Dominoes

by Barbara Gaskell Denvil

  “I can teach you, if you like,” offered Zakmeister.

  “That’s a horrible idea,” said Sam, pulling a face. “But one thing I would love to learn, and you’re really good at it so you could teach me loads. That’s magic. With this silver stuff on my finger, can I learn magic?”

  “A far more interesting idea.” Zakmeister nodded, smiling. “I’ll certainly try it out.”

  They were interrupted by Messina and Bayldon sweeping into the living room and Granny calling from the kitchen. “Lunchtime,” she called. “Who’s hungry?”

  “And how is young Sam?” asked Bayldon.

  Messina was already carrying the glass jar with the one remaining creature, which was flat on the base as though asleep. “Vile thing. I have studied it for five long hours but cannot discover a single thing of interest. I only see that this one has grown much fatter since it ate the one you squashed, Zak. But it does nothing. It makes no effort to escape. Nor can it escape.”

  “We thought that about those wretched stars,” Granny reminded her, marching in from the kitchen. “And we still have no idea how that happened. I believe we should keep that thing under constant watch.”

  Ferdinand, sitting comfortably on Granny’s shoulder, spread both small arms. “In the meantime, my illustrious lords,” he said in a squeak, “our delectable meal is ready and waiting on the kitchen table. After the work involved to cook and set, we must not leave it to grow cold.”

  Laughing, Messina and Bayldon hurried into the kitchen behind Granny, while Zakmeister and Sam followed. Sherdam was already sitting at the table, spoon in hand. Although Granny had brought over and introduced the fork, which had never existed in Lashtang before, few bothered to use it. They thought it was new-fangled. But Sam thought this new-fangled fork thing was wonderful, and picked up his, ready to eat.

  While dishing out hot spaghetti in tomato sauce with minced meat and beans, followed by cherry pie and custard, Granny was also talking. “I have,” she said, “attempted to communicate with the creature in the jar. I believe it is some state or servant of Yaark or the Hazletts. But I can’t claim to have had any success. Whether it hears me or not, I have no idea. Most certainly it doesn’t speak back and I’m not going to risk taking the lid off the jar. I dislike even touching the glass. But somehow we have to decide what it is, and what to do with it.”

  “I’ll take it to Sparkan,” said Sam, his mouth full of cherries and custard, “and chuck the whole thing in the volcano. That’s what killed the other stars.”

  “Do we know that for sure?”

  “My silver finger said so.”

  “Your silver finger,” said Granny at once, “needs examining too, young man. We should remember to ask it those things we can’t work out for ourselves.”

  Messina leaned across the table. “Ask about these jelly creatures,” she said. “Clearly they can be most dangerous, and we knew nothing of them until after capturing Yaark and discovering he wasn’t alone.”

  Sam gulped down the last of his pudding and held up his finger in the sunlight. He put his elbow on the table, with his finger sticking up, all its silver polish glowing, more like moonlight than sunlight. His hair, also silver, shone around it.

  “Please,” he asked, “can you tell us about the horrid red lumpy things that tried to stick to me and attack me? There’s still one here in this glass jar. Is it safe? Should we kill it? And how would we do that?”

  The silver pools looking like moonlight seemed to grow until Sam was shining too. It seemed a long time before the voice came but everyone sat very silent, waiting for a magical answer. Finally the soft even voice whispered from the ceiling.

  “In the beginning of time,” it said, while the echo seeming to float above their heads, “there were great magicians. The greatest was Merlin, and he chose to rule the Earth. This is a great planet which has changed many times over millions of years. Lashtang was the choice of Mandabella, a wise and beautiful wizard. Sparkan, although very small, was all that was left for the wizard Mimster Hazlett, who became very cross at getting the smallest place of all.” Lights sparkled as the echo bounced around the room. “But none of them knew of the very small world, which was very far away, hurtling through space. A Lashtang scientist named it Meteor K.E. 869.”

