Spellfall (10 page)

The woman’s blue gaze slid to Natalie, then quickly away again. She hurried back up the hall. Natalie tried to see where she went but Hawk clicked on a light and tugged her down the steps.

The throbbing grew louder as they descended. It was a large cellar with brick arches, whitewashed and quite brightly lit but a chill oozed out of the walls and breathed down the back of Natalie’s neck, raising goosebumps on her bare arms and legs. The air had a musty smell, reminding her of the pet shop where she and Jo went to buy Bilbo’s dog chews. There were whiffs of a sharper odour too, maybe urine. She wrinkled her nose.

Hawk positioned a stool under one of the arches and told her to sit. Then he pulled a handful of spells out of his pocket and set them carefully on the floor around her feet, forming a circle. As he laid each one down, he smoothed it with his hand and chanted a soft word in a language she didn’t recognize. The spells began to glimmer, exactly like the one she’d found in the puddle in the car park. Natalie drew her bare toes under the stool and pressed her knees together. She started to wonder if playing along was such a good idea.

To her relief, the woman returned then with her glasses, stepped carefully through the ring of spells, and pushed them on to Natalie’s nose. She blinked as the cellar snapped into focus. It was larger than she’d thought. What she’d assumed to be shadows at the back turned out to be a tunnel leading into the wall. The throbbing was coming from some large machines at one side, and under one of the arches she made out a long bench with a collection of cages and glass tanks. Most of them seemed to be empty, though the overpowering smell suggested they hadn’t always been. She hugged herself, cold and sweating at the same time.

Hawk regarded her in amusement. “Not so confident now, are you Spider? Sit still and don’t touch the spells. I’m going to collect Hunter, then we can start. Fetch her familiar, Claudia, and watch her.”

He took the cellar steps three at a time, while the woman –
Claudia, remember that
– disappeared into the shadows.

Natalie eyed the steps and the open door at the top, then transferred her attention to the spells. Eleven of them, evenly spaced, with gaps the length of her arm between each. Easy enough to avoid, except she was supposed to be playing along. Before she could decide, Claudia returned carefully carrying a small glass tank with a lid. She stepped between the spells, gave Natalie a hesitant smile, and placed the tank next to the stool.

At first, Natalie thought the tank was empty. Then a large spider scurried across the glass floor. “Itsy?” she whispered. It certainly looked like a house spider but that didn’t mean it was the same one she’d lost. One of its legs was missing. She frowned.

Claudia was watching her, the sympathy back in her eyes. “I couldn’t stop him,” she said. “He was furious when you tried that trick with the tray and wanted to teach you a lesson. Don’t worry, that sort of thing won’t be necessary once you’re one of us. After a while it doesn’t hurt so much.” Her eyes misted and she stared at the tank as if she were seeing something other than a spider inside.

Of course.
My Fish.

“Where’s your fish?” Natalie asked.

At once, the blue eyes emptied. “You’ll find out soon enough,” she said. She retreated under one of the arches and stared at the cellar door.

Natalie followed her gaze and her breath stopped. Merlin’s father was coming down the steps, one arm held horizontally before him, a leather glove on his fist. Perched on this glove, a huge grey and brown hawk fluttered its wings for balance. Natalie gripped the stool. She’d never been so close to such a large, fierce bird without wire netting between them. Its tail and breast were barred black, its legs bright yellow, its beak curved and very sharp. She shrank back instinctively as the hawk regarded her from one shining gold eye. Excited by her movement, it opened its cruel beak and screeched.

Caaa-caaa-caaa!

The cry echoed around the cellar, drowning out the throbbing of the generators and making a small animal in one of the cages scuttle in alarm. Natalie slammed her hands over her ears. Under her arch, Claudia cringed.

Hawk smiled fondly at the bird and smoothed its feathers until it settled again. “This is Hunter,” he said. “He’s a pure bred goshawk. Isn’t he a beauty? He’s hungry because I haven’t flown him today.” He looked meaningfully at Natalie.

