The Demon Curse

by Simon Nicholson

  “Maybe best to be safe.” Daggerbeard turned away with Yelloweyes.

  “It’ll be easy enough.” Yelloweyes lowered his voice. “Already caught them in our nets, like fish out of the sea. We’ll just wrap them back up, take them out on our boat. Throw the nets down into the water, like we always do. Who’s to say what’s tangled up in them…”

  “Billie! The spirits!” The words, tiny noises, hissed out of the corner of Harry’s mouth. “The Islanders’ spirits, remember?!”

  A fisherman’s hand was covering Billie’s face, but Harry could see her eyes. They flickered a few times, and then they squeezed so tightly shut that almost every other bit of her face clenched with the effort. She understood. Harry checked the distance between the sack on the table and the brazier again and adjusted his boot so that it gripped the table leg even more securely. His eyes slanted to the door and he saw, propped next to it, an old rowing paddle. The last bit of the trick.

  “Sure, we’ll lose some good netting.” Yelloweyes was still muttering. “But that won’t be hard to replace and—”

  Harry tipped over the table. The sack slid off it, but Harry’s boot flew up in time and kicked it at the exact angle he needed. The sack spun, arched through the air, and shot straight down toward the brazier, glancing against the steel rim and tumbling into the flames, which shot up, a furious green. Plumes of smoke sprawled, just like in Brother Jacques’s hut but twenty times thicker, and Harry kept his gaze fixed on Billie. Her eyes were still shut, like two screwed-up fists, and he knew the plan would work as he squeezed his own eyes shut too.

  “I can’t see!”

  “What have they done?”

  “Don’t let them get away!”

  “My eyes! My eyes!”

  The fishermen’s fists fell away. The wooden floor shuddered as boots stumbled and bodies thudded to the ground. Every one of the fishermen, Harry knew, would be digging into their eyes, trying to rid them of that stinging blur, and he felt a faint stinging in his own eyes too as a few wisps found their way through the squeezed lids. He rolled over, boots thundering, hands scrabbling around him, and he kept his face as close as he could to the ground. Only then did he risk a blink.

  “This way, Billie! Follow me!”

  The smoke was thinner down by the ground. Harry saw scrambling boots, collapsing bodies, and beyond them, the boathouse door. He spotted Billie’s hand and grabbed it. His eyes squeezed shut again, but that image of the boathouse door hovered on. He scrabbled forward, tugging Billie after him, and reached the door. He grabbed the paddle hanging from the hook behind it for the last part of the trick, just in time.

  “The door! Get to the door, everyone! That’s how they’ll escape!” one of the fishermen yelled.

  Harry held the paddle like a spear and flung it as hard as he could across the boathouse, aiming it so it would fly over the fishermen’s heads. He heard a crash and the shattering of a window. The whole boathouse shuddered as every fisherman spun around in the direction of the sound.

  “They’re trying to get out the back!”

  “Stop them!”

  Just like a trick. Harry pulled Billie out onto the steps. All a matter of making your audience look in the wrong place—and there was nowhere more pointless to look right now than on the other side of the boathouse. He stumbled down the stairs. His eyes were open, and he felt a little blurriness, a mild stinging, but that was all. He leaped onto the soft mud of the beach, Billie landing beside him. They reached their boat, and with a shove of his shoulder, Harry launched it.

  “Maybe you were right about the Islanders’ magic, Billie,” Harry said as they scrambled into the boat.

  “What?”

  “About it protecting you. Looks like it got you out of another sticky situation just now. Me too.” He couldn’t help a tiny smile from forming on his face as he dug into the water with an oar. “Not a bad stunt, that.”

  “Row, Harry! Row!”

  They were out on the river, but Billie was pointing back at the boathouse. At the top of the steps, the fishermen were stumbling out through the door, their boots slithering in the wet sand, their fists still rubbing their eyes. Harry made out the voices of Daggerbeard and Yelloweyes, thundering through the rain.

  “Stop them!”

