The Purple Emperor

'The, ah, the business with the, ah, wand in the ear and knee in the – the knee… and the knee: that really is all right, you know. I mean, I understand. Heat of battle and all that.' She just stood there, smiling at him. He wondered if she was a professional soldier. He wondered if she had a boyfriend. 'Do you ha- do, did, wha-' He started again. 'Is wondering why you attacked the ouklo?'

Nymphalis looked surprised. 'You don't believe all that nonsense about the Forest Faerie being brigands, do you?'

'No, no,' Pyrgus said hastily. 'Actually I thought you were Hairstreak's men.' It occurred to him she mightn't know who Hairstreak was, but pressed on. 'No, but I was really wondering why. Why you attacked us?'

The platform lurched beneath their feet.

'Ah,' said Nymphalis, 'we're here already.'

CHAPTER FORTY TWO

Henry had been in the palace dungeons once before -briefly – when he had tried to rescue Mr Fogarty, who'd been thrown in jail when everybody had believed he'd murdered the Purple Emperor. But that experience had been civilised compared to this. Now they'd thrown him into a dank, subterranean cell that smelled of someone else's pee and had no facilities for his own except a small grating set into the worn, cracked flagstones on the floor. The walls were stone as well, and the whole chamber had an ancient feel, as if it had been built at the same time as the original palace Keep. There were no windows. The only light came from a single rush taper that looked in danger of flickering out with every errant draft.

The door was extraordinary. It was nearly a foot thick and banded in metal for extra strength as if the designers had expected to lock up a dinosaur. It had some sort of spell coating that made a sound like fingernails across a blackboard every time he went near it. He didn't think the guards had literally thrown away the key, but he suspected he might be here for a very long time indeed.

Henry set his back against the wall and slid down to the floor to think. What had happened to Blue? What had happened to Pyrgus? And who on earth was Quercusia?

He had to find Blue and Pyrgus, had to find out what had happened. He had to get out of here.

Henry looked around his cell. There must be something he could use to escape, something he could break apart for digging or picking the lock or beating up the guard like they did in the movies. But the chamber was empty. No furnishings. No table, no chairs. Not even a mattress on the floor. Nothing but a moth-eaten rug thrown into one corner.

He stopped his eyes roaming and stared. Why would they give him a rug and nothing else?

Henry pushed himself abruptly to his feet. That was no rug!

'You can stop skulking in the corner now,' he called.

'I'm not skulking,' said the endolg. 'I was asleep. You woke me from a lovely dream.' It started to crawl towards him. 'Oh, it's Henry. Hello, Henry – or do you prefer "Iron Prominent" these days?'

Henry frowned. 'Do I know you?'

'Sure you do. I was the one shopped you to the guard upstairs. Fat lot of good it did me.'

For a moment Henry continued to stare at the creature. Then it came to him. The endolg was referring to Henry's attempt to free Mr Fogarty from the dungeons on their first visit to the Realm. Henry had tried lying to the guard and an endolg in the outer office had spotted it at once.

'That was you?' he asked.

'In the fur.'

'They sent you here to spy on me?' He couldn't imagine why. But then he couldn't imagine why he was here in the first place.

'Ah, the self-centred certainties of youth!' the endolg exclaimed philosophically. 'It's nothing to do with you. That loony old plud had me jailed.'

Somehow Henry knew the loony old plud was Quercusia. 'Why?'

'Why did she have me jailed? Didn't like the look of my pelt. Didn't like the colour of my eyes. Who knows why that barm-brack does anything? She'll have the dungeons full in a month – and Asloght Jail as well, if she keeps on the way she's going. It was a bad day for the Realm when Comma let her out.'

Comma let her out? The endolg mightn't be much use in smashing out of here, but it suddenly occurred to Henry that it could give him an awful lot of much-needed information. 'I've been away for weeks,' he said. 'What's been happening?'

For a horrible moment he thought the endolg wasn't going to answer, but then it sighed deeply. 'Where to begin? You know Prince Pyrgus has been sent into exile?'

Henry nodded. 'Is Blue with him? Princess Blue?'

'Princess Blue and Gatekeeper Fogarty. All history now.' The endolg sighed again.

'How did this happen?' Henry asked. He could hardly believe it. The last thing he'd heard was that Pyrgus was getting ready for his Coronation.

'Orders of his father,' the endolg said.

Henry stared at it. 'His father's dead,' he blurted.

'He was alive and kicking last time I saw him,' said the endolg. 'Well, alive, anyway: he didn't look so good.'

'Last time you saw him? When was that?'

'Couple of days. Before the loony old plud had me thrown down here.'

'Are you sure?'

'You don't know much about endolgs, do you?' remarked the endolg. 'We can't lie.' It wriggled slightly as if it had an itch. 'Seventy-eight brain cells missing. Doesn't sound like much, but it means we just can't do it. Any time an endolg says something definite, you can take it that's the truth. If we're not sure about something, we say "maybe" or "perhaps" or "somebody told me" or whatever. I saw the Purple Emperor alive, couple of days ago, in this palace. I'm sure. You can believe it.'

Henry couldn't believe it. Pyrgus's father had been shot at close range with a shotgun. But maybe the blast really hadn't killed him. Even in his own world there were people who fell into a coma and the doctors thought they were dead.

'Comma's on the throne now – or will be when he's crowned and confirmed. Purple Emperor Elect and Royal Pain in the Ass. Comma. Can you imagine it? First thing he did was let his mother out.'

'Out of where?' Comma's mother had to be the old Emperor's second wife. Henry had vaguely thought she was dead.

'The West Wing. They kept her locked up there for years.'

It suddenly struck Henry who the endolg must be talking about. 'Comma's mother is Quercusia, isn't she? Why was she locked up?'

'Because she's mad, of course. You know that. They're all mad in her family.'

'Who's her family?' Henry asked curiously.

'Quercusia is Lord Hairstreak's sister,' said the endolg.

CHAPTER FORTY THREE

Pyrgus was finding it difficult to believe what he was seeing.

Close on a thousand faeries had poured into the forest clearing and more were joining them at every minute. They seemed to be emerging out of the very trees, as Pyrgus himself had emerged from a tree only moments before, along with Nymph and others on the transporter. The spells that allowed them to do so had to be related to the portal technology that translated you to another dimension, but he'd never seen anything like this before. The thing was, you didn't translate to another dimension. You went into a hollow shaft in the tree. At least that's what he'd done. But to do that, you passed through the solid trunk of the tree itself. Which was some spell. He'd never even heard of a Halek wizard who could do it. He wondered how the Forest Faerie managed it.

An errant thought occurred to him. With a spell like that, no castle was safe. You could take an army right through its walls.

The Forest Faerie were organising themselves in ranks even though not all of them were wearing the green military uniform. Perhaps the rest were off-duty soldiers, or perhaps they were just naturally disciplined. He looked round for Nymph to ask her, but she was nowhere in sight now. Nor was Madame Cardui. He felt a flash of embarrassment at his attempt to strangle her.