by T. H. Hunter
“That,” Barry said, reading our bewildered expressions correctly, “is the school emblem.”
“A hedgehog?” asked Val in disbelief.
“It is a most noble animal,” said Barry. “But don’t worry, they will bore the pants off of you at the school in regard to all of this trivia. Quickly, now, before the portal closes again. We have to get our luggage in first.”
I grabbed one of the suitcases closest to me. Stepping in front of the portal, I gently placed it against the wall – or so I thought. For the wall was no longer solid, and the suitcase went right through, vanishing within seconds. Val, desperate not to miss the fun, tried one of her bags, with the same effect. Soon enough, we had all but a few handbags inside the portal.
First, it was Barry’s turn to go through, and then Val. I had to step through last because I had to speak the incantation that would close the portal from our side. It was a delayed-action spell of Barry’s own invention that no longer necessitated a witch or warlock to remain behind.
After Barry and Val had passed through the portal, it was my turn. But for some reason, I found myself hesitating. For one mad moment, I thought of staying within the secure walls of Fickleton House, with nothing else to worry about than having to start the crackling fire in the morning room or Mrs. Faversham burning my bacon every once in a while. But then, as I remembered the desperate letter we had received from Warklesby’s School of Magic, the madness passed as soon as it had come, and I spoke the final incantation, stepping into the portal shortly after.
Chapter 3
Transport within the portal system was a lot more violent and uncomfortable than I had anticipated. It was like being sucked into a massive vacuum cleaner. As blackness engulfed me, I felt my arms and legs being pulled in every conceivable direction. My head was jerked to and fro, as though I was a ball in an old arcade machine.
Then, with a dull smack, I landed head first on a dusty carpet. My head felt dizzy, and it took me a while to bring the room into focus. Barry and Val, both wearing bemused looks on their faces, were already awaiting me.
But they weren’t the only people present. There seemed to be a welcome party specially for us, but I could see, by my more than inelegant appearance on the stage, that they were not impressed.
My bones and limbs still aching from the portal experience, I gingerly got to my feet. The room we were in resembled a waiting area in a doctor’s office as I imagined it must have been around the early 1900s. The furniture was antique but beautifully kept. Various paintings depicted witches and warlocks, all dressed in robes and pointy hats. There was no sign of our luggage, however. Barry smoothly stepped forward to make the introductions. He seemed to be in his element.
“Headmistress, deputy headmaster, this is Amanda Sheridan.”
There was a slight, awkward pause.
“And this,” Barry continued, “is the headmistress of Warklesby’s School of Magic, Muriel Hall.”
Muriel Hall was a thin woman in her late forties. She had long hair, reaching well below her shoulders. Though it was still full and mostly brown in colour, hints of grey had already crept in here and there. The deep crinkles on her forehead, as well as the bags beneath her eyes, gave the impression of someone young who had aged rapidly within a very short period of time. But although her looks were fading, I could tell that she must have once been a very attractive woman.
“How do you do?” she said, with a rather vacant and weak smile as she shook my hand. “I hope your journey was alright.”
“Well,” I said, trying to loosen up the atmosphere a little bit, “I need a few more times to get used to portal travel.”
The tall, thin man standing next to the headmistress snorted, a look of superiority on his face.
“This, Amanda,” Barry said, “is the deputy headmaster, Clement Harper.”
The dislike was mutual and instant. Harper couldn’t have been much older than thirty-five, though he had made every effort in his appearance to look the part of an older man. His dress robes were meticulous though boring, as was his sleek blond hair that he had combed backward. He wore round black glasses that gave him the air of an ill-tempered bureaucrat.
We shook hands for the briefest of moments, nodding our heads ever so slightly.
The headmistress didn’t seem to register any of this. She smiled again, beckoning all of us to follow her.
“We will have more privacy in my office,” she said.
With one last look of disdain, the deputy headmaster turned on his heel and followed her. Val and I exchanged a look of raised eyebrows. Evidently, someone wasn’t too keen on having us here.
“Excellent start,” I breathed to Val. “Always great to have a warm welcome.”
“Yeah,” said Val. “I wonder what the rest of the staff are like.”
We passed along several corridors with stone walls. They looked much older than the ‘waiting room’ we had arrived in. I supposed that this was a much older part of the school. At last, the headmistress and her deputy came to a halt in front of a stone spiral staircase.
“Only fifteen floors up,” the headmistress said, almost as though she were speaking more to herself than to us.
Our little party traipsed up the stairs, which were extremely narrow and steep, so that I had to help Val on multiple occasions. Panting furiously atop the fifteenth and final staircase, a broad landing – adorned with a beautiful carpet in gold and red, as well as similar tapestries to our left and right – led us straight to a pair of massive oak doors. With a wave of his wand, Deputy Headmaster Harper opened them.
We stepped into what might have been the most beautiful office I had ever seen in my life. The rough stone slabs had been replaced by marble. A massive desk of a dark wood – mahogany perhaps – spanned almost the entire width of the room at the far end. Behind it, large windows overlooked fields of green and yellow as far as the eye could see.
