Leprechaun Wars 6/16
6
As they stepped through the door, Mel and Marky gawped from the top of a set of descending green steps. Jack's pot-o-gold was just inside the door next. An assortment of medium-sized leprechauns (none within a foot of the height of Jack, but some husky, a few even big-boned for Leprechauns) lined either side of the rail-free staircase. A pair to every other step.
"This place is as big as a basketball stadium."
"A very green basketball stadium," said Marky.
The green stairs that Marky and Mel began to descend would have been nearly directly behind the visitor's basket, but it wasn't the only set of stairs descending from the wall. There were 24 other sets of steps down each side of the massive hall. Each had a door at the top. Each were doubly lined by Leprechauns.
As they descended the stairs, they could see that their sister and the leprechauns were walking, swift and confident, straight to the throne which sat 6/7ths of the way to the other end of the massive hall.
"Come on." Marky bounded down the stairs, and jogged to catch up to the rest of the group.
"Marky!" Mel hissed through his teeth. "What are you doing? You can't run in a leprechaun's throne room."
"It's not a library," Marky hollered back, skipping backwards while he talked, and then turning to resume his jog.
Mel apologized to the closest leprechaun guard, who shrugged his shoulders and said, "Whatcha' gonna do?"
Mel joined the group fifteen seconds after they had been greeted by the queen. The group of leprechauns that had been waiting before the queen's throne moved to the side. They had already kneeled and stood back up. Mel put a knee awkwardly to the ground and then stood back up himself.
Marky was in the middle of addressing the queen, " . . . and may the stars shine upon our meeting."
The Queen, petite even for a leprechaun, looked like a single tea cup trying to fill the whole table as she sat on the large throne. There was a tall, thin legged, long-haired, snow-white goat with a single, scimitar shaped horn lounging on the ground to the right of the throne. A white lion with an oversized shaggy mane and enormous feathered wings, sat to the left, wings folded along his sides.
The queen turned her attention to Mel. "Mellencamp, you are a welcome guest. All of the comforts that I have to offer are yours."
Mellencamp began to speak as he stood. "Thank you ma'am, I am sorry that we have . . ." He stopped midsentence, mouth open. The silence thickened, then matured. Tip and Snap, who were standing in front of Bea, Mel, and Marky and between Smith and Jack, turned their heads and growled. Bea and Marky elbowed Mel from either side, and he looked, first at Marky, pointed at the queen, then swiveled his head around to Bea, mouth still opened, still pointing at the queen, squeaked weakly. "She . . . she . . . Ouch!"
Jack had taken a half step backwards and trod heavily on Mel's toes. "Though I am sure that Mel is going to try and apologize for their presence, they are here because, for some reason," Jack paused and looked right at the queen, who looked back without expression, "the Witch Sisters attacked their house."
"Technically, it was just my house." Bea was speaking to the Queen, who turned her head to look at Bea and pressed her lips to the side like she was trying to place a frustratingly difficult puzzle piece. "My brothers still live at home with Mom and Dad."
Jack's head had fallen into his hand, where he was shaking it slowly and muttering something under his breath.
"Prince Jackson." The queen cocked her head slightly to the side and kept looking at Bea. "Why were you being pursued by the Witch Sisters in the first place? Did they have reason to . . . to be . . . perturbed?"
"My Queen," said Jack, "why do you use words that so obviously taste unpleasant?" Jack smiled a brother-torturing-his-sister smile. "And yes. They had reason. I broke out after they leprenapped me." Jack turned back and looked at Marky. "Did you hear that one? Leprenapped. I thought of that one when I was back watching Little House. I didn'tah think I'd get to use it so soon."
"Jack." The queen dropped her head back and let her shoulders sag. "Court." she swept her hand as she lifted back into a straight-backed throne-worthy posture. "Manners."
"My Queen," Smithsonian bowed deeply at the waist, one hand folded across his chest, the other fully extended to the side and then graced to a full standing position with his left foot turned out at an angle. "As always, your patience with the antics of your brother do honor to the throne upon which you sit. If I might interject myself . . ."
"No, Duke." The Queen spoke calmly but firmly. "I must retire." She leaped from the throne in order to stand before it. A thousand leprechaun soldiers, standing guard up and down a thousand green steps descending from 49 white doors, along with Tip and Snap thwacked to attention simultaneously. Marky smiled and snapped to attention himself.
Mel, whose jaw still quivered a bit on its hinges, looked around, then at the Queen of the Northern Leprechauns several times. "Um . . ." he squeaked. Then tentatively raised his hand.
Jack took a half step back to stand next to Mel, put a hand into his elbow-pit and pulled it back down. "Not here. And not now, young Mellencamp."
The queen had turned around and walked through a short door behind the throne. Jack spoke to the group without looking away from the door where his sister had just retired, "Bea, Marky, and Mel, follow me. Tip and Snap, you are released until you are summoned again by Her Majesty. Smithsonian, go send your hat over a waterfall without taking it off your head."
Jack raised his eyebrows with deliberation then walked with purpose towards the small door that his sister had gone through. Bea, Mel, and Marky followed.