  Messina smiled to Sam with encouragement, and the voice carried on, “The meteor was populated by several tiny species, and one of these is a lumbering jelly-ox, which is used by the more intelligent creatures to dig, grow food, pull weights, and generally obey. But it is a thing which suffers from great hunger. It has no intelligence, but it will hunt for food wherever it goes, having no knowledge of right or wrong, and will use its suckers where it smells warmth, meat and blood. The two other creatures living on the meteor are the parrot-folk and the star-thieves. The parrot-folk rule the meteor, and are generous kind, and clever. But the star-thieves have no proper bodies of their own, and will steal another body if they can, draining out its brain and identity, and replacing that with their own. Most are wicked and cruel, although some are patient, only looking for an easy life.

  “Rap-Eye, one of the parrot-folk who was voted king and ruler of the meteor many years ago, exiled eight of the star-thieves, for they had broken all the laws and started fights and great trouble, trying to take the bodies of both parrots-folk and jelly-oxen.”

  “The eight wicked star-thieves were forced from the meteor and left to find other homes. The most wicked and cruel of all these, but also the cleverest, was Yaark. After a long journey, he and his friends arrived here. They brought some jelly-oxen with them to do any hard work and attempted to settle down. Seven did, with varied success, living happily within the volcano. But Yaark wanted more. And that,” said the voice, “is the story.”

  Everyone was sitting quietly and listening attentively. Messina, Granny, Zakmeister, Bayldon and Sherdam all knew the story of the wizards and the beginning of Lashtang, but they had never heard of the meteor and the star-thieves. Naturally Sam had known none of it and was fascinated.

  “I love that story,” he said. “I must tell the others when I see them next. I wish they’d come home.”

  “So do I,” said Bayldon. “I worry about Poppy.”

  “She’s very good at looking after herself,” smiled Sam. “I wouldn’t worry about her. But I’ll ask my silver magic.”

  “Remember, only three questions,” Granny reminded him. “I think you already asked three. Maybe four.”

  Sam asked anyway, hoping for the best, “Where’s all my friends?” But no voice came back to him, and his fingertip stayed pale. “Oh dear,” he said. “I’m so sorry. After being so scared by that jelly thing, that’s all I could think of.”

  Messina got up slowly from the table and walked across to Granny. “Let’s go out into the garden,” she suggested. “You and I together, I think, have the power to discover more.”

  Sam whispered, “Can I come?”

  Messina relented. “While the danger with Yaark and the unknown creatures was a threat of considerable and fearful possibility, I had no sense of urgency in discovering where Nathan, Poppy and their friends are. It seemed unwise to haul them back to a place about to be destroyed. However, now I feel safe concerning our position here, I am far more worried about what might be happening to the others.” She turned to Granny. “Can we devise our own system of questions and answers?”

  “We’ve sent Hermes to search,” said Granny. “Just because he hasn’t returned yet, doesn’t mean he’s seen nothing.”

  “I need something more helpful, and far quicker,” Messina said, sitting on the garden bench beside her mother.

  “Very well,” said Granny, leaning back and closing her eyes against the strong sunbeams. “Sherdam and I tried this concerning the Jellies. Our answers were vague, but we were at least able to discover that the jelly things were slaves of Yaark. That alone felt like a small success. And Sam’s clever magic has confirmed it.” She smiled down at Sam who was sitting on the grass
at her feet.

  “Try it now,” said Messina.

  And Granny raised both her arms straight up into the air and began to speak. “From the world of men to the world of spirit, we need guidance,” she murmured. Her fingers began to move in strange ways, first pointing to each other and then pointing away, flexing and twisting like tiny serpents. Her eyes were tight shut, and she murmured again to herself. This time the words made no sense. “Estimable, erristaple. Tangible. Nomabulittle.”

  “Gracious,” whispered Messina. “I don’t know that spell.”

  Sam felt his spine tingle and it was a good feeling. Granny straightened her fingers again and three jets of light flooded from both hands. Finally her fingers closed into fists, and she cried loudly, “Show me my grandson. Show me my granddaughter. Show me the means to rescue them both and bring them home.”

