The Eye of Zoltar (6 page)

I climbed out of the car and waited for the forklift truck to deliver the crate in front of us. While this happened, I noticed several other henchmen dotted around the hangar. They were all dressed in black suits, dark hats, white gloves and large sunglasses. I peered at the one closest to us. There was no flesh in the small gap between where his glove ended and his shirt cuff began. It was an empty suit, animated by magic. Usually you can tell a drone by their mildly jerky and decidedly unhumanlike movements, but these ones were top class – at a distance you’d never know at all.

‘Notice anything odd about the henchmen?’ whispered Tiger.

‘Yes,’ I said, ‘drones.’

‘Drones?’ asked the Princess.

‘Watch and listen,’ said Tiger.

‘Good afternoon, Miss Strange,’ said Miss D’argento in a cultivated voice, her high heels click-clicking on the concrete floor as she approached us, ‘congratulations on winning The Magic Contest. I reported it to the Mighty Shandar, who expressed admiration for your fortitude.’

I nodded towards the closest drone.

‘They move well for the non-living.’

‘Thank you,’ said D’argento. ‘Shandar does us all proud.’

‘And from purely professional interest,’ I added, ‘are you running them on an Ankh-XVII RUNIX core?’

‘You know your spells,’ said Miss D’argento with a smile. ‘We run them with the Mandrake Sentience Emulation Protocols disabled to make them less independent. Make no mistake, they are twice as dangerous as real bodyguards for they fear no death.’

She wasn’t kidding. Pharaoh Amenemhat V of the Middle Kingdom was said to have attempted to expand Egypt along the Mediterranean with an unstoppable drone army of sixty thousand. They got as far as what is now Benghazi before Amenemhat V was killed in battle.

I told Tiger and the Princess to wait in the car while the forklift placed the crate in front of us and then reversed away. Almost immediately, several of the lifeless drones unlatched the crate and wheeled the two sections apart to reveal the Mighty Shandar.

But it wasn’t a flesh-and-blood Shandar, it was Shandar as he spent most of his time these days: stone. Every fold in the fabric of his clothes, every pore in his skin, every eyelash was perfectly preserved in glassy obsidian. This was how the Mighty Shandar could still be a power to be reckoned with four centuries after his birth, for in stone, you don’t age.

But spending time
in petra
was not without dangers. The world is littered with sorcerers who have turned to stone for some reason, only to have an arm, leg or head fall, or be knocked or sawn off. Those that return to life generally bleed to death before they can be saved. But given the right storage facilities and barring erosion, accidental damage or mischief, a sorcerer could live hundreds of thousands of years without a second of their own life having passed.

‘The Mighty Shandar celebrates his four hundred and forty-fourth birthday next year,’ said Miss D’argento, ‘yet in his own personal life he is only fifty-eight. He doesn’t get out of stone for anything less than a million an hour, and at current life-usage rates will live to 9,356.’

She looked at Shandar’s features, unclipped a feather duster from inside the crate, and flicked some dust from the statue.

‘He spent the entire seventeen and eighteenth centuries turned to stone,’ continued Miss D’argento proudly, ‘but that was mainly for tax purposes. Four generations of my family never spoke to him at all.’

‘You must be very dedicated.’

‘Dedication does not even
begin
to describe our commitment to the Mighty Shandar,’ said D’argento, ‘but enough chit-chat. Read this.’

She passed me a sheet of paper. I scanned the contents, and my heart fell. It was a letter from Representatives of the unUnited Kingdoms to the Mighty Shandar, outlining a case of ‘Breach of Contract’ they had filed with the unUK’s highest court.

‘The thing is,’ said D’argento in a half-apologetic tone as I read the lawsuit, ‘that the Mighty Shandar doesn’t do refunds.’

The problem was this: the Mighty Shandar had been contracted to rid the Kingdoms of Dragons four centuries before, and was paid a lot of money to do so. His plan required the last Dragon to die of old age, something that I personally intervened to ruin. There were now two Dragons left, and that was two more Dragons than the contract stipulated. Unless he rid the Kingdoms of all the Dragons he’d have to return the cash. And it was a
lot
of cash, paid to him four centuries ago – the interest alone would fund at least half a Troll War.

