The Storm Tower Thief

by Anne Cameron

  McFangus—DO NOT come to the experimental division this morning. You have now reached a new phase in your training as a lightning cub, and for the next few months you will be working in the research department instead. Report to Catcher Grimble in the Octagon at eight o’clock precisely. DO NOT BE LATE. And NEVER forget that I am still your master lightning catcher. If I hear any reports of bad behavior or deliberate stupidity from Catcher Grimble, THERE WILL BE CONSEQUENCES.

  Angus gulped and stuffed the letter into his pocket. He swiftly checked his weather watch—a highly valuable piece of equipment that he’d been given on his first day as a lightning cub and that showed exactly what the weather was doing. At that moment a flurry of fat snowflakes and frosted ice crystals were floating across the gray watch face, clearly indicating that Perilous was in for some extremely cold weather. It also showed that he had precisely seven minutes and twenty-eight seconds to dart up to the Octagon before he was in deep trouble.

  He grabbed his new fur-lined snow boots, dragged a comb through his hair, then dashed out into the curved hallway. There was no sign of Dougal, however; his bedroom was already empty. So Angus sprinted up the spiral staircase alone, hoping that Catcher Sparks hadn’t suddenly decided to split them up and send them to different parts of the Exploratorium.

  When he finally stumbled into the Octagon, he found Catcher Grimble waiting for him. Gray haired and shriveled, he reminded Angus of a punctured balloon, with knees as ancient and knobbly as his walking stick.

  “Sorry . . . I’m late . . . sir,” Angus gasped, trying to catch his breath.

  “Late?” the lightning catcher bellowed, taking a pocket watch out from the folds of his leather jerkin and studying it through a pair of thick glasses. “Why, I’ll have you know that in sixty-seven years at this Exploratorium, I’ve never been late for anything! Not once!”

  “No, sir, I didn’t mean—”

  Before Angus could explain himself, Catcher Grimble was talking again, his loud voice echoing around the Octagon.

  “Now, Catcher Sparks has sent you on from the experimental division, I believe,” he said, consulting a list of names, his nose pressed hard against the paper. “Ah yes, here we are, you must be . . . Agnes Munchfungus.” He squinted at Angus over the top of his list. “Quite extraordinary, the names some of you lightning cubs have these days!”

  “Er . . . actually, sir, I’m Angus McFangus.” Angus hastily checked over his shoulder, hoping there were no other lightning cubs lurking about in the Octagon. Because if anyone heard him being called Agnes Munchfungus . . .

  “Splendid! Well, then, Agnes,” Catcher Grimble plowed on, completely ignoring everything Angus had just said. “I think you will find that life inside the research department happens at a rather less frantic pace. It is a delightful oasis of peace and tranquillity, a place for quiet contemplation and study in the midst of other much noisier, smellier distractions at Perilous. I must therefore ask you to keep your voice down at all times,” he boomed, making Angus’s eardrums vibrate painfully. “If you would follow me, Miss Munchfungus.”

  Angus had already visited the claustrophobic department once before with Edmund Croxley, less than an hour after discovering that he’d been enrolled as a trainee lightning catcher. He followed Catcher Grimble through the familiar tightly packed bookshelves, wondering how anyone could possibly find it tranquil. There was barely enough room to breathe among the maze of crumbling records and ancient layers of dust, let alone contemplate anything. He was just trying to decide if he should risk asking for a transfer straight back to the experimental division, even if it meant weeks of cleaning out blocked storm bellows, when Catcher Grimble came to a sudden halt.

  “Here we are,” he announced cheerfully.

  Angus frowned. They’d come to a dark dead end. There was nothing in front of them except a solid wall. Or maybe . . . Angus squinted. He could see a faint outline in the gloom. There was a small click, a thin gleam of light appeared in the wall, and Catcher Grimble shuffled him through a concealed door in the shadows. Angus’s jaw dropped in astonishment as they emerged into an enormous hall. Edmund Croxley definitely hadn’t shown him this on his guided tour!

