Heavy Is the Crown- Chapter 5

For three months the Entem family lived in a pair of tents Luther purchased at the market in Dregg, the murky, run-down village where they fetched up after moving to the Seventh Magistrate. The Seventh was reserved for the Empire's lowliest, largely because it was dominated by bogland, where little could be grown.

Another reason was that it bordered the Mushroom Kingdom to the east. In the event of another skirmish or war, the first victims on Gora Empire's side would be its cast-offs.

Cassandra had modified the tents, making of them one large living space divided into two rooms. They maintained a cooking pit out front, though Cass often had to stay with the pot or pan in which she was cooking, to fend off those who would filch what food they could afford. She and Luther both lost a good deal of weight in those first months.

Yet not so Bowser, for they gave of their own meager portions to feed the boy. One day, when he was only eight months old, he turned his nose up from his plate, pointing at his parents' dishes. Cassandra and Luther exchanged a worried glance and put their food on his plate, but Bowser reacted angrily, smashing his high chair tray. He dug his claws into the food, splitting it into three even portions.

Cass's first thought was, Gannon promised he would be smart. All along I have seen he was more clever than others his age, but this defies logic. Is this the power of that warlock's magic? She scraped her share onto her plate, Luther's onto his, and the family began eating.

And for a while, things went well. Luther and Cass began opening up to their neighbors up and down the dirt road, and their combined charm made them fast friends among their fellow castoffs. As they approached Bowser's first birthday, he'd become a darling among the koopas and goombas in the community.

Yet through it all, he remained silent, and this was beginning to worry Cassandra. The Seventh Magistrate had only one medical clinic, two days north of Dregg by bucka wagon drawn by tamed beetle baileys. Two weeks out from his birthday, Cass told Luther to stay and work overtime at the castle while she took their son to see a doctor. He boarded a work train, as he had since moving, and bade his wife and child farewell.

The two day trek went well, as Po Kanet, a goomba woman who lived in the village and who enjoyed the Entems, took the trip with Cass and Bowser. She and Cass played card games while Bowser looked through his books, many of them secondhand pieces offered as gifts from the community.

Neither of his parents realized he could read the words for himself. They assumed he was just enjoying the pictures.

Everything went swiftly at the clinic when they finally arrived on the second day. The doctor who saw Bowser, himself a green tribe koopa, informed Cass that he was growing at an accelerated rate, but that nothing beyond his obvious mutations seemed out of the ordinary. He recommended filing down the boy's shell spikes soon, though, as they were quickly shaping up.

Upon their return home two days later, Luther greeted them at the opening to their tent home with open arms. Bowser rambled up to him, and as he embraced his father, spoke his first word.

"Dad," he said. Luther Entem had been a practical and stoic man for most of his life, but at the sound of his son's voice, he wept openly and without shame.

Bowser's first birthday had been four nights past when Cass woke to hear him groaning in his makeshift bed. He was a month beyond his crib, too heavy for it to safely support him. Cass didn't mind; the Boreto goomba family needed it anyhow.

When Cass lit a lamp and crouched beside her son, she gasped at what she found. He was clutching the sides of his head, face pinched in agony as his horns stretched before her eyes. "They hurt, mom," he croaked. "They hurt bad!" She cradled his head in her lap, her big boy, until the horns ceased expanding and he drifted back to sleep.

For the first time since he'd hatched, Cassandra wondered if he would truly be okay.

On a balmy summer morning some four months later, Magistrate Godash approached the castle of one of the princes, Nurit, in the back of an advanced kart, one entirely covered and wrapped in metal panels with clear glass to see out of. His driver and chief escort, Turiya, had been even more taciturn of late than in his years previous. He had served Godash for almost nine years now, and never had the hulking Hammer Brother seemed so, detached.

The kart rumbled over the moat via a drawbridge, which normally would have caused Godash to jounce and rattle about in a standard kart. Over the bridge they pulled into a wide courtyard fronted by a kart parking area, which Turiya entered at speed. He slammed into a parking space and turned the key, stopping the kart cold. Turiya climbed out and opened Godash's door for him.

"Come along, then, Turiya," Godash said, waggling one finger to indicate the Hammer Brother should follow.

"Gonna wait with the kart," Turiya rumbled, eyes looking off into the middle distance at the outer castle wall. Godash waited for an explanation, but when a minute passed without one, he snorted angrily and stomped off toward the castle keep proper. He adjusted his voluminous robes and headed inside.

In the entry foyer of the prince's castle, Godash saw half a dozen green and four red tribe koopas, all dressed in construction gear, working at tearing open one wall off to the left. Godash saw some of the new security cameras in the upper corners of the chamber, which had been turned into a workspace. He approved the cautionary measure.

