Bumblestook: Book 1, The Accidental Wizard (40 page)

Each time he checked, Tom peered anxiously over his shoulder in the hopes that,
this
time, the little lights would change direction and point back up to the surface. But alas, each time, “Yep! Still goin’ down!” Yap called out cheerfully, deflating the Bungaree’s hopes like a punctured balloon.

Clucking unsympathetically, Heloise leaned in close to purr in the miserable Bungaree’s ear. “Poor little kitten. Per-r-r-haps the Water Spirit will carry you to safety.”

Tom’s ear, tickled by her warm breath, twitched involuntarily and he rubbed it angrily with one paw. “
Perhaps
you hadn’t noticed, but I am not a
kit
,” he spat indignantly. “And when it comes to duty, you’ll find I’m
more
than fit!”

Heloise barked out a short, sharp laugh. “Of that I have no doubt, not even one small bit,” she replied in kind, deliberately capping off his rhyme. Her large, golden eyes narrowed, as she smiled with cold satisfaction; slowly exposing her strong, sharp, white teeth.

The Bungaree whirled away; stomping off in a huff, fur puffed out, tail and whiskers madly a-twitch, having lost his fear in anger.

Moments later, the group came to a halt, as the stairway ended beside a river of muddy water.

“I’m afraid this is the end of the road, my friends,” Ranger Gary said, eyeing each of them keenly. “We’ll have to proceed underwater from here.”

“If you say so, we’re good to go!” Tom declared with a defiant look at Heloise and a lift of his chin. Yap nodded eagerly, setting his entire body a-wag.

“Very well. I gave this a lot of thought on the way down. I believe I’ve come up with a way for us to travel safely underwater. If we stick close together, I can extend a field of force around all of us,” Ranger Gary explained. “That will hold the waters at bay. We’ll use a rope to tie us together, then jump in all at once. After sinking down, we simply walk across the bottom. However—”

“There’s a catch,” Heloise remarked wryly.

“The problem, you see, is one of adequate oxygenation,” the Wizard replied.

Despite his new-found bravado, Tom found that his mouth had suddenly gone dry.

“You’re saying we could suffocate? That would be a most unpleasant fate!”

“What’s suffercate?” Yap asked, eyes big.

“To put it simply, we’ll run out of air,” Ranger Gary told him.

Yap scrunched up his little face in thought. Then, his furrows fled and his eyes brightened. “I know, I know! We c’n take extra air with us—like this!” he exclaimed, taking a very deep breath and holding it in.

Heloise rolled her eyes, while Tom shook his head over his companion’s youthful ignorance.

“In a way, Yap’s correct,” Ranger Gary said, as Yap’s eyes widened above his puffed out cheeks. “We
do
need to take fresh air with us. I think I’ve figured out a way to do that.”

“How?” Tom asked, as Yap’s breath exploded outward in an explosive rush.

“We’ll use the Magic Hose!” Ranger Gary exclaimed, chuckling at the puzzled looks on his companion’s faces. “I keep it in a shed, back at Chilao. Comes in mighty handy during fire season.”

“Does it spray magic water?” Yap asked eagerly.

“No, the magic is in its length,” the Wizard said. “It can be as long, or as short, as I need it to be—100 yards or 100 miles—whatever I ask. In other words, it can stretch all the way down to the bottom of this lake to bring us fresh air! It should be here any minute now.”

The Magic Hose had, indeed, responded to Ranger Gary’s summons. Uncoiling, it had let itself out of the shed, pushing away a corner of the window screen with its snout-like metal spout. Slithering through the forest at top speed, it arrived at the lip of the crevice in very short time; whereupon, it began stretching itself out to reach the bottom, where the four members of the Quest awaited its arrival, with upturned faces.

**********************************

Shaking off the shock of seeing himself inside the giant snowglobe, Farley returned to his peephole. He watched as the
other
Farley (dressed in blue-flannel p.j.s and fuzzy slippers) sat down at the dining room table. Immediately, as if on cue, his parents began to stir. Rubbing the sleep from their eyes, they sat up, turning to look at their “son”.

The Fake (as the real Farley thought of him) looked stiff and unnatural. His movements seemed robotic and his eerie, look-alike face was smooth and expressionless. His parents didn’t seem to notice. When the Fake opened his mouth to speak, they responded animatedly. Farley couldn’t hear what they were saying, but it looked as if they were carrying on a perfectly normal conversation with the horrible thing!

