for a moment.
"Yes. I know. We did all we can do, I think. And we can count ourselves acquaintances of Gurthreyn."
"As if that helps," the witch snorted.
William doubted it too. The experience of meeting the magician had drifted to the back of their memories, and they both considered it a very strange kind of dream by now.
As they were getting up and ready, the sound of trumpets rang through the air.
"The king is here," said the house. "And he did not come alone."
"You don't say..." William peeked out the window. "Good grief. Looks like he brought half the country."
"Don't exag- Crap, looks like he brought half the country," Hilda said as she looked out with him.
As they were dressed already, they stepped outside. One does not keep a king waiting.
"Dear honourable witch and wizard," said King Walt from inside the carriage. "We thought it only proper to come to you on this day and inform you that we wish you all the magic you need to make this challenge a favourable one."
Before either of the two could say something, the trumpeteers blew their hearts out, and the crowd started cheering like crazy. It left the magical couple completely flabbergasted. A relatively small delegation of the enormous amount of visitors came to them, to personally wish them well. There were about ninety people in that group.
After a few hours the horde left the area again; they heard the trumpets' sound long after the group had gone.
"Shiny, wasn't it?", said Hilda.
"This was... wow." William had an arm around her shoulders. "I'd never have expected that."
"No, really. This was quite a surprise." Hilda looked up at her wizard. "My hands hurt."
William took her hands and kissed them. "Better now?"
"No, but it feels nice. Could you do that again?" Blue sparkles flew from her eyes.
With a grin, he kissed her hands again.
"Thank you. Now we should get ready to leave, sweet man."
It did not take them very long. They had been preparing for a while already, their luggage had been pre-shrunk even. With brooms in hand they left the house and Hilda put the large iron chains around it. She mumbled something extra and William was a bit worried as he sensed her feeling through their bond.
"We are coming back, Hilda."
The witch stared at her house. "I hope you are right, William. This is just in case. If we don't make it, then in five years the chains will disappear."
"You must come back sooner. I do not want to be chained up for five years," said the house.
"I know," Hilda said with a nod. "We're going to do our best. Five years of chains is not good for your paint."
William was a bit surprised. Did he just hear her brave and boisterous witch sniff away a tear?
As she turned to him, nothing showed of it. "Come. Let's go."
They mounted their brooms and flew away. They had decided, a few days ago, to make a detour to the castle, but as the king was still on his way there, they looked for the caravan that was going there. That was quite easy. They flew low over the crowd and along the carriage, raising a few hundred people to cheer again, and then they turned their brooms toward the east.
The couple had planned plenty of stops, so they would not arrive at the labyrinth totally exhausted. It took them a full two days, in which they did nothing remarkable, but they spent a lot of quality time that way. The challenge hung over them like a tangible thing, and they did their best to to ignore it.
In the afternoon of the second day, they passed through the magical field that separated the labyrinth of Gurthreyn from the rest of the world. They had been expecting it, and yet again, as happened with their previous visits, they had their load of nausea hitting them by surprise.
The large terrain outside the actual labyrinth looked peculiar. There were tents, people, horses and brooms. Lots of banners with the sigil of King Herald were put everywhere, but the lack of wind made the banners look remarkably pathetic as they hung down listlessly.
Despite the large number of people on the grounds, there was hardly anything one could hear. The magic that reigned over the fields dampened almost everything from sounds to moods.
The labyrinth itself, with the high grey walls, looked as uninviting as ever. The massive iron doors were closed as usual. High up, out of reach of the most depressing layers of magic, there were magicians and witches cruising over the daunting walled area, making sure that there were no stranger things happening than what had been recorded throughout history. Big solid walls that moved by themselves were not considered strange things here.
As Lamador, the magician of King Herald, had called for the challenge, the court of his king was responsible for supplying quarters for the adversaries. For that reason there was a large tent set up a bit away from what could be considered a village of citizens of Heraldion. The tent was simple in its looks, brown and red.
