The Last Words of Will Wolfkin by Steven Knight

Author:Steven Knight
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2010-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

Emma and I ate in silence at first. The sounds of swallowing, of putting down cutlery and serving from the cauldron, were deafening. Egil was standing at attention, still as a statue beside the fire, and he was making Emma and me feel distinctly uncomfortable. He was obviously taking his new role extremely seriously.

“Egil, are you not hungry?” I said.

“Servants do not have feelings,” he said evenly.

His stomach rumbled.

“Egil, just sit down and eat something. This is ridiculous.”

“Servants are made of gold,” he said. “Unfeeling. Enduring. Untarnished by age, reflecting only their master’s face—and besides, I know that Princess Emma does not care for my kind.”

“Oh, just sit down and eat,” Emma said, clattering a golden bread plate in front of the chair beside her. Egil quickly sat down at the end and helped himself to stew. Emma and I smiled at the way he shoveled the food onto his plate and then into his mouth.

“It is such a wonderful relief not to have to eat mice and bats,” he said, to explain his eagerness to fill his plate.

“Where I come from we very rarely ate meat,” Emma said.

“And where I come from all I ever ate was white goo,” I said, and we all smiled at our silly competition to have had the hardest life.

“So there,” Egil said, breaking himself some bread. “We are all happier to be here. And I imagine, Toby, that I am now forgiven for rescuing you from the chair.”

“That depends on what comes next,” I said.

“What comes next is your education,” he said.

“And what will our education be like?” Emma asked.

“I don’t know exactly,” Egil said, spooning gravy. “My own education was very short because I am a prodigy.”

“Who will teach us?” Emma asked.

“I believe Earl Hawkin is the first teacher on your timetable,” Egil said.

I was glad to learn Earl Hawkin was to be our teacher. I already felt a connection with him through his musty old books. However, what I was really looking forward to was the bangs and the whizzes of battle.

“They said something about giving us weapons,” I said casually, and Egil shrugged. I could see he wanted to lick his hands, but he controlled himself.

“What kind of weapons will they give us?” I asked, and he glanced at me.

“The Jerlamar will decide what weapons you are given,” he said. “Some go fizz and some go pop and some go bang and some hiss and some shoot fire and some are just the size of a fingernail and are the worse for that. Some are open and loud and some are sly. And of course, one weapon you have already.”

Egil gestured at the pocket in Emma’s calico dress that contained her golden dagger.

“Everyone here is amazed that one so new to the Jerlamar should have been given a head start,” he said, and Emma looked a little embarrassed.

“You don’t realize it, but your little trinket is one of the most mighty weapons there is, and it found you the moment you came under the ice.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.