed the lids and turned to face the assembly.

The royal party had not thought the reading would be so short. When they realized that there was nothing else, Cuilean and Malcolm advanced to the spot where two retainers held the boxes. Cuilean leaned over to his young nephew, placed a hand on his shoulder and whispered something in his ear. The young stoat nodded nervously and stepped forward. Reaching out tentatively, he put his hand on the lid of the battered crate and held it there a moment. He appeared not to want to open it. No one spoke. The moment stretched on. Finally Malcolm reached out with his other hand and, with both paws, slowly lifted the lid. Again there was stillness and silence.

Malcolm must see it now. He must know what his gift was and what it meant. Without removing it, he looked to his uncle, an apologetic frown upon his face. Cuilean must see the book too. Surely he would be disappointed. Hadn't he trained all his life to be King? Maybe he held out hope. A thought struck Norman: what if the second gift was a book too? Maybe this is what Cuilean hoped now. How would they solve it then?

Old King Malcolm's only surviving son now reached forward. More assured and graceful than his nephew, he opened the box before him with one swift movement. Why not? He had been waiting all his life to do this. It was like knowing where your Christmas presents were hidden. He could have forced it open at any time, but he had resisted. He peered in for just a moment. No one behind could see the look on his face. Norman held his breath and hoped. Let it not be another book. Let him be okay with not being King. Whatever was in the second box, Cuilean did not waste time pondering it. He reached in with two hands and lifted it out. Still he shielded it from the audience with his back. Upon a nod from Cuilean, Malcolm removed his own gift from its case. They turned to reveal the gifts in unison.

There were gasps of surprise from the attendees. Norman looked first not at the gifts but at the face of Cuilean, the man he
just might have robbed of the throne. He was smiling—not the tired, sad smile that Norman had seen on his face the night before in the great hall, either, but the one that reminded Norman of young Malcolm's cheerful grin. Cuilean held up the ornately engraved silver helm for all to see, and with a gentle tap on the shoulder, urged his nephew to lift his own gift. Malcolm looked stunned, unprepared for his gift or the result. His eyes were lowered as if unwilling to recognize the book in his hands. Cuilean leaned over and whispered something in his nephew's ear. A gleam returned to Malcolm's eyes as he listened. He nodded, looked up and stood taller.

“King Malcolm divided the two traditional gifts of the Mustelid Kings between his sons,” the haughty cleric declared. “To Cuilean he gave the Helm of Govan, symbol of the protector. To Duncan he gave the Chronicle of the Mustelid Kings, the one true record of our history.” He held up the book.

“From Malcolm to his son Duncan and to his son Malcolm the throne passes,” he proclaimed.

“Long live King Malcolm!” Cuilean's voice rang out, calmly and warmly.

“Long live King Malcolm!” the audience in the chapel shouted enthusiastically. It was echoed not only in the church but behind Norman, where a large crowd had assembled to witness the emergence of their new king.

“Long live Cuilean the Protector!” the audience now cried. The bells above the church had begun a joyful peel. Norman's legs felt weak beneath him.

One glance toward the two princes convinced him that he'd done the right thing. Cuilean stood proudly and protectively at Malcolm's shoulder. The young boy looked up for reassurance. The older man nodded encouragingly, and the new king again brightened and stood tall.

It would all work out. The bookweird would make it okay. Whatever he had written last night was now the truth. Norman might have changed the story, but he had done it right. Malcolm
would be a good king. His people clearly loved him, and his uncle would protect and guide him.

Malcolm's gleaming eye caught his own as he stared down the aisle of the chapel.

“Long live King Malcolm,” Norman yelled, giving his friend the thumbs-up sign again. At least he thought he yelled. It came out quietly, as if the volume had been turned down. He still felt faint and his vision was blurring. By the time he realized what was really happening, it was too late to say or do anything more in Undergrowth.

 

Grounded

T
here was no scent of pancakes this time, or of bacon, or of banana milkshakes, for that matter. Norman just woke up. That didn't make it any less confusing. Wherever he was, it was dark and very, very quiet. He rubbed his face and sat up. He'd been sleeping on something hard, and it had left an impression on his cheek that he did his best to rub off. Where was he, anyway?

It looked liked he was back in his own time, or at least close. Carpet had been invented at least, he noticed, as he stood up and felt it with his sock feet. He peered down at his feet for a while, trying to remember why he wasn't wearing shoes. It came to him eventually. One shoe was stuck in the mud of an ancient English battlefield. The other was now displayed on the trophy wall of the great hall of Castle Lochwarren.

Norman hardly dared to hope that he was home again. It certainly wasn't his own house he was in. He knew the sounds of his house—the hum of the furnace, the rattle of the old fridge—but there were none of these here. And yet this had to be modern times. There was carpet on the floor and the sound of the occasional car going past outside. He was in a large room, with no windows. The only light was the faint red glow of an illuminated
exit sign. God, Norman hoped, let this not be Mom's gross murder book again. He reassured himself that it didn't smell like a police station.

