Many people had taken a day off work to come and view the contest, and the road leading towards the medieval bridge now resembled something more akin to a fairground. There were barbecues selling roadkill pizzas[37] and camel’s ears in a bun,[38] and traders selling merchandise such as hats, King Snodd action figures that threatened to execute you when you pulled a string, and T-shirts with unfunny slogans like: ‘My dad went to a magic contest and all I got in our damp hovel was bronchitis’. There were tents with Travelling Knee Replacement Surgeons, sideshows where you could gawk at ‘Gordon, the amazing two-headed boy’ and other ‘Quirks of Nature’. There was also a tent where you could pay half a moolah to view parts of a Troll pickled in a large jar.
‘Do you have a half-moolah coin?’ asked Tiger.
‘Don’t even think about it.’
As we moved closer to the bridge we could already see the flag-wavers, jugglers, tumblers and ventriloquists performing to entertain the crowds until the warm-up act started, and we overheard in passing that the half-time bear-debating event was cancelled as the bear had come over all mellow and wasn’t up for an argument.
‘They’ve got a replacement,’ said someone close by. ‘Jimmy Nuttjob will be setting himself on fire and then be fired high above the rooftops from an air cannon while yelling “God Save the King”.’
‘Probably hoping for a knighthood,’ said his friend.
‘Definitely – but there must be easier ways to do it,’ replied the first man.
We worked our way to the front, where the barriers had been erected to keep the crowds from any passive spelling, and Tiger and I showed our IDs to the police on duty. We were permitted to pass, and moved towards a small gaggle of people standing right on the edge of the bridge’s north abutment, close to where the royal observation box had been built.
‘Ah!’ said Blix. ‘The defenders approach.’
He was standing with the rest of iMagic’s staff: a weaselly character in ill-fitting clothes named Tchango Muttney, the well-dressed Dame Corby, who wore far more jewellery than was good for her, and Samantha Flynt, who was fantastically pretty, but not that bright. I knew this because she had put her pretty floral dress on back to front. Perkins, I noticed, was not with them, but Colonel Bloch-Draine was, and he nodded a gruff greeting in my direction.
‘No sorcerers to help you?’ asked Blix sarcastically.
‘Won’t be much of a contest, will it?’ I said.
‘On the contrary,’ replied Lord Tenbury, who was hovering close at hand, ‘the best contest requires only a winner – not necessarily any competition.’
‘And how do you think the crowd will react when they find that the potential winner has no opposition?’
‘The people will not riot,’ said Tenbury confidently. ‘After all, a one-sided contest should be cosily familiar to any resident who has ever voted in a Kingdom of Snodd election.’[39]
We stopped talking because a colourful parade was approaching from down the street. There was a shiny brass band, several horsemen, and a retinue of hangers-on before the Royal Family arrived in a gilded open-top carriage. Everyone, including me, knelt before our monarch as the carriage stopped and a handy duke offered himself to be used as a step. The King and Queen were accompanied by the two Spoilt Royal Children, His Royal Petulantness the Crown Prince Steve, who was twelve, and Her Royal Odiousness Princess Shazza, who was fifteen. As their accolades suggested, they were horribly spoiled and spent much of their time stamping their feet and wanting things. No governess ever lasted longer than twenty-six and three-quarter minutes.
As soon as they had descended from the carriage, a deafening alarum sounded from thirty buglers all dressed traditionally as badgers, and the royal family walked slowly up to where we stood, waving at the citizenry while one of their footmen tossed coin vouchers into the crowd. They used to throw coins until the King discovered that his ungrateful subjects were spending the cash in non-Snodd-owned shops. The ‘Alms Vouchers’ are redeemable only in Snoddco’s, the well-known and wholly substandard superstore.
‘Ah!’ said the King. ‘Lord Tenbury and our Court Mystician. Good to see you both. I trust we are to see some sport this morning, hmm? Brave of you to turn up, Miss Strange.’
Since we had been spoken to, protocol dictated we could now stand. I couldn’t help noticing that Queen Mimosa was looking around for something. I took a deep breath.
‘I would be failing in my duty,’ I said nervously, ‘if I did not lodge a formal complaint over the fairness of this contest.’
‘Your displeasure is noted, Miss Strange,’ said the King. ‘We will glance at your complaint some time next year. Shall we proceed?’
‘Not yet,’ said the Queen, staring at me. ‘Are you Jennifer Strange?’
‘A foundling, my dear,’ said the King in an unsubtle aside, ‘unsuitable for a queen’s conversation.’
‘Shut up, Frank. Miss Strange, where is the Kazam team?’
There was a deathly hush.
‘Let us take our seats, my dear,’ said the King, ‘I feel the—’
‘Your team, Miss Strange?’
‘In prison, Your Majesty,’ I said, curtsying, ‘awaiting a hearing on Monday.’
‘I see.’
Queen Mimosa glared at the King, who seemed to shrink under her withering look.
‘Are you meaning to tell me that you have imprisoned the entire Kazam team in order to guarantee a victory?’
‘Not at all,’ said the King, ‘it was entirely coincidental. They were all brigands and villains and scallywags and lawbreakers. Is that not so, Court Mystician?’
‘Up to a point, Majesty, yes, I think we are agreed on that.’
‘One of their number attacked the castle last night,’ added Lord Tenbury, ‘and caused considerable damage to the palace.’
‘Poppycock,’ said Queen Mimosa. ‘I saw the whole thing. A single unarmed carpet rescued someone from the High North Tower. Any damage was done by your own gunners.’
‘And they will be roundly punished, along with the sorcerers we have in custody. I think I have shown considerable restraint – I could have put them all to death, but instead I showed mercy – like you tell me to, pumpkin.’
‘The charges are quite serious, my Queen,’ said Tenbury, but Queen Mimosa raised a finger and he stopped. I noticed, too, that all the courtiers and hangers-on had taken a pace backwards and were finding something else to do. Queen Mimosa moved closer to her husband and lowered her voice.
‘Listen here, you inbred, pompous little twit,’ she said. ‘I didn’t arrange with Mother Zenobia to have the bridge rebuilt in aid of the Troll War Widows’ Fund to have you hijack it for your own money-grabbing agenda. Release the Kazam sorcerers immediately, or I will make life so unpleasant that you will wish to have been born a foundling.’
‘We will discuss this later, my dear.’
‘We are discussing it now,’ she said with a look of thunder that would have impressed Lady Mawgon, ‘and do you doubt for even one second that I would not do as I say?’
The King took a deep breath and puffed out his cheeks. He looked around at the ten thousand or so subjects who were eagerly awaiting the start of the contest. It looked to me as though the King knew only too well that Queen Mimosa could make his life very unpleasant indeed.
37
A Snodd delicacy often served at open-air gatherings. Real ‘roadkill pizza’ these days is rare as demand far outstrips supply, but the alternative is still baked in the traditional way – on asphalt under a sunlamp.
38
These actually are camel’s ears. They are considered an ‘acquired taste’, which is shorthand for ‘extremely nasty’.
39
Elections are neither free nor fair in the Kingdom of Snodd. In fact, there is only a yes box to tick against the only two questions: Do you feel King Snodd is doing a swell job? and: Would you like him to continue to do so? Any ballot papers not having both boxes ticked are destroyed as ‘spoiled’.