The Land of the Silver Apples

Chapter Twenty-seven HAZEL

That night Pega gave them “The Jolly Miller” and “The False Knight”, followed by “The Man in the Moon”, a song Jack hadn’t heard. The Man in the Moon came down to gather wood for his hearth, leaning on a forked stick as he searched. It was an odd tale and somehow disturbing. Jack wondered where she’d learned it.

“I have sometimes spoken to the Man in the Moon,” remarked Mumsie when the song was finished. “He has much lore for those who can bear his company.”

“He really exists?” said Jack, who had supposed it was only a legend.

“He’s one of the old gods. He’s doomed to ride the night sky alone, and being with him is like being lost on an endless sea with no star to guide you. He visits the green world only during the dark of the moon, and his conversation is both cheerless and disturbing.”

“I wish you wouldn’t talk to him,” said the Bugaboo. “You cry for hours afterward.”

“Knowledge is always gained at a price,” said Mumsie, her eyes blinking serenely. “I gather news of the wide world from the swallows that visit the forest outside. It’s the only way the Man in the Moon can learn of it. In the dark night only owls are abroad, and they’re both stupid and surly.”

Jack’s eyes widened. He remembered the Bard talking earnestly to a swallow in the window of Din Guardi. “Are you—a bard?” he asked cautiously.

Mumsie laughed. “Nothing so grand. I’ve learned a few things from the Wise, but I’m far too lazy to commit my life to such study.”

Jack didn’t believe her. There was nothing at all lazy about the Bugaboo’s mother. It seemed she knew much that she didn’t care to reveal.

“I think we need something cheerful to make up for tales about the Man in the Moon,” said the king. “Give us ‘Caedmon’s Hymn’, Pega my dear.”

She smiled and obeyed. As her perfect voice soared up to a mob of entranced will-o’-the-wisps, hobgoblins began to appear from nearby houses. They came in twos and threes until a dense ring of them surrounded the courtyard. When Pega finished, they all sighed like a wind blowing through a forest.

“You darling!” cried the Bugaboo. “I can’t tell you how happy you’ve made me. Ask for anything and it shall be yours.”

“Now you’re in for it,” said the Nemesis. “She won’t be satisfied until she’s got your heart and liver.”

“First I have to tell you a story,” began Pega. “Long ago Jack’s mother gave birth to a little girl. Unfortunately, she was so ill, the baby had to be cared for by another woman. Later, when Jack’s mother had recovered, his father went off to fetch the infant, and on the way home he stopped to gather hazelnuts.”

At the mention of hazelnuts all the hobgoblins sat up straight and looked attentive.

“He put the infant’s basket into a tree to keep it safe, but then a terrible thing happened. A crowd of little men swarmed up the tree and stole her. Jack’s father tried to catch them, but they were too swift.”

“There you go again,” grumbled the Nemesis, “accusing us of stealing.”

“I didn’t mention you,” retorted Pega. “But you’re right. They were hobgoblins. Jack’s father went frantic with grief, and he knew his wife would be heartbroken.”

Mumsie dabbed at her eyes with her apron. Several women cooed in sympathy.

“Amazingly, when Jack’s father went back to the basket, there was another baby inside. It was a beautiful child—a thoroughly selfish one, it turned out.”

“Lucy isn’t that bad,” Jack protested.

“She could use improvement,” Thorgil said. “She ought to be beaten frequently, as I was, to develop character.”

“I’m not finished,” said Pega, frowning at the shield maiden. “Jack’s father took the new infant home and never told anyone what happened for years. Now I’m coming to my request.” She put her hands on her hips and looked directly at the king. “I want Jack’s sister returned so we can take her home.”

Absolute silence fell over the gathering. Dozens of shiny, black eyes stared at Pega, and nothing moved. Even the will-o’-the-wisps were frozen. Then Mumsie sighed deeply. “I knew no good would come of it,” she said. “I told you, ‘Don’t copy the elves. They’re bad to the bone.’”

“But, Mumsie, I only wanted to give them a taste of their own medicine,” protested the Bugaboo. “I took one of their brats and found an unguarded cradle to leave her in. I thought it would teach the elves how it feels to lose a child.”

“It didn’t teach them a thing,” said Mumsie. “It only gave us the problem of what to do with the baby you took from that cradle.”

Jack hardly dared to breathe. Had his sister been handed over to the elves to become a toddler on a leash?

Mumsie clapped her hands, and a young hobgoblin came up to her. “Go to the Blewits’ house and fetch the human child,” she ordered.

Jack sighed in relief. The hobgoblins did have his sister and they were bringing her to him now! Events were moving so fast, it made his head spin. What would she look like? What kind of life had she led? A dozen questions occurred to him, but he was too overwhelmed to speak. And so was everyone else.

In the distance Jack saw a male and a female hobgoblin coming down a path that led from a rocky ledge. In front danced a girl still too far away to see clearly.

The crowd around the Bugaboo’s hall parted. The woman hobgoblin was sobbing, and her husband had his arm around her. The girl suddenly halted and ran back to them. They hugged her, each taking a small hand to lead her forward. She was much smaller than Lucy—the size of a four-year-old, perhaps.

