The Merlin Conspiracy (Magids 2)

“It was a Prayermaster from Loggia City and his two boys,” I said. “They wanted to kill Romanov, and they used me—”

“Then that explains it,” he interrupted. “We Magids have been trying to keep the Prayermasters in line for centuries now.”

“You’re a Magid?” I asked. I was delighted. I’d met three Magids in my life, and now here was another one.

“For my sins,” he said, dismissing the whole thing. He rubbed at his little mustache and frowned at his coffee in a tired way. “What’s Romanov been doing to stir them up? I wish he wouldn’t do this—keep stirring people up. Not that I can stop him, of course. Far more powerful magic than any of mine. All I’ve got is moral pull. Better use that, I suppose. Lad, you wouldn’t have anything to eat, would you? My stomach’s just reported in starving.”

I looked at the basket on the table. “Eggs?”

He shuddered violently. “Not eggs, not after two hundred quids’ worth of booze! I couldn’t! Anything else?”

“Well,” I said, “the goat’s just eaten the bread, but …” On the off chance I reached back and opened the oven where I’d found the loaf. And there was another one in there, to my great relief. Magic at its best. “Here’s another loaf,” I said.

I found him a big hunk of cheese in a cupboard and brought the butter out of its bowl and put them in front of him. He eyed it all a moment, speculatively, rather like the goat had wondered about the armchair, and then he suddenly snatched the loaf and a knife and ate. And ate. And finished the loaf. Neither of us talked until he’d done.

By this time he looked a lot better. I found him staring at me rather piercingly. He had eyes that looked at you so firmly that you couldn’t remember what color they were, just how they looked at you. All I knew was that his were red-rimmed.

“Now,” he said. “You, lad. Has Romanov taken on an apprentice at long last?”

“No,” I said. “Or … well, I was hoping he’d take me on, but … I didn’t know how to get home, you see, but when I got here, Romanov was ill, so I couldn’t ask him anything.”

“Ah!” he said. He raised a finger at me triumphantly. “Got it! Placed you. You’re the lad I gave the magelight to. Did it help at all?”

“It was great,” I said, “but I couldn’t get it back again after I sent it away.”

I got the piercing look again. “You from Earth, by any chance?”

I nodded.

“Thought so,” he said. “Earth people always have trouble raising magelight. Something in the climate, I suppose. Mind telling me your name?”

“Nick Mallory,” I said. “But I’m not really from Earth—”

“Yes, but according to your dad, you were born there,” he said. “Your mother was pregnant with you when he married her, he tells me.” And while I stared at him, he added, “He told me all about you while I was getting drunk enough to go after you. Cost him two hundred pounds, I’m afraid. But he didn’t mention you were so large and striking-looking. Accounts for me not recognizing you before. Expecting someone smaller. Well, at least this means I don’t have to pay Romanov to find you.” He stood up and held out his hand in an old-fashioned, courteous way. “Pleased to meet you, Nick. My name’s Hyde, Maxwell Hyde.”

“Oh,” I said. “Er. How do you do.” I was gobsmacked.

THREE

When I got my senses back, I wanted to ask Maxwell Hyde a hundred things. But he was so tired he was swaying about.

“Later,” he said. “I have to sleep, lad. Just a couple of hours and I shall be right as rain. I don’t need much. Just a couple of hours.”

So I took him along to the living room. I’d forgotten the goat. It had eaten half an armchair, and it looked up at us cheekily with a strip of carpet dangling out of its mouth. “Damn,” I said.

Maxwell Hyde said, “I’m not having that in here!” and he took hold of the goat by one of its horns and its backside and ran it into the kitchen. There was a good deal of clattering and bleating in there, but he got the front door open somehow and kicked it outside. I was impressed.

Meanwhile I was dragging together the two armchairs and a stool to make him a bed. I draped a carpet over it all to hide the part the goat had eaten, and it made quite a respectable place to sleep.

“Thanks, lad,” Maxwell Hyde said, coming back, wiping goat hairs off himself. “I’ll be with you again for lunch. Tell Romanov I’ll talk to him then, if you would.” He climbed into my contraption and, as far as I could see, went to sleep on the spot. He was snoring when I shut the door.

I went along to Romanov then, but I couldn’t tell him anything. He seemed to be unconscious. His face was ash-colored and covered with little clusters of sweat. The illness smell in the room was stronger than ever. I tried to open the window for him, but I’d shut it too firmly and I couldn’t budge it. So I went away. I didn’t know what else to do.

Lunch, I thought, and went to the kitchen. There were eggs, of course, but Maxwell Hyde hadn’t seemed to fancy those and he’d eaten all the cheese. I hunted around, and I couldn’t find any pasta, which is the other thing I know how to cook, and I got rather anxious. I wanted to do things right for Maxwell Hyde. Dad thought so much of him. I thought a lot of him, too, because he was a Magid and helped secretly run the universe, and I could tell he was the sort of person who expected proper meals to turn up regularly whatever else was going on.

And I was even more anxious about Romanov, in a horrible, nagging way. I was sure he ought to be in hospital. But there was no way to get him to one. And then I was almost equally anxious about that Prayermaster. I kept expecting him to turn up again. I was sure he had flown away just to tempt me outside so that he could knock me out with a well-aimed prayer and then go after Romanov.

I made more coffee and sat at the kitchen table drinking it and staring at the chinking, glowing fire in the range. It was odd. The fire never seemed to need fuel, and it never occurred to me to look for any. It glowed comfortingly orange and black and red between the bars, and it helped me think somehow.