Faculty of Fire (45 page)

“There doesn’t seem to be any need to hurry,” Kelnmiir summed up, glancing over my shoulder.

“I already realised that,” I muttered.

But then events took a completely unexpected turn. About twenty trolls arrived on the scene. I didn’t know where they’d been hiding until that moment, but the stoneheads acted rather nimbly. They divided up into three groups and surrounded my friends.

“No, our help might be needed after all,” Kelnmiir corrected himself. “The question is, will it be enough?”

They grabbed Neville first. Naive managed to smash one troll over the head with his club, sending splinters of the poor stonehead flying for a good ten yards. Inspired with sudden respect for their enemy, instead of grabbing him, like his brother, the trolls stunned him with a rather powerful (and sneaky) blow to the head. Meanwhile, Caiten had somehow managed to fell two trolls, but further resistance was useless, and he surrendered. The trolls quickly tied him up and I think they stunned him just to be on the safe side.

“A dragon take them!” I swore, striking my battle broom against the floor.

“Looks like it’s time for us to clear out,” Kelnmiir remarked.

Several of the trolls were already casting suspicious glances in our direction.

I didn’t object, since I realised there was nothing we could do to help my friends now, and we ran in the direction of the storeroom, taking as much care as possible.

“Maybe we should have tried to rescue them after all?” I said to the vampire; I felt guilty leaving my friends behind…again.

“Just think about it,” the vampire replied. “There were about twenty trolls. We couldn’t have done anything, we would have been captured, or maybe even torn to shreds.”

In principle I agreed with him ... but abandoning my friends in distress, I just couldn’t do that. No, we couldn’t have done anything to help at the height of the battle – we didn’t get there in time – and after the fight there was even less we could have done. I didn’t think I could have taken on twenty trolls with my broom ... and the vampire might be dragging that sword and poleaxe around with him, but he wasn’t really in a fit state to use them, he hadn’t got his strength back yet – or had he? But we could follow the trolls, waiting for the right moment to rescue my friends. It looked as if Steel hadn’t been grabbed, but if he’d decided to hide, there was no way we would find him now. But what if he tried to rescue the others? If we struck from different sides, then maybe ...

“You know, I doubt very much that we’ll be able to rescue Caiten and your friends,” the vampire said, as if he had read my mind. “We have no right to take any ill-considered actions now, because we’re probably the only ones still free.”

And they said that vampires had no common sense!

“And why take such a stupid risk?” Kelnmiir went on. “When we reach the Main Hall where the Craftsmen are besieged, there are bound to be far more trolls there. Then we can really have good time!”

Mmmm, apparently Kelnmiir did have a few difficulties with common sense after all.

“I don’t even know how to answer that,” I admitted.

“And by the way, if you’re really rearing for a fight, there’ll probably be several trolls waiting by the teleports, specially for you!” the vampire said to cheer me up.

“Do you know how to control a teleport?” I asked.

“Quite honestly, no, but I think it’s tuned to Romius’s study, so we won’t get lost,” Kelnmiir replied blithely.

We ran through the storeroom at a rather fast pace. Evidently the vampire had forgotten that I was only a human being and for the last two months I hadn’t had any exercise except for brief strolls from one teleport to another. I was very quickly out of breath and by the time we reached the teleports, I could barely even stay on my feet.

“I see you’re pretty weak,” Kelnmiir remarked.

“It makes you pretty weak,” I hissed, “when you only sleep a few hours every day, run all day like a scalded cat from lectures to meditation sessions to practical classes, slave till you drop in the dining hall and keep getting injured all the time.”

“That’s nothing,” the vampire laughed. “Some day I’ll tell you how I spent my childhood. Now that really is a horror story ...”

What was going on at the teleports could have been called a horror story too. Kelnmiir’s assumptions were proved wrong. There were at least thirty trolls, and they were lugging boxes about! In other words, they were plundering the Museum.

Scene 4

“Yes, I definitely like the scale of this operation,” Kelnmiir said admiringly, when we had crept to within about twenty yards of the teleports. “Combining sabotage, invasion and common theft ... that’s really something.”

“Why don’t you join them, then?” I suggested peevishly. “Since you’ve taken such a great liking to them.”

“Take part in the capture of the Academy?” the vampire said thoughtfully. “No, my great granddaughter likes it here, and she wants to become a Craftsman. So the capture of the Academy will have to be postponed for the time being. And anyway, I won’t accept a mere supporting role in such a memorable event.”

“Sure, better to die in a leading role, defending the Academy,” I chuckled.

“Why so pessimistic?” asked Kelnmiir, slapping me on the shoulder. “I prefer to play a leading role in the successful rescue of the Academy.”

“Well I hope your wish comes true,” I sighed as I watched the trolls lugging the wooden crates to the teleport. All the stone trolls looked exactly the same, they could only be told apart by their loin cloths. And their stone bodies were impervious to the cold, so the loin cloths were strictly symbolic. To be quite honest, I had no idea what we could do against these stone hulks. Beat them with our fists? Absurd. I wasn’t even sure that my battle broom could knock them over as easily as the golem ... although in theory iron ought to be heavier ...

“Don’t be so solemn,” the vampire said with surprising sternness. “For your information, all my wishes have a way of coming true.”

I wondered if he was serious, or just trying to reassure me.

Meanwhile the trolls lined up and started walking into the teleport one by one, holding the crates in their arms.

“You know, I think the rescue of the Academy ought to begin with the rescue of its property,” Kelnmiir mused thoughtfully.

“And what do you suggest?”

