Faculty of Fire (42 page)

“And are you so sure that no one’s helping me?” Kelnmiir asked suggestively.

“We’ll certainly come back to that question later.”

We walked into the study and carefully closed the door behind us. Just to be on the safe side. You can never tell.

“I hope it’s working,” Caiten said with a sigh, and started making strange passes over the teleport while he thought out loud: “Not many people know about this teleport, and what good would it have done them, even if they did know? Before the sabotage it was practically impossible to get into this study, the defences were so strong ...”

“Were ...” said the vampire, and he made a move to step onto the teleport.

“Wait!” said Caiten, jumping in front of him. “This isn’t a standard teleport with a fixed destination. It requires precise tuning, or it will smear you across every floor in the tower!”

“Ah, indeed?” Kelnmiir said in surprise. “Progress is not standing still, then?”

“But you told us that teleports can only be tuned to one specific place!” I blurted out.

“I said that is the principle on which the teleports installed in the corridors work,” Caiten corrected me. “Non-specific teleports are much more complex ... and dangerous, but let’s not talk about that right now.”

More dangerous?

“More dangerous?” said Steel, repeating my thought out loud. “And you want to stick us into this dubious device?”

I remembered with horror that I had already been through this “dubious device” the first time I visited the Academy.

“My child, surely you don’t wish to stay here all alone, do you?” Kelnmiir asked in a wheedling voice. “Aren’t you afraid the trolls will find you and eat you, washing you down with those repulsive juices that they serve in the dining hall?”

I wondered when he’d visited the dining hall. And as for the gastronomic preferences of trolls – he was obviously less well acquainted with them than we were.

“Why don’t I just drink you up straight away, to spare you unnecessary suffering?” The vampire continued.

“Will it take much longer to tune the teleport?” Steel asked hastily, retreating along the wall.

“It’s done,” Caiten replied. “There’s no apparent damage, so in principle everything should be fine.”

“In principle?” we all howled together.

Even the vampire appeared slightly dissatisfied.

Caiten looked embarrassed.

“Well, in theory, the probability that everything will be all right is ninety-eight per cent.”

“That is, you mean to say ...” said Kelnmiir, drumming his fingers on the wall. “That there is a probability of two per cent that I shall be smeared across all eighty floors of the Academy. I would not wish to die in such an unattractive manner in the thirtieth century of my life!”

I might have lived only twenty years, not thirty centuries, but I didn’t wish to die in such an “unattractive” way either – or any other way.

“Do you have any better ideas?” Caiten growled. “You can always stay here!”

“There now,” said Kelnmiir, and he whistled appreciatively. “Apparently you can behave like an adult after all. Switch on your teleport and stop bandying these useless theories about.”

“Maybe we shouldn’t go?” Naive piped up.

“Yes we should, Naive,” Caiten sighed. “Yes, we should.”

We emerged from the teleport into a rather strange space. It was absolutely huge. The domed ceiling soared to an immense height, and as soon as I raised my head to look up at it I felt a breathtaking sensation of flight. As if the silvery ceiling was drawing me upwards after my gaze.

Covering the shelves and walls was a fantastic collection of jewels, carriages, bones, boxes, crates, statues, paintings, old clothes, books and somewhere, may a dragon take them, weapons and armour. This unbelievable collection seemed to be arranged in categories—or, at least, it certainly seemed that way. Huge shelves towering towards the ceiling of silver held most of the items and the shelves were set in rows…straight rows that went on into the distance until they seemed to come together…how big was this place anyway? I thought. It made me dizzy to look at it. The History Museum was like a huge maze of walls and shelves. But, as we discovered a little later, in this maze there weren’t any dead ends (or any doors either).

Caiten was the last out of the teleport, and he immediately bent down over the round platform, either tuning it or putting it out of action.

“So this is the famous Museum,” Kelnmiir said, emptying his lungs in a deep sigh. “Can you smell what’s in the air?”

“Dust?” I suggested.

“Centuries,” said the vampire, ignoring my comment.

“And why haven’t we been to the Museum before?” asked Steel, looking around.

“You haven’t been here,” Neville replied instead of Caiten. “I’ve been here, but in the exhibition hall, not this part.”

We stared at him in surprise.

“You’ve been here?” I asked, astounded. “And you didn’t tell us anything about it? Chas and I would have enjoyed coming here too.”

“You and Chas were washing dishes at the time,” Neville laughed. “And if you hadn’t been, you’d probably have found some excuse for not going. Isn’t that right? Wandering round boring old museums ... that’s not your thing.”

“And where was I?” Naive asked in surprise.

“Now let me guess,” said Steel, laughing for the first time that day. “Naive was sleeping at the time.”

We all laughed with him, but Naive frowned, as usual. No matter what situation we found ourselves in, nothing changed ... and that was great. It was just a shame that Chas and Alice weren’t there with us. I wondered where they were. And I hoped they were all right.

Without even realising it, I started feeling sad and withdrew into myself ...

Meanwhile, Caiten got up from the teleport and set off along the shelves at a brisk walk.

“Keep up!”

Kelnmiir fell in beside Caiten and immediately started peppering him with questions.

“Where are we going? Why are the rows so crooked? What’s on these shelves? And what’s in those crates over there?”

Caiten impatiently brushed aside the curious vampire’s questions for a while, until he couldn’t take any more.

“Maybe you’d like me to give you a guided tour?” he growled at the vampire.

“Good idea!” Kelnmiir said delightedly.

