Avis Blackthorn and the Magical Multicolour Jumper (The Wizard Magic School Series, Book 2) (31 page)

I
slept like a log. Can you blame me? It was the most eventful, stressful, adrenaline fuelled day I’ve ever had at Hailing Hall. I didn’t even bother taking off my Riptide shirt, nor did I care about them all watching me as I drifted into sweet unconsciousness.

Strange dreams flew around my head for what felt like years — Caretaker Ingralo burst through the bedroom door. CRASH! “Where is he?” he called.

Everyone jumped. “Who?
Who
?” Hunter cried, pulling his sheets up to his chin.

“Avis
BLACKTOOOOORN
!”

“Over there!” said Simon pointing at me. Ingralo charged forwards and grabbed fistfuls of bed cover and leg.

“What are you doing!” I cried. “Get off me!”

“Yeah get off him!” said Robin.

“YOU’RE EXSPELLED! OUT! OUT! OUT!” Ingralo got a purchase on my ankle and dragged me hard. BANG! Went my head as it caught the floor.

“Not yet!” I cried. “NOT
YEEEET
!” I put my hands up at him. “
Pasanthedine
!
Nouchous
!” A whoosh of wind and fire shot at Ingralo but did nothing!

Then, Ingralo dropped me outside the dorm… looking down at me was the Lily, he began to chuckle softly — the fire in brackets dancing white in their holders and flashing on and off. When the light went black — he turned into Malakai! The Lily — Malakai — the Lily — Malakai… I cried out for Robin, anyone, to help me.

“I’ll take it from here,” said Jasper rising tall behind the Lily.

Suddenly, we were in the Hall. The Lily and Jasper standing over me — the big double doors swung open, rain and wind filled the Hall as lines of pupils around the Hall chanting: “
OUT! OUT! OUT!”
Robin appeared behind me and pulled me up until I was standing.

“Robin! You gotta help me…” Robin looked down at the floor.

“Probably best if you just go,” he said, pointing at the door. The outline of two tall figures stood in the doorway, silhouette casting a long shadow into the Hall. I cowered as my parents moved into the light.

“Come along Avis,” said Mother. “We could do with another scivvy!” she cackled.

“Indeed,” said Father. “Kilkenny!” Our Irish butler appeared by their side in a flash, mop and bucket in hand.

“I think these are
yours
now…” he exploded with devilish laughter.

“
NOOO
! … Ahhh!”

I woke with a start, covered in sweat. “Please…
huh
?” I was in bed. The curtains were still drawn, but there was light outside. Sitting up, I saw empty beds. Suddenly I was so immensely grateful that I was here — the dream felt so real. I looked up the clock, but I had to wait a minute for my foggy eye sight to adjust — 11am? I’d slept for almost twelve hours? Jeez.

I opened the curtains with a flick of my hand. As I got out of bed crusty mud fell everywhere, but that wasn’t all. A small note fell to the floor. I picked it up:
Avis, you were dreaming pretty hard. We left you to sleep in. (Talk later?) Robin.
I put the note down and grabbed my towel — I needed a shower.

When I returned, I dressed slowly watching the rain out side the window. The Riptide Stadium stuck out like the imperfect crack on the Lily’s floor — against the backdrop of the perfect grounds. Then I took a seat on the sofa and lay down — running everything through my head.

“Hey Avis? Avis?” Someone was shaking me slowly.

“Huh? What?” I sat up, shaking the sleep away — I’d fallen asleep again? Robin was standing over me, looking concerned. “What time is it?” I said.

“Its dinner. I told the guys to go on without me. You and me need to talk.” It was already dinner time? I was starving. The sun was setting over the horizon.

I sat up, my neck ached. Robin took the sofa opposite me, for a long moment he didn’t say anything — he just stared. “Is it true? You’re really being
exspelled
?” I nodded slowly. “Oh god!” he said collapsing backwards into the sofa, deflating like a balloon. “What happened?”

I told him everything, right from when the Djinn took me to the Heptagon room, it taking my blood and all that Chambers and the Djinn told me.

