chapter 2: THE EMPEROR

Four years passed during which Wand studied her craft and made
no mistakes as serious as her near-lethal encounter with the Old
and Evil One.  That had been an effective lesson.

As she matured, so did her beauty in a spectacular manner until
it was not only the talk of the City of Tarro, but of all
Theland as well.

Perhaps we should orient ourselves at this point, and give those
four years ample space to slide past.

The City of Tarro was the capitol of the Empire of Theland.  You
will find no mention of it on any current or historical map, for 
it is of another time and place so long ago that even the 
mountains and seas we know now were in different places.  
Perhaps it was somewhere in what we now call Europe, or maybe 
the continent that would later become America, or even those 
lost continents of Atlantis or Mu.  We simply do not know.

What we do know is that this story takes place during the reign 
of Emperor Aleister XXII, and that his empire spanned over 
several minor states, themselves ruled by other kings; such as 
Westland, Yonders, Finemark.  Theland was not a huge warlike 
empire, as were the later-to-come Atlantean or Roman empires, it 
was much more cozy in those days, orderly and peaceful.  This 
was possible because the Emperor's authority was backed up by a 
Sorceress rather than a military machine.

Tarro was a city of twelve thousand basically happy people, 
built in a style resembling Medieval European.  The magnificent 
old Palace of the Emperors overlooked the City Place, the scene 
of many a celebration and pageant, there upon the west bank of 
the River Lyfe.  Standing tall before the Palace and the Place, 
midstream in the river between the old bridges, was the shining 
silver Tower, wherein dwelt the Sorceresses, for generation after 
generation.

It was a very pleasant city, in a valley of grains and grasses
and fruit orchards checker-boarding the land on all sides, with
the calm, wide river meandering through.  Most of the buildings
were old but well-kept and proudly painted, the streets were 
kept clean, as was the river, and its environs were happy to 
live there.  At night magic crystals illuminated the city as if 
it wore a crown of jewels.

Tarro was not a walled city, as were most towns built before the
Empire conquered those barbarian hordes which had laid waste to 
all in the semi-ancient days.  It was an open, unafraid, free 
place, completely vulnerable to attack except for one thing: the 
tower rising up out of the River Lyfe, around which the city had 
been built.

The Tower of Tarro was more ancient than the very Ancient Days
themselves.  No one knew who built it or when, it may have been
put there when the world had been created.  Yet it shone in the
sunlight and appeared to be new.  It's silvery shell was an
unknown metal which could not be scratched or bent or cut or
rusted.  

It was invulnerable to attack, for no one could climb or penetrate 
it, and it stood too tall to reach with grappling hooks or ladders, 
being the equivalent of 20 stories to the platform on top.  There 
were retractable balconies at several levels, but only one entrance, 
that being a fifth of the way up the smooth round tube-shape, from 
which a Bridge of Light could span the distance between the Tower 
and the top floor of the Royal Palace, when the Sorceresses wished 
to come and go.

The Tower had always and only been the domain of the Sorceresses.  
The city had been built around the Tower because a sorceress was 
protection more effective than walls or moats, or even armies.  
For generations unknown the sorceresses had lived therein and 
wielded the magic of the Powerstaff, an ancient magical wand that 
was passed down from mother to daughter.  Only women had been the 
recipients of that particular Powerstaff, even though many a male 
sorcerer had attempted to conquer the Tower and take the
Powerstaff for their own.  But the power was kept, the city
illuminated by it, and enemies zapped by it when necessary.

The sorceresses were therefore as royalty, although they did not rule, 
for the Emperors were usually on familial terms with them (several 
emperors had fathered the line), and the power of the Sorceress was
the authority of the Emperor.  It was not that the sorceresses could 
not rule, but that they did not allow themselves to.  They had rules 
of their own.

There had been evil sorceresses in olden days, in other cities,
misuses of power, but in Tarro the sorceress had always had the
love of the people, for their healings and weather magic were a
boon to all.

So it was, that when a sorceress' daughter, an Initiate, came
unto her eighteenth birthday, she was honored as royalty and the
city held a great celebration for her coming of age.

And now we find Wand turning eighteen.  There is to be a
three-day festival, a ceremony, dancing, feasting, perhaps even 
some drinking by the merry folk, and certainly some magic.



The Gypsies came to town the day the celebration was to begin.  A
festive energy filled the air, colored paper streamers crossed 
above the cobbled streets and fluttered from doors and windows.


Up in her Tower, Luminata studied Documents of 
Powertext, concentrating upon an occult schematic 
delineating the 22 paths between the 10 points of 
Power.  

"It begins," she said to herself, "The Chariot has 
arrived, perhaps The Hierophant as well."  Tracing 
the converging lines she muttered names of symbolic 
personification, "And here's The Fool...who should 
come stumbling along at any time now."  She turned 
the page to an illustration of that Fool grinning 
up at her, a young man drawn dancing, eyes wild with 
madness, body on the brink of balance/unbalance. "A 
jester, a clown, perhaps?  

But that path crosses this other path, of a Magus..."



