by K. E. Mills
'I know that,' she snapped. 'So?'
'So this hex hasn't got one fingerprint. It's got lots. As though a whole bunch of wizards performed it simultaneously'
'You're right. That's crazy'
It's worse than crazy,' replied Markham. His expression was strained, it's hex soup. I mean, I'm good. I'm really good. And I've neutralised a bunch of hexes in my time. But I don't think I can do this one.'
There was a moment of shared and silent panic. Then she slapped her forehead, I'm an idiot. And so are you. We don't need the doors, we can use your portable portal to escape.'
He hesitated. 'Not necessarily. I haven't had a chance to fine-tune it for short distances. We may end up in the middle of the desert by mistake. Or worse.'
'Oh.' She thought for moment then slapped herself again. 'Oh! Of course! You can levitate us through the bedroom window!'
Another hesitation, then he shook his head. 'I don't think we should go anywhere till I've got a better understanding of this hex.'
'Mister Markham, I have a kingdom to run,' she said sharply. 'Get me out of here and you can spend as long as you like studying your precious hex. Better yet, ask Gerald to explain it.'
Markham slammed the doors with his fist, eyes blazing. 'For the last bloody time, lady, it wasn't Gerald! Gerald's in trouble somewhere, thanks to you! And if he ends up another one of your brother's victims I promise you: someone's going to pay, big time! And I don't have a problem if that someone is you.'
There was an appalled silence. Then, panting and grunting, Reg flapped to the marble-topped table by the doors. 'Now, now. Let's take a deep breath and remember what's at stake here.'
'I know what's at stake!' Melissande turned on Markham. 'And don't you threaten me! I've been threatened by experts and I'm not scared! You—'
Reg let out a screech. 'Shut up the pair of you! Wasting time spitting like mangy alley cats when Gerald is out there somewhere expecting us to rescue him!'
Silence. Then Markham ran his fingers through his hair. 'You're right, Reg. I'm sorry' She crossed her arms. 'Yes. Well.'
'All right, Markham,' Reg continued. 'You're the genius here, so act like it. How many fingerprints can you sense in that hex?'
Markham sighed, I think… five. And they're all First Grade.'
Reg scratched her head. 'So. Five thaumic signatures… five missing First Grade wizards. Even Boris could do the maths on this one.' She sniffed. 'Where is that long black streak of misery, anyway? Last thing we need is for me to end up as his lunch.'
'One of the maids is looking after him,' said Melissande. 'What do you mean, even he could do the—'
But Reg and Markham weren't listening. They were staring at each other, eyes wide with dismay.
Is it even possible, Reg?' said Markham. 'I've never heard of—'
'You wouldn't have,' said the bird darkly. 'Seeing as you're a nice young man who doesn't read that kind of grimoire. But I've known men who do, Monk, and I'd say it's more than possible. It's the only explanation that makes any sense.'
Grimoire? 'What, so now you're saying there's black magic involved?' Melissande demanded, I don't believe it. This is getting more and more farfetched by the minute!'
Markham shook his head. 'Sorry. I know this is difficult but we have to face facts. The only way a single hex could contain five different thaumaturgical signatures is if someone stole the potentias of those five wizards.'
Not someone. Lional. Blinking rapidly, she stared at Markham. 'That is nothing more than wild speculation.'
'No,' said Gerald's annoying friend. His engaging grin was entirely absent. Now he looked angry and a whole lot older, it's not speculation. And I can prove it. All I need is something bearing the thaumaturgical signature of one of the missing wizards.'
'Well, ducky?' said Reg, not unkindly. 'Can you help him or would you rather go on sticking your head in the sand? Because all three of us know who's behind this trouble.'
She returned to the bedroom. Snatched up the brown painted tin horse from its special place on her dressing table and took it back to the foyer.
I had a birthday a while ago,' she said, stroking the toy with one finger. 'Bondaningo Greenfeather—Lional's wizard before Gerald—gave me this. When you say a special word it—it—canters in little circles, neighing. Or it did. Now it can barely trot, I'm afraid I ran the magic down playing with it. Silly. It's not like I'm a child.'