  At first and for just a moment, Messina was disappointed. Yet Sam grinned, sure that the tingle he felt meant success. Then, as if a huge hand had wiped the screen, the sky cleared, and a series of blurred pictures began to form. But these pictures moved, racing across the clouds like a huge fast film, and Granny, Messina and Sam had to run around in order to see what these pictures showed.

  “A man with swords and knives and funny clothes and big boots,” pointed Sam. “Looks like a pirate.”

  “He’s gone. There’s someone else instead. No, it’s John.” Messina was running in the opposite direction.

  Granny bumped into them both. “There’s Poppy. And she’s laughing fit to bust. That great big fat man is laughing too. And the one in armour with a crown on his head.”

  “Ridiculous.”

  Sam twirled, nearly fell over, and twirled again. “It’s Alfie. There’s Nat. There’s Alice. Look – they’re all together.”

  “I can see young Peter. He’s running after that other man in grand clothes.”

  “I recognise that one,” said Granny, frowning and distinctly puzzled. “That’s that wretched King Henry VIII. The one who killed his wives. Divorced, beheaded, died. Divorced, beheaded, survived. What on earth is he doing there?”

  “Where is there?” demanded Messina.

  The pictures were not accompanied by sound, and it was hard to guess what was going on when you had to run to keep up with them, and they were running too. Then, completely out of breath, Sam flopped down on the grass, and the pictures went black. The darkness surrounded everybody, both on the ground and in the sky, and the confusion increased. Finally they saw the sudden fire dance above the volcanic mountain. The sparks flew high, the flames seemed to simmer like boiling water, and the lava slipped down the mountainside like burning ashes carrying the scarlet glow of embers. Smoke formed a great ugly mist, but was burst asunder by another fiery explosion.

  “They’re all on Sparkan,” decided Messina. “Oh what a relief. All together and all safe.”

  “I’m not sure I’d call Sparkan safe,” decided Granny. “But everyone is laughing, and everyone appears happy. That’s good enough for me.”

  “But there’s other people there too,” said Sam. “Who’s that?”

  And Messina stared. “Good heavens above,” she said, mouth open in shock. “I think that’s Deben. He’s the false Ninester, but he looks just like Brewster and Wagster. Deben is their ancestor, that marks the time when the fair-haired wizard rulers, like Krillester and those before him, and like the real Ninester, suddenly became black haired, tall and skinny as young cypress trees.”

  “Yes. I’ve seen a portrait of Deben. That’s him,” said Granny.

  “And there’s the real Ninester.”

  And as the pictures faded away and then stopped altogether, Zakmeister, Sherdam and Bayldon came running out into the garden.

  “What have you discovered, my love?” asked Bayldon.

  “That our children are safe and fine and happy,” Messina replied. “So now we have to make a decision about that horrible jelly thing.”

  “The jelly-oxen which Sam told us about. But didn’t tell us how to get rid of it.” Sherdam sat down on the garden bench, leaning back in the sunshine. “I think it should be done as soon as possible, before it finds a way to escape.”

  “It can’t,” Messina insisted.

  “But I’d bet Yaark could rescue it if he wished,” said Zakmeister.

  “If this thing is simply Yaark’s servant, then he’d not bother to rescue it,” decided Sam.

  But Zakmeister disagreed. “It was sent to confuse and frighten us. Perhaps to drink our brains. That’s the sort of thing Yaark would encourage.”

  “He does it himself.”

  “Is Yaark a ‘he’? “wondered Granny. “I suppose all these vile things are just ‘it’, neither male nor female.”

  “But they must have babies,” objected Sam, “or there wouldn’t be any left.”

  Zakmeister avoided this subject. “I simply believe the jelly-thing should be quickly destroyed. Into a fire, squashed underfoot, or blown up with magic.”

  “|I imagine Yaark already has it protected by magic,” sighed Messina, “but I shall try. It’s time. We have to think of other things, and not just spend our lives staring into glass jars.”

  Sherdam laughed. “Back to the golden figs.”

  “Back to the children,” said Bayldon. “I want Nathan and Poppy back. And all the others too.”

