She accepted the linen handkerchief Mrs. Forester offered. Putting on a brave smile, she said, “We’ll come up with something.”
“Why wouldn’t the Grand Abracadabran front you the blunt?” Mrs. Forester asked.
Miranda fluttered the handkerchief. “He says he’s giving all his funding to Randal Stevens’ warlock school. He doesn’t believe witches should be doing industrial wizardry.”
Mrs. Forester made a sound that would have made the Grand Abracadabran proud. “He is a conceited, self-righteous, misogynous ass, isn’t he?”
Miranda darted a look at Jessica but found the girl had gone. Probably to spread the word about their headmistress’ failure to procure funding.
With a sigh, Miranda rose. “I’d better talk to the girls about this. Jessica will have them whipped into a frenzy in five minutes, and then we’ll really have a mess.”
Mrs. Forester twitched a brow. “Quite. The last time those little cherubs lost control, one of them converted every mouse in the county into talking, purple-spotted cats. Dear me! What a disaster!”
That reminder sent Miranda racing up to the third floor where the girls’ dormitory was tucked under the roof. Clutching a lantern with one hand to light the way and her skirts with the other, Miranda stomped up the rickety wooden stairs to the attic. Most of the space was one giant room with an angled roof high in the center and falling off to the floor on either side. The girls’ beds marched one after another along the length of the space with a dresser between each as spacing. Each bed possessed a feather mattress and lots of down-filled pillows. The linens were of good quality, if somewhat threadbare, and knitted wool afghans lay folded on each bed to keep its occupant warm. The space was spartan but clean and safe.
When Miranda arrived, the girls had blown out their lanterns, but she knew by the smell of smoke in the air, they’d only done it moments before she stepped into the attic. All now pretended to be asleep, unmoving lumps beneath their quilts. Miranda wasn’t fooled. She set the lantern on a table and clapped her hands.
“All right, ladies,” she announced. “I know you were still up and talking a minute ago. You know there’s nothing I hate more than being lied to.”
“We aren’t lying!” piped Missy, a tiny mite who was five years old and a foundational witch good with stone and earth. “We’re sleeping.”
Miranda’s lips twitched, threatening to smile. “I see. You always talk in your sleep.”
Missy’s mouth opened in an O before she snapped it shut, closed her eyes, and pulled her quilt over her head.
“Please, ladies,” Miranda said patiently. “I know Jessica overheard the conversation downstairs.”
Immediately, thirty-two heads popped up. The girls, ranging in age from five to fifteen, sat up in their beds.
“Is it true?” Deidre asked. “Are they going to close our school so Mr. Stevens’ horrid boys can have the money?”
“They can’t!” exclaimed Missy, pounding her fists on her bed. “We can’t let them do that!”
With a sigh, Miranda leaned her hips against the desk near the door and folded her arms. Funny how children misinterpreted things. “No, they aren’t closing our school. But finances probably will. You know I’ve been struggling to keep the books balanced.” She drew another breath. “I know it’s not something you should be worried about because you are just little girls after all…”
“We’re not little girls!” exclaimed Nan. She was one of the older girls and a luminous witch. As she grew angrier, a light started to glow in the palms of her hands. If she got excited enough, she could blow the roof off the building with her incandescence. “We’re Exceptional Ladies.”
Miranda smiled. “Indeed, you are. But finances are my problem. I don’t want to burden you with them.” She rubbed her arms. “However, as you know, I believe in open and honest communication, and I would be remiss if I didn’t tell you what has occurred. Yes, I requested funding from the Grand Abracadabran in London. Yes, he refused. He’ll be funding the Junior Warlock’s Academy, not us.”
“So those awful boys are stealing our money!” shrieked Annabelle.
Margot leaped to her feet. “We can’t let them! It’s not fair!”
Miranda raised her hands. “Now! Now! Ladies. Calm down. The boys didn’t steal anything. Sir Basil Pfisterbottom…”
“You can’t trust a wizard,” hissed Deidre. Her pale blond hair began to waft around her face as her agitation grew. She was an ethereal witch, able to manipulate the air and other gasses. Papers flew off the desk from her breeze.
Miranda’s heart started to pound. This could quickly go out of control.