She wet her lips and glanced at the glimmering spells. “Maybe you should fly him, then?”

Two pairs of yellow eyes blazed at her. “Give it up, Spider. You know very well why he’s here and you told me you’d cooperate. This can be easy or it can be hard. Spiders have eight legs, remember.”

Natalie eyed the cellar steps and wondered if it might, after all, be a better idea to risk the woods barefoot.

Play along
, she told herself firmly. It’s only a bird.

She took a deep breath. “I’m sorry, but I don’t know what to do. You see, I’ve never taken part in a ceremony like this before.”

The anger died as suddenly as it had come. “I was forgetting your education has been gravely neglected. After you’ve recovered, I’ll give you a few lessons in the basics. You’ll have to wait until after the Opening for the rest. Claudia, my darling Fish, explain will you?”

Claudia cleared her throat. “The girl’s very young,” she said. “Are you sure this is such a good idea, Hawk? Her disappearance will have caused a fuss. It’s not like taking an adult no one cares about. You were so careful with me and the others. Why risk discovery now?”

Hawk hissed, and his bird beat the air with its huge wings. Although these were a long way from her head, Natalie ducked. Her stomach clenched as the goshawk’s shadow leapt around the cellar.

“How many more times do I have to explain it to you?” Hawk said. “The Boundary opens on Saturday night. Everything’s set. Going in with our spellclave incomplete would be suicide, you know that, and if we’re going to take on the Council of Oq, we need to make ourselves as powerful as possible. You can’t deny Spider will be a lot more useful than Merlin. Either she joins us or we wait another year with all the increased risk of discovery by the authorities while I find another who possesses her sort of power. Fancy that, do you my Fish? Being locked up for the rest of your life? They’d destroy Hunter, you know. What would your imprisonment be like then, do you think?”

Claudia paled. “It’ll be quick,” she said to Natalie. “Over before you know it. You don’t need to do anything. Just sit still and try to relax. Whatever happens, don’t touch your spider.”

Natalie’s heart thumped uneasily. She eyed the steps again. The door at the top was shut now, but not locked. Quietly, she began to shift her weight to the edge of the stool.

Hawk walked around her, touching the spells with his stick and chanting under his breath. The air in the cellar gave a peculiar crackle. Hawk stepped back, and the shadows around the stool
shimmered
.

Natalie froze.

Claudia raised an arm to shield her eyes, which should have warned her. Before Natalie thought to do the same, blinding purple light flooded the cellar, followed by the smell of burnt sugar she remembered from the supermarket and clouds of drifting purple smoke. A little scream escaped her, which the goshawk upstaged with another of its wild cries.

When the smoke cleared, the cellar was full of people.

*

Natalie gripped the edge of the stool and blinked round the ring of faces, still trying to calm her heart. Surely they hadn’t stepped out of thin air? She began to tremble, then shook herself. No, they must have crept along the tunnel under cover of the smoke while she’d been blinded by that explosion. She’d seen a magician do something similar on television once. She started to feel a bit calmer. Hawk hadn’t even got the number of spells right. Only ten people had “appeared” in the cellar – seven men and three women of various ages, quite ordinary looking except for their eyes, which regarded her with fierce interest.

As if I’m their prey, she thought with a shiver.

“This is our little Spider,” said Hawk, gentling his bird. “Some of you have already seen her asleep in the attic. Today, I’m pleased to announce she’s very much awake and willing to complete our spellclave. Today, our power increases thirteen-fold. Today, I become a Spell Lord!”

Excited whispers rippled round the cellar, but quietened as Hawk raised his stick. “Silence,” he said. “Stand still.” Immediately, everyone was silent and still.

Hawk counted them, peered into the shadows at the back of the cellar, then prodded one of the spells, which unlike its neighbours was still glimmering. He scowled. “Where’s that boy got to now? I
told
him to be ready for transportation. I want him to witness this. Damn him, he never learns...” He carried his goshawk across to the cage from which the sound of a small animal’s panic had come earlier. Natalie watched uneasily as Hunter beat his wings in excitement. Inside the cage, a white mouse vanished into its bedding.