“This is your sister,” Mumsie said to Jack. “We named her Hazel.”

The girl looked up at Jack in utter amazement. “A mud man!” she cried. “And there’s more? What a treat! Where did you get them?”

“I never told her the truth,” wept the woman hobgoblin.

“None of us did, Mrs. Blewit,” said Mumsie.

Hazel danced from Jack to Thorgil to Pega. “This one’s pretty,” she said, pointing a chubby finger at Pega.

“Told her what?” Jack was finding it difficult to speak. Hazel was the exact image of Father, right down to his sturdy body and determined expression. Her eyes were gray, not violet, and her hair was brown, not golden as afternoon sunlight. She didn’t float like thistledown. She bounced like a puppy on oversized paws. No one would ever mistake her for a lost princess.

But she was pretty in her own way, with round rosy cheeks and thick, healthy hair that sprang up on her round head.

“We never told her that she’s not a hobgoblin,” said Mumsie.

Jack was astounded. How could Hazel not know she was different from the other children? She must have looked into a stream or noticed that her arms weren’t speckled. But she was very young, and small children might not notice things like that. “Hazel,” he called. She ran to him, and he knelt down beside her. “Hazel, I’m your brother.”

“No you’re not!” She giggled.

“We’re alike. Our hair, our eyes, our bodies are the same. Look at your hands. Your fingers aren’t long and thin. They aren’t sticky at the ends. You’re a mud girl.”

“I’m a hobgoblin, silly, like Ma and Da.” She pointed at the Blewits. “I don’t like you, but I like her.” Hazel went back to Pega, who lifted her in her arms.

“Oof! Heavier than she looks,” Pega said, putting her back down again.

“She’s spent her whole life with the Blewits. They lost their only child shortly before we acquired her,” Mumsie said.

Stole her, you mean, thought Jack. He didn’t say it aloud. He didn’t want to start an argument now.

“If time doesn’t pass here,” he said, reasoning it out, “Hazel should still be an infant. But she isn’t. How is this possible?”

“Do you think we’d keep her shut up like a bird in a cage?” Mr. Blewit said indignantly. He was a thin, gloomy-looking hobgoblin with permanently hunched shoulders. “A sprogling needs fresh air. We often take her into the fields of Middle Earth.”

“And we love it there, too,” said Mrs. Blewit. “We are creatures of Middle Earth, not the Land of the Silver Apples. Sometimes we long to visit the mountains of our youth even though it means we shall age.”

“Many hobgoblins refuse to leave their homelands,” added the Bugaboo. “Kobolds, for example, are perfectly happy in the dark forests of Germany, and brownies cannot be lured from their hearths. We are the only ones who have come here.”

Jack watched Hazel, his mind numbed by the reality of her. She looked human, but she behaved exactly like a hobgoblin. She hopped like one, hooted like one, and gleeped like one. “Gleeping” was a particularly nasty sound the hobgoblins made when they were happy, halfway between a croak and a belch. Hazel was doing it now. “We’ll have to get used to each other,” Jack said.

“Fortunately, we have lots of time,” Mumsie said.

“All the time in the world,” added the Bugaboo.

“No, we don’t,” said Pega. “I asked for Jack’s sister to be returned so we could take her home.”

“You can’t take my baby!” Mrs. Blewit suddenly burst out. “I’ve cared for her all her life and I love her so! Oh, no, no, no, you can’t be so cruel.”

“We can wait a few days,” said Jack.

“A day, a month, a year—it won’t make any difference,” wailed Mrs. Blewit. “I’ll love her just as much then as now. Oh, my darling, my tadpole, my wuggie-wumps, they’re going to take you away!” She hugged Hazel, and the little girl began to cry.

“You can’t have her and that’s flat,” growled Mr. Blewit, smacking his fist against his palm.

“She’s my sister,” cried Jack.

“Stop it right there,” said the Nemesis, coming between the two. “Great toadstools, Blewit, you’re acting like a mud man.”

“I’m sorry, Nemesis, but it goes against the grain,” apologized the hobgoblin. “When we lost our little one, Hazel was the answer to our prayers. I can’t give her up.”

“Let’s all take a deep breath,” the Nemesis advised. “It’s almost time for bed, and I’m sure we’ll see things more clearly in the morning. Mumsie? Did I see a basket of apples in the kitchen this morning?”

“You did indeed,” the Bugaboo’s mother replied. “They’re from the Forest Lord’s best trees (he was busy with the rock slide at the other end of the valley). They’ve been roasted and dipped in honey.”

“Excellent! I’m sure it will do Hazel good to see everyone friendly again. It’s very bad for sproglings when their elders quarrel.” The Nemesis’ eyes were as deep and tranquil as forest pools, and he had a calming effect on everyone.

Jack wondered who actually ruled this kingdom—the Bugaboo, Mumsie, or the Nemesis? Or did they work together at the jobs they did best?

Hazel stopped sobbing and settled down in Mrs. Blewit’s lap. She stuck her tongue out at Jack.