“Everyone, settle down. It’s not that…
Nan was standing on her bed in violation of the rules. The glow of light in her palms had spread over her entire body as she gathered energy. “I knew I should have kicked Billy Martin’s arse during the Spring Festival!”
“Nan!” Miranda stomped her foot. “That’s not how a lady acts.”
“I can pull the stones out from their school,” Missy offered. “Bring it down on them.”
“You will not!” Miranda rounded on the girl. Missy was young and still learning, but she just might succeed in knocking enough stones out of the Academy to do damage. “Nan, get back in bed. The rest of you, lie down.” She burned each girl with her gaze. “Now!”
One by one, the girls grudgingly settled and pulled their covers up. Miranda didn’t move until every one of them had obeyed her.
Picking up the lantern, she said, “We’ll figure out something in the morning. Get some sleep, girls.”
“Yes, Miss Winters,” a half-dozen high-pitched voices called.
Miranda frowned, wondering why the remainder were silent. With a shake of her head, she headed downstairs to pretend, much like her girls, that she would get some sleep.
“Dearie, they’ve flown the coop!”
Miranda’s head popped out of a vile nightmare at the hard shake to her shoulder. Gasping in fright, she sat up, spraying a protective splash of water in all directions to drive off her attacker.
“Oh, now!” Mrs. Forrester danced backwards to avoid getting wet. “You’ve no need to drench me, Miss Winters.”
Blinking blearily, Miranda frowned at her helpmate. “Mrs. Forrester! What are you doing here? It must be…” She glanced out her window to see only the black of night. “Goodness! The middle of the night.”
“The girls, Miss Winters,” the old woman gasped. “They’ve bolted.”
Miranda was instantly awake and sitting up. “What do you mean they’ve bolted? To where?” Even as the words left her mouth, Miranda knew where her brood of troublesome little witches had gone. Straight for Ardmore Manor. Randal’s warlock school.
“Oh, dear God!” she gasped, scrambling to her feet and grabbing at clothes. “We’ve got to stop them before they attack! As angry as they are, they’re capable of anything. Blowing up the Manor. Turning all the boys into insufferable Frenchmen. They might even cut a magical trench across all of England and make Scotland an island!”
“Maybe that’s a good thing,” Mrs. Forrester considered.
Miranda gave her housekeeper a scathing look. Jumping on one foot while she jammed a half-boot on the other, she staggered for the door. “Oh…I’m going to lose my Professional Conjurer’s License over this!” she muttered. “I’ll be arrested. Sent to Australia! Hell on earth! I’ll die speaking English with a funny accent!”
“Can’t be worse than the one you’ve got now, dearie!” Mrs. Forrester called to her back.
But Miranda had hitched up her skirts and was pelting out the front door.
She dashed across the lawn and up the lane, her feet drumming steadily. Once away from the school, however, with its handful of gaslights, the night became wickedly dark. Cursing in a most unladylike fashion, Miranda glared up at the night sky. Heavy cloud cover hid the moon. Still in a dead run, she panted a dis-spell which sent the clouds spinning away. Her magic w
as so uncontrolled and violent, the clouds broiled into a great mass and a tremendous thunderstorm complete with tornado rolled through Murton. Miranda could only swear some more and promise to send ten weeks of sunshine to the village tomorrow.
Ardmore Manor stood only a mile from Miss Augusta’s school, a juxtaposition explained by the fall of ley lines in the area. Both schools had been established at a point of convergence to make best use of the magical power running through the earth. Building a school atop convergences gave student magic a boost, like providing a cushion under one’s rump at the dinner table. Ordinarily, Miranda considered that an advantage. But not tonight. Not with thirty-two little witches on the warpath headed for seventy-six junior warlocks who had no idea the juggernaut heading for them.
Or maybe they did.
Miranda tripped and nearly fell when a pig wearing a night shirt slammed into the grass near her with a squeal of protest. It popped to its hooves and snorted something that sounded rather like bloody hell. Which was when Miranda recognized the porcine face as that of Julius Featherbern, one of the students at Randal’s academy. As she recalled, he’d always been a chubby, arrogant, pig-like young man so the transformation was rather apt. She planted her hand over her mouth to keep from laughing as the junior warlock, now transmogrified by Margot’s magic into an actual pig, looked down at his hooves and oinked in horror.