There was a short pause.

Then Merlin came racing down the cellar steps at dangerous speed, pushed through all the people and snatched the cage into his arms. “No!” he screamed, shielding the mouse with his body. “Leave him alone, please leave him alone!”

His father’s lip twisted. “Put that down, boy, don’t be such a baby. Now we’re all here at last, perhaps we can start. We’ll use spellfire, I think, since this is such a special moment. Ferret! Turn that thing off, it’s driving me crazy.”

A black-bearded man crossed to the generator. After a moment, the throbbing stopped and the electric lights died. Darkness rushed from the walls, leaving only the faint bronze glimmer of the single unused spell by Natalie’s feet. Everyone’s breathing grew louder. Over by the bench, Merlin whimpered. Natalie started to feel sick.

Hawk touched the glimmering spell with his stick and it burst into flame. Haloed in purple fire, the goshawk twisted its head and eyed her upside-down. Shadows whispered chill threats across her neck. If the cellar had been spooky before, it was a hundred times worse now. She hugged herself tightly, tears coming.

“Don’t hurt me, please don’t,” she whispered, knowing she sounded like Merlin but unable to help herself. “If you let me go, I promise I won’t tell the police anything. I’ll say you kept me blindfolded. I’ll say anything you want—” Her voice cracked on a sob.

“Get on with it,” Claudia said. “Stop torturing the child.”

In two swift strides, Hawk crossed to the stool. Natalie made herself as small as possible and shut her eyes tightly. But he didn’t touch her and after a moment she heard a scrape near her feet. She risked a peep. She’d quite forgotten Itsy – if it really was Itsy. Hawk had removed the lid of the tank. As she watched, hardly daring to breathe, Hunter hopped down, stretched his neck into the tank and delicately swallowed the spider.

For three heartbeats, no one and nothing moved. Then the goshawk shrieked, Merlin’s father raised both arms to the roof, and everyone except Merlin went down on their knees and shouted, “Lord Hawk! Lord Hawk! Lord Hawk!”

It was all too much. The tension ran out of Natalie as if someone had punctured her. Her legs, that had been clenched together since the lights went out, seemed to become liquid. She slipped off the stool and crumpled in a little heap at Hawk’s feet. The others crowded forward, a strange mixture of eagerness and pity in their eyes, tiny purple flame-reflections dancing in their pupils.

Hawk patted her head. But instead of helping her up, he pushed her further down. “Good girl. Now kiss my feet, then I’ll let you rest.”

Natalie’s blood stirred. Kiss his feet? His boots were caked in mud. She started to tell him so, then stopped herself.
Play along.
Meekly, she crawled forward and touched her lips to the cleanest boot. A sigh rippled around the cellar.

She waited a decent moment, then raised her head and said as sweetly as she could, “Please Lord Hawk, I’m cold and my feet hurt. Could I have my clothes and shoes back now, do you think?”

She held her breath. Had she overdone it?

Hawk smiled and fingered a lock of her still damp hair. “Of course you can, my little Spider. No need to keep them from you now, is there? Merlin! Stop that pathetic whimpering. Go fetch Spider’s clothes and take them up to her room. Fish, you can help her upstairs and put her to bed. The rest of you, get down to the archery range and start practising! This is the year we show the Council of Oq who has the real power. I want everyone capable of shooting a unicorn at twenty paces when we cross that Boundary!”

Chapter 8

ESCAPE

Thursday morning, October 29

~~*~~

Merlin took his time fetching Spider’s clothes. With the girl recovering in the attic and his father and the rest of the spellclave practising down at the archery range, no one would know what he was about to attempt. If it didn’t work, he wouldn’t get into trouble. And if it did, he’d be free. He felt a bit guilty as he remembered the price of that freedom. But he didn’t see what he could have done to help Spider and it was all over now. Not even his father could turn back the clock.