Otto’s
coach took them rapidly away from Caste Uberwald – none of them was
particularly sad to leave. The road was steep but well-made and they made good
progress down to shores of Lake Heimat, which they reached by noon the next
morning.
Hardacre, having satisfied himself that Lily
and Erik were safe in Otto’s hands, had decided he must leave as soon as
possible. He was worried that the magical trail might soon go cold, and then
all his exertions would have been wasted. He had decided that at the next stop
he would sneak away and teleport on to wherever Boo was going next. It was far too dangerous to expect anyone else
to come with him: he’d call up reinforcements when he really needed to. Above
all else, he wanted nothing more to do with human politics.
Gerard
was fascinated by Hardacre. He’d never met anyone like him before. They sat
next to each other and every now and then he would try to get some information
about him. So far he hadn’t even extracted his name.
‘So, where were you born’ he asked
‘Eth’ replied Hardacre.
‘Where exactly in Eth?’
‘I can hardly recall – it’s been some time
since I’ve been back there’
‘East? West? North? South?’
‘West-ish, I’d say, if I had to commit myself…’
‘So, in Rhylan?’
‘I’ve never mapped it exactly, Mr Hoffmann,
it’s never seemed that important a question’
Gerard did a double take.
‘How is it that you know my name but I don’t
know yours?’
‘I assume that that is because Miss Jenkins
has told me your name but she hasn’t yet deigned to tell you my name’
Gerard was beginning to find this
exceptionally vexing. For some reason it was so very hard to ask this man a
direct question.
‘Perhaps she didn’t consider it vitally
important’ Hardacre added.
‘So, why won’t you tell me your name?’
Hardacre considered this.
‘I think, although this is a provisional
answer, you must understand; I think it is because you haven’t yet asked me’
Gerard glared at him. He felt that he was
being beaten at his own game.
‘Tell me your name!’ he blurted out.
‘No’ said Hardacre, completely calmly.
‘Why on earth not?’ demanded Gerard,
exasperated
Hardacre smiled politely.
‘Because I haven’t yet established whether
you are a friend or a foe’ he concluded
Gerard found himself smiling back. This was
logic that he could fully understand.
They travelled on in relatively companionable
silence until dinner time.
***
Inside,
the coach had two tiers of seats – with room for two in the front and two in
the back, both pairs facing the same way. Otto and Victoria were at the front,
mostly quiet, but occasionally discussing the past or the state of the world;
Erik and Lily were in the back, whispering incessantly. They had both decided
that this was the most exciting thing that they had ever done in their lives,
and were keen to extend the adventure for as long as possible. Lily was scared,
but in the same good way that she was scared by a thrilling ghost story, while
Erik was never really scared by anything, but was keen to see everything about
the natural world that he could.
When they stopped for dinner at twilight,
Otto jumped out of the coach and went to inspect his troops. At the same time Victoria
went to stretch her legs. The two teenagers shook themselves out of the awkward
positions that they had been sitting in and prepared to leave the coach too.
Lily watched without much interest as Gerard clambered down from the coach and
wandered off. Then she saw Hardacre descend cautiously. She prodded Erik.
‘He looks suspicious’
Erik was startled but he looked over to where
Lily was now pointing.
‘Mr Hardacre? What do you mean?’
‘Look at him, he’s sneaking off with his big
bag’
‘I’m sure he’s not – he’s probably going off
for a call of nature’
‘With his entire bag? That seems unlikely…’
‘Why do you care?’
‘You are silly!’ she snorted, ‘he’s probably
going to send Boo off and then follow her’
Erik
peered out of the window where Lily had been looking.
‘Do you really think so?’
Lily looked at him disbelievingly.
‘Obviously Amanskian princesses are cleverer
than Formish princes’
Erik looked as if he was considering the
merits of this argument carefully.
‘If we don’t catch him up he’ll go without
us…’ Lily was talking rapidly, ‘and
we’ll miss out on a great adventure!’
