The Langorian Queen

By George Fripley

Langoria is a land where the magic is fading. The only magic is what you bring with you, but even then. it is easy to use it up. Some people arrive with none, some with a little, some with a lot. You'd want to have some if you were an important part of a prophecy that says you'll save the land.

Tarquin, Jemima, Kylie, and Wayne, find themselves fighting an army from neighboring Gomania, with just a few sacred items for comfort, alongside a queen who they're not sure that they trust, and a small army with internal divisions. It soon dawns on them that they are fighting not only for Langoria, but for their lives.

• Language: English
• Publisher: George Fripley
• Release date: Jan 26, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463771822

George Fripley

George Fripley is a Perth-based writer who has dabbled in satire and fiction for a number of years. The Langorian Queen is his first novel, however he has a number of other stories in process. In addition to fiction he has written Grudges, Rumours and Drama Queens (a satirical manual for the office-worker) and More Gravy Please! (a satirical how-to book for the aspiring politician).

Book preview

The Langorian Queen

Published by George Fripley

(Smashwords Edition)

© 2020, George Fripley

Cover Art by boldfoxdesigns.com

George Fripley can be contacted on [e-mail]

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Chapters

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Thirteen

Fourteen

Fifteen

Sixteen

Seventeen

Eighteen

Nineteen

Twenty

Twenty-One

Twenty-Two

Twenty-Three

Twenty-Four

Twenty-Five

Twenty-Six

ONE

Tarquin sat surveying his temporary prison. There was nothing except bare wooden floorboards that poked out from around the edges of a large cream and blue Persian carpet woven in the Nain style, and a large shabby cupboard that had seen better days. The walls were covered with light blue paint that was flaking off in numerous places, exposing the previous creamy white colour and the dull red that preceded it. The room was light and airy and had that musty smell and relaxed atmosphere that all empty un-used rooms eventually acquire. Particles of dust floated lazily through shafts of sunlight that speared through the only window. He noticed that the slightly muffled air felt quite pleasant, almost as if time had stopped. If there had been a comfortable couch, he would have been happy to snooze until Mrs Dawson relented and decided to let them out. He felt his eyelids getting heavy and almost forgot that he wasn’t alone.

Kylie glared at Jemima. ‘It’s your fault we’re in here.’

‘Me? Why me?’

‘I saw you kissing Wayne behind the shed earlier, and so did Mrs Dawson. He’s too young for you, you know.’

‘You did not.’

‘Did so.’

‘Did not.’

‘Did so.’

‘Did not. And even if I did, he’s only a year younger than me.’

Tarquin glared at them. ‘Oi! Settle down.’

They both glared back at him for a moment and then scowled some more at each other while Wayne paced up and down from one end of the room to the other, ignoring the discussion. Tarquin remained sat in a corner, watching.

‘I reckon that I could touch the ceiling if I tried,’ said Wayne.

Kylie glanced at her brother, who was looking up at the ceiling, and rolled her eyes.

Jemima looked at him with a frown. ‘What?’

‘Look, I’ll show you.’ Wayne proceeded to squat on the floor and then launch himself up towards the ceiling, his arms flailing. He missed by a few inches before crashing to the wooden floorboards in a heap, giggling at his failure.

‘Like, wow,’ muttered Jemima

‘Whatever.’ Kylie turned away from her brother.

Tarquin shook his head before levering himself upright and going to the window to look at the gorgeous summer’s day he was missing out on. He was seventeen, a year older than Kylie and his sister, and in charge, apparently. He looked at the other three and rubbed his eyes. It didn’t seem like release was coming any time soon, and there was a good chance that Kylie and Jemima would start fighting again, and that he would have to sort them out, or at least stop them from hurting each other. He turned and saw Wayne running his hands across the central medallion of wool carpet where he’d landed. The kid was in a world of his own. Not for the first time that afternoon he wondered what had made their parents think that he and his sister would get on with Wayne and Kylie.

‘Why me?’ he said to nobody in particular. The others ignored him. It was probably karma, he thought, or maybe he was just lacking in something. Mrs Dawson had expected more of him judging by the disgusted look she thrown in his direction. At least he’d been able to pull the girls apart before they’d seriously hurt each other. That fight had been the last straw for the housekeeper. It had happened after Kylie saw his sister kissing Wayne in the garden. Mrs Dawson had told them that if his uncle’s gun hadn’t been missing from the cabinet, then she’d have had good reason to shoot them all. The thought sent a shiver down his spine.

