The Black Amulet Read online

  The answers to these questions had no time to materialize as Ruby was dropped from a height of nearly two metres into a very large nest that sat on the ground. It was made from sticks and lined with leaves and the woolly hides of sheep that had clearly been ripped from the bodies of their former owners.

  The bottle of Slap Dust slipped from her hand as she landed hard and it clattered into the dark. There was no time to look for it because she was instantly up on her feet and worrying about what else was in the nest. Three Snarl chicks were all eager for a piece of her, their beaks snapping open and clicking shut, tails swishing behind them.

  Ruby pulled a stick from the wall of the nest and thrashed it about. She hit the most hungry and fearless chick full in the face as it came at her, sending it tumbling backwards into its siblings and knocking them over. They pecked and screamed at each other for a moment before refocusing on Ruby with bright red eyes, their tongues darting out from their beaks.

  Ruby could see the chicks well enough, despite the dark, and realized it was because a white light was filtering up through the bottom of the nest as if someone had placed small floodlights in the ground beneath it. When a white spark shot up through the base of the nest, fizzing up into the air, the stick in her hand drooped as her mouth opened. It had looked like a white spark of magic.

  Ruby raised the stick as the chicks inched closer, their small talons tapping. The creatures were warier of her this time, their eyes watching the stick she was holding. She kept glancing around for the bottle of Slap Dust, but she couldn’t see it.

  When Ruby heard voices behind her, she wanted to turn round and look, but she was scared of the chicks rushing at her if she gave them the chance. As far as she could tell, there were two people shouting, a man and a boy, and then the adult Snarl came crashing through the trees and landed beside the nest, roaring its disapproval. Ruby heard a man speaking in Anglo-Saxon and knew then that the voices must belong to Badlanders, a Master and his apprentice. A dull sonic thud boomed through the air, making Ruby’s teeth rattle. Something struck the Snarl on the side of the body, knocking the animal to the ground. It lay panting, its wings flapping weakly, its talons flexing, and then was still.

  A boy, rather smaller than her, appeared in her line of vision and threw out a golden rope that snaked through the air and lassoed one of the chicks round the neck. He tugged hard and yanked the chick out of the nest onto the ground. As it struggled to stand up, a tall man strode into view with white sparks whizzing round the ends of his fingers. A few words later, a flash of white from his fingers, and the chick was no longer moving.

  The boy was already twirling the rope above his head again and let it loose, snaring another of the chicks and dragging it out of the nest. Ruby decided not to hang around any longer. She dropped the stick and started to clamber out of the nest on the other side. But the sticks were rickety. They moved under her weight. And, even worse, some were covered in something slippery. At first, she thought it might be dew. But she soon realized it was blood. Her hands glistened with it.

  Looking down, she saw a cow’s head between her feet and swallowed down the urge to be sick. Her hands were slipping on the sticks as she tried to climb up and out. She reached the top and then, looking for a way down, saw her bottle of Slap Dust lodged between two sticks. She reached across and grabbed it, and just had time to see there were a few precious grains in the bottom before her feet gave way and she tumbled out of the nest. The hand of her outstretched arm hit the ground first. She heard a nasty click deep in her wrist and the air inside her lungs shot out with a grunt.

  She closed her eyes to stop herself feeling sick and, as she lay there on the forest floor for a few slow seconds, she heard the squawking of the last chick cut out suddenly. She thought her wrist might be sprained or, even worse, broken, because it was so painful.

  Ruby became aware of two voices talking and decided the safest thing to do was to lie there and pretend to be unconscious for now. She kept her eyes firmly shut, with one hand tight round the bottle of Slap Dust to conceal it as she lay in the dirt.

  Randall Givens smoothed down his black hair as he observed the unconscious girl on the ground, resisting the urge to prod her with the silver toe of his boot, to see if she was alive. His brown leather trench coat flared around him as he bent down instead to feel for a pulse in her neck.

