Read The Spellbinder (Tom & Laura Series) Online
Authors: John Booth
“General Lee waited a whole three hours so as anythin’ he’d witched would be undone. Then we fired our artillery at your positions.”
The Captain’s voice rose higher. “Three thousand cannon and every one of them exploded. Shrapnel tore into our infantry, cutting down four or five for every cannon that fired.”
The Captain’s eyes glazed as he stared out across the room seeing the past. “My brothers Caleb and Joe were torn to shreds.” His voice went low again and
Cam
saw flames in his eyes.
“And the Limey soldiers laughed and clapped each other on the back. Well, General Lee was blazing with justified anger and ordered us to raise our rifles and shoot the bastards. We lined up, to do it proper, as a volley. Our scouts flashed a signal that their Spellbinder was standing, hands on hips, not even lookin’ in our direction. I was in the line to fire, but my hands were slick with sweat and my rifle slipped from my hands. As I bent to pick it up everybody else fired.”
“Every single rifle in those lines exploded.” The room had gone even quieter. The Captain paused and smiled again.
“Nearly thirty thousand dead in the time it takes to pull a trigger. That field ran red with our precious blood, no green grass no more, it was all bright red. Far as the eye could see there were dead soldiers. Five thousand or more of ‘em still alive, screaming in agony. Half of those died afore the day was out.”
The Captain took off his cap and placed it over his heart. “Brave men, every last one of them. Killed by one lousy Limey Spellbinder.” The Captain put his cap back on and smiled at the assembled host.
“Best go back to your rooms now,” he said mildly and waved them out of the room.
Tom poked his head out of their small cave and saw that the flat rock was now visible above the waves. It looked particularly treacherous as it was coated in green slime and seaweed. As he watched a large wave swamped it in white foam.
“We should wait a little longer before we risk it.”
“I could happily wait a day or two.”
Tom nodded as he knew exactly how Laura felt. They didn’t know if they were going to find one American or a hundred when they entered the cave. According to Fred, there were more than a dozen soldiers in Hobsgate, so the hope was that there would only be a few of them down in the harbor. The plan seemed insane to Tom and he had helped to devise it. But if it worked they would free the smugglers, capture the enemy’s vessel and take possession of the harbor.
They had decided to use Laura’s binds to overpower the soldiers. They knew they had no chance in a fair fight, so it had to be as unfair as they could make it. That required them to get into the cave and look around as Laura needed to see what she was doing.
Tom looked out of the cave entrance again and the sea was noticeably lower. Parts of the rock looked dry, though there were puddles of water all over it despite it being relatively flat. It looked very slippery.
The last few steps down to the rock proved difficult enough. They held onto the rope and would have fallen without it. Finally they stood at the bottom of the steps and contemplated the journey across the rock to another short flight of steps that was visible at the other side.
“I’ll go first,” Tom suggested.
Laura disagreed.
“Better we go together. Then we can hold onto each other and stop ourselves falling.”
“Or we both fall together.”
Laura grinned. Part of her concern was that Tom would make it across without falling and then she would look foolish when she did.
Tom went first, trying hard not to slip and when he had found somewhere firm to stand he held out his hand and Laura would follow.
It took a long time to get across. They could see nothing of the harbor at this point because of the way the cave entrance curved. When they reached the steps they climbed them and inched around the curve. The sunlight was cut off by the curve and they found themselves in semi-darkness.
They could see the other side of the entrance, but little else.
Without warning, Laura gripped Tom’s hand so tightly he nearly screamed. He stared at her and she pointed into the water, her face ashen. The water was crystal clear and they could see through it to the seabed below.
Resting on sand and silt was a shrouded body, weighted down with stones. The corpse’s head end was trying to rise to the surface and enough of the cloth had dislodged so they could see the corpse’s staring eyes and open mouth. A small crab was trying to get into its mouth.
Laura put her head on Tom’s shoulder and recovered herself. Finally, she nudged Tom to carry on. It took them only a few more steps to spot the end of the dock on the other side of the cave, and far above it, the tunnel mouth that led to the house.
Tom hugged the wall and edged further around the curve. A man stood at one end of the dock while another smaller man stood on the steps leading to the tunnel. Tom moved back before he was seen.
“There are two of them. Take a look, but be careful.” Laura slid past Tom and fixed both men in her mind.
Laura got out her sheaf of incomplete spells. She had two of the kind she needed at the front. She showed them to Tom.
“I’ll change the man on the steps. You need to distract the one on the dock for a couple of seconds to stop him calling out for help while I complete the bind on him.”
Tom nodded his understanding as they had discussed this tactic earlier.
Laura completed the first bind and the man on the steps turned into a small green frog. His clothes dropped around the tiny body while his rifle fell onto the stone steps with a clatter.
