Hilda - The Challenge (38 page)

"I am not listening to you, you are not a
magical person," the cook retorted. "One magical person can sense
the magic in another, and there is nothing around you. It's the
witch that does all the work."

"Oh, really," William said. "Well, it looks
as if you saw through our little ploy. Too bad in a way, but we got
you anyway. " He turned to the fire with the floating pot again,
shielding his front from Bilgar. He popped up his wand and
whispered something. Hilda sensed what he was doing.

A shadowy shape of impressive size moved
along the camp, just outside the reach of the light that the fire
cast. A grumbling sound reached the three people that sat near the
fire.

"What was that?" Bilgar asked, nervously
looking at the disappearing shape, the grumble also fading.

"Oh, probably one of the beasts that roam
around here. No problem as long as we keep the fire burning, they
don't like fire," Hilda pitched in.

"Remarkable that this one even came so
close," said William as he handed a plate of food to Bilgar and
then one to Hilda.

The cook stared at the small mound on the
plate. "What is this?"

William grinned. "Well, since it has no
proper name, we'll call it food."

Hilda was already shovelling it inside her,
and said she liked it.

Bilgar, clearly used to more refined dishes,
ate it as if there were sharp sticks in it, but he did finish what
he had been given.

William leaned back to the fire, to add some
wood to it and made another shadow roam around their small circle.
Bilgar stared at the shape. This time it was less big, William had
made a lion, including the growl.

Hilda and William lay down to rest.

"But what about the fire?", Bilgar asked.
"What if it goes out? Won't the animals then come closer?"

"Yes, there's a chance of that," Hilda
agreed, "maybe one of us wakes up and puts more wood on the fire.
Can't promise that it's me, I am really tired." She snuggled up to
William. "Oh, Bilgar? I put a nice little spell on the brooms for
tonight. If you want to try and fly off, do warn me. I really want
to see you try. Sleep well." The sound of a hyena-like animal came
from afar.

Bilgar lay down, close to the fire and the
stack of wood Hilda had inflated from the luggage they carried. The
sound spooked him.

The next morning, Hilda woke up William by
gently shaking him. As he came around, Hilda pointed to Bilgar who
was still with them. The cook was sleeping, in a sitting position,
a piece of wood in his hand. The fire was still burning, the stack
of wood almost depleted.

"That last howl you made last night really
frightened him," the wicked witch whispered in William's ear.

"That I made? I thought you did that," he
whispered back, confusion on his brow.

"I didn't." Hilda sat up and looked around
while worry wandered within her.

The environment however was peaceful, quiet,
serene even. They had landed on a high mountain. The view was
stunning: to the north there were giant forests, with enormous
trees, brown and red. To the south lay a great plain with several
settlements, dark brown blots in a sandy painting of many shades of
yellow. To the west, where they had come from, the grass-covered
mountains continued their rising and falling, while to the east the
land of king Walt was waiting for them. It was also the direction
that presented most danger to them. The trip down here had not been
too bad, but now the brooms were stuck together and they had a
passneger, although the two were quite certain that Bilgar would
not give them a lot of problems.

Hilda made some food and tea while William
woke up the sleeping cook. "Bilgar, food. We're leaving soon.

"What? We're still alive? Good!" The hostage
told William he had stayed awake through most of the night, feeding
the fire so the animals would not be feeding on them.

"Good show, Bilgar. Here's your breakfast. No
delaying, we're about to go up and away."

Soon they were indeed up and away. Bilgar had
insisted on being tied to the broomaran. The first leg of the trip
went without many incidents as it was still nice and early and not
many guards were on their stations yet, or so it looked. After
about half an hour though, William saw the first small tree being
shot at them. Good thing about this one was that it was aimed
poorly, even Hilda was ashamed of it.

"There is no challenge in avoiding something
like that," she muttered.

"What's going on?", asked Bilgar who was
trying to see what was going on.

