The Little Broomstick

by Mary Stewart

  Then he came back. 'It's another open field, a big one, sloping down to what looks like a stream. A few trees there, but not enough–not thick cover like this. And beyond that it looks just like open moor.'

  'What are we going to do?'

  Peter patted the little broomstick, absently. He cleared his throat. 'Look, this is silly. I heard what they said. It's obvious what we ought to do. I told you before, in Doctor Dee's garden. If I stay here and you go on, then at least one of us stands a good chance. You take both cats, and we could arrange a signal. If I broke out of the opposite side of the wood and drew them off, that would give you a start. And if there was only you on the broomstick it could get you well above cloud before they realised what had happened. And with that start–'

  'But what about you?'

  'Oh, I'd be all right. I'd dodge back in before they saw it was only me.'

  'But,' said Mary, 'it's not like it was in Doctor Dee's garden. They know you're in here. Once they realised you hadn't even got a broomstick–and they'd guess what had happened, sooner or later–they'd come in and look for you.'

  'They'd never find me. It's dark.'

  'And in the morning?'

  'Well,' said Peter, 'it's a big wood. I'd climb a tree or something. And you'd be on your way back, by then, with help.'

  'On a broomstick?' asked Mary. 'With the Vicar your father–and Constable Buffin and old Zebedee following on bicycles?'

  In spite of their plight, Peter laughed. 'Well, I suppose you couldn't use the broomstick.'

  'I don't know the way without the broomstick,' said Mary grimly. 'And you say you don't, either. It's no good, Peter. We'll have to get out of this together, or not at all.'

  She hesitated, pulling a frond of fern absently between her fingers. Then she looked straight at him. (It was strange to remember that shy and stiff Mary Smith of two days ago, who could never have spoken like this.) 'And don't think I haven't realised that you've tried to save me twice, Peter, and risked yourself to do it. But it's together, or nothing.'

  'OK,' said Peter easily. He, thought Mary, must never have been shy in his life. 'Well, we have to think of something else. What about this Master Spell? Isn't there something in the book that'll help?'

  'No. I've been thinking, and there isn't. There's only the Master Spell itself, and that simply undoes any magic that's in reach. It would un-magick our own little broomstick, too. And even if I went, and left you the Master Spell to protect you, you might never find your way home again, or we mightn't be able to find you.'

  She turned her head to look at the gap of starlight at the end of the path. 'I have a feeling that we're in a very different country from our own, and it isn't just distance that separates them.'

  'Look,' said Peter, 'don't sound so worried! We've done all right so far, haven't we? We'll think of something. In any case, I'd be nervous of using that Master Spell of yours. Just think if I did it when your broomstick was still in range, and getting you nicely up to five hundred feet or so! Well, let's think what to do.'

  'Give the little broomstick a rest, first,' said Mary, 'and maybe groom it a bit. It seems to like that.' And she dismounted and stood stroking it with her fly-by-night hand.

  It certainly seemed to like that. It rubbed itself against her, purring…

  No, of course it wasn't purring. Mary turned her head, sharply. It was Tib, beside her ear, who had suddenly purred. And his head was up and his ears cocked towards where, deep in the wood, someone something–was approaching them.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  The Birds Are Singing, The Bells Are Ringing,

  The Wild Deer Come Galloping By, By…

  'Someone's coming,' said Peter sharply. 'Get on quick. It sounds as if one of them's beating the wood to flush us out, while the other–'

  'No,' said Mary. 'Tib's purring. And look, the little broomstick hasn't moved. Keep still and listen.'

  They waited, quite still, their eyes on the darkness of the deep wood. The rustling grew louder. It was not one person, but a crowd of people or creatures approaching softly through the thick undergrowth.

  Ferns swished and the dew shook down. All the scents of the wood came floating, larch and bramble-flowers and late honeysuckle, and the dark smoky scent of ivy. Then the bushes parted, and into the dim starlight, the dew shining on antlers and burnished coat, stepped a big, beautiful stag. After him, delicately, trooped a score of dappled deer.

