Abarat: The First Book of Hours

supernatural strength Wolfswinkel was displaying: the source of it, of course, those ridiculous hats of his. Candy flailed around, hoping by chance to knock them off his head again, but he had her held in such a position that she was powerless to do so. “You’re coming back to the house with me,” he said. “Right now.”

Candy continued to struggle, but the man’s strength was simply overwhelming. She started to yell for help, hoping there might be somebody out there on the murky slopes that could save them.

“It’s a lost cause, I’m afraid,” Wolfswinkel said, his invisible mouth inches from Candy’s ear. His breath stank of rum.

Before Candy could reply, there was a lot of motion in the grass around them, and out of the darkened landscape came a number of tarrie-cats. It was not a small assembly. One minute the place was deserted; the next the beasts seemed to be all around them, their ears pricked, their eyes incandescent, watching Candy intently as she struggled in the arms of her invisible captor. As they approached, she remembered the horrendous crimes Wolfswinkel had claimed the cats had been responsible for. Had any of what he’d told her been true? Had the tarrie-cats come here now to commit some new atrocity? To leap on poor Malingo while he lay on the ground and scratch out his eyes? Or to climb up her body and smother her?

As if their situation wasn’t bad enough, it had now become incalculably worse.

Or so she thought.

But as the tarrie-cats advanced upon them, she felt Kaspar’s hold on her weaken a little, and a few muttered words escaped his lips.

“You stay away from me…” he warned them.

The tarrie-cats ignored him. They simply continued their approach, their scrutiny frighteningly intense.

“Don’t look at me that way,” Wolfswinkel said to them.

Look at me? Candy thought. What did he mean by look at me? He was invisible, surely. How could they possibly be seeing him? Suddenly it was clear to Candy.

“They can see you,” she said to Kaspar.

The magician made no reply. But he didn’t need to. His body was answering for him. He’d begun to shake, and his grip on Candy had weakened so much that she was able to slip free of him. She went immediately to tend to Malingo, who was still curled up on the ground.

“It’s all right,” she reassured him. “The tarrie-cats are here.”

“That’s good?” he said, turning over to look at her. There was blood and fear on his face.

“Oh, yes, it’s good,” she said.

“How so?”

“Because the tarries can see him, Malingo.”

“They can?”

They both looked up.

The animals’ eyes were all focused on the same spot, just a few feet from Candy and Malingo. And from that exact place came Wolfswinkel’s voice.

“You keep your distance, you spit rags!” he wailed at the tarries. “Stay away, I’m warning you, or I’ll set fire to your tails. I mean it. You don’t know the things I can do to the likes of you!”

A few of the tarries exchanged anxious glances at Wolfswinkel’s outburst, but none of them were intimidated enough to retreat.

“He’s bluffing,” Candy said to them. “Do you understand me? He’s afraid of you.”

“You be quiet, bug-rot!” Wolfswinkel yelled, his voice shrill now. “I’ll deal with you later.”

Malingo, meanwhile, had got to his feet. The blood was running down the side of his face from the wound on his brow, but he seemed indifferent to his own hurt. There was a strange new confidence about him.

“You know all you ever do is threaten people,” he said, striding toward the place where the many stares of the tarrie-cats converged; in other words, the spot where the wizard stood. Wolfswinkel said nothing more—presumably hoping to keep his ex-slave’s hands from touching him. Then he beat a rapid retreat. Candy and Malingo could hear the dirt his heels kicked up, and they could see the collective gaze of the tarries moving up the slope, following the magician as he fled for the sanctuary of his house.

Malingo wasn’t about to let him get there. He chased Wolfswinkel up the slope, glancing back at the animals now and again to confirm that he was indeed running in the right direction.

He was twenty yards shy of the front door when he pounced.

There was a loud, profoundly outraged yell from the murk.

“Unhand me, slave!” Wolfswinkel yelled.

“I am not your slave!” Malingo yelled back.

Clearly Wolfswinkel fought to be free of Malingo’s hold. It looked as though Malingo was wrestling with two armfuls of invisible eels, all slathered in fat. Threats and curses poured from Wolfswinkel.

Tired of the wizard’s endless mouthing, Malingo shook his prisoner back and forth.

“Show yourself,” he demanded.

He had grabbed Wolfswinkel’s neck, as far as Candy could guess, and was threatening to choke him.

“Take the hats off and show yourself.” he demanded.

A moment later a flickering form began to appear in Malingo’s arms, and an irate Kaspar Wolfswinkel came into view. He had taken off his hats, and he was clutching three in each hand. By the expression on his face, he would gladly have murdered every living thing on Ninnyhammer at that instant—starting with Candy and Malingo, then going on to the tarries.

“So now, Kaspar,” said a voice behind Candy, “you should perhaps go back to your house and stay there. You know you’re not supposed to be running around.”

Candy turned, wondering who the speaker was, and found herself face-to-face with a two-legged creature who had clearly some familial relationship with the tarries. Its wide face was covered with a subtle down of red- dish-brown fur. Its luminous eyes were decidedly feline, as were the whiskers that sprouted from its cheeks. It had apparently wandered up the hill to see what was going on.

“She started all this, Jimothi!” Kaspar said, pointing at Candy. “That damnable girl. Blame her, not me.”

“Oh, for A’zo’s sake, be quiet, Wolfswinkel,” the creature said.

Much to Candy’s surprise, Wolfswinkel did exactly that.

The creature returned to its gaze to Candy. “My name is Jimothi Tarrie.”

“I’m very pleased to meet you.”

“And you, of course are the famous—or is it infamous?—Candy Quackenbush.”

“You know of me?”

“There have been very few visitors to these islands whose presence has been so widely discussed,” Jimothi said.

“Really?”

“Oh, certainly.” He smiled, showing his pointed teeth. “I’ve been out among the islands these last two days, and it seems every second soul I met knows of you. Your celebrity grows by the Hour. People who can’t possibly have met you claim they have.”

“Really?” said Candy.

“Believe me. Did you buy a slice of Furini from the cheese maker in Autland?”

“No.”

“Well, he says you did. What about the shoes you ordered from a cobbler in Tazmagor?”