Bumblestook: Book 1, The Accidental Wizard (24 page)

Thick veins throbbed at the prisoner’s temples, drops of perspiration broke out on his forehead and the muscles of his neck stood out visibly. He clenched his jaw and tried, in vain, to break eye contact with the Wizard.

“No doubt you fear that by cooperating with us, word will get back to him and you will lose Mira forever! But we know of the Dark Wizard’s shadows and have shielded all of our strongholds against them. So! It is time to drop this pretense!” Impy shook his finger at the prisoner and his voice rose, ringing with fervor and conviction. “You can’t fool me, Kondor Dal! You despise Malador and his minions as much as we do. I can see into the very depths of your soul and it is not as dark as you would have us believe it to be!”

Abruptly, he turned and walked away, cutting the connection. Standing off to the side, he leaned heavily on his cane, eyes closed, breathing deeply through his nose; looking very old and very tired, as his colleagues exchanged concerned looks behind his back.

Kondor reeled, staggering when the powerful connection was severed. He shook his head to clear it and steadied himself against the glass walls.

“What in blue blazes was
that
?” he shouted angrily after the mage. “Some kind of mind reading trick? So much for your
promise of free will!”

Imperious opened his eyes, nodding to himself as he came to a decision. He turned about slowly, to face the prisoner.

“Fear not, my good fellow. I did not violate your thoughts, although I
do
possess the ability to do so. I merely used the power of Empathy to assess your intentions. Fortunately for us all, I found them to be good.” The High Mage turned wearily to Bartholeumous and gave a tired wave of his hand. “Release him.”

Bartholeumous started. “With all due respect, Imperious, do you really think that wise?”

“Do you doubt my powers, old friend?” Impy asked, a twinkle re-appearing in his tired eyes. “Tis true, this old body
is
getting a bit rusty. It
does
have a lot of miles on it and yes, I admit, the tires are going bald—but my engine is still running and my closest friends will tell you that I’m positively
full
of gas!”

Bartholeumous chuckled, despite himself. Shaking his head, he crossed over to the prison, then thumped one of the walls with his fist.

“Pillars of light! Walls of glass! Permission granted! Let the prisoner pass!”

The pillars of light dimmed and the glass walls became laced with fine, spider-web cracks from top to bottom. Then, they shattered outwards, in a shower of tiny, sparkling particles; disappearing before they hit the ground.

Kondor stood inside the circle of pillars, looking about warily.

“Come, come,” Impy said in a querulous, old-man voice. “It’s not a trick! We don’t have time to waste. We’ve got to figure out how to save your wife
and
those silly Humans from that madman!

“I’m
really
sorry, Mrs. Faire. I musta tripped on the rug again,” Farley apologized (for the umpteenth time).

“That’s alright, Farley. It’s not important,” Olivia reassured him through a tight smile. “Why don’t you go outside for awhile, while I clean this up.” She shooed him out the back door, just as her husband sauntered into the kitchen, peering at the back of the tube of Super-Duper Glue.

“Look here, Livie! See what it says, here, in fine print? It’s
so
fine I completely missed it the first time I read the directions.” He looked up, to see his wife standing over the shards of a broken plate, looking somewhat less than patient.

“This is the fourth plate today, and it’s only 1:00! Thank goodness I had the foresight to put away the
good
china.”

Lance held up the glue triumphantly. “Your problems have been solved, madam! Read this!” He thrust the tube under Olivia’s nose (which succeeded in causing her eyes to cross, but did nothing to improve her disposition).

She stepped back and waved it away, crossly. “We can’t just go around super-duper-gluing everything in the house!”

“Actually, that’s
exactly
what we need to do! It says so right here,” Lance said excitedly, squinting at the Lilliputian print. “
Put one drop of glue on anything that you do not wish broken. A seal
will form instantly, protecting the item from chipping, splintering, cracking, shattering or breaking. CAUTION: Be very careful not to glue your fingers to each other or the object. Removal may be difficult and painful. WARNING: We cannot be held responsible for misuse of

this product.
See?”

Olivia crossed her arms and thought about it for a moment. “H-m-m-m, that
is
good,” she said grudgingly.