The man on the dock spun at the noise and looked for his companion, seeing only empty clothes. He raised his rifle and spun around looking for the enemy.
Tom ran across the rocks to put some distance between him and Laura.
“I say, my good man.” Tom said as cheerfully as he could manage and waved.
Tom’s words had the desired effect as the man turned towards the sound of his voice. But in one smooth movement he raised his rifle and fired. The sound of the shot echoed loudly in the cave and Tom ducked as the bullet whistled past his head. The rocks he was on were below the level of the dock and he moved forward to try and get out of sight.
Laura’s hand shook at the sound of the bullet and her pen slipped across the page ruining the bind. She had others she could use, but now she had to search for the right one. She scanned the one on top of the pile and activated it.
The dock turned into a crystal clear sheet of ice, as smooth as glass. The man fell as his feet slipped out from under him. He landed face first, his rifle sliding across the dock and into the water. He drew his revolver and rolled on the ice, pointing it in Tom’s direction. Laura searched desperately for another frog spell.
Tom dived for cover as the man took aim and fired. The rocks he was standing on were well below the dock level and the man could only see him through the ice.
The man raised his arm as high above his body as he could, angled his gun down and fired again. The bullet only just missed Tom. The recoil from the gun forced the man’s hand down. It took him a few seconds to take aim again.
As he was about to shoot, Laura completed the bind. Faster than the eye could follow the man shrank down to frog form. That was far faster than his gun could fall by the force of gravity. The frog looked up to see the gun falling towards him. It was the last thing he ever saw.
The bind she was holding burst into flames and she threw it into the water. She peered around the curve of the wall to see a naked man lying on a dock made of ice. Tom was cautiously looking to see what had happened. He turned to look in her direction.
“It could have gone worse, I suppose.”
“I wasn’t expecting the shot.”
Tom grinned. “Neither was I. I think we can assume the cave is deserted. Even the dead would have risen, given the noise we were making.”
Laura tore the ice bind and it flared into flames as she threw it into the water. The two of them made their way round to the dock.
The man on the dock was clearly dead, his skull crushed almost flat. Laura felt sick. She had killed this man and she wanted to vomit. The plan wasn’t supposed to kill anybody.
She felt the other frog bind heat up and threw it away as it burst into flame. Somewhere in the cave a small naked man would be very mad with them. Tom took the revolver from the head of the man. There heard nothing but the lapping of water and slight creak of the boards.
Tom looked over the side of the dock and felt sick. Floating in the water was a naked body. Seen up close he was not a small man, but the right size for his age, a boy a few years older than Fred. He was very dead.
Laura looked more puzzled than shocked. “Why would a frog die in water?”
“It’s salt water, Laura. Frogs can’t survive it. It killed him.”
Laura turned away from Tom and vomited as the reality of what they had done sank in. Tom held her and told her it was all right. That it wasn’t her fault.
When she calmed, she looked him straight in the eye. “I am not doing that again. Not even if it means that they shoot me through the head. I will not become a killer.”
“Laura, we need to change our clothes and investigate that boat.” Tom nodded towards the strange black vessel that seemed to be half sunk in the harbor. “The plan, remember?”
Laura nodded reluctantly and Tom went towards the pile of clothes under the dead man. He rolled the corpse off them, though he couldn’t bring himself to roll the body into the water.
Laura climbed the steps to where the boy’s clothes waited. She wondered if they were going to be big enough.
As she struggled to get the boys trousers over her baggy underwear she realized it wouldn’t work. Looking first, to be sure that Tom’s attention was elsewhere, she stripped off her underwear and struggled to get the trousers on. Similar action was needed to wear the shirt. The fabric was thin cotton, more suited to warmer climes than these. But thankfully there was also a black jacket, even though it was a size too small for her.
When she looked to the dock she found Tom staring at her with glazed eyes and a prominent bulge in the front of his trousers. It was then that she realized the cotton shirt and trousers were acting more like a layer of paint than clothing as they were so tight. Every contour was clearly visible.
“If you can put your tongue back in your head, perhaps we can proceed,” Laura said haughtily, though she had similar trouble taking her eyes off Tom’s bulge.
“Well, distracting of the enemy should be easy from now on,” Tom said. “All we have to do is let them have a good look at you.”
Laura blushed and pulled the jacket tighter so she could fasten the top button. This did not help at all, as her breasts tried to escape over the top of the button. She undid it as she also had trouble breathing.
“I give up. Let’s go and examine this boat of theirs.”
The enemy vessel was tied up alongside the fishing boat. Tom knew a little about boats and the enemy one seemed to have been constructed by someone who knew nothing at all about them. Its hull was a long metal cylinder with a curved nose that sat low in the water. A strange rectangular mast jutted up about halfway along the cylinder. This gave the boat the look of something about to tip over and Tom wasn’t sure why it didn’t.
