17

MAGISTER HICKORY’S DEFENSE

“I am the Master,” said the wizard Nettle, “and this is the Beast. Do not think to stop us. Do not even try. See what happens to those who would.” He pointed down into the room at Register Oakbend and at the cage holding the now silent Dr. Mo.

For the first time Thornmallow saw that the little white creature was not a mouse at all. Or a shrew. Or a vole. Or any other tiny animal. It was a miniature human being dressed in white, its hands waving in agitation.

“Dr. Mo,” Thornmallow whispered to himself as if adding up a string of numbers. “Dr. Mo-rning Glory. Oh!”

“And there!” said the Master, pointing this time at Magister Hickory, still crouching over his scalded hand.

Thornmallow cried out, “Try, Magister Hickory. Please—try!” His voice was too weak to be heard.

Still, Magister Hickory must have heard something, because he nodded to himself, shook himself all over, and slowly stood, his wounded hand red and inflamed before him.

“We have …,” Magister Hickory began, flinching once when the Master raised his nettlesome hand. “We have …,” he began again, his wavering voice starting to grow stronger, the red hand paling down to a pink, “the number to defeat you, Nettle. We have one hundred and thirteen students. Sing, children! On the dominant!” He sang out a note, and all around Thornmallow the students began to sing the note back When Thornmallow opened his mouth and tried, he missed the note by at least half a tone. But he did try.

The Master laughed, high and hollow. “You have nothing. You never had anything. Numbers are mere fingers on a hand, symbols on a page, nothing. Your casual mathematics mean zero to me, nil, null, nothing. What are one hundred and thirteen children singing? Openmouthed bottles over which wind plays. Nothing.”

He held up the staff before him, and the sound the students were making stopped at once. Thornmallow felt the breath sucked out of him, and his note, along with the others, was gone.

“Number …,” Magister Hickory tried again. “Number one hundred and thirteen, as it says in the spell.” He waved his hands before him, the good hand and the reddened one, which was once again a bright painful color. His fingers made complicated signs in the air. From his fingertips a bit of smoke wavered, wobbled, and at last dissipated into a strange unnatural darkness.

The Master struck the ground with the globe end of the staff. Little lightning cracks darted across the globe’s face. At each crack, a similar crack appeared on Magister Hickory’s face, until his skin looked like parchment with a map of the Dales written across it. He no longer spoke.

Then the Master lifted the staff, pointing it directly at Magister Hickory, who was still desperately waving his fingers. A thin line of something seemed to spin out of Magister Hickory’s open mouth. It was as if a thread were being pulled out of the cloth of his being, and he was unraveling before their eyes. The unraveling took a long minute, unwinding the magister into a golden-red thread, then winding him up again around the bulky back of the Beast. When the unraveling and the winding up were done, a new patch had appeared on the Beast’s shoulder, a patch as red-gold as the thread, as red-gold as Magister Hickory’s hair with the faint imprint of a face on its surface. The Beast belched, and Magister Hickory’s empty robe fluttered to the ground.

Thornmallow felt himself sigh, a sound so quiet he doubted anyone near him could hear it. But it felt like a small surrender.

“And now,” the Master declared, “oldest to newest, you will do my bidding. You will mount the steps and add to the beauty of my Beast.” He smiled horribly. “As your own Magister Hickorystick could do naught against me, not a one of you will be able to do anything more. Best come along quietly and get this done without any messy fight. Remember the words: Punctuality, Practicality, Personality. So come one at a time when I call. It’s the only thing you can do. After all …” He laughed again. “Of the one hundred thirteen students, of the thirteen magisters, whose personality is the dominant one?” He raised his staff high overhead, and all the magisters stood upright as if they were marionettes jerked to their feet by invisible strings. Magister Briar Rose tried to raise her hand and failed.

“Once I was not good enough for the Hall, but now I will quarter my Beast here!” the Master said.

And after Wizard’s Hall, Thornmallow thought desperately, he will take all the Dales. He wondered briefly what color he would make on the Beast’s big body. He wondered what color patch his dear ma would make. He was much too frightened to cry.