“Can’tcha tell it’s
not me
?” Farley moaned softly.

Fiona drew close to her agonized friend. “They can’t help it, Farley. It’s like Mubglub said, they’re under a spell.”

Farley nodded understanding, although the pained expression did not leave his face. Then he frowned. “
Now
what are they doing?”

All three had begun making curious motions with their hands and mouths. Fiona looked back in.

“Looks like they’re eating. See, your father’s cutting up some food. And look, he’s passing it to your mother.”

Farley watched, as everyone at the table went through the motions of eating a meal. They passed invisible serving platters, helped themselves to heaping portions of air and cut up bite-sized pieces of nothing. They even placed the non-existent meal in their mouths and chewed it!

“I’m eating with my mouth open,” Farley observed. Softly, he lip-synced the gentle admonishment he could see, but not hear, his mother deliver in her quivery sing-song voice;

‘Take a bite, but be polite!
Not everyone enjoys the sight,
Of food that’s chewed,
It looks quite crude!
So close your mouth when you cheeeeew
!’

The Fake paused with his mouth open, staring at her in unsmiling non-comprehension. Seconds ticked by while Myrtle beamed at him, fondly. Finally, he complied, closing his mouth to chew. The dining and conversation went on; Harvey and Myrtle gesturing and speaking animatedly, in sharp contrast to their stiff, expressionless “son”.

Then, abruptly, the Fake pushed back his chair to stand. Harvey and Myrtle immediately ceased talking. Their eyes closed and they slumped in their seats. Slowly, the pair tilted forward until their heads were cradled atop their arms. Once again, they slept at the dining room table.

Farley bit his lip, but kept his eyes glued to the Fake. His double stepped away from the table, whereupon the dark, rectangular Doorway flickered into being. Turning precisely, the Fake stepped into darkness and the Doorway disappeared.

Farley whirled to face the Vish. “What’s going on here?” he demanded, no longer bothering to keep his voice down. “Who is that- that
Fake
and what is he doing to my parents?”

“I have seen this occur twice before,” Mubglub told him. “When the Other comes, your parents awaken. They pretend to eat while conversing with it. When it leaves, they fall back asleep.”

“Why do you call him
it
? Isn’t he alive, like Farley and me?” Fiona asked shrewdly.

Mubglub turned his round eyes upon the girl. “Its mannerisms are that of a golem,” he re-plied. “In which case, it is not truly alive. It is fashioned of wood or rock, then animated by magic. Its appearance is most likely the result of a Glamour, a spell which disguises its true nature.”

“But why? Why would anyone use Magic to make something that looks like me?” Farley asked.

“As I am not privy to the plans of its maker, I can only speculate,” Mubglub said.

“If that means you hafta make a wild guess, that’s better than nothing,” Farley replied. “Go on, give it your best shot.”

Mubglub nodded. “Most likely an Overlord created the golem to question your parents. It was given your appearance because they trust you and would have no reason to withhold information from you.”

“That’s just plain
mean
!” Farley cried out.

“The Overlords are known for such,” Mubglub said.

“But why
Farley’s
parents?” Fiona asked. “What could
they
know that the Overlords would want to know?”

“As to that, I cannot even venture a ‘wild guess’,” the Vish replied.

“Well, we’ve got to get them outta there and skedaddle before that thing comes back!” Farley said adamantly.

“I do not know what is meant by this ‘skedaddle’. Is it a kind of Magic?” Mubglub asked.

“Nah, it’s just something my mom says when we hafta hurry,” Farley explained. “It means you gotta move real fast.”

“I see. That is unfortunate, for naught but magic will open the dome.” Lifting one webbed finger, the Vish intoned dolefully, “From Magic has it sprung, so must it be undone.”

“I bet
I
could crack it open in a minute. I’m pretty good at breaking things,” Farley claimed with confidence. “My mom says, practically all I hafta do is
look
at something and it breaks!”

Mubglub’s large, round eyes opened even wider. “Perhaps you could focus this power on the globe of snow. When it cracks open, the water will rush in. Then, with the help of my Mistress, we can place your parents within a second bubble and, as you say, ‘skedaddle’.”

“It doesn’t exactly work like that,” Farley said, with a grimace. “It’s not a Magic Power. It’s just that I have lots of accidents and sometimes things get broken. I don’t
mean
to break them—it just
happens
. Maybe if I climb on top of the snowglobe, I’ll break it by accident!”