Sitting down in a leather armchair behind her desk, the headmistress beckoned us to sit on the three chairs opposite her. Val, Barry, and I each took a seat. Harper, in any case, seemed to prefer to stand. With a tired flick of her wand, Muriel Hall whipped up tea and biscuits for all of us.
“First, I’d like to welcome you to Warklesby’s School of Magic,” she began slowly. “It really is a wonderful institution… or was, rather, before all this… awful business began.”
“I’m sorry to hear it,” I said sincerely.
Deputy Headmaster Harper scowled and looked out of the window. As ever, the headmistress seemed to be oblivious to this.
“Thank you for saying so, Miss Sheridan,” she continued. “It really was a shock to everyone here.”
“So what happened exactly?” I asked. “The letter only spoke of several murders at the school but didn’t provide any details”
“… a series of murders,” corrected Harper irritably. “It’d be a miracle if the same person wasn’t responsible for all three murders.”
“Yes, indeed,” said Headmistress Hall, nodding her head. “That is what it looks like. But you never know. Magical Law Enforcement certainly believe it to be the same person, but they have been unable to find the perpetrator. And I’m afraid to say that, I…”
She paused, looking at her desk for a moment, evidently trying to fight back the tears that were on their way.
“I believe what the headmistress is trying to say,” Harper said, pompously shifting his glasses, “is that if we don’t find out who is committing these crimes, the school will have to be closed.”
“But that would also mean you wouldn’t be able to track down the guilty party anymore,” I said. “Is that right?”
The headmistress nodded heavily.
“That is, in fact, why we have asked you to come here, Miss Sheridan. With the Earl of Barrington acting as our substitute professor for water magic, you will have an advantage that the police do not.”
“Headmistress,” Harper blurted out, unable to contain himself any longer, “if I m
ay. The situation calls for trained professionals, not amateurs.”
“Hey,” said Val, narrowing her eyes, “who are you calling amateurs?”
“With all due respect, headmistress,” Harper continued, though his manner suggested quite the contrary, “our guests have no formal education in detective work. The cat is incapable of wielding a wand, while Miss Sheridan would require decades of training before she could even confront one of our pupils, let alone a dangerous sorcerer.”
This time, it was Barry’s and my turn to protest. Struggling to resist my urge to slap him across the face immediately, I stood up, shaking slightly.
“Excuse me?” I said angrily.
“I resent your tone of voice,” said Barry, who was also on all fours.
“Well, then why don’t you…” Harper began, turning on Barry.
But the headmistress lifted her hand to stop him. It was a surprisingly authoritative gesture that must have caught all of us by surprise, for we all stopped dead in our tracks.
“Clement, we have been over this several times before. And my decision in this matter is final, as I have told you also. Our guests stay. And you will do everything you can to aid them in their attempt to catch this murderer. Have I made myself clear?”
Harper, realising he had pushed it too far, stared at us and then the headmistress. Slowly – though resentment was etched across his entire face – he nodded.
“Yes, headmistress. Forgive me,” he said coldly.
“What matters the most,” said the headmistress, returning to her tired and weary way of speaking, “is that we all want this sorcerer caught.”
Privately, I thought that Harper certainly didn’t look as though he had the same priorities. His lips were white with repressed rage, though he made no audible sound as he stared out into the fields.
“So what do we know about the case?” I asked.
“Well,” the headmistress began, “it’s a rather long story. I suppose I should start with… Vincent Wycliffe. Some thirty years ago, Wycliffe was here at the school as a student. He had been moderately gifted, not much better or worse than many of his peers. He specialised in earth magic. It was quite surprising that Wycliffe was promoted to the post of assistant teacher after he had completed his final exams by the then head of department for earth magic, Professor MacKenzie.”
Headmistress Hall shifted rather uncomfortably in her chair.
“I knew both of them, because I was a young pupil here at the time, too. Wycliffe was several years older than I was. There had been a lot of talk about his promotion, even amongst the students, but nobody really thought about it much after a while. Wycliffe, though not brilliant, did his work, and so that seemed to be the end of the matter. Biscuits, anyone?”
“Erm, no thanks,” I said, confused at the headmistress’s sudden break in her story. “So what happened next?”
“Well,” she said, absent-mindedly reaching for one of the biscuits, “nothing happened – or at least, nobody was aware of what was developing in that sick mind – brewing, you might say. But then, years later, when I was in my last year of school, mysterious things began to occur at the school. You see, I had my own academic hopes for the future, and so I worked as a student helper in several departments. You know, menial tasks such as copying or preparing notes. One such job was in earth magic, and so I saw Professor MacKenzie and Vincent Wycliffe quite regularly. Their relationship, so much was obvious to me at the time, was bad – and it was deteriorating further.”
“You mean, they quarrelled openly?” asked Barry.
“Yes,” she said, a vague expression on her face. “Yes, you see, Wycliffe demanded more time for his research, wishing to reduce his teaching duties. Professor MacKenzie, however, refused. In fact, he even upped Wycliffe’s teaching hours.”
“Why would he do that?” I asked. “Just to spite him?”