“So you have… three weeks?” said Robin incredulous. “To find evidence of it being Malakai? That’s impossible! How on earth are you supposed to do that?!” I couldn’t think of anything to say, so I just shook my head. “If I didn’t know any better I’d say the Lily doesn’t really want you here anymore. Mind you, when we saw the Djinn fly away with you up into the sky, I thought… well, we all thought, that you were as good as dead.”

“I bet,” I sighed. “It’s all my fault.”

Robin’s beady eyes flickered behind their glassy frames. “What is?”

“I should have realised sooner. I mean it’s obvious now isn’t it? I read something last year about true names — and I’d forgotten it, until now. There was some guy called
Tyreko
and he went bad. This woman, I can’t remember her name, used love magic to seduce Tyreko and get his true name. Then she defeated him. He reduced in size to a small… stubby… creature in rags.” I said, but Robin was still staring at me expectantly. “I defeated Malakai using his true name. And now he too is a small, stubby, creature in rags. The thing that’s been trying to kill me all year was Malakai. It couldn’t have been the Djinn, like everyone was saying, because the accidents started way before I even released the Djinn. So that’s why it’s all my fault…” I cried, I couldn’t help it. I felt so useless, so stupid. “This whole year I’ve been an… idiot. Concentrating more on trying to be popular than realising what was trying to kill me, putting my friends in danger.”

“Don’t get down about it. It’s easy to look back with hindsight. Anyway, I want to know what you mean about the Djinn saying you are the seventh member of the Heptagon Society?”

I nodded. “Yes. But, the Lily reckons the Djinn implanted the memory, or that the Djinn was lying to me.”

Robin looked to the ceiling. “Could be, but I don’t think the Djinn was lying — not about the Heptagon Society anyway.”

“What? You’ve heard of it?”

Robin tapped his chin. “I’ve read about it somewhere yeah. And you are a seventh son, so it’s plausible right?” Robin clicked his fingers, two cups of steaming tea popped into existence on the arm of the chair. With another click of his fingers, some parchments and a pen fell into his lap.

“What you doing?” I said confused.

Robin began scratching on the paper. “We’ve got to find a way of finding the evidence to stop you being exspelled…”

Stress
continually bubbled away under the surface of my mind. I felt hot under the collar, my tie was too tight. Lessons were uncomfortable — I tried my very best to concentrate, to absorb my last remains of magical teachings. But, I just couldn’t, it passed me by in a daze. Someone made a joke in Wasp’s lesson and I snapped at them to be quiet — I didn’t even mean to, it was like someone else had taken over me — my gaze drifting to the floor as wave after wave of sorrow engulfed me.

All I got was sorry glances from all that had heard the news — my form were quieter than usual and kept glancing up at me with sorry grimaces. Word of mouth slowly spread and I walked the corridors to stares and mutters. They had put it together — the Lily announces in assembly that the person responsible for unleashing the discarnate being will be expelled, I had a magical jumper that was most suspicious, and then the Riptide Stadium collapses and I am carried off by a flying spirit.

— “It must be,” said the barely concealed whispers. “It all makes sense doesn’t it. He released the…”

— “Genie! And he wished for that jumper… I wonder why?”

— “To get Tina Partington to fall in love with him, that’s what I heard.”

— “Pffft,” scoffed another. “You can’t wish for love. Everyone knows that.”

— “You can too!”

— “Anyway, it’s not called a Genie, it’s called a Djinn…”

— “Whatever.”

I was suddenly the talk of the school — rumours flew around faster than the end of school fireworks that Ingralo was carefully placing around the school, concealing with charms so as no one accidentally let them off early, or blew their hand off or something. I gave him a wide berth, remembering the awful dream.

Robin clapped me on the shoulder. “You’ve gotta get a grip. It’s like you’ve given up already?” he whispered. “We’ve got three weeks left, that was enough last year…
remember
?”

