A paralyzed silence. And then Monk plucked Reg off his shoulder and held her up to his face, nose-to-beak. “You had to do it, didn’t you?” he said, sounding desperate. “You had to mouth off and make everything worse. You couldn’t just—just sit in a cage for an hour until I worked out how to help Gerald, could you?”
“Oh,
please
!” Reg retorted. “As if Gerald’s getting out of this pickle without
my
help! This pickle
you
landed him in, sunshine, when you showed him madam’s
stupid
Position Vacant advertisement without waiting to consult
me
on whether—”
“Oh for the love of Saint Snodgrass, would the pair of you
shut up
?” Melissande shouted, and fetched Monk a resounding clout on the back of his head. “What’s
wrong
with you? Carping and bickering while Gerald’s in trouble!”
“Hey!” said Monk, turning on her. “D’you mind? That hurt!”
“Really?” she retorted. “I find that hard to believe, seeing Klieheias how your head’s a solid block of wood!”
Reg rattled her tail even harder than before. “Ha! You tell him, ducky!”
“Shut up, Reg, or I’ll clout you too,” she said, glaring. “Monk’s right,
ducky
. You should’ve kept your beak shut. I was just about to tell Lord Attaby that you had to come with us because you’re a beloved childhood pet but
now
—”
“Now,” said Lord Attaby, his expression forbidding, “I can see we have yet another crisis to contain. I take it this isn’t a mere trained talking bird?”
“Far from it,” said Sir Alec. His voice and face were impassive but there was a definite gleam in his chilly gray eyes. “In fact, my lord, upon a closer examination, I think you’ll find this isn’t a bird at all.”
Lord Attaby stared at him. “Not a bird? What are you talking about man, it’s got feathers. And a beak.”
“True,” said Sir Alec. “But appearances can be deceiving—can’t they, Your Majesty?”
With a puffing effort Reg wrenched herself free of Monk’s grip and flapped onto the oak conference table. Head tipped to one side, she gazed gimlet-eyed at him.
“Speaking from experience, are we, sunshine?”
“Something like that,” said Sir Alec, dry as a desert. “And when this current crisis is resolved I’m sure it will be most edifying to compare notes. But in the meantime—” He turned. “My lord, the bird might well prove useful to our cause. I suggest it accompanies us down to Priority Monitoring.”
Lord Attaby’s jaw dropped. “You suggest—” And then he shook his head. “Very well, Sir Alec. There’s no time for a lengthy debate—and Saint Snodgrass knows your instincts have proven sound in the past. But you can stand surety for its trustworthiness.”
Melissande held out her arm. “Come on, Reg. Let’s go.”
So Reg hopped onto her arm and from there to her shoulder and they all trooped down into the bowels of the Department of Thaumaturgy building,
a stiff-backed Lord Attaby leading the way. The Priority Monitoring station was a small, windowless cubbyhole buried beneath floors and floors of less-secret government divisions. Almost every square foot was crammed full of cluttered desks and rickety chairs and extraordinary machines sprouting gauges and thaumostats and wiggly, jiggly thaumatographs. Some of them had indeed melted to goo.
“Everybody out,” Lord Attaby ordered, sweeping his goggle-eyed minions with a glare guaranteed to petrify wood. “In fact, go home. You’re relieved of duty until tomorrow. And not a word about any of this, do I make myself clear? Consider yourselves bound by the Official Secrets Act.”
A chorus of obedient
Yes, sirs
, and then the four astonished wizards, including Juby, departed before their superior could change his mind about the early mark.
“Right then,” said Lord Attaby, once they were alone. “Get on with it, Mr. Markham.”
As Monk stripped off his coat and rolled up Kand”
“Are you all right?” he asked softly, smoothing a lock of hair behind her ear.
“No, of course I’m not,” she said, feeling snappish. Refusing to be charmed by his sweet, caring gesture. “Rupert, what’s going on? What’s
happened
to you?”
Rupert looked at Reg. “Do you mind?”
“Huh,” Reg said, sniffing. “All these public displays of affection. Not what
I’d
call royal, ducky.”
