He was gone for about half an hour. He came back looking displeased and rather puzzled, saying, “Well, I don’t know. Daniel seems to be in a meeting about it. They couldn’t contact him, and I had to get on to the Chancellor’s office instead. Some fool of a clerk who didn’t really know anything. She seemed to think that it wasn’t really a dispute, just some idiot suggestion from that stupid cow Sybil. Those are my adjectives, by the way; the young lady gave me official-speak and gave almost nothing away, if she even knew, which I doubt. All she really knew was that the King has nothing to do with it, whatever it is. Storm in a teacup, by the sound of it. Get the board game out, Toby.”

So they went on to the next bit of their routine, which was this game the two of them played every night. It was really passionate. They sat facing each other over a small table with the board and pieces on it, as tense as people could be, and if you couldn’t tell by their faces how tense they were, you could tell by the number of transparent creatures who came crowding around them. Both of them were ready to kill to win.

They’d offered to teach me this game, but I couldn’t understand the rules of it any more than I could understand hurley. I watched them a bit, out of politeness, but all it did for me was make me homesick for my computer games. My computer wouldn’t work in Blest anyway. They use quite a different system. I went back to my book.

I’d read about a chapter, and Maxwell Hyde had moved on from low moaning, because Toby seemed to be winning, to his usual unfair attempt to persuade Toby to be kind to his poor old decrepit grandfather, when Dora came back.

Dora sailed into the main room with her eyes wide and dreamy and a silly smile on her face. But such a blast of terror and pain came in with her that all three of our heads whipped round. She was carrying some kind of creature by its tail.

All I saw of it was a mistiness and a blur because Maxwell Hyde jumped up and slapped the thing out of her hand. The table went over with a crash, and the creature bolted under the big cupboard. “Dora!” he said.

She gave him a bewildered look. “It was only a salamander, Daddy.”

“Whatever it is, it’s a sentient creature!” Maxwell Hyde told her angrily. “You’ve no business carrying it around like that!”

“But we’ve all got one in the circle!” Dora protested. “They’re to enhance our magic.”

“Are they now?” he said, and he took her by one rattling black sleeve and led her to his chair by the table, which Toby had just put upright. “Sit there,” he said, “and write me out the names and addresses of all the people in this magic circle of yours.” A piece of paper appeared in front of Dora. Maxwell Hyde unclipped the pen from his top pocket and pushed it into her hand. “Write,” he said.

“But why?” Dora looked up from under her hat at him. She really did not seem to understand.

He barked at her, “Just do it! Now!” and rattled the paper angrily under her nose.

She went white and began writing. Meanwhile Toby, who had been collecting dropped game pieces, picked up one that had rolled near the cupboard and asked, “Shall I try to tempt the salamander out?”

“No. Leave it,” Maxwell Hyde said curtly. “Poor thing’s mad with terror anyway. Nick, go to the cupboard under the stairs and fetch out any baskets you can find with lids to them.”

“But won’t it set fire to the house?” Toby asked as I was opening the door.

“I’ll surround it in a field of water. Keep writing, Dora. Get on, Nick,” Maxwell Hyde said. “This is urgent.”

THREE

I found a lunch basket, a smelly fishing creel, and a fancy thing with raffia flowers on it. “Will these do?” I asked.

Maxwell Hyde was leaning over Dora, counting names and addresses. “Perfect,” he said, not looking at me or the baskets. “This is only eleven, Dora. And you make twelve. There has to be thirteen of you, hasn’t there? Who’s your head wallah?”

“Oh, I forgot Mrs. Blantyre,” Dora said, and wrote again.

Maxwell Hyde more or less snatched the paper from under the pen. “Come on, boys,” he said. “Follow me. Bring the baskets.” He marched out of the house into the warm, dark blue evening and slammed the front door behind us. “Luckily,” he remarked as he strode down the street with us hurrying after him, “all these silly people live within walking distance. I think we’ll start with Mrs. Blantyre. Evil old biddy.”

I gave Toby the fishing creel to carry. “What are we doing?” I asked Maxwell Hyde.

“Rescuing salamanders, of course,” he said. “Before they set half London on fire. Before anyone gets a chance to torture them. Two things you should both know,” he went on, swinging round the corner in the direction of the Thames. “One, salamanders are not native to this country. Most of them come from Morocco or the Sahara. So it follows that someone has deliberately imported these. Probably in appalling conditions. And two, salamanders, if hurt or frightened enough, give off an extremely strong discharge of magic. If the witch tormenting them is like Dora’s lot—an idiot—then the magic almost instantly becomes a violent burst of fire. Do you see now why we’re in such a hurry?”

We did. We half ran behind him, baskets bumping, down that street and the next, until we came to a nice little house in a quiet mews. Maxwell Hyde hammered with its little brass knocker. The door was opened, after quite a while, by an old lady with loopy hair, who peered at us sweetly over little half-moon glasses.

“Evening, Mrs. Blantyre,” Maxwell Hyde said. “I’ve come for your salamanders, please.”

Mrs. Blantyre blinked, very, very sweetly. “What salamanders, dear?”

“I haven’t got time for this,” Maxwell Hyde said. And he raised Magid power. He looked just the same, but he suddenly became quite awesome. He stood there as strong as a great mountain or a huge natural disaster. I looked on with interest. It was more or less what I used to do when I was small and older kids tried to bully me. “I’ll have your salamanders,” he said. “Now.”

She took one look and trotted away into her house. She came back again a few seconds later holding a tiny cage that exuded dim light and blasts of panic and horror. “Here, dear. I can’t think why—”

Maxwell Hyde took the cage and tipped the three terrified, misty occupants into the fishing creel. “Tell them they’re safe now, Toby. Make it strong. Where did you get these, Mrs. Blantyre?”

“I can’t think why—” Mrs. Blantyre said again.

Tags: Diana Wynne Jones Magids Fantasy
Source: readsnovelonline.net