‘We have the money,’ said D’argento. ‘The Mighty Shandar’s share in Skybus would cover the debt pretty much on its own. No, it’s the
principle
of the matter. A job was left unfinished, and we’re not keen to make a habit of it. Clients might lose confidence, and in business, confidence counts.’

‘I agree with that,’ I replied, ‘but Dragons aren’t much into eating people any more – it’s probably the last thing on Feldspar and Colin’s mind.’

‘They have names?’

‘Certainly. In the first month of their new life they did a goodwill tour around the world to promote their “not eating people or burning stuff” agenda, and they are at present in Washington, DC, reading the entire contents of the Library of Congress in order to understand a little more about humans.’

‘Admirable, I’m sure,’ said Miss D’argento, ‘but the refund issue still stands. Don’t take my word for it, for you are to be honoured: the Mighty Shandar wants to speak to you
personally
.’

Miss D’argento checked her watch and somewhere a clock struck two. Almost immediately the statue of Shandar turned from black to grey to a sort of off-white. There was a pause, then Shandar took a deep breath as life returned to his body, and the off-white coating seemed to burst off his skin and clothes like dry skin. He staggered for a moment, shook himself and looked around.

‘Welcome back, O Mighty Shandar,’ said Miss D’argento, beaming and clicking a stopwatch. ‘It’s two o’clock on the afternoon of 14 October 2007. You’ve been
in petra
for sixty-two days. We’re currently at Madley International Airport in the Kingdom of Snodd.’

She handed him a damp towel so he could refresh himself, then a clipboard and pen.

‘Ongoing progress reports, sir.’

His eyes scanned the text.

‘I’ll take two minutes,’ he said, his voice a deep baritone that seemed to transmit confidence, awe and leadership in equal measure.

‘This is Jennifer Strange,’ said D’argento, gesturing in my direction, ‘as you requested.’

He looked across at me. He was a handsome man, tanned, appeared healthy and was imposingly large. His eyes, which regarded everything with the minutest attention to detail, appeared not to blink, and were of the brightest green, like a cat’s.

‘Miss D’argento? Make that four minutes.’

He shook my hand.

‘I’m
very
pleased to meet you at last. A worthy opponent is the only opponent worth opposing.’

His handshake was firm, yet cold, which is hardly surprising; a few seconds ago he had been stone.

‘You assisted the Dragons in destroying my carefully laid plans,’ he added in a quieter voice. ‘Plans four centuries in the making. All that work for nothing, and now they’re asking for a refund. Worse, you have damaged my hundred per cent wizidrical success rate and bruised my credibility as a sorcerer of considerable power.’

I didn’t know what to say so I said nothing. He had a point to make, and he’d make it soon enough.

‘For any one of those reasons I should banish you to the icy wastes of outer Finlandia.’

‘If that was your plan you would already have done so.’

‘Very true,’ he said with a half smile, ‘but I’m not into revenge. It has a nasty habit of biting you back when you least expect it. I have a feeling that punishing you would upset the delicate Good–Bad balance.’

Most sorcerers believed in what they called ‘The Balance’. Simply put, all life requires
equilibrium
to survive. For every death there is birth, for every light there is dark, for every ugliness there is something that shines with the greatest lustre. And for every truly heinous act, there are always multiple good acts to compensate. It’s why evil despots are always defeated, and why a truly awful reality TV show can never go on for ever.

Shandar looked at the clipboard for a moment, signed something, then continued to read while he spoke to me. Someone as powerful as Shandar would be able to read two books and converse with three people at the same time – even in different languages.

‘You seem a resourceful young lady, Jennifer. I’m not often beaten, and the experience has renewed a sense of excitement that I have not felt for a long time. You appreciate that I have almost unlimited power at my disposal?’

‘I know that, sir, yes.’

‘Are we sure about this?’ asked the Mighty Shandar, pointing to a clause in one of the notes he was looking at.

‘Yes, sir,’ replied D’argento. ‘They want the state of Hawaii moved to the middle of the Pacific.’

‘I thought it was fine between Wyoming and Arkansas.’

‘The venerable Lord Jack of Hawaii said the move is on account of the climate – and they want to retrofit the collective memory so everyone thinks it’s always been there.’

‘Standard stuff,’ said Shandar, signing the contract, ‘and they didn’t quibble over the price?’

‘Not a murmur.’

He sighed and shook his head.

‘Where
have
all the good negotiators gone?’

