The Warlock Insane
Christopher Stasheff
Chapter One
"Yeah, but you don't have to shovel it!"
"Oh, come, husband." Gwen tightened her grip on his arm, mouth pursed in amusement. " Tis beautiful by moonlight, naetheless. And thou hast no need to clear it by main force, in any event."
Rod smiled, watching the kids frolic up ahead, carefully avoiding the well-cleared road and slogging through the snowbanks, where they could get nice and wet. Geoffrey had started a snowball fight, and Magnus was retaliating with enthusiasm.
"Gregory's trying, anyway."
"He is merely distracted by watching the snowballs' trajectories, Rod, instead of their targets." The voice of the great black horse behind him sounded through the earphone implanted in his mastoid process. "He is a son to be proud of."
"Yes. He certainly is, Fess—he certainly is." Rod smiled down into Gwen's eyes, and she radiated back up at him. "They all are—each in his own way." He looked up with a sparkle of mischief in his eye. "Or hers."
Cordelia was standing by, watching her brothers with her nose in the air, pretending to be above such things— while she packed a snowball behind her back, waiting for a clear target.
The moonlight was lovely, throwing the shadow of the castle's turrets before them, glinting off the piled snow to either side of the hilly road, and frosting the village below. Not that Rod could admit that, when he was in the middle of a perfectly good banter with his wife. "But as to the shoveling—you're the one who's always saying we shouldn't use magic for daily tasks."
"Indeed we should not," Gwen said with prim rectitude. "Yet thou hast stalwart lads for the task, and thy lass…"
"Swings a mean broom, yeah. Okay, you win—I have to admit I like it. Of course, I'm still suffused with the glow, of Twelfth Night. Tuan and Catharine throw a great party!"
"They are a most excellent host and hostess, aye—the more so on a feast day."
"Feast day is right! Talk about a royal banquet. You nearly had to roll me home." Rod smiled with nostalgic fondness, remembering the goose—and the ham, and the sausages, and the trifle… "Sorry there wasn't anything for you, Fess."
"On the contrary, Rod, there was a plenitude of oats and hay—and I had to pretend to eat, to avoid making the grooms suspicious. Still, there was ample interest in observing the infinite variation in their customs."
Rod frowned. "I would have thought you knew every habit of every groom in Gramarye by now."
"Knowing is one thing. Understanding is quite another."
"Oh." Rod pushed his tongue into his cheek. "Learn anything new?"
"There were some fascinating variations on courting rituals…"
Rod grinned. "That's right, it was a holiday for them, too, wasn't it? Of course, the banquet was over four hours ago." He frowned at the thought. "Y'know, I could've sworn I'd never have an appetite again."
Gregory came charging up, eyes and cheeks aglow. "Papa, Papa! A beldame doth linger by the roadside yon, hawking hot chestnuts! May we?"
"Oh, please!" Cordelia pleaded, appearing just behind him.
"I was talking about being a mite peckish, wasn't I?" Rod fished in his purse and pulled out a copper. "Okay, kids— but save a few for us, will you?"
"Thou shalt have the half of them!" Gregory snatched the coin and shot off, Cordelia hot on his heels.
"Glad we could do something." Rod could see the old lady now, shivering by the roadside in her shawl, popping chestnuts into Cordelia's kerchief.
"Aye." Gwen snuggled closer. " 'Tis beastly to have to stand in the chill."
"Tuan and Catharine have brought prosperity to the land," Fess observed, "but they have not succeeded in eliminating poverty."
"No one else ever has, either—all they do is redefine it. But at least she has a brazier—and I must say her wares are in the proper holiday spirit…"
"Thine!" Gregory popped up in front of them again, looking like a chipmunk. Behind him, his brothers and sister were cracking shells and gobbling goodies with more verve than neatness.
"Gee, thanks." But Rod was talking to air; his youngest was already en route back to his siblings. He sighed. "Well, left holding the bag, as usual. Care for one, dear?"
"I thank thee." Gwen accepted the chestnut, broke the shell the rest of the way, and nibbled at the meat.
Rod popped the whole kernel in his mouth and chewed.
His eyes widened. "My heavens! I didn't know chestnuts could taste so good!"
"They do, in truth." Gwen's eyes lost focus. "There are spices added to this. Let me see—there's rosemary, that's for remembrance…"
"Odd combination—but very good, I have to admit." Rod swallowed and took the last chestnut. "Share?"
"Aye." Gwen dimpled. "Three for us—and how many for them?"
"Half a dozen each, at a guess. Maybe we should buy some more." Rod looked up, just in time to see the old lady kicking snow onto her fire and turning away down the hill, pot in hand. "No, I guess we got the last of them."
"She had good custom, I doubt not, with all the folk of the village coming home from the castle."
Rod nodded. "Plenty of apprentices, and a ha'penny each adds up. Glad we happened by before she folded—it lent the perfect touch to a wonderful day."
Cordelia came up to them. She glanced back at the old peasant woman's retreating back, troubled. "What emptiness is that in her eyes, Mama?"
"Ah." Gwen exchanged a look with Rod. " 'Tis only that she is very simple, child."
"Simple?" Cordelia frowned. "Like to Their Majesties' fool?"
"Oh, no!" Rod looked up, shaking his head. "That jester is a very intelligent man, dear, with a quick wit and a sense of humor that borders on genius."
"Then why," said Magnus, "do they call him a fool?"
"Because some of the things he says and does are very foolish."
"Which is to say, they are things done by a fool," Gregory protested. "What sense is there in that, Papa?"
"A rather unpleasant sense, I'm afraid," Rod answered, and Gwen said gently, "Long ago, lords did take the simpleminded and keep them by, to laugh at their clumsiness and mistakes of judgement, which did amuse their masters greatly."
"How cruel!" Cordelia exclaimed indignantly, and all three of her brothers nodded in agreement. Rod felt a glow of pride in them as he replied, "It was cruel—and I'm afraid it wasn't exclusive to kings and queens. Most people have laughed at the mentally retarded, down through the ages."
"E'en today, in a small village, thou wilt find many who do make mock of the village idiot," Gwen said softly. " Tis vile, but 'tis done."
"So maybe it's just as well that smart people who had a gift for comedy convinced the lords that they were more foolish than the fools," Rod concluded.
"Aye," Geoffrey said through his scowl. "At the least, they do it willingly."
"Yet I did hear some ladies discuss him as a 'madcap,' " Gregory said. "Do they not mean that he is maddened, in his head?"
Rod smiled, a glint in his eye. "Very good, son! Maybe that's where the term came from. But even if that was its original meaning, it's not now—today it means that the man behaves insanely." Then he frowned. "Wait a minute…"
"That he doth do and say things that make no sense," Gwen explained.
"Then one who is 'insane' is senseless?" Cordelia asked.
"Nay!" Geoffrey said. "He who is senseless hath been knocked unconscious."
"Yea and nay," Gwen said, smiling. "The term doth mean one who doth sleep so unwillingly, aye—yet it also doth speak of one who hath lost all judgement."
"Or whose judgement has become so distorted that he has become completely unpredictable," Rod added. "He's as likely to hit you as to hail you."