  Long and narrow, the research department stretched far into the distance, like a never-ending library. Monumental shelves stuffed with countless books and stacks of documents towered above them on all sides, with flights of stairs diving off in every direction possible. Some wound in tight spirals all the way up to the ceiling, while others meandered between the shelves and across the aisle down the center of the hall, forming a strange spiderweb of stairs and reading platforms.

  High above them, a vast cathedral-like ceiling had been painted with livid storms, lightning bolts, blizzards, and what appeared to be showers of pea-green hailstones. Angus gazed around, feeling faintly dizzy.

  “This department is the beating heart of Perilous,” Catcher Grimble said suddenly, making Angus jump. He led the way down a wide center aisle. “Without the countless research projects that have been carried out across the centuries, we would understand very little about the weather. Any lightning catcher needing to know more about wind-howling scales or the correct way to measure a monsoon can find information here, within the peaceful haven of the research department.”

  Angus couldn’t help thinking that it would be a lot more peaceful without Catcher Grimble’s booming voice bouncing off the walls. And he noticed that several elderly lightning catchers, sitting in various comfortable armchairs scattered among the stacks, were glaring at them as they walked past. It took Angus several seconds to realize that they were also being glared at from above. Some of the armchairs had been raised off the floor on pulleys and were dangling directly overhead. All the chairs had been fitted with seat belts, reading lamps, and alarm clocks, along with an assortment of feathery pillows. Angus grinned as they ducked under a low-flying sofa from which definite sounds of snoring could be heard.

  He was equally surprised, a few moments later, to see Indigo and Dougal hovering awkwardly up ahead of them.

  “Where have you been?” Indigo asked, looking relieved, as Catcher Grimble wandered over to a desk to speak to a fellow lightning catcher.

  “I only found out we were coming here fifteen minutes ago,” Angus explained, hastily doing up the last few buttons on his shirt. “How come you two got here before me?”

  “Catcher Sparks pushed a note under my door last night,” Indigo said.

  “And she pounced on me this morning in the kitchens, before I’d even finished half a slice of toast,” Dougal said. “She gave me this long lecture about not doing anything stupid and then dragged me up here before I could come and get you. It was worth it, though,” he added, suddenly looking far happier than he ever had in the experimental division. “I can’t believe we’re spending the next few months in the research department. No more messing about with hailstone helmets and armpit warmers. No more machines exploding or inventions going haywire. Most of the lightning catchers who work in here look at least a hundred years old. So it’s got to be less dangerous than being with Catcher Sparks, hasn’t it?”

  Angus smiled. “I wouldn’t be so sure.”

  A few moments later Catcher Grimble joined them once again. “Now that Miss Munchfungus is here, we can begin,” he said. “I have some very important work for you to tackle today.”

  “Miss Munchfungus?” Dougal grinned, nudging Angus in the ribs as they followed the wheezing, shrunken lightning catcher farther into the depths of the research department.

  Angus sighed. “Yeah. Just call me Agnes.”

  Dougal smothered a huge guffaw. Several lightning catchers glared in their direction.

  “I don’t know what you’re smirking about,” Indigo whispered, trying hard not to smile. “Catcher Grimble’s been calling you Miss Mildew ever since you arrived.”

  “Miss Mildew?” Angus snorted, suddenly feeling much happier.

  “Miss India Mildew, to be precise,” Indigo added
as Dougal’s face dropped. “He’s also convinced my name’s Douglas Drainpipe. But it’s not surprising that he’s got us all mixed up with each other. I mean, he can hardly see a thing through those dreadful glasses; he’s almost completely deaf; plus, he’s obviously lost most of his marbles.”

  At that precise moment Catcher Grimble stopped up ahead and began an animated conversation with a large potted plant, which he addressed affectionately as Gertrude.

  “Oh, dear.” Indigo sighed. “I’m not sure how good he’s going to be as a teacher.”

  Catcher Grimble led them up a long flight of stairs and onto a narrow reading platform that was only just big enough for all four of them to stand on. Angus glanced quickly over the side of the railings and instantly wished he hadn’t; it was a very long way down.

  “Many years ago,” Catcher Grimble barked loudly, “the Exploratorium fell prey to a mysterious book thief, and measures were put in place to safeguard our most precious tomes from grasping fingers.”