He was right, I knew he was. But I felt so dam listless. Last year I had less time to figure out how to defeat the most evil Sorcerer in all of the Seven Magical Kingdoms — now I was sure I could work out how to prove to the Lily that I was right and reclaim my space in Hailing Hall. I just had to get a grip, stop feeling so useless and try.

It was around this time that I noticed the seventh years walking around in tall glassy bubbles. That only meant one thing — their P.W.W exams had started. In the Chamber there were lots of these glass balls surrounding the seventh years. They were a clever enchantment, they blocked out all noise and stopped anyone touching or coming near you so they could study in absolute peace. Actually, I think some of them even played soft, relaxing classical music for better concentration. The Magisteers had their eyes on the seventh years, who all had their faces in book and papers, hands waving around softly as they practiced a certain spell. It had given rise to a kind of unofficial game for some of the younger years to see if they could break the bonds of the enchanted glass balls. One girl — Becky Lewis, I think, from the fourth year Flinkydots form was trying to penetrate her brothers glass ball. He can’t have noticed much inside because he wasn’t looking at her. But then, Becky lost patience trying to distract her brother and instead began slamming her fists into the ball like a madwoman. Magisteer Yelworca stood abruptly at the head of the Magisteers table. The next second an orange smoke arrow shot across the room.

“
AHHOOOWWW!”
Becky cried as the arrow shot into her bottom. She clutched fruitlessly for it as the Chamber erupted into laughter (the seventh years paying no attention at all.)

“And let that be a lesson to all of you,” Yelworca cried, taking her seat as Becky hopped around clutching her buttocks before the orange smoke dissipated and she took her seat, looking rather red and embarrassed and sitting down a little gingerly. I looked around for Ernie but, he was no where to be seen. He was probably up high in the school, somewhere he wouldn’t be disturbed.

Over the course of the day Robin kept muttering encouraging things to me — I don’t know how or why, but it lifted me out of that depressing haze and now my thoughts returned, in part, back to normal.

A defiant charge was beginning to return. Not completely, but I felt a tiny roar of fire deep down in my belly — I hadn’t given up yet. As we sat eating dinner, I wasn’t too hungry so was just moving a baked potato around my plate, my thoughts began multiplying — I began thinking what I could do to find evidence of Malakai.

That night in bed I realised I only had seventeen days left to save my place at Hailing Hall. I couldn’t sleep — the rain outside still poured hard, I wondered how long it could go on for until everything washed away. Hunter snored loudly, while someone else, Simon I think, was muttering softly in his sleep.

Orange glowing embers crackled in the fireplace. I watched for hours, running everything that had happened through my head. It’s strange how time puts a new skew on things. I thought right back to that fateful moment the Stadium fell — I was so close to scoring and putting the Condors in the final of the Riptide Cup. But no, the Lily now decided (after giving them to me) that my shoes were not
sporting
. He was right, they weren’t — how could I have thought any else? It was cheating. I had almost convinced myself that I was good at Riptide, that we, the Condors were good at Riptide. We weren't — we just had magic that no one else did, and lots of it. I thought back to the start of the Riptide season. The only reason I decided to wear the shoes was because we were so paranoid about getting hammered again. I had lost sight of the original idea of wearing them, getting too caught up in the hype.

And then suddenly I realised something. The Seven League Shoes — I only knew part of the magic they did… I’d almost forgotten about the time they had saved me from that Outsider who chased me across his field with a pitchfork — his dogs nearly ripping me to shreds — blasting me back to the Magical Kingdoms, straight into a fairy ring and into Gnippoh’s. I was on the cusp of understanding a solution, I just knew it…

Zzzz-ZZZ-ZZZ! Went a gigantic snore from Hunter, causing me to lose my train of thought. Dammit Hunter! I was so close to something.

And then it struck me… the shoes had saved me and Straker that time when the corridor fell… when we
BOTH SAW
the hunched figure of Malakai, of course! He liked me now, I was sure he would be able to tell the Lily that we had both seen it, then I would be able to stay! All I needed to do was find him first thing tomorrow morning before lessons and ask him to tell the Lily.