He swept into the room as if he owned it; every head turning as he strode across the parquet flooring, his heels clicking. Even Queen Elowen Lumina looked up from the sheaf of demands she was studying.
“This is,” she started to say, ‘this is a meeting of the Royal Council to which only members and invited guests can attend.’
But then he pulled back his hood, and recognition spread across her face. “Oh, Inspector Ironbell, I hadn’t expected to see you.”
“Ma’am,” Inspector Camden Ironbell kneeled at her side and took her hand. “I believe you have a problem.”
“Ironbell?” Nathaniel Clarke, the court lawyer, gasped, slapping his hands on the tabletop. “THE Inspector Ironbell?”
“I have that honour,” Ironbell responded. “To whom am I speaking?”
“I am, Nathaniel Clarke, Chief Liar to the Court.” Clarke bowed his head slightly.
“Liar?” Ironbell queried.
“Ye-es,” Clarke pursed his lips. “I’m a lawyer. But suffice to say the public voted on our titles.”
“I understand. Never let the public loose on anything without controlling the options,” opined Ironbell. His eyes settled on Hua Jin.
“Jin, Hua Jin,” she said, lighting a cigarette. She pushed a biscuit tin towards him. “You wan’ a sweet and sour Cherry Bakewell?”
Ironbell sat next to a priest who had not spoken so far. He held out his hand. “Father Alaric. I represent the spiritual dimension of the kingdom.”
“Not for the Confucians, you don’t,” snapped Jin. “They can’t stand you.”
“There is only one Confucian, madame,” the portly priest retorted.
“Damn right, papist bottom,” she retorted. She stubbed out her cigarette and lit another one.
“Now, now,” Elowen interjected, turning to Ironbell. “Inspector, let me bring you up to speed.”
Ironbell nodded.
“It’s the Goblins,” she said. “They’ve kidnapped Princess Tolymundy and have sent a list of demands.”
“I see,” Ironbell said. “Tolymundy is your second eldest daughter, isn’t she?”
“Correct,” Elowen said, a rim of tears appearing around her otherwise sparkling blue eyes. “If they harm her, I will have no option but to wage war.”
“Could you not accede to their demands?” Ironbell asked.
“I say,” Clarke spluttered. “The spike-heads sent a twenty-page list of demands, ranging from the right of droit-du-seigneur over every maiden in the kingdom, to a free supply of Jin’s Chow Mein Welsh-cakes.”
“Yeah, not gonna happen, bucko,” Jin snarled through a cloud of smoke. “No-one is gonna droit this maiden.”
“I think I may have an answer,” the Inspector said. “I need a camel, a train ticket to Manchester, and a complete set of Jonathan Price’s war poems.”
The Queen gasped, “You’re not going to… I mean, you can’t. Not even I would dare…”
“I can and I must,” Ironbell said, while picking out a Bakewell from the tin. “Hmmm very nice.”
“You knows it,” Jin said, winking.
“Do we get retribution afterwards?” Elowen asked.
Despite reservations about placing “Elowen” and “Retribution” in the same sentence, Ironbell agreed. “Just tone down the fireworks.”
The queen just smiled.
