Jonathan Stroud - Bartimaeus 1 (45 page)

He looked the old magician directly in the eye. "Does Simon Lovelace
really

think I will join him?"

"He does."

"After everything that has happened?"

"Even so. He knows how your mind works."

"Then Simon Lovelace is a fool."

"John—"

"An arrogant fool!"

"You must—"

"After what he has done to me? He could offer up the world and I'd refuse it. Join him? I would rather die!"

Schyler nodded, as if satisfied. "Yes. I know. That is what I told him you'd say. I perceived you as you are—a silly, muddled child. Tcha! You have not been brought up

correctly; your mind is fogged. You are of no use to us."

He took a step forward. His shoes squeaked on the shiny floor.

"Well, aren't you going to run, little boy? Your djinni is gone. You have no other power. Would you not like a head start?"

Nathaniel did not run. He knew it would be fatal. He flicked a look at the other

tables, but couldn't see clearly what objects they displayed; his enemy blocked the way to them.

"Do you know," the old man said, "I was impressed the first time we met—so young, so full of knowledge. I thought Simon was very harsh on you; even the affair with the mites was amusing and displayed an enterprising nature. Ordinarily I would kill you slowly—that would amuse me further. But we have important business in a few moments

and I cannot spare the time."

The magician raised a hand and spoke a word. A shining black nimbus appeared,

glimmering and fluctuating around his fingers.

Nathaniel threw himself to one side.

39

Bartimaeus

I hoped the boy could keep out of trouble long enough for me to reach him.

Getting in was taking longer than I thought.

Up and down the wall the lizard scuttled; round cornices, over arches, across

pilasters, its progress ever more speedy and erratic. Each window it came to—and there were plenty of them in the mansion—was firmly shut, causing it to flick its tongue in

frustration. Hadn't Lovelace and Co.

ever heard of the benefits of fresh air?

Many minutes went by. Still no luck. Truth was, I was loath to break in, except as

a last resort.

It was impossible to tell whether the rooms beyond had watchers who might

respond to the slightest untoward noise. If I could only find a crack, a cranny to sneak through.... But the place was too well sealed.

There was nothing for it: I would have to try a chimney.

With this in mind I headed roofward, only to have my attention caught by a very

tall and ornate set of windows a little way off on a projecting wing of the house. They suggested a sizeable room beyond. Not only that, but a powerful network of magical bars crisscrossed the windows on the seventh plane. None of the Hall's other windows had

such defenses. My curiosity was piqued.

The lizard sped across to take a look, scales scuffling on the stones. It gripped a

column and poked its head toward the window, being careful to keep well back from the

glowing bars. What it saw inside was interesting, all right. The windows looked onto a vast circular hall or auditorium, brightly lit by a dozen chandeliers suspended from the ceiling. At the center was a small raised podium draped with red cloth, around which a hundred chairs had been arranged in a neat semicircle. A speaker's stand stood on the

podium, complete with glass and jug of water. Evidently this was the venue for the

conference.

Everything about the auditorium's decor—from the crystal chandeliers to the rich

gold trimmings on the walls—was designed to appeal to the magicians' (vulgar) sense of wealth and status. But the really extraordinary thing about the room was the floor, which seemed to be entirely made of glass.

From wall to wall it glinted and gleamed, refracting the light of the chandeliers in

a dozen unusual tints and shades. If this wasn't unusual enough, beneath the glass

stretched an immense and very beautiful carpet. It was Persian made, displaying—amid a wealth of dragons, chimeras, manticores, and birds—a fantastically detailed hunting

scene. A life-size prince and his court rode into a forest, surrounded by dogs, leopards, kestrels, and other trained beasts; ahead of them, among the bushes, a host of fleet-footed deer skipped away. Horns blew, pennants waved. It was an idealized Eastern fairy-tale

court and I would have been quite impressed, had I not glanced at a couple of the faces of the courtiers. That rather spoiled the effect. One of them sported Lovelace's horrid mug; another looked like Sholto Pinn. Elsewhere, I spied my erstwhile captor, Jessica

Whitwell, riding a white mare. Trust Lovelace to spoil a perfectly good work of art with such an ingratiating fancy.[1] No doubt the prince was Devereaux, the Prime Minister,

and every important magician was pictured among his fawning throng.