“I’ll fix it!” she gasped as she ran past the boy.
He squealed again, but Miranda kept running.
Miranda flinched when an explosion rumbled through the ground. Up ahead, she saw what looked like sparks flying high into the sky before they rained down around her in a strangely fragrant shower. Miranda found herself pelted by soft, pale stones that bounced gently off her. The sudden snowstorm blinding her, Miranda stumbled as her skirts swished in three inches of the yellowish stuff. When she held out her hand to catch the odd pellets, they struck her and pinged away, leaving greasy patches on her fingers.
“What in the world…?” Miranda’s breath caught as she struggled forward into the storm to emerge beside Ardmore Manor’s farmstead. There she found the source of the strange rain. The corn silo was erupting like a volcano. Deidre, the aerial witch, had hit its contents with broiling air, instantaneously causing each individual bit of corn to explode. A fountain of popcorn plumed into the night air and fell as a shower across the countryside. Little Betsy and Francine raced around in their night shifts snatching up handfuls of it and stuffing it into their mouths.
“Girls!” Miranda protested. “Don’t eat food off the ground. You’ll get worms.”
Francine looked at her dirty hand then at Miranda, shrugged, and kept eating.
Shrieks and cries from the manor house drove Miranda on. She’d deal with the stomach aches she knew were coming later.
Rounding the barn, Miranda staggered to a stop before Ardmore Manor. The entire five story granite building appeared to be on fire. Light brighter than the sun glowed from every window, dazzling Miranda. With her hand before her eyes, she squinted, knowing Nan was at work. The luminous witch’s brilliant light had jolted the young warlocks from their sleep and sent them fleeing in their night shirts onto the lawn in front of the house. Still half-asleep, the boys were easy pickings for Margot’s transmogrifying magic. The older girl stood brilliantly lit by Nan’s blaze, a self-satisfied smirk on her lips as she selected an appropriate animal for each of her victims then zapped them with bolts from her hands.
Poor Jonathan, a rather tall, thin, pedantic boy, began to elongate, his legs, arms and neck all stretching for the sky. A rain of shredded nightshirt joined the popcorn as he transformed into a giraffe. Terrified, he reared, kicking out his long legs and walloping two of his fellow warlocks on their backsides, sending them tumbling into the creek. A quick snap of Margot’s fingers saved the pair from drowning by changing them into ducks. Splashing frantically, both ducks flopped towards the bank. The quacking of one sounded like I can’t swim!
Regaining some of her wits, Miranda fashioned a quick spell that diverted the stream away from the struggling ducks, allowing them to flounder onto to land and lie there like two tiny beached whales.
Before Miranda could stop her, Margot turned her vindictive gaze on the Turner Triplets, little boys still in knickers. Pop! Pop! Pop! they went. Then hop! Hop! Hop! as they became fluffy gray rabbits darting about in panic.
With a cry, Miranda scrambled to grab one before he hopped under the hooves of Jonathan Giraffe. Clutching the trembling bunny to her chest, Miranda whirled on Margot.
“Stop it this instant!” she demanded. She was too flabbergasted to conjure a spell to stop it herself nor was she certain if she did that it wouldn’t just add to the chaos.
“I can’t now!” Margot complained, pointing.
Still holding the rabbit, Miranda spun to see what worried the girl. Young warlocks boiled en masse out of the blazing house, flinging bolts of magic at the marauding witches. Gerald, one of the older boys, narrowed his eyes at the sight of his compatriots oinking, galloping and hopping about as animals. He spat out a spell and cow patties from the nearby field rose up. Horrified, Miranda watched them come flying at her girls.
Annabelle lifted her hands, spun her own spell in return, and the cow patties transformed in mid-flight into fruit pies. The sailing pies hit their targets, splattering numerous witches with gooey cherry, apple and strawberry filling. Miranda ducked just in time to avoid a coconut cream to the face.
“Everyone!” she shouted. “Stop it! Please!”
Too slowly, she twisted to avoid another pie. It grazed her cheek, leaving a blob of fruit behind.