  ‘She’s alive,’ he said to the boy standing beside him. ‘Though it looks like she’s taken a painful bang to the head,’ continued Givens, studying the large, egg-shaped lump on the girl’s forehead. ‘And that left wrist looks nasty too,’ he said, peering at the swelling. ‘Let’s see what state the rest of her is in.’

  He fired a few sparks out of his fingers and they rushed round her body. Some of them clustered round the wrist, the lump on her forehead and a graze to her face, and more gathered on the tips of her shoulders where the Snarl’s talons had pierced her old army camouflage jacket through to the skin.

  ‘No other damage apart from the obvious. Do you see where the Snarl must have grabbed her by the shoulders, Wilfried?’ said Givens, standing up and brushing his knees down. The boy nodded. Although Wilfried was young, at the most eight or nine years old (although he didn’t know for sure since he was an orphan), he had an inquisitive and serious air about him. His eyes ran up and down the girl on the ground, looking for any clues.

  ‘Now then, Wilfried, what do we do in a situation like this?’

  ‘We need to find out who she is and where she’s from, sir.’

  ‘And the best way of doing that?’

  ‘We could go back to the van and mix a potion, something she can drink to tell us who she is.’

  ‘We could, but what if she wakes up before the potion’s ready? And, even if she doesn’t, she’s bound to panic when she comes round because she’ll be scared and certainly in pain judging by the state of her wrist. How would you get an ordinary girl like this to drink a potion then? Force it down her throat?’

  Wilfried looked down at the toes of his brown lace-up shoes for an answer. He was a diminutive boy and looked even smaller in his grey woollen coat that was too big and hung off his narrow shoulders, his hands only half visible at the ends of the sleeves.

  ‘Magic is the only solution to our predicament here,’ said Givens. ‘First, to heal her injuries, and then to find out what we need to know. We’ll also need it to wipe her mind of all the horrors that have befallen her. Our duty isn’t only to protect ordinary people, but, in the case of this girl, it’s to treat her gently and put her back safely wherever she came from. Only then will our job as Badlanders be done. So you can see how important Commencement is, how magic is the very key to being a success in the Badlands, whatever situation arises. Not just in the heat of battle with whatever foul creature you might encounter.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Givens looked down at the girl again and whispered some words. The white sparks round her wrist and the injuries on her head, face and shoulders started to change colour before vanishing. The lump on her forehead began to shrink. Her swollen wrist started to reduce in size.

  ‘Make a note of what you’ve seen, Wilfried,’ said Givens.

  The boy took out a small ring-bound notebook from his pocket which had Wilfried’s Learning Book – Keep out! scrawled on it in spiky writing. He prised out a pencil lodged in the metal ring binding down the side of the notebook.

  ‘Now there’s no way of finding out more about her until she’s awake and ready to speak so let us attend to the matter at hand in the few minutes it’ll take for everything to heal.’ Givens shot out a hand and more white sparks thundered from his fingers. They hooked round the Snarl’s nest and lifted it off the ground, placing it down some metres further on beside the dead adult and its chicks.

  The nest had been covering a small rupture in the ground that was full of bright light and out of which sparks of magic fluttered up occasionally and then vanished.

  ‘So, Wilfried, what of this vent in the
Ley Line?’

  ‘It’s dangerous to leave it open. It could grow larger.’

  ‘And how would you suggest closing it?’

  Wilfried crouched down to have a look. ‘We could probably use a nædle like we did with the other opening we found a few days ago.’

  ‘Yes, I would say so,’ said Givens, peering into the hole too. He caught a magical spark as it fizzed up towards him and watched it fade between his fingers and then dissolve to nothing.

  ‘It’s a shame the girl meant we had to intervene. We were gathering such useful information about the effect of magic on the Snarl chicks. The book I’m writing about magic and monsters will be a bestseller, Wilfried.’ Given smiled at the thought. And then he sighed. ‘Remind me, how many anomalies have we found along this Ley Line we’ve been surveying for the last few weeks?’

  ‘Two vents, sir, three smaller ruptures and four cracks.’

