The Ondine Collection

by Ebony McKenna

  Yikes. Where exactly was the hatch for the water to go in?

  Ooops, wrong type of canon. This was just an every day tank. The water canon was several meters away, and guarded as well.

  “Melody! Help me out here!” Ondine screamed.

  “Hey, what are you doing?” A group of cadets turned on Ondine.

  Her belly lurched. Time to sound important. “They sent me over to put an additive in the water. Purple dye so you can find people later to make arrests.” I’m so impressed with me, I can’t wait to tell Hamish later.

  “You think we’re stupid?”

  Maybe not. Gears and cogs clicked in her brain. Something rumbled over the cobbles, coming closer. Hamish poked his head out the top hatch.

  “You want to know what I have?” Ondine said. “I have a tank right behind me.”

  The cadets combined their dark magic to hold the tank at bay. The lid shut down hard on Hamish’s head, muffling a yelp from inside.

  Jupiter’s moons, this wasn’t supposed to happen.

  To Ondine’s relief, another group of protestors turned up, their focus not on the tank, but the cadets.

  “They’ve got your good magic,” Melody said inside Ondine’s head. “We’re going to win!”

  The display of good magic was simplicity itself. Every single rivet popped out of the tank behind the cadets. The machine fell apart like a rusty bucket. A puff of glittering yellow magic dust blew all the components into the air, leaving a shivering cadet sitting in the driver’s seat, control knobs in his hand.

  Another cloud of magic swept the cadets from their feet, sending them wafting through the air like a swirl of snow. The crowd of revolutionaries cheered and jeered at their defeated foes.

  No time to rejoice, they still had a revolution to win and Mrs Howser would be here soon with her henchmen and women. Or hench-cadets. Hurrying, Ondine found the water canon’s inlet cover and poured the bubble mix into the reservoir. Then she cranked the nozzle high into the sky and hunted for a switch. They all looked round and green. Nothing so simple as a big red lever.

  Silently she reached out to Melody, hoping the clever witch was somehow keeping track of her, despite the chaotic battles surrounding them. Please help me?I need superconcentrated good magic and I need it now.

  In three heartbeats, nothing at all happened, then suddenly a burst of magic entered Ondine’s body, swirled in her brain and poured through her hands. She pressed a small green button and a water fountain charged into the sky, spreading bubbles through the air.

  “Are ye right lass?” Hamish said as he came over and stood beside her.

  Bubbles continued to spray into the sky, falling in snowy drifts all through the plaza. As each feather-light bubble landed on a cadet, it’s popped and showered them with good magic, putting love back in their hearts instead of anger.

  The fighting continued, but bubbles kept landing on the cadets, confusing them momentarily, before they dropped their weapons and started playing with the bubbles instead of fighting.

  Good magic was winning against evil. People slipped and giggled and laughed as the ground became slick with detergent.

  Clomp, clomp, clomp. A new threat marched into Savo Plaza.

  Leading a platoon of cadets, Mrs Howser hovered on a broomstick. Just to pick over that fresh emotional scab, Ondine noticed that broomstick was Old Col’s.

  Everyone froze. The water canon switched off. People turned to Mrs Howser as she hovered above the melée and aimed her finger directly at Ondine. A blast of magic hurtled through the air. Ondine leapt behind the water canon as Howser’s magic crashed against the machine, instantly freezing the metal. Being wet, Ondine stuck fast to the frigid surface. She ripped hard and tore her sleeves off, but at least she was free. A huge boom echoed around the plaza as the water canon exploded into icy powder.

  Run! A voice yelled inside her head. It didn’t matter whose, she heard it and she ran, ducking and zigzagging to get away from Mrs Howser and her magic bolts of frozen death. Running for her life, Ondine’s face burned red with panic. Her heart hammered so hard it blocked the sound of her boots on the cobbled stones. A laneway came up, already blocked with fleeing protestors. Ondine shoved into the panic, carried along with the flow of people until she fell out into an open street.

  Screams came from the plaza, from the innocent people she and Melody had summoned here. The people who’d risked being out after curfew to show their support – except Ondine had run like a coward and abandoned the very people she needed.