The Gypsies had arrived in a gaily painted rainbow wagon pulled by 
a great bay gelding.  Pots and pans dangled and clanked along the 
sides, iridescent fabrics flapped in the easy breeze, people 
turned to watch this jolly house on wheels roll by.  Three gypsy 
men rode atop the wagon, handsome and dark, the face of a very 
exotic girl was framed in the wagon window, and another set of 
eyes, wide in wonder, could be glimpsed peeking out.

The driver was a tall, lean, sun-browned man of indeterminate age 
between fourty and fifty, with grey streaking the sides of his 
otherwise black hair.  He had a traditional thin gypsy moustache 
and perfect white teeth that exaggerated his smile, and he smiled 
a lot, as if at some joke.  His eyes were kind and wily and wise 
and his name was Benutio.

His two sons rode beside him.  Agra, the family thief, eighteen 
and bold with the ladies, short but muscular and physically 
beautiful.  Devo, the student, was tall at seventeen, and usually 
had a book in his hands.

The other two inside the wagon were Leema, Benutio's sixteen year 
old daughter and the Clown. 

They waited to make their appearance.  The Clown was at the 
wagon's door, ready to spring out and do something.  "Now? now?" 
he asked eagerly.

"Wait, Clown, not yet.  Benutio will let us know when."

"Crown reddy now."

"Wait, I said.  I'll tell you when."

The wagon rollicked through the streets of Tarro, crossing a 
bridge, from which they could see the Palace of Emperors and the
shining silver Tower.

Benutio paused a moment to look at the Tower.  It was, after all, 
very famous.  Then he clicked to the gelding and they rode on, 
past the City Place, the Temple, the Clocktower, shops, hostels, 
taverns, police house, and finally stopped at the Market Square.

Here were many vendors of foods and goods, under open sky or under 
awnings of tentcloth rigged with ropes like a ship.  Here it was 
crowded with people buying and selling, eating and drinking.  The 
smells of meat and bread and cheese, the colors of fruit and 
jellycakes tantalized the hungry Gypsies.

"I could eat it all," Agra told his father.  "If I go lift a
purse..."

"No.  Not here, not now.  It's too important not to have trouble 
with the law in Tarro just now.  We will have to earn some money."

Agra sighed.  "All right, but we'd better hurry or my stomach 
will decide otherwise."  Devo said nothing, but his eyes were 
also hungry.

Benutio felt awkward about allowing his family to get hungry, but 
he had driven them all to reach this city on this day because it 
had to be so.  And they made it, but now they had to do something 
about their economic plight.

He climbed down from the wagon and pounded the dust from his 
clothes and hair, tweaked his moustache straight, adjusted his
powerful smile, and was ready.

There was a seller of breadmeats.  Benutio approached the man's 
booth.  The smell was maddeningly good.

"Fine looking breadmeats you have there, friend."  Benutio spoke 
theatrically and loudly enough to attract the attention of others 
in the crowd.

"For just six minors you can enjoy one yourself, friend," the 
marketman said.

"Ah, well!  Six minors!  And I with a hungry family to feed. Well, 
then, how much for five of those lovely breadmeats?  Any discount 
for volume, friend?"

"Why, two majors and six minors, of course, friend.  No discounts."

"Ah, what is a poor man to do," Benutio asked the crowd, "when he 
cannot even afford to feed all his children?"   

The marketman sighed and looked to heaven for help.  "Okay, okay, 
five for two majors, then.  Shall I wrap them?"

"Ah, well," Benutio scratched the grey above his ears, "there is 
now only one problem remaining." 

The marketman stopped wrapping.  "No money," he guessed with a 
frown.  The crowd looked to Benutio for the next bit off drama.

Benutio offered a good-humored shrug.  "A small matter. Keep them 
warm for me."

He returned to the wagon and slipped a violin from beneath the 
driver's bench, and climbed up atop the rainbow wagon, as if it 
was a stage, for now he had an audience. 

Agra pulled castanets out of his shirt, Devo materialized a 
guitar from somewhere, and at the same moment that Benutio began
to play, they were ready.  A Gypsy song rang out in the
Marketsquare and the crowd thickened. 

"Crown go now?  Now, huh?"

"Not quite yet."  Inside the wagon, Leema held the Clown back from 
the door, waiting for their cue, as they had rehearsed this so 
many times.  After no matter how many performances, however, the Clown 
could never get the timing straight.  When it came she clapped him on 
the shoulder and let him at the door.  "Now!"

The back door of the Gypsy wagon flew open and the Clown sprang 
out into the crowd, handspringing over the cobbles of the 
street.   

People jumped back, surprised by this wild and nimble Clown. Then 
they began to laugh, as he danced upside-down on his hands to the 
music, which was rapid and merry.  The Clown was almost inhuman in 
his agility, more like a monkey than a man.

But a young man he was, of perhaps 20 years, dressed in a floppy, 
multicolored, multipatterned costume with great cuffs and collar, 
blond shaggy-dog hair and his face painted with a stupid smile.

Abruptly, with a roll and a bound he was atop the wagon with the 
musicians, hopping about and making funny faces, seeming always to 
stumble and fall, but always swinging back up in time to avoid 
harm.  Once in motion, his timing was amazing.