“Nobody asked you, Reg,” she said, and twitched her shoulder. “Get off. I want to hug my brother.”
“I don’t know,” Reg grumbled, and hopped onto the back of the nearest empty chair. “No decorum. That’s your problem, ducky. You’ve got no bloody decorum.”
Folded hard to Rupert’s skinny chest, surprised by the sudden wiry strength in his arms, she rested her cheek against his velvet coat and sighed.
“You knew all along there was something the matter with Lional, didn’t you?”
“I’m afraid I did, yes, Melly,” said Rupert, his voice aching with regret. “Since I was a boy. Sorry. It wasn’t safe to tell you.”
There was so much she could have said. But what was the point? It wouldn’t change a single thing that had happened.
“Oh, Mel,” Rupert sighed. “I knew he was bad, and probably mad, but I never
dreamed
about the wizards.”
She tightened her embrace. “Oh, Rupes. None of this is your fault. And it’s not mine, either. This is Lional’s doing, all of it.”
“Mel…”
She could feel the tears crowding thickly in her throat. “I know,” she said, choking. “He has to be stopped. And if he won’t surrender willingly—”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”
Of course they could hope—but hope wasn’t exactly a fearsome weapon, was it? “What d’you suppose has happened back home?” she whispered. “D’you think it’s possible Gerald’s managed to—to kill him?”
Rupert shook his head. “I don’t know. Is Gerald the kind of chap who could bring himself to kill?”
Shamelessly eavesdropping, Reg snorted. “Blimey bloody Charlie. You won’t last five minutes as king with
that
kind of noddy thinking, Butterfly Boy. Every man jack in the world has got at least one murder in him. Justified or not, in cold blood or in hot. And after what your charming brother did to my Gerald—”
Melissande pulled out of her brother’s arms. Felt herself shudder, remembering what Gerald had told them in the cave. Seeing Rupert’s confusion, she patted his cheek.
“I’ll explain later, Rupes.”
Over at one of the terribly complicated thaumaturgical monitoring stations that hadn’t melted to goo, Monk sat back with a relieved sigh. “All right. The information’s still here.” He held up a small crystal. “I’ve copied it.”
“Very well,” said Lord Attaby, tight-lipped and tense. “What now?”
“Now, sir?” Monk wiped a shirt-sleeve across his sweaty face. “Now I figure out what the hell is going on in New Ottosland. I hope.”
T
hey were all staring at him: Melissande, Reg, New Ottosland’s unlikely-looking next king, Uncle Ralph, Lord Attaby—and Sir Alec.
Of them all, Sir Alec’s stare was the worst.
Sir Alec was one of those wizards often whispered about in dark corridors. Lots of rumor, very little fact. Once or twice Uncle Ralph, after partaking of his brother’s fine post-prandial brandy, had dropped mildly inebriated hints about the man’s secret, shadowy doings. Alluded to feats of thaumaturgical espionage and derring-do that could never be discussed in the cold light of day.
“There are some things, Monk my boy, you’ll be happier not knowing,”
Uncle Ralph liked to say, waving a fat, confiding cigar for emphasis.
“Truth be told, I wish I didn’t know ’em. Truth be told, between you and me, I don’t know how Alec sleeps at night.”
Because he was a Markham on his father’s side and a Thackeray on his mother’s he’d long ago lost count of how many pies his family’s fingers dabbled in, one way or another, but the upshot was that he
knew a little something about the seamy underbelly of wizarding. He didn’t need details to guess the kind of nastiness his uncle hinted at. Especially if he let himself meet Sir Alec’s measured, steady gaze.
Which he didn’t. The man’s guarded gray eyes were
far
too disconcerting. Especially now, watching him prepare for a little thaumaturgical sleight-of-hand which—in theory—shouldn’t be possible.
But that’s what I do, isn’t it? I turn theory into fact. Even when—especially when—I’m not supposed to.
And to think his family had found it amusing when he was a child.
Feeling the wintry weight of Sir Alec’s regard, he tucked the small crystal containing an imprint of Gerald’s unauthorized Level Twelve transmog into his pocket and looked up.
“I know what you’re thinking.”
Sir Alec’s light brown eyebrows lifted. “I doubt it.”
