The End?

Toby dealt with her ox in a secluded corner of the Spa grounds, transferring it from external to internal space with gusto and dispatch.

No one at table had much appetite for dinner. The absence of Uncle Ernie and Minsky weighed heavily upon them. A place had been set for Uncle Ernie. When Bunnysweet realized that he would not be joining them she offered to clear it, but Lilly demurred. She set the Ring on his plate. “What shall we do with it? Give it back to Toby’s Grandmamma?”

“That’s probably best, it’s the sort of thing that could cause trouble in my royal relatives hands,” the Queen agreed. “Toby can take it the next time she visits.”

“Could we have explanations now, Mamma?” Rose asked.

“You’ve probably figured out most of it already,” the Queen told her.

“I don’t think so,” said Rose. "It’s only been a week since the spells were broken. I’m going to need time and practice to get away from the habit of being stupid.”

“I think you are already well on your way,” said the Queen. “When we first talked about the fairy spells, I said that most spells lapse when the person who cast them dies. You almost guessed then, that Aunt Nellie had to have been in Briar Castle for the sleep spell to hold. But there has been so much to do and think about that you didn’t go back to it. Now we go back

“She was in the Castle. But where was she, or more to the point, who was she? It wasn’t hard to arrange. We didn’t have to find a new way to hide her after your christening disaster, because she’d already been hidden in the Castle for most of her life.

“The old librarian, old when Nell was young, was a cousin to Nell’s grandmother. He met young Nell when she was a child visiting her grandmother. He told her stories, and read her stories out of books. She was fascinated. She decided that she wanted to be a librarian, the next Briar librarian after him. You know that in those days trades were passed on from father to son. The old librarian had no sons; the old seneschal knew it. But one day he brought a likely young lad with him to the Castle, and introduced him as his grandson, ‘Ernie’. ‘Ernie’ was Nell with her hair cut short, dressed up in her brother’s trousers and shirt.

“Nell loved the library, and learned everything the old librarian could teach her. But she also loved the world outside the Castle. Nobody in the Castle used the library much, so they didn’t miss her when she wasn’t there. It came to be accepted that ‘Ernie’ would be there one month and gone the next. Out in the world, Nell began to have a reputation as a wise woman, and as a traveller. She’d be home about half the year. If you waited she’d eventually come back, her hair tied up in its usual kerchief..

“When you were three years old, Rose, we had a shock. The seneschal decided that Ernie was too old to be the Royal Librarian – actually he wanted the salary, pittance as it was, for his wife’s nephew. Well, the staff loved ‘Uncle Ernie’, and they had a soft spot in their hearts for me by then too, so they helped us. There had always been haphazard provision for ‘pensioners’, favoured staff members who were allowed to stay on in Briar even after they were incapacitated or too old to work. Over a few years they became ‘the Queen’s pensioners’, and we fixed things up for them. And one of the couples who lived among the pensioners was Ernie and Lilly.”

“I thought you were married,” Rose said to Lilly.

“We were,” said Lilly. “It would have been 50 years next summer solstice. She was older than me, of course, and wanted to tell me that I should find someone my own age. But I loved her from the day we met; it just took time to persuade her it would be okay. I was only sad when I thought that she might . . . might die and leave me behind.” She paused to try to regain control of her voice. “I think I’d better go to my room now.”

Bunnysweet said, “Let me go with you, and be sure you have everything you need. A soothing drink, perhaps? The nightingales will sing softly outside your window.”

“One other question,” said Rose, “How did Minsky get into Lilly’s pocket?”

“Walked across the floor, I suppose,” McLaren said. “We didn’t pay attention to him after he put the Ring in the Shell. Then climbed up her gown; when she was old it reached the floor.”

“But how did he get Lilly to give him to Nell, and for that matter, why did Nell take him?”

No one answered. Finally the Queen said, “He was very good at getting you all to take him where he wanted to go, and to do what he wanted done.”

* * *

Next morning at breakfast, Nell and Lilly came down hand in hand. When the general jubilation and embracing had subsided, Rose demanded an explanation.

“I haven’t completely figured it out myself,” said Nell. “Yes, thanks, I’d love another cup of chocolate.”

“I don’t know what our leaving looked like to you, but for me it wasn’t really scary, just lonely and sad because I thought I was leaving you all. The Shell felt very secure under my feet, and the cloud took on the colours of the Shell as it closed around us – no longer full of mud and grit and anger, just bright and enveloping. It seemed like a long time before we arrived at the Palace of the Time-gods, and when we got there it was even more confusing. I don’t think I actually saw them, but I did meet some of them. There were very old and very young ones, fast ones and slow ones, and tangled ones that our guide told us were the Future of the Past, the Past of the Future, the Impossible Past of the Probable Future, and other beings like that.

“After a bit they told us that we would meet the most revered among them, Zervan Akarena itself, the God of Infinite Time. Since its true form contains us and the multiverse, we speculated that “meeting” must be a different concept in the Palace of the Time-gods than our getting-to-know-you rituals in Über Celestia. But finally we were brought into the presence of an avatar of the Revered One. It met us in the form of a marsh-rat.

“It had a conversation with Minsky, in Marsh-raddish, which I don't understand. I could see that they were discussing something, coming to an agreement, and shaking paws on it. Then it turned to include both of us, started speaking Briarish, and thanked us for bringing the Shell. In return, it told us, our petition had been granted. The loose anchor had been repaired, and the rent in our time had been mended.

“Then it asked me what I would like to do, where and when I would like to go. I thought of the many mysteries I had encountered as a scholar. I could ask to be there when our kind learned to speak, when we invented the wheel, or the bone needle. I could ask to meet Sulieman the Magnificent, or Merlin, or Hammurabi. I could even visit the distant future, when knowledge has increased so that we are as learned as dragons!

“Visions of these, and even more exotic possibilities opened before me, and so I said, ‘Put me down beside Lilly as soon as may be, so she will not spend another night grieving for me.’ And here I am! Lilly tells me it was just last night I stepped onto the Shell – it felt as though it was weeks ago.”

“And Minsky?” asked McLaren.

“It seems that the Time-gods were in need of a Hero,” Nell replied. “He stayed to help them combat an invasion of dust-mite-nots that were carried there by the time-storm. The mite-nots are attacking the before-dams in the Time-marsh, and threatening to make a complete muddle. He said he would come visit when he has fixed it all up. He gave me a special message for Great-Aunt Tatiana.”

* * *

“Impressive, no?” said Great-Aunt Tatiana.

“Indeed,” said the Queen, “and very fitting. Such a good idea to carve the inscription into that huge granite outcrop. And here at the edge of the Marsh everyone sees it – travellers on the main road, villagers, marsh-dwellers.”

“Dragon carved it, dragon toenail almost as sharp as dragon lawyer,” said Great-Aunt Tatiana. “Dragon going to read.”

Toby summoned her best case-winning tones, adjusted louder for the open-air ceremony, and read:

Great-Aunt Tatiana wiped away a tear. “Great Prince, sweet fellow. Too bad kits maybe not going to know Pappa.”

“Kits?” asked the Queen. “Lovely!”

“Da, in three months, ” said Great-Aunt Tatiana.

“Ah, congratulations, and ah, good wishes,” said Rose. “But I thought you were his aunt?”

“Great^15th Aunt is not close relative. Think, Princess. We marsh-rats more careful than you royals.”

“Quite right, Tatiana,” said the Queen. “Have you spoken with Nell? She was looking for you, earlier.”

When they were alone for a moment, Rose asked, “Mamma, is it true, what it says on the monument? That it was Minsky who saved our worlds?”

The Queen replied, “Who knows?”