The watching groups often included Quinn, though he would stand apart from the others. He never stayed for long, and whenever Niamh glanced in his direction his head always seemed to be buried in a book. She wondered why he came – was it to keep an eye on her friends (who always gathered with the watching groups) or was it to keep an eye on her (which was more worrying …). It was never possible to ask. Whenever she tried to approach him during a break in training he would disappear – almost magically it seemed – into the gaps between the trees, behind a group of children, or over the brow of the small hillock which ran along the side of the spell casting range. And it was impossible to bring up the topic during the increasingly rare occasions they actually shared a conversation. He would deflect the discussion or simply ignore it outright.
Quinn became, if it were possible, even more withdrawn as the year dawdled into October and November. Despite the returning blush of spring and then the intensifying heat of summer which turned the hills brown with nor’west winds, there was nothing to brighten the mood of the odd boy and no way to tell if he really was up to no good. They had reached a dead end.
Chapter 24
Deception and Diversions
December grew hotter by the day. As the end of year holidays drew closer the days seemed to drag out, delaying the release from the daily grind of schoolwork until it seemed as though a plot had been laid by the adults to make the children suffer as long as possible until the gates closed for the year.
The children’s vigil to catch Quinn at whatever he was planning had failed miserably. Despite their close, almost ceaseless watching, the boy seemed to lead the dullest of lives – school, then study, then library – it was an almost unvarying routine. ‘I can’t be bothered with this anymore,’ said Hugh to Grady as he stomped along the second floor corridors. ‘I’ve had to give up my Wiz-Jit-su this term to make sure I could follow that stupid boy around. And it’s not like I’m getting anything out of it either. Honestly, it’s been such a waste of time!’
‘I’m sorry, mate,’ said Grady. There was nothing he could think of that would be a good counter argument to Hugh. Either Quinn was an incredibly good actor or he really was up to nothing at all and the children had it wrong. ‘We had to be sure, though. All of us thought he was a bit dodgy.’
‘All of you but me!’ said Hugh stubbornly. ‘I told you he couldn’t cast his way out of a paper bag. I’m three years younger than him and even I can cast better spells.’ Hugh turned down the stairwell past the glass window with its moving images of past school champions. The corridors were strangely quiet as the senior school completed its year end exams. There were only a few students wandering around indoors – most were outside playing or letting off steam in the increasingly hot and muggy afternoon. The stone walls of the school cast welcoming shadows and stayed thankfully cool despite the heat. Grady and Hugh turned down towards the shaded colonnaded walkway to the fields and past the rows of statues. ‘Who’s watching him now, anyway?’
‘Emily has the watch for now,’ said Grady.
Hugh rolled his eyes in response.
‘Oh, don’t worry,’ said Grady. ‘You know as well as I do she might be a little mad every now and then, but she has a devious mind and is very good at keeping him in sight. Hugh won’t be able to move out of the school grounds with her in tow.’
As he said those words one of the statues spilled a pile of books from its arms onto the floor. Without turning round Grady said, ‘Bardolphus. What could I possibly have said to have upset you this time?’
‘Oh. Well. Nothing really. But Master Quinn is not in the school at the moment,’ said the statue as it creakily descended from its plinth to recover the books. Grady and Hugh helped him to pick them up and then helped him back up to his spot.
‘What do you mean, not in the school? We haven’t let him out of our sight all day.’
‘You know, normally I don’t agree with anything my brother says but in this case he’s actually correct,’ said the statue of Beroldus – the twin of the one in the castle. ‘I saw young Quinn sneaking along in the castle not ten minutes ago. At least my twin saw him, anyway. He may be very good at sticking to shadows but you don’t pull a fast one on us that easily. Well, maybe you can on my brother but you certainly can’t try that on me! I didn’t get to be king by having the wool pulled over my eyes.’
‘Ummm ...’ Bardolphus started to say.
‘What?’ said Beroldus, with a haughty flick of his chin.
‘You’re not a king. You’re a statue,’ said Bardolphus, a little meekly.
