Jinx (24 page)

“Ah, sooner than that,” said the Bonemaster. He waved a hand again, and Reven was unfrozen and got to his knees, looking confused. “Let’s not try that again, young Reven. I’d hate to have to damage someone important enough to have a curse like yours cast on him.”

T
he next day Jinx and his friends explored the Bonemaster’s demesnes. The Bonemaster allowed them to. In fact, he invited them to, all smiles and politeness. Jinx was suspicious.

“Do be careful out there,” said the Bonemaster. “I would hate to have you fall off.”

They went outside into a gray fog, moving cautiously. The fog was thick—you could see only about twenty feet ahead of you.

When they got to the place where they thought the bridge of bones should be, it wasn’t.

“Maybe it’s invisible,” said Reven. He walked up to the two stone posts that had anchored the bridge the night before. He felt around the edge of the cliff with his feet.

“Don’t do that!” said Jinx.

“Do what?”

“Stand so close to the edge.”

Reven laughed. “I’m fine—don’t worry about me. See?” He stood on one foot and stuck his other foot out over the edge and waved it.

Jinx closed his eyes and felt ill.

“Stop it, Reven. That’s mean,” said Elfwyn. “Could he turn the bridge invisible, Jinx?”

“How should I know?” It wasn’t nice, but Jinx felt unaccountably irritated with her for sticking up for him. “If Reven says the bridge isn’t there, the Bonemaster probably took it away.”

“Let’s see if there’s another way down,” said Reven.

And he led the way, walking much too close to the edge of the cliff. Jinx kept far away from it, and Elfwyn walked in between.

The island was about an acre in size, and nothing grew on it except lichen and a single gnarled hemlock tree digging its roots deep into cracks in the rock and finding Jinx-couldn’t-imagine-what-nourishment. There was no way down. They could hear water rushing far below.

“Is it just as far down all the way around?” said Elfwyn.

“Come and look,” said Reven.

Elfwyn did, cautiously, and Jinx, hating himself for being afraid when they were not, inched forward until he could see over the edge. The canyon was filled with clouds. Nothing penetrated the fog except the black outline of a tree here and there on the cliff tops. You couldn’t see the ground.

Jinx really was not a coward. It wasn’t as if his brain was afraid—it was his body that was screaming at him to get away from the edge of the cliff.

They circled the island and then started around again. When they had gotten to the farthest point from the wizard’s house, they stopped to talk.

“Do you think Simon will be able to get us out of here?” said Elfwyn.

“I don’t think he’ll even try,” said Jinx.

“He must care about you. He gave you that bird so—”

“So he could spy on me!”

“—so he could make sure you were safe.”

“Why are you sticking up for him?” Jinx demanded. “You
said
he was evil. You heard what he did to me!”

“I heard what the Bonemaster said he did,” said Elfwyn.

“He spied on me! And he took my life!”

Elfwyn looked out at the fog. “Or anyway, that’s what the Bonemaster wants you to think.”

“Look, I
know
he did,” said Jinx. “He did this evil spell and took away my life, and afterward I couldn’t see the stuff around people’s heads.”

And it made sense that that talent would go away with his life, he thought—if he’d developed it to protect himself, like Dame Glammer said. There was no need to protect a life you’d already lost.

Reven cleared his throat. “What does the magic bird do, exactly?”

“Simon has this window.” Jinx looked at Elfwyn and remembered how different she’d seemed in the Farseeing Window. She’d never taken Simon’s side back then. But then, she’d only spoken words he’d invented for her. “Most the time it just shows you what it wants to, but he must have fixed that bird with a spell so that the Farseeing Window would follow it and he could watch me.”

He wondered if Simon’s spell enabled him to hear through the window as well as see.

“He won’t know where you are, though, will he?” said Reven. “All he’ll see is the inside of the Bonemaster’s pocket.”

“It’ll show him Bonesocket, I think,” said Jinx.

