by Zen Cho
“You could fit two of the Sultan’s palace on Janda Baik in there!” she whispered.
Muna was beginning to regret the suggestion that had brought them there.
“They say the English king of Malacca is mad for magic,” she had told Sakti. “He has a collection of magic spells and artefacts from England and India, as well as the countries hereabouts.”
Sakti had been rather offended by the notion of Muna’s knowing more of a magical matter than herself. “Who told you this?”
“I overheard the lamiae speaking of it,” said Muna. “They were gossiping outside the kitchen and did not know I heard. It seems the English king is fond of collecting magic. Tuan Farquhar pays a wang for every magical verse he is given and more for whole formulae, so there is a great crowd of people outside his house every day, clamouring to sell him their spells. He has engaged two scribes and has them write the spells down in books.”
“A wang for every verse!” said Sakti, intrigued.
Muna saw where her thoughts tended.
“Mak Genggang would be bound to find out if you attempted to sell her magic to the English,” she said. “Even the lamiae would not do it, for fear of provoking her!”
“I did not think of selling him real magic, of course,” said Sakti, injured. “A good spell is worth far more than a wang. But the English king is no magician, and one could easily invent a credible formula to take in a layman.” At Muna’s look, she said, “If the man has the impertinence to buy magic without being a magician, he deserves to be cheated. He ought to know his place.”
“That is nonsense and you know it,” said Muna, frowning.
“Oh, very well!” said Sakti. “But if you don’t wish to profit from the Englishman’s magic-madness, what do you mean by mentioning him?”
“Do not you see,” said Muna, “if he has spells from England and India, he will have magic unknown even to Mak Genggang. Magic that could help us break the curse—cure your disease!”
Sakti was struck by the idea. Her look of scepticism fell away. Encouraged, Muna hurried on, “Perhaps it is not likely we will find the antidote to the curse, if it has proved beyond Mak Genggang’s power to break it. But there may be a spell that would shed light on the nature of the curse, or its origins—a spell that would give us the curseworker’s name.”
Sakti gave her a pitying look. “We already know who the curseworker is. It is only that you don’t wish to credit it.”
Muna raised her eyebrows. “Supposing you are right, can you tell me Mak Genggang’s true name?”
“Why—” Sakti pursed her mouth, displeased. “No. But no one knows it.”
“Well, shan’t we need it if we are to break the curse?” demanded Muna. “When Mak Genggang is asked to cure any magical disease, the first thing she does is find out the name of whoever caused it.”
This was an undeniable hit. Sakti looked vexed.
“That is only because one generally cures a magical illness by calling upon its author and threatening to break his head if he does not take the curse off,” she said. “You don’t mean to suggest we adopt that course with Mak Genggang?”
They both imagined it. Sakti looked rather pale.
“If we know her true name, we shall have other courses open to us,” said Muna, but Sakti rolled her eyes.
“The truth is you do not think it is Mak Genggang at all!”
“Even if it is,” said Muna, “we ought to make certain of it, rather than abandoning ourselves to the world on a mere suspicion! Come now, adik—would not you like to break the curse yourself, and tell Mak Genggang you had done it?”
Sakti had given in—more because an expedition across the Straits to the English king’s house smacked appealingly of adventure than because she had had any real belief that it would teach them anything about the curse. As for Muna, she had been so anxious to distract Sakti from the idea of running away that her proposal had seemed less wild than it now appeared to her, hunkered down upon the grass outside the English king’s house, with the sun beating on the back of her head.
Even Sakti’s high spirits flagged at the sight of the King’s house—and the armed sepoys guarding the entrance. “Kak, there are soldiers!”
Muna had not accounted for soldiers. This now seemed stupid to her. Vexed with herself, she said irritably, “Why, you did not think the King’s own house would be left undefended?”
“I am sure you did not think we should have to battle sepoys when you said we should come,” said Sakti, unimpressed. She reflected. “Perhaps we could turn ourselves into birds and fly in at an open window.”
Disconcerted, Muna said, “Can you do that? Is not shape-shifting a very great magic? Mak Genggang says none but the most skilled magicians should attempt it.”
“Oh, everything is ‘Mak Genggang says’ with you!” said Sakti. “I have never tried to change my form, but it cannot be that difficult. You would start by imagining yourself as a bird . . .”
She was already beginning to look rather beaky around the face. Muna shook her shoulder.
“Let us not!” she said. “I know what we ought to do.”
It was Sakti’s dismissive reference to Mak Genggang that had given her the idea. Sakti could call the witch wicked, but she could not deny that Mak Genggang was effective. What, Muna asked herself, would Mak Genggang do now?
Thinking this was like a sort of magic in itself. Muna suddenly saw the sepoys through new eyes. They were only bored young men stranded in a foreign country, perspiring in their regimentals.
Mak Genggang was of a thrifty disposition; she never used magic where force of character would do. Muna seized her sister’s arm, brushing glossy black feathers off Sakti’s head. “Come!”
