Fireborn Read online

  The trouble with this was that he hadn’t been very good at that either and was glad when the job here came along. It was all very difficult.

  He went into the garden to think about it. He felt less lonely and useless in the garden because there were no other teachers there to ignore him, no pupils to tease him and cheek him.

  He settled down on a bench behind a hedge and thought about what he should do. He was a shabby, crumpled sort of person, with a worried face that smiled too often when it wasn’t happy. He came from a family with great wizards in it and he felt he should be a great wizard, too and he couldn’t understand why people thought he wasn’t.

  He was just wondering whether to toss a coin to see if he should stay at the college or leave when he heard the roffle and Melwood. He sank down lower on the bench and listened.

  It was annoying. They were not quite close enough for him to hear properly. He gathered that there was a big problem and for some reason that he couldn’t begin to understand this roffle boy thought he could help to solve it. A roffle, imagine. And not even a grown-up roffle, but a boy. In his short time at the college Frastfil had come to think of boys as the enemy. He knew they laughed at him and he couldn’t find a way to stop them.

  He strained to hear. Whatever it was they were talking about, the principal thought it was important. And, to Frastfil’s delight, he worked out that it was about Boolat. If there was anything he thought he knew about it was Boolat. This was his chance to get noticed and to be important. He had a good idea that Melwood was not very pleased with him, that she thought they had made a mistake in giving him the job. This would be his chance to prove her wrong.

  Frastfil’s great uncle had been the court wizard at the Palace of Boolat. Frastfil had often visited there as a boy. He knew it well. When Melwood and the roffle went back inside he crumpled up his cheeks in pleasure. He was going to show the others what he could do. He’d offer his knowledge. He had heard that they were meeting later in the library. Good. He’d go and join in.

  He stood up, pushed back his limp hair, put his hands into his pockets, jingled the coins and squared up his shoulders ready for work. |

  Mattie had eaten a rat,

  a raw rat.

  When he thought about it his throat hurt and his chest squeezed in hard and he had to stop himself from making a sick noise.

  He had hit the rat with a lump of stone and ripped the skin off.

  It was all right.

  It wasn’t all right.

  It was all right.

  It had to be all right.

  So it was all right.

  He retched when he remembered it.

  He was going to do it again. He was going to keep on doing it until he found a way out of Boolat. Or he would die. It was as simple as that. Eat rats or die.

  Water wasn’t a problem. The sides of the passageways between the walls were all wet when you got to ground level, wetter still underground. Mattie could lick himself a drink any time he wanted to.

  Apart from the portcullis hole he hadn’t found any other escape possibilities. He was still looking. There wasn’t anywhere he couldn’t go as long as he stayed inside the tunnels. He watched the beetles colonize the palace. They liked the damper parts best. Once they had cleared the palace of people they stayed away from the upper floors mostly. Mattie didn’t dare use any of the rooms yet. Perhaps later.

  Everything about them made him feel ill. Their hard shells. Their glossy bodies. Their crooked legs that could stab as well as support. Their clacking. Their rattling. Their swift actions. And they were changing all the time. Changing in all different directions. Some grew bigger. Some could rear up and look as though they walked upright. Some had more legs than others. There was no pattern to it, no reason. Except for one sort. They grew to be the size of big dogs. They developed a spiny armoured shell and stabbing legs and many eyes and they walked on tiptoe. And they made a noise which Mattie thought was like talking. They chattered to one another – Takkabakk, takkabakk, takkabakk. It made him want to disappear.

  Then there was the biggest one of all. The one who spent time with the grey ghost in the turret. Mattie was frightened of them, but because they were less like the beetles than anything else alive except for the rats, he spied on them. And because he thought that if ever he could discover the secret of how to escape it would be from them. So he watched from inside the wall and he listened and he remembered.

  “I think it was a woman,” said Perry. “But I can’t be sure.”

  They sat around the library table again. “I wasn’t close enough, but you know how it is. Even from a distance you can tell a man from a woman.”

