‘Why does life have to be so complicated?’ she cried.
‘Because if it wasn’t, you would be out of work,’ she answered herself. ‘And life would be boring.’
‘Right now,’ she continued, ‘I wouldn’t mind a bit of boring.’
She was now seriously depressed because she knew that having conversations with yourself was only one short step away from sitting in a chair smelling of wee and having conversations with the wall like her old grandmother used to do. Depressed was the normal mood for the Hearse Whisperer. She felt happy and safe that way, but this was way below that kind of depression. And there wasn’t even a wall to hit her head against.
Let’s face it, she thought, I have become an emo.
And it was all the Floods’ fault.
The cold was getting to her. She began to fantasise about leaving planet Earth, about transporting herself up to the international space station and then blasting the whole of planet Earth into oblivion. That would finish the Floods off wherever they were hiding.
Trouble is, she thought, it would finish off all my friends and family too.
She thought for a bit longer, then concluded, But I haven’t got any friends and I hate my family, so maybe it’s worth looking into.
‘I’m getting too old for this job,’ she said out loud and then set about destroying every single living thing – fourteen slugs, eighty-three ants and a lost snail – that might have heard her say it.
The door had slowly creaked open a crack, but the Floods still couldn’t see who was inside.
‘Go away,’ said a voice.
‘We were wondering if you could put us up for the night,’ said Mordonna.
‘We’re closed,’ said the voice. ‘For renovations.’
‘And we’ve come for the dog,’ said Mildred. ‘My dog.’
‘I said…’ the voice began and then stopped.
The door opened wide to reveal a thin, ashen-faced man who bore a strange resemblance to Valla – which is to say, he bore a strange resemblance to a long-dead corpse.
‘Dog?’ said the man.
‘Yes, her dog,’ said Mordonna.
‘Oh my Lord,’ said the man. ‘You are Mildred Flambard, the last witch to die here under the merciful hands of the Knights Intolerant. How can this be?’
‘As you can see,’ said Mildred, ‘I am no longer dead.’
‘I, I, I …’ said the man.
‘You, you, you,’ said Mildred. ‘You are Standpipe the butler and you took as much delight in my suffering as I shall in yours.’
‘No, please,’ said Standpipe. ‘Hear my words, words I dared not speak those many years ago.’
‘Go on.’
‘I do not believe there is such a thing as witches, nor did I then,’ said Standpipe. ‘But to have said as much to the Knights Intolerant would have been to sign my own death warrant.’
‘So why were you so cruel?’ said Mildred.
‘Erm, no, listen,’ Standpipe begged, ‘I am a nice person. I am kind to animals. Have I not kept your dog alive these past two hundred years?’
‘I don’t know, have you? We haven’t seen him.’
‘Can you not hear him howl?’
‘That could be a recording,’ said Winchflat.
‘Recorders weren’t invented two hundred years ago,’ said Standpipe.
‘Well, maybe the dog died only a few years ago,’ said Betty. ‘And happy dogs don’t howl. Only sad ones do that.’
‘Or else you invented the very first sound recorder a long time before anyone else,’ said Merlinmary.
‘Or you have invented a brilliant time machine sound recorder that can capture noises from times gone by,’ said Winchflat.
‘Or the dog is still alive,’ Standpipe whimpered.
He seemed to shrink to half his size, a small pathetic creature with a runny nose and mould in his hair. He moved his head slowly from side to side, staring open-mouthed at the Floods.
‘Oh my Lord,’ he cried. ‘I was wrong. There are real witches and wizards and Mildred Flambard was not the last of them and you are all wizards and I –’
‘Yes,’ said Mordonna. ‘Now go and fetch the dog before I turn you into a toad.’
‘I can’t,’ said Standpipe.
‘Why not?’
‘It hates me. Although I have fed and watered it for the past two hundred years, it hates me with all its heart and if I ever go too near, it tries to tear me apart.’
‘All the more reason to send you to fetch it,’ said Mildred.
‘I’ll fetch it,’ said Winchflat.
‘It might be a trap,’ said Mordonna.