  “Measures?” Dougal asked, looking mildly concerned.

  “Booby traps, Miss Mildew, booby traps!” Catcher Grimble bellowed, addressing the reading lamp behind Dougal’s head. “A number of clever antitheft devices were concealed within the pages of these books to discourage the wretched thief. Unfortunately, no record was kept of where they were hidden, and some of them still remain. It will be your special task, therefore, to scour these shelves and remove any contraptions that you find. You will start with the oldest, most valuable books,” Catcher Grimble added, producing three sets of safety goggles and gloves from his leather jerkin and handing them to Angus. “Pass these around if you will, Miss Munchfungus. I’ll be keeping an eye on your progress from the Howling Gallery.” He pointed across to the opposite side of the hall, where a long bank of comfy armchairs was filling up fast with lightning catchers in various states of consciousness.

  “When he says booby traps . . .”—Dougal gulped as Catcher Grimble disappeared back down the spiral stairs—“what do you think he means, exactly?”

  Angus dragged an innocent-looking book off the shelf closest to him and studied it cautiously. “I don’t know, but it can’t be that bad, can it? I mean, they’re just records and research papers.”

  Luckily, the first few books he examined contained nothing more dangerous than a couple of dead moths. And it wasn’t until he opened a battered tome called A Cloud Spotters’ Spot Guide, from 1898, that he was hit by his first booby trap.

  “Ow!” He flinched as a small device with jagged wooden jaws leaped from the page and attached itself to his finger, biting down hard. “Ow! Get this thing off me!”

  “Hold still!” Indigo quickly came to the rescue, but before any of them could speak again— Poof!

  “Ew!” Dougal had been hit straight in the safety goggles by a cloud of acrid yellow powder.

  So it continued. There were rusty alarm bells that dropped straight out of the spine as soon as a book was opened, causing several snoozing lightning catchers to shake their fists in Dougal’s direction. There were antitheft ink squirters, explosions of potent sneezing powder, and clouds of minuscule book mites that buzzed angrily around their heads. But by far the most dangerous booby trap was a set of revolving spine spikes, which twisted themselves so tightly around a loose strand of Indigo’s hair that she had to be cut free by Catcher Grimble.

  “I don’t believe it! This is even worse than the experimental division,” Dougal grumbled as he wrestled a finger clamp to the floor of the reading platform and stamped on it hard. “I thought we’d be doing some proper research into cloud formations, at the very least.”

  “Speaking of research . . .” Angus swatted some annoying book mites away from his face with a hefty tome and sat back on his heels for a rest. “Have you had any luck with the qube yet?”

  “Oh, yeah, I cracked it hours ago,” Dougal answered sarcastically.

  “So you haven’t discovered anything?” Angus tried hard to keep the disappointment out of his voice. But he’d been dying to ask Dougal about the qube all morning.

  “Well, there is something.” Dougal glanced over his shoulder to make sure Catcher Grimble wasn’t watching. He then cleared a space on the floor, took the qube out of his pocket, and placed it in front of them. “I’ve been reading a book Dad gave me last year. It explains how all sorts of secret message devices work. It says that each Farew’s qube is specially made for the person who buys it and comes with its own unique code, like a password.”

  “How do we find out what the password is?” Indigo asked, trying to not to touch anything important. A sticky coating of antitheft gum that she’d just peeled out of a book had attached itself to her fingers instead.

  “Easy,” Dougal said. “See all the signs and symbols carved into the sides?”

  Angus picked up the qube and studied the symbols carefully. He’d already spent a considerable amount of time in his bedroom at the Windmill gazing at the carvings. There were sixteen symbols on each side of the qube, arranged in rows of four. There were tiny letters of the alphabet and numbers, bolts of lightning, half-moons, and thunderclouds.

  “All you have to do is line up the symbols in the correct order, so they spell out the password, and then the qube will open automatically.”

  “But the stupid thing won’t budge,” Angus said, frowning. “I’ve already tried loads of times.”