  Too late. Harry tugged on the oars, Billie pulled up the sail, and the boat glided away. Back on the shore, the fishermen were toppling down the steps onto the beach, and a few of them even managed to reach their boats, fumbling and cursing. A couple of skiffs bobbed away from the shore, but the occupants floundered, unable to see. Harry stopped rowing because the sail had caught the wind; the boat shot through the water, leaving the fishermen behind. Billie sat in the stern, looking back at the struggling shapes still visible on the shore. Rain trickled down her cheeks, and her eyes blazed.

  “Don’t worry. At least we managed to wreck their plan.” Harry slotted the oars into their holders. “If they go back, if they try and put anything under the mayor’s bed, we’ll tell everyone about it—the Islanders will never get the blame. Anyway, they haven’t even got the stuff anymore; it’s all gone up in smoke and—”

  “It doesn’t make any difference, does it?” Billie’s head snapped around. Her eyes were glaring at him now, not the men on the shore. “Can’t you see that? Can’t you?”

  The boat flew on. The rain fell even more thickly, coating Harry’s face, but he felt it burn away almost immediately. The blush was back, even more powerful than before, and he felt blood throb in his cheeks, his jaw, even down his neck. He looked up at Billie and saw tears spilling from her eyes.

  “Sorry, Harry. It’s not your fault. It’s just…” Her head sunk onto her chest. “So maybe we’ve managed to stop their plan. But the only reason it would have ever worked in the first place was because this whole city’s rising up against the Islanders, isn’t it? And we haven’t done anything about that, have we?”

  “I…I guess not…”

  “You saw Oscar Dupont! You saw the crowd—they burned down one of the Islanders’ huts, didn’t they? Who knows what they’ll do next! If they don’t discover something under a floor, do you think it’ll be long before they find another excuse?” She grabbed a rope. “As far as New Orleans is concerned, this demon curse is still on the loose. So it doesn’t matter what we found out back there. The demon curse—until we discover the truth behind it, the Islanders are in as much danger as ever.”

  “I know—”

  The wind snatched the words from Harry’s mouth. He tried to think of other ones, of anything to say at all, but his lips remained still. Crouched in the boat, he ran back over everything that had happened, ever since the moment when those two burly figures had appeared in Mayor Monticelso’s office. He thought of how carefully he had followed the two men, how determinedly he had broken into the boathouse to spy on them, how certain he had been. Wrong, wrong about everything…

  “Come on.” Billie’s voice was softer now. “Maybe Artie’s discovered something. He said he’d have gotten through half of magic and folklore by now, remember?”

  The rain drove harder against the sail, making the boat fly on. Clouds of mist swirled in the darkness. Billie frowned, but she seemed to be concentrating on the ropes of the boat, tugging at them so that the boat curved toward the city and its wharfs. Harry joined in, undoing knots. Maybe she’s right; maybe Arthur will have found something.

  The boat sailed up to a wharf. Billie tied it to a post, and Harry followed her along the wharf’s planks. Together, they made their way through the rainy streets. The iron balconies dripped, and up in the sky, the dark clouds glimmered around their edges. Thunder echoed all around. Harry and Billie reached the main square and hurried over to the New Orleans Public Library, where a crowd had gathered outside.

  Harry stopped. It was Oscar Dupont’s mob. He recognized the placards and some of the faces too, even mo
re fearful and hateful than the last time. People were joining the crowd all the time, pouring out of the surrounding streets. Some carried banners; some were carrying poles with lanterns dangling from them, each one bright with flames. In the middle of it all was Oscar Dupont, rain spattering off his bald head, his eyes gleaming, his arms jabbing as he addressed the crowd. More hateful words, thought Harry, but then he found himself listening to those words quite carefully, taking in each one.

  “The demon curse! It has struck again!”

  “What’s that?” Billie was frozen beside Harry too. “What—”

  “Follow me,” said Harry urgently.