As his eyes adjusted to the dim light, the room became clearer. The tall shapes that filtered the light on either side of him were not cell walls. Those were books, not iron bars. It was beginning to dawn on him where he was.

“Hello,” he whispered cautiously. He'd listened to the silence about as long as he could. There was no answer. He tried again, louder this time. Now he was sure that the library was empty, that it was long past closing time. Only a few cars had driven past since he'd woken up. During the day, the street outside the library was much busier than that.

Keeping his hand on the shelf beside him as a guide, Norman slowly made his way out of the history section, where he'd fallen asleep. There was a phone by the desk. It should be that easy to get out of here.

It could have been just the lack of light, but the library seemed more of a maze than he remembered. He hit a few dead ends at the end of the rows of shelves as he groped his way through the dark. When he finally emerged from the stacks at the library's front desk, the first thing that confronted him was the illuminated face of the clock. It couldn't possibly be that late, could it? The clock insisted it was 1:30
A.M
., but he was reluctant to believe it. That would mean he was in some serious trouble.

Norman stared at the telephone keypad and listened to the drone of the dial tone for several moments. He wondered if it might not be better to be back in a book being chased by a wolf or a crazed Viking. Darwin and Rorschach's interrogation room didn't even sound all that bad at the moment.

When Norman finally worked up the courage to dial, it did not take long for someone to pick up. It hardly rang once. His dad must have been sitting by the phone.

“Norman, is that you? Where are you? Are you all right?” he demanded.

Norman must have said he was all right about fifty times before his mother picked up the other extension and asked some sensible questions.

Norman's parents arrived at the library about the same time as the police. Edward Vilnius had called Norman back on his cellphone and talked to him while he drove to the library. The police, he insisted, said it was okay to go out through the emergency door, but he was to wait until they were in the parking lot.

The alarm going off made it pretty dramatic. The police didn't have any way of turning it off. They'd already phoned the fire department and explained the situation. They weren't sending a truck. The chief would drive over in his own car. That, at least, was a little less embarrassing than it might have been. Still, it was surprisingly difficult to explain.

Nobody seemed to want to believe that he'd just fallen asleep in the library. Not his parents, not the police. The fire chief, at least, didn't care. He just wanted to get the alarm off and get back to bed, which sounded like a pretty good idea to Norman himself. Instead, though, he had to answer a dozen questions from his parents and the police—or rather, the same question over and over. Everyone wanted to know if he had really fallen asleep in the library or if he had tried to run away. The police officer wasn't at all like Rorschach or Darwin. She reminded him more of his grade 2 teacher, Ms. Morin. She always made a big deal out of little things, too. When he finally convinced them all that he really had just fallen asleep in the library, it was after 2
A.M
.

If his parents were angry, they did a good job of hiding it. His mom sat in the back with him while his dad drove. She kept stroking his hair back from his forehead while she told him how worried they had been.

“I haven't seen your father look that worried since the day you were born.”

Norman's dad looked back at them in the rear-view mirror. There was a deep frown on his face.

“Honestly, Edward,” his mom said, talking to his dad's face reflected in the rear-view mirror, “your forehead was creased exactly like that.”

His parents didn't mention the missing page from the poem, even when they arrived home. Norman wasn't complaining. If he could avoid talking about it, he would. Maybe he would never have to talk about it. Maybe they didn't know that the old poem had been changed at all, never mind that it was his fault. It would be a terrible secret to keep. Worrying about it tainted his relief at being home even as he fell back asleep, exhausted.

 

He was still thinking about the damage to
The Battle of Maldon
when he awoke. He was more than a little surprised that he was in his own bed in his own room in his own life. Once you've woken up inside a book a few times, it's hard to go on through your life with the same expectation of normalness.

The clock told him it was 9:30, but he was sure it was a school day. Hadn't he left on a school day? His mother was working at the kitchen table when he finally dragged himself down there. There was no reprimand. She just looked up, smiled and said, “Good morning, sweetheart,” as he lurched into the room. Norman poured himself a bowl of cereal and waited. Perhaps he ate with an elbow on the table and slurped to hasten the scolding, but really Norman was too exhausted to be this calculating.

“Isn't today a school day?” he asked finally, cautiously.

His mother smiled the same indulgent smile she'd given him when he'd first come down. “We thought you could use a little extra rest.”

Boy, if she only knew, Norman thought. He gulped another spoonful of cereal before another thought came to him.

“Is Dad at the university today?” Norman's mom tended to be more lenient than his father. When his mom went easy on him, there was always the chance that this would only make his dad come down harder on him.

“Your dad's here too. He's working in the den.” She got up
from the table to steam the milk for coffee. “Why don't you take this up to him? He'll appreciate that.”