  Tib gave a queer, gobbling cry, deep in his throat, the cry Mary had last heard in the dreadful strong-room. On Peter's shoulder, the grey cat mewed softly, and began to purr.

  'It's the deer that were enchanted!' said Mary excitedly. 'I freed them with the Master Spell. Perhaps they've come to help us!'

  The stag paced forward, stretching his splendid head towards her. He snuffed twice, at her, at Tib on her shoulder, then turned to look at Peter, ears pricked.

  'Peter's my friend,' said Mary quickly. 'He came to rescue Gib.'

  The great stag reached forward to snuff at Peter's chest, then he wheeled, trotted forward to the fence that edged the wood and stood there, his magnificent head high, looking back at them over his shoulder.

  'I remember him,' said Mary. 'He was that poor creature covered with mangy fur. Madam laughed at him and prodded him. I'm sure he's come to help us. But how? What can he do?'

  'He wants us to go that way,' said Peter. 'Come along.'

  But Mary hung back. 'I don't see how we can. Listen, you can still hear those two overhead.'

  The other deer were all around them now, crowding close. Peter laughed, pointing to the tossing heads and bright liquid eyes. 'It's a convoy.' He sounded quite cheerful and confident. 'Don't you see? If we break out of the wood in the middle of that lot, Madam and the Doctor certainly can't get at us even if they see us. And they might miss us completely among all the running shadows. Come along. It's our best chance.'

  'Do you really think–?' began Mary doubtfully, but was stopped by the little broomstick. It could hardly be said to be tossing its head and pawing the ground, but the effect was the same. It pranced in her hands, obviously excited, and willing them to go. 'All right!' she said, and jumped on. 'Hang on then, Tib! Jump for it, Peter, or the little broomstick'll be away with me!'

  Peter jumped astride the broomstick, and held on. The cats clung tightly, both purring now like racing engines. Round them the deer leaped and frolicked, their delicate hoofs hardly printing the ground, and with them the little broomstick skipped, frisking. The great stag threw his head up, snuffed the air, then, from a standstill, leaped the fence and trotted out into the starlight. After him streamed the deer, and among them, a shadow among their leaping shadows, ran the little broomstick.

  Smoothly over the fence, over the ditch, out into the open field–then all at once they were galloping, the deer travelling in long, fluid leaps all around them. Antlers tossed, eyes shone wide and dark in the starlight, white tails scudded ahead, dainty hoofs pattered on turf like rain. The dew-laden coats brushed the children's legs, and under them the grassy meadow flashed by as, effortless, the herd raced as silently as their own shadows down the long slope towards the stream. A hedge showed, briefly, and was gone under them as if it had been no more than a stand of thistles. The stream, shining and noisy, flashed under them and fled back into silence.

  A stone wall loomed, and the little broomstick, gathering itself, flung itself and its load up and over as the deer soared and sank like a great wave breaking, and the race went on.

  Then suddenly the birds were with them, too. A peewit tumbled screaming out of the dark, then a flight of swallows, with a high shrilling noise, then blackbirds, thrushes, pigeons, sparrows–all the birds fresh from those dreadful cages; birds who should have been asleep, head under wing, but who flew now with the herd of deer to hide the escaping children from the danger above them.

  For the danger was there.

  For the first few minutes, it seemed, Madam and the Doctor had assumed that the str
eam of shadows breaking at a gallop from the wood was only a wild herd of deer; but they must have decided to make sure, for now one broomstick turned quickly in pursuit. The other still circled sentinel above the trap of trees.

  It was Doctor Dee who was coming. There was the dreadful, familiar swish of his broomstick overhead.

  Then the sudden fierce swoop, which scattered the birds in all directions, and the yell of anger and triumph: 'Madam! Madam! Here! This way!'

  Then with the white wand brandished in his hand like a whip, Doctor Dee was swooping down among the birds, scattering them to right and left as he tried to reach the children in the middle of the racing herd.

