“Not like this. It was like back in Freedonia.”
She didn’t continue on the subject, but Senta didn’t need reminding that in Freedonia, where Hero and Hertzel and their sister Honor had come from, their parents had been shot in the street.
“I thought you would want to know,” said Hero, after a moment. “Even though I probably shouldn’t tell you…”
“Tell me what?” sighed Senta, pouring the tea.
“PC Shrubb arrested those three men.” She didn’t need to explain which three men she was talking about.
“Hmm. They’re at the police station?”
“Please don’t do anything stupid,” pleaded Hero. Then she brightened up a bit. “You know my sister said that I could spend the night here and have a sleepover. I know you just bought a bunch of food. I bet you have some great evening snackies.”
“I was saving those for picnics, but oh well. I’ve got nuts and raisins, Teddy Sweet Men, custard chips, and baked cheese nests.”
“That sounds great,” said Hero. “We can stay up late and play games. You can show me more magic. It will be ace.”
“All this just so I won’t go off the hammer and boil those three wankers in oil?”
“Well, I don’t want you to do anything that will get you into trouble,” said Hero, “But I really don’t want you to do anything that will ruin things between you and Graham.”
“Yeah, Graham,” said Senta. “What do you suppose I’m to do with him?”
“I don’t know.”
“What does he want anyway?”
“You know he basically competes with you, don’t you?” asked Hero.
“What do you mean?”
“He has to be friends with everyone in town. He has to be the one who everyone comes to. He’s the boy who can talk to the lizzies. He’s the boy that rides the dinosaurs. He’s Jammy Graham.”
“I know,” said Senta.
“But he’s also the boy who knows the Drache Girl and the steel dragon, which is really ace, until the Drache Girl and the steel dragon are right next to you making you seem much less exciting by contrast.”
“Are you talking about Graham, or are you talking about you?” wondered Senta.
“I’m talking about Graham, because I know how he feels. I seem much less exciting by contrast no matter who I stand next to.”
“So what am I supposed to do?” asked Senta. “He knows how he is and he knows how I am. Am I supposed to change for him? I don’t even know if I can. I have to be a great sorceress someday.”
“I think you have to just wait for him to settle down. I think he’ll come around in a day or two.”
The two friends drank tea, ate huge amounts of snack-foods, talked about all the boys in the colony and most of the girls, and played Which is Which, then Hero went upstairs to take a bath and climb into one of Senta’s nightdresses. While she was thus engaged, Bessemer arrived home and sulkily started for the stairs.
“What’s wrong? asked Senta.
“I miss Fina!”
“She might not even be gone yet.”
“She’s gone,” he said, and Senta paused to feel the magic aura around the house.
“Yes, she’s gone,” she said. “Don’t worry, she’ll be back soon, and I’ll take care of you till then.”
“I’m going to bed. I need to cuddle my turtle pillow.” Senta let him go on up to his own chamber, and then went to her own bed to join Hero.
The two girls talked well into the night, largely managing to stay off the topic of Graham, but not entirely able to avoid his name. At last Hero stopped talking and a few minutes later she was snoring softly. Senta got up and got dressed, slipping down the stairs and out the front door into the night.
Quietly opening the door of the police station, the sorceress’s apprentice stepped inside. PC Shrubb was sitting at the desk typing very slowly on a mechanical typewriter. Click…click…click…
“Oh hey Senta,” he said, looking up. “I’ve got those three tossers in lock up. Thought you’d want to know.”
“Oh I do,” said Senta, then she pointed her index finger at him and said “Uuthanum.”
PC Shrubb’s eyes rolled up into his head, and he slumped forward over his typewriter. Senta walked over to him, lifted his head up, and put his arm between it and the machine. Then she stepped through the door in back, into the storage room, and opened the door to cell number one. Stepping inside, she closed the door after her.
“Hello Mr. Fonstan,” she said. “I didn’t know you were in here.”
Mr. Fonstan was lying on the cot reading Pilgrimage into Danger by Delia Hume.
“Hello Senta,” he said, without looking away from the book.
“Drunk and disorderly?” she asked.
“Yes,” he replied, then licked his finger and turned the page.
“Where are the three new arrivals?”
“Next door. Cell number two.” He looked up from the book finally. “Bunch of wankers. No respect for the law. I had to lock the door.”
“Thanks,” said Senta. “If anyone asks, I was never here.”
Giving her a salute with his index finger, Mr. Fonstan went back to his reading.
Senta unlocked the next door, noting in her own mind that giving the prisoners of cell number one control over the incarceration of those in cell number two was not a particularly brilliant design for a penitentiary. She stepped through another door and closed this one behind her as she had the previous doors. A man lay on one of the cots. A second man sat on another cot. The third cot was empty, and the third man stood leaning against the wall.
“Hello, little lady,” said the man standing.
Senta pointed her right index finger at him.
“Uuthanum Regnum,” she said.
A ray of colorful, sparkling light sprayed from her fingertip onto the standing man. He immediately fell back against the wall. He hunched over in pain, and then cried out as a red rash spread from under his clothes to cover his hands and face. He began to shake uncontrollably. The seated man jumped to his feet. Without looking, Senta pointed her left hand at him, fingers splayed.
