“Hi, there,” Jason said from the lane. “Is one of you the Gamester?”
“I am,” said the man in overalls. He stood, a husky man with arms like a linebacker. He seemed a tad wary, but unafraid.
“Did you make that puzzle?” Jason said, jerking his head at the man trying to unlink the shapes.
“I did, along with many others.”
“I like that sculpture.”
“It can be reassembled in many combinations.”
“Do you sell your puzzles?”
He shook his head. “I give them away.”
“Do many people come by?”
“Mainly just Jerome here. Most folks would rather not bother. Sometimes a few will come and watch Jerome solve a series of my toughest creations.”
Jason gestured at the parchment. “Are you designing a new puzzle?”
The Gamester nodded. “I permit no man to view my designs.” He rolled up the parchment, even through Jason could view none of the drawing from where he stood. “What brings you this way, stranger?”
“I need to speak with the Blind King.”
“How do you know the Blind King?”
“Isn’t he famous?” Jason answered vaguely.
“Locally, yes, to some extent. But you are not from these parts.”
Jason was unsure what to say. “It might be best not to ask me too many questions.”
“Fair enough,” the Gamester replied. “Safe journey.”
Jason turned his back on the peculiar pair. The Gamester had not acted very welcoming and had seemed a little too curious. He walked briskly.
After a few miles Jason stopped and stripped off his gray coveralls for the first time, revealing his T-shirt and jeans. A tentative sniff proved that his sweat-marked underarms reeked like unwashed monkeys. It was long past time to wash up and do some laundry. Maybe the castle would have someplace to bathe.
Continuing on with cloak, blanket roll, and coveralls bundled under one arm, he eventually forked right onto a gravel road. Crunching along the gravel sapped more energy than walking on the hard-packed lane. The road wound around a hill, finally bringing him below the shade of broad-leafed trees.
As he rounded the back side of the hill, the castle came into view, constructed atop a shallower hill behind the first. The massive stone complex looked abandoned. Sagging walls topped with crumbling battlements had collapsed entirely in some locations. Only two towers remained standing, one of which was so crooked and damaged it looked ready to topple at a cough from a butterfly. Jumbled heaps of stone and rotted beams marked where other structures had already fallen. The decrepit castle looked like an ideal hideout for thieves or vagabonds. No wonder Aster had told Jason to send the Blind King his regards.
Jason sighed. Had the loremaster misled him? Might he have sent him into a trap? Jason was quickly losing confidence that the Blind King would be able to help him. But with no apparent alternatives, what else could he do?
The gravel path led Jason to a corroded, raised drawbridge with a small door built in its center. A plank led across the shallow, dry moat. Outside the door stood a grave, middle-aged man clad in mismatched armor and clutching a poleax. “Who might you be, sir?” the gatewarden inquired stiffly. Despite the ruins around him he apparently took his job seriously.
“I might be anyone,” Jason said. “I’m searching for the Blind King.”
“Have you scheduled an audience with His Majesty?”
“No. I’ve recently arrived from a distant land.”
“Do you come on an errand of royal consequence?”
“Of course.”
“Your name?”
“Jason.”
“Wait here while I inquire within.” The man unlocked the door using a key from his belt. Probably not the best defensive strategy to give a lone, exposed guard the key to the door he was protecting. Then again not the best idea to have huge gaps in your walls, either. The gatewarden disappeared through the door.
A few minutes later he returned. “His Majesty bade me to admit you. Take care to show him the respect befitting a sovereign of his magnificence.”
The gatewarden escorted Jason across a courtyard where weeds thrived between the cracks of uneven paving stones. They passed close by the precariously teetering tower. The entire complex appeared deserted. Nobody roamed the courtyard, and the windows in the surviving structures looked vacant. Motioning with his poleax, the gatekeeper ushered Jason through a set of double doors into the sturdiest building within the castle compound, which adjoined the only solid tower.
The building housed a great hall. Birds roosted in the rafters, and white streaks of droppings marked the floor and trestle tables. At the far end of the room, upon a moldering dais, a shabby man sat upon a battered throne. A dingy rag bound his eyes, a tarnished crown rested upon his gray hair, and a grimy green robe edged in dirty white fur enshrouded his body. He looked like some old homeless guy playing the part of a wise man in a soup-kitchen Christmas pageant.
Three attendants stood nearby: a mustached man in a stained velvet cap fingering a dented trumpet, an ugly woman with her hair caught up under a faded bonnet, and a humbly clad, young minstrel holding a lute.
“Presenting Lord Jason,” called the man in the velvet cap in a proud voice, blasting a flourish on his trumpet for emphasis. The loud notes sounded brassy and annoying, echoing harshly off the bare walls of the cavernous hall.
“One moment,” croaked the old king. “First allow my chancellor to complete his report.”
“As you will, sire,” the minstrel said in a courtly voice, casting a nervous glance at Jason. “As I was recounting, the invading armies have been repelled beyond our frontiers. General Braddock reports staggering enemy casualties. He hesitates at our borders awaiting your command.”
“Onward,” the king coughed, waving an arm. “Use our initiative to drive them into oblivion before they can reform.”
“A dispatch will be sent at once.”
“Sooner,” the king demanded. “What now?”
“The matter of Lord Jason,” said the man in the velvet cap.
“Come forward,” rasped the old king, beckoning with one hand.
Jason gaped at the ridiculous scene.
“Go on,” urged the gatewarden quietly.
Jason approached the dais. “Greetings, mighty king,” he said politely, opting to play along with the charade. It required some effort to restrain his sarcasm.
“Welcome to my realm,” the king intoned, spreading an arm outward, sightlessly indicating the damaged walls and dilapidated furnishings. It was embarrassingly clear that the Blind King believed he ruled a grand domain. Jason felt tempted to turn and walk out. There seemed no chance that this pathetic pretender could help him. But it would be rude. And he had no other place to go.