[1] How the weavers of Basra must have loathed being commissioned to create

such a monstrosity. Gone are the days when, with complex and cruel incantations, they

wove djinn into the fabric of their carpets, creating artifacts that carried their masters across the Middle East
and
were stain-resistant at the same time. Hundreds of us were trapped this way. But now, with the magical power of Baghdad long broken, such

craftsmen escape destitution only by weaving tourist tat for rich foreign clients. Such is progress.

This curious floor was not the only odd thing about the circular hall. All the other

windows that looked onto it had shimmering defenses similar to the one through which I spied. Reasonable enough: soon most of the Government would be inside—the room had

to be safe from attack. But hidden in the stonework of my window frame were things that looked like embedded metal rods, and their purpose was not at all clear.

I was just pondering this when a door at the far end of the auditorium opened and

a magician walked swiftly in. It was the oily man I had seen passing in the car: Lime, the boy had called him, one of Lovelace's confederates. He carried an object in his hand,

shrouded under a cloth. With hasty steps and eyes flicking nervously back and forth, he crossed to the podium, mounted it and approached the speaker's stand. There was a shelf inside the stand, hidden from the floor below, and the man placed the object inside it.

Before he did so, he removed the cloth and a shiver ran down my scales.

It was the summoning horn I'd seen in Lovelace's study on the night I stole the

Amulet of Samarkand. The ivory was yellow with age and had been reinforced with

slender metal bands, but the blackened fingerprints on its side[2] were still quite visible.

[2] The only remains of the first person to blow the horn, it being an essential

requirement of such items that their first user must surrender himself to the mercy of the entity he summons. With this notable design flaw, summoning horns are pretty rare, as

you'd imagine.

A summoning horn...

I began to see daylight. The magical bars at the windows, the metal ones

embedded in the stonework, ready to spring shut. The auditorium's defenses weren't to

keep anything
out
—they were to keep everyone
in.

It was definitely time I got inside.

With scant regard for any overflying sentries, I scampered up the wall and over

the red-tiled roof of the mansion to the nearest chimney. I darted to the rim of the pot and was about to duck inside, when I drew back, all of a quiver. A net of sparkling threads was suspended below me across the hole. Blocked.

I ran to the next. Same again.

In considerable agitation, I crossed and recrossed the roof of Heddleham Hall,

checking every chimney. Each one was sealed. More than one magician had gone to great

lengths to protect the place from spies.

I halted at last, wondering what to do.

All this time, at the front of the house below, a steady stream of chauffeured

cars[3] had drawn up, disgorged their occupants and headed off to a parking lot at the side. Most of the guests were here now; the conference was about to begin.

[3] In a perfect example of most magicians' dreary style, each and every vehicle

was big, black, and shiny.

Even the smallest looked as if it wanted to be a hearse when it grew up.

I looked across the lawns. A few late arrivals were speeding toward the house.

And they weren't the only ones.

In the middle of the lawn was a lake adorned with an ornamental fountain,

depicting an amorous Greek god trying to kiss a dolphin.[4] Beyond the lake, the drive curled into the trees toward the entrance gateway. And along it three figures came

striding, two going fast, the third faster. For a man who had recently been knocked about by a field mouse, Mr. Squalls was racing along at a fair pace.

Son was doing even better: presumably his lack of clothes encouraged him on his

way (at this distance he looked like one big goosebump.) But neither of them matched the pace of the bearded mercenary, whose cloak swirled out behind him as he strode off the drive onto the lawn.

[4] Inadvisable.

Ah. This might spell trouble.

I perched on the lip of the chimney pot, cursing my restraint with Squalls and

Son[5] and debating whether I could ignore the distant trio. But another look decided me.