  Stopping, she turned back to the plaza, but her feet wouldn’t obey. Nerves had taken hold, she couldn’t move. “Get back in there!” she yelled at herself. But her feet weren’t listening. Stupid feet. And the flow of people squeezing out that one small laneway meant she couldn’t get back in if she tried. The crowd were coming to her, pouring through the bottleneck of the lane and out towards the next major open area only a block away.

  On she ran, ahead to the clear space, which just happened to be the steps of Brugel’s Dentate.

  In the old days these steps would be teeming with night markets and festivals, assemblies and general tourism. Tonight those steps were bare and glittery wet in the cold night air. Ondine’s feet raced towards those steps, where an enormous, permanent screen featuring images of a beaming Lord Vincent mocked her approach. The urge to rip off her boot and hurl it at the screen had never been so strong. Unfortunately, her hands were so stiff with cold she couldn’t manage the laces.

  “Stop running, girl,” Mrs Howser said from behind her.

  Only her last reserves of courage held her up. It took a few breaths but eventually she turned to face her nemesis. Mrs Howser was sitting on that broomstick, floating in the air. No doubt she’d ridden over everyone through the lane to get here.

  Meanwhile, people kept teeming out of the plaza, into the open streets.

  The enormous screen flickered and crackled, making Ondine turn around. Lord Vincent’s face was gone – hoorah! – but now it showed the back of Ondine’s head. It took a few double-takes, but somewhere on the top of a car, or up high, somebody had a camera aimed at her. And Mrs Howser. Aha! There on the walls of a building were several cameras and projectors, capturing everything and beaming it onto the screen for all to see. Ondine’s showdown with her arch enemy would be massively public.

  And massively humiliating for one of them as well. Ondine hoped it wasn’t her, but with the way her luck was going, she couldn’t be sure. Clever words and speeches deserted her as she trembled on the steps.

  Mrs Howser advanced on Ondine and growled, “This ends here, girl.” Then the witch turned around to face the crowd now gathering at the base of the steps. The people should have fled. Nope, they were hanging around to see what happened next.

  Clomping feet and rattling metal brought the rest of Mrs Howser’s dark army to the edges of the crowd, creating a new barrier to escape. At the head of this dark army, Ondine recognised that powerful cadet, the one she’d seen in her street the night Da had been arrested. The same one from the shared visions with Melody, who had trained under Mrs Howser at Fort Kluff. Looking at her now, Ondine could see rips and tears in her uniform, where she’d engaged in direct combat. Her face had no bruises at all, showing just how one-sided the cadet’s battles had been.

  At that moment Lord Vincent himself stepped out – of where, Ondine couldn’t tell – and quietly walked up the steps to the top, as if taking control of proceedings. But he wasn’t in control. Neither was Ondine. Mrs Howser was the one in control as she raised her hand and sent a hideous dark shadow flying out from her fingers. The shadow arched in the air like a net over a school of fish.

  “Kill them!” Mrs Howser cried out to her dark army. “Kill them all!”

  “No!” Ondine leapt towards Mrs Howser.

  “Arrrrrrggggggghhhhh!” Hamish’s familiar cry carried up the steps as he ran towards Ondine, making her heart soar.

  Dripping with sarcasm, Mrs Howser shoute
d, “Oh come on!” She threw a fresh bolt of magic and caught Hamish straight in the chest.

  He absorbed the impact but it didn’t stop him taking those last steps to be closer to Ondine.

  Mrs Howser glared at Ondine and Hamish as a fresh ball of darkest green magic built in the palm of her hand. “This ends. Now.”

  The ball rocketed towards Ondine. Hamish leapt out to take the blow. The sound of crunching gravel filled the air. Hamish’s entire body froze in mid-leap.

  “No!” Ondine screamed as she grabbed him, her hot skin pressed against his marble-cold form. Beneath her arms, his flesh turned to stone. She pressed herself against his chest, feeling the last thuds of his heart as his body fossilised in her arms. Blubbering now, she held on, as if her softness and warmth could transfer to his body through sheer force of will. “No, no, no. Hamish. Oh Hamish. It wasn’t meant to happen like this.”

  Mrs Howser, her voice low and deadly, said, “Yes it was. It’s exactly how it was meant to happen. This was how it was always going to end, right from the start.”

