Murray Leinster - Gateway to Elsewhere

More doorways. They passed through parts of the palace with which Tony was naturally unfamiliar, and whose features as of today he could not compare with yesterday’s. Then they reached a quite small, quite inconspicuous doorway, and the djinn Abdul stopped before it and bowed low again.

“The residence of the Queen of Barkut, lord,” he said blandly.

Tony stepped out-of-doors, onto a sort of dry meadow with patches of parched grass here and there. The sun shone brightly. He heard a bird singing rather monotonously, and he assured himself that no djinn was making that noise! A hundred-odd yards away there was a clump of trees and among the trees a small group of mud-walled houses which were plainly human buildings, not too expertly made, with completely human implements about them.

Tony advanced. Someone waved to him, and he felt his heart pound ridiculously faster. But as he drew nearer yet, he saw that it wasn’t Ghail. It was a stout, motherly woman with her gown tucked up to reveal sturdy, sun-browned calves. She seemed to have been working in a garden. He saw a neatly hoed patch of melons, and a field of onions and other vegetables. The woman beamed at Tony and said:

“The Queen is in there. You are the Lord Toni?”

Tony nodded. Abdul looked oddly uncomfortable.

“When you go back to Barkut,” said the woman, “do try to get them to send us some sweets! We haven’t had any sweets for months!” Then she said tolerantly to Abdul: “Not that you don’t try, of course.”

Abdul wriggled unhappily. “I will wait here, lord,” he said sadly. “It is not fitting for a djinn, of the most powerful of created beings, to be made mock of by a mere human. Perhaps I will go back and wait by the door.”

Ghail came out of the largest building—it would have no more than two or three rooms, and was of a single story—and regarded Tony with a deliberately icy air. She said:

“Greetings, lord.”

Just then the motherly woman said comfortingly to the short stout djinn:

“Oh, don’t go away, Abdul! I’ll watch your magic tricks for a while—if they’re good ones.”

Abdul wavered. Tony grinned at Ghail. He said critically:

“Of the two of us, you look most like you had a hang-over. Have you been crying?”

“With my Queen,” said Ghail with dignity, “over the sadness of her captivity.”

Then a pleasant slender sun-browned woman came out beside Ghail and nodded in a friendly fashion to Tony. He gaped at her. She had the comfortable air of an unmarried woman who is quite content to be unmarried. Which is not in the least like a queen. The palace of the djinn king loomed up on all sides, but here in the center things were different. These houses did not look like a dungeon, to be sure. Here was a meadow half a mile this way by half a mile that, with these buildings and gardens in the center so that it looked like a small farm. The contrast between these structures and the magnificence of the palace was odd enough. The atmosphere of reasonably complete contentment was stranger still. The Queen looked as if she were having a perfectly comfortable time here, and was as well-satisfied as anybody ought to be.

“This,” said Ghail stiltedly, “is the Lord Toni.”

The Queen smiled. There was flour on her hands, as if she had been cooking something.

“Have you breakfasted, Lord Toni?” she asked.

“Well—no,” admitted Tony.

“Then come in,” said the Queen, “and we will talk while you do.”

They entered a small room, an almost bare room, a peasant’s general-purpose room which had the shining neatness of a house with no man in it to mess it up. But this had not the fussy preciosity of too many possessions. There was a small fire burning on a raised hearth, giving off a distinctly acrid smell which yet was not unpleasant.

“You will have coffee,” said the Queen, “and whatever else we can find. We are a little straitened for food today, because so much went for your meal last night.”

Tony had been dazed, but this was a jolt which showed in his expression. The Queen laughed.

“The djinns have their own foods,” she explained. “But no human being can eat of their dainties. When I was first made prisoner the king used to raid caravans to get food for me, but it was very tedious! So now I have my own garden, and someone—I think it was Abdul—stole chickens for me. When you came as a guest they asked me for food for you, and I gave it. Of course. You probably did not notice, but no matter what you pointed to in all the dishes they paraded before you, you actually got—” she chuckled—“no more than flesh of chicken, and eggs, and cheese and dates and salad! That was all I had for you.”

Tony said: “Majesty, I think I ought to make some appropriate speech. But I don’t know what to say!”

She busied herself at the fireplace, and Ghail went quickly to help. The two of them gave Tony his coffee, and a melon, and eggs. It went very well.

“You are going to defeat the djinns, Ghail tells me,” the Queen said practically. “She assures me you will destroy them to the last small djinnling. I hope not.”

Tony goggled at her. “But—”

“Oh, I know!” said the Queen. “I am their prisoner, and so on. But in their way they’re rather cute.” Tony stared.

“I’ve lived among them four years,” the Queen said briskly. “I’ve had them around all the time. They’re a little bit like men, and a good deal more like children, and quite a lot like kittens. I suppose you’d say that I’ve made pets of them. Of course they won’t let me go home, but it isn’t bad.”

Tony chewed and swallowed, and then said carefully: “I’m afraid I don’t quite understand.”

The Queen shrugged. “They’re terribly vain, like men. If possible, more so. You can do anything with a djinn if you flatter him. They’re terrible show-offs, like children. My maid outside can wind Abdul around her little finger any time. He loves to show off his transformations, and she watches him. The other djinns won’t. And they’re like kittens because they’re so completely selfish. But that’s very much like men and children, too.”

Tony said in astonishment:

“But they’re a menace to Barkut—”

“Of course!” the Queen conceded impatiently. “They’re dangerous to Barkut in the same way that a troop of—say—wild apes would be dangerous to a village near where they lived. They steal, and they destroy, and they probably kill people now and then. But it’s because they can’t understand people and people can’t understand them.”

“There’s a war—” began Tony.

“Oh, the war!” The Queen dismissed it scornfully. “That’s what all wars are about! Misunderstandings! Marriages are too, probably. Men are so absurd! That’s why I have to stay a prisoner.”

Ghail said warningly: “Majesty!”

The Queen regarded Ghail with impatience.

“My dear, you cannot deny that I am patriotic! I have no children, so I can be patriotic! But for the same reason I haven’t any particular prejudice against the djinns. Do you remember how I used to adore horses? I’ve come to like the djinns as well, that’s all. I admit that it seems terribly silly to me that I have to stay here because the djinn king’s vanity is involved in holding me prisoner! If I were to escape and go back to Barkut, he’d feel that he had to attack it furiously to recapture me. So I can’t go home until he’s conquered. So I simply want the Lord Toni to realize that as far as I am concerned—”

Ghail said again: “Majesty!”

Tony looked sharply at Ghail and at the Queen. Ghail was young and very desirable. The Queen was less young and contentedly undesirous. She laughed frankly.