Chapter 44: Gosgos the Jam Enchanter

“Well, do feel free to stay the evening, its better to travel by day isn’t it?” Gosgos suggested.

“How kind, We should really get going though” Ismi said.

“Yes, we did, I’m afraid we have to go you see because…” Yerdl began.

“Why did we have to hurry?” Kejo asked.

From behind her ice mirror, Fancy Chill was finding these developments quite suspect.

“You have to hurry because I’m chasing you, or I was… until things got as interesting as this” She seethed.

Outside the tower, her slush minion creeped closer, she wasn’t really chasing them anymore, but they had no way of knowing that.

“Don’t worry, don’t worry, this tower is quite safe, and it is so rare to have guests, I do love the chance to fill up the… rooms” Gosgos said, ushering them away from the dining room.

There was a yawn that made the jars of jam vibrate.

“Oh I am feeling kinda tired” Loro said.

“See, see, after a bit of rest you’ll feel packed with energy, fit to burst”

“I don’t want to burst, that sounds painful” Kejo objected.

Gosgos shoved him onwards with surprising strength.

“Just a turn of phrase dear boy”

Gosgos led his lethargic charges through the castle dropping them into separate rooms, even Ismi and Yerdl, but by this stage they were far too sleepy to object to being separated. After this job was done he hurried back to the dining room to clear up the mess.

He stared at the smashed jars. The jam was nowhere in sight. Gosgos sneered, no trace of jams was to be found.

“You cannot escape. I’ll deal with all of you later”

As he cleaned up the mess, he didn’t notice that among all the bread that fell on the ground, at Marlequant’s place the bread was crushed and the amount was not two slices. It was three!

While Gosgos was cleaning and cursing, Marlequant was in his room, which he recognised as being a prison cell! He was wide awake!

The cell was of course quite dank. Surprisingly there wasn’t a single jam jar inside it. There was just a hard wooden bench in the shape of a bear in chains hanging from the wall. There was not even any lights. Not even a stay glowing mushroom or luminescent moss. It was probably better that way, seeing as how the walls had fierce accusing faces carved on them.

He lifted up his hat and pulled a jar from under it. A jar with bright orange jam in it. Marlequant may have been a bit of a fop and a little foolish, but he wasn’t so stupid as to dismiss seeing faces in jam twice. There was the knot in his stomach he had about this tower too.

He tapped the jar.

“Hey, wake up”

No reaction.

Marlequant shook the jar.

No reaction.

He carefully took the lid off and put the jar on the ground.

“You aren’t fooling anyone you know” Marlequant said.

No reaction. Marlequant began to wonder if he had been seeing things.

Just then, there was a squirming sound, a slopping sound, and the jam arose up before Marlequant.

“Its useless”

Marlequant gasped.

“I knew it! This tower is a vile place! Don’t worry poor unfortunate, now that I, Marlequant qu Marlequant, am here your troubles are at an end!”

The jam took a more duck-like form and shook its head.

“You may have avoided eating jam, and falling to sleep, but do you really think you are the first to have done so? This tower is not evil, It is Gosgos who is the foul enchanter cursing this place”

Hat in his hands, Marlequant paused. He had trained himself to adventure, to fight evil since he was a small kit, but now. Now there was a real villain spreading ill like jam on unreasonably crunchy bread.

“What is your name, how did you come to be like this? How did Gosgos come to power here?”

“I suppose it will do no harm to tell you. I am Blame, I was once just a lesser member of the Hairburn Bear Clan, now I am but a jam.”

“Wait, aren’t you a duck?”

“I did say I was a lesser member, I was a rare fire duck so, that got me in”

“Ok” Marlequant accepted this.

“Gosgos enchanted all those that lived here in Sunfollow tower, but he did it because he is a servant of the Firelord. Curse his name, curse his pride that he will suffer no flame to exist other than his own. My clan stood strong against the Firelord’s Cinders, but then, that vile enchanter submitted to the Firelord.

He came in the evening, a simple peddler of jams, we fools that we were, took him in and our fate was sealed. Each of us fell to sleep after a feast of jams, and those that did not were taken down directly by Gosgos’s deadly jam magic. He turned us all into jams. Feeding us to unsuspecting travellers then turning those poor people into jams. Troops of the Firelord, sometimes come by taking jams and bringing prisoners to be turned to jam.

He is feeding the armies of the Firelord. Sometimes a brave adventurer will come by, but they too will be turned to jam”

On the surface Fancy Chill was unsettled.

“So many stories ended…” she muttered.

She didn’t really like this. The Firelord was a distasteful creature, a being of pure flame, one who snuffed out his own kin. That wasn’t a kind of story she liked.

Marlequant felt like a fire had been lit in him.

“INJUSTICE! Fear not poor enchanted denizen, for I Marlequant Qu Marlequant will defeat this vile enchanter!”

Marlequant put on his hat and heroically rushed out the room, or at least that was intention.

As it was, he slammed into the prisonbars.