Markham took the horse from her and lightly held it. 'Yes. Yes, Greenfeather's fingerprint is still quite clear,' he murmured, it's a clever incantation.' He reached out his other hand and pressed it to the door. Moments later his face twisted and his breathing harshened. He pulled his hand away. 'Blimey, that's disgusting!
'Never mind disgusting!' Reg said sharply. 'Did you recognise Greenfeather's signature?'
Reluctantly, Markham nodded. 'Yes. It's in there.'
'But not Gerald's?'
'No.'
'You're quite sure?' Reg persisted.
'I'm sure,' said Markham. 'Wherever he is Gerald's still got his potentia.'
Reg fluffed up all her draggled feathers. 'Well, praise Saint Snodgrass for that.'
Hardly paying them any attention, Melissande took the toy from his unresisting fingers. Whispered 'tallyho' into its ear then put it on the foyer floor. All her insides felt hollowed out, scoured bare with sorrow. As they watched, the little tin horse lifted its head, flicked its tail and pranced in a slow jerky circle, neighing.
It wasn't till Reg said, in a strangled voice, 'There, there, ducky. Markham, give her a hanky' that she realised she was crying.
Lional. Lional. Wlxat have you done?
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
'What I don't understand,' said Markham, 'is how Lional managed this in the first place. If he's not a wizard…'
Reg let out a thoughtful sigh. 'Well, magical ability usually runs in families and madam, there, is studying witchcraft. Inadequately, but she's studying it. So maybe he had just enough juice to get the ball rolling. And after that…' Another sigh. 'Well, Melissande? Did he?'
It was the first time Gerald's appalling feathered companion had ever addressed her by her actual name. Slumped in a chair, still clutching Markham's damp hanky, she looked up. 'Did he what?'
'Aren't you listening: Did your miserable brother have a spark of magic in him? Sufficient, as it were, to get the engine started? Saint Snodgrass preserve me,' she added to Markham. 'From the look on her face you'd think I was talking Babishkian!'
'Don't be so hard, Reg,' said Markham, disapproving. 'She's had a bad shock.'
'And she's going to get another one if she doesn't buck up! Royalty doesn't sit around glooming, it rallies, it rebounds, it seeks revenge! Look at me!'
Trying to sniff discreetly, Melissande watched as Markham ignored the damned bird, crossed to her chair and dropped to a crouch beside it. With flagrant disregard for protocol he took her hand in his; ridiculously, she felt comforted.
'Your Highness—Melissande — I'm sorry about this,' he said with surprising gentleness. 'I really am. I've got a brother. We can't stand each other but even so… I think I know how you feel. I mean, if I found out Aylesbury was a mass murderer…'
She pulled her hand free. 'Stop calling Lional a murderer. You don't know those other wizards are dead.'
'Melissande…' Markham's thin face was full of compassion. 'It's impossible to take a wizard's magicali potentia without killing him. Magic is in the blood, literally. It'd be like having your bones ripped out. Not even a First Grade wizard could survive it.'
She wasn't Lional's sister for nothing. 'I don't believe you. Show me five corpses and then I might accept what you're saying, but until you do, I—'
'Melissande! said Markham. His hand took hers again. 'The wizards are dead!
'And if you bleat "no, no, Lional isn't a murderer" one more time when you know damn well he is,' said Reg, without any compassion, I swear on my phoney grave, ducky, I'll poke out your eyeballs like olives
and feed them to your precious Boris.'
She tried not to think of dear Bondaningo, ripped apart from the inside out. 'Fine,' she said sullenly. Hating Markham. Hating the bird. Most of all, hating Lional. 'Have it your way. They're dead.'
Markham chewed on a fingernail. 'Blimey, Reg. We've got a real problem. How are we supposed to stand up to a man with the potentias of five First Grade wizards?' His expression changed, abruptly. 'Especially when one of them had access to texts from the Internationally Proscribed Index! He let go of her hand and unfolded to his feet, looking stricken. 'Damn. Pomodoro Uffitzi held a doctorate in Theoretical Applications of Reverse Thaumatics.'
In Ottish please?' said Melissande, feeling waspish.
'Black magic,' he said, distracted. 'Uffitzi spent eleven years researching his thesis in several countries renowned for their past dabblings in unsavoury practices. Who knows what grimoires he managed to find in that time?'