Lance smiled smugly. “Told-ja. Might even turn out to be better than that old lump of dried-up tree sap Bartholeumous gave
you
!”

Olivia rolled her eyes, then joined her husband at the kitchen table. Putting their heads together, they came up with a plan to Bumblestook-proof their entire home.

***********************************

Farley had joined Fiona, outside on the swing set.

“Broke another plate,” he said glumly as he sat on the swing next to hers.

“My dad will fix it.”

“We used paper and plastic at my house,” Farley said wistfully, involuntarily glancing in the direction of his home.

“We’ll probably be switching to those here, too.” Fiona said.

“And we don’t have any of those slippery rugs at my house, either.”

“I heard my mom tell my dad, he might as well roll up every rug in the house and throw them in the attic.”

“Yeah, well, I wish I could sleep in my own bed. The guest bed here is up too high. I just know I’m gonna fall out.”

“You can use my sleeping bag and sleep on the floor.”

Farley groaned. “It’s not really the plates, or the rugs, or the bed, or any of that stuff. I just wanna go home and be with my
own
mom and dad.”

Fiona hopped off of the swing and planted herself in front of her friend. “I promise you, everything’s gonna be okay. You’ll see,” she insisted.

“How can you say that? The police don’t even have a clue.”

Fiona’s eyes flashed. “I don’t care what the police say! If
I
say everything is going to be okay—then it
will
! Have I ever been wrong before?”

“No-o-o, but—”

“No buts!” Fiona shouted, clenching her fists and stomping her foot angrily.

Farley’s eyes widened and his mouth popped open, at the sight of his even-tempered friend throwing a tantrum! Suddenly, he burst into giggles and fell out of the swing, rolling about on the ground in a fit of glee.

“No
butts
! You s-said no b-
butts
!” he managed to squeal between giggles.

Fiona’s fury faded fast. She even allowed a tiny smile to surface. She sank to the grass, sitting Indian-style, chin in hand, patiently waiting for Farley to recover. Finally he sat up and eyed her curiously.

“You know what? You’re right. You’re never wrong! How d’ya do it?”

“I don’t know. Just talented, I guess. Like the way you can talk to rocks.
Or
— ”Fiona leaned forward, eyes glittering, “ —the way you pulverized those stupid bullies at school, without even getting a scratch!”

“Hey, that’s not fair! I never meant to hurt those guys—you know that.”

“Right! I
do
know that—because I’m
never
wrong,” Fiona said smugly, crossing her arms.

Farley fell silent for a few moments, as he absent-mindedly plucked leaves of grass.

“Fiona, does it ever seem to you like there’s something—I dunno—really,
really
different about us?”

Fiona regarded him steadily and nodded. “My parents say that
someday
, when I’m
older
, I’ll understand why I’m so different from the other kids.” She tossed her head with a disdainful sniff. “They think I’m too young to understand.”

Farley grimaced. “My mom likes to say
everybody’s
different. She also says I’m ‘special’.” He grinned. “That’s not exactly a
good
thing, you know.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Anyway, I’ve been thinking about it and I think I got it figured out.”

“What?”

Farley looked about mysteriously and leaned in close. “You and me, we have
Super Powers
!”

“What, you mean like Spiderman?’ Fiona said, raising one, perfectly arched eyebrow.

“Well, yeah! Listen, I know it sounds crazy, but think about it. First, there’s the way we always know each other’s feelings. I use-ta think all best friends did that, but they don’t. And
no
one, not even Olympic-gold-medal guys, are as good as you at gymnastics. And the way you know how something’s gonna turn out before it even happens—that’s just freaky!

And what about me?
Nobody
can hear the rocks, like me. And how come I never really get hurt, even though I have more accidents than anybody I know? Or even if I do get a little scratch, it disappears right in front of my eyes. How d’ya explain
that
?”

“And don’t forget your Super Bully-Crushing Power.” Fiona’s eyes gleamed wickedly. “First, the bad guys are mysteriously drawn to you. Then, when you’ve got them just where you want them, you
crush
them without even lifting a finger!”

“I told you—those were just accidents!”

Fiona shrugged a single shoulder and tossed her head. “They only got what they deserved.”