Wood strips were fastened to the upper surface of the cylinder to create a level walkway. There was an open hatch near the front of it. Everything on the boat had been painted black, which made it look sinister.
Tom and Laura clambered onboard using a wobbly plank from the dock that sloped down alarmingly. When they reached the hatch they saw it bore a name plate declaring the vessel to be the
USS Pride of the South
. The hatch was circular and made of metal. Along its inner rim was a leather sealing strip. It looked like the kind of hatch used in steam engines to seal the boiler.
“How could anybody breathe down there?” Laura asked. “Wouldn’t the hatch stop the air getting in?”
“We should be safe down there while it remains open.”
Laura shuddered. “But what is somebody shuts it while we are inside?”
Tom grinned. “You can change the metal to gingerbread and I shall eat a way out for you”
Laura sniffed disdainfully. “You are a typical male, Thomas. Only interested in your animal needs.”
When they looked through the hatch they saw a wooden ladder leading down.
“Ladies first?” Tom suggested. A slap from Laura suggested otherwise and he clambered down the ladder with Laura following only when he had reached the cabin below and said it was safe.
The cabin was lit by two electric light bulbs, one at each end. It was a cramped space. The walls were lined with mysterious copper pipes, many of them fitted with stop valves. There were several large dials and a number of strange controls.
“Touch nothing,” Laura ordered, scared at the thought that they might drift out to sea or flood the boat if they did.
They went through a hatch into a corridor lined with doors leading to small cabins. At the end of the corridor they found a central hatch that was barred so it couldn’t be opened from the inside. Tom looked at it and felt a surge of excitement run down his spine.
“Our smugglers might be in there.”
Laura shook her head as all her instincts told her that the smugglers were dead.
Tom removed the metal bar holding the hatch closed. He had to spin a central wheel to get the hatch to open. As he pulled it open, the stink of human feces and vomit assailed them. Laura put a handkerchief to her nose to block out the worst of it. They peered cautiously inside.
At first, they could see nothing much in the gloom. A small electric lamp lit the cabin. With all the strange contorted piping that ran across the walls it was difficult to make out any shapes. It was their eyes that Tom saw first. Three girls, probably about Laura’s age though it was difficult to tell because they were so emaciated. They wore nothing except filthy dungarees. Their feet were bare. They looked terrified.
As if at some signal heard only by them, the girls left their hiding places and went to sit on three chairs bolted to the floor.
Each seat had a metal desk in front of it bound to the floor. They lifted the tops of the desks and took pen, ink and parchment from a small compartment beneath. It was clear that the children were Spellbinders.
Tom felt a moment of fear, but the girls wrote nothing on the parchments in front of them. They waited silently, their eyes fixed on the parchment, pens in their hands and ink bottles uncorked.
Tom moved towards the nearest girl and she shrank back as he approached. He stepped carefully over a slop bucket that hadn’t been emptied for days and was close to overflowing.
“What is your name?” he asked, but the girl ignored him.
“I am not going to hurt you,” he told her and brushed the girl’s face with the tips of his fingers.
His talent laid the girl’s body bare before him.
She had half healed scars on her back, bottom and thighs, the result of frequent beatings. There was also some damage to her internal organs that Tom thought must be due to living in the dark in such a cramped space. The urge to heal her overwhelmed him and he did the best he could. The girl first sighed and then shuddered uncontrollably. The other girls ignored her and stared fixedly down at the parchment in front of them.
“What binds do you write?” Laura asked the girl gently when Tom had finished.
“Air in the bottles for breathing underwater. Power for the engines to make the propellers turn, sir!” Her words were spat out like a mantra.
Laura put a hand on the girl’s shoulder.
“We don’t need you to do any of those things right now. You can relax.”
“This boat travels underwater…”
Tom was impressed. The Empire had nothing so advanced. They had diving bells to recover goods from wrecks, but nothing that could be called an underwater boat. Laura looked at the frightened, starving girls and reconsidered her vow to kill no more.
“Heal the others, Tom. We need to get them out of here. The enemy will not be going anywhere without these three.”
Tom did as he was told, reflecting on the fact that while Laura didn’t seem to like the army, she often acted like a born commander.
“Come with me, please,” Tom said as he tried to pull one of the girls out of the cabin. She struggled and as soon as he let go of her she ran to huddle beside the other girls at the far end of the room. Getting them out of the cabin was proving to be much more difficult than healing them.
“Tom, stop that, you are frightening them.”
Laura went to the girls and knelt in front of them. They struggled to become part of the wall behind. “Why won’t you come?”
Seeing the girls this close, Laura wondered if they might be related. Ignoring the similarities of their faces due to lack of food they still looked remarkably alike.
“Cp’tain kill us,” one of the girls said. “N’t loud out.”
“Beat us first,” another said, “Cut us too.”
That was enough for Laura.