‘This place gives me the creeps,’ he muttered to himself.

Jemima giggled. ‘Scared you’ll be the next one to disappear, Tarkie?’ She started making what she thought were ghostly sounds.

‘I don’t understand why they bring us here.’ he said. ‘People go missing. You know that.’

‘What are you talking about?’ asked Wayne.

‘Take no notice, they’re just trying to scare you,’ Kylie said with a sneer. ‘They think that just because we aren’t loaded with money like them that we’re also thick.’

‘You’re so-o full of shit Kylie,’ Jemima taunted her. ‘I’ve got better things to do than make up stories.’

‘Yeah, I noticed. Cradle-snatcher.’

Jemima smiled sweetly.

Kylie scowled but said nothing.

‘When did the last person disappear?’ asked Wayne.

‘About ten years ago wasn’t it, Tarkie?’ said Jemima.

Tarquin nodded his head but said nothing. He’d had this conversation a million times with Jemima. It never made him look good.

‘Are you alright, Tarquin?’ asked Wayne.

‘Yeah.’

‘You don’t sound very enthusiastic. Don’t you want to tell us? Go on. Tell us about it,’ said Wayne.

‘He’s not telling us, cos Jemima here is full of shit,’ said Kylie.

‘No, I’m not!’

‘Yes, you are!’

‘Am not.’

‘Are so.’

‘Oh shut up, will you,’ said Tarquin as he stepped between the two girls. He turned to Wayne. ‘If you really must know, some kid disappeared here in the eighties when his parents were on holiday. They were dodgy stockbrokers, or something like that. The story is that he murdered a girl from the village and then killed himself, but nobody ever found him or the girl. I think the parents probably murdered both of them and buried them somewhere in the grounds. Or maybe it was Mrs Dawson. She seems keen to use firearms! How old is she?’

‘Not that old,’ said Jemima. ‘Apparently the boy was adopted, so maybe his parents just got bored with having a kid and then got rid of him, had him re-adopted or something.’

‘What about the girl then?’ asked Wayne.

Kylie stared at her brother. ‘You don’t believe this crap, do you? Stop filling his head with all this rubbish, will you Jemima.’

Jemima ignored her. ‘They say that when the floorboards creek at night it’s the village girl coming to look for her murderer. It keeps Tarkie awake, doesn’t it Tarkie?’ she giggled again.

Tarquin shrugged. ‘Before those two there was that politician who came here for a dirty weekend with his mistress, the comedienne. Nobody knows what happened to them, but some of the more insane locals spread the story that they were Satanists who opened a portal to hell and got sucked in. Sounds like rubbish to me. The gun went missing at the same time, so one of them probably shot the other one. That must have been some time back in the seventies.’

‘Perhaps they just ran away to get married.’ suggested Jemima. ‘Became bigamists. No-one found any bodies.’

‘Is that it?’ asked Kylie. ‘That’s hardly a whole history of murder and mayhem, is it?’

‘Oh, that’s not all of it.’ Jemima told her. ‘Uncle has a book in his study that details over two hundred years of crimes and goings on at Langston. He says that there were a group of four kids who went missing during the Second World War. And before that a handful of others that are presumed dead. People were even hung for the murders. And even just last week there was a break-in. Mrs Dawson chased a kid around the house but lost him somewhere. They never caught the boy, but some kid has gone missing from the village.’

‘This place really is creepy.’ Tarquin shivered as he spoke.

‘What this place is, is really, really boring,’ said Jemima with a dramatic sigh.

‘Yeah,’ said Wayne. ‘Really boring.’

‘You’re not wrong. Could have done with a TV, or computer, or something,’ said Tarquin.

Even Kylie nodded her head in Jemima’s direction.

They sat in tedious silence for a while, fidgeting with the non-existent phones and tablets that Mrs Dawson had confiscated, or in Tarquin’s case, his non-existent sword. ‘You can’t be punished if you’ve got all your toys,’ she’d said.

