‘Look I’m sorry it …’
Cindy held up a hand and shook her head. ‘I corrupted and ruined him,’ she said, ‘and then you saved him – as far as you could after all I had done. Thank you.’
Tamar bowed her head. ‘Where will you go?’ she said.
‘Oh, here and there, I’m not sure. We’ll be back sometime. In the meantime.’ she held her arms out tentatively and Tamar grabbed her in a sudden hug. ‘Don’t stop saving the world,’ said Cindy.
* * *
A night out was called for it was agreed, and Iffie graciously suggested Griff’s, as long as they did not embarrass her in front of her friends.
‘It’s like an open mic’ night on Thursday,’ she said. ‘Dad could sing. He hasn’t sung for like an age and a half, and he’s not bad for an old guy,’ she teased. ‘They have a band and everything.’
They went, and Denny did sing too.
Ali, Iffie’s best friend since like forever, was in mourning to hear that Jack was off the market, but when Denny took to the stage she seemed to perk right up. ‘Ooh, she nudged her friend. He’s lovely isn’t he?’ (Ali was also a witch)
‘Eeeuw!’ said Iffie, ‘that’s my dad. Don’t be gross.’
‘Is it? But look at him. He has the body of a teenager.’
‘That’s the rumour,’ said Iffie acidly. ‘But no one knows where he keeps it.’
‘Now who’s being gross?’ said Ali, as Jack snorted into his drink with sudden laughter. And she marched off in mortification.
‘That was … weird,’ said Jack.
‘Oh, anything in trousers that one,’ said Iffie dismissively. But in reality she was a little disturbed. The fact was, it was just coming home to her that her family were not like other people. Her dad, up on that stage, and her mum, fending off admirers with an icy glare, hardy looked any older than herself. And what was more, they never would. Pretty soon, they would be like contemporaries. The incident with Ali proved it. It was already happening.
She shrugged. Well if you can’t beat them … or something similar but more relevant. In any case, might as well get with the program.
She had a pretty mean singing voice herself, and she could play the guitar like a maestro – something her dad had never mastered, despite years of effort.
She jumped up on the stage to cheers and catcalls, swung her guitar – which she had had to call for, because manifested ones were always out of tune – and struck up a beat.
‘Come on dad,’ she said. ‘Let’s rock this joint.’
* * *
‘Peace at last,’ said Denny later at home, referring to both the state of the world and the fact that the moment it had all never happened all the Agency people and magic folk who had hijacked their living space had mysteriously never been there at all.
‘For now at least,’ said Tamar. ‘You know it never lasts long.’
‘Killjoy,’ said Denny lazily. ‘Thank “us” for the paradox file,’ he added. ‘Ever since we thought of shoving old Askphrit into one it’s been invaluable – ’specially this time. Have I told you you’re a genius lately?’
‘Not lately,’ she said, preening in the mirror.
‘Well you are,’ he said.
‘It was you who thought up the whole idea of a paradox file,’ she said generously. ‘Of course, it was also you who crashed the mainframe and fractured reality. That could have been really nasty I suppose. What if someone had slipped through the cracks?’
‘Hey, it was your idea to crash it, not mine,’ said Denny half sitting up on the bed – where he had been lounging – in his indignation. ‘I’m just the technical support around here.’
‘You’re a lot more than that and you know it,’ she said fondly.
‘It was still your idea,’ he said mulishly. ‘And stop trying to get round me.’
‘Well, they didn’t anyway,’ she said. ‘We’d have heard about it by now if they had. And yes okay, it was my idea, I admit it. But you pulled it off beautifully,’ she added snaking up the bed towards him.
‘Forget it woman,’ he said turning over on to his face in a mock sulk. ‘You aren’t getting around me that easily.’
She pulled him round to face her. ‘Like you said,’ she told him. ‘Peace at last. ‘Let’s make the most of it while it lasts. Who knows what tomorrow will bring.’
~ Epilogue ~
When the bottle washed up on shore, the castaway thought about the irony for a little while – he was supposed to send a message in a bottle, not receive one. But still, it was the most interesting thing that had happened in years. That’s how boring it was here. It was a shame that it was obviously not the kind of bottle likely to contain spirits, particularly considering that it was still tightly sealed.
He sat and looked at it for a very long time – well there was no point in rushing it. It might be years again before anything else happened. That’s the problem with a desert island. It’s not all swimming in the lagoon and falling in love with your sister.
He had never had a bottle before (well, he had never had anything except coconuts and sand). It gave him an idea. He could send a message in a bottle now. Well, he could if he had something to write with. And something to write on.
Eventually he opened the bottle.
When he regained consciousness, the Djinn was still there – a touch of the sun? After all these years, it seemed unlikely.
It was grinning at him, apparently enjoying the joke immensely.
‘Wish I could see what’s so damn funny,’ thought the castaway. ‘I could do with a good laugh.’ Then he realised that he was the joke.
‘Nice place,’ said the Djinn. ‘And I like the hair. What is that look called, shabby chic?’
This was a bit rich coming from this overdressed buffoon, thought the castaway.
‘This is a desert island,’ he said. ‘I was shipwrecked.’