“I do not think that will work,” the Vish ventured politely. “The nature of an accident is that one does not
intend
for it to occur. Therefore, it would not be possible to have an accident, on purpose. Also, if you leave the safety of the bubble you will surely drown, unless your kind are blessed with gills with which to breathe underwater…”

Farley and Fiona shook their heads regretfully.

“Then, I believe the only way in is through the Doorway. We shall have to seek out its source,” Mubglub told them.

“Where do we start?” Fiona asked.

“One of my tribe followed the golem to an underwater cave. That is where I suggest we begin,” the Vish replied.

“Can you take us there now?” Fiona asked.

Mubglub performed his funny little bow. “If that is your wish.”

“It is,” Fiona spoke decisively. “I wish to leave right away.” Then, seeing Farley’s stricken look back at his parents (and feeling the stab in her
own
heart, as well) she took his hand and spoke encouragingly. “Don’t worry, we’ll find the Door, I know we will. The sooner we get started, the sooner we’ll be back.”

The boy nodded miserably, whereupon Mubglub gestured to his fellow Vish. They began maneuvering the bubble out of the tangled underwater forest. As it moved up and away from the snowglobe, Farley pressed his face against the bubble’s smooth, cool surface.

“Don’t worry, Mom and Dad,” he whispered. “I’ll be right back, I promise.”

**************************************

He wanted to find a nice little hidey-hole and crawl inside, he did, but unfortunately, he was, way too big.

He wasn’t always this way, oh no, he most certainly was not! Was a time, there was, when he could easily pop into a gopher hole, scurry down a nice, twisty tunnel and hunker down in a cozy, underground burrow. His thoughts turned to fond memories of those long, low, winding pathways; heavy with the scent of damp, earthen walls, floors worn smooth and hard underfoot by years of passage. He wished and wished and wished, he did, that he could go back to those good-old days, and those good-old comfortable ways.

Alas, alack, the wishing did not make it so! That world was closed to him for
ever
. For al-ways. No going back.

He whimpered, squeezing his eyes tight shut, curling up as small as his great bulk would allow; simulating, as best he could, the close comfort of his lost home. And saw again, down Memory’s Trail, that fateful day when the Great Wizard Malador came to call.

The Mage’s eyes glowed ruby-red, like jewels against skin, white as a newborn grub. He spoke in a voice that was whisper-soft, but sharp-cutting, like the Winter wind. His long, spidery fingers wove the air between them into a curtain of haze. It shimmered and sparkled with mesmerizing twinkles of light. Then, Malador’s mind slithered and slunk, uninvited, into his own; snuggling close like a litter-mate, but
not
, indeedy-no,
not
.

He shivered at that memory, recalling the false familiarity and his foolish feeling that here, at last, was one who
truly
understood his desire for small, sparkling treasures; the never-ending search that was his life-long passion, the boundless joy-like-no-other when he found one and the deep, soul-soothing peace when he stashed them safely away in one of his numerous hidey-holes.

Oh, oh, oh! How could he know, the Wizard’s offer, made with such seeming generosity, was not all it was cracked up to be! It was a trade-off to be sure—
that
he knew up-front. The larger his body, the greater the treasure he could carry. All he needed was a bit of so-called “Sizing”, which just happened to be Malador’s specialty. It seemed like a smart choice—bigger body, bigger treasure! All the Wizard asked in return was a measly year of service. He had need, it seemed, for one with a nose for treasure. Only thing, said he, there was no going back. Only one Sizing per customer, said he.

That
could-a
been a clue right there (had he been paying close attention) that all was not as it seemed. After all, what was
made
by Magic could usually be
un
-made by Magic. But then, he was no expert on the subject. Besides, his mind was filled with thoughts of large mounds of sparkling treasure, just waiting to be hauled away.

Maybe he
should-a
known something was wrong, when the Wizard insisted on sacrificing one of his whiskers (swiftly, yet painfully, plucked). It disappeared, in a flash of blue-white fire, flaring up in the palm of Malador’s outstretched hand. Hadn’t his dear Mum taught him, never-never to surrender so much as an eyelash, to anyone with magical powers? Yes, yes, she had quite clearly said so, but his ears had been filled with the sound of Malador’s voice, describing the treasure that would soon be his. He would not have heard his sweet Mum’s voice, had she been standing right beside him.