Beroldus gave his brother a stare before sniffily replying; ‘Yes, well, I may be a statue but at least I’m a statue of a clever king and not just some ordinary knight like that lot down there!’ he said, gesturing towards an enormous pair of fiercely armoured statues. They stood with heads bowed slightly and one hand resting on one of the biggest broadswords Grady had ever seen.
‘Oh God. Here we go,’ said Bardolphus, closing his eyes.
The two statues straightened up and turned their gazes towards Beroldus who continued to try and stare them down. The knights looked at each other before drawing the broadswords, and leaping off their plinth, landed on the floor with a thump. Grady and Hugh stepped gingerly out of the knights’ way as they creakily stomped towards Beroldus who was attempting to stand as tall as he could; the knights, however, still managing to stare down at him.
‘Were you talking to us, Jimmy?’ said one in what sounded to Grady like a strong Glaswegian accent.
‘And what if I was?’ said Beroldus, with the same nasty manner. Beside him Bardolphus groaned and raised his eyes skyward.
‘Well, we don’t talk!’ said the other knight, swinging its sword up and over its head in a slow but seemingly unstoppable arc towards Beroldus. As it reached the zenith of its swing a bolt of purple magic crashed into it and the knight stopped abruptly in mid-swing – the suddenly arrested momentum causing it to rock slightly.
‘I think that will be quite enough,’ said Ms Maladicta from twenty yards down the corridor. The other knight saw the witch and quickly took his hands off his sword in a What sword? This sword? Oh right. Yes. No, wasn’t about to use it. Honestly sort of way.
‘Beroldus,’ said Miss Maladicta disapprovingly. ‘I thought we had agreed you wouldn’t antagonise the Scotsmen again.’
‘Well I wasn’t the one waving the ...’ – his last words were cut off by a gesture from the principal.
‘You are just lucky – again – that I happen to be the one on misuse of magic patrol today, or we could be pasting you back together. And you, Mr O’Connell. Why am I not surprised to find you would be in close proximity to another incident?’
‘Sorry Ms Maladicta, but we didn’t do anything. Honestly!’
The Hand came up again. Grady had come to hate it as Ms Maladicta had learned how well it could control the young prince. And Grady, to his credit, learned that talking, explaining, or even looking like he was about to talk were high on the list of extremely unwise actions when The Hand was brought out. He firmly shut his mouth and tried to hide the sound of his teeth grating.
‘Mr Wilding,’ said Ms Maladicta to Hugh. ‘I’d be very interested in hearing what I can safely assume from you will be a realistic interpretation of events?’
Hugh had a habit of staring down the principal without incurring the wrath associated with Grady’s looks. ‘Grady is right, Ms,’ said Hugh. ‘All we did was stop to ask Bardolphus if he was kidding about seeing Quinn in the castle just a few minutes ago. That’s all.’
‘Well I think our friend must be greatly mistaken if he thinks he saw Quinn in the castle. I can tell you I’ve just seen him myself in the fourth year common room, so unless he has found a way of splitting himself in two, it’s most unlikely he’s been in the castle.’
‘But, but, but ... I did see him!’ protested Bardolphus. Ms Maladicta shunned him to silence though.
‘I knew he was talking nonsense, pr
incipal,’ said Beroldus smugly, holding the lapels of his cloak.
‘But you told me you DID see him!’ spluttered Bardolphus.
‘Don’t know what you’re talking about,’ said Beroldus, looking as innocent as a marble statue can.
‘I think it might be best if you yourself didn’t say too much either, Beroldus the Unbearable,’ said Ms Maladicta, looking over the rim of her glasses. ‘I’ve no doubt the only reason those knights were down here again was, yet again, another word out of place. If you can’t keep your marble mouth a little more silent I’ll have to move you into the Reflection Room where you know full well the spells cast there will prevent you from talking at all. Honestly, I would think that after six hundred years you would have learned a little restraint.’ Bardolphus looked relieved to see his brother being skewered with a sharply targeted word from Ms Maladicta, but lapsed into a silent pose as she glanced sideways at him.
‘Now,’ she said, turning back to Grady and Hugh. ‘I want to see you outside in the sun for a while and no more skulking around in corridors. Whatever Quinn is up to is his business and not yours, so get along with you both.’
