The mushroom king lived in a castle. John would have considered it a small castle if he had been his full human height, but from John’s current size, it appeared to be a full size castle. It was made of wood and stones. John suspected some sort of magic had gone into the construction of the castle--the same way some sort of magic was responsible for the castle in which Catherine and Carlyle lived. But not knowing much about magic, more than that John really couldn’t say.
The mushrooms were strange creatures. They looked like ordinary mushrooms, but they had legs and arms coming out of their stem. They also had a face in the mushroom stem--eyes and a mouth and a nose. The mushroom cap looked like a little small hat above their face. Their arms were small and scrawny, but they worked well enough for carrying wooden spears, or clubs, or whatever else the mushroom soldiers carried with them.
After having stayed in the castle for several days, John eventually found his way to the library, where he was absolutely fascinated by all the books he found. If he had thought the library in King Carlyle’s castle was fascinating, the library in the mushroom castle was at least 10 times as fascinating. He marvelled at all the history and literature and wisdom that the mushrooms had collected. It was so fascinating to see what life was like from a mushroom’s perspective. He read about the dynastic intrigues of the royal mushroom family, and the great mushroom wars fought over a century ago. He even read about the various alliances that the mushroom kingdom had formed, or tried to form, with some of the leaf tribes, but the alliances always seemed to break down because of mutual suspicion on both sides.
The king of the mushrooms became very impressed with John, and his growing knowledge of mushroom history. They used to have long talks into the night about various historical mushroom leaders, or famous mushroom philosophers.
Eventually Benjamin the Mouse had to approach John. “We’ve lingered here long enough. It’s time to continue. You are on a mission. You must return to your proper form so that you may help your friends.”
“My friends don’t need my help,” said John. “They’ve never really needed me. Henry and Grace don’t need me. I’m just the little brother that they have to protect.”
“It’s a very dangerous time for the forest right now,” Benjamin persisted.
“It is, but I’d only get in the way,” John said. “I’ve never been any good at fighting. And I’m happy here learning about the history of the mushroom kingdom.”
“Are you saying that this is where you want to stay?”
“Well, not forever of course. But certainly for a few more weeks. There’s so much to learn. And the thing is, if I go to the fairies, and they do change me back, then I can never again walk into the library in the mushroom castle.”
“That is true,” said Benjamin the Mouse. “This is something you can only do now while you’re small.”
“Exactly. So I have to take advantage of this now.”
“I wonder,” said Benjamin. “Is there any way we could use this time to help your friends in Castle Tauna? Perhaps you could convince the mushrooms to join us in our fight against the monsters.”
John laughed. “What a ridiculous idea!” he said. “What good would mushrooms be against giant monsters?”
“Yes, a fair point,” said Benjamin. “Well, I am your friend. If you choose to stay here, I will stay here with you until you are ready to move on. And then we will journey to the land of the fairies together.”
“Thank you,” said John. “I didn’t expect you to stay with me, but it is appreciated. What about the rabbits?”
“Klangor and Starrof?”
“Yes, I’ve been so busy in the library the past few days I’ve practically forgotten about them,” John admitted.
“They’ve grown bored in the mushroom kingdom,” said Benjamin. “So they’re hopping about the forest now. But they haven’t left you. They are still in this general area, and they check back in at least once a day to ask if you’ve decided to move on.”
“Why don’t they just go to the fairy kingdom by themselves?” asked John.
“They claim not to know the way,” said Benjamin.
“But with all the magic around us now, surely it can’t be far. Surely they could find it themselves.”
“Yes, it is puzzling,” Benjamin admitted. “I get the sense that they must have some reason why they can’t go to the land of the fairies themselves, but they won’t say. Perhaps they’ve angered the fairies in the past, and they need you to plead with them.”
“Possibly,” said John. “Although they’ve done very little to ingratiate themselves with me this whole trip.”
“Dragons are not usually good at ingratiating,” said Benjamin. “From their perspective, they’re doing us a huge favor by not eating us.”
“But they’ve been changed into rabbits,” said John. “They couldn’t eat us if they wanted to.”
“I suspect they still expect us to be grateful,” said Benjamin. “Dragons are an odd species.”
“Well, as long as they don’t cause any trouble, I guess they are welcome to wait around for us,” said John. “I hope they’re not trying to eat any more of the sentient leaf armies.”
“I hope so too,” said Benjamin. “I haven’t heard anything, so I guess I’ll assume they’re staying out of trouble until I hear otherwise.”
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