"Shut up," the other two told him. More
humongous arrows were coming at them, and those were aimed much
better so they needed all their attention to stay clear of the
large objects.

"Come on, tell me what happens!", Bilgar
demanded, making wild movements. For some reason he was keen on
watching impending doom come closer. It also meant that Hilda and
William had loads of problems keeping the brooms with the added
wood in a stable flightpath.

This time the link from Willaim to Hilda came
in handy as it had never done before. The wicked witched nodded,
said: "I got us", and then William let go of his broomstick and
whacked Bilgar into oblivion.

Shaking his hand, he said: "Damn, cooks have
hard heads." Then he was back in the race of avoiding the big
arrows.

Some of the moves they had to make with their
broomaran were so violent that the wood that held Bilgar complained
loudly. At one time a ominous cracking sound made the both of them
swallow.

"This is not good," said Hilda, "this is very
much not good."

Somehow they managed to make it to the
kingdom of Lorn without being shot down, and there they could
breathe easy again.

"Want to stop and chill for a moment?",
William asked Hilda.

"Yes, a stop would be a good plan, although I
can't understand why we would call up a cold wind. I'm not that
hot, you know."

"Okay, I'll explain that later. Let's find us
a nice place to touch down."

Ironically enough, the place where they
landed their broomaran was near a family of shepherds who looked at
the strange construction touching down. The shepherds came closer,
to have a look.

William whopped Bilgar another one, to make
sure the cook would remain unconscious during their time on the
ground.

"Good day," said the woman that was in the
small group of shepherds that approached them. "We hope you can
forgive our curiosity, but we have never seen a flying arrangement
like yours before. Will you accept some water, and bread and
cheese?"

Both Hilda and William were grateful with the
simple food. It tasted great, and with Bilgar enjoying small stars
or so, there also was not commenting on it.

The shpeherds saw the unconscious cook
strapped to the boards, but did not dare ask the reason for this
awkward way of transportation. After all, these were magical
people, and they had their own rules and standards for doing
things.

As they were getting ready to fly on, William
had the feeling he should pay the shepherds some money, if only one
silver piece. Hilda picked his intention up and said: "We thank you
for your hospitality."

The shepherds smiled. "It is always our
pleasure to share what we have. We wish you a good day."

"Thank you. You too," said Hilda, wiggling
her eyebrows at William who understood. No paying. It would be
offending to the nice people.

The magical couple lifted off again, Bilgar
still in the land of sorcery dreams. The passage over the kingdom
of Lorn was calm and quiet, the red soil and trees a welcome sight
and a promise that they would be home soon.

Bilgar had regained his awareness again and
was complaining about a sore back, sore arms and sore legs. On
William's friendly request if he should put him out of his misery
once again, the captured cook responded with a growl and remained
silent. Hilda sensed that the man applied some magic to make his
stay on the wooden board a bit more comfortable, which was fine
with her.

After landing the broomaran, they untied
Bilgar. As the cook rubbed his wrists, he looked around. "So this
is where you live. Very nice area. Bit quiet though, I guess."

William undid the excess boards from their
brooms and Hilda removed the chains from the house.

The house let out a sigh of relief. "You
really took your time, didn't you?"

"Oh, how cute, an ancient talking house!",
exclaimed Bilgar.

"Who's this?" The house was not eager to
allow entrance to someone that called it 'cute'. After all,
standing came with age.

"This is in some weird way family of
Lamador," said Hilda.

Bilgar frowned as he heard that. "Who told
you that? And I was family. His niece divorced me."

"Good for her," said Hilda.

"That is a nasty remark, witch," said
Bilgar.

"I know. But I'm good at that. So now off
with you." She shoo'ed him away with her hand.

"What?" Bilgar stared at her, then at
William, not understanding a thing.

