The Midnight Carnival (10 page)

‘Gotchya!’

She laughed in relief and guided the ball towards her.

‘See?’ Adie said. ‘That wasn’t so bad.’

The faery didn’t seem distressed, in fact it seemed amused. It smiled down at her with its horrible triangular teeth, then wagged its finger.

The water hit her so fast, Adie wasn’t sure what had happened. She tumbled backwards, rolling to a stop at the top of the bank. Her hair and clothes were soaked, and her face stung from the force of the blow. She blinked against the drops that streamed down her forehead and saw the faery standing at the edge of the trees, free of its watery cage. It was grinning.

‘How did you…?’ Adie gasped.

The creature sprang into the shade of the leaves and disappeared into the woods.

‘No,’ Adie cried. ‘You can’t… Wait!’

She was weak with shock and it took a few strides before her legs would work properly. When she was sure on her feet she raced into the woods as fast as she could go. It had gone
to the left, she thought… or maybe straight ahead. She stopped and listened. There wasn’t a sound.

‘Where are you?’ she yelled into the gloom.

Desperate, she took off again, running through what seemed the most open path between the trees. She had to find it. If that thing was seen in town, if it hurt somebody, it would be all her fault. And the girls would know, and Ms Lemon and Mrs Quinlan would know, and she’d never be allowed to study witchcraft again. The girls would go to lessons without her, and she’d be alone, and she’d lose all her friends and…

The tears were streaming down her face now as she realised she was running in no particular direction. She was zigzagging through the woods and she couldn’t see a thing. The faery could be anywhere; it could be up a tree, in a hole, under a rock, in the
town
.

Bump.

She hit something tall and solid, and fell back. It wasn’t a tree. It was something else.

Squinting in the dim light, she gazed up at a pallid face, old and wrinkled, under the shadow of a black slicker. His eyes sent the same shiver down her spine as they had less than two years before. One of them was blue, the other pearly white. She opened her mouth, but her voice stuck in her throat.

The Mirrorman.

9

Rabbit Stew

The crackling of the fire soothed her nerves a little, as did the heat of the bowl of stew in her hands. It smelled good but Adie couldn’t bring herself to eat it. She was pretty sure the meat was rabbit. What else would the Mirrorman have to hunt in these woods?

Bob
, she corrected herself.
His name is Bob
.

Bob had first appeared to Grace through an enchanted mirror in Mr Pamuk’s shop, hence the nickname. He had scared the group out of their wits, but it had been an attempt to reach the girls from the depths of the demon well, and save them from a terrible fate. For Bob had been thrown down the well by Delilah’s wicked mother, Meredith Gold, many years before, and it was his strength and courage that saved Adie and her friends from becoming demon-possessed
slaves. Grace had eventually pulled Bob free of that hell, but Adie could see the horror and torment of his time down there, written in the lines and shadows of his face.

He was even older than he looked, she knew, his life artificially extended by many years as another witch’s enchanted slave. Adie sighed. Bob had really had a rough time of it. She should try to be nicer to him.

‘Thanks for the stew. It smells lovely.’

She flinched, realising she would now have to eat some of it. Smiling widely, she spooned what she hoped were just vegetables into her mouth. It was delicious.

‘It’s lovely out here,’ she continued. ‘Outside, under the trees and the moon… and stuff.’

He glanced at her but didn’t reply. Bob was famously quiet, and rarely spoke if he could help it. Adie gazed around at his humble stone hut, the wrought-iron pot hanging over the open fire, the fishing rod leaning against a tree. She hadn’t meant it when she said it, but though it was a very simple life, it was lovely. The sweet sound of the wind through the leaves, and the distant rush of water from the river made her momentarily forget what trouble she was in. She glanced up and the mismatched eyes were staring at her. Waiting for her to speak again.

‘You’re probably wondering what I’m doing out here… all alone, soaking wet, running around like I’ve lost my mind.’

The eyes watched but there was no reply. The silence made
Adie desperate to talk.

