at me intently. The importance of the information wasn’t lost on him, and it wasn’t lost on me either. By ancient decree the Dragon’s land belonged to whoever claimed it as soon as the Dragon died, so there was always an unseemly rush for real estate which eclipsed a Dragon’s death. Within a day every square inch of land would be claimed. In the following months there would be legal wranglings, then the construction would begin. New roads, housing and power, retail parks and industrial units. All would cover the unspoilt lands in a smear of tarmac and concrete. A four-hundred-year-old wilderness gone for ever.
‘I heard that when Dragon Dunwoody died twenty-seven years ago,’ said Tiger, who was fairly up on Dragons, as you would be, growing up so close to the Dragonlands, ‘the crowd surge resulted in sixty-eight people dead in the stampede.’
Kevin and I exchanged glances. The death of the last Dragon would be a matter of some consequence.
‘How strong was this?’ I asked.
‘On a scale of one to ten,’ replied Zipp, ‘it was a twelve. Most powerful premonition I’ve ever felt. It was as though the Mighty Shandar himself had called me up person-to-person
I doubted it too. I phoned Randolph, 14th Earl of Pembridge, the only other pre-cog on our books. Randolph, or EP-14 as he was sometimes known, was not only minor Hereford aristocracy, but an industrial prophet who worked for Consolidated Useful Stuff (Steel) PLC, predicting failure rates on industrial welding.
‘Randolph, it’s Jennifer.’
‘Jenny, D’girl! I thought you’d call.’
‘I’ve got the Remarkable Kevin Zipp with me and I wondered if—’
He didn’t need any prompting. He had picked up the same thing but had also furnished a time and date. Next Sunday at noon. I thanked him and replaced the phone.
‘Anything else?’
‘Yes,’ replied Kevin. ‘Two words.’
‘And they are?’
‘Big Magic.’
‘What does that mean?’
He told me he didn’t know, and I understood. He only saw the visions; it was up to others to interpret them. In the absence of any good interpretation, they could generally be explained by events or, failing that, hindsight.
‘Before I go,’ he said, pulling a rumpled piece of paper from his pocket, ‘these are for you.’
He handed the grubby piece of paper not to me, but to Tiger.
He scanned the note. It didn’t seem to mean anything at all.
He read the note, then lowered the piece of paper.
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Me neither.’ Zipp shrugged. ‘Isn’t seeing the future a hoot?’
Tiger looked at me and I nodded to him that he should take it seriously.
‘Thank you, sir,’ said Tiger with a bow.
‘Well, there you have it,’ said Kevin, and he left in a hurry as he had felt a good tip on Baron, a six-year-old mare running in the Hereford Gold Stakes Handicap.
The phone rang and I picked it up, listened for a few moments and scribbled a note on a standard form.
‘This is a form B2-5C,’ I told Tiger, ‘for a minor spell of less than a thousand Shandars. I need you to take it up to the Mysterious X in Room 245 and tell them that I sent you and we need this job done as soon as possible.’
He took the form and stared at me nervously.
‘Who, exactly, is the Mysterious X?’
‘They’re more of a
Tiger looked at the note, then at the Quarkbeast, then at where the moose had been but suddenly wasn’t, then back at me.
‘This is a test, isn’t it?’
He was smart, this one. I nodded.
‘You can be back with the Sisterhood by teatime, and no one will have thought any the worse of you. I’ll let you in on a secret. You weren’t sent to me as a punishment, nor by chance. Mother Zenobia is an ex-sorceress herself, and only sends those she deems truly exceptional. Aside from the fifth foundling—the one we don’t talk about—she’s never been wrong.’
‘So was all that stuff about the Limping Man, the thirteenth floor, the second sub-basement and being flown in a cardboard box also part of the test?’
‘No, that was for real. And that’s just the weird stuff I can remember right now. We haven’t even got started on emergency procedures yet.’
‘Right,’ he said and, after taking a deep breath, he left the room. He was back again a few moments later.
‘This job,’ he said, waving the form B2-5C nervously, ‘is it something to do with Dark Forces?’
‘There’s no such thing as the “Forces of Darkness”, despite what you read in the storybooks. There are no “Dark Arts” or “wizards pulled to the dark side”. There is only the Good or Bad that lurks in the heart of Man. And in answer to your question, X’s job is a cat stuck up a tree. He’ll grumble, but he’ll do it.’
About the Mystical Arts
‘It was kind of... well,
‘That’s the Mysterious X all over,’ I said. ‘Did it show you its stamp collection?’
‘It tried to,’ said Tiger, ‘but I was too quick for it. What exactly
I shrugged. There was a very good reason X carried the accolade ‘Mysterious’.
We were talking over a pre-bedtime cup of hot chocolate in the kitchens. Wizard Moobin, Lady Mawgon and Full Price had finished the rewiring job early and got the bus back into town. They were quite elated at the way the gig had gone, and even Lady Mawgon had permitted herself a small smile by way of celebration. Wizidrical power had been strong today—almost everyone had noticed. I’d fielded a few calls although nothing too serious, and one from a journalist at the
The rest of the afternoon had been spent explaining to Tiger how Kazam is run, and introducing him to the least insane residents. He had been particularly taken with Brother Gillingrex of Woodseaves, who had made speaking to birds something of a speciality. He could speak Quack so well that he knew all the eighty-two different words ducks use to describe water. He could also speak Coot, Goose, Wader and Chirrup—which is a sort of generic Pigeon/Sparrow language. He was working on Osprey, had a few useful sentences in Buzzard and the Owl word for ‘mouse’, which is tricky to pronounce if you don’t have a beak. He was mostly employed by birdwatchers, especially useful when it was time for putting identification rings on their legs. Birds worry endlessly about their appearance—all that preening is not only about flying, as they might have you believe—and a softly spoken ‘that looks
‘Does anyone else at Kazam have an accolade?’ asked Tiger, who seemed to be developing an interest in
