Chapter 54: Through the Fairy Gate
In Which Lord Melchior’s patience is sorely tried
Like many old English castles, stately or otherwise, Castle Redemption was a hodge-podge of architectural styles. It had been built, demolished, neglected, rebuilt, re-purposed and re-imagined numerous times. The Old Castle had been built back in the 12th Century as a fortification of the Benedictine monastery attached to the Shrine of the Holy Redemption, located at the crown of Togwogmagog Tor, some centuries earlier. For the most part, the castle remained in the hands of the Benedictines and treated like an annex to the abbey, until Henry VIII seized the monasteries and booted out all the monks. Henry set about to build a new castle on the site of the old, incorporating what was left of the original into a larger, more impressive building.
The Main Gate of the New Castle was an imposing thing: high-arched and wide enough to accommodate two tour busses side by side, set between sturdy guard towers with an iron portcullis and a largely ornamental drawbridge.
The Council never used the Main Gate.
On one side of the Castle, screened by a discreet line of hedges, stood a section of the original Old Wall that had been incorporated into the New. There had originally been a doorway in the middle of the section as part of a guardhouse, but it stood in an inconvenient spot relative to the rest of the castle, and so Henry's architect had it walled up. Perhaps on a whim, or perhaps for aesthetic reasons, the builder added a new door-frame to the blocked entrance, complete with ornate carvings over the lintel. The tour guides called it “The Fairy Gate” and invented a silly legend to go with it, and tourists liked to have their picture taken in front of it.
“The Fairy Gate?” Inanna said with an incredulous glance as Strephon led them to the doorway.
“Well, it is a gate,” Strephon said, “but as it is sealed up it cannot be used by mortals or anyone with a physical body. So obviously it must be intended for beings who can become immaterial.”
“Obviously,” Inanna smiled.
“An earlier age which still believed in faeries and knew better than to mock them might have called it a 'Soul Gate', or a 'Spirit Gate', but the Elizabethans – at least those in the upper classes – regarded fairies as quaint peasant superstitions and therefore felt free to borrow them for their own courtly entertainments.”
“Mortals do love their cultural appropriation,” Melchior chucked. A fine remark from someone dressed as the Duke of Buckingham, Strephon thought, but he kept the thought to himself. “Still,” Melchior continued, “I wish you had mentioned this earlier. I would have included it in the speech I'm giving to the Council. No matter. There's still time to work it in.”
On either side of the Gate stood two men in the gaudy livery of the Castle’s Yeoman Warders: a bright red woolen surcoat with the City Coat of Arms embroidered in front, with gartered stockings and knee-breeches. The outfits were supposed to look medieval and to evoke the Beefeaters of the Tower of London. They certainly did the latter, and succeeded in the former well enough to please the tourists. One of the warders was Thaddeus Simms, Tobias's father and the Hidden Council's Sergeant-at-arms. Befitting his rank, his livery bore extra gold stripes on its sleeves, an iron ring holding several large and ornate keys hanging from his belt, and a ruff around his throat at least half an inch wider in diameter than that of his subaltern. Strephon mused, not for the first time, that in his day the sight of a black man dressed as a figure from the label of a gin bottle would have seemed comical, like something out of Punch – and with a twinge of guilt he had to admit that he would once have thought the same. Of course, that would have been before he had become friends with the Simms family and gotten to know and respect them. And, to be fair, the wig and robes he wore at the Bar as a barrister and on the Bench as a judge were hardly less comical.
Thaddeus carried the pseudo-Tudor attire with dignity and gravity. The pageantry of the outfit was part of the job, and as the first black man to be appointed as a Yeoman Warder of the Castle, let alone Sergeant-at-arms, he treated the position with an enormous amount of respect. The ornate, gilded mace he carried helped. It was the symbol of his office and was mounted at the end of a five-foot shaft – more of a staff than a mace. Its sheer size lent him an aura of authority and, like his son, he had the size and strength to wield it.
He was not, however, too dignified to smile when Strephon approached. “Good e’en, Mister Bellman,” he said, “It's good to see you.” He then added in a formal tone of voice: “Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel.”
“You should know better than to try and stump me with Shakespeare,” Strephon laughed. “Polonius to Laertes; Hamlet, Act One; Scene... Three, I believe. Now, let me see... How's this? Let us have wine and women, mirth and laughter, Sermons and soda-water the day after.”
Thaddeus pondered. “Byron...? Yes, Lord Byron. That would be from Don Juan.”
“Excellent!” Strephon said. Thaddeus had come to the country as a child when his family emigrated from Jamaica and had grown up surrounded by the attitude that Jamaicans were ignorant and illiterate and, worst of all, Not English – an attitude which, Strephon regretted to admit, lingered to this day. Thaddeus had worked all his life to overcome this stereotype, and, although mostly self-educated, he was probably as well-read and familiar with the canon of English Literature as some professors Strephon had known in school. Thaddeus was proud of his knowledge and enjoyed matching wits with Strephon, challenging him with literary quotations: a game which Strephon enjoyed as well.
“I haven't seen you in a while,” Thaddeus said. “Where have you been hiding?”
“Oh, just pottering around the house, mostly. And how are you, Thaddeus?”