  “Beetles?” said Jackbones. “What sort?”

  “No sort I’ve ever seen before. Shapes and sizes I didn’t recognize.”

  “And this boy?” said Flaxfield. “Tell us that again.”

  “It wasn’t a boy,” said Perry. “I’m sure of that. It was a thing pretending to be a boy. It couldn’t talk, and it walked like a thing.”

  Jackbones laughed.

  “I’m serious,” said Perry.

  “And I’m taking you seriously,” said the librarian. “I’m admiring your choice of words. Someone like Flaxfield here would have wasted time trying to find a clever way of saying it. You did well. A thing walks like a thing, not like a boy. Good.”

  “It’s not Slowin then?” said Cabbage. “Slowin’s dead?”

  “What about the other thing?” asked Melwood.

  Perry closed his eyes and opened them again quickly.

  “Like a beetle, like a man, like a monster,” he said.

  “Could that be Slowin?” asked Cabbage.

  “It could,” said Flaxfield. “We don’t know what the magic has made or the changes it’s brought. He deserves to be a beetle.”

  “And they killed everyone?” said Jackbones.

  “I heard the screams. I saw things I don’t want to tell you.”

  “All dead,” said Melwood. “That’s as much as we need to know.”

  “Where does this leave us?” said Jackbones. It wasn’t a question so much as a preliminary to saying what he thought. “The beetles survived the magic storm. More than survived, they thrived and multiplied. The magic has taken over Boolat. And something else survived and has gone with them.”

  “Survived or was created,” said Flaxfield.

  “Or was created,” agreed Jackbones.

  “What about the boy-thing?” said Cabbage. “That didn’t come from Slowin’s Yard.”

  “It might be dead already,” said Dorwin. “It went into Boolat.”

  “So,” said Jackbones, “as I said, where does this leave us? I vote we concentrate on finding out Slowin’s name, forget about Boolat until we’ve done that.”

  “On the other hand,” said Dorwin, “we need to find out what’s happening there, just in case.”

  “If there are beetles there, then Slowin’s there,” said Cabbage.

  “One thing at a time,” said Jackbones.

  Cabbage and Melwood looked at each other. Melwood nodded to him to speak.

  “We tried to look at Boolat,” he said. “Both of us. We couldn’t see it. The magic was blocked.”

  “Why were you looking for it?” asked Dorwin.

  “It chose us,” said Melwood. “We have to keep Boolat in our minds. I think it’s as important as Slowin’s name.”

  “Of course,” said Flaxfield. “Boolat has always been important. It would have to be Boolat. It’s always Boolat. It will end there.”

  They stared at him.

  “What do you mean?” said Jackbones.

  “We may as well look for Slowin’s name?” said Flaxfield. “Boolat will intrude soon enough. What’s your plan, Jackbones?”

  The librarian shrugged. “You know what I’m suggesting,” he said. “Are you prepared to do it?”

  “We all have to agree.”

  “Agree to what?” said Cabbage.

  “You tell him,�
�� said Flaxfield. “It’s your idea.”

  Jackbones looked at Cabbage and Perry.

  “You know about Finishings?” he said.

  “Yes,” said Cabbage.

  “No,” said Perry.

  “Tell him,” said Flaxfield.

  “Where shall I start?” asked Cabbage.

  “You decide.”

  Cabbage frowned.

  “You know,” he said, “that there’s the Deep World and there’s Up Top?”

  “Does a book of recipes taste as good as a pork pullover?” said Perry, reverting to roffle speech in his frustration.

  “What?” said Cabbage.

  “Of course I know,” said Perry.

  “Of course. Well, there are other places as well. And the Finished World is one of them.”

  “Where is it?”

  “I can’t tell you about it if you ask me questions and I lose my thread,” said Cabbage.

  “Do you know where it is?” asked Perry.

  “Flaxfield,” said Cabbage. “You tell him.”

  Flaxfield shook his head.