  He didn’t quite recognize his own voice. It hung there in the rain, unusually high, as he threw himself into the crowd. His body felt unfamiliar and awkward too, his legs weak, his arms slow. He tried to push through the crowd and pushed again but remained where he was, and he wondered whether it would be possible to make his way to the front. But then the crowd broke apart in front of him, a corridor forming all the way up to the library’s doors.

  “Let them through!”

  “They’re his friends, aren’t they?”

  “Orphans from a swamp school! They came to city hall this morning!”

  “Let them through!”

  Harry ran. His legs trembled, but they kept moving under him, and he arrived at the library doors. Billie blundered into his back, and he saw that her face was pale, her mouth open. Together they ran into the hall and saw a group of men up at the top of the library’s main staircase. They raced up the stairs, pushed past the men, and stumbled into a domed reading room.

  Harry saw him.

  He reached out and grabbed the corner of a desk, taking in the piles of books, the scattered papers.

  And he saw the boy’s body, slightly smaller than his own, spread out on the floor, his back arched, limbs shaking.

  Arthur.

  Chapter 13

  “Found right there!” one of the men shouted.

  “Stretched out and trembling!”

  “The curse! The curse!”

  “The demon has entered him!”

  Pain shot through Harry’s knees as he slammed down onto the polished floor. He crouched over Arthur, staring at his face. He hardly recognized it. His friend’s familiar features, that gentle mouth, those inquiring eyes, were a tangled wreck. Harry felt the floor shudder and saw the back of Arthur’s head jolting against it. He tried to hold it still.

  “A poor orphan boy!” A frail voice cut through the crowd. “Why, he and his friends visited Mayor Monticelso earlier today! To comfort him, to aid his recovery. To think that one of them should end up suffering the same fate!”

  Dr. Mincing toppled in. The feeble-bodied doctor was in a completely distressed state, his hair flying in all directions, his hands fumbling with a stethoscope. Those dark-ringed eyes stared at the sprawling figure and then at Harry.

  “Forgive me!” A feeble croak fell from his lips. “If only I could offer you the slightest help! But what I told you this morning remains true now—I know nothing of this condition. Despite my years of study, my field trips, my journey into the jungles of Costa Rica…” He lowered his head. “It is just as it was with our poor mayor. The shaking will only increase from now. Soon, I shall have to arrange for your poor friend to be pinioned. For his own protection, you understand…”

  “Just tell us what happened! Tell us—”

  The floor shook harder. Billie’s knees had thudded onto it too, and she crouched over Arthur. Tears flooded from her eyes as she tried to say more, but her voice was a dry gasp, impossible to hear. Dr. Mincing hesitated then continued.

  “I was attending to Mayor Monticelso at city hall,” he spluttered. “A distressing enough business, but then a messenger burst in with news of a further terrible incident at the public library. I came directly. My medical knowledge, faced with these awful incidents, seems more useless by the hour, and yet I must do what I can!” He bent unsteadily over Arthur, as if to examine him. “What can I say? Is there any history of nervous disease in your friend’s family, perhaps? Anything that might explain his sudden collapse? Had he exhibited any unusual patterns of behavior in the last few hours, perhaps…”

  “Nothing.” Harry’s throat felt choked and swollen. “He was just helping us.”

  “Helping you? In what way?”

  “We were trying to find out what happened to Mayor Monticelso…” Billie managed another gasp. “The three of us, we wanted to—”

  “Arthur came here to do research.” Harry spotted his friend’s notebook, fallen by his body. His hand shook, but he picked it up. “Look, Billie—he was making notes and everything.”

  “Notes? Notes about what?” Dr. Mincing stared at the notebook. “What does it say? Read it! Perhaps some chance jotting might suggest something that happened to him in the minutes before the attack.”

  “It’s a list of books.” Harry peered at his friend’s handwriting, surrounded by inky splatters. “Magical Charms of the East Indies. Sorcery in Modern Siberia. A History of Supernatural Trances. All about magic…”

  “Ah yes, and he does appear to be in the section for books regarding such matters.” Dr. Mincing pointed at the nearby bookshelves and at a small brass sign hanging nearby. Magic and Folklore, it said. “It would seem your friend, like so many others, was putting Mayor Monticelso’s disease down to supernatural causes. Brave fellow, to delve into such matters.”