Norman studied her face. She didn't
look
like she was sending him off for his punishment, but his mother could hide her intentions better than most. She was hard to read sometimes.

On the stairs, on his way to his father's office, Norman decided that honesty was the best policy, or at least as much honesty as would be believable, which, now he thought about it, wasn't really much. This might be a case where he'd have to lie in order to be honest. This conundrum made him hesitate as he knocked on the door of his father's den.

“Is that coffee I smell?” his father asked cheerfully. “I certainly hope so. I feel the last one wearing off.” It was the old familiar joke, but Norman would not let himself be lulled into a false sense of security. He kept his guard up and placed the coffee carefully on the desk.

“Ah, cappuccino, just what the doctor ordered. Your mother is a lifesaver.” This was really weird. Maybe it would be better to just leave his father alone with his coffee. Norman backed away toward the door.

“Listen, Spiny…” That stopped Norman in his tracks. Dad never called him Spiny when he was angry. Norman was a bundle of nerves. He could feel his lip quivering and bit it to make it stop. His dad had every right to be furious. It
was
all his fault after all. When he'd eaten that first page out of his book, he'd broken some ancient law of books. He'd caused a chain reaction of destruction that had culminated in his father's work being destroyed. Now history was all messed up and his dad would get fired, and he'd have to learn to speak Viking. He was probably already speaking Viking and just didn't know it.

“Spiny—”

“I'm sorry, Dad. I'm sorry about your poem. I didn't mean to. I don't know how it happened…I just, accidentally one night. I ate…I didn't even know I was doing it.”

His father got up from his chair and approached him with his arms open. “Spiny?”

“There's a librarian, though. He's also a fox. He knows how to fix it. He won't tell me, but maybe if you…”

His father had wrapped one arm around him and pulled him close. With his free hand he wiped Norman's cheek. “Hey, relax. There's nothing to be sorry about. Fox librarians, eh? That's what happens when you have a sleepover in a library. Listen, I owe you an apology.”

Norman was sniffling now. When had he come down with a cold? It was probably from running around outside in hills of Lochwarren without shoes.

“Yesterday when I was looking for the page I'd lost, I was frantic. I let my anger at myself get out of control and I blamed other people for something that was entirely my fault.”

“But, Dad, it
is
kind of my fault. Even though it doesn't seem like it. It's something called bookweird.”

His father chuckled. “Bookweird? That's a good word for it. It's funny how you can lose your head over a book. I found my missing page, Spiny. It was here all along.” He pointed to a large leather-bound book. “It was here, in between the pages of this dictionary. I was up late—not as late as you, perhaps—but like you, I lost track of things.”

Norman nodded. “But the battle at Maldon. The English lost, and it's all my fault.”

“Your fault, eh?” His father laughed. “Now you're getting delusions of grandeur, Spiny. That must have been some crazy dream you had in the library last night. Stress can make you dream strange things. I'm really sorry, Norman. I shouldn't have blamed you for the missing page.”

“But the English lost,” Norman repeated. His father clearly didn't understand.

“Of course, they lost. Brythnoth let the Vikings across the causeway, and as soon as things got rough his allies ran off.”

“But was it always that way?” Norman asked.

Another chuckle from of his father. “Yes, it was always that way. It's the whole point of the poem. It's what makes it interesting. Is
Brythnoth a sucker, or is he another example of this crazy English idea of fair play?”

“But don't the Vikings go on and conquer England? Didn't you tell me that this was an important point in the war against the Vikings?”

“It was, but not because they won—because they kept fighting. English history is full of stories like this, fighting on in the face of sure defeat.”

Norman didn't really know what to say to this. He wasn't sure he believed it.

Norman's father smiled again and tried to cajole one out of Norman. “Your mother figured you could use a day off school. I think she's right. You couldn't have slept all that well in the library.”

Still deep in thought, Norman shook his head slowly.

“Listen,” his father said. “I have a book on this you might like. It's about the first great English king, Alfred the Great. Do you want to read it?” Norman's father ran a finger across the spines of the books on his bookshelf until they came to rest on a slim green clothbound volume. Norman jumped back involuntarily when his father held it out toward him.

His dad chuckled. “You haven't developed bibliophobia, have you? Fear of books? It's very serious. The treatment is quite painful.”

Norman couldn't stop a small grin from wrinkling out from his mouth. “I just think that I should give my brain a rest for a day or so.”

“You're probably right. That's another possible diagnosis: you could have bibliotoxosis, book poisoning. I'd suggest a day of bike rides. I could pull my bike out after lunch, if you like.”

“Maybe until then I'll just play on my computer.”

His father took a sip of his coffee and nodded in mock solemnity. “Yes. For now, that's probably the safest course of action.”

 

Norman did finally return to book reading later that week. He borrowed his dad's book on Alfred the Great and got through it
without incident. And
The Scythian Scimitar
finally came in at the library on the weekend. Mrs. Balani handed it over and took his library card with a sly smile.