The bearded man was coming along faster than ever. Strange—his paces seemed ordinary

ones, but they ate up the ground at blinding speed. He had almost halved the distance to the lake already. In another minute he would be at the house, ready to raise the alarm.

[5] I'd thought my blows would keep them unconscious for at least a couple of

days. But I'd fluffed it. That's what comes of hurrying a job.

Getting into the house would have to wait. There wasn't time to be discreet. I

became a blackbird and flew purposefully from the mansion roof.

The man in black strode nearer. I noted a flicker in the air about his legs, an odd

discrepancy, as if their movement was not properly contained within any of the planes.

Then I understood: he wore seven-league boots.[6] After a few more paces, his trajectory would be too swift to follow—he might travel a mile with each step. I speeded up my

flight.

[6] Potent magical devices, invented in medieval Europe. At the wearers

command, the boots can cover considerable distances in the smallest of strides. Normal (Earth) rules of time and space do not apply. Allegedly, each boot contains a djinni

capable of traveling on a hypothetical
eighth
plane (not that I would know anything about that). It was now easier to understand how the mercenary had managed to evade capture

when he first stole the Amulet for Lovelace.

The lakeside was a pretty spot (if you didn't count the statue of the disreputable

old god and the dolphin). A young gardener was weeding the margins of the shore. A few innocent ducks floated dreamily on the surface of the water. Bulrushes waved in the

breeze. Someone had planted a small bower of honeysuckle by the lake: its leaves shone a pleasant, peaceful green in the afternoon sun.

That was just for the record. My first Detonation missed the mercenary (it being

difficult to judge the speed of someone wearing seven-league boots), but hit the bower, which vaporized instantly. The gardener yelped and jumped into the lake, carrying the

ducks off on a small tidal wave. The bulrushes caught fire. The mercenary looked up. He hadn't noticed me before, probably being intent on keeping his boots under control, so it wasn't strictly sporting, but hey—I was late for a conference. My second Detonation

caught him directly in the chest. He disappeared in a mass of emerald flames.

Why can't all problems be as easy to resolve?

I did a quick circuit, eyeing the horizon, but there were no watchers and nothing

dangerous in sight, unless you count the underwear of Squalls's son as he and his dad

turned tail and raced for the park gateway. Fine. I was just about to head off back to the house, when the smoke from my Detonation cleared away, revealing the mercenary

sitting in a muddy depression three feet deep, mucky, blinking, but very much alive.

Hmm. That was something I
hadn't
counted on.

I screeched to a halt in midair, turned, and delivered another, more concentrated

blast. It was the kind that would have made even Jabor's knees tremble a bit; certainly it should have turned most humans into a wisp of smoke blowing in the wind.

But not Beardy. As the flames died down again, he was just getting to his feet, as

casual as you like! He looked as if he'd been having a catnap. Admittedly, much of his cloak had burned away, but the body beneath was still hale and hearty.

I didn't bother trying again. I can take a hint.

The man reached inside his cloak and from a hidden pocket withdrew a silver

disc. With unexpected speed he reached back and threw—it missed my beak by a

feather's breadth and returned spinning to his hand in a lazy arc.

That did it. I'd gone through a lot in the last few days. Everyone I met seemed to

want a piece of me: djinn, magicians, humans... it made no difference. I'd been

summoned, manhandled, shot at, captured, constricted, bossed about, and generally taken for granted. And now, to cap it all, this bloke was joining in too, when all I'd been doing was quietly trying to kill him.

I lost my temper.

The angriest blackbird you've ever seen made a dive for the statue in the middle

of the lake. It landed at the base of the dolphin's tail, stretched its wings around the stone and, as it heaved, took a gargoyle's form once more. Dolphin and god[7] were ripped

from their foundations. With a brittle cracking and the rasp of ripping lead, the statue came away. A jet of water spurted from the ruptured pipes inside. The gargoyle raised the statue above its head, gave a bound, and landed on the lakeside bank, not far from where the mercenary was standing.