All those school chants and drinking songs about this man who slew dragons and saved worlds—now that I have slain and saved as well, I see an even better picture of what might be the truth ... and what might be a lie. New songs pop up around the countryside every so often about our legendary Jack. What if they’re really a message to us? Maybe they’re saying, in their own secret, storytelling way: I live on still. How better to communicate to a family of taleswappers than with a story well told?
How indeed.
The minstrels had fled with their stories after the king’s death. There were only six bards left on the castle grounds, and I called them all to me. My first official command. Sometimes it’s fun being queen.
I gathered these craftsmen together to tell them my story, the whole story, the complete truth of everything that had happened in the past few weeks. Thus armed, I planned to send these songwriters and storytellers on their way with purses filled with silver and a mission to spread the tales of my adventurous family far and wide.
If Jack’s tales can reach us here in Arilland, perhaps our tales will find him someday, wherever he may be. He will laugh to discover how, even in his absence, he brought the oncoming storm as a stone brings an avalanche. He will know we are safe and well, and he will know that it’s blood and booty and business as usual around the Woodcutter household. And maybe one day, when one of his new tales comes back to us, he will, too.
Acknowledgments
This novel could not have been possible without four unlikely muses: a frustrated mother, a South American president, a North Korean dictator, and an Internet celebrity author.
I am sure that Marcy Kontis had no idea when her eldest teenage daughter sat at her feet in the dining room and whined, “Mom, tell me what to write,” that her daughter would take it quite this far.
I am sure that Eric James Stone had no idea that when he raised the bar in the Codex Writers group by including every single story trigger in “By the Hands of Juan Perón” (instead of just one from each column) for the Get the Creative Juices Flowing Contest that I would then take every single one of the Fairy Tale Contest suggestions and jump over that bar. (He beat me in both contests, but I got published first, so we both win.)
I am sure that Kim Jong-Il never heard a word I said when Ken Scholes made me scream a promise to him out over the Pacific Ocean that I would finally finish my manuscript once and for all. (The roses I received on Mr. Kim’s behalf upon completion were gorgeous, though.)
I do know for a fact, however, that John Scalzi had no idea that seeing him at Millennicon was the reward I had planned to give myself if I finished the manuscript and sent it off to my agent before the weekend of the convention. I’m so glad I did. I believe Cincinnati still speaks of us all in hushed tones.
I would also like to thank, in some particular order:
Casey Cothran-Muldrew and Margo Appenzeller, who penned the original Princess Stories with me. Orson Scott Card, for being the teacher in the back of my head constantly telling me to “just write the novel.” Andre Norton, for being my guardian angel. Fellow Codexian and Orson Scott Card Bootcamper Christine Amsden, for suggesting the Fairy Tale Contest in the first place. Brian Keene, who was with me in the first dance. (I am happy that our forbidden friendship has lasted far longer than my relationship to the pillock who forbade it in the first place). Luc Reid, founder of the Codex Writers group, who sat me down the day after my birthday party and told me to submit “Sunday” to Realms of Fantasy. Shawna McCarthy (with help from Doug Cohen), who accepted my ten-thousand-word “short” story for publication in Realms of Fantasy. Scott Grimando, for the most amazing centerfold illustration a girl could ever dream of, and the fantastic story of the bicycling adventure that went along with it.
Deborah Warren, my agent of sunshine and delight, a kindred spirit from that moment in that little café in Pasadena when she peered at me over her rhinestone-studded sunglasses and told me she liked my aura. Reka Simonsen, fairy godmother and dream editor, a kindred spirit from the moment when, out of the blue, she quoted my favorite Diana Wynne Jones character in an e-mail. The Starbucks on Old Fort Parkway in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, for making that last homestretch of writing physically possible.
Mary Robinette Kowal and her parents, Ken and Marilyn Harrison; Lillie and Chuck Rainey; Ken and Sherrilyn Kenyon (and the boys); Janet and Mike Lee; J.T. and Randy Ellison; Eddie Coulter, Edmund Schubert, and Leanna Renee Hieber for their love, support, inspiration, motivation, and solace.
Joe Branson, a.k.a. “The Fairy God Boyfriend,” who knew exactly what it would take to win the heart of a princess but went and did it anyway.
And, finally, to Adam, Josh, Turtle, Rob, and Chappy of the Adam Ezra Group, because I wrote most of these acknowledgments on a scrap of notebook paper while waiting for their show to start at the 8 × 10 club in Baltimore.
May we all be doomed to a happy life.
Alethea Kontis, Enchanted
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