  “Not like this. Never like this. Even you can’t be this cruel.”

  “Yes, I can. This is my magic. I designed it so everything would come to this point. And beyond.” The witch stood closer, gloating her victory. “I made it so that once he bonded with someone, their affections would make other people’s wishes come true. That’s how the magic spread so beautifully in the first place. As each wish came true, people absorbed the magic and passed it on. Such a marvellous virus.”

  “Shut up!” Hot tears blurred Ondine’s vision. They ran down her cheeks and fell with a splatter on Hamish’s granite form. He was heavy in her arms. So heavy. So solid and cold. Too heavy to lift, she lay him along the step.

  “It’s my best spell ever, even if I do say so myself.” Mrs Howser smirked. “Contagious magic that everyday normals can catch! Don’t mean to brag. Well, actually I do, because it was so, so clever and you never even worked it out.”

  Hamish’s body wasn’t getting any warmer, or lighter. Ondine couldn’t move for the weight of him, or the sheer terror of being fixed in Mrs Howser’s glare.

  “I designed it so the first normals to catch it would be ever-so-sweet and lovely and good,” Mrs Howser shuddered, “that you wouldn’t be able to help yourself spreading even more. And then, and see, this is the bit I’m really proud of, then the good ones would keep spreading magic to even more people, like ripples in a pond, and then it would mutate and get darker, and so many more people would catch it. Enough to fill a whole army with dark magic.”

  Frustrated and sick with fear, Ondine yelled, “I don't believe you!” Even though in her heart, she knew it was true.

  Mrs Howser cackled and wafted her arm out. “Look around you, gaze upon my magnificent dark army. They are here because of you, Ondine. In a way, this is all your fault.”

  The dark army filled the streets, standing to attention, waiting for their next directive.

  “Don’t you dare blame me!” Ondine said through gritted teeth. “This is your horrible magic, not mine!”

  “Let me show you, my dear.” Mrs Howser tapped her wrinkled hand on the top of Ondine’s head and her vision filled with images and memories.

  Disgusted with the images filling her head, Ondine turned away from Howser. Yet those same images now played on the big screen at the top of the steps, for everyone to see.

  Pain lanced Ondine as she looked at her beloved and batty great auntie, dancing at a debuntante ball with Hamish. It wasn’t recent Old Col, it was a much younger version. On the sidelines, a youthful Birgit Howser was glaring at Col and Hamish waltzing past. Ondine almost didn’t recognise Howser, because she looked so wholesome. On the screen and inside her head, images bounced around.

  Near the drinks table a furious Howser was now yelling at Col. “You knew I wanted to partner with Hamish. So you cast a spell on him so he’d choose you over me! I’ll never forgive you for this Col!”

  Later, after having too much alcohol to drink, Hamish slurred “You tricked me you witch!” He then accidentally stepped on Col’s feet, falling over and ripping her dress. Looking embarrassed, Col waved her hands casting a spell on him, “You revolting little weasel. How dare you break my heart? You can stay like that for all I care. You’re all the same, you lot.”

  Up on the screen, for all to see, Hamish the handsome lad screamed as he transformed into Shambles the ferret for the very first time.

  Then the image flickered to a new scene, with Mrs Howser taking in Shambles after Col had spurned him. Time then flew forward again, to a moonlit night at the Psychic Summer Camp. As Shambles slept, a now middle-aged Howser stood over him. She chanted and waved her hands, casting another spell on Shambles.

  ​

  “A girl of whom you are fond,

  the two of you will form a bond.

  You’ll make other’s wishes come true,

  When she becomes closest to you.

  Those wishes will turn dark and loyal,

  To make an army for one who is royal.

  A new Brugelish ruler to be adored,

  And I shall finally get my reward.”

  ​

  In the next image, Mrs Howser was at the Autumn Palace, placing her curse over the stones at the gatehouse, which she knew Shambles would one day cross over, therefore setting all her twisted magic into motion.

  Then a memory played out of Ondine, from nearly two years ago, at Psychic Summer Camp, where she found Shambles face-deep in her Brugelwürst sausage.

  “And now we’ve come to the end of the memories. For you at any rate,” Mrs Howser said.