“A stupid idea ...” I remarked in a quiet voice.

“How ill-mannered your pupils are,” the vampire observed. “They remind me of someone ...”

Caiten looked down at his feet without saying anything. After a few more steps, he stopped.

I wondered if he was lost.

“All right,” the vampire sighed. “We’ll figure it out for ourselves.”

And so saying, Kelnmiir walked over to one of the wooden crates and opened it.

A cloud of dust rose up into the air.

“Looks like the cleaning spells broke down a long time ago,” said Neville, sneezing furiously.

“Atchoo,” Caiten replied. “That’s not dust, it’s a special mixture for the long-term storage of exhibits.”

“And will we end up in long-term storage after breathing in this filthy muck?” Neville enquired.

“No, the mixture only affects things, not people,” Caiten said. “Kelnmiir, don’t touch anything!”

But it was already too late.

The vampire took a strange human-like, iron figurine out of the crate. The figurine had crooked hands with long nails, a wide toothy smile and an expression that was far from good-natured. After the figurine, Kelnmiir took a gilded sceptre out of the crate.

“Oh, what a sweet little toy,” the vampire exclaimed in delight.

“Listen, Kelnmiir,” that’s enough,” Caiten pleaded wearily. “It’s best not to touch things that you don’t know anything about. It can be fatal.”

“But I know that this thing is for,” Kelnmiir said with a smile. “Watch ...”

He put the figurine on the floor and started waving his hands around it.

“It’s not working, is it?” Caiten said sympathetically after a couple of minutes. “A fine specialist you are.”

“Don’t interfere,” the vampire retorted. “Here, hold the sceptre.”

Caiten obediently took the sceptre and started looking round the corridor with a bored look on his face.

Meanwhile the figurine started slowly increasing in size. It grew bigger and bigger ... until soon it was as tall as us or even taller.

“I think that will do,” said Kelnmiir, moving a couple of yards away from the figure and casting an appreciative glance at the terrifying sight.

It really was terrifying. And now that I looked at it more closely, I could see that its face was very much like a vampire’s face in battle form. But the claws on this terrifying figure’s hands were as long as my hand.

“What is that?” Caiten asked suspiciously.

“It’s a battle golem that was used about eight centuries ago. As far as I know, the secret of making them has been lost...”

I wondered how the vampire could know about knowledge that the Craftsmen had lost.

“So that bogeyman can move too?” Naive squealed and jumped back a few yards from the battle golem.

“Not only can he move,” said Kelnmiir, hitting the golem’s iron shoulder with his fist. “This is an iron golem intended for fighting vampires. Consequently, he has all the strength of my kind ... and he is specifically designed for hunting down vampires.”

“And can he hunt trolls?” I asked.

“In principle he can ...” said the vampire, scratching his head. “Only we have to switch him on first ... now how was it ...”

He walked behind the golem and prodded something with his finger.

The golem moved.

We all jumped back several yards. Maybe he was supposed to be designed for hunting vampires, but it still best to be cautious. Who could tell what might have happened to this gizmo in the last eight hundred years?

“Well, look at that, it works,” the vampire exclaimed in delight. “Now we have to reprogram it for trolls ...”

The golem looked round, and its gaze came to rest on Caiten.

“Why’s he looking at me?” Caiten asked suspiciously. “Has he confused me with a vampire?”

“Right, the similarity’s obvious,” Kelnmiir chuckled.

The golem slowly turned towards the vampire, then grabbed him by the neck with a surprisingly deft movement and lifted him up in the air.

It was such a surprise that we didn’t even have time to feel frightened.

Kelnmiir dangled in the air, quite unconcerned, and said: “Caiten, use the sceptre before this iron dummy starts tearing me to pieces, I recall that’s the tactic that was programmed into them.”

Caiten nodded in agreement and whacked the golem on the head with the sceptre. The sceptre shattered into pieces, and the golem completely disregarded this unfriendly act.

“What have you done?” Kelnmiir asked in a quiet voice.

“I used the sceptre,” Caiten replied honestly.

“You weren’t supposed to use the sceptre in that barbarous fashion,” said Kelnmiir, starting to wheeze now – apparently even vampires needed air. “That sceptre was made for controlling golems! And now ...”

With an abrupt movement, Kelnmiir tore himself out of the unfriendly embrace of the golem.

“And now this iron dummy will try to tear me into little pieces!” he screeched and went dashing away.

“Didn’t I say you shouldn’t touch anything here?” Caiten yelled after him.

The golem stood there for a few seconds, thinking, and then set off unhurriedly after Kelnmiir. With every step he moved more and more confidently.

We watched the golem, wide-eyed with amazement.

“Isn’t there anything we can do to help Kelnmiir?” I asked, staring anxiously in the direction in which the vampire and the golem had disappeared.

“Yes,” said Steel. “What if that thing turns on us after the vampire?”

“Of course we’ll help him,” Caiten agreed. “But only after we reach the storage bay where the weapons are. We can arm ourselves, and then we won’t have to worry about trolls or golems ...”

“Then let’s go, quick,” we all howled together.

“Yes,” said Caiten, looking around. “Only I don’t recall ... whether we need the second or the third turn to the right ...”

Suddenly we heard the sound of breaking glass.

“Sounds as though the golem has caught up with Kelnmiir,” Neville mused.

“No, the sound’s coming from the other direction,” Steel objected.

“It’s not the golem,” Caiten said in a low voice. “I think that’s the teleport that I fitted with a little warning signal. We have visitors.”