Muna marched up to the entrance of the King’s house, Sakti grumbling behind her. The sepoys looked doubtfully at them, but Muna was at the door and rapping energetically before they could issue any challenge. She frowned at the sepoys, as much as to say, They had best not keep me waiting!
The manservant who opened the door was a Malay, to Muna’s secret relief. She had never spoken to a foreigner before and she was not altogether confident of her ability to mislead one into believing that she was a person of importance.
“Good morning, adik,” said Muna in her stateliest manner, though the manservant looked of an age with her, and in common courtesy she ought to have addressed him as an elder, not a junior.
The manservant blinked, but he seemed to decide to overlook her lapse in manners. “Do you have a petition for the King? He has gone out.”
“That is no inconvenience to me,” said Muna graciously. “Tuan Farquhar desired me to come while he was away and put his library of spells in order. I am a witch,” she explained, “and this is my assistant.”
Sakti made an outraged noise, but Muna drove her elbow into her sister’s side.
“Surely Tuan Farquhar told the household to expect me?” said Muna.
“You must be mistaken,” said the manservant. “Tuan Farquhar cannot have asked for you. Perhaps you do not know, but the English abhor witches. Their customs prohibit the practice of magic by women.”
“By Englishwomen, to be sure,” said Muna. “But what business is that of mine? Tuan Farquhar sought one who understood our magic—one who could study the spells he has been sold and ensure that he has not been cheated—and he was given my name.
“I am sure his scribes have done their best,” she added, in a tone of kind condescension, “but they are not witches. They are bound to have introduced errors while taking down the spells. I beg you will lead me to the King’s collection. I am told it is extensive, and I must be off by the afternoon, for I have a healing ceremony to conduct.”
“A case of possession by evil spirits,” added Sakti. “Very sad!”
When the manservant hesitated, Muna fixed a stern eye on him.
“Unless you would like to account to Tuan Farquhar for turning me away?” she said. “You should know that witches are no fonder of Englishmen than Englishmen are of us. He is not likely to find another who is willing to assist.”
The manservant wavered. Muna tossed her head, turning to Sakti.
“Let us go!” she said. “You were quite right to say we ought not to lower ourselves to help the Englishman. What business is it of ours if he has been cheated? Let him take false for true, the worthless for the valuable. It would serve him right for his servants’ arrogance!”
Sakti was beginning to enjoy her role of witch’s helper. “I cannot think why he paid us so many visits, begging for help, if he only meant to send us packing. It is a deliberate insult, depend upon it!”
“An insult not only to us, but to all witches,” agreed Muna. “We had better spread the news abroad at once—tell everyone the English are not to be trusted.”
“I beg your pardon,” said the harassed manservant. “Pray come in! If you knew . . . but it is true Tuan Farquhar wished to know if the spells he collected were real magic. I meant no offence, kak.”
Muna held her head high as they sailed through the door, but it was fortunate that the manservant did not look back at Sakti, for she did not trouble to keep her countenance at all.
* * *
• • •
THE English raja’s collection was larger than Muna had expected. There were magical artefacts, in tall cabinets fronted with glass, but the main part of the collection consisted of spell books—rows and rows of these, stretching from floor to ceiling in the room where the manservant left them. Muna had not dreamt that there might be so many books in the world, much less books of magic.
“We shall never get through them all before that man returns!” she whispered, appalled.
“No,” Sakti agreed, round-eyed. “Tuan Farquhar must have kept his scribes hard at it. I should think the people of Malacca have sold him all the magic they have.”
But there were greater surprises in store. Muna had expected that they would be obliged to restrict themselves to investigating the spells Tuan Farquhar’s scribes had taken down in Malay. No other language was used in Janda Baik, and there was no reason to suppose either Muna or Sakti could understand anything else.
When Muna took down her first spell book, however, reaching for the tome closest to hand, she found herself reading it with perfect ease. This was unexpected, for the book was not in Malay.
“That is English, I believe,” said Sakti, when Muna showed her the book. “How curious that we should understand it!”
Their want of self-knowledge meant that Muna and Sakti often made surprising discoveries about themselves, but this was the most unexpected yet. Not all the books in the collection proved accessible—some defeated them, being written in scripts they did not recognise—but it appeared that in their past life they had made sufficient study of English and Arabic to be able to read both languages with ease.
Sakti was delighted. “How clever I am, and I never knew it!”
The revelation had given Muna’s thoughts a different turn.
“Our family must have been wealthy, as well as liberal, to have educated their daughters,” she said. “They must have been pious to have had us learn Arabic. And they must live here—in Malacca, ruled by the English. There is no reason why they should have had us learn English otherwise.”
“Perhaps we are princesses!” said Sakti, brightening.
Muna would have thought it would be interesting to read about magic, but if the scholars of English magic were to be believed, their thaumaturgy was a very different beast from the magic that permeated the witch’s household. Mak Genggang’s magic was a wild, living force, as everyday as the weather and as untameable. The English made their magic sound exceedingly dull in comparison. To understand what they said of it demanded all of Muna’s powers of concentration, so it was some time before she realised that Sakti had abandoned her books.