“I suggest creeping closer to the teleport, then making a rapid advance and teleporting to Romius’s study. Immediately after that, we’ll smash the teleport, leaving the stoneheads trapped in the Museum until things improve.”

“But Caiten said there were other teleports in the Museum,” I recalled.

“But are you sure that the trolls know that? In any case, it will delay them for a while.”

“And what about Steel? It didn’t look as if they caught him,” I reminded the vampire.

“We don’t know that, and even if he wasn’t caught, are you suggesting we should give the invaders a chance to plunder the repository of technomagical items?”

“You’ve persuaded me,” I sighed. “Shall we crawl?”

“Right!” the vampire said and flopped to the floor. “So even you feel the spirit of the hunt at last?”

“I feel it, I feel it,” I said to shut him up.

Kelnmiir categorically refused to abandon the sword and the poleaxe, and I was much too attached to my battle broom, so crawling was awkward, to put it mildly. And that was the reason – it had nothing to do clumsiness – that when we had almost reached the teleport, I happened to catch one of the crates with my broom. And, as ill luck would have it, the crate happened to be standing right on the corner of the shelves.

“Catch it!” the vampire hissed.

I grabbed the crate and held it up, but in doing that I caught the next one with my foot ... and that caught another one ... and the final result was that five wooden crates of various sizes tumbled off the shelf onto the floor. I hardly need to say what a terrible racket that made.

“Run!” the vampire roared one second before the first crate fell, and sprinted for the teleport, still holding on to his sword and poleaxe. As he ran the vampire managed to swing these incredible heavy lumps of iron and scattered all the trolls who happened to come between him and the teleport. I followed Kelnmiir at top speed, not forgetting to grab my broom off the floor.

Our sudden appearance was accompanied by such a terrible din that at first the trolls were stunned by this unexpected attack. And when they did react, the vampire and I were already at the teleport. Kelnmiir dashed straight into it, but I gave way to a sudden impulse – I turned towards the advancing trolls and waved my broom. All the stoneheads were simply blown away. And why not? It was foolish of me not to believe in the power of my universal battle broom.

As I emerged from the teleport in Romius’s study, I was horrified to see the vampire preparing to swing the poleaxe at me. I was so surprised, I squeezed my eyes tight shut ... could he really have decided ...

“Don’t just stand there! Get off the teleport!” Kelnmiir shouted angrily.

I hastily stepped down off the platform, and the vampire immediately smashed the poleaxe down onto the round disk.

“What took you so long?” the vampire asked as he struck blow after blow.

“I had to tidy up a bit before I left,” I replied. “Listen, that’s enough, I don’t think anyone will be able to use this teleport now.”

“Ah, yes ...” said Kelnmiir, slightly embarrassed. “I got carried away ...”

“What next?” I asked, trying to stop myself shaking.

“I have an idea,” Kelnmiir said thoughtfully. “It’s very dangerous and very interesting.”

I almost collapsed.

“Can’t we get by with just interesting?”

“Oh no,” the vampire said blithely. “You never get interesting without dangerous.”

Feeling a slight weakness in my legs, I sat on the edge of the bed.

“And what do you suggest?”

“This is no time to be talking it easy,” said Kelnmiir, shaking his head. “The trolls were carrying the crates into the teleport, so more stoneheads will turn up here at any moment to collect the next delivery. You can please yourself, but I’m leaving.”

I jumped off the bed and ran out of the room after the vampire. Fortunately for us, there was no one in the corridor yet.

“Now where to?” I asked in bewilderment.

After all, the standard-route teleports only allowed trolls through, there were no windows on the Craftsmens’ level, and we had just smashed the only teleport that was working normally. I wondered what the vampire could have come up with.

“We have a choice: either wander through the Craftsmens’ studies looking for teleports, or go to the standard teleports and lie in wait for a troll ...”

“The point being?” I asked, confused.

“Well ... we’ll find a non-standard teleport in one of the studies and jump from level to level, until we find the seventieth floor ...”

“I didn’t mean that,” I interrupted. “Why should we lie in wait for a troll?”

“Well now ...” Kelnmiir said with a smile, “that’s the spirit of the hunt ...”

It cost me a serious effort not to tell the vampire where he could shove his dragon’s spirit of the hunt.

“Let’s leave hunting trolls for later,” I said as calmly as I could.

“All right then,” the vampire agreed. “Where do we start?”

“Logically speaking, the teleports must be in the Higher Craftsmen’s studies,” I reasoned. “So we just have to read the plaques on the doors.”

“So read them,” Kelnmiir said with a shrug.

I trotted off towards the start of the corridor, but before I had gone a few steps, I heard a terrible crash behind me.

“Did you find one?” I asked, running up to the door that had been smashed open.

“I don’t know,” the vampire said with a yawn. “Read the plaque if you like, but there’s definitely no teleport in here.”

Then Kelnmiir went up to the next door and kicked it open.

“Great,” I sighed. “Now we can add doors to the list of malicious damage ...”

I had a feeling that if trolls turned up on our floor anytime soon, they’d realise straightaway which way they ought to go. Unless, of course, it was a stone-deaf troll who turned up ...

While the vampire smashed the doors open one after another, I leaned against the wall and tried to gather my thoughts. To be quite honest, I still didn’t understood Kelnmiir’s plan. He didn’t know how to tune the non-standard teleports, so we could end up on absolutely any floor ... or we could simply disappear. If we ended up on a floor with windows, we could climb down to any other floor ... but what good was that? There weren’t any windows on the level where the Main Hall was in any case, the only way to get there was through the teleports. And that was a dead-end.

After about ten doors Kelnmiir gave a shout of joy: “Found one!”