  “And he has paid the price! The price we shall all pay if we let this menace remain within our city!”

  It was Oscar Dupont. He stood in the doorway of the reading room, the crowd swelling behind him with their banners and placards. Dupont’s eyes flashed as they fixed on the shape on the library floor. One arm swung forward and pointed at Arthur; the other flew up, a fist punching the air. He was almost dancing as he poured out words faster than ever.

  “See what the Islanders will do! A boy! A boy dares to probe their darkness, and their vengeance is swift. They have set the demon on him, just as they did with our poor Monticelso. And if they did that to him, so harmless and young, whom will they spare?”

  “Get out! The Islanders didn’t have anything to do with it!”

  Billie was marching right up to him. Somehow, she had recovered her voice and her strength too, and her boots pounded across the floor. Harry saw the tears on her face trail backward with the speed of her march.

  “You? Why, I remember our conversation just this morning.” Dupont smiled. “You are a friend of the poor victim? How tragic. I remember how gently I tried to put you right this morning. A shame that it has taken a far more brutal event to reveal how little you understand these matters—”

  “Leave us in peace, will you?”

  “Again, the Islanders have struck!” Another punch of his fist, and Dupont swung around to address the crowd. “As I, your one loyal councilor, predicted. Pity this poor, brave boy. He was about to stumble on proof of their evil charms, I’ll be bound, but they set the demon upon him. And now we must take action of our own! We must rid this town of these villains and—”

  “Get out! Get out!” Billie yelled.

  She slammed the doors on him and fumbled with the key in the lock, her hands shaking. Billie turned and tried to head back across the room, but Harry saw that the last remains of her strength had vanished, her legs sinking beneath her. Only Dr. Mincing grabbing her arm stopped her from collapsing completely. He lowered her beside Arthur on the floor, as carefully as he could.

  “Talk to your poor friend, my girl!” The doctor pointed sadly at Arthur. “I have summoned men to take him to the hospital, but in the meantime, help him cling on to his sanity, to his sense of himself! Gather around him, and show your faces! It had no effect on Mayor Monticelso, of course, but you hardly knew him, whereas your relationship with your friend is more powerful. Some memory of nor
mal happiness might help shift this dreadful affliction.”

  “It’s all my fault, Harry!” Billie could hardly look at Arthur. “I was the one who wanted to help the Islanders—”

  “We all did.” Harry cut her off. “We all wanted to help—Artie too. That’s why he came here to the library; I thought it would be safe but—”

  “Nothing’s safe around here,” Billie cried. “Nothing at all.”

  Harry stared down at Arthur’s face. It was even less recognizable now, the shuddering more violent, those glimpses of his true self even more fleeting, and Harry winced as he took in his friend’s eyes, two rippling pools of fear. He leaned his ear close to Arthur’s lips, those lips that were always saying such fascinating things. He tried to hear if they were saying anything at all. Fragments, choking sounds, the gritting of teeth. Harry flinched. Arthur’s arms and legs were beginning to thrash. I shall have to arrange for your friend to be pinioned.

  “If it’s anyone’s fault, Billie, it’s mine.” Harry’s face was hot again, and his eyes ached with tears. “I should have worked it all out by now, found out what was going on.”

  Keep going. He reached forward and tried to examine Arthur’s clothes. Clues, the tiniest trace, the tiniest sign. But his hands faltered as they searched, fumbling in the pockets, catching themselves in the lining. Giving up, he picked up Arthur’s notebook instead, but his hands fumbled again, and the notebook toppled onto the floor. Impossible. He saw that Billie wasn’t searching at all. She was just tugging at Arthur’s body, trying to talk to him as if he were still awake.

  “Tell us what happened, Artie!” She pounded his chest, and his body shook even harder. “Tell us!”