'And ever so carefully forgot to declare to the authorities?' said Reg. 'Saint Snodgrass preserve us!'
If I'm right, I have to notify the Department.'
'Yes, but after we've found Gerald,' said Reg. She chattered her beak, thinking hard. 'He must be around here somewhere.'
Very carefully Melissande laid Markham's damp handkerchief over the arm of her chair. 'Lional said he was in private retreat, meditating.'
Reg snorted. 'Meditating my feathered arse. He's being held prisoner.'
'Maybe he's run away'
'Stop being deliberately provocative. I'll bet you a nice pair of high-heeled pumps, ducky, Gerald's "accident" in the forest was Lional not being able to steal his potentia. That means our mad king needs him to do his dirty work for him—whatever that is. Trust me, he won't be far away'
'But he will be somewhere with a decent amount of space,' added Markham. 'We know the dirty work involved a Level Twelve transmog that makes the cat-into-lion trick look puny. Melissande, do you have any idea what Lional wanted Gerald to make?'
She glared at him. 'Of course not! Who do you think I am, his evil sidekick? I don't have the first idea what—' And then she turned to Reg.
'Hell's bells,' Reg whispered, as they stared at each other in sudden, appalled comprehension. 'Are you thinking what I'm thinking, madam? The Kallarapi gods. Tavistock as Lalchak… me as Vorsluk…'
Melissande shot out of the chair.' Grimthak! Oh my God, Reg! Gerald's made a bloody dragon.'
Reg turned, her dark eyes blazing. 'Markham, get us out ofhere.'
He flung himself at the foyer doors. Spread his fingers flat to the polished oak surface and pressed his cheek between them. After a moment he began to hum off-key. A moment after that, alarmingly, his unruly dark hair developed a life of its own, weaving and unweaving itself around his head in a series of bizarre patterns.
'Ah—wouldn't the window have been easier?' she asked.
'Don't distract him!' hissed Reg.
As she watched, holding her breath, Markham's face began to twist with pain. The humming became a groan and a bloody sweat broke out on his forehead. Moments later there was an explosion of light and sound and a billow of foul green smoke. Markham, shouting, flew across the foyer, struck the far wall and slid moaning to the floor.
As Reg exclaimed in the background Melissande dropped to her knees beside him. 'Monk! Are you all right?'
I think I'm going to be sick,' he groaned.
'Not in my foyer you're not!'
He heaved himself upright. 'Okay'
'Good!' said Reg, hovering now between the splintered remains of the foyer doors. 'Now come on, you two. Let's find Gerald!'
She helped Markham to his feet. 'Give him a moment, you nagging old hag! He was practically knocked unconscious!'
'Gerald's running out of moments!' Reg shouted, flapping madly. 'How long will your brother keep him around, do you think, now that he's got his precious dragon?'
'Reg is right,' said Markham, still looking sick. 'We have to go.'
'Go where? I've no idea where Gerald is. Have you?'
'No. But if we're lucky I can find him with a locator incant. I'll need something to guide me.'
'Then what are waiting for?' demanded Reg, still haphazardly hovering. 'Let's get to our suite!'
They raced through deserted corridors and up and down empty staircases to the palace's official wizard's residence. Gasping for air, Reg landed on a foyer chair and pointed a wing.
'The bedroom's that way. Fetch a used sock, Markham. That should have a good strong scent.'
As Markham fetched, Melissande frowned. 'Something strange is going on. The place is deserted, we didn't see anybody between here and my apartments. Where's everyone got to? There are always servants scurrying around here, it's like a damned anthill.'
Before Reg could comment Markham returned with a limp red sock. 'This should do it. Now I need a map of the kingdom.'
'There's one in the Guide to New Ottosland I left here for Gerald.'
Reg jerked her beak. 'It's in, the dresser, underneath that painting of the constipated cow on the wall there.'
'He shoved it in a drawer?' said Melissande, offended, as Markham found the pink folder. 'Did he even read it? I'll bet he didn't. I spent hours putting that guide together, you know!'
'And now it's come in very useful,' said Reg, 'which only goes to show there's a first time for everything. Now be quiet and let Markham focus.'