  But the herd defeated him. Each time the wand whipped down it struck some tossing antler, and the green sparks flew and flashed, but still the deer fled on unharmed. They were not afraid; he could not enchant them again; they only bunched more closely round the children, and raced on. The wizard whipped at them with the powerless wand, and the green fire ran along their coats like water. Mary saw, then, that all the animals nearest to them were the stags, all armed with antlers. Once, when the wand flashed down near her head, a pair of antlers caught and parried it with a crack and blaze like lightning, and the wizard gave a cry as if he had had a shock.

  After that he withdrew to a height of perhaps twenty feet, and once again the birds closed in.

  But not just defending now; this time they attacked. And they, too, were immune to the strokes of the white wand. They were all too small to damage Doctor Dee himself–the biggest were the pigeons–but it is not easy to fly straight through a flock of wheeling, darting, furious birds, who think nothing of flying straight into one's face, or hitting out with passing claws at one's head, or simply blinding one by flying round and round in flocks at the level of one's eyes. And the Doctor's broomstick didn't like it, either. It swerved and bucked and tried to jib, while the Doctor, hanging on with one hand and swiping blindly round him with the wand in the other, came once or twice very near to falling off.

  But not quite. And, as mile after swift mile went by, Mary and Peter could see that the deer were beginning to tire. And above Doctor Dee, still fresh, and too clever to come down into the swirl of birds and defending antlers, sailed Madam Mumblechook.

  They were on a slope now, a long slope running downhill. Here and there were tufts of rushes; they brushed the bellies of the running deer and swished past the children's feet. Beside them now, on the right, was the bright rush and noise of water. A river. A swift river, rushing down through stony rapids and over steep, white falls. Then suddenly, about a quarter of a mile away, at the foot of the long slope, they saw what seemed to be a wide stretch of water.

  The sea? thought Mary, and for the first time felt despair. If they had to cross a sea, without the deer, with perhaps only the frail help of the birds …and if the little broomstick tired…

  'It's the mist!' cried Peter. 'I told you I got lost in it on the way here. If we get through that, we'll know the way home!"

  On down the slope, with the drumming of the tiny hoofs all round them. Now she could see.

  It was indeed the mist, a great, white lake of mist, thick and rolling like cloud. The starlight was bright on the surface of it. The river rushed and cascaded right into it and was lost, as if there really was a sea or a lake below. But at least, once in the shelter of that thick cloud, they would need no escort, no cover.

  They could run at the broomstick's own pace, safe and shrouded, till perhaps on the other side they would see the familiar yellow lights of home.

  The cloud of birds was already wheeling, ghostly, in and out of the edges of the mist. The herd went down the last slope with a slither and scatter of turf, then slowed, trotted, stopped on the long stony strand where the river met the mist.

  The big stag turned, the vapour swirling round his shoulders like cloud. The herd parted to let the children through into the safe shelter of the mist.

  Then with a yell and a last, desperate swoop, Doctor Dee dived on them like a stone falling.

  He almost reached them. But the great stag leaped clear into the air, straight over their heads, and his antlers struck the wizard's wand clean out of his hand. The wand flew wide. It struck the surface of the river. There was a hiss like steam as the green fire ran to and fro across the water, then a flash, a crack, a spurt of white smoke, and the wand vanished into the swirling river.

  Behind the children was another crack, a flurry, then a crash. Past Mary's cheek went the broken half of a broom-handle, and a scatter of birch-twigs. Then everything dimmed and vanished; stag, deer, birds, starlight all blotted out as their own little broomstick, undamaged, plunged forward with them into the cloud of mist.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Home Again, Home Again,

  Journey's Done…

  The mist was not so very thick after all. Once, momentarily, they ran through a thinning patch of it which showed a glimpse of sky, and Peter spoke breathlessly in Mary's ear.

  'She's still there. High up. I don't think she saw us.'

  'She can't attack us here. I think it's water underneath,' said Mary. 'As long as we stay low enough, we're safe.'

  'And when we come out of it we'll be on our own side, I'm sure of that. But how do we know she can't follow us there? After all, we've been on her side of the mist.'