  Footsteps sounded. Melody charged up the stairs. “What have you done?” She was out of breath. “Tell me I’m not too late?”

  “Oh dear,” Mrs Howser said. “My protégée is here, and she is too late. He’s already dead.”

  Vincent, who had said nothing all this time, interrupted. “Won’t Hamish’s death mean the end of your curse that made the dark army?”

  Ondine inwardly swore. Vincent’s such a selfish basket.

  “You are especially thick tonight,” Mrs Howser said. “His death means nothing. I made the curse, the curse lives on as long as I do.”

  Melody’s eyes rounded like saucers. Ondine’s breath staggered in her lungs. Mrs Howser’s showboating had just given them the key to ending this. If the old witch died, the curse would die with her.

  “Kiss him,” Melody urgently whispered to Ondine. “One more make-a-wish kiss.”

  “No you don’t!” Mrs Howser said, delivering a nasty blast of magic towards Hamish.

  In Ondine’s arms, Hamish the man shrivelled into a cold, stone ferret.

  Tears poured from Ondine as she looked at Howser, standing over them. “Only you could be so cruel!”

  “Kiss him anyway!” Melody said.

  The deepest sorrow from losing her one true love welled inside Ondine. Her dry lips met his stone head, the only warmth came from the tears running from her face onto his icy body, begging him to come back to her. Then Melody’s voice rang inside her head. She was sending out another message, to every magically-receptive mind in the crowd: “Wish that Ondine becomes more powerful than Howser.”

  Ondine held Shambles, willing his stone ferrety body to warm. “Come back to me. Please, please come back to me. Hamish I love you with all my heart and my being. You are mine, you hear me? Mine. Now come back to me. Please.” Another soft kiss on his hard little head, then a sob of pain as she stroked his cold ears and felt as if she too would rather turn to stone than live without him. Nose pressed to the tip of his, she cried and sniffed and made a mess of his face. Reverently she wiped the slick with her sleeve and kissed him afresh.

  He felt warmer this time. Probably a trick of her hot tears warming his stone skin. “I’m not done with you,” she said, her voice choking with emotion. “You have to come back. I love you Hamish. Pure and simple. I love you and you love me.”

  Somethin
g magical stirred in her chest and her belly as she kissed him again. A tinge of golden mist came from her lips this time. Magic. Coming from inside Ondine.

  The people in the streets were holding hands and wishing for stronger, kinder magic.

  Thank you Melody. Hope surged within. “Come back to me, my love.” Ondine caressed Shambles’s stony forehead.

  “Right well. Busy schedule,” Mrs Howser said, turning her hand left and right, building a new ball of magic in her palm. “This has been fascinating to watch, but time’s a’wasting.”

  “Stop!” Still holding Shambles’s prone form, Ondine stared at Mrs Howser. “Stop now.”

  Wisps of gold traced through the air, from Ondine’s lips towards Mrs Howser. The woman did indeed stop, her body slowly curved inwards, as if her entire being formed a scowl. “How are you doing this? You have no magic!”

  “I do now, thanks to yours,” Ondine said, putting the pieces together. “Hamish is alive. He’s coming back to me right now. And I have your curse to thank for it.”

  “But . . . you can’t!” Crumpling now, as if her body was imploding, Mrs Howser curled around her ball of magic, unable to fling it away.

  “I can.” Boldness filled Ondine. Something magical and calming settled inside her. Fear lost all meaning as Shambles’s body warmed in her lap. In a few seconds, his ferrety head grew back into his lovely humanly Hamish face, gold sprites played about his head as his hair changing from a carved solid into the lush strands she loved playing with so much. All the while, Mrs Howser stood there, curling into herself.

  “It’s all your magic, Birgit. The people wished me to have it, and so I have. You shouldn’t have bragged. Only the witch that created the curse can take it off. The curse doesn’t die until the witch that made it dies. When you’re dead, your curse will lift and life will return to normal.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” Mrs Howser said. With a gasp and a grunt, Mrs Howser threw her ball of magic towards Ondine.

  “No!” Ondine held her palm out to protect Hamish from the blast. Mrs Howser’s ball of power ricocheted off Ondine’s hand and barrelled back towards its maker, crashing straight into her heart.