“Intior uuthanum err.”
The second man began to laugh. He laughed harder and harder. There was no joy on his face. Instead, there was panic. He dropped to his knees, gasping for breath, but still couldn’t stop laughing.
The man who had been lying down, now sat up, and pushed himself as close to the wall as humanly possible. He looked as though he was trying to push himself through the wall, as he watched in horror the terrible condition of his friends. The smell of urine filled the room as the laughing man lost control of his bladder.
“What are you going to do to me?” asked the unafflicted man.
“That depends,” said Senta. “Which of you hit the boy by the dock today?”
He pointed at the man with the rash, who was now feebly trying to scratch the skin beneath his shirt.
“Good. Tomorrow, there is a ship coming into port. You three are going to book passage on it. If you are anywhere in Birmisia even one minute after that ship leaves port, terrible things will happen—terrible and ponderous things. And they’re going to happen to you.”
Chapter Twelve: A More Complicated Life
Police Constable Saba Colbshallow and Police Constable Eamon Shrubb led the three men down Seventh and One Half Avenue toward the docks. Though they had stopped short of getting the service revolvers out of the gun case, both policemen carried their truncheons on open display. For their part, the three men looked nervously in every direction. Several times, one of them shrieked when he saw a little blond girl walk by.
“Kafira,” said Eamon. “Buck up, man. She’s not even the right little girl.”
“Keep walking,” said Saba.
Saba had come in first thing that morning to find Eamon slumped over asleep at his typewriter. That was not particularly significant in and of itself, but when he found out that the last thing the other constable remembere
d was a visit by a certain young sorceress, things looked more ominous. Lon Fonstan in cell one was asleep, and upon waking at first, claimed not to have seen anyone at all.
“Maybe we can have a little magic tell us what you’re not remembering?” Saba had said.
“Oh yeah?” Fonstan sneered. “Who you going to get to do that?”
“Maybe Zurfina.”
“I don’t think so,” had said Fonstan.
“I’ll bet Mother Linton could do it.”
Fonstan had chewed on the possibility for a moment.
“Well, Senta came in to say hello. She was only here for a minute. Gave me her best. Said goodnight. End of story.”
“And you didn’t see or hear anything unusual in the cell next door?”
“I was busy reading the book you gave me,” said Fonstan, holding up Pilgrimage into Danger. “I quite like the part where they have to fight off the adulterous women.”
“It’s supposed to be metaphorical,” Saba had suggested.
“Well, I didn’t see or hear nothing.”
Saba suspected that his double negative hid the truth in plain sight.
As for the three men in cell number two, they all had seemed in perfectly good health, with the exception that all three had soiled their pants sometime during the night. The stories they had told of the demon child who had visited them with plagues, while fantastic, were not dismissed by the police constables. All three were adamant about booking passage on the S.S. Majestic as soon as it came into port, an idea both PCs thought had merit with or without sorcery. The men had demanded protection on their way to the ship.
The formation reached the dock area, where a fourth man met them. He had been present for the first run-in with the lizzies, which the constables had managed to stop, but apparently was at home when the second incident involving the slapping of the lad had occurred. He had arrived in Birmisia with his three friends and had decided that if they were leaving, he would leave as well.
“Oh blooming heck!” said one of the men in custody, scrambling at once to hide behind his fellows. “There she is.”
Sitting on a wooden crate not fifty feet away, wearing a multihued blue dress, was a twelve-year-old blond girl. She had her hands crossed in front of her chest and her feet crossed at the ankles. She definitely had her eye on the four men.
“You’re the law!” squealed one of the men. “You’ve got to protect us!”
“Eamon, take them and see that they are able to purchase steerage class passage back to Brech,” said Saba. “I’ll see about our little friend.
He walked across to stand in front of where Senta sat.
“You know you could be charged with assault, aggravated assault, assault on a police constable, interfering with a police investigation, and illegal entry into a secure facility. I imagine I could find several more charges if I opened up the Corpus Juris.”
“I doubt you’d be able to hold me.”
“Don’t get too cocky. Mayor Korlann and his daughter may be very fond of you…”
“That’s not what I mean,” said Senta. “I doubt your jail would be able to hold me. And if by some chance it did hold me, how long do you think Zurfina would allow it?”
“Zurfina has to follow the law, just like everyone else.”
“That’s why you were at our house about to experience life as a marsupial or a toad. But you’re about the only one in Birmisia with bullocks like that. Zurfina exterminated what... a hundred thousand lizzies? Nobody has come to call her on that.”
“That was a time of war.”
“Yes, sort of. Well, I’m done being afraid of anyone because they’re bigger or stronger, or because the law says I have to be. If somebody gets in my way, I’m going to knock them down, hard.”
“These men aren’t in your way,” said Saba. “In fact, they’re doing their damnedest to get out of your way. They’re leaving the continent. Leave them alone.”
“I’m not even here for them,” said Senta.
“Then what, pray tell, are you here for?”
“I want to see who gets off the ship. There’s another practitioner of the arts aboard.”
“Great. You going to kidnap them, like Zurfina did?”