“Adik, what are you about?”
Sakti was standing by the cabinets, turning over an article in her hands with fascination. “Look! It is a dead imp. I wonder how they prevented it from rotting. I cannot tell that there is any magic on it to keep it sweet.”
Muna recoiled, holding her book up before her. She would not put it down till Sakti had restored her find to its original place.
“You had best not touch anything else,” said Muna. “For all you know there was a horrid curse on that imp, which could have rubbed off on you.”
“Nonsense!” said Sakti, but she rather contradicted herself by adding, “We could always bathe in flowers later to cleanse ourselves of any bad luck.”
“Yes, but you might try to avoid picking up any more bad luck. One curse is enough, surely,” said Muna. “Come and look at the instructions for this spell.” It was in a book of English spells—a device for discovering the author of an enchantment.
“You lay your hand on the enchantment and ask the spirits, Whose magic is this?” said Muna. “And if the spell succeeds, they tell you. Do you think you could cast it?”
“It sounds easy enough,” said Sakti. Casting spells interested her more than reading about them. She became businesslike. “But how am I to lay my hand on the enchantment if it is in us?” She looked around, frowning.
“Is that a piece of string by you?”
She knotted the string around Muna’s wrist, then held out her own to Muna. “If you tie it around me, too, that will do to mark the curse. What is the formula?”
Muna read it out from the book, Sakti repeating the syllables after her. When she said, “Whose magic is this?” the words themselves wound out of Sakti’s mouth, written in green smoke. For a moment they hung in the air.
“Adik,” said Muna, worried. It could not be healthy for a human to breathe smoke, surely?
Sakti coughed, dispersing the words of the spell. “What a strange effect!” she said cheerfully. “I have never seen that before.” A look of surprise came over her face. She picked up a pen and wrote the words:
SAKTI MUNA
“What is that?” said Muna.
“The spirits’ answer.” Sakti looked put out. “But it is only our names!”
Muna reflected. “You asked the spirits whose magic is this? Perhaps they misunderstood, and the spell is simply telling us what the source of your magic is.”
“But you do not have any magic. Why should the spirits have named you?”
“The spell might have confused us. You could cast the spell on me alone,” suggested Muna. “Since the curseworker stole my magic, the only magic remaining in me should be his—the magic of his curse.”
Sakti slipped her wrist out of the loop of string, but the second attempt produced the same result.
“Perhaps the magic has not come off,” said Muna. “Are you sure you have said the formula correctly?”
Sakti was not accustomed to her spells going awry. She said crossly, “Of course I did. Read out the instructions again. I expect you have missed a step.”
“I have not,” said Muna, but an inspiration had come to her. “I tell you what it is. Your question is too vague. I expect you are confusing the spirits. Could not you simply ask for the true name of the enchanter who cursed us?”
This time after speaking the spell, Sakti wrote a different word.
Muna read it out: “‘Midsomer’ . . . it must be an English name.” She looked up, her eyes shining. “This could not possibly be Mak Genggang’s true name. She is not the curseworker after all. I told you so!”
Sakti screwed up her face. She obviously meant to give an uncivil answer, but instead she gave a stifled shriek, staring at something behind Muna. The blood drained from her face.
Muna smelt frangipane—the small, sweet-smelling white blossoms people called grave flowers. She whirled around.
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A ghoulish face hovered at the window. Long yellow nails tapped the glass. The creature’s mouth stretched wide, revealing yellow fangs and a scarlet tongue, but then the glowing eyes narrowed.
“Why, you are only natives!” exclaimed the lamia in disappointment. It was one of Mak Genggang’s vampiresses.
Muna stumbled backwards, seizing Sakti’s hand. Lamiae had poor vision during the day, their eyes being best adapted to the darkness of night. It was not too late. If they could only get away before the lamia recognised them . . .
Muna was nearly at the door when it swung open. She looked directly into the startled pink face of a foreign gentleman.
“What in heaven’s name . . . ?”
With remarkable presence of mind, the lamia smashed the glass and leapt into the room. She seized Muna and Sakti and bounded out of the window again before the Englishman could do anything but gawp.
The air whistled in Muna’s ears. The lamia flew over the city of Malacca, a sister under each arm. Behind them the Englishman leant out of the broken window, shouting, but his words were snatched away by the wind.
“If you keep writhing, I shall let go, see if I don’t!” snapped the lamia.
“I shall make disgusting eating, I warn you!” shouted Sakti, struggling. “I have a bad disposition and everyone knows that turns mortal flesh rancid!”
“Where are you taking us?” said Muna. She shut her eyes, feeling queasy—they were a horrible vast distance from the ground.
“Where but the witch’s house?” said the lamia. “If you were wise, you would beg me to drop you in the sea. That would be no worse punishment than Mak Genggang will deal when she hears what you have done!”
* * *
• • •
TO be flown through the skies by a furious vampiress was terrifying, but the return to earth was even worse. Mak Genggang gave them such a scolding as seemed to shake the very timbers of her house.