‘I’m talking to a figment of my imagination,’ he thought. He was not in the least distressed by this idea. He had done it before. But they were usually women, and they were not usually so convincingly real. They did not usually talk back to him either, although he had often wished they would.
‘Sorry.’ said the Djinn. ‘I didn’t realise. I thought you were some sort of a hippy or rock star or something and talking of that …’
‘Who are you? What do you want?’
‘Straight down to business eh?’ said the Djinn. ‘Do excuse me, I just thought we could socialise a bit first, you know, get to know each other, but have it your own way – you are the master after all. And speaking of that, it’s really more a question of what you want.’
‘Well, getting off this island would be favourite,’ said the castaway.
‘We-ell yes, I can see that,’ said the Djinn. ‘But is that really the limit of your ambitions? I can give you so much more you see. Three wishes. Anything you want, anything at all. Three wishes,’ he repeated, to emphasise his point.
‘Three eh?’ said the castaway. ‘So if you get me out of here – and that really is wishful thinking,’ he punned atrociously. ‘I’d still have two left like?’
‘But if you make the right three wishes, you see, you could get yourself off this island and have everything in the universe that you can dream of,’ said the Djinn helpfully. ‘Supposing you had the same powers that I have for instance.’
‘Why, what powers do you have?’ asked the castaway interestedly.
The Djinn drew himself up importantly. ‘I am omnipotent, omniscient and immortal,’ he said.
‘I wish I was,’ said the castaway gloomily.
‘Well, that was easy,’ thought Askphrit, carefully burying the bottle deep in the sand. ‘That should hold him for a few thousand years at least,’ he thought. ‘I don’t want this one coming after me. No mercy this time.
‘Speaking of which, I wonder what ever happened to Tamar Black?’
COMING SOON
THE FINALE!
TAMAR BLACK TAKES HER LAST BOW
Denny should never have crashed the mainframe!
Rebooting was the easy bit, making sure all the deleted files did not reboot was a little harder. He should have been more careful.
Now the mythological age is back, in fact, it never went away. The Greek gods are still on Mount Olympus, and the clerks in mainframe are furious and insisting that Tamar and Denny fix it. Right now!
The only problem is, they have to go back to when the age of myths was supposed to have ended and make sure that it does.
Well, that’s not the only problem …
Also by Nicola Rhodes
SCI ‘ON The Shadow Worlds
The first book in the SCI ‘ON Trilogy
Whenever a decision is taken that is of significance to the world, the world divides and two alternate futures are created. In the beginning, there was only one world. That world we name SCI ‘ON. All other worlds that sprang from it, we name the shadow worlds. Some believe SCI ‘ON is the only real world and that all others are mere reflections, hence the name. Others believe that all the alternate worlds are equally real and important – however they may have come into being.
Whatever the case, one thing is certain. If SCI ‘ON itself – the cradle of creation– were to be destroyed, all other worlds would cease to exist. For SCI‘ON is the mainspring and without it, the shadow worlds would have no point of origin.
Johnny Hammond is not your ordinary computer nerd. He has the makings of a hero. When a mysterious man shows him the way To SCI ‘ON, Johnny becomes obsessed. And only he can find a way to get there through the myriad shadow worlds that stand in his way. But someone doesn’t want him to get there.
From earliest childhood, Ryan and Kai have been best friends. The fact that they come from separate universes is not allowed to stand in their way.
As they grow up, they realise that this ability to travel between the worlds is no mere coincidence, as their ultimate destiny unfolds.
SCI ‘ON II - Legacies
Even his own mother, from the moment he was born, was afraid of Talvas, for she knew whence he had come and wondered what his power would be.
Talvas Firebrand, later known as Talvas de Bellême and “The Destroyer of Worlds” was the son of Toros the fire god. His story and that of the other Undying begins on SCI ‘ON back at the beginning.
Watching him from his citadel beyond time is Johnny Hammond, the only man in all creation capable of defeating Talvas and stopping the slaughter of millions.
What will happen when these adversaries finally meet again in a new cycle of time?
About the Author
Nicola Rhodes often can’t remember where she lives so she lives inside her own head most of the time, where even if you do get lost, it’s still okay.
She has met many interesting people inside her own head and eventually decided to introduce the rest of the world to them, in the hopes that they would stop bothering her and let her sleep.
She has been doing this for ten years now, but they still won’t leave her alone.
She is married to the long suffering Mike who lives in Derby because he is not crazy (well not much anyway) and they have three girls between them.
She wrote this book for fun and does not care if you take away a moral lesson from it or not.
www.makerofmagic.co.uk
Table Of Contents
In the same series
~ Chapter One ~
~ Chapter Two ~
~ Chapter Three ~
~ Chapter Four ~
~ Chapter Five ~
~ Chapter Six ~
~ Chapter Seven ~
~ Chapter Eight ~
~ Chapter Nine ~
~ Chapter Ten ~
~ Chapter Eleven ~
~ Chapter Twelve ~
~ Chapter Thirteen ~
~ Chapter Fourteen ~
~ Chapter Fifteen ~
~ Chapter Sixteen ~
~ Chapter Seventeen ~
~ Chapter Eighteen ~
~ Epilogue ~
COMING SOON
Also by Nicola Rhodes
About the Author
Rise Of The Nephilim (The Tamar Black Saga) Page 23