“Tom, please leave me alone with the girls and go back onto the dock. I need to assure them they will be safe.”
Tom was only too glad to get out of the foul cabin and breathe the fresh air of the dock.
Half an hour later Laura helped the girls out of the hatch and onto the deck of the boat. Tom sat on the dock some way away and made no move to approach. From the way the girls looked at him he was certain a single word from him would have sent them scurrying back inside.
“Tom, I’d like to introduce Ann, Mary and Sue. They are triplets and were born in
New Orleans
. Apparently that makes them Creole, but I’m not sure what that means.”
The girls smiled at Tom uncertainly, but when he smiled back they flinched away.
“They are fourteen years old and were kidnapped by the Captain from some sort of circus.”
“Freak show,” Anne corrected. “He shot Ma and Pa an’ Massa Jeffreys.”
“Then he made them Spellbind for him, on this boat.”
“He whip us good,” Mary added. “Till we learn.”
“Whip us all the time,” Sue put in. “For nuttin’”
Once they girls were on the dock it was clear that they could not travel far. They could barely walk. Trying to get them out via the cliff route was completely out of the question. Not that Laura was sure how she and Tom could have done it without someone on the top of the cliff to help.
“I am not leaving them here for that monster,” Laura stated in a cold voice.
Tom nodded. Not only would that have been inhuman, but the girls were far too important to leave anywhere the Captain could find them.
“We use the tunnel and find a way to deal with the guards in the cellar. We can take Mick the rifle he wants and leave the girls wherever
Nan
has Mick hidden. The problem is how to deal with the guards without the Captain finding out what we have done. Any ideas?” Tom knew Laura was the one with all the power. She would have to come up with a method.
“I could block the tunnel when we leave. Then the Captain couldn’t be sure which side of it we are, or even if the girls have been taken.” Laura started to prepare a suitable bind, grinning as an idea how best to do it occurred to her.
“How do we deal with the guards in the cellar? Fred said there were two of them and we can’t afford to have them firing their guns like they did down here.”
Laura sat and considered what she could do.
“How do you all fancy being rats?” Laura asked, grinning at the girls
“Only if you make our clothes change with us,” Tom stated, determined about this requirement. “I am not changing back to end up naked in front of four girls. Once was enough.”
Laura nodded, “I can do that, I think. I’ll make the rifles and guns part of the change too, but the bind can’t change in size or nature. We will need to carry our binds in our teeth.”
“Make us black rats, Laura, it will make it easier.”
They explained slowly and carefully what they were going to do until they were sure the girls understood. Laura constructed her binds on the smallest piece of paper that could hold the words, leaving them unfinished until they were needed. She wrote the bind for the girls so they would be fit when they became rats.
They went to the tunnel and walked in to it as far as they dared. Laura changed Tom first and he found himself a rat wearing tiny human clothes. The guns and rifles had shrunk with him and Laura carefully tied them around his tummy using cotton thread. She folded his bind as small as she could and gave it to him. He held it in his teeth.
Laura changed the girls in turn and handed them their binds. She folded her own as tight as she could while leaving the place for the last word visible. Then she completed the bind. She thought her piece of paper was going to be difficult to manage as it was partially open, but she soon discovered that a rat’s front paws are as dexterous as human hands. They found it easy to see in the tunnel as rats’ eyes were better than human ones in the dark.
When they got to the door it was closed. This was something they hadn’t considered when they made their plan. Tom tried to force his body under the door, but the gap was too small. They were large rats.
Tom looked at the gun tied across his middle and had an idea. He motioned the girls to get back from the door and then banged on the door with his gun.
“What was that?” someone on the other side of the door asked. Tom banged again, putting rhythm into his knocks.
“Open the door. I’ll cover you,” another voice said.
Tom backed away from the door as it opened.
“I can’t see anything.”
Tom slipped past the guard and into the dark cellar beyond. It was easy to find a place to hide among the stacked barrels.
“In think I saw a rat.”
“Rat’s don’t knock on doors.”
The girls slipped past the guard one by one. If it hadn’t been so dark they could never have managed it.
“Shut the door. The cave must be infested with rats.”
“I didn’t see any.”
“Then you must be blind as well as stupid.”
Tom and the girls made their way to the far end of the cellar and hid behind a convenient stack of barrels. Tom tore his bind with his paws and snuffed out the flames in human form. One by one he took the binds from the girls’ mouths and tore them. There was some bumping of bodies in the confined space behind the barrels, but luckily the guards didn’t hear.
There was enough light for Laura to complete her other bind. The rock above the tunnel mouth fell inwards, blocking it. The collapse was so severe the guards had to jump back to avoid being crushed.
“The Captain aint gonner like that,” one of the guards said as he looked at the pile of rubble.
“We might as well go tell him,” his companion said morosely. “Ain’t nothin’ ‘ere left to guard.”