“Yes,” she said, vanishing into what looked like rows of counters half
a mile long, cooks lined at them, vigorously chopping, clanging pot lids,
whirring machinery, shouting for this or that.
“And you—” the man said. “I’m not seeing you. Who are you?”
“Pierce Oliver.”
“You’re not—” He flung up his hands, his list taking flight, settling
again. “Never mind. What have you got in there?” Pierce pulled the knife out
of his pack. The broad blade picked up light from somewhere, flashed silver.
The man stared at it, his harried face suddenly slack with wonder, as though
he recognized it though he could not remember why or from where. He pulled his
thoughts back together abruptly. “All right. We have seven hundred and
forty-nine knights to feed in seven hours, including the king and his knighted
children. And, of course, everyone else in the palace not invited to the
formal dinner must be fed as well. There are extra uniforms and aprons on that
rack, and an empty station at the third counter. Get dressed, get over there,
and start chopping.”
Pierce threw on black trousers and a tunic, found his place, and began to feed
the knife whatever anyone put within his reach. He had no time to think,
except to marvel that he had somehow muddled his way under the king’s roof.
The knife melted through anything it was given. It minced garlic, chopped
onions, sliced tomatoes, diced potatoes. The wicked edge, neatly balanced,
rocked its way across walnuts or celery as easily as it cleaved slabs of raw
beef into fine ribbons, and fresh chives and parsley into airy flakes. He had
no idea what he was making, only that the thinnest rounds of unpeeled lemon
were involved, endless narrow strips of red pepper, vast quantities of apple
wedges and butterflied prawns.
After an hour or three, Pierce felt he had merged, melted into the kitchen.
Its relentless heat, its endless alphabet of smells, its clatters, whirs,
bangs, whacks, and sizzles had become his skin. His hand had grown a knife at
the end of it; his feet existed in some other universe. He could toss a lime
and part it six different ways before the wedges landed on his board. He could
pare an avocado and catch the falling pieces. He could notch the green end of
an onion in three strokes as it flew. He could julienne a carrot in midair.
He wondered if his father would be among those he would help feed.
He hardly noticed the chaos he was creating around him. Odd strands of light
caught and swirled around the blade, then flashed across the counters,
snagging themselves in metal and steel, in bowls and whisks, in other blades.
Things groaned, smoked, clattered to the floor. Equipment froze or overheated;
squalls of black smoke, hot, oily steam, collided with shouts and curses from
the cooks. Pierce, oblivious, tossed yet another of a seemingly endless supply
of oranges to peel it in one spiraling stroke when he realized abruptly that
the knife was no longer in his hand.
The orange thumped down on his cutting board and bounced off. A woman wearing
the king’s crest on her hat and apron caught it with one hand. With the
other, she laid the knife across the board, where, for the first time in
hours, it was still.
She said succinctly, holding Pierce’s eyes in her dark, furious gaze, “This
is not working. I don’t know you, I don’t know what that knife is, but you
are creating havoc every time you move. Whatever purpose that knife has, it
does not belong in my kitchen. And neither do you. Remove it and yourself so
we can at least try to function again.” Pierce opened his mouth; she pointed
her finger. “Out!”
“I’m sorry—”
“Just go away before something else breaks.”
Pierce tucked the knife into his pack and, following the rigid finger that
seemed to him to point the wrong direction, he slunk out of the kitchen.
He got lost before he could find his way.
He roamed through empty classrooms, dorms, a staff room, and a dining hall
before he found a door around a corner beyond the hangar-sized bathrooms. He
pushed it open and heard the world cheer, as though he had done something of
magnificent import. The cheering died away. A voice spoke loudly,
incoherently. He walked outside, found himself in a small, walled garden with
a couple of benches, shadowed by huge trees with narrow, silvery leaves. A
statue stood among the shadows, its face broken and blurred, its eyes blind
with mold. Its head was angled toward the invisible crowd cheering again
somewhere beyond the old stone wall.