Carry On

That’s partly why I’m such a useless magician.

“Words are very powerful,” Miss Possibelf said during our first Magic Words lesson. No one else was paying attention; she wasn’t saying anything they didn’t already know. But I was trying to commit it all to memory.

“And they become more powerful,” she went on, “the more that they’re said and read and written, in specific, consistent combinations.

“The key to casting a spell is tapping into that power. Not just saying the words, but summoning their meaning.”

Which means you have to have a good vocabulary to do magic. And you have to be able to think on your feet. And be brave enough to speak up. And have an ear for a solid turn of phrase.

And you have to actually understand what you’re saying—how the words translate into magic.

You can’t just wave your wand and repeat whatever you’ve heard somebody saying down on the street corner; that’s a good way to accidentally separate someone from their bollocks.

None of it comes naturally to me. Words. Language. Speaking.

I don’t remember when I learned to talk, but I know they tried to send me to specialists. Apparently, that can happen to kids in care, or kids with parents who never talk to them—they just don’t learn how.

I used to see a counsellor and a speech therapist. “Use your words, Simon.” I got so bloody sick of hearing that. It was so much easier to just take what I wanted instead of asking for it. Or thump whoever was hurting me, even if they thumped me right back.

I barely spoke the first month I was at Watford. It was easy not to; no one else around here shuts up.

Miss Possibelf and a few of the other teachers noticed and started giving me private lessons. Talking-out-loud lessons. Sometimes the Mage would sit in on these, rubbing his beard and staring out the window. “Use your words!”—I imagined myself shouting at him. And then I imagined him telling me that it was a mistake to bring me here.

Anyway, I’m still not good with words, and I’m shit with my wand, so I get by with memorization. And sincerity—that helps, believe it or not. When in doubt, I just do whatever Pe

I work my way carefully through the Catacombs, doing my level best with the spells I can make work for me.

I find hidden doorways inside hidden doorways. I find a treasure chest that’s snoring deeply. I find a painting of a girl with blond hair and tears pouring down her cheeks, actually pouring, like a GIF carved into the wall. A younger me would have stayed to figure out her story. A younger me would have turned this into an adventure.

I keep looking for Baz.

Or a clue.

Every night I turn back when I get to the end of my rope.

18

LUCY

Do you know these walls are a thousand years old?

There are spirits moving through them who speak languages no one is left to understand. But it doesn’t matter, I guess. Nobody hears them.

The walls are the same as when I walked them. The Chapel. The Tower. The drawbridge.

The wolves are new. The fish-beasts. Where did Davy find them, I wonder? What spell did he cast to bring them here? And what does he think they’ll prevent?

“Paranoid,” Mit always said. “He thinks everyone’s out to get him.”

“I think a few people might actually be out to get him,” I argued.

“Only because he’s such a spiteful git,” she said.

“He cares too much.”

“About himself? Agreed.”

“About everything,” I said. “He can’t let any of it go.”

“You’ve been listening to him for too long, Lucy.”

“I feel sorry for him.… And if you’d listen to him, you’d realize that he’s making sense. Why can’t pixies and centaurs with mage heritage come to Watford? And why did my brother have to stay home? Just because he isn’t powerful?”

“Your brother’s an idiot,” she said. “All he cares about is Def Leppard.”

“You know how much it hurt my mother when he was rejected. He has a wand, and he doesn’t even know how to use it. My parents almost got a divorce over it.”

“I know.” Mitali softened. “I’m sorry. But the school’s only so big. It can’t take everyone.”

“We could make it bigger, Davy says so. Or we could build a new school. Imagine that—schools all over the country for anyone with magic.”

She frowned. “But the point of Watford is that it’s the best. The best education for the best magicians.”

“Is that the point of Watford? Then Davy’s right. It is elitist.”

Mit sighed.

“Davy says we’re getting weaker,” I said. “As a society. That the wild, dark things will wipe us from the earth and let it reclaim our magic.”

“Does he tell you that they live under your bed?”

“I’m being serious,” I said.

“I know,” she said sadly. “I wish you weren’t. What does Davy expect you to do? What does he expect from any of us?”

I leaned towards her and whispered my answer—“Revolution.”

*   *   *

I’ve been wandering.

Trying to find my way to you.

The walls are the same. And the Chapel. And the Tower.

The neckties are thi

I can’t help but feel proud of Davy now—you’ll think that’s fu

He managed it. His revolution.

He opened these doors to every child blessed with magic.

19

SIMON

It’s almost Halloween before I finally talk to the Mage.

He calls for me himself. A robin flies into Greek and drops a note onto my desk. The Mage often has a bird or two flapping around him. Robins, mostly. And wrens and sparrows. (Like Snow White.) He’d rather cast A little bird told me than use his mobile.

When class is over, I head towards an outbuilding at the far end of the grounds, up against the outer wall. There are stables back there that have been turned into a garage and barracks.

His Men are outside—Pe

“Simon,” the Mage says, stepping out of the garage. He puts his arm around my shoulder and leads me away from the truck. “Here you are.”

“I would have come right away, sir, but I was in class. And the Minotaur said you would have sent a larger bird if it were an emergency.”

The Mage frowns. “The spell doesn’t work with larger birds.”

“I know, sir. I’m sorry. He wouldn’t listen.”

“Well.” He claps my shoulder. “It wasn’t an emergency. I just wanted to see you. To check on you. Miss Possibelf told me about the attack, the bugs—she said it was the Humdrum.”

Flibbertigibbets. In Magic Words class. A whole swarm of them. I’d never even seen a swarm of flibbertigibbets before.

We call them bugs because they’re about the size of bumblebees, but flibbertigibbets are more like birds. One can kill a dog or a goat or a gryphon. Two or three can take down a magician. They burrow into your ears and buzz so loud, you can’t think. First you lose your mind—and then they get to your brain, and you lose everything else.

Flibbertigibbets don’t attack people, not usually. But they came in through the classroom window last week and surrounded me like a chattering orange cloud. The worst part was that dry, sucking feeling that always accompanies the Humdrum’s attacks.

Everybody else in the class ran.

“It felt like the Humdrum, sir. But why would he send flibbertigibbets? They’re hardly a threat.”

“Not for you, certainly.” The Mage rubs his beard. “Maybe he just wants to remind us that he’s out there. What’d you hit them with?”