‘It’ll be OK,’ said Winchflat. ‘Besides, there’s something down there that I need to check on.’
‘What?’
‘You’ll see.’
He left the room and went down to the cellars. Almost immediately, the mournful howling stopped and was replaced by happy yelps.
‘He never did that for me,’ said Standpipe. ‘Not once in two hundred years.’
‘Well, look at you,’ said Mordonna. ‘You’re a disgrace to whatever species it is you belong to. Who on earth would be happy to see you?’
‘I expect his mother was,’ said Betty, who was the kindest one of the Floods.
‘She wasn’t, actually,’ said Standpipe. ‘She put me out with the garbage when I was three. I sat by the kerb in the garbage bin for a week because the garbage men refused to take me. When they came back a week later she gave them ten dollars and then they took me.’
‘That’s terrible,’ said Betty.
‘Did they give her any change?’ sniggered Merlinmary.
‘Yes, nine dollars,’ said Standpipe. ‘How did you know?’
‘What did they do with you?’ said Betty.
‘Two streets away they threw me off the back of the cart into the mud.’
‘But surely you could have just gone back home, couldn’t you?’ said Betty.
‘Oh yes,’ said Standpipe. ‘I did, but in the hour since I had left, my parents had sold the house and moved and refused to tell anyone where they were going.’
‘You poor man,’ said Betty. ‘So you never saw your parents again?’
‘Only bits of them,’ said Standpipe. ‘When the Knights Intolerant took me in and I told them my sad tale, they tracked my parents down.’
‘So you were reunited after all?’ said Betty.
‘Partly,’ said Standpipe. ‘The Knights chopped them into little bits. All I saw of my parents were their left ears. They were so good to me, the Knights Intolerant, they had those ears made into a beautiful purse. Look, I have it here still with the three coppers the knights gave me for my twenty years of loyal service.’
‘Oh, you poor, poor man,’ said Betty.
‘No he’s not,’ said Mildred. ‘He’s pure evil. Look.’
She pulled her left sleeve up and burnt into her skin was a scar. It read:
‘Oh,’ said Betty. ‘Fair enough. Let’s take him down to the cellars and chain him up where your poor dog was.’
‘Winchflat’s taking his time,’ said Mordonna, ‘and it’s gone very quiet.’
She went over to Standpipe and, clicking her fingers, made him rise up into the air. There was a large iron chandelier hanging from the ceiling and Standpipe floated over to it. The chandelier had once held fifty-one candles, one for each of the Knights Intolerant. Standpipe reached out and grabbed it, clambering up into the middle of the ornate steelwork. Mordonna clicked her fingers again and fifty-one large yellow candles filled the chandelier, fifty-one candles with big yellow flames that imprisoned Standpipe in a circle of fire.
‘Tell me,’ Mordonna said. ‘The Knights Intolerant, are any of them still alive?’
‘They are, all fifty-one of them, but they are old and toothless and all near extinction,’ Standpipe cried. ‘They all lie in their beds in the Great Dormitory awaiting death.’
‘Really. And their weapons?’
‘They lie
rusted away in the Great Sword Room.’
‘So they are powerless?’
‘Yes,’ said Standpipe. ‘They are like me, old and feeble, living out our last days on nettle soup and weevil biscuits.’
‘But in their time they killed many, many witches and wizards,’ said Queen Scratchrot. ‘They almost drove our race to extinction, and being old and feeble is no release from being guilty.’
‘I, I, I …’ Standpipe whispered. ‘I cannot disagree.’
The heat from the fifty-one candles was ferocious, as had been the wrath of the fifty-one Knights Intolerant. Standpipe poured with sweat as he clung to the chain. Mordonna handed him a steel rod with a little cup on the end.
‘Take this,’ she said, ‘and snuff out the candles. As each one dies so will each one of the evil Knights Intolerant.’
‘I cannot,’ whimpered Standpipe.
‘Of course you can,’ said Mordonna. ‘Don’t be such a baby. It’s your one chance to redeem yourself and possibly save your own neck.’
‘Oh, all right,’ said Standpipe and began snuffing out the candles.
