Jan’s father closed his eyes. “This is not a threat,” he said wearily. “It is a warning. I have sat in this chair for many years now, and as the vines grew deeper into my flesh, and then my veins, binding me to both the throne and the people, I came to know their lives, and their hearts. This has brought me great wisdom.” He gave his son a sad smile. “Alas, the wisdom comes far too late for me. But not for you, Jan. Not for you. I tell you only what I have learned. Forgive me, or carry me like a stone for all the days of your life.”

Kneeling, clutching his father’s hand, Jan gazed up into the eyes he knew so well, though it had been so long since he last had seen them. Hurt boiled within him, acid in his veins. So much lost. So much lost.

“I am more sorry than I can tell you,” whispered his father.

Jan blinked, then nodded. He tightened his grip on his father’s hand. “I forgive you,” he whispered.

Then he dropped his head against his father’s knees and wept, until the knot of his anger had turned to water as salty as the sea and flowed its way out of his heart.

“Now go,” whispered his father at last. “Go out into the world. The ship is yours. It will take you anywhere you want to go. But one thing I beg of you, Jan. When you find what you love . . . stop looking.”

An hour later Jan and Samos stood on the beach where they had landed. Jan took the golden coin from his pocket and flung it into the air. It spun high in a glittering arc. As it passed the peak, began to move away from the sky and back toward the sea, it changed into a ship, tiny but growing.

“Where shall we go?” asked Samos, as they climbed aboard.

Jan started to answer, but the words caught in his throat. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, tried again. “Where shall we go? Anywhere we want! After all . . . I’m a free man.”

The Golden Sail caught the wind. The sea air was fresh and sweet in their nostrils. A gull cawed and wheeled above them. Beyond the gull they saw a single bright star, the first star of evening.

A mermaid sang in the distance.

And the ship sailed on.

Biscuits of Glory

I AM HAUNTED by biscuits—Elvira Thistledown’s biscuits, to be more precise. But I don’t have any regrets. If I had it to do over again, I would still eat one, if only to free that poor woman from her curse. I’d do it even knowing how it was going to affect the rest of my life.