Once Upon a Time: New Fairy Tales Paperback(118)

That was when he realized that he had been gone for hours. Well,

it would not matter, would it? He could always catch up with any

work he did not finish tomorrow. He walked back in the direction of the tower, only becoming lost once. It was dark when he reached it

again. He opened the door and walked in.

There were Professor Owl and Blanchefleur. The Professor was

perched on the table where Ivan had been sitting earlier that day,

scribbling furiously. Blanchefleur was saying, “What did you expect of someone named Idiot? I told you he would be useless.”

“Oh, hello, boy,” said Professor Owl, looking up. “I noticed you

went out for a walk, so I finished all of the notes for today, except Orion. I’ll have that done in just a moment, and then you can sit down for dinner. I don’t think I told you that each day’s updates need to be filed by the end of the day, or the Encyclopedia will be incomplete.

And it has never been incomplete since I started working on it, five hundred years ago.”

“I’ll do it,” said Ivan.

“Do what?” said Blanchefleur. “Go wandering around again?”

“I’ll do the update on Orion.”

“That’s very kind of you,” said Professor Owl. “I’m sure you must

be tired.” But he handed Ivan the pen and hopped a bit away on the

table. It was a lopsided hop: Ivan could tell the owl’s right foot was hurting. He sat and finished the update, conscious of Blanchefleur’s eyes on him. When he was finished, Professor Owl read it over. “Yes, very nice,” he said. “You have a clear and logical mind. Well done, boy.”

Ivan looked up, startled. It was the first compliment he ever

remembered receiving.

“Well, go on then, have some dinner,” said Professor Owl. “And

you’ll be up at dawn tomorrow?”

“I’ll be up at dawn,” said Ivan. He knew that the next day, he

would not go wandering around, at least until after the entries were finished. He did not want Blanchefleur calling him an idiot again in that tone of voice.

v

? 353 ?

? Blanchefleur ?

Summer turned into winter. Each day, Ivan sat at the table in the

tower, updating the entries for the Encyclopedia of All Knowledge.

One day, he realized that he no longer needed to compose the

updates on the backs of Professor Owl’s notes. He could simply

compose them in his head, and then write each update directly onto

the file. He had not learned much in school, but he was learning

now, about things that seemed useless, such as Sponge Cake, and

things that seemed useful, such as Steam Engines, Epic Poetry, and

Love. One morning he realized Professor Owl had left him not only

a series of updates, but also the notes for an entry on a star that had been discovered by astronomers the week before. Proudly and

carefully, he took a blank file card out of the cabinet, composed a new entry for the Encyclopedia of All Knowledge, and filed the card in its place.

He came to write so well and so quickly that he would finish all

of the updates, and any new entries the Professor left him, by early afternoon. After a lunch of soup, for he had never managed to get the kettle to make him anything else, however politely he asked, he would roam around the rocky countryside. Sometimes Blanchefleur

would accompany him, and eventually she allowed him to carry

her on his shoulder without complaining, although she was never

enthusiastic. And she still called him Idiot.

One day, in February although he had lost track of the months,

he updated an entry on the Trojan War. He had no idea what it was,

since he had not been paying attention that day in school. So after he finished his updates, he asked the Encyclopedia. It opened to

the entry on the Trojan War, which began, “It is a truth universally acknowledged that judging a beauty contest between three goddesses causes nothing but trouble.” He read on, fascinated. After that day, he would spend several hours reading through whichever entries took his fancy. Each entry he read left him with more questions, and he

began to wish he could stay with Professor Owl, simply reading the

entries in the Encyclopedia, forever.

But winter turned into summer, and one day the professor said,

? 354 ?

? Theodora Goss ?