K. Mills - The Accidental sorcerer

Please, no. No. Heart thumping, he scrabbled for his cherrywood staff and waved it at the closed club gates.'Open! OpenV

A spurting fizzle of power. A momentary pause that lasted forever. Then, with a complaining groan and a flaking of rust, the wrought iron gates dragged sluggishly apart. He fell against them, panting. Thank you, thank you, thank you. His abilities, such as they were, had returned.

Straight ahead, at the end of a long brickwork path, squatted six wide stone steps. Above them loomed the club's ancient, imposing front doors. And behind those doors waited Haythwaite and Co, doubtless primed with Bellringer's best brandy and salivating at the thought of dragging that upstart nobody Dunwoody down a peg or two. Because the idea of discretion or sympathy was as foreign to them as a delegation of ambassadors from Katzwandaland. Errol and his friends had tongues like well-sharpened knives and there was nothing they enjoyed more than carving up their social inferiors. Especially when those inferiors made spectacularly public blunders.

On the other hand, perhaps loitering isn't such a bad idea after all.

'Bloody hell,' he said to the fading sky. 'When did I turn into such a coward?'

Heart colliding painfully with his ribs, he walked through the gates.

The club's parquet reception area was blessedly deserted. Blinking in the carefully cultivated gloom Gerald checked his pigeonhole and found a letter from his globe-trotting parents. This one was postmarked Darsheppe. He had to think for a moment where that was. Oh, yes. Capital city of Hortopia. Half-way round the world. Suddenly that seemed even further away than it actually was.

As he stared at his mother's sprawling scrawl he found himself torn between relief that they weren't here to witness his latest disaster, and sharp sorrow-that he'd disappointed them again. That was the trouble with being the only offspring: no sibling shoulders to help carry the burden of familial expectations.

Mr Pinchgut, the club's retainer and general factotum, emerged from his tiny office set underneath the grand staircase that led up to the private apartments. He saw Gerald and stopped. From the angle of his bushy eyebrows and the particular stiffness of his tail-coated spine it was clear he'd heard all about Stuttley's. Gerald tucked the letter into his pocket and nodded at him. 'Mr Pinchgut.'

The retainer favoured him with a frosty bow. 'Mr Dunwoody.'

He sighed. 'Would it help if I said it wasn't my fault?' Mr Pinchgut thawed, ever so slightly. 'I'm sure it's not for me to comment, sir.' 'Even so. It wasn't.'

Another bow. 'Yes, sir. May I say I hope that's a comforting thought?'

'You may,' he said, heading for the stairs. 'But we both know you'd be wasting your breath.'

The staircase stopped being grand after the first two flights because all the posh apartments were on the first and second floors. For the next two flights it was plain but serviceable, just like the rooms it led to. After that the stairs became narrow, uneven and downright higgledy-piggledy, which was also a fair description of the cheap rooms crammed beneath the roof of the building. Puffing, Gerald staggered on up to his bedsit.

It was tucked away at the rear of the club's top floor. Squashed cheek-to-jowl inside were a saggy-mattressed single bed, a lopsided wardrobe, a narrow cupboard, a three-legged card table, a rickety chair, a very skinny bookcase and a single temperamental gas ring. Mysterious plumbing groaned and gurgled at all hours of the day and night. The bathroom he shared with six other wizards was on the next floor down. This meant a chamber-pot, which added a certain piquancy to the atmosphere. There was one miserly window with a fine view of the noisome compost heap and only two places where he could stand completely upright without cracking his head on an exposed roof beam.

'Reg?' he called softly as he kicked the bedsit door unstuck and shoehorned himself inside. 'Reg, are you here?'

A resounding silence was the only reply. He flicked on the light-switch and looked around, but the room was empty.

Dammit. Where the hell was she? He'd left the window open, just in case. She should be here, all broody and complaining on the tacky, revolting old ram skull she insisted on using for a perch. Eating a mouse and leaving the tail on the floor because tails always get stuck halfway down. Why wasn't she here? They'd quarrelled before. Hell, they quarrelled practically every day. Just because he'd lost his temper and called her a moulting feather duster with the manners of a brain-damaged hen, was that any reason to fly off in high dudgeon and not come back? Had she gone for good?

Scrunching down to avoid the rafters, he crossed to the window and stuck his head out. The last of the daylight was almost gone and the first faint stars were starting to sparkle. A thin rind of moon teetered low on the distant horizon. All in all, it was a beautiful evening. He couldn't have cared less. 'Reg!' he called in the loudest stage whisper he could manage. 'Reg, are you out here?' Nothing.

'Don't be an idiot,' he told himself sternly. 'She's fine. She's only a bird on the outside. Anybody who tries to mess with Reg is making their last mistake. She'll be back. She's just trying to wind you up.' And it was working, dammit.

Defeated, Gerald pulled his head back into the room and slumped on the edge of his horrible bed. Two more springs died, noisily.

His stomach grumbled. Lunch had been hours ago and he'd been a bit busy since then, one way and another. But steak and chips in the club's dining room was an expense he could no longer afford and anyway… Errol Haythwaite and his ghastly friends were downstairs.

He didn't have the heart to face them. Not without Monk Markham as back up, at least. And if that made him a coward then fine. He was a coward.

There was a tin of baked beans in the cupboard, and a can opener, and a spoon, for emergencies. If this didn't qualify as an emergency he didn't know what did. Bloody hell. I hate baked beans.

Morose, disconsolate and feeling more alone than he'd ever felt in his life, he went about eating his pathetic, solitary supper.

Melissande heard the commotion when she was still one dingy corridor away from the palace's Large Audience Chamber. Raised voices. Indignant expostulations. The rat-a-tat-tat of ebony canes on marble-tiled flooring. She felt her insides clench. Her brisk footsteps slowed, and her heart suddenly felt too large for her chest. Someone was arguing with Lional.

She started hurrying again, breath caught in her throat. More than likely it was the Council. Oh, how could they be so stupid? Didn't they understand her brother yet? When were they going to realise that Lional wasn't his father? The late king had been a kind, mostly ineffectual man who was more than happy to let the Council run the kingdom on his behalf. Leave him alone to potter in his gardens and trundle out once or twice a year for public display and he was perfectly content. Lional wasn't. For a start, he didn't like gardens. Even less did he like being told what to do by a bunch of nattering old men. The only thing Lional and the late king had in common was the name. And in the last few months, as kingship took its toll, Lional s temper had grown markedly short.

Fearing the worst she sprinted the final eight yards and skidded around the corner to the audience chamber's reception area. Now she could make out actual words in the shouting. Words like 'foolish' and 'ridiculous' and 'misguided'. Saint Snodgrass preserve them.

Her other brother was sitting in a plush red velvet chair, his bony nose stuck in a book as usual. From the ratty state of his britches and jacket he'd come straight from his butterfly house. It was possible he'd even slept there last night; half a green butterfly wing was caught in his hair and he had a rumpled, unbedlike look. Ignoring the shouting and the two discomfited attendants on either side of the open chamber doors, she rushed up to him and snatched the book from his hands.