Wisdom's Kiss (41 page)

Nonna is right—magic brings only jealousy & outrage & despair.
>
Besides how could a magic broom help—or the Elemental Spells? We have no power against the will of Rüdiger IV—& that beastly, beastly Wilhelmina!

O! A sound—at the window! It is my love come to me at last!

A P
LAY IN
T
HREE
A
CTS

PENNED BY ANONYMOUS

Act I, Scene ix (cont'd).
Wisdom's suite in Phraugheloch Palace.

Benevolence paces. Wisdom writes at her desk. A knock.

BENEVOLENCE
: A ghost, atop our other woes!

WISDOM
: It is my love—my angel!—come to me at last!

Enter Tips.

TIPS
: I mean no fright, Your Majesty, for I am no ghost, only a humble performer. I beg you: I must have a word with Lady Fortitude.

WISDOM
: What? Not me?

TIPS
: I must explain myself to her—perhaps my words will offer comfort.

BENEVOLENCE
: She has fled, I fear.

TIPS
: To Bacio? 'Twill be my undoing!

BENEVOLENCE
: I know not her location, or intent ... But tell us, fair lad, why tread our windowsill? We have a door quite serviceable; indeed several.

TIPS
: The duchess, I suspect, has little stomach for my presence—

WISDOM
: So? Let all the world behold our love!

TIPS
: Moreover, I know this building's casing well, having many times traversed its façade in service to the emperor.

BENEVOLENCE
: As spy?

TIPS
: I must confess it. Love demands naught but truth.

WISDOM
: O my darling, you are too brilliant! How could I ever love another?

BENEVOLENCE
: A spy ... a vocation of which we now have desperate need.

WISDOM
: O darling, you must spy for us!

TIPS
: I am not sure of this...

Enter Escoffier the cat.

BENEVOLENCE
: I am certain the duchess schemes even now ... Know you her location?

TIPS
: Without fail ... Yet no human could enter that room unnoticed.

BENEVOLENCE
: Nor shall any human do so.

WISDOM
: O Nonna Ben! You would not!

BENEVOLENCE
: Spelling lost me my daughter, but perhaps it will preserve hers.

Exit Benevolence holding Escoffier.
Wisdom and Tips embrace.

WISDOM
: A moment of bliss! I cannot deny myself!

TIPS
: Nor I ... Yet I confess I do not follow Her Majesty's thinking. How does spelling lend assistance—have you no dictionaries?

WISDOM
: Think not upon it. Simply deliver Escoffier to the duchess's chamber; he shall see to the rest.

Enter Escoffier, who leaps onto Tips's shoulders.

TIPS
: Gadzooks! He is like no creature I have ever known! Does this cat possess intelligence?

WISDOM
: Far more than that; he doth provide it. Fly, my love! Be safe! Be true!

Exit Tips and Escoffier through window.

WISDOM
: I shall keep the casement open in expectancy of their return ... My grandmother slumbers behind closed door, preserved in a veil of enchantment ... We have profaned our vow! Yes, yes, I am a sorceress—I do confess it—but one imperiled by misery eternal. O, how I pray these Dark Arts illuminate my gloomy plight, and light a path to resolution...

8
TH EDITION

Printed in the Capital City of Rigorus
by Hazelnut & Filbert, Publishers to the Crown

DOPPELSCHLÄFE
RIN
>

Also known as "the sleeping double," the
Doppelschläferin
is yet another now-disregarded shred of magical lore from the Kingdom of Montagne. That the name is feminine—the standard, masculine phrase should be Doppelschläfer—reiterates the kingdom's long association with female witchcraft.
The Doppelschläferin is part of the legend of Queen Virtue, founder of Montagne, who was said to have devised it while held prisoner by the
Pots de Crème
Giants; the spell (she claimed) allowed her to split into two identical bodies—one unrousably asleep, the other conscious and cogent—that could be reunited at will, often many years later. Several of her heirs professed, when it was yet acceptable to invent such tales, to have improved upon the spell by employing pets, most often cats, to operate as their doubles, viewing the world through the animal's eyes while their human body remained "asleep." As false as this myth most patently is, the legend had strategic advantages: the Montagne army once feigned sleep en masse, and the sight so terrified the approaching Drachensbett forces that the soldiers broke ranks and fled.
The fairy tale "
Cat Whiskers
" contains the last published reference to a Doppelschläferin, and it concludes with both the witch and her Doppelschläferin feline burnt at the stake.