  “You do it like this.” Dougal grabbed the qube and pulled a slender, near-invisible wooden pin from one side of the block. “The linchpin keeps everything locked in place. By removing it, you release the twisting mechanism, and then you can move the squares in any direction you want—up, down, left, right, even in diagonals—to spell out any combination of letters or symbols.”

  To demonstrate, Dougal picked a tiny letter A and pushed it four squares to the left and three down, forcing all the other squares out of its way in a strange, fluid, rippling motion. “See?” Dougal grinned. “It’s simple when you know how.”

  “But how do we know what the password is?” Angus asked, amazed.

  “That’s the difficult part.” Dougal’s smile faded. “I’ve tried all the obvious words already, like ‘Perilous,’ ‘lightning catcher,’ even ‘Angus,’ but nothing works. So it could be a combination of letters, numbers, or symbols, or letters, numbers, and symbols.”

  Angus stared at Dougal, sudden understanding washing over him. With so many combinations possible, so many passwords that his mum and dad could have made up or chosen, it could take them days, weeks, or even months to figure it out.

  “Why is it called a Farew’s qube, anyway?” Indigo asked.

  “Haven’t got a clue,” Dougal said. “But Farew sounds a bit like pharaoh, doesn’t it? Like in ancient Egyptian times, and—”

  Whatever Dougal was about to add was cut short by one of the books, which suddenly exploded in a shower of foul, musty-smelling gas, and all conversation came to an immediate halt.

  In the days that followed, Angus lost count of the number of booby traps they removed from the never-ending supply of books, as well as the number of times each of them had to be rescued by a lightning catcher. And he began to think longingly of Miss DeWinkle and her impressively boring fog lectures, where he’d allowed his thoughts to drift harmlessly, without fear of being attacked.

  Angus also discovered that they weren’t the only trainees who’d been moved to a new department. Georgina Fox and Jonathon Hake, two of his fellow first years, had been sent up to the roof, where they’d been set to work chipping icicles off hurricane masts. Nigel Ridgely had sprained his wrist in the Antarctic testing center and had been sent to help the new librarian, Miss Vulpine. Violet Quinn and Millicent Nichols had been moved to the experimental division. And the Vellum twins were now sweeping up bits of flaky seaweed (used for predicting rainfall) in the forecasting department.

  “Couldn’t have happened to a nicer pair of lightning cubs.” Dougal grinned as they passed the scowling twins one day in the stone
tunnels.

  Some of the older lightning cubs, too, had moved on to different phases in their training.

  “We’re doing an advanced lightning identification course with Valentine Vellum in the Lightnarium, and it’s totally brilliant,” Nicholas Grubb, a friendly, sandy-haired, fourth year said one evening when he met Angus outside the boys’ bathrooms. “Three lightning cubs have fainted so far. Plus, we’ve had two nosebleeds, and we’re doing sinister lightning next, so someone’s bound to have a truly excellent screaming fit!”

  Angus had yet to see two of his favorite lightning catchers: Aramanthus Rogwood, who was rarely seen wandering the stone tunnels and passageways of Perilous, and Felix Gudgeon. After a very wobbly start to their friendship, which was due mainly to the fact that Gudgeon had dragged him out of the Windmill in the middle of the night, Angus had grown to like the gruff lightning catcher enormously. So far, however, he had caught only a brief glimpse of Gudgeon at the far end of the kitchens, hurrying in the opposite direction with Principal Dark-Angel.

  Mealtimes were as boisterous as ever. Clifford Fugg and Theodore Twill were constantly being shouted at by an irate Catcher Howler for starting food fights. It was after one such incident, when Angus was forced to skirt around a large lake of cold custard, that he found Dougal and Indigo sitting with another boy, whom he’d had never seen before.

  The boy had thick, brown tousled hair and looked several years older than the other lightning cubs in the kitchens.

  “Hey, Angus!” Dougal, looking remarkably cheerful, grinned as Angus approached the table. “Guess who this is?”

  “Um?”

  The boy stood up and shook Angus’s hand in a friendly manner. “Geronimo Midnight, Indigo’s older, more intelligent brother. I’ve already heard a lot about you.”

  “Oh. Er . . . it’s nice to meet you, Geronimo.”