A Brief Note: This post sees the first entry from our cover competition. It’s so exciting to have someone draw a character I’ve seen only in my head, and do such a good job as well! This one comes from Sheila Bacai.
The poem was still there, the URL the same, but the blank screen now had four posts, three pictures and a poem, set neatly across the top of her blog.
The pictures were OK. One was a horse, sort of white and grey, with big hair between its eyes. It looked kinda sad, like no one wanted to talk to it. She could relate. The next was a necklace, and actually, it was really lovely. It was gold, which wasn’t cool, but it was really simple, a red jewel in the shape of an eye, set on a fine chain.
The third was a book, which was just fine, one of the old leather bound ones that probably contained lots of unnecessary words, but some quite good stories.
So, a book, a necklace, and a horse. What was weird, was that none of them had any comments, like they’d been made and put straight on her blog. She was used enough to the world of magic that the actual act of someone else posting to her blog just wasn’t that freaky.
She moved to the poem, mentally clearing her throat:
The year is dying, fading fast,
The sun goes down on all you know
The end is coming, this one last,
No crops to reap from what you sow
The world beneath us, rising fast
Come to feast and slake their thirst
The year is over, time has passed,
What once was last is now the first.
Oh. Well, that was a bit…ordinary. Not much by way of beautiful, or mysterious. Well, sort of mysterious, but mostly creepy. And what was with all the rhyming, like, totally over the top?
This one had a comment:
On Christmas night, The Underworld will rise.
The Underworld was capitalised, as though the commenter knew what she did, knew about the world beneath the real one. She shook her head, abruptly shoving the computer away and folding her arms. She felt sick. She’d eaten dinner too fast.
She stood, and paced the room a couple of times. She needed Disney, this was all a bit too much. She chose Aladdin, just for the hot princess, and settled down to watch, closing the lid of the lap top absently, as though it wasn’t bothering her, as though it was watching, and might think it was bothering her. She grinned sheepishly at her room.
(c) Sheila Bacai
The genie was just transforming into some sort of power tool when she hit pause and yanked open her lap top. The posts were still there, and were, she now decided, definitely trying to tell her something.
Something was going to happen, at Christmas, something that involved the Underworld, and people ‘slaking their thirst’ which, had she known what slaking meant, would almost certainly have been a bad thing. What the pictures were about, she had no idea though, or why it had all appeared on her wall.
There was, probably, some kind of magical connection, so maybe that was it, but if the blogger was looking for some kind of help, they’d come to the wrong girl. She was an apprentice of five months training, and, yeah, she could float things now, and create gates, and even make fire, but the last one gave her a head ache, and made her want to wee, which didn’t really seem to be the stuff of magical legends.
She needed to talk to Martin. That was the simple truth she’d been skirting around for the last half hour. She sighed, and looked at the ceiling. Life was never simple. It was almost certainly someone’s fault, and definitely not hers, but there was nothing she could do about it, so she grabbed her spell book, jacket and oyster, sidled downstairs, and was out the front door before mum could spot her.
Up through the estate, in through the bin doors and she was standing outside Martin’s ‘door’. She knocked, and seconds later he hauled it open, as if he’d been waiting for her. She looked at him, eyebrows raised, and he returned the look, equally serious.
‘Um, hi?’
He replied with a nod, and stepped back, ushering her in. They’d tidied the place after the watchers trashed it. She’d got to know him better in that one afternoon than in all their lessons, as they talked about normal, non magic stuff. She’s wanted to ask about his wife, but hadn’t been able to summon up the courage.
Now it was back to being a familiar, comfortable mess, and she sunk into the sofa with a grateful sigh. He folded his arms, and stared down at her, until she squirmed. ‘Uh, yes?’
He shook his head. ‘It is normally customary to apologise when you’ve insulted someone.’
‘Well, go on then.’
He sniffed, and tapped one foot against the floor. They waited. This was boring. ‘OK, fine, I’m sorry, OK?’
He smiled, nodding. ‘Thank you. That wasn’t too hard now, was it?’
‘You know, I don’t think I should have to apologise if you actually are being a dick.’
He sat in his chair, still smiling, and leaned back, crossing his hands over his stomach. He’d neatened up a bit since the Council thing, though his hair was still a mess. She glanced around, letting out a breath, a smile playing across her face. She’d missed it here.
‘So, my apprentice, are you here for a lesson, or do you have some other matter you wish to discuss?’
‘How do you know that? Really, like, how do you know?’
He spread his hands apart, palms up. ‘I’m a magician, Scarlet, what do you expect?’
‘But it doesn’t work like that, I mean, you have to do spells and stuff, you don’t just know things.’
He laughed. ‘We are linked, you and I, as a master and apprentice should be. I know when your mood is not as it usually is. What is it?’
She told him about the Tumblr thing. It took a while as she had to explain what Tumblr was, then what a blog was, then what social media was. She thought she was going to have to go over what a computer was, when he finally got it, and let her go into the details.
When she pulled out her phone, and recited the poem, he shook his head, face going pale, and put his hands up as though she were pointing a gun at him.
‘What is it?’
‘The poem. Do you know who sent it?’
‘Um, no. Well, there’s a comment on it, so I could look at that person, but all I’d know is their Tumblr account, which could be anything.’
‘But isn’t it social media? So, you socialise with people?’
‘Well, yeah, but only through the computer.’
‘So is there a photo of them?’
Scarlet shrugged. ‘Could be, but who’s to say it’s actually them?’
Martin looked at her as though she had three heads, brows creased fiercely together. ‘I’m not sure I fully understand Tumblr.’
‘Yeah, or, like, anything in the world, at all.’
He sniffed, and turned to his table. She stared at his back for a moment. ‘So come on, what is it, what’s so wrong?’
He sighed. ‘The poem is ancient. The words have changed, been updated somewhat, but the meaning is still the same. Someone has discovered the grave of the Undying, and that means they intend to end the world.’
‘Huh?’
Next Instalment Friday 7th February