The boys did not try to argue with their principal, but exchanged glances and headed off down the corridor away from her as fast as they could. ‘Where to then?’ said Hugh as they rounded a corner out of her sight.
‘The common room,’ said Grady. ‘Let’s see if he really is here or not.’
Ms Maladicta watched Grady and Hugh trot back down the corridor before reaching inside her robe and pulling out her iWand. Her face looked troubled, a frown creasing her forehead. She hurried away from the bickering brothers and flipped out the wand. Entering a small alcove behind another tall knight she flicked the tip of the wand. A blue light spiralled out of the tip before resolving itself into the face of Murdock.
‘Malignata. What a nice surprise. How can I help?’ said the elf with a smile that in most circumstances would have had Ms Maladicta’s features softening, but in this instance made no impact on them.
‘He’s gone,’ she said quietly.
‘What do you mean?’ said the elf, looking suddenly startled.
‘Bardolphus has just seen the boy in the castle, but I know I saw him in the common room not five minutes ago. Whatever he is up to, he’s up to it now.’
‘Understood,’ said Murdock intensely.
Up at the castle Murdock flipped shut his iWand and quickly ran to the family wing. Bursting in on the living room door, Merritt jumped up with wand in his hand. ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing, Murdock? I could have incinerated you! Don’t you ever knock?’
‘Sorry Merritt, but Malignata has just been on the wand web to me. It’s started.’
Merritt stood up slowly, staring at the elf. ‘Then let’s hope we’ve done enough. It’s out of our hands now.’
‘Are you sure about this?’ said Murdock. ‘There will be no going back from here.’
Merritt turned and stared out the window. To his right the door opened and Grace entered quickly. ‘I’ve just had the word from Malignata,’ she said, hugging Merritt tightly. ‘I don’t want this anymore.’
‘What we want is not up to us anymore. We gave up the right to worry about it back at Avalon’s End. But don’t worry. They’ll be fine – I’m sure of it,’ said Merritt, with as much strength in his voice as he could muster. He struggled to sound convincing though, and Grace could tell.
‘I’ll leave you to it, then,’ said Murdock, slowly retreating from the room.
‘Murdock,’ said Merritt. The elf stopped and turned back. ‘Thanks – for everything. We couldn’t do this without you.’
The elf smiled back. ‘That’s funny – I was just thinking the same thing about you two. Good luck,’ he said, raising his hand in salute.
As the door clicked shut behind him Grace looked up at Merritt. ‘We don’t need luck,’ she said. ‘There are two others who need it much more than we do.’
Grady and Hugh crept along the corridor outside the year four common room. ‘Can you see him?’ whispered Hugh.
‘Yeah – he’s sitting on the windowsill on the far side, where he always sits.’
‘How are we going to get in? The door guardians won’t let us through.’
‘We don’t need to worry about them. Look! The door is already open.’
‘That still won’t help us,’ said Hugh petulantly. ‘If we can’t get past the door wardens we can’t get in to challenge him – even if the door is open.’
‘Who said anything about going in?’ smiled Grady. ‘Come on!’
The two children scuttled bent over behind a large statue across the corridor and in a direct line across from where Quinn was sitting. From behind its wide cloak the boys had a clear view. ‘Watch this,’ said Grady deviously. Taking out his wand, Grady thought for a moment and closed his eyes. When he opened them again the sight made Hugh gasp. Both of his pupils glowed bright red and with a delicate flourish of his wand Grady sent a bright blue bolt of magic across the corridor, through the door of the common room, and scored a direct hit on the cheek of Quinn’s pants. The boy jumped up as it struck and, just for a moment, seemed to the boys to blur. It was only for a fraction of a second but what they saw was unmistakeable – Quinn had disappeared and in his place was a small, very surprised, ugly little goblin.
‘That’s not Quinn!’ said Hugh. ‘It’s a goblin that’s been charmed to look like Quinn.’
‘I knew it!’ said Grady triumphantly. ‘Let’s get out of here and find Niamh.’
The boys ran bent over double and scuttled back down the hallway. The goblin – its features now restored to Quinn’s – marched over to the doorway and peered out just as the boys rounded the next corner.
