The Eye of Zoltar

‘It’s good to see you again too, Boo,’ I said. ‘This is Addie Powell, our friend and guide, and this is Princess Shazine of Snodd.’

‘A Sister Organza switcheroo?’ asked Boo, staring at the Princess and prodding her with an inquisitive middle finger.

‘My mother did it,’ said the Princess.

‘Once, I knew the Queen very well,’ said Boo, raising an inquisitive eyebrow at the Princess. ‘A good woman until she married that idiot your father. Ask her if she remembers the incident with the squid.’

‘I will,’ said the Princess, who seemed to have become immune to the insults her father’s name attracted.

‘Right,’ I said as soon as we were in the car, Once Magnificent Boo deferentially allowing the Princess to sit up front, ‘let’s get out of Cambrianopolis before someone changes their mind.’

Luckily, no one did, and an hour later we were heading back towards the border. Barring bad traffic or a breakdown, we’d be back at the palace by lunchtime, and the Princess and the handmaiden could be changed back.

‘I used to think Laura Scrubb was the ugliest girl I’d ever seen,’ said the Princess, staring in the courtesy mirror at the face she’d been using for the past few days, ‘but I’ve got to quite like the snub nose, shortness of stature and lack of any agreeable bone structure.’

‘You’ll soon be yourself again,’ I said, with mixed feelings. The Princess in Laura’s body and I had got on really well, but I wasn’t sure how that would translate once she was back to being beautiful and rich and influential once more.

As we drove towards the border I related everything that had happened over the past four days. I told Boo all that I could recall – leaving out the bit about Gabby – and expected her to make comment, ask questions, or say ‘Ah-ha’ or ‘Really?’ or ‘Gosh’ or something but she didn’t say anything until I’d finished.

‘At least it explains why there’s a rubber Dragon strapped to the roof,’ she said at last. ‘I was wondering about that. Where’s the Eye of Zoltar right now?’

I told her it was in the old saucepan in her footwell, and she drew her feet away.

‘Has anyone touched it?’

‘No.’

‘Keep it that way. It’ll be nothing but trouble. If I were you I’d drop it down the first disused mine shaft you come across.’

I explained why we needed it, and that we’d hold a conclave to discuss everything when we got home. Boo merely shrugged at this and muttered darkly about ‘meddling with powers you could not possibly hope to comprehend’.

We passed a road sign alerting us that the border to the Kingdom of Snodd was ahead.

‘Thirty minutes,’ said Addie, who would be picking up her next group from the tourist office, where we first met her.

‘About time,’ said the Princess, ‘I’m really beginning to miss being me.’

I ran over my speech to Queen Mimosa as we drove along. About how I felt the Princess had progressed from being a spoilt brat of the highest order to someone who could, and would, think of others. On second thoughts, I probably wouldn’t need to say anything at all – the Princess would simply open her mouth and speak, and the Queen in her wisdom would know.

We first spotted the smoke when we were still some way from the border. We thought at first that it was the result of a minor border skirmish or something. When I mentioned it to Boo she leaned forward in her seat.

‘That’s not the border,’ she said, ‘it’s farther away.’

‘Hereford?’ I asked.

‘Closer than that,’ said Boo. ‘Perhaps the palace.’

‘The palace?’ echoed the Princess, and urged me to drive faster. The palace was only ten miles from the border, and as we crested the last rise and the Kingdom was spread before us the Princess’s home came into view. And what we saw was neither expected, nor welcome.

‘No!’ cried the Princess, and put her hand to her mouth.

I stopped the car at a lookout spot where several other people were already watching, and we climbed out. The royal palace was on fire, and a long pall of black smoke drifted across the land. There was a small explosion in the castle, then another.

‘My lovely palace,’ said the Princess. ‘I do hope Mummy and Daddy got out okay.’

‘The powder magazine must have blown up or something,’ I said.

‘Don’t be a clot,’ said Boo. ‘The palace is under attack. See there, landships on the move.’

She was right. Far in the distance we could see the unmistakable rhomboid shape of King Snodd’s defensive landships moving across the land, one of which exploded into fragments as we watched. Beyond the palace, another distant smudge of smoke was drifting into the sky. They – whoever they were – had attacked Hereford as well. I think I felt anger rather than fear, and concern over my friends and colleagues.

‘Who would dare attack us?’ said the Princess. ‘A sneak attack by, what, Midlandia? But why? My cousin is the Crown Prince and the one I was most likely to marry. Our kingdoms would have been joined peacefully in the fullness of time.’