“Well, anyway it all points to just one thing. We have Super Powers and
that’s
what makes us different!” Farley folded his arms with finality, having soundly presented his argument.

Fiona thought about it,
hard
, allowing her smoothly perfect forehead to crease ever-so-slightly.

“It does make sense,” she mused. “Maybe our moms and dads don’t want us to know, because they think we’re too young to handle our powers.”

“Parents!”
they said simultaneously, eyes rolling comically.

“So-o-o, what are we gonna do about it?” Farley asked.

“I am
not
wearing a costume,” Fiona said.

“Well, it just seems to me, if someone has Super Powers, then they ought to do something with ‘em, like fight crime—that sort of thing.”

“H-m-m-m, possibly.”

Suddenly, Farley’s jaw dropped. He smacked himself in the forehead and fell over backwards. He looked up to see Fiona, leaning over him.

“Now what?” she asked.

“I know what we’re supposed to do! I can’t believe I didn’t think of it before.”

“Oka-a-ay, what is it?”

Farley sat up. “We’re supposed to use our powers to solve crimes, right?”

“Perhaps.”

“We don’t have to go
looking
for crimes. We’ve got one right here in our own back yard. We can use our Super Powers to save my mom and dad!”

****************************************

Tom and Olivia were busy super-duper-gluing everything in the house. Olivia stood with a pad of paper and pen, calling off items on a list. Lance held the precious tube of glue, applying one tiny drop to each item with a toothpick.

“Front room—windows?”

“Check.” Lance replied.

“Umbrella stand?”

“Check.”

“Umbrellas?”

“Check, check, check.”

“Mantle clock?”

“O-o-o, missed it!”

They heard the back door open and close, as the children came into the house.

“Kids? Is that you?” Olivia called out. “We’re in here!”

Fiona peeked in at them. “Just going to my room, mom.”

“Farley with you?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Try to keep him out of the den, will you? Your father and I are doing some repairs in there.”

“Sure, mom.”

***********************************

Farley and Fiona sped down the hallway and into her room, shutting the door behind them. They sat down on her pink, elephant throw rug. Fiona unzipped the zipper in the back of the elephant’s pillowy head. Reaching in, she pulled out a spiral notebook and a pen.

“The first thing we should do is make a list,” she said. “My mom always makes a list whenever she has something important to do.”

“Okay,” said Farley. “What kinda list?”

“Well, first we make a list of things to do, then a list of places to go, then a list of things we need.”

“Sounds like we need to make a list of
lists
first,” Farley complained.

“This is serious, Farley.”

“I
know
! I just wanna get on with finding my parents. They’ve been missing since this morning!”

“We can’t just rush right out and save them. We have to be prepared,” Fiona said reasonably.

“Alright,” Farley said reluctantly. “I think we should start by talking with Big Grey. He

mighta noticed something.”

Fiona wrote:
1. Talk with Big Grey.

“Then I think we should try to get a-hold of your uncle. Does he have, like, a secret agent cell phone we could use to call him?”

“No-o-o-o, but—” Fiona reached into the elephant’s head and pulled out the sparkling tear-drop crystal. “He gave me this and said if I ever really needed him, all I had to do was look into it and think of him.”

Farley whistled in appreciation. “That definitely goes on the list.”

Fiona wrote:
2. Talk to Uncle B.

“Then what?” she asked.

“Then we use our Super Powers to track down my mom and dad!”

“But, we don’t have Super Tracking Powers.”

“Oh, yeah,” said Farley. “Wait, I know! We’ll take Yap. He can sniff ‘em out. All we need is something that belongs to my parents—we can get it from my house. He sniffs it, and off we go!”

Fiona nodded and wrote:
3. Get Yap to sniff and follow.

Farley looked at what she had written so far. “Hey, this is really working! Just one more thing—find my mom and dad and bring ‘em home!”

Fiona added:
4. Save the Bumblestooks.

“That does it!” she said, writing the last word with a flourish. “Now the list of where to go. Well, obviously we have to go to your front yard to talk to Big Grey, then to your house to get something that belongs to your parents, and then wherever Yap takes us.” She scribbled furiously.