They could see Hardacre walking with steady
step away from them. In a minute or two he would have walked past a group of
willows and out of their, or indeed anyone else’s, sight.
‘He won’t take us with him, anyway’ pointed
out Erik
‘Not on purpose, no, of course not…’
Erik looked very confused.
‘But how could we possibly trick him into taking
us with him?’
‘It’s easy’ said Lily, with a note of triumph
in her voice, ‘we’ll get into the bag!’
‘What?’ hissed Erik, ‘won’t that be
dangerous? It’s some sort of distorted space thing.’
‘It doesn’t seem to hurt Boo…’
Erik was torn between the prospect of finally
seeing new and exciting things, and the fear of doing something exceptionally
stupid and awfully dangerous.
‘I’m going’ announced Lily, stepping through
the coach door, ‘if you want to come you’d better do it now!’
Logic told Erik this was the most ridiculous
idea in the world, but it was exciting and the person suggesting it was the
closest he’d ever come to a proper friend. These were seriously important
considerations and they, perhaps for the first time ever, overwhelmed his
rational mind.
They
stalked him down to a secluded spot on the lake’s edge and hid behind a large
birch tree at the border of the lakeside woodland. Once he had reached a place
where he thought no-one could overlook him, Hardacre put down his bag and began
to rummage in it. He took out Boo’s cage and placed it on the floor.
‘How are we going to get in the bag?’
muttered Erik.
‘Watch this!’ she said, pulling at his shirt.
Lily pointed to a group of trees, a little beyond
where Hardacre was crouching.
‘aemophthoros’
she whispered.
The wind gusted suddenly and a half fallen
branch jumped out of the tree that Lily had pointed at.
Hardacre turned to see what had happened. He
took a few steps towards the fallen branch, looking at it suspicously.
Erik was almost speechless.
‘You’re a mage!’ he hissed
‘No’ giggled Lily, ‘it’s just a trick that a
friend of mine taught me’. Her face was
bright red and she was panting with the exertion.
She cast the spell again, this time on the branch.
The magical wind whipped it up so that it flew up in the air in Hardacre’s
general direction. He shielded his eyes and then ran over to it, kneeling down
to inspect it. He was now about a hundred yards from the bag, with his back to
them.
Lily was now very tired, but she knew that
she would have to cast the spell one more time, and this time with as much
strength as she possessed. She intoned the trigger word one more time. The wind
grew to a gale and the branch and Hardacre were almost picked up by it. They
both careered involuntarily down the beach, further and further away from Boo
and the bag.
‘Now!’ shouted Lily. They ran full pelt out
from behind the trees and straight towards the bag. Lily lifted the bag’s
entrance and ushered Erik inside. It was surprisingly easy to do, as the
opening of the bag seemed to possess some of the elastic dimensionality of the
space inside. It was rather like crawling into a paradoxical sleeping bag.
Hardacre
ran back as soon as he could. He fully realised that someone had been casting
magic, but he assumed that it must be some enemy trying to distract him and
steal the tupaia. He was very relieved to find that Boo was still there in her
cage – she never liked teleporting from there, in fact, as it didn’t give her
enough room to open her wings.
Hardacre was in a hurry – he was convinced
that he was under attack. He opened the cage and put Boo on the ground; her
wings appeared immediately on her back. Hardacre was not really prepared to go,
but there was no time to think. He threw the cage into his bag and then picked up
the bag. It was fortunate that he didn’t hear the noise that Lily made when the
cage hit her on the head.
A pink wormhole had opened up in front of Boo
and she was flexing her wings. Hardacre sighed and waited. A second later Boo
was through the hole, Hardacre murmured the trigger word, and the three
companions followed her, one visible and unwitting; the other two completely
hidden stowaways.
The branch finally fell still and the wind
died down on the lake. Everything was quiet again.
No comments:
Post a Comment