As she stretched her tongue to lick it off, Miranda murmured. “Hmmm! Rhubarb!”
A shadow appeared in the door of the manor house, back lit by Nan’s blazing fireball. Although she couldn’t make out a single feature, Miranda had no doubt that tall, lithe figure was Randal. He stepped onto the lawn but proceeded no further. He took no action to stop the magical carnage.
In her frantic ducking to avoid fruity cow pies and keep hold of a squirming rabbit boy, Miranda couldn’t study his face to determine what he was thinking. But that he wasn’t going to aid her became abundantly clear when one of his warlocks conjured balls of yarn that went spinning through the attacking girls. As they unwound, the balls tangled in everyone’s feet. Girls tripped this way and boys that when they were assaulted by worsted weight wool. In minutes, half the children were hogtied in a pretty spiderweb of neon green, puce and purple.
“Aren’t you going to help?” Miranda shouted at Randal in frustration. She caught the second Turner Triplet and struggled to juggle two squirming rabbits at the same time.
Randal’s dark eyes shimmered in the strange light. When Miranda realized his attention was focused on something outside the immediate war zone, she turned. Her heart hit the ground with a thunk.
Standing just beyond the whirl of yarn balls stood Sir Basil Pfisterbottom, his mouth hanging open, his eyes goggling. He was so stunned by the magical war, he sputtered incoherently. His eyes found Miranda’s, and she saw the flash of fury and disgust. Her heart thumping painfully, Miranda watched him storm through the battle directly towards her, using his magic to fend off attacking cow pies, popcorn balls, yarn bombs and prancing giraffes until he stood before her in all his Grand Abracadabran pomposity.
“Miss Winters!” he boomed. He shoved his face into hers, so close spittle hit her in the eye. “What in the name of all that’s phantasmagorical is happening?”
Miranda tried to raise her hands to ward off the blustering bombast but two furry rabbits kept them busy. “I don’t know what to say, Sir Basil,” she wailed. Her eyes started to burn as tears threatened to overwhelm her. “It’s not…”
“Not what?” His voice rose three octaves. “A complete, unmitigated disaster? A catastrophe of epic proportions? An insidious rout of distaffian chicanery? If not that, what is it? I came here at my nephew’s request to give your proposal a
second review and this!” He shoved a finger under her nose at the rabbits, “is what I find of your genteel, exceptional ladies. They’re exceptional all right. Exceptional twizzling vermicelli from hell!”
Before Miranda could retort that her girls weren’t worms made of pasta or anything else, a blob of butter from the summer kitchen sailed at them. It hit Sir Basil in the chest then slowly sank earthward, leaving a long slimy trail behind like a slow-moving snail. Sir Basil’s mouth flapped in his horror as he slapped it off his fine silk vest. Seeing the Grand Abracadabran so bloated with rage that his face was beet red and his eyes were popping, Margot spun a new enchantment at the pats of butter being flung by a warlock. Instantaneously, the butter evaporated in mid air, and a cloud of brilliantly-colored wings scattered in all directions.
“Butterflies,” Margot giggled. She danced away to wreak more havoc elsewhere.
The stunt transported Sir Basil past enraged, through blood-boilingly infuriated and right to explosively apoplectic. He tore off a stream of such foul invective, Miranda stood in stunned awe, buffeted by wave after wave of curses so vile they developed into a fog that would probably hover over Murton for centuries to come. He kept going even after Randal appeared at his side, rested a gentle hand on his arm, and quietly said, “Uncle,” several times. That seemed to enrage him even further until he reached new heights in vulgarity such that even Randal was punched back by the force of the miasma he generated. The expletive fog became so great, it enveloped the battlefield, silencing one by one the combatants so that their magic gradually dissipated and they grew silent. Still Sir Basil went on, excoriating Miranda to where she suspected she had no flesh left on her bones.
“And… and… and…” Sir Basil hiccoughed, sounding stuck as he stretched for the final, perfect word to slay Miranda where she stood. Yet he couldn’t find it. His eyes bulged from his florid face. Spittle glistened on his chin. His clenched fists shook with his all-encompassing fury.
Fantastic Schools: Volume One (Fantastic Schools Anthologies Book 1) Page 3
