Ptolemy's Gate
BOOKS BY JONATHAN STROUD
LOCKWOOD & CO.
The Screaming Staircase
THE BARTIMAEUS BOOKS
The Amulet of Samarkand
Ptolemy's Gate
The Ring of Solomon
The Amulet of Samarkand Graphic Novel
Buried Fire
The Leap
The Last Siege
Heroes of the Valley
About the Endnotes
Bartimaeus is famous for making snarky asides and boastful claims, which you can find in this book's endnotes. To access his comments as you are reading the story, click on the highlighted superscript number and the page will turn to the corresponding note. To return to where you were reading, click on the same number in the endnotes section. This feature works on most devices.
Copyright © 2006 by Jonathan Stroud
Excerpt from
The Screaming Staircase
text copyright © 2013 by Jonathan Stroud, illustrations copyright © 2013 by Kate Adams
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. For information address Disney - Hyperion Books, 114 Fifth Avenue, New York, New York 10011-5690.
ISBN-13: 978-1-4231-4141-9
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For Isabelle, with love
The Main Characters
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THE MAGICIANS
| Mr. Rupert Devereaux | Prime Minister of Great Britain and the Empire, and acting Chief of Police |
| Mr. Carl Mortensen | Minister of War |
| Ms. Helen Malbindi | Foreign Minister |
| Ms. Jessica Whitwell | Security Minister |
| Mr. Bruce Collins | Home Secretary |
| Mr. John Mandrake | Information Minister |
| Ms. Jane Farrar | Deputy Police Chief |
| Mr. Quentin Makepeace | A playwright; author of Petticoats and Rifles and other works |
| Mr. Harold Button | Magician, scholar, and book collector |
| Mr. Sholto Pinn | A merchant; proprietor of Pinn's Accoutrements of Piccadilly |
| Mr. Clive Jenkins | Magician Second Level, Department of Internal Affairs |
| Ms. Rebecca Piper | Assistant to Mr. Mandrake, Information Ministry |
THE COMMONERS
| Ms. Kitty Jones | A student and barmaid |
| Mr. Clem Hopkins | An itinerant scholar |
| Mr. Nicholas Drew | A political agitator |
| Mr. George Fox | Proprietor of the Frog Inn, Chiswick |
| Ms. Rosanna Lutyens | A private tutor |
THE SPIRITS
| Bartimaeus | A djinniâin service to Mr. Mandrake |
| Ascobol Cormocodran Mwamba Hodge | Greater djinnâin service to Mr. Mandrake |
| Purip Fritang | Lesser djinnâin service to Mr. Mandrake |
Contents
Preview of
Lockwood & Co., Book One:Â The Screaming Staircase
T
he assassins dropped into the palace grounds at midnight, four fleet shadows dark against the wall. The fall was high, the ground was hard; they made no more sound on impact than the pattering of rain. Three seconds they crouched there, low and motionless, sniffing at the air. Then away they stole, through the dark gardens, among the tamarisks and date palms, toward the quarters where the boy lay at rest. A cheetah on a chain stirred in its sleep; far away in the desert, jackals cried.
They went on pointed toe-tips, leaving no trace in the long wet grass. Their robes flittered at their backs, fragmenting their shadows into wisps and traces. What could be seen? Nothing but leaves shifting in the breeze. What could be heard? Nothing but the wind sighing among the palm fronds. No sight, no noise. A crocodile djinni, standing sentry at the sacred pool, was undisturbed though they passed within a scale's breadth of his tail. For humans, it wasn't badly done.
The heat of the day was a memory; the air was chill. Above the palace a cold round moon shone down, slathering silver across the roofs and courtyards.
1
Away beyond the wall, the great city murmured in the night: wheels on dirt roads, distant laughter from the pleasure district along the quay, the tide lapping at its stones. Lamplight shone in windows, embers glowed on roof hearths, and from the top of the tower beside the harbor gate the great watch fire burned its message out to sea. Its image danced like imp-light on the waves.
At their posts, the guards played games of chance. In the pillared halls, the servants slept on beds of rushes. The palace gates were locked by triple bolts, each thicker than a man. No eyes were turned to the western gardens, where death came calling, secret as a scorpion, on four pairs of silent feet.
The boy's window was on the first floor of the palace. Four black shadows hunched beneath the wall. The leader made a signal. One by one they pressed against the stonework; one by one they began to climb, suspended by their fingertips and the nails of their big toes.
2
In this manner they had scaled marble columns and waterfalls of ice from Massilia to Hadhramaut; the rough stone blocks were easy for them now. Up they went, like bats upon a cave wall. Moonlight glinted on bright things gripped between their teeth.
The first of the assassins reached the window ledge: he sprang tigerlike upon it and peered into the chamber.
Moonlight spilled across the room; the pallet was lit as if by day. The boy lay sleeping, motionless as one already dead. His dark hair fell loose upon the cushions, his pale lamb's throat shone against the silks.
The assassin took his dagger from between his teeth. With quiet deliberation, he surveyed the room, gauging its extent and the possibility of traps. It was large, shadowy, empty of ostentation. Three pillars supported the ceiling. In the distance stood a door of teak, barred on the inside. A chest, half filled with clothes, sat open against the wall. He saw a royal chair draped with a discarded cloak, sandals lying on the floor, an onyx basin filled with water. A faint trace of perfume hung on the air. The assassin, for whom such scents were decadent and corrupt, wrinkled his nose.
3
His eyes narrowed; he reversed the dagger, holding it between finger and thumb by its shining, gleaming tip. It quivered once, twice. He was gauging the range hereâhe'd never missed a target yet, from Carthage to old Colchis. Every knife he'd thrown had found its throat.
His wrist flickered; the silver arc of the knife's flight cut the air in two. It landed with a soft noise, hilt-deep in the cushion, an inch from the child's neck.
The assassin paused in doubt, still crouched upon the sill. The back of his hands bore the crisscross scars that marked him as an adept of the dark academy. An adept never missed his target. The throw had been exact, precisely calibrated ⦠yet it had missed. Had the victim moved a crucial fraction? Impossibleâthe boy was fast asleep. From his person he pulled a second dagger.
4
Another careful aim (the assassin was conscious of his brothers behind and below him on the wall: he felt the grim weight of their impatience). A flick of the wrist, a momentary arcâ
With a soft noise, the second dagger landed in the cushion, an inch to the
other
side of the prince's neck. As he slept, perhaps he dreamedâa smile twitched ghostlike at the corners of his mouth.