That was the view presented to Hilda and William as they finally approached the place where they would be doing the duel with Lamador.
"I don't know about you," said William, "but that whole circus down there just looks wrong."
Hilda agreed. "It is the way Lamador travels. Big. Pompous. Attracting attention. Let's go down and see what they have lined up for us."
The two brooms did not make a nice and elegant swoop to the ground. Instead, because of the thick and heavy magic there, it was as if they were plowing through mud. Hilda was now again flying the both of them, to keep everyone ignorant of William's abilities. She steered them to the brown and red tent. She knew the layout of the camp and the rules, so that had to be their place.
First thing they did was go into the tent, to unload their luggage. The tent's inside was strictly functional, there was nothing lavish about it. William put the handful of dice on the ground, Hilda did her trick and then the wizard put away the boxes and cases. "Right, that's out of the way. And now?"
"Now we're going to see Lamador. He will probably gloat and try to intimidate us, so be prepared for that. He's a real prick in things like that." Hilda thought back to the latest challenge. Intimidating was not even the word then. Humiliating was more like it.
The couple left the tent. They had agreed that William would be wearing the wizard's clothes. Lamador had seen William in those before, at the house of Gerdundula, so that should not be a surprise. William also had the notes with him in which Lamador had written that he was allowed to participate in the challenge. Just to be absolutely sure.
The tent of Lamador was again unmistakable. The largest, the richest in stuff added to it, and thanks to the area, just as depressing as everything else.
William had a thought, but decided to put that on ice until he was alone with Hilda again. They stopped in front of a layer of guards that had the ceremonial task to protect Lamador, which in itself was ludicrous. Lamador was much more capable of taking care of himself than any amount of soldiers dressed up in uncomfortable and relatively useless battle dresses.
"Who goes there?", one of them asked.
"Yeah, don't you wonder," Hilda said. "Who would come to this tent, in this forsaken place? Do we need to spell our names out for you? We can do that, if you need that."
The guard looked very annoyed. His mood wasn't sublime to start, and this answer did not make things better. He muttered something under his breath. Hilda as well as William were certain that it was something quite unflattering at their address, but they could not care less. "I'll tell the great Lamador that you are here."
"Yes, you do that," Hilda said as the man paced off. "Idiot. I hate all that ritualistic nonsense."
"Easy, Hilda, don't get overly excited. We're doing well, I think, let's keep our cool." William wanted to put his arm around her, but in this situation it would not be the wise thing to do.
The guard, with a disgruntled face, reappeared. "The great Lamador will see you now."
Lamador was seated on a throne that was larger and more richly decorated than the one
s they had seen in the castle of King Herald. It looked wrong, bad, corrupted. The man himself was dressed in what looked like pure gold, which had to be a magical illusion.
Hilda signalled to William not to be impressed by all this, using their bond. William wasn't. He was adverse of all those overdone things.
"Well, well," Lamador sneered. "You dared to come. And you brought your friend with you too. And he is still dressing as a wizard too, how amusing. Why didn't you do that when you visited us in the castle?"
"Would that have made any difference?", Hilda asked. She willfully ignored all the scorn and allegations in Lamador's words.
"No." The word came out hard. Lamador had not expected that response. Then he got back to his balmy and disgusting gloating. "So you are really willing to sacrifice him as well, Grimhilda. Have you explained to this man what will be waiting for him? And", he grinned, "I do not just mean me."
"William is well aware of what will happen here," Hilda told the man, "and he offered to help me in this. As you agreed to already, in your notes."
William brought out the pieces of paper. "We have brought them along, just to make sure there is no confusion about this point. Maybe there is some kind of judge or referee that would like to check them, to make sure of the legal validity of these small bits of evidence."
Lamador frowned. "An ordinary that speaks without being spoken to. How... fascinating. But of course, you are free to participate in the challenge, William. You did not bring along a bow and arrow, by chance? Or a