Melissande swallowed. 'Will the incant still work if the person you're trying to find is—you know—'
Markham glanced up from spreading the guide's map on the foyer table. 'Dead?' he said. 'No. It won't.'
'Anyway, he can't be dead,' she added, desperate for a bright side. 'You said Lional couldn't kill him.'
'Not with magic, apparently. No.'
She didn't need him to elaborate. 'Oh.'
Reg flapped from her chair to the table and glared. 'Any more clever questions, ducky?'
'Not for the moment.'
'That's a relief. Now come on, Markham. Let's get cracking.'
Markham nodded curtly, his face pale and serious. He wrapped Gerald's sock around his left hand, extended the index finger of his right hand and held it over the map of New Ottosland. 'Seekati. Kevelati. Demonstrate.'
Almost before the words had left his lips the tip of his pointing index finger flared into life as though a light had been switched on under the skin.
He laughed. 'We've got him, Reg! He's still alive!'
'Yes, but where?' Reg demanded.
His pointing finger started zigzagging across the map. 'Hang on, it's trying to home in on him now.' Another zig and two more zags and his finger jabbed itself to a standstill. 'There.' He peered at the map. 'Tolepootle Valley. Melissande?'
'That's miles from here. It'll take hours to—'
'No, it won't. The Stealth Stone's fine with miles. What can we expect when we get there?'
Before she could answer they heard a thundering of feet in the corridor outside the suite and a cacophony of alarmed cries.
'Now what?' said Reg, and rattled all her feathers. 'Quick, madam, see what's making the natives restless!'
Melissande flung open the foyer doors and accosted the first running servant she recognised. 'Hamish! What in the name of Saint Snodgrass is going on?'
Hamish was too panicked to be polite. 'Bloody hell, miss! Haven't you heard? There's a bloody great fire-breathing dragon on the loose! It's already killed people down in the city and now it's flying over the palace!'
She stepped back, shut the doors on all the fleeing servants and turned to Reg and Markham. Instead of gibbering incoherently, she felt unnaturally calm. It's already killed people down in the city. 'Hamish says there's a fire-breathing dragon flying over the palace.'
'He's right,' said Markham, staring at the foyer's skylight. 'There is.'
She looked up.
On the other side of the skylight's glass, floating lazily on an updraft like an enormous crimson and emerald striped seagull—with teeth
and talons—was Lional's dragon. As they watched, it opened its massive jaws and belched a fearsome plume of fire.
She felt her heart shrivel to ash. It's already killed people down in the city.
'Come on,' said Reg grimly. 'Let's go. We have to stop that damned thing before it really gets started.'
Melissande nodded. For once she wasn't inclined to argue.
When Gerald eventually roused from his exhausted, nightmare-ridden stupor there was still no light in the cave. So he sat with his back to the wall and waited.
There wasn't anything else to do.
A few feet away in the dirt and the dark was Reg.
He didn't want to think about her. Reg was a bruised and bloody mark in his heart, an absence he was only just beginning to realise. Another failure he wasn't sure he could live with. She was dead, she was dead… and it was all his fault. Everything was his fault. All those people, hunted to a crisp or soaked in poison. The terror. The destruction. He pulled his knees to his aching chest and held on tight.
If only I'd been braver. If only I'd defied him. If only I'd never been born.
There was no food or drink in the cold dark cave. If Lional changed his mind about wanting more dragons or lost what little was left of his sanity and forgot about him, which seemed more likely, then he was doomed to die in this place.
Oh God. I hope so.
Time dragged on, sodden with regrets.
Later, in the unrelenting black, he thought he saw a pinpoint of light.
He stirred. Stared, blinking. What new torment was this? Lional, returning at last to dispose of his tool? Or demand more damned dragons… or something worse…
I can't. I can't.
Ten feet away and six feet in the air, the pinpoint of light grew. Intensified. Glowing, it expanded to the size of a firefly. Against his skin, a sudden tingling crackle of power. Heedless of scrapes and bruises he hauled himself to his feet and leaned against the rough rock of the cave wall, his gaze not leaving the ball of light pulsing before him.
With a flash and a ripping sound the air tore open and three briefly silhouetted figures fell through the hole to land shouting on the cave's dirt floor.