“You mean the outside of the castle?” said Elfwyn.

“Yeah.” Jinx thought about how angry Simon would be if he knew where Jinx was.
Stay away from the Bonemaster
.

“So he’ll be here soon,” said Reven. “Once he looks in his magic window.”

“I doubt it.” A thought occurred to Jinx. “Besides, he’s kind of sick right now.”

“What’s the matter with him?” Elfwyn asked.

“Somebody stuck a sword into him.”

“And you left him? You didn’t stay to take care of him?” Elfwyn seemed really shocked by this.

“He killed me!” Jinx said.

“Yes, but you didn’t know that!”

“Anyway, his wife is taking care of him.”

“I didn’t know evil wizards had wives,” said Reven.

“Some do. Anyway, he’ll probably forget to look in the Farseeing Window. He kind of forgets about me a lot.”

“He’s sure to look soon,” said Reven.

“I don’t see why,” said Jinx. “When I was little, he’d just go off places for days and leave me. He probably forgets I exist.”

“So what will happen when Simon doesn’t show up?” said Reven.

“The Bonemaster will kill us,” said Elfwyn. “Well, me, anyway. He might not kill you because you’re probably somebody very important. And he might not kill Jinx because he thinks he can use him against Simon.”

“Yeah, he can use me by killing me,” said Jinx. “Like he said. Because if I’m dead, Simon won’t have as much power.”

“I wonder how they know each other,” said Elfwyn.

“I expect all the evil wizards know each other,” said Reven. “How many wizards are there, anyway?”

“Not very many.” Jinx had never met any others.

“Simon and the Bonemaster must’ve been at one time, don’t you think?” said Elfwyn. “Because he said Simon stole something, and it would be hard to steal anything from Bonesocket if you weren’t inside it.”

“We’ve been inside it and we’re not his friends,” said Jinx.

They stood in silence for a moment, looking out at the mist.

“We’d better plan to save ourselves, then,” said Reven. “The first thing we need to do is find the bridge.”

“Can we find out where his power is coming from?” said Elfwyn.

“Probably not,” said Jinx. “I mean, he’s got a power source hidden somewhere on the island, but it doesn’t matter where. He’s got a lot of it; that’s all we need to know. He can stick us to doors or probably turn us into toads if he wants to.”

“I don’t understand why you can’t use his power source,” said Elfwyn.

“Because he would know.”

“How?”

“I don’t know, he just would. Simon could always tell what I was using for power. It’s just something wizards can sense.”

“So shouldn’t you be able to find where the power source is, then?” Elfwyn pressed.

“No, because I am not a wizard, all right?”

“There’s no need to get cranky,” said Elfwyn. “I just thought if you could find his power source, maybe you could use it against him.”

“Use it against him? Look, he’s the
Bonemaster
. He’s a really hugely powerful ferocious wizard. If I even tried to use his power, he’d know it and he’d probably kill me or something. You don’t understand magic.”

Elfwyn turned away, looking hurt.

“Er, perhaps we could go indoors now?” said Reven.

It was unpleasantly damp and cold out here. They went back to the castle.

“Found that there’s no way down, have you?” said the Bonemaster. “Excellent. Then come along, Jinx. It’s time we had a talk with Simon.”

Jinx wanted no part of this. He didn’t want to talk to Simon, and he didn’t need Simon “rescuing” him. He was going to get away from the Bonemaster without Simon’s help and without falling back into Simon’s power. He glared at the tiny golden bird as it lay on the Bonemaster’s open palm.

“Simon, I have your boy here, and he has something to say to you.”

Jinx tried to pull away, but the Bonemaster’s claws were like iron digging into the flesh of his arm.

“Tell him to come here now if he wants to see you alive,” said the Bonemaster.

Jinx said nothing.

The Bonemaster jabbed his thumb just above Jinx’s elbow. Intense pain shot through Jinx’s arm. He had to clench his teeth hard to keep from screaming.