Yeah? Well, Sir Alec, how’s this for size?
“You’re thinking—the government’s thinking—that Gerald’s some kind of loose cannon. That he’s a menace. A danger to society—or even the world.” He scowled. “But you’re wrong. Gerald Dunwoody’s the most harmless wizard I ever knew.
And
the most decent.”
“In my experience,” said Sir A N thlec, not arguing, just observational, “decent, harmless wizards don’t turn lizards into dragons at the behest of insanely despotic tyrants.”
Bastard
. “That isn’t what happened!”
Mysterious Sir Alec breathed out a whispery sigh. “Your loyalty is admirable, Mr. Markham, but we both know it’s precisely what happened.”
With an effort he kept his fingers from fisting. Made
himself not look at Melissande and Reg. “There were mitigating circumstances.”
“Which will be discussed in full once Mr. Dunwoody has returned to Ottosland,” said Lord Attaby, at his most repressive. “And most likely taken into account. But that is a discussion for another day, Mr. Markham.”
Yes. Right. In other words
Get on with it.
And Lord Attaby had a point. Even now Gerald could be locked in a desperate battle for his life. Waiting for him. Relying on him.
I never should’ve let him talk me into leaving.
Standing adrift amidst the Department’s sea of thaumaturgical monitoring equipment, he took a deep breath to steady his thumping heart. “Have we got a recording of the event on a machine that hasn’t been melted?”
Sir Alec swept his keen gaze around the cramped, crowded room then nodded. “Try that one.”
That one
was probably the oldest thaumatograph still in use anywhere in the Department—or possibly the civilized wizarding world. Oversized and clunky, its plain copper wiring antiquated, it hulked in the corner, largely overlooked these days. The latest-model thaumatographs employed wiring composed mostly of brinbindium, newly discovered in the darkest jungles of Ramatoosh. Highly etheretically conductive, a little temperamental, prone to spontaneous reverse thaumaturgic fluctuations, yes—but terrifically sensitive to the most minuscule of etheretic fluctuations.
Which is possibly why the new monitors tossed in the towel once they picked up the goings-on in New Ottosland.
“Well, Mr. Markham?” said Lord Attaby, shifted
from repressive to impatient. “Can you do this or can’t you? Time is fast slipping through our fingers, you know!”
“Sorry, sorry, my lord, yes, I do know,” he muttered, and wriggled his way between the crammed-in desks and gooified modern thaumatographs to the aged pile of copper wiring, circuits and gears that was the Abercrombie Eleven Etheretic Thaumatograph (1843 Patent Pending). “If you’d give me a moment—”
“There are no moments remaining, Monk,” said Uncle Ralph, sounding tense. “Now prove yourself a Markham and get the job done! We need to know what’s going on in New Ottosland!”
He risked a single glance at Melissande, defiantly ramrod straight beside her odd brother. She slayed him. Tart-tongued and bossy and horrifyingly self-sufficient. Everything a well-bred girl wasn’t supposed to be. Her eyes met his and his heart banged like a hammer.
I’m going to save her Sg tngekingdom for her.
With a loud flustering of wings Reg joined him at the thaumatograph. “So, Mr. Clever Clogs, can you really do this or are you just flapping your lips for the exercise?”
Offended, he looked down his nose at her. “What do you think?”
“I think we’re all going to get terminal indigestion if you’ve bitten off more than you can chew, sunshine.”
Bloody hell. How did Gerald
stand
it? “D’you mind? I’m Monk Markham.”
“Oh, really?” Reg fixed him with a glittering stare.
“And what else would you like engraved on your headstone if this doesn’t work and my Gerald ends up paying the price for your thoughtless meddling in his life?”
Oh, God.
Gerald
. He had to look away. Pretend interest in the old monitor before him. “He’s my best friend too, Reg. Don’t you know there’s nothing I won’t do to save him?”
Reg sniffed. “I never said your heart wasn’t in the right place, sunshine. But this?” She shook her head. “It’s never been done.”
“Well, you know what they say, Reg,” he retorted, flicking the Abercrombie’s switches to stand-by. “There’s a first time for everything.”