‘But I’m training for the national championships’, he’d complained. Mrs Dawson had simply shrugged and locked the door with her customary evil smile.

‘Ha! Fencing. Why don’t you do a real sport,’ Jemima had said with a smirk as the door closed.

He’d then had to explain to Wayne what fencing was.

Wayne had been impressed. ‘Sword-fighting? Cool.’

But that had been some time ago and Tarquin hadn’t felt like explaining it in any more detail, much to Wayne’s disappointment.

The silence dragged slowly onwards and they all drifted into their own private daydreams. All except Wayne.

‘Listen to this,’ Wayne tapped his fist on the carpet.

They listened for a while.

‘Listen to what?’ asked Kylie with as much patience as she could muster.

‘It sounds hollow under here.’

‘Well of course it is. We’re on floorboards,’ Tarquin said as kindly as he could.

‘No, what I mean is more hollow than other places.’ Wayne tapped near the edge of the carpet a few times and then in the middle where the medallion design was. ‘See what I mean?’

It did sound different.

‘And what about it?’ asked Kylie.

‘Maybe there’s something under here. Why don’t we take up the carpet and have a look?’

They were silent for a while before Jemima said, ‘Why not. There’s nothing else to do.’

‘Yeah, alright,’ said Tarquin. ‘Let’s roll it up.’

‘And what if Mrs Dawson comes back and sees us messing up the room’ asked Kylie. ‘Then she’ll never let us out.’

‘We’ll tell her we’re polishing the floorboards or something. Look, who cares. At least it’s better than just sitting around,’ said Tarquin.

Kylie said nothing. He was right.

The four of them rolled back the carpet. There was nothing under it except more floorboards. Wayne knelt on the floor and tapped the wood. There was a distinctly un-hollow sound.

Kylie couldn’t help but smirk at her brother. ‘See. Nothing!’

‘It’s here somewhere. I heard it. You all did,’ Wayne insisted as he tapped around the area. The other three drifted away towards the window.

‘Whatever,’ Tarquin sighed as he once more stared out towards the countryside.

‘Got it!’

They all looked across at Wayne who busy trying to lever up a floorboard.

‘Stop that! You’ll damage it,’ Kylie almost screamed.

‘Leave him alone,’ said Jemima as she went to help Wayne, who eventually pulled the board up far enough for her to look inside. ‘There’s something in here.’

Wayne lay on his back and pushed the board higher. It creaked ominously as Jemima reached in.

‘You’d better be quick,’ said Tarquin. ‘If that goes you could lose your arm.’

Jemima pulled out a small brown envelope that was crinkled and covered in dust. They all gathered around her as Wayne let the floorboard snap back into place.

‘It looks ancient,’ said Jemima.

‘Yeah. Hey, what’s written on the other side?’ asked Tarquin.

Jemima turned it over. ‘It says Langoria.’

‘Langoria? What’s that?’ asked Wayne.

‘Dunno. Let’s open it.’ Jemima carefully peeled back the flap and pulled out a piece of paper which she unfolded. It had writing on it.

‘What’s it say?’ asked Kylie, trying to read over her shoulder.

‘It says to roll back the carpet,’

‘No, seriously. What does it say?’

‘That’s what it says. Look, it’s a list. Number one is put the carpet back how you found it.’ Jemima showed Kylie the paper.

‘What’s number two?’ asked Tarquin.

‘Sit around the central medallion, and number three is rub the back of the paper.’

‘Then what?’ asked Tarquin.

‘It says that after that, the future will become clear.’

‘Sounds like some sort of game. Let’s give it a go,’ said Wayne.

Kylie shrugged. ‘Looks boring,’

‘More boring than sitting here waiting for release from this prison? I don’t think so,’ said Jemima. ‘Come on, let’s roll the carpet back out.’

They returned the carpet to its original position and sat in the middle, around the central medallion pattern.

‘Right, I suppose you’d better rub the paper, Jemima,’ said Wayne.

‘Is it me, or is getting colder,’ asked Kylie.

‘Stop complaining, will you,’ Wayne told his sister as Jemima started rubbing the paper. They looked on as nothing happened.

‘It is getting colder,’ said Kylie. ‘Look at the window!’

There was ice forming in the corners and they could all see their breath.

‘What’s going on?’ Tarquin whispered.