As each candle died and Standpipe moved the steel cup on to the next one, the dead candle sprang back to life.
‘Betty, stop doing that,’ said Mordonna.
‘Sorry, Mum, I couldn’t resist,’ said Betty.
‘I know, sweetheart, but this is a seriously gothic moment of great symbolism. So stop it,’ said Mordonna. ‘When all of the candles are gone, witches and wizards around the world will be free.’
‘We’re free already,’ said Valla. ‘I mean, most of us hadn’t even heard of these crazy knights.’
‘I know, darling,’ Mordonna replied. ‘It’s symbolic more than real, though I’m sure that hidden deep inside the soul of every wizard is an ancient memory of persecution by the knights, a memory that we are about to finish off forever.’
‘OK,’ said Betty. ‘Sorry, Mum.’
One by one Standpipe put out the candles until there was only one left.
‘This is a truly great moment,’ said Queen Scratchrot, peering out from her backpack with her one good eye.
But the last candle wouldn’t die.
‘Betty!’
‘It’s not me, Mum. I’m not doing anything.’
Mildred Flambard-Flood fell to her knees and wept. She buried her head in her hands and shed floods of tears onto the ancient flagstones.
‘It is me,’ she cried. ‘That last candle is my father.’
‘Your own father was one of the Knights Intolerant?’ said Mordonna.
‘Yes.’
‘And you cannot bear to see him die?’
‘You must be joking,’ said Mildred. ‘After what he did to mother and I? No, these are tears of relief and joy. I feel as if I have been holding my breath these past two hundred years. Actually, I was holding my breath until my precious Valla rescued me. So let me be the one to kill the flame.’
So she sat on Valla’s shoulders, who stood on Nerlin’s shoulders, and she grabbed the steel cup from Standpipe and slammed it down on the last candle.
‘And as for you,’ she said, turning to Standpipe, ‘did you really think snuffing out a few candles would make up for all the terrible things you did to me and my mother and countless other witches?’
‘But …’ Standpipe began, turning to Mordonna. ‘You promised.’
‘No, she said “possibly save your life”, not definitely,’ said Mildred. ‘Do we look like Love and Peace Greenie Buddhists? Do we look like hippies? Don’t answer that bit.’
She clicked her fingers and Standpipe vanished in a pile of dust.
‘Wow,’ she said. ‘I haven’t done magic for two hundred years. I’d forgotten just how good it feels.’
She clicked her fingers and three cockroaches that had been sitting on the chandelier next to Standpipe turned into a box of paperclips, a bowl of muesli and a copy of the first ever Batman comic.
At the same moment, Winchflat and Brastof came up from the cellar. The dog raced over to Mildred and leapt up into her arms, licking her face and madly wagging his tail – which, considering Mildred was still sitting on Valla’s shoulders, who was still standing on Nerlin’s shoulders, shows not only how much Brastof had missed her, but also how incredibly high he could jump.
‘That is Brastof?’ said Mordonna. ‘I kind of pictured him as a huge black hound, not a spaniel.’
‘He certainly barks like a big black hound,’ said Nerlin.
‘Oh, I did that,’ said Mildred. ‘He had such a girly little yap that even mice laughed at him.’
‘Until I speaked,’ Brastof said. ‘They usually went srsly quiet then.’
‘So tell me,’ said Mordonna, ‘could you speak when you were born, or did your wonderful mistress teach you?’
‘Mistrss dun magik,’ said Brastof. ‘Not too good wiv speling tho. Srsly.’
Mordonna gave Mildred a hug and a huge smile.
‘You were so made to be part of our family,’ she said.
‘And so were you,’ said Satanella to Brastof.
There were so many ways that Brastof was meant to be part of the ever-growing Floods family. They included, in no special order of importance:
Satanella needed a boyfriend.
He could talk.
He had his own red rubber ball – although, as it was over two hundred years old, it had lost a lot of its bounce.
His smell was exactly the same as Queen Scratchrot’s armpits.
He was very cheap to look after – after all, he had survived for two centuries on three tins of Pedigree Chum, seventeen spiders, lots of rats’ legs and a brussels sprout.