‘How did you do that?’ asked Hugh incredulously as they ran towards the door to the grounds outside. ‘That’s really advanced magic to cast a revealing spell.’
‘I don’t know,’ shrugged Grady. ‘It just seemed obvious.’
‘I am so over you saying that, Grady!’ said Hugh exasperatedly. ‘Every time you pull out some amazing piece of spellwork you just say, “It’s obvious”, when it clearly isn’t obvious to any of us.’
‘If someone’s trying to hide what they look like they’d need to use some sort of spell to change the view around them. So I just sent a spell that would shake it all up a bit using a bit more Spirit and a bit more Air.’
‘But they’re not your talents, Grady,’ said Hugh. ‘When Murdock tested you he said you were strong in Fire and Earth – not Spirit and Air.’
‘Well I don’t know. Maybe they got it wrong!’ said Grady as they burst outside into the fresh air. ‘We need to find Niamh quickly.’ Grady whipped out his iWand but his call to Niamh was answered with nothing but static. ‘Aaaarggghhh!’ he growled as he thrust the useless gadget back into his pocket. ‘Come on!’
The boys burst out into the open air and sunshine. The grounds were a mass of children, the air full of sound. Grady stopped and stood still. The noise seemed to wash over him, threatening to overwhelm him. There was no sign of Niamh anywhere. There were a hundred places she could be but Grady couldn’t even begin to think of where to go – his mind was racing with thoughts of what Quinn was getting up to without anyone realising where he was. Grady closed his eyes and felt the sounds of the playground start to drift away. The background noises became dull and muted. He suddenly knew what to do. ‘Niamh,’ he whispered. The sound echoed in his head for a moment before seeming to take shape behind his eyes and drift away.
Niamh leaned forward and tipped her broom into a shallow dive. As the ground raced towards her she pulled back and skimmed the surface of the field. She took a moment to balance and then flicked her wand with a deft spiral thrust. A blue bolt shot from the tip and crashed into the wall beside the target at which she was aiming. She sped past the low stone pillar on which the target sat, closing her eyes to avoid the stony dust which hung in the air after her miss.
�
��Never mind, Niamh!’ shouted Emmy as Niamh raced past. ‘That was nearly a perfect run – nine from ten. Niamh swung back round towards the teacher in a big arc, dropping lightly off her broomstick as she pulled up in front of the teacher.
‘I almost had it!’ she said, stamping her foot. ‘That would have been my best run yet!’
Emmy laughed. ‘Niamh, you’ve been flying for less than a year. Look how far you’ve come. Don’t be so hard on yourself!’
‘I know, but ...’ Niamh suddenly stopped as she heard a voice inside her head. ‘Niamh’ – Grady’s voice was unmistakeable.
‘What is it?’ said Emmy, noticing Niamh’s sudden faraway look.
Niamh just stared at her for a moment. Grady had done nothing but call her name, but she knew he needed her and quickly. ‘I’m sorry. I’ve got to go,’ she said, jumping on to her broomstick again and turning back to where she knew Grady would be.
‘Hey!’ cried Emmy. ‘Come back and clean up these targets!’ she yelled, but Niamh was gone in a flash of green as she raced back towards the buildings, causing a couple of birds to scatter and several broomstick riders to take evasive action and crash into each other.
Niamh swooped over the tree tops and down to the steps where she could see Grady and Hugh standing. She didn’t bother with trying to slow herself but bore down on the boys, pulling up the tip of the broomstick and braking suddenly on the step beside them. ‘What! What’s wrong?’ she asked.
‘Quinn’s at the castle. He’s up to something.’
‘Oh don’t be stupid, Grady!’ said Niamh, tossing her hands up in the air and her broomstick to the ground. ‘I thought you were in danger. Bree and Emily have been keeping an eye on him this lunchtime.’
‘Well I don’t know what they think they been watching,’ said Grady, ‘but it isn’t Quinn.’
‘For heaven’s sake!’ said Niamh, whipping out her iWand and extending it with unnecessary venom. ‘Watch this, then.’ The familiar blue fuzzy patch appeared above the tip before Bree’s face came into sharp focus.
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