  Once again the glass jar was placed on the kitchen table, with everyone sitting around staring at the creature trapped inside. It had grown,. And was considerably fatter, having eaten its companion. But it was also more placid, as though eating had kept it contented. It sat, looking asleep, on the glass base and did not move. Its ten arms were curled beneath it and it made no sound.

  Three times Messina used her magic to destroy the thing, but on the first two attempts, nothing happened except a quiver of jelly. On the third attempt, it was the glass jar that quivered, and the jelly-ox turned a startling somersault and landed back with a plop.

  Finally Messina began a different form of magic. She stood, pointed directly at the jar, and sounding almost angry, she spoke seven very strange words.

  Immediately the jar exploded, and every piece of it disappeared in a flash of shattered glass. Once the red smoke had cleared, there was no sign remaining of glass or the jelly creature. “I just hope it wasn’t simply blown somewhere else,” muttered Zakmeister.

  “Well, if it has,” frowned Messina, “it can simply go and pull carts and do the hard work for its master.”

  Granny frowned too, as though she thought this was quite possible. But before she could say a thing, through the open door from the garden strutted Hermes. He was a little out of breath but appeared happy enough as he stretched his wings and flopped down beside the table. “Ah, my illustrious friends, the illustrious empole is indeed safe –,” and then stopped. “What a very odd smell,” he said, surprised.

  “Not chocolate cake this time,” smiled Granny. “More of a jelly-monster.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “My puppy. Smudge has run off,” yelled Ninester in panic. “He was asleep inside my coat. Now he’s not anywhere. He’s run away. He’ll get eaten by volcanoes.” And Ninester burst into tears, then buried his head in his hands.

  Richard III looked at everyone else, made a quick decision, and walked off across the wild grasses and small hillocks. “I shall look,” he said without bothering to turn. “What size is this dog?”

  “Little. Brown. Baby. Big brown eyes,” sniffed Ninester, wiping the tears off on his sleeve.”

  Henry V handed him a kerchief. “Keep your chin up, fellow,” he said with strident impatience. “Warriors do not sob over their animals.”

  “Well, I do,” objected Ninester. “I have a cuddly llama and I love him very much. But Little Smudge wriggled and cuddled up and licked my ear, and that was even better.”

  “I have no idea what a llama is,” frowned Henry V, “but if the creature doesn’t react to anything, then you should get rid of it. It’s probably d
ead.”

  Ninester promptly burst into tears again. Violet Crinford looked as though she was ready to cry too, but she kept a straight and angry face, and went to sit down on a large stone next to a tall flowering cactus.

  Henry VIII and the brigands had shared some tankards of ale and were arguing about what was going to happen in the future. Neither Paolo nor Gino believed that Henry could be the king of England in some years to come, but Enzo, the smallest of the brigands, was perfectly willing to accept the idea. “We can travel across many miles of land,” he insisted. “Why can we not travel also along time?”

  “But we do already,” objected the captain. “But in the right order. Not topsy turvy and upside down.”

  “We go beginning to end. Not end to beginning,” agreed Podge.

  “Pazzo,” said another brigand. “Sieti tutti pazzi.”

  “That sounds like an ice cream,” said Poppy. “Next time I go to an ice cream shop, I’ll ask for a tutti pazzi.”

  “No. Tutti fruiti.”

  This argument faded as Richard III reappeared carrying the puppy, and Ninester cheered up immediately, holding out his arms for Smudge to be returned to him. Richard III smiled and handed it over. “A delightful hound,” he said. “But I doubt it’s the right breed for future hunting.”

  “I don’t want to hunt anything,” said Ninester with a sniff. “I just want to cuddle things. Cuddly things are nice. And Little Smudge likes cuddles as much as I do.”

  Richard III appeared puzzled at first, but then smiled, his eyes softening. “My wife and son – yes. When I was a child only my elder brother ever took me in his arms. They are good memories.”

  Henry V glanced over. “My best memories are the great battlefields of victory in France, the turbulent seas as I took my men back home, the huge cheers of the crowd as we marched through the countryside, my horse prancing. And then home, the comfort and velvets in soft candlelight after the clash of steel, the cries of the men and the sunlight harsh on the blade of my sword.”