They all stared at the window, mesmerised as the ice snaked its way towards the centre and a thick fog began to form in the room.

‘Hold on!’ shouted Jemima.

‘What. Hold on to what?’ asked Kylie.

‘No, look!’

They all looked at the paper she was holding. Where she had rubbed were the words Hold On.

‘What…’ began Wayne, before they felt an almighty jolt and the room blurred at the same time as a wind started blowing from nowhere, tugging at the edge of the carpet which was now flapping hysterically.

‘We’re flying!’ yelled Wayne.

‘How can we be flying? We haven’t moved!’ Kylie screamed back as she scrambled to get a hold of the carpet.

‘Dunno, but Wayne’s right. Can’t you feel it?’ Jemima screamed back as she lay flat against the wool.

‘Whatever happens just don’t fall off,’ yelled Tarquin, as the carpet started writhing under them. ‘What’s going on?’

The wind howled and the fog became thicker until they couldn’t even see in front of their faces. They desperately held on to each other, clasping hands, arms, legs, or whatever else was convenient, as the carpet bucked underneath them, lifting and dropping them where they sat. Then the carpet banked and dropped, climbed sharply, and then dropped again. They all felt like they could be thrown off at any time, but they remained glued to the wool. It seemed to go on for a long time.

And then it was over.

Silence. Stillness.

There was the smell of damp vegetation and a biting chill. There was snow on the ground. There was no carpet.

‘We’re in a forest,’ said Wayne.

‘We’re on solid ground,’ said Jemima. ‘Where’s the carpet?’

‘Gnngghh,’ said Kylie.

Tarquin yelled. ‘Shit!’

The four of them sat for a moment in silence as snowflakes gently settled on their clothes. They were indeed in a clearing in a forest. Wayne got up and went to investigate the trees.

‘Where are you going?’ said Kylie. ‘We don’t know where we are, or what’s out there.’

‘Ease up, sis,’ said Wayne. ‘Stop stressing.’

‘Just don’t go out of sight, okay? You should at least sound worried!’

Wayne nodded and wandered around the edge of the clearing, where he found a path. ‘Worried. Okay. Look, there’s a track here. Why don’t we see where it leads?’ He didn’t sound worried.

‘I’m not going down some unknown forest track,’ said Kylie. ‘Who knows where it’ll take us. We’ll get lost!’

‘Yeah, you might be right,’ said Tarquin as he peered into the gloom between the trees.

Wayne grinned. ‘I’d say we’re already lost, wouldn’t you?’.

‘Or maybe we’re having a group hallucination,’ suggested Tarquin.

‘You really believe that?’ asked Wayne.

‘No.’

Jemima looked around. ‘There’s one question that I think we need to ask.’

‘What?’ asked Tarquin.

‘How do we get back to Langston?’

There was silence.

‘Thought so. Well then, we could sit here in our summer clothes and slowly freeze to death, or we could go and try to find somewhere warm and ask somebody that very question. We’re already lost so I’m going with Wayne. Anybody else coming?’ She didn’t wait and scrambled to her feet before following Wayne down the forest track.

‘Well, we can’t let them go on their own, can we?’ muttered Tarquin as he watched them go.

‘No, we can’t,’ Kylie agreed. ‘Come on, let’s catch up with them before they get themselves into trouble. And us with them.’

TWO

The snow glistened as the Queen of Langoria looked out over the snow-covered plains that stretched away to the east of her castle. She barely felt the chill of the wind as it blew in through an open window, rustling the papers on her desk. Something wasn’t right in her land.

Events were moving too fast. The Four weren’t here and she had a sneaking suspicion that the gomans weren’t being upfront with her in the trade negotiations. She turned back to address the matters at hand.

The Queen smiled again. ‘I am sad that we haven’t been able to conclude our business, Ambassador.’

‘As am I,’ said the Ambassador. ‘My President will be disappointed. You know we are in a bit of a bind with our timber supply. Our forests only have two good years left in them before we run out of good logs. It will take at least twenty years to get them back to any useful state.’

‘I will do my very best to get agreement from the other Langorians, but they are a little bit distracted at the moment. Were you aware that they believe that there is a prophecy that is currently unfolding as we speak? Unfortunately, they tend to read all sorts of catastrophes into these little stories. It does complicate matters.’