A rare purple shell koopa in a matching robe, embroidered with stars, wearing a pointed cap with cabalistic symbols and carrying a silver wand approached Godash from the entryway to the west hallway. Godash smelled the man before he drew near, a combination of dust from old books, and a cloying scent of sweat. He smiled broadly at the Magistrate with broken and rotted teeth.

"Aha! Aha! Who is this, who indeed," said the purple tribe.

"Hail, wizard," said Godash politely. "I am Magistrate Godash, of the Fourth. I am come to visit the prince, who I understand desires many changes to his home here."

"Oh, indeed he does, indeed he does," said the wizard koopa, nodding his head up and down violently. "Many rooms, and traps! Oh, he wants lots and lots of traps he does! Thwomps, he loves thwomps, and chomps too! Kalamazoo!" The purple robed koopa raised one foot, shaking it to and fro as he hopped in place, slowly rotating in a circle. Godash had plenty of experience dealing with the purples, and generally speaking, the crazier they were, the more powerful. Magic did strange things to koopas, and all purple tribes were born for an affinity for its study.

Beware this lunatic, Gode. He might blink wrong and turn you into a bat. "Tell the prince for me that I'd like to recommend a worker for this project," said Godash respectfully. The wizard finished his rotation, then folded his hands into the sleeves of his robe and floated away, off down the west wing hallway. Godash felt his left cheek twitch, irritated by the necessity of waiting and the curious looks of the workmen across the room. He wheeled on them, a scowl rampaging across his face. "Have you not enough banal labors to keep thyselves occupied, fools?" The workmen turned back to their tear-down without reply.

Soon a tall, broad-shouldered koopa in fine silk tunics and a blue shell strode into the chamber, and immediately the workmen all knelt down, pressing their foreheads to the floor. Godash began to do the same, but Prince Nurit was not one, apparently, to stand on ceremony.

"Come now, lads, and old dad, kneel not to me," he said, his voice smooth and velvety. It was a voice made for inspiring with honeyed words, and it made Godash cringe to think it belonged to a young man who clearly did not appreciate the importance of rank and appearances. He supposed, after a moment's thought, that his reaction might be partially born from being called 'old dad', an honorific used mostly for the elderly and sages in the empire.

"You spare my knees, and receive my thanks and blessings, your highness," said Godash with a smile. You also make me seem a doddering old man in front of these men of lower rank, you fluff-headed clod! He let nothing of his inner turmoil show outwardly, however. "I had heard tell of new works on your keep, and thought to come and offer some recommendations, sire."

"Ah! Most welcome news this is," said Nurit, signaling for Godash to follow him. "Let us discuss such matters in my office, that we can be out of these good men's way."

"Of course, sire." Godash followed, throwing one last evil glare at the workmen, who all flinched away from him. A minute later, they entered Nurit's first floor office, a resplendent study complete with various tomes on shelves lining the walls, a mahogany desk large enough to park a kart on, and a fireplace with armchair and end table nearby. Blueprints lay scattered about on the floor, though a second glance showed Godash that there was an order to their arrangement. "Hmm. Well, sire, all looks to be mapped out well. The entrances take unwelcomed guests to the dungeon, yes?"

"Yes, of course. My father made certain each ingress was enchanted long ago to ensure us of that. But therein lies my problem, Magistrate Godash. See this one, here?"

"Yes, what of it?"

"That's my castle dungeon," said Prince Nurit with a sigh. "I just kept putting it off. Now, there's nothing in there, and tensions rise between my father and the Mushroom King."

"I see," said Godash with a nod. "You worry about intruders."

"I worry about assassins or kidnappers, yes," the prince admitted. "I know I am my father's least favorite son. That's why he gave me this castle, so close to the border between our lands. If he should lose a son, best the one he doesn't care for so much."

"Pish-tosh and nonsense, sire," Godash said, flapping one hand in dismissal. Can you blame him? I'd have had you 'fall ill' of a 'mysterious sickness' a long time ago, you sniveling whelp! "The Emperor is aware of your keen wit and capacity for diplomacy, my prince! That, sire, is why yours is the first face the Mushroom King will ever see when relations fall short. He is crafty in his choice." Nurik raised one eyebrow at Godash, clearly curious.

"Do you say so," he asked.

"I do, sire."

"Hmm. Well, I'm sure you're probably right, Godash." Prince Nurit began shuffling the main castle blueprints together into a pile. "You're far more versed than I in political thinking. Now, this workman you would recommend, is he capable?"

