Bedtime Story by Robert J. Wiersema Read Free Book Online

skiffs ferried passengers and supplies to the island.
    “Do you see those mountains?” He pointed at the distant, dark swell that seemed to rise out of the smoky green forests deep inland.
    Matthias nodded.
    The captain moved his fingers as if to trace the mountaintops. “They mark the edge of the kingdom, two days’ ride from here. There is a watchtower on each of the seven passes through the mountains, a ring of soldiers watching the King’s borders every moment of every day. Less than a week ago, three of those towers fell. Those soldiers died defending this land against an army that came under the cover of night, that stole through the gates and slew every man. They took no prisoners.” He took a heavy breath. “Do you know what this all means?”
    Matthias had heard the emotion thick in the man’s voice. “No,” he said quietly.
    “It means the Berok have no interest in diplomacy, no intention of treaty. They will not be satisfied until they level the kingdom to the waterline, taking every man, woman and child with it. They will not be satisfied until the crown falls in the dirt, until it can be crushed beneath their heels.”
    Matthias nodded slowly, thinking about the savage Berok warriors just over the rise, picturing the village below in flames, the screams of his mother, of Arian—
    “These are desperate times, Matthias.”

    I got David to school about five minutes later than normal, but still well before the opening bell. Not a crisis. On the walk home I started mentally composing my column, trying to find the perfect opening line. Once I had that, everything else would fall easily into place.
    I usually spent Monday mornings, after the real writing was done, working on my column for the
Vancouver Sun
. It would be nice if my fiction paid the bills, but that was still a fair ways off, especially with how late the new book was. I had been writing
Off the Shelf
for almost five years. It gave me the best of both worlds: a regular pay cheque, and the freedom to spout off on whatever I wished.
    I brought up my e-mail and poured myself another cup of coffee, set David’s book on the desk next to the laptop.
    I winced as the new message headers started to pop up. I had been waiting for an e-mail from Roger, my agent, for a couple of weeks, and here it was. He would, no doubt, just be confirming dinner for when I was in New York in a couple of weeks, but the subtext would be plain:
Where’s the new book, Chris?
    Ignoring the looming shadows of the inevitable, I opened a Google window and typed “Lazarus Took” into the search block.
    Google came up with 947 hits.
    Several of the entries on the first page were rare books dealers—I ignored them for the moment and clicked on the link to Wikipedia.
    The entry on Lazarus Took was a stub, little more than a paragraph.
    Lazarus Emile Took was an English writer, briefly popular in the mid-1940s. His first novel,
Shining Swords and Steel
, was published by Bartley-Knox in 1945. A purveyor of clichéd, derivative, post–Second World War British fantasy, Took benefitted from the new popularity of the paperback format for his readership, and is rightly overshadowed by his contemporaries including C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien.
    Not really useful, and it looked like the page hadn’t been updated in years. It was strange to think that in the age of the Internet, whenpeople could get obsessed about the most meaningless of things—from obscure silent film stars to the toys inside Cracker Jack boxes—no one seemed to have the slightest interest in “derivative, post–Second World War British fantasy.”
    The next hit made me feel better immediately. The LazarusTook.com page was entitled “Servants Bold, Treasures Untold” and described itself as “The Ultimate Resource for Readers of Lazarus Took.” I clicked on its Books page, and scrolled down, looking for mention of
To the Four Directions
. Nothing. The final book listed was
Long Journey Home
, published in