  Givens pursed his lips. ‘Then we’ll take a short break from our survey and return home. I could do with a night in my own bed anyway.’

  ‘Why are we going home, sir?’

  ‘Where does magic come from, Wilfried?’

  ‘The land, sir.’

  ‘Precisely. Hidden deep in the ground until the first Badlanders learnt to use it. So if a Ley Line is becoming unstable, allowing magic to escape, it means our absolute control over it is being threatened. We need the right advice on a problem like this to stop it getting worse. As head of the High Council of the Order, I’m able to speak to “the Cutter” on such a matter.’

  ‘Who’s that, sir?’

  Givens glanced at the girl who was still lying there with her eyes shut before proceeding.

  ‘I’m going to tell you something very few Badlanders know, Wilfried. The Cutter is a man who has such a kinship with magic that he understands its very essence. He has such a gift for magic that not only can this man cast the greatest of spells, but it’s said he used to be able to cut the magic out of Badlanders or alter their magic if a Commencement had gone wrong. Imagine that, Wilfried. Someone who has the power to take away the greatest gift a Badlander can ever have.’

  Wilfred shuddered at such a thing.

  ‘Now you won’t tell anyone this secret, will you, Wilfried? I can trust you, can’t I?’

  ‘Of course, sir. I won’t tell anyone.’

  Givens stared at the boy down his long nose and smiled. ‘Good. An apprentice should always keep his Master’s secrets. Why?’

  ‘Because trust helps keep us safe and sound, sir.’

  Ruby may have looked unconscious to Givens, but she was very much awake, her mind fizzing with thoughts about ‘the Cutter’ and whether this person could possibly help her and Jones and Thomas Gabriel with their magical problems.

  Over the last few minutes, she’d started to feel much better as the magic healed her, and she had kept quite still, biding her time. Victor Brynn had told her that Masters often showed off in front of their apprentices. It was meant to be inspiring, to make the point that an apprentice was lucky to be with their Master, so they wanted to work even harder. But it was also a test, to see if a boy could keep a secret. Victor Brynn had made it very clear to Ruby that he wanted a different type of relationship with her, one that was honest and open, befitting of the respect he owed her for saving his life. She had always loved him for that. Secretly, she’d thought of him as the father she’d never had.

  But now he was dead.

  Ruby shuddered as she felt a tinge of sadness curdle the insides of her tummy. Once more, she tried to focus back on the two Badlanders, waiting for the opportunity to use the last remaining Slap Dust to get away.

  But, when she felt a warm sensation inside the hand holding on tight to the vial of Slap Dust, she started to panic. The dust was reacting to the air because the stopper had been off for so long. Even with her thumb over the top, it was only a matter of time before the last few grains fizzled to nothing and Ruby would have no way of getting home. She had another problem too: the dust would start to smell the more it reacted. If either the boy or the man smelt it and realized she had Slap Dust, they’d search her and find her limitless pockets full of things only a Badlander would own. That could only lead to trouble.

  She had to get away. Fast.

  She sat up so quickly, the blood rushed to her head.

  ‘Sir! The girl’s waking up,’ she heard the boy cry out to his Master.

  Givens walked over to the girl who was clutching her arms around herself as she got to her feet. He stopped and raised his hands to show her they meant no harm.

  ‘How are you feeling?’ asked Givens gently.

  ‘A bit sick,’ said the girl.

  ‘That’s only to be expected after what’s happened. You took quite a tumble and hit your head. What exactly do you remember?’

  The girl opened her mouth to speak and then started to shake as she noticed the dead Snarl and its chicks.

  ‘There, there,’ said Givens. ‘We can help.’

  ‘Stay away!’ shouted the girl and started backing towards the treeline. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘We are Badlanders, the noble protectors of ordinary people from creatures that live secretly in the dark around you, which makes us very special indeed. Only minutes ago, my apprentice and I saved you from certain death.’ Givens conjured some white sparks round the ends of his fingers. ‘But we’re going to help you forget any of this ever happened. It won’t hurt at all.’