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My Dearest Temperance, Queen of Montagne,

Granddaughter, I have broken my pledge and returned to magic—violating every vow I made to you and Dizzy and the memory of your dear mother. And would that I had not—for the truth I learned is far worse than anything I could have conjectured!

Tonight Duke Roger paid a call to our suite and in heated conversation revealed his true self, which is only a more polished variant of his mother's selfish grasping. Dizzy now professes that she would rather die than wed him. I do not believe she will take her life, but I would not wish this life upon her.

No sooner had His Grace departed than Dizzy's new love appeared at our window—fittingly enough for an acrobat!—hoping to speak to Trudy, or Lady Fortitude as he sweetly termed her. His good intent crumbled to despair when he learned that the lass had departed the suite for points unknown. Our conversation did reveal that the lad had no little experience as spy—also fitting for an acrobat in liege to the emperor! At once I glimpsed a faint path out of our horrible predicament: in learning Farina's true intent, we perhaps might thwart it. I recognize too well that
eavesdropping
in and of itself is villainous; to conduct such depravity through veil of magic rightly brings upon witchcraft every censure the empire might devise. However dismayed you must be in your grandmother, know I am more dismayed in myself. Yet if I could have perceived a solution beyond sorcery to this wretched dilemma, trust I would have exploited it forthwith.

Oh, Granddaughter, you cannot imagine my agony as I whispered those enchanted phrases. With every word, I recollected more vividly that fateful night, the reckless exuberance of Dizzy and myself, and your mother's breezy assurance that she would be
fine
and
safe
upon my broom, her eagerness to experience at last the magic of flight after so many years of yearning...
I should have known better
! You are wise beyond measure to keep your two feet firmly planted upon the ground and to accept, however reluctantly, that you lack both the power of magic and its pain.

Thus incorporated with my feline partner while my creaky old body snored abed, I then contravened the Empire of Lax's most cherished laws and mores. With little urging from Dizzy, Tips escorted noble Escoffier—unaware of the cat's recent
enlightenment
—to the duchess's privy chamber. There, as I had suspected, she sat plotting with her son and several others. Tips was fortunate enough to find a window cracked ajar, and though the young man could not hear the conversation within, supple Escoffier slid through this opening as a black shadow and traversed her suite undiscovered to the table, heaped with papers, where the schemers conspired.
To my delight, the duchess had with her that miserable little dog, and so
Escoffier
's silent leap to the table's center had the effect not only of frightening the faction almost to death but also of setting the dog off as a fuse lights a firecracker, with easily as much noise. Adding insult to injury, Escoffier then lounged in a most possessive and feline manner across the documents, a stroke of brilliance that even in my fear and grief cheered me immeasurably.

The duchess at once made to strike Escoffier a vicious blow, but her son deflected her swing, pointing out that a pet from Montagne should not be harmed. "Not yet, anyway," sneered Wilhelmina.
"I shall sleep much easier once this marriage is sealed and the
abdication
complete."

Yes, Granddaughter, you read correctly:
Abdication
! Oh, Teddy, an awful conspiracy has been concocted, and Wilhelmina and her son fully expect you will quit your throne—within the week!

Would that I could spare you this terrible reality—alas, I cannot. Instead I shall report my findings swiftly; the sooner pain is felt, the sooner it may pass. Darling, it appears—and from the confident and informed manner with which these connivers schemed, I cannot but believe they speak the truth—it appears your suitor, sweet-tongued though he may be, is in actual fact an agent of the Duchy of Farina! And his only task has been to win your love that he might convince you to leave Montagne forever—and by so abdicating, pass the throne to your sister! Is that not horrible?

Wilhelmina is a wicked, wicked woman; it was all I could do not to hurl Escoffier at her to scratch out her eyes. If only I could be there to sit with you and comfort you in your grief, reassuring you again and again that someday, me dear, you will find true happiness.

Numb with shock at this loathsome discovery, I hastened back to our suite and released myself from Escoffier that I might read again your description of this alleged suitor—and yet your letter was nowhere to be found! Such correspondence I treat most carefully, securing it within a locked casket, and to discover it missing devastated me utterly. I am certain that it has been stolen, and moreover I cannot but suspect that your more recent missives have met a similar fate—at the hands of a
villainess
whom we can both readily identify—that I might remain ignorant of your plight.

Please, Granddaughter, much as it will crush you, you must imprison this rogue at once. I shall return as hastily as I can, lingering in Froglock only long enough to see to Dizzy's safety.

Please, I beg you: protect your nation and your throne!

Your panicked grandmother,
Ben