‘I’m looking for something. Something I’ve lost. Well, someone really. I need help, but I can’t tell the others what I’ve done.’ She gave him a pleading look. ‘If I tell you a secret, would you keep it?’

Bob plunged a spoonful of stew into his mouth and chewed. After a few seconds he nodded.

‘Okay,’ Adie said, taking a deep breath. ‘I think I’ve brought a faery from Hy-Breasal here. I was trying to… I’m not sure how I did it, but it’s here. You know about Hy-Breasal?’ The man just chewed on his rabbit stew. ‘Of course you know about Hy-Breasal. You’re all in with the magic stuff. Anyway, I brought a faery back from there and I don’t know how to send it home. Did anyone tell you me and the others got dragged to Hy-Breasal one time? Do you ever talk to our teachers? Ms Lemon and Mrs Quinlan, I mean. Do you ever…?’

Babbling isn’t the word
, she thought.
Get a hold of yourself, for heaven’s sake
.

‘Anyway, I tried to trap the faery with a water cage and it just smashed right out of it. I mean, I’m pretty good with water and I didn’t even feel it coming. It just blew the cage away like it was nothing.’ Adie set her bowl down near the fire. ‘I’m really worried. If the teachers find out they might kick me out of our witchcraft lessons, and the others… I’m afraid everyone will be really mad when they find out. And
what if the faery is bad? What if it hurts someone? I have to send it back before it can do any harm.’

The peaceful sound of the woods was somewhat marred by Bob’s squelchy chewing. It was slow and purposeful, and went on forever. Adie didn’t interrupt, trying to remain patient while her leg bobbed up and down with such ferocity she was in danger of kneeing herself in the chin.

‘It’s been here how long?’ Bob’s voice was rough and gravelly and rusty – as if he didn’t like to use it at all.

‘Since yesterday.’

‘And it’s kept to the woods?’

‘I guess so. I don’t know where it’s been the whole time, but I looked for it here first. You see, in its own world it had to stick to the woods. The witches and faeries had this kind of war, and the faeries lost, and the witches made sure they stayed in the woods.’

‘It’s not a water sprite?’

‘I don’t think so. Rachel saw a couple of those – they had blue or green skin and big fins that looked like wings.’

‘Yet it controls water. So what is it?’

‘Um.’ Adie swivelled her toe, making a messy dent in the mud. ‘I don’t know.’

Bob stood, his tall figure blocking the light from the moon. Sniffing, he wiped a hand under his nose and mumbled as if talking to himself.

‘No water sprite, but it can move water.’ He pulled his
hood up, hiding his pallid face in its shadow. ‘What else can it do?’

Crossing to the fishing rod, he picked up the lure at the end of the line – it was a fishing fly unlike any other, delicate feathers of purple and silver, and a single tiny jewel for the eye. Adie knew it was a magical object, and that it magnified Bob’s power somehow.

He snapped the fly from the line and put it in his pocket.

‘Coming?’ he said, not waiting for an answer.

Adie jogged after him, warm with relief. If anyone could help her trap the creature, surely Bob could. The night didn’t seem so dark now, and the challenge ahead didn’t seem so difficult. She could do this. She wasn’t alone anymore.

Keeping up with Bob was not easy. The man moved like a cat through the undergrowth. Adie tripped over roots and her own feet as she followed, trying not to fall behind. Then she gasped as he leapt up a tree, climbing like a monkey to the very top. She watched in wonder. He was old – spritely, obviously – but still
old
. To look at his face you’d think he was positively ancient. How did he move so quickly and quietly?

The black slicker slid swiftly back down the bark, and Bob landed with a thump.

‘What’s that?’ Adie said, looking at the browny orange
scrapings in his hands.

‘The beginnings of
Chalara fraxinea
. Dieback.’

‘Oh.’

He took off again, grabbing a leaf here, a shoot there, as if the woods were just an extension of himself. He didn’t have to stop to identify anything, and he didn’t have to go looking. It was like he knew where every tree and every bit of fungus grew. After he had jammed nearly a dozen ingredients into a small cloth bag, he spat into it and gave the bag a good shake.

‘Did the faery touch you?’