“Probably not. This one’s a great deal more powerful that Miss Jindra. I just want to get a butchers.”
Saba sighed.
“Pick which road you walk down carefully, Senta.”
Then he turned on his heel and followed after Eamon and their charges. Once the four men had their tickets, they went aboard the ship. It wasn’t going to leave port for another four days, but Saba doubted that the men would step back on land before then. The two constables strolled back from the dockside to the opposite side of the street.
“That girl is going to get herself into a pack of trouble,” said Saba.
“Those tossers only got what they deserved, if you ask me,” said Eamon.
“She did assault you.”
“She didn’t hurt me. I was almost asleep anyway, to tell you the truth.”
“That’s not the point.”
“I’ve got a point for you,” said Eamon. “My point is I’d just as soon stay on the good side of any sorceress.”
“She’s only twelve years old.”
“You know what I was doing when I was twelve years old? I was shoveling coal in a factory furnace, that’s what.”
“What’s your point?” asked Saba.
“I don’t know. I don’t think I have one.”
“You should go home now. Dot’s probably angry with you for being gone all night.”
“She’s not been feeling too right,” said Eamon. “I think I’ll take the rest of the day off.”
“Fine.”
“What about you?”
“I’m going to stick around here for a bit,” said Saba. “Apparently, there’s another sorceress coming ashore.”
“Do tell,” said Eamon. “Well, be sure to let her know that I’m the friendly one.”
Eamon headed off toward home. He had been on duty for a little more than twenty-four hours, though he had been asleep for fourteen of them. Saba strolled around the dock area, keeping a particular eye on the new arrivals and their interactions with the lizzies who worked on the docks. There was no trouble. Most new arrivals found the reptilians either frightening or fascinating, and it was fairly rare that anyone decided to have after them.
Around noon, Saba purchased fish and chips from Mr. Kordeshack, two thick slabs of white fish, battered and deep-fried, along with a pile of slab cut potatoes, all wrapped in a thick cone-shaped package of newspaper. As he ate his purchase, Saba read the side of his paper. It was a broadsheet originally printed in Brech almost a year and a half before. It was amazing that it had ended up on the other side of the world, serving as a take-away food container.
He was just finishing when the now familiar honking signaled the arrival of one of Port Dechantagne’s two steam carriages. This one was driven by Professor Calliere, who of all those usually seen at the wheel, was probably the least likely to mow down a pedestrian. He came to a stop just down from the ship, and climbed out of the vehicle. Seeing Saba, he waved, but didn’t come over. Instead, he went up the gangplank.
Saba threw his rubbish away in one of the public dustbins and continued his circuit of the dock area. He walked once again past Senta, who was still seated on her wooden crate, but he didn’t speak to her. He swung back by Seventh and One Half Avenue, and spotted a pile of red hair peaking out from behind two young men. He walked over to the small group and found Miss Tabby Malloy chatting with two young sailors.
“Miss Malloy,” he said.
The two sailors turned around with scowls on their faces, which quickly turned to looks of surprise, as they hurried away.
“Why so formal, Saba dear? And I was right in the middle of a business transaction.”
“It’s the middle of the day,” he said.
“Do you think I should have to work all night?
If I wanted to do that, I’d become a police constable.”
“You can’t conduct your business right here in front of Kafira and everybody. Not in the middle of the day.”
“I think you’re just jealous.”
“Didn’t you hear the honking horn? The governor’s husband is right over that way.” He pointed.
“Oh, him,” said Miss Malloy. “He’s not even up to the job.”
Saba gave her a sharp look.
“That’s what I hear, anyways.”
“If I hear you’re spreading gossip about the governor’s family, I really will run you in.”
“Fine. Have it your way,” said Miss Malloy, unhappily stalking back toward the apartment building, and muttering. “Can’t even do an honest day’s trade.”
Saba strolled back across Bainbridge Clark Street, just in time to see the professor walking back to his vehicle from the ship’s loading area, along with a stranger. The man was tall with a dark complexion. His slightly graying hair was cut fairly short and parted in the middle, while his squinty eyes peered out from behind horn-rimmed spectacles. His nose was turned up just enough that one could look directly into his nostrils. His wide thin-lipped mouth and a heavy lantern jaw made him seem toad-like. About five foot ten, he wore a black pinstriped suit and over it, a long black rifle frock coat that reached to his knees.
Saba could feel the stranger’s eyes upon him for just a moment, as the man evaluated him. Then the stranger seemed to freeze in place. His head turned quickly to the right, and Saba looked to his left to follow the man’s gaze. They made three points of a triangle—Saba, the man in black, and the twelve-year-old sorceress’s apprentice. Senta and the stranger stared at each other for at least ten seconds, though to Saba, it seemed like much longer. Then the girl got up from her crate and skipped south. She turned to look back twice, as if she was worried about being followed.
The man in black watched her, giving no more notice to Saba or anyone else in the street, and then he climbed into the passenger seat of the steam carriage. Professor Calliere hopped into the driver’s seat and was soon off, honking to warn dockworkers both human and reptilian to get out of his way, driving north in the direction of his workshop.
The Drache Girl Page 18