“Perhaps,” she said. “As I said, they didn’t get on very well anymore. However, I think there was another reason. This is hindsight, of course – judging from what Wycliffe did later on – but I can only assume that MacKenzie had found out in which direction Wycliffe’s research was going.”
“A very sinister direction, I might add,” the deputy headmaster said suddenly.
“What sort of research was he involved in?” I asked the headmistress.
“Necromancy,” the deputy headmaster interjected before she could answer herself.
“It is a forbidden branch of earth magic,” Barry added helpfully. “It hasn’t been practised legally in centuries.”
“You mean, Wycliffe was trying to resurrect the dead?” I asked, horrified.
“In essence, yes,” the headmistress said. “We believe that he destroyed the majority of his work before he was captured, so it is difficult to tell how deep he was into necromancy at the time.”
“So what happened next?” I asked.
The headmistress didn’t answer immediately, but gazed out of the windows behind her for a while. Her expression was impossible to read. Yet it seemed to me to be more vacant and adrift than ever. Was this her peculiar way of remembering the events surrounding Wycliffe’s crimes? Somehow, I had the impression that there was something more, something deeper, that seemed to be eating away at her.
“I think,” she said after a while, “it started with little things. As it did a few weeks ago, again.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“You must understand,” she continued, turning around to face us again, “that I only gained full access to this information after I had become headmistress. The headmaster had kept these things secret at the time. They aren’t open to the public. But I recognised the patterns quickly enough.”
“What pattern was that?” I asked.
It felt as if I were trying to draw blood from a stone, as she paused yet again, staring at us with the same vacant expression on her face. The deputy headmaster, no doubt feeling impatient, spoke next.
“What the headmistress is trying to say is that…”
“Please, Clement,” she said in a tired voice, closing her eyes, “let me explain fully to our guests. They need to know everything, do you understand?”
It was quite evident that he strongly disagreed, but he pressed his lips so tightly together until they went white in his effort to stop himself from speaking. The headmistress drew back and opened a drawer at the bottom of her desk. She retrieved a piece of paper. The writing was tiny and upside down, but it looked like some sort of list to me.
“You must understand that, as necromancy is prohibited by magical law, there are naturally very few scholars who have delved deeply enough into the subject to understand it. It is forbidden knowledge. That makes it rare, as few would choose to meddle with it despite the heavy cost. But, as you might also imagine, there are some who seek it for the sake of the forbidden. A juvenile impulse, often, to test the boundaries of our world.”
She sighed deeply, as though a great burden was beginning to lift.
“From my very first year onward, there had been rumours of necromancy amongst the students – and even amongst the staff. Most people didn’t take these allegations seriously. The official school line, as expressed by many staff members and the headmaster himself, was that these stories were suitable only for frightening the gullible and the foolish, but that they lacked any basis in actual fact.”
She fidgeted slightly, playing around the corners of the list in front of her.
“At the time, we didn’t know that they were lying to us. As the magical community found out much later, the evidence was there. Many had tried to convince the headmaster that something evil was brewing within his school, though he chose to ignore it until it was far too late. He simply couldn’t believe that anyone at the school would do such things. And so, he took the easy approach and denounced all those who warned him as conspiracy theorists and troublemakers.
“Yet, the signs were there. Soon enough, markings appeared in the corridors of the school.
They depicted the forbidden symbols of necromancy, the staff and skull, as well as the bone and the book. These acts alone, of course, would have simply been taken as forms of teenage vandalism and provocation. But other, more sinister occurrences soon weighed heavily upon the school. There were reports by students that they had seen secret rituals in the woods nearby, well beyond the gaze of authority. A member of staff reported a similar event close to the school’s graveyard, where many accomplished scholars and teachers have been put to rest.
“Additionally, a series of mysterious break-ins plagued the school at the time. Specific roots, plants, and rare powders were stolen. Few – if anyone – recognised the importance of the specific magical ingredients that went missing, of course. The headmaster, still wilfully ignorant, insisted that these were no different from other acts of theft in the past.”
Headmistress Hall paused, breathing heavily again as she suddenly looked at her office door. It was almost as though she were afraid of someone eavesdropping.
“Of course,” she continued, though in a somewhat lower voice, “they were nothing of the sort. Taken as a whole, these precise ingredients had been used for millennia in the abhorrent practice of necromancy, though the problem at the time was, as I said, that it took an expert to recognise this.
“Soon enough, people began to vanish. Though the crimes were investigated, the working assumption was that the students in question had in fact simply run away. But as more and more students disappeared, even the headmaster had to admit that something was seriously wrong. The MLE was contacted, and an investigation began, though with few results. The problem was that nobody had drawn the connection with the markings and the stolen ingredients.
“Luckily, a historian of magic who had specialised in the history of necromancy, had come to Warklesby’s as a guest lecturer a few weeks earlier. He immediately recognised the pattern when the issue of stolen ingredients from the school’s supplies was raised during a staff meeting. He asked for a complete list of missing items and soon confirmed that, due to the amounts and ratios stolen, they were most certainly intended for the dark practice of necromancy. The rest, I’m afraid, is history.”