‘No,’ Adie replied. ‘Just smacked me with the water from the cage I made.’

‘That’ll do.’

His hand shot forward and rubbed the bag vigorously on her face.

‘Ugh,’ she complained, putting a hand to her raw cheek. ‘That had your spit in it.’

Bob ignored her, holding his fishing fly in one hand, and grinding the bag between the fingers of the other. The fly fluttered suddenly and Bob pointed.

‘That way.’

Jumping over falling logs and swishing through the grabbing twigs of unruly bushes, Adie felt close to fainting with fatigue. She got only a moment’s rest here and there, when Bob would stop and wait for the fly’s feather to shiver.

‘This way,’ he’d say, and they’d be running again.

She wanted to tell him to slow down, that she needed a break, but this was her mess he was helping clean up, so she kept her mouth shut.

Just when she thought she could take no more, the black slicker skidded to a halt and she was dragged to the woodland floor.

‘Shh.’

Bob held his finger to his lips, and nodded ahead.

There was the faery. Its head of twiggy hair cast eerie shadows as it twirled and spun, leaping into trees and somersaulting down.

It’s like a kid that just got out of school for summer
, Adie thought.

It looked so joyful she wondered for a second if it really was dangerous. Then she remembered the smack of water that left her bruised and reeling.

The fly was fluttering madly now, as Bob ran his thumb over the jewelled eye. It sparkled as he recited something under his breath, and Adie felt a sudden gust of wind. It grew and grew, coming from all directions, swiping the browning leaves from the trees and twisting them into a tornado of vegetation. Too late, the faery’s head turned in their direction, before it was sucked into the swirling column, vanishing behind a wall of leaves.

‘You got it!’ Adie cried. ‘We can send it back now.’

Bob’s expression was close to a smile, until a dried leaf bounced off his cheek. He looked perplexed. Another leaf hit, then another, and another. Soon Adie and Bob were being pelted with leaves, fired like bullets from the churning twister. It went on and on, Adie barely able to glance up through the deluge. At last, the leaves ran out. Bob and Adie sat up, taking their arms from their faces.

The faery sat hunkered on a branch, staring down at them, smiling. It didn’t look angry. Like before, it looked amused.

It thinks we’re playing with
it, Adie thought.

Then, blowing them a kiss, the creature turned and darted into the darkness.

All athletic grace was gone from Bob’s movements as he staggered painfully to his feet. He looked in shock.

‘That’s no faery,’ he said.

‘What?’ said Adie. ‘What do you mean? What is it, then?’

He shook his head.

‘It’s something else. Something worse.’

The classroom was freezing. Mr McQuaid announced that the radiator was broken and that was too bad. He ignored the groans and moans that followed, turning to the whiteboard to begin the history lesson that was bound to bore the pants off everyone. Grace pulled her jacket closed against the vicious shaft of cold air from the window, and began 
taking notes. She glanced to her left and spotted the
cho ku rei
symbol on Jenny’s leg. She flipped her scarf out to slap the other girl on the arm.

‘Cover that symbol,’ she hissed.

‘Alright, alright,’ Jenny whispered, pulling up her sock. ‘Don’t know what you’re worried about, no-one saw.’

But at least three people
had
seen, earlier in the A block, when Jenny had marched to her locker with the symbol on display.

‘Here, Jenny,’ Lena Domanski had called out, ‘did you get a tattoo?’

Lena and two others had trotted over to take a closer look, while Jenny had smiled mysteriously. It made Grace angry. The secret wasn’t just Jenny’s, it was all of theirs, and she had no right to risk the whole group.

The sky outside was filled with dark clouds. Grace felt they were invading the room. Jenny was pushing her luck with Mrs Quinlan and Ms Lemon, Adie seemed to have withdrawn completely inside herself, and the sheen had begun to wear off on the carnival just a little bit. The girls had visited again with Justine in her tent, and again been invited to dinner, but Grace had avoided seeing Drake. She felt weird about the meeting she had seen between him and the doctor. She had no idea what it meant, but she was sure it wasn’t good.