“Tolerably well.”
“And your dear wife?
“Ariadne's fine too. She was just asking after you the other day, wondering when you'd be coming over for dinner again. Oh, and Theophilus and Melissa are expecting.”
“Are they? Congratulations! So, Tobias is going to be an uncle! That’s splendid!” Theophilus was Thaddeus's eldest son, and Tobias's brother. “By the by, Tobias is coming to the meeting too. He should be along, just as soon as he parks his cab.”
“Is he now? It's about time that boy started taking an interest in civic affairs.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Strephon noticed an impatient scowl on Melchior's face. “I beg your pardon,” Strephon said. “How thoughtless of me! Thaddeus, let me introduce Mister Dusk, Lord Melchior; and his assistant Miss Inanna. Melchior, this is Thaddeus Simms, a Yeoman of the Castle and the Council's Sergeant-at-arms.”
“We are honored by your presence, your Lordship.” Thaddeus bowed. Melchior must have deemed it adequate because he graciously extended his hand.
“If we shadows have offended, think but this and all is mended,” Melchior quoted, not wishing to be outdone by Strephon. “That you have but slumbered here, while these visions did appear.”
Thaddeus shook his hand politely and continued the quote: “And this weak and idle theme, no more yielding than a dream. I'm not surprised that a gentleman of your kind would be familiar with A Midsummer Night's Dream. Welcome to our city.”
Melchior’s scowl returned. Apparently he had expected to cow the man with a demonstration of cultural superiority, but it didn't work.
“I understand you are presenting a petition before the Council. I hope it goes well for you,” Thaddeus said. “Just one thing, though. I wish no offense, but I must inform you that under the Rules of the Council, weapons are not permitted in the Council Chambers during meetings. I am going to have to ask you to relinquish your sword for the time being.” He extended his own hand.
Melchior gripped the hilt of the rapier at his side and for a moment Strephon thought he might strike Thaddeus. Then he relaxed, unbuckled his scabbard, and handed it over to Thaddeus, who gave it to the other warder for safe keeping. He did the same with a dagger on his belt.
“And you, Milady?” Thaddeus turned to Inanna. She relinquished a slim, lady-like poniard of her own, as well as one of the rings on her fingers. Strephon wondered about that. Did it contain a poisoned needle, or was it enchanted with some kind of offensive spell? Inanna did not say, and the enigmatic smile she gave him suggested she preferred to leave him guessing.
Then Thaddeus turned to Strephon. “Your canes, if I may?” he said.
“My what?” Strephon drew one of his crutches from the back of his chair and held it protectively. “I need these. In case I have to hobble about, you know.”
“You won't need 'em. The Council Chambers are fully handicapped-accessible. Government regulations, you know. Besides, The staff in the hands of a wizard may be more than a prop for age.”
That sounded like another quote, but Strephon could not place it. “I beg your pardon?”
“Lord of the Rings. J.R.R. Tolkien. Surely you know Tolkien. It was even in the movie.”
Mention of movies always irked Strephon. “Tolkien? The name does seem familiar. Is he one of the Moderns?”
“Oo... he would slap your face if he heard you call him that. Or if he didn't, C.S. Lewis would. The point is, I know you keep a couple sword blades hidden inside those canes.”
Melchior started at that, and Inanna gave Strephon a sly look of approval. Blast. Strephon would have preferred that Melchior not know about his swords. He gripped his crutch tighter.
Melchior was clearly growing tired of the delay. “What if the canes were enchanted so that the their blades could not be unsheathed? Would that be acceptable?”
Thaddeus gave him a cautious look. “It would.”
“Then I will do so.”
Thaddeus placed his hand on Melchior’s to halt him. Another impertinence, Strephon feared. “If it's all the same to you, Your Lordship, the Council's Peace is my responsibility. I would prefer to do it myself.”
He unsnapped a pouch on his belt and withdrew a second key ring, this one bearing a set of magic charms, the handiwork of Grandma Simms. He selected one, passed it over Strephon's crutches and uttered a few syllables of a language Strephon did not know, but which he recognized. Tobias had a similar charm which he used to lock his cab when he had to leave it to help Strephon with his chair. Strephon could feel the almost-audible 'click' as the charm's magic locked the release for the crutch's sword.
This was a shrewd move, Strephon realized. Although not unbreakable, the charm's spell would be difficult to undo without effort, and anyone nearby with any magical awareness at all would know he was breaking the Council's Peace before he could do anything; whereas any spell cast on the crutches by Melchior could be removed just as easily by him without anybody noticing.
“There you are,” Thaddeus said when the procedure was finished. “All ready to go.” His assistant by this time had made out receipts for the other items, which Thaddeus passed on to Melchior. “You may reclaim your weapons after the meeting. And I'll have my Warders direct Tobias to your seats when he arrives.”
He took a step back, and then, facing the “Fairy Gate”, tapped the plastered over portal three times with his mace and uttered a phrase of Latin: “Quod est impassiblile, aperi.” The stonework sealing the doorway shimmered and seemed to dissolve, revealing a dark passageway beyond.
“Enjoy your evening.”
NEXT Meeting and Mingling