There Are No Children In The Castle Read online

daughter-in-law, even though she had less reason to do so. But it had been Demelza who had spoken to the ogre, convinced it she was her own daughter, Demelza who had stepped out into that moonlit garden, humming that tune, while her soldiers waited within for her signal. And all so the local villagers would have a tale to tell – a tale that would spread far and wide and could be later used to persuade a man such as he to make an end to the creature.

  Of course he could not say this to the old queen. He would not be allowed leave the castle alive. What if her son learnt the truth?

  “Your majesty, the evidence is scanty at best –”

  “Evidence?” the old queen spat the word, sitting forward in her throne, clutching those armrests so tightly now the network of blue veins on the back of each gnarled hand leapt into high relief, her eyes blazing. “That fiend tries to eat a child and you talk about evidence?”

  And now her chamberlain – a stringy old man with a beard trailing down to his ancient knees – was shaking his head in disgust. “It seems your majesty that there are some who would let the ogre roam where it wills, some who would let it devour any child it finds in its path! Shame on them I say!”

  There was no child. It was on the tip of his tongue to say as much, but he knew better. His life was forfeit if he did.

  And now one of the ladies-in-waiting was studying him, a sour smirk on her aged face. “Maybe it is my imagination, your majesty, but does not yon youth not have a somewhat ogreish caste to his countenance?”

  He felt his heart start to race. All his life he had prepared to be a hero, but nothing had prepared him for this.

  “Yes, yes,” the queen nodded. “I see it now. There is ogre somewhere in your ancestry, sir. Ogre blood runs in your veins. That is why you seek to defend it. You and it share the same appetites. Tell me – do you ever dream at night, boy? Dream of dismembering and devouring some small child mayhap?”

  *

  Many years later, older and wiser, often sitting in a bar after the completion of some successful campaign and surrounded by fellow soldiers, Cedric would describe how he had turned and fled – or rather stumbled out of that keep as quickly as his heavy armor would let him – and how he had not breathed easily until he was back on his horse again and many, many miles away.

  He was famous by then, as much for his ability to see to the heart of a situation and for a certain low cunning as he was for his bravery. The story would always end the same way. Cedric would look around his listeners with a twinkle in his eye. “So what’s the moral of my tale? That discretion is the better part of valor? Aye. Sometimes it’s best to show a clean pair of heels! But I think the most important lesson” (and here he would hold up one callused finger) “the most important lesson I extracted from the whole experience is: never make assumptions.”

  “As to who is the villain of the piece and who the victim?” somebody would tentatively suggest.

  “That,” Cedric would agree. “And something else besides.”

  So saying he would toss a small, tattered volume onto the counter. Inevitably one curious soul would pick it up and open it. The legend on the title page – in thick, ogreish script – ran:

  OSTEOCLASTIC ODES.

  In response to his legions of admirers

  And in honor of both their majesties,

  Laureate

  SIR SITRIC GRUNDHAMMER

  Is happy to proffer up his latest volume of poetry.

  Cedric would watch the book being passed from hand to hand, take another swig from his ale and grin.

  “Aye, lads! Never make assumptions! About who is the villain, who the victim. Or about the poetry of ogres! There are some who find it to their tastes – chiefly other ogres!”