‘Two minutes gone,’ said Miss D’argento, consulting her stopwatch.

‘So with my power almost unimaginable right now,’ he continued, turning back to me, ‘your friends the Dragons are easily exterminated. Take it from me that I could – and would – destroy them in a twinkling, thus completing the contract and avoiding a refund.’

‘Then you will take on the might of Kazam as well, Mighty Shandar,’ I said, ‘for we will do
anything
to prevent you harming a single scale of a Dragon.’

It was a bold speech, and I felt myself shiver in fear of how he might react. He appeared not to hear me at first and spoke again to his agent.

‘We’re not doing this,’ he announced quietly as he handed an unsigned contract back to Miss D’argento. ‘There are quite enough boy bands on the planet as it is.’

He turned back to me.

‘The combined power of your sorcerers would not equal a thousandth of my power,’ he said.

‘I know that,’ I replied, ‘and so do they. But it would not stop them. They would all die defending one of their own, and the Dragons, masters of the magical arts themselves, are one of us.’

The Mighty Shandar regarded me thoughtfully. I’d not consulted the sorcerers on any of this, but I knew them well enough, and so did he.

‘Then I have a proposition for you, Miss Strange. Are you listening?’

‘I’m listening.’

‘As you can see, my time is strictly rationed. I have no spare time to search for rare and exotic trinkets to add to my collection of Wonderful Things. Miss D’argento is too busy with managing my affairs, and drones are all very well for heavy lifting and the odd senseless act of violence, but they have no finesse. So: find something for me and I’ll leave the Dragons alone and take the indignity on the chin.’

‘I’m still listening,’ I said. ‘What do you want me to find?’

‘A magnificent pink ruby the size of a goose’s egg. It belonged to a wizard I admire greatly. You can find me … the Eye of Zoltar.’

‘That’s a tall order,’ I said, having absolutely no idea what he was talking about, but keeping that to myself. It didn’t pay to look an idiot in Shandar’s presence.

‘One minute to go,’ said Miss D’angelo, consulting her stopwatch.

‘Do we have a deal?’ asked Shandar.

I didn’t need to think for long. If I didn’t agree to find this ‘Eye of Zoltar’ then Shandar would attempt to kill the Dragons, and we would be honour bound to try to stop him, and that would end in our collective annihilation.

‘I’ll find you the Eye of Zoltar,’ I said, ‘whatever it takes.’

‘Good choice,’ said Shandar with a grin. ‘I knew you’d agree.’

‘Any clue as to where it is?’ I asked. ‘The world is a big place.’

‘If I knew where it was,’ snapped Shandar, ‘I’d get it myself.’

Since the meeting was clearly at an end, I returned to where the Princess and Tiger were waiting for me. From the Bugatti Royale we watched as Shandar talked quietly with D’argento, signed some more forms and eventually, when his four minutes were up, changed rapidly back into obsidian.

The drones quickly crated him up, and the forklift reappeared and placed the crate back into the rear of the cargo aircraft. Once that was done a clothes rail that had been standing unnoticed to one side was approached by the drones, and they deftly jumped back on to their coat hangers, the empty suits returning to what they had been – creatures given life only by the will of Shandar. The human manservant wheeled the clothes rail into the back of the aircraft, swiftly followed by Miss D’argento in the Phantom Twelve. A minute later the rear cargo door was closed, and the engines started up. By this time tomorrow they could be anywhere on the planet.

I tapped the Helping Hand™ to bring it out of sleep mode and it dutifully pulled the wheel around and we drove out of the hangar. We paused on the perimeter track to watch Shandar’s aircraft lumber almost impossibly into the sky with its tiny wings, then headed towards Zambini Towers.

‘The Eye of Zoltar?’ said Tiger when I’d finished relating what Shandar had said. ‘What on earth’s that?’

‘I’ve no idea. The person to consult is someone with a clearer idea of what the future might bring.’

‘I’m no clairvoyant,’ said Tiger, ‘but I think I know who you mean.’

The Remarkable Kevin Zipp was one of Kazam’s most accomplished clairvoyants. When we walked back into the offices at Kazam he was checking out baby futures. Not in a stocks and shares kind of way, obviously, but what a baby’s life had in store for them. It was a good way to earn ready cash, as Kazam was constantly short of money. Two mothers had their tots with them, and Kevin was checking each by holding on to their left foot for a moment.