The Ambassador shook his head and chuckled. ‘I have heard of such things, but surely these old fairy tales have no bearing on our negotiations. I have read widely in Langorian mythology and prophecy and they all appear to be a bit fanciful for modern countries like ours. Is it this prophecy that is complicating matters? Surely we don’t have to deal with mythology in our negotiations. The elves and dwarfs can’t possibly use that against us. My people would be outraged at such a tactic.’

‘Nevertheless,’ said the Queen firmly. ‘I need to talk to the elves and dwarves. If they are uncooperative then we can revisit the situation. Perhaps next month?’

The Ambassador sighed and shook his head. ‘We can’t wait forever. Sooner or later we will need access to these resources.’

‘And I’m sure we can make such access mutually beneficial,’ said the Queen.

‘I hope so, I really do. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to prepare for my return journey.’

‘You’re not staying?

‘No, Your Majesty, I have urgent business to address with our trading post on the border. The Deputy Ambassador will, however, be here in a few days.’

‘I look forward to meeting him,’ said the Queen as the Ambassador bowed and took his leave.

The Queen watched him go before turning to her assistant, Mankus, who had been silent during the meeting. ‘He probably killed that Craig lad we found in the forest, don’t you think?’

‘His group were the only ones in the vicinity.’

‘Who gave the lad a sword? If he hadn’t have had a sword, they probably wouldn’t have hurt him.’

‘Yes, they would, Your Majesty. Despite what he said, they are worried about the prophecy of The Four just in case that it might actually have some truth in it. They’ll slaughter any humans they come across that don’t look local. Probably even if they do look local.’

‘We’ll soon know won’t we. If The Four don’t arrive in the next day or so it’ll be too late. The eclipse is in a few days and they have a bit to do before they come here to Wanton Dope.’

‘You really think they’ll arrive?’ asked Mankus. ‘The magic of Langoria seems to be fading. I don’t even know why Craig was brought here. What was the purpose? He was the first to come though since Cedric and Ruby, and we don’t even know why they’re here.’

‘I don’t know, perhaps it was just pure chance, pure bad luck.’

‘Well, whatever, I hope The Four are luckier and better equipped than he was, otherwise we’ll be digging four more graves.’

‘I’m sure they will be ready for action, motivated, and raring to go,’ said the Queen.

‘Yes, I’m sure they’ll be the cream of the crop, Your Majesty,’ said Mankus.

‘I really hope so.’

Kylie was sure that they were more lost than they otherwise would have been with her in charge. The four of them had been trudging through the knee-deep snow for an hour with Wayne seemingly taking random paths. The snow was mushy on the surface and she had sharp ice-cold water soaking her jeans below the knee. There was also water seeping into her boots, which crunched loudly on the still-frozen snow buried close to the ground. Above them the grey sky had given way to broken cloud, the sun periodically illuminating their path. She noticed how it sparkled through droplets of meltwater waiting to fall from snow-covered branches. Every now and then a whole clump of slushy snow dropped from overhanging branches in the forest canopy as the sun did its work.

As she looked around, Kylie got the feeling that she’d seen some of the trees before. Perhaps they were walking around in circles, or perhaps, the trees were following them. If you could enter a world on a magic flying carpet, then moving trees wasn’t that much of a stretch – was it? It happened in Lord of the Rings. And she was missing her phone? And Jemima annoyed her. She didn’t appear to be at all worried. And neither did Wayne – instead he had a content look on his face.

Tarquin broke into her thoughts. ‘Did you see that?’

‘See what?’ she asked.

‘There’s somebody up ahead on the path. I think they’re coming this way.’

They peered down the path into the gloom beneath the trees. Sure enough there was a figure striding through the snow. It waved at them.

‘Seems friendly enough,’ said Wayne.

‘He could be an axe murderer for all we know,’ Kylie told him. ‘Probably chopped up numerous people in this very wood and buried them here.’

Jemima smirked at her. ‘I love your optimism.’

‘Well, you never know.’

The other three ignored Kylie and waved back at the fast approaching figure. As it got closer, they could see that it was wrapped in furs and carried a sack on its back. When it got within a few metres it removed its hood revealing a young