  “You’re doing a good job,” he said. “Go on. Let him tell it his way, Perry.”

  “When you die,” said Cabbage, “you go to the Finished World. And you never come back. It’s not a place. It’s everywhere.”

  “Does everyone go there?”

  “I think so.”

  “Do roffles go there?”

  Cabbage put his hands on his head and gave Flaxfield a desperate look.

  “Help me, please,” he said.

  Flaxfield took up the explanation.

  “Roffles are different,” he said. “You’ll tell Cabbage about that one day. For now, just remember that the Finished World is everywhere. One of the things a wizard can do is help people as they go to the Finished World. If you die and have to make the journey yourself it can be confusing when you get there. You may forget who you were, or you may be frightened because it’s so strange. You may take a long time finding other people you knew. Wizards can help with this. They perform Finishings.”

  “Do you?” Perry asked Cabbage.

  “I watch,” he said. “And I help sometimes. A little bit. I’m learning.”

  “A Finishing makes the journey easier,” said Flaxfield. “A Finishing gives a person things to take into the Finished World, things that help them to remember, things that they knew Up Top, things that tell others in the Finished World who it is that’s coming to join them.”

  “Do the wizards take them into the Finished World, then?”

  Cabbage recoiled.

  “No,” he said. “No. We don’t go through. We have to stay this side.”

  His face was white and his hands gripped the table edge.

  “It’s all right,” said Flaxfield.

  Cabbage tried to smile.

  “We don’t cross that border, Perry,” said Flaxfield. “There’s no way back. And it’s wrong to go into the Finished World before you’re called there. You would never be at rest. You wouldn’t fit in. It’s the worst thing that could ever happen. A wizard must be very careful to make sure he doesn’t cross the border.”

  “What’s the Finished World like?” asked Perry.

  Jackbones leaned close and said quickly, “It’s greedy. If it can snatch you it will.”

  “Don’t talk like that,” said Melwood. “You’ll frighten them.”

  “I’m frightened,” said Jackbones. “They should be.”

  “I’m not frightened,” said Cabbage.

  Jackbones stood up.

  “We’re never going to find what we want by looking through the books,” he said. “There are too many. We don’t know where to look. So I’m suggesting that we call up everyone from the Finished World who has written a book in here and we ask them. It’s the only way I can think of.”

  “It’s the quickest way,” said Melwood, “but not the only way. We can carry on as we were.”

  Jackbones made an impatient and ill-mannered noise of exasperation.

  “No,” said Flaxfield. “Not after what Perry has told us. Something from Slowin’s Yard has gone to Boolat, and there’s going to be trouble if we don’t stop it, and stop it soon. There’s no time to look through here any more. Jackbones is right.”

  “So we open up the Finished World?” she said. “Just like that? And see if we can stop it from grabbing us all? Is that it?”

  She was nearly shouting at him and she put her face close to his in defiance.

  “Yes,” he said. “Yes that’s what we do, Melwood. You know it is, don’t you?”

  He put his arm around her.

  “One hour,” she said. “We need to prepare ourselves. We’ll meet here again in one hour.”

  “There’s no need for Dorwin to stay,” said Jackbones.

  “Don’t you dare try to keep me out of it,” she snapped.

  “It will be dangerous enough for wizards,” he said.

  “Wizards!” she said the word as though it meant something nasty you trod in. “I’ve seen enough of the mess wizards can make. You’ll need someone ordinary to save the lot of you if it goes wrong.”

  “And a roffle,” said Perry.

  Dorwin hugged him.

  “And a roffle,” she agreed.

  “Who’s going to do this?” asked Melwood.

  “It’s my library. I’ll do it.”

  “Very well. One hour. We’ll meet back here.” |

  Frastfil had waited along the corridor

  from the library door. Now he pounced.

  “Flaxfield,” he said, smiling, he was always smiling. “I want a word with you.”

  “Who are you?” asked the wizard.