He knew of lot of really rude jokes.
There is, hidden away in a remote valley25 in Transylvania Waters, a special clinic. Only 0.5 per cent of the population know this valley exists. It isn’t on any maps, on account of none of Transylvania Waters being on any maps, but even if there was a map of Transylvania Waters, this valley would NOT be on it because it’s a secret. Of the 0.5 per cent who know it exists, only thirty-seven of them know there is a clinic there and only half of those thirty-seven know what the clinic is for – and seven of the ones who know what it’s for work there.26
To summarise, this clinic is more remote, more exclusive and more secretive than anywhere else on Earth, even that place in the Nevada desert where the American government keeps some dead aliens from outer space.
One of the thirty-seven people who knew about the clinic was the Hearse Whisperer.
And she has just gone there.
This is the Sulfuric Clinic, a special hospital for the treatment of depression and insanity in witches and wizards. Its director and owner is the fearsome Dr Reversion.
Dr Reversion was a powerful woman. She had more muscles than most men, even serious body builders, and other muscles that most men would never want if, that is, they even knew such muscles existed. Tall, with damp black shiny hair, Dr Reversion wore a lot of damp black shiny leather that cried in pain as she moved, because some of the leather belonged to animals that were still alive. Notebook and pen in one hand, damp black shiny whip in the other, Dr Reversion was the perfect psychiatrist for a depressed wizard. For depressed witches, maybe not so perfect, but as she was actually a witch herself and the only psychiatrist specialising in the treatment of screwed-up wizards and witches, she was as perfect as they were going to get.
‘I cannot believe it,’ she said. ‘The legendary Hearse Whisperer here in my clinic.’
The Hearse Whisperer had left a webcam on the volcano rim on Tristan da Cunha, a webcam that sent its pictures right into her brain so she would know the instant the Floods arrived – if they arrived. Then she had transformed and flown back to Transylvania Waters.
To get into the clinic as a patient and not as dinner – albatross stew was one of Dr Reversion’s favourite meals – she had had to transform herself again, but she felt her miserable state of mind was worth it. It had snowed a lot more on Tristan
since she had left, and now the camera was buried in a deep drift. All the Hearse Whisperer could see inside her head was pure white, the colour she hated more than any other colour in the whole world. This, of course, was making her even more depressed.
‘When I was a child,’ said Dr Reversion, ‘I had your picture on my bedroom wall. Well, I say your picture, but as you know, there are no pictures of you, so I had a huge sheet of black paper taped up right above my head.’
‘How black was it?’ said the Hearse Whisperer, fearing grey.
‘Well, what is the blackest thing you can think of?’
‘Is this part of the treatment?’
‘Of course. Everything is part of the treatment at the Sulfuric Clinic,’ said Dr Reversion. ‘So, what is the blackest thing you can think of?’
‘The centre of my grandmother’s heart when she was sitting in a locked cupboard in the deepest part of the Transylvania Waters coal mine, right at the bottom of shaft thirteen, where it is so dark that the light from a torch is absorbed before it even leaves the bulb,’ said the Hearse Whisperer. ‘At three a.m. on a completely moonless night.’
‘That is good.’
‘And I have my eyes shut,’ the Hearse Whisperer added. ‘And I am wearing a blindfold made of lead lined with black velvet.’
‘Excellent,’ said Dr Reversion, ‘an answer worthy of the legendary Hearse Whisperer. Now I can tell you that the huge black poster on my wall that represented you was ten times darker than that.’
‘Ten times darker?’ the Hearse Whisperer said. ‘Is that possible?’
‘Oh yes,’ said Dr Reversion. ‘Do not forget you are the Hearse Whisperer. You are a legend and as such you deserve the blackest black in creation, a black that is not merely the absence of all colour, but the absence of black itself.’
‘You’re not just saying that to make me feel better?’ said the Hearse Whisperer.
‘Well, of course I am,’ said Dr Reversion, but before her patient could look upset, she added, ‘and you should feel better, because it is true.’
‘Already, I feel a great weight beginning to lift from my shoulders,’ said the Hearse Whisperer.
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