The crowd laughed at his antics, applauded the musicians,
who played faster and faster until their rhythm became quite
infectious and had people clapping in time.  The people of Tarro
had seen travelling minstrels before and they appreciated a good
act.

"Now, Clown," Agra called out, "catch Leema!" 

The wagon door opened again as Leema leaped out, caught the 
Clown's grip with perfect timing, and was swung up on the stage, 
even as he flew off in a double-flip to make room for her.

Leema rattled her heels on the wooden wagon roof and went into her 
wild Gypsy dance.  Men began to hoot and whistle, for she was 
strikingly beautiful, her long black hair flying, red skirt 
flowing and she moved very well.

Now the Clown took the floppy hat from his head and passed it 
through the audience, pointing into it and rolling his eyes.  Many 
threw in small coins, an occasional major clinked among the 
minors, and the hat soon contained well over the amount needed 
for the breadmeats.  

The Clown had understood that this money was for their supper, but 
could not count so well, and he was as hungry as the others, so he 
was afraid there wasn't enough yet, and continued around to the 
same people again and again.

One of them, a large lumbercutter named Crusho, taller and more 
burly and more massive than any other around, bushy of red hair 
and beard, had offered no more than a scowl to the Clown's hat.  
When the Clown tried him a second and third time he passed through 
the crowd, the giant growled, "I ain't given' you nuthin' but the 
back o' my hand inf'n you don't scruff off!"

Clown gave a courteous curtsy, and went on around past the man.  
But then, with a leap was climbing up Crusho's back, and in an 
instant was standing balanced upon those burly shoulders, posing 
for the entire crowd to see.

People laughed, Crusho the lumbercutter cried out, "Hey, you
little twerpus, I'll..." and reached up to grab the Clown.  But
Clown was far too fast, having already sprung to the awning of a
market stall, which he rolled up onto and ran along as the giant
lumbercutter shook his fist and tried to catch him just out of
reach below.  The crowd laughed harder yet as Crusho shouted
curses up at the Clown.

Crusho became even more angry and so frustrated that many people 
were laughing at him, so he used his strength, pulling an
awning-rope loose from whatever it was attached to.  A bank of
awnings went slack and the Clown came tumbling down with them. 
With a victorious roar the lumbercutter grabbed the Clown by his
silly, baggy costume and jerked him up, feet dangling.

"Now I'll teach you not to play on Crusho's back!" he shouted into 
the painted face, and pulled back an enormous fist to deliver his 
mightiest blow.  The Clown was helpless and he looked scared.

"Hold there, sir Crusho!"

It was Benutio, speaking from atop the rainbow wagon.  The music 
had stopped and the two Gypsy lads had leaped down into the crowd.

"The Clown meant you no harm.  He is simple!"

"I'll say he's simple!  To attack me..."

"He was born simple.  A fool.  An idiot.  Handicapped. Pray, harm 
him not, or you will do a great injustice."

Crusho growled in disgust and looked at the pathetic Clown in his 
grasp.  The fist still hovered ready.  "It is I who will have 
justice.  And perhaps he will learn a lesson!"

"Oh, do pray, harm him not."  Another voice, just behind Crusho, 
and although the words were mild, the tone was deadly. Crusho 
looked back to see the oldest son, Agra, standing very close to 
him.  There was a sparkle of steel in his hand and even more so in 
his young eyes.  Crusho understood that Agra was no simple Clown.

Then the crowd joined in.  "Aw, be a sport, Crusho!  Let the fool 
go!"  "Yea, let him go, he has harmed thee not!"  "Come, come, 
lumbercutter, be festive!"  "Find another more your size--if there 
be any!"

"Faugh!" he cried, and tossed the Clown five yards back, to fall 
rolling over and again--somehow never once spilling even a coin 
from his hat.  Clown finally landed in an undignified sprawl and 
shook his head in dizziness.  Everyone laughed at that, even 
Crusho.

Benutio bought breadmeats and fruit and tea for his little 
troupe.  Interested and friendly people asked from where they had 
come.

"Oh, from here and there," he told them, saying nothing, "the life 
of the Gypsy, you know."

Agra and Devo explored the streets of town, then returned and 
spoke in the Gypsy language to their father.  Benutio then climbed 
once again atop the wagon.

"An Announcement!" he cried out to all, "Tonight, before the
ceremony of Initiation for your beautiful-I'm-sure Sorceress'
daughter, our Clown will perform a stunt of death-defying 
bravery and skill!"  Benutio pointed toward the Palace.  
"Where that street meets the City Place, our Clown will leap 
from one rooftop, over the street, to the opposite side!"

"It can't be done!" several cried out, "It's too far!" 
"That's fifteen yards, and those buildings are five stories
high!"

"Ah, did someone say it can't be done?"  Benutio shrugged and 
smiled like a Gypsy.  "Well, I am willing to make wagers. This 
evening, just before sunset.  Until then, be festive!"

Many people shook their heads.  "It really can't be done!" 
shouted a fishwoman, shaking her head.  "That Clown of yours 
must be simple indeed," jibed another.  But many others were
interested, for people in those days (unlike today) were
bloodthirsty and had no television.