  Frastfil introduced himself, jingling coins in his pocket all the time and smiling till Flaxfield thought his cheeks would explode. Flaxfield did not smile much unless there was a reason and he didn’t like this constant smirk.

  “My third cousin, twice-removed was Cosmop,” he said. “I come from a great family of wizards.”

  “I knew Cosmop,” said Flaxfield. “He was a good man.”

  “I don’t think you did,” said Frastfil. “He lived a long time ago, and has been dead for a long time.”

  Flaxfield let it go. “What do you want?” he asked.

  “I want to help.”

  The coins jingled faster than ever and the smile grew more irritating.

  “We’re busy,” said Flaxfield. “See the principal next week.”

  He started to walk off. Frastfil jogged along just behind him, smiling and jingling.

  “No. I can help now. I know Boolat. My uncle was there. Court magician.”

  Flaxfield stopped, turned slowly and stared at him.

  “Have you been eavesdropping?”

  “No.”

  “How do you know we’re thinking about Boolat?”

  “I was in the garden,” he jingled. “I overheard.”

  “Did you tell them you were there? Did you walk away when they started talking? Or did you sneak around and listen in?”

  Frastfil backed away.

  “I couldn’t help hearing. My cousin was Cosmop. I know about Boolat. I teach here. I can help. I want to help. They were talking in loud voices. My uncle was a court wizard. Cosmop was my cousin.”

  Flaxfield waited for the drivel to run out.

  “I had a dog once,” he said. “Best dog I’ve ever known. Gentle, playful, strong. He was a fast runner. A baby was safe alone with him. A thief would do well not to break in if he was there.”

  Frastfil looked confused.

  “I haven’t got a dog,” he said.

  Flaxfield waved a hand to silence him.

  “When he died I always had one of his pups in his place. Good dogs, but not as good as he was. When the next one died I had a pup from his last litter and so on and so on. In his honour.”

  Frastfil tried to interrupt again. Flaxfield ignored him.

  “I knew they weren’t as good as he had been, but I kept to the
breed, out of loyalty. In the end, I could see that other people’s dogs were better than mine. I stayed with the breed until one day, Whiterime, the last of the line, showed me it was time to stop. He was clever enough, but sly, and cowardly. He followed wolves. I think he thought he was a wolf himself. But instead of running with them he ran after them. He scavenged what they had killed. He began to harry sheep and make them lose their lambs. He disgraced me and he disgraced his great ancestor.”

  “What did you do?”

  “What do you think?” said Flaxfield. “He was no use, and he was dangerous.”

  Frastfil jingled and smiled.

  “Now, go away,” said Flaxfield. “And don’t listen again or you’ll wish you hadn’t. This is too much for you. You’ll get hurt if you try to help.”

  Frastfil turned his face away.

  “Now, I’ve got things to do,” said Flaxfield, “before the work begins. Run off and think about what I said.”

  The children in the village liked Flaxfold. She let them steal apples from her orchard and even left some on the trees for them, without saying they were theirs. She gave them drinks at the kitchen door in the summer when it was hot, and she let them make snow-memmonts in the garden in the winter if they cleared her path of snow first. Then she let them sit by the huge fire in the kitchen and eat toast and jam while they held their hands in front of the hot coals to get the feeling back into their fingers.

  So they were shocked when she took them to one side and told them off in a quiet, level voice that made them more ashamed than any amount of shouting would do.

  Wilfmore tried to argue and soon gave it up.

  “She’s like a monster,” he said. “Her face is all…”

  Flaxfold lifted one finger and he was silent.

  “By the time you are forty,” she said. “If I let you live that long, you will have the face you deserve. Do you understand?”

  “No.”

  “No. You don’t. If you keep making fun of people because of the way they look, or shouting at them, or being cruel behind their backs, you’ll get the ugliest face there is.”

  “Sorry,” he muttered.

  The others mumbled their apologies.

  “Bee isn’t ugly,” said Flaxfold. “She isn’t a monster. She’s had an accident. Do you understand?”