  He observed the girl’s reaction and hoped Wilfried was watching it too, understanding how magic was something so special that ordinary people were dumbfounded by it. ‘Why don’t you tell us who you are? And where you’re from? We want to help you. That’s what we Badlanders do.’

  ‘I’m gonna wet myself if I don’t get to pee right now!’ she blurted out.

  This time it was Givens’s turn to open his mouth at such a strange outburst.

  ‘I need to pee!’ repeated the girl as she started hopping from one foot to another. Her face scrunched up as if she was about to cry.

  ‘Well, I . . . well . . .’ Givens had not expected such a reaction from the girl. But then he didn’t know the first thing about such creatures. He was acutely aware that Wilfried was watching and the Badlander’s mind ticked over as the girl in front of him started to hop even faster from one foot to another.

  She pointed to the treeline, providing Givens with an answer.

  ‘Yes, of course. Wilfried here will keep an eye out for you. Make sure you don’t come to any harm. The forest isn’t a safe place to be at night.’ The girl nodded and set off quickly towards the trees.

  Givens raised his eyes at Wilfried, urging him to follow. The boy obeyed without a moment’s hesitation and Givens gave a silent moment of thanks for having such an obedient apprentice.

  Ruby walked as fast as she could out of the clearing and didn’t stop when she passed the first trees. The bottle was growing hotter in her hand and the grains of dust were starting to smell too. Soon they would be gone.

  The boy was trying to keep up, tramping through the undergrowth.

  ‘Don’t go too far!’ he shouted. ‘It’s not safe.’

  But Ruby strode on faster, breaking out into a run.

  ‘Wait!’

  Ruby wove between the trees and then stopped behind a particularly large oak with a wide trunk. She peered round it to see the boy looking about him, wringing his hands.

  ‘Where are you?’ he hissed. ‘This isn’t a place for playing games.’

  Ruby looked up into the tree when she heard something and saw a pair of red eyes staring down at her. A wide grin of teeth glinted. Something sticky and foamy dripped to the ground and Ruby smiled as she thanked her lucky stars. It was a Slobbering, a vicious, toothy creature with a big enough appetite for a girl her size. More slobber dripped. Some splattered onto her jacket. It fell onto her hair. A smell like stagnant water rose up around her.

  ‘Come on, what are you waiting for?’ she whispered at it, emptying
the last grains of Slap Dust into her hand.

  The creature launched itself at her and Ruby announced where she wanted to go and slapped her hands together.

  Nothing happened.

  The Slobbering landed on her and knocked her to the ground. It ripped a mouthful of material from her jacket, leaving a raggedy hole as she pushed it away.

  With the Slap Dust struggling to work properly, Ruby began disappearing limb by limb as the Slobbering came at her again, the material from her jacket flapping between its teeth.

  The last thing she saw was the Slobbering launching itself at her, threatening to swallow her whole, its jaw unhinging so it could take her in one gulp. Ruby gave a loud scream for good measure so the boy might hear, and even the man in the clearing too . . .

  . . . and then she was standing in the driveway in front of the cottage she now called home. Through a window, she saw Jones and Thomas Gabriel deep in conversation. They appeared to be arguing. Various weapons lay on the table, the gun among them. Ruby ran as fast as she could across the drive and in through the front door.

  When the two boys saw her, they stopped speaking and just stared as though they were unsure it was really her.

  ‘Jones, I’ve found out something that might be useful,’ Ruby said before the boy flung his arms round her, almost knocking her over. He held on tight for a moment.

  ‘I thought you’d gone,’ he gasped.

  EIGHT

  Ruby tried not to cry as she looked down at Victor Brynn’s corpse. But something inside her broke and the tears streamed from her eyes against her wishes. Even though it was very late at night, and she was tired and sore, she knew the man’s body needed to be honoured. So she tried her best to recite the wyrd rhyme as Jones and Thomas Gabriel stood in silence in the garden, their heads bowed and their hands clasped respectfully.

  ‘Do not be afear’d

  It is only the wyrd

  That says you must go

  From this world that you know.’