Go. Leave. Go home to Heraldion, or wherever
you want to go. Oh, here, you may need this." Hilda took his large
wand from her pocket. She waved her own over it a few times, then
handed it back. "It won't be any good for big magic for a week, but
at least you have your big wand again." She had a big smile on her
face as she talked, making William grin.

"Do you know what the punishment is for
magical castration?", Bilgar said as he stared at his wand that was
rendered mostly inoperative.

"Do you think we care?", asked William who
stepped in front of the angry cook sorcerer.

William was a lot taller and wider than the
cook. "What we care about is the way your big sorcerer is abducting
witches from this country. And if he thinks he is the only one who
can do that - well, I think we have just proven that we can take
people away also. And we hit home, on the side of his family.
Divorced or not. Now you go away, unharmed. Contrary to what your
big Lamador does to the less powerful witches he kidnaps."

Bilgar put his fists in his sides. "The Great
Lamador would never do something like that! I know him."

"Sure," said Hilda, "you know his nice side,
since he does not want to get into trouble with his family. We know
of at least three witches he took away. We don't know what became
of them so we fear the worst."

"How can you know they did not leave by
themselves?", Bilgar demanded to know, his in-law family pride
taking the lead.

"We found a Grizble at one of the places. A
young witch did not return home after an evening with friends. One
was taken from her home with force, the house shows that. Signs of
voluntary leave, right?"

"I don't believe that." Bilgar looked angry
at the accusation, even if it did not involve him directly.

"Believe whatever you like. But now you are
free to go home. Heraldion is that way, I suggest you first head to
the village and find a place to sleep. Perhaps there is someone who
can take you along on a cart tomorrow," said Hilda.

Bilgar was close to fuming. "You take me from
my kitchen, knock me out, tie me to a piece of wood and drag me
over 3 countries to send me home after this? Are you insane?"

"As I already said, I am local," said Hilda,
"and William here is the insane one. But he is very good at it. So
now you know it all. This is all you will get to hear, and
therefore I advise you to walk to the village quickly because the
darkness here falls fast and we are not going to tell you what
scary animals live in the forests here."

William put an arm around Hilda's shoulders,
and standing together like that they saw the dismayed sorcerer walk
off.

"Bilgar? The village is that way," Hilda
corrected the man, who looked back in anger where she was pointing
and then changed course.

"Are there scary animals in the forest?",
William asked.

"No." She chuckled, turned around and they
went inside, their brooms following them.

When the door had closed, Hilda wrapped
herself around William and rested her head against his shoulder.
"You are really insane, William. And what worries me is that I like
it. We dragged that man over three countries just to let him go
again. And it was fun, despite the Ringeholm soldiers shooting at
us. And the crappy place to sleep."

They went to get some food from the kitchen
and turned in early. Eventually, they slept...

With the remains of breakfast still on the
table, William studied the original challenge Hilda had received.
"I'm not going to use that style of handwriting," he declared. "My
own paw will have to do, and otherwise he'll have to hire a
specialist."

"That's fine, William. He'll be able to read
it." Hilda stared at the tip of the quil as William was writing on
the piece of paper that lay in front of him. It was obvious that he
was not used to writing this way, she grinned, but he gave it his
best. He had messed up several bits of paper already, to get the
hang of it, and now the writing was for real.

As he finished, he blew over the still wet
ink and handed the paper to Hilda. "That should be it. What do you
think?"

Hilda looked at the paper. "To the sorceror
Lamador," she read out loud. "Shouldn't that be Great
Sorcerer?"

"No way," replied William, "this way we tell
him without words that we don't find him so great."

"Oh. Right." Hilda looked at the paper again.
"Through this official note I challenge you to a duel on the next
dark moon, in the forest where the witch Baba Yaga lives. You are
free to bring an aid with you. The challenge is for points, not for
lives. Signed, nothing."

With a frown she took the quil and signed her
name under it. Then she looked at William. "Why do I have the
feeling that I have just signed my own death cerfiticate?"