THE DUCHESS;

EVERYBODY'S LOOKING FOR SOMETHING

A Pantheon guard offered to take them to the castle, but Cal and Buddy preferred to find their own way, so he drew them a map instead. Cal took it and led the way while Buddy plodded along behind, with none of his usual strut. Both were subdued. They were only really roused from their quiet when they passed by an open-air market place with a live band and gaggles of fairies socialising and trading.

“Not one,” Cal mused.

“I know,” Buddy replied mournfully. “Not a single aja.”

“That’s not what I meant,” she glanced sideways at him. “I mean, not one person is treating you like a celeb. You’re not a super rare wonder-aja here.”

Buddy’s jaw dropped comically; it was clear he hadn’t even considered the possibility that he might not be a celebrated figure outside of Xara. Cal would have laughed if she hadn’t felt the uneasy stirrings of guilt in the pit of her stomach.

“I’m sorry, Buddy,” she muttered. “You should never have been stuck as a fairy familiar. You could have stayed on Xara.”

He snorted with such force that the paper rippled in Cal’s hand. “If you dare suggest we split up again, I will bite your tail.”

Which quite put an end to that conversation.

The walk was long and largely quiet, apart from the occasional commentary on the scenery, so they both had a chance to think and mull over their predicament. The castle, once they arrived, provided new and welcoming distractions – most notably in the form of several aja being ridden by fairies. Buddy pricked his ears keenly at them while Cal watched a couple of younger fairies run behind them with two great, long lances.

“They joust here?” She grinned. “Excellent. What type of aja are those, Buddy? They look like some kind of earth element.”

Buddy’s electric blue eyes narrowed almost to the shape of Cal’s red ones. “I’m not sure. I’ve never seen aja look like that before… they all look like the same element, but different colours, and it’s not clear what the element is.”

Cal shrugged. “Why don’t you go and find out while I find one of the captains? I don’t know if familiars are allowed indoors.”

“You watch yourself, little missy,” Buddy wheezed in a fairly bad imitation of a famous actor from Xara. “This is man’s work this, murder, heyyy?”

She grinned and slapped him on the ribs as he trotted off to join the jousters, before bouncing up the stone steps and pattering inside the ‘castle’, which looked like a cross between a palace and a military fort. She’d never seen anything like it before. The inside was highly decorated, but in a traditional style, with a tapestries like the ones her mother hung in their old round-house. She checked the directions with a passing servant and quickly negotiated the winding corridors until she found herself outside a door which stated, in big, bold letters:

CAPTAINS OF THE ROYAL GUARD
CAPTAIN BIRCH – CAPTAIN FLYNN

Flynn? Birch was a normal name amongst the agricultural class on the Volcano – fairly common, even – but Flynn was a crazy name. What did it even mean? Was it a boy’s name or a girl’s name? Cal shrugged, knocked on the door, and went straight in.

There was no one there – just a couple of boring looking desks. Cal had seen enough of desks to last a lifetime, so she went to the window instead and peeked out, trying to see if she could spot the jousters. The view was spectacular, but largely devoid of people: just an older lady planting some flowers fairly near to the castle wall, and some of the odd looking aja grazing in a meadow further out. Cal marvelled at the flat landscape, and wondered how on Xara the people of this planet were able to grow anything without the fertile soil provided by the volcano.

She brushed her earpiece with her finger, activating it with the distinct, gentle humming sound.

“Coast is clear, little man,” she wheezed over the earpiece to Buddy, using the same imitation he had earlier. Her back was to the open door. “So I guess we kill the king, heyyy?”