  Mary was silent for a moment. This was something she had not thought of. But it was reasonable, after all. If the magic fly-by-night had worked at Red Manor, then it was possible that they would not be safe from Madam Mumblechook even on their own side of the mist.

  She tried to keep the nervousness out of her voice. 'But she can't take the cats back, and would she follow us just to get revenge?'

  'I expect she wants her Master Spell book back,' said Peter.

  'Oh! Of course she does …Then we'll have to use it somehow, won't we, to protect ourselves. But how? Let's think…'

  'Let's not take the trouble,' said Peter. He sounded light-hearted. 'As soon as we're near home, you can chant your spell, and chant it as loud as you please. It'll bring her broomstick down sharpish, and once we're in our own fields, it won't matter if it un-magicks ours as well.'

  'But our dear little broomstick–'

  'Wants to be un-magicked,' said Peter. 'Can't you feel it?'

  And indeed, the broomstick had given a little skip and a bound or two, and quickened its already headlong pace through the mist.

  'Don't you see?' asked Peter. 'It's probably enchanted, too, and it's tired of having to rush about at all hours, and wait where it's told, and carry tiresome old witches around all the time–'

  'Thank you very much,' said Mary.

  'Well, I didn't mean you. Anyway, I'm sure it's as much prison for the broomsticks as it was for the birds and deer. That's why they behave so badly. If they liked it, would they buck and try to throw people, like naughty ponies?'

  'I think you're right,' said Mary. 'It only obeyed me because of the fly-by-night.'

  'What was that?'

  'A kind of spell, I suppose.' She told him about it, quickly.

  'Well, there you are,' said Peter. 'And I think it's helping us now because we were kind to it. But it'll just love to be rid of the spell, and go off free on its own, and kick up its heels when it feels like it. Won't you, little bizzom?'

  And Mary, feeling the little broomstick wriggle and jump in reply, thought Peter was probably right.

  In any case, they had to get rid of Madam Mumblechook somehow, and the only way to do it was by using the Master Spell. But they would have to time it correctly, or it could mean disaster for them all...

  She was opening her mouth to say so, when Peter's hand touched her arm, and she realised that the mist was thinning round them. There was darkness ahead that looked solid, and from time to time a glimpse of darkness below that did not seem so solid, but that caught and reflected stray gleams like water rippling.

  And daylight was coming. Around them the faint light touched the m
ist, hazing it with colour. In a short time, the Master Spell would be powerless.

  Then all at once they ran out from the covering mist, over a narrow strand where pebbles gleamed and the faint waves crisped and whispered. Then up over a meadowland starred with daisies showing pale already in the growing light.

  As they ran clear of the mist they heard Madam Mumblechook's voice behind them, high above.

  'Stop!' cried Mary, and the little broomstick stopped and sat down. The children, slipping from its back, looked up the way they had come.

  She was there, some way back, high over the lake of mist. She must have been cruising to and fro above them, waiting, as she and Doctor Dee had waited above the wood, to see where they would break cover.

  Behind her the sky was growing pale, the stars fading already into a strip of swimming and luminous rose.

  But the magic round her still shone green and baleful, and the sparks spurted from under her broomstick as she hauled it round sharply in midair and set it on a course straight for the little group on the ground.

  'I have you!' she shrilled. 'I have you now! My book! My book!' And she put her broomstick into a dive.

  The cats were hissing; even Peter was looking scared. Mary whipped the book out of her pocket, and groped for the torch. But she did not need it.

  The book fell open in her hands at the Master Spell, and there on the page the words glowed clear and red. Standing straight and without moving a step, while the light grew and the dawn came and the witch tore down towards them like a baleful star, Mary began, loudly and very clearly, to recite the Master Spell.

  The witch heard it. They saw her urge her broomstick faster, faster, to force it down to earth before the spell came to an end. They saw her glance over her shoulder at the growing light, which would take from Mary the power the spell gave her. But it was no use.

  Madam Mumblechook was still well up above the mist, and the last of the stars were still visible, when, triumphantly, Mary finished.