“Speak,” the Bonemaster commanded.

Jinx didn’t say a word. The Bonemaster jabbed again, harder.

“I’m fine,” Jinx said through clenched teeth.

Two weeks had passed, and Simon had not shown. The Bonemaster had not tried to make Jinx speak to Simon again. But he’d kept his promise to make Jinx his servant.

Jinx was straining dragon’s blood, which was a job he hated. You had to pick clots out of the strainer with your fingers. The stuff smelled like a murdered village.

Elfwyn was helping the Bonemaster make a potion. She was
always
helping him.

“There, take the phial in the clamp, dear,” said the Bonemaster. “Hold it over the flame and agitate it slowly. Excellent. You would have made a much better wizard than Jinx.”

Jinx tipped more blood into the strainer and watched it drizzle down into the jar below. The Bonemaster had mostly been kind to Elfwyn, polite to Reven, and domineering to Jinx. Jinx did the work that was expected of him and wished that most of it didn’t involve being in the same room as the Bonemaster.

Especially not when Elfwyn was sucking up to him.

“Can girls be wizards?” said Elfwyn.

The Bonemaster beamed at her. “Oh my, yes. There have been very powerful female wizards in the past.”

“Not now, though?”

“There are no truly powerful wizards at all now,” said the Bonemaster. “Not like we were in the old days. Not since we lost our knowledge of Samaran magic.” He clenched his fist. “We should have taken the libraries by force. We should have brought all their contents to the Urwald—take that off the flame, dear. Now just wave it gently—don’t spill!—until it cools. Hurry up with that dragon’s blood, Jinx.”

“It won’t pour any faster than it pours,” said Jinx.

“Clean the strainer out!”

Jinx shook blood from the strainer and took it to the sink to rinse it out.

“Now you’ve spattered blood all over the floor,” said the Bonemaster.

“What is Samaran magic like, Bonemaster?” Elfwyn asked.

“I don’t have the good fortune to know that,” said the Bonemaster. “But it’s as different from wizarding magic as wizarding magic is different from Urwald magic.”

“Is this potion ready yet?” said Elfwyn.

“No, dear, we have to add half a bat wing. They’re on the top shelf.”

Elfwyn went for the stepladder, but the Bonemaster said, “Jinx will get them, dear.”

Jinx wiped blood from his hands onto his clothes and went and got the stepladder.

“We all know about Samara, you know,” said the Bonemaster, speaking to Jinx. “But the ways through were shut over a century ago, when they outlawed magic there. And when you tell me you’ve actually been there, Jinx, I find that very interesting. How did you get there?”

“I don’t really know,” said Jinx. He dragged the ladder over to the shelf. “I just sort of got lost and I was there.”

“Hm. And where were you before you got lost, exactly?”

“I don’t know. Around.”

“And was there some sort of spell that you did in the process of getting lost?”

Knowledge Is Power. But that was Samaran magic, precisely the kind the Bonemaster didn’t know about. “No, it just sort of happened,” said Jinx.

“And how did you get back?”

“Simon came and got me.”

“Does Simon go to Samara often?”

“I don’t know.” Jinx reached for the clay jar labeled
BAT WINGS
. Everything was neatly and carefully arranged in the Bonemaster’s laboratory. It was quite different from Simon’s workshop.

“Well, you must notice if he’s home or not.” The Bonemaster took the jar from Jinx. “There, pound half a wing in the mortar, Elfwyn, dear.”

Jinx shrugged. “I never pay much attention to Simon. I just sweep up.”

“Get back to that dragon’s blood before it clots. You know, if I had access to the kind of secrets that you’ve had access to, I would have paid a lot of attention. I’m sure Elfwyn would have.”

“What would you do if you could get to Samara?” she asked the Bonemaster.

“Do? With access to Samara, to the libraries? I would learn all the magic I could, of course. Knowledge is power.”