"Quite capable, m'lord," said Godash. "The only downfall is, well, he's a local, sire, of the lowest caste. If that is a problem, I understand."

"Now it is thee who speaks nonsense, Magistrate," said Nurit with a grin. "I would have this man's name."

"His name, sire, is Luther Entem."

Bowser spotted the Elite Guardsmen coming from down the lane, parked in the front patch with his books. His mother and father now knew he could read, and he often sat to one side of their multi-tent home to enjoy his reading under the sun. His reasons for being outside so early on that day were two-fold. Firstly, at just seventeen months of age, he already stood as tall as his mother's stomach, a height most koopas didn't reach until two years. Much as their makeshift home had expanded, it was still cramped inside.

Secondly, his father had been pulled off of his duty working the Great Road almost a week earlier, and he'd been in a foul mood since. Luther was a man of words when he wanted to be, or needed to be, but when his heart turned heavy and dark, he became oppressive to be around. He didn't yell, or throw things, or start arguments, no, think it not. But he gave off a pervasive air of near-violence mixed with ennui, an infectious cloud of negativity which put all around him in a similar state.

The Elite Guardsmen rode in a simple bucka, drawn by large, pink bird-like creatures with bullet-shaped snouts. Birdos, Bowser thought. Odd, seeing them here. Bowser had read in one of his guides to empirial wildlife that birdos tended to promulgate mostly in the western realms of the country. He marked his place in his book and rose to his feet, straightening out as the bucka pulled to a halt before the tent.

The Guardsmen were both yellow tribe, and Bowser felt his mouth forming a natural smile against his will. Meechum had managed to find his family just a month before, spending some time playing chase with young Bowser before heading back to his home in Kurn, in the Fifth Magistrate. He'd promised to visit whenever he could.

Bowser forced the smile down and nodded up at the heavily armored koopas as they dismounted the wagon. One of them stepped up a foot away, glaring down at the child. "Boy? Are you the son of Luther and Cassandra Entem?"

"I am," Bowser said.

"And you live, er, here?" The question came out sounding awkward or embarrassed as the Guardsman pointed to the tent structure.

"Yes, we do. Pray tell, why?" The Guardsmen exchanged a glance, and the one clearly in charge knelt down so he and Bowser were eye-level with one another.

"Tell me, son, how old are thee? Do you ken 'how old'?"

"I do ken, aye," said Bowser. "I am seventeen months of age."

"Surely not," said the Guardsman, pulling back, eyes wide. "To be already so spoken in the olden way, and not still wearing clouts? And the sheer size of you, t'would seem you're at least a full year older."

"I don't lie," Bowser snapped testily. He shook his head, breathed deep. "My apologies. I have a temper. I don't like not being believed."

"It's all right, young one," said the Guardsman. "I have here a missive from Prince Nurik. Can you deliver it to your father within?" The yellow tribe handed down an envelope to Bowser, who silently nodded and took it to the tent, his heart racing.

In the tent's main chamber, Luther sat at the small round table, nursing a cup of coffee. Bowser strode over to him and offered the sealed envelope. "Royal Guardsman outside gave it to me to give you." Luther made a long, impressed face, tore the seal, and withdrew a folded letter from within.

As his eyes scanned the paper, his face slowly worked itself into first a smile, then outright excitement, elation. By the time he finished, Luther dropped the paper on the table and dashed outside, shouting, "Yes! By all the gods, tell him yes!" Cassandra came out of their bedroom add-on into the main room, rubbing her eyes, yawning.

"What's your father hollering about, Bowser," she asked dreamily.

"I don't know," said Bowser. "But he sounds happy." Luther came rushing back inside, sweeping Cass up in his arms and crowing, spinning her around in a circle. She laughed and hugged him back, asking what had him so elated.

Prince Nurik had sent a personal contract offer for Luther to come onboard as a crew foreman for renovations to his castle on the Seventh Magistrate's eastern border. The envelope included a salary chit, payable through a Treasury office one town south of them, in the amount of his first month's pay.

It was the first time Luther had ever been invited to be a foreman. It was also the first time a chit had been written to him for more than one hundred coins.

"It's only half an hour away by kart, and they're letting me borrow one for free until the contract is done," Luther added as they sat round the table, everybody brimming with glee. "Even better, there's no time estimate on how long the job will take!"

"Oh, honey, you see," said Cass, clutching his hands on the tabletop. "The gods have finally smiled on us again, for the first time since they gave us our son." It seemed there was good cause for celebration, and Bowser basked in his parents' joy.

It was also the completion of Godash's first step in teaching the Entems the cost of going against him.