Soul Stealer (22 page)

Sebastian laughed quietly and, guessing what was going through Tim’s head, said, “You need not worry. Childish misdemeanors
will not affect your integrity.”

Taking a small bronze rod, Sebastian touched each chalice, which again rang like a tiny bell.

“Are you ready,” he inquired, “to bind yourself solemnly and sincerely to the cause of good?”

“Yes,” Pip and Tim confirmed in unison.

Sebastian began softly intoning in Latin. Neither Pip nor Tim could pick up more than the occasional mention of their names
and a few words the meanings of which they could only hazard a guess — justicia, diabolus, malign…

After several minutes, Sebastian fell silent and slid the chalices over the table.

“Remember.” Sebastian repeated his warning. “Just wet your lips. Do not then lick them.” He placed a square of dark-green
silk next to each chalice. “Wipe your mouths dry with these.”

Gingerly, they picked up the chalices. As the potion touched their lips, their skin seemed to effervesce as if they had sucked
upon a sherbet fizz.

“Weird!” Tim said when he had wiped his mouth dry.

Sebastian picked up the chalices, flinging the contents at the wall. As the liquid hit the stones the chamber was lit by a
brilliant light, a shower of orange sparks cascading to the flagstoned floor.

“Wicked!” Tim exclaimed.

“Don’t we have to swear an oath or something?” Pip asked.

“Your acceptance of the risk of touching the liquid assures your fidelity,” Sebastian answered.

“So now we’re punitors?” Tim asked.

Sebastian nodded, picked up the silk napkins and, placing them in a crude earthenware pot, set light to them. They quickly
ignited, the cloth spitting and hissing.

“How do we know what powers we have?” Pip inquired. “Is there some way we can test them?”

“That is not necessary,” Sebastian answered. “They will become apparent according to what your need is at the time. If you
see great evil, your powers will be great. If you see less significant wickedness, your powers will be less, yet still adequate
to address it. There is, however, one point you must bear in mind,” he ended. “You may avenge evil but you are not protected
from it. However, I have prepared tokens which will afford you some protection.”

Sebastian handed Pip and Tim each a thin disc of highly polished wood about two centimeters in diameter.

“These are cross-sections of the bough of a rowan tree,” Sebastian explained. “They were cut after the tree was dead. One
may not fell a living rowan, for to do so is to encourage evil to befall you.”

“So what do we do with it?” Pip inquired.

“You merely revolve it in your hand,” Sebastian instructed. “So long as you do this, you will reverse any nearby evil. Keep
the coin of rowan, with you at all times.”

Pip and Tim placed the wooden discs in their pockets.

“So,” Tim asked, “how does this punitor power work? Do we have to do something to sort of switch it on?”

“No,” Sebastian said. “It will commence just as any emotion might. Consider how you felt when you saw the girl being bullied
for her staph infection. You were
angry at her antagonist, sympathetic to her. You did not have to switch on these emotions, as you put it. They were automatically
aroused in you, for you are good and what you saw was wrong. So will it be. Your powers will come to the fore for they are
now extensions of your feelings.”

“The Force is with us!” Tim said, punching the air. “We have the power…”

“Oh! Tim,” Pip said with a weary voice. “Do get a life!”

The following week was vacation. On the Friday before, the entire school was called to assembly before school began, to be
addressed by Dr. Singall.

He began his speech by commending the pupils on a solid start to the new school year.

“The soccer season has kicked off particularly well, if you’ll excuse my pun,” he said with a self-indulgent smile at his
own wit, “with not a game lost so far. Our junior boys’ cross-country team has won the first round of the inter-county competition.
And, lest you think only the boys are faring well, I’m delighted to report that the senior girls’ hockey team has scored a
resounding victory over Capland Girls’ High School.”

He continued with a number of announcements concerning the school play, the annual concert, the refurbishment of the Food
Technology suite and a forthcoming German exchange in the first week after vacation.

“As those of you going on the German exchange will know,” he announced, “you will be accompanied by Mr. Staples and Miss Bates.”

This information gave rise to a general murmur and a brief wolf whistle, which were quickly suppressed by a scowl from the
headmaster. It was widely known the two teachers were dating each other.

“In their place,” Dr. Singall concluded, “we shall have two substitute teachers. Mr. Staples’s German classes will be taken
by Miss Brandeis and Miss Bates’s classes will be taught by Mr. Loudacre.”

With that, the school was dismissed to their classes.

Although it was Friday, Yoland let it be known that the Atom Club would meet that lunchtime to make up for the Monday which
would be missed over vacation and for the first Monday after vacation which was to be designated an in-service training day.
Accordingly, as soon as they had finished their sandwiches, Pip, Tim, and Sebastian made their way to the chemistry laboratory.
As they went in, Scrotton was hanging a large color diagram in front of the whiteboard. Once it was up, he lingered at the
end of the demonstration bench and surveyed the room.

“Arrogant little runt,” Tim whispered. “Thinks he’s the man’s man.”

“Man’s monkey, more like,” Pip replied under her breath.

“Be sure,” Sebastian said softly, his back to Scrotton, “not to underestimate him. He has the ear of his master and, worse,
his master has his ear. Even now, he will be monitoring our conversation as best he can.”

“Think he can hear us?” Pip asked quietly, her words camouflaged by the general babble in the room.

“It is possible,” Sebastian answered, “but we utter nothing of an incriminating nature and, besides, Scrotton is not sufficiently
intelligent to assess what we say, only to pass it on verbatim.”

The preparation room door opened. Yoland stepped out, carrying a laser pointer.

“Today,” he began, “we look at nuclear power.” He switched the pointer on, moving the dot of red light over the diagram. “This
is a plan of a nuclear power station. It looks complicated but is, in fact, quite simple in principle. A controlled nuclear
reaction creates great heat that raises the temperature of water in a sealed system. This turns to steam, which drives massive
turbines operating huge electrical generators. There are different types of nuclear power stations, but they all operate along
basically the same lines. The fuel used in the reactor…” he moved the pinprick of light over the diagram once more “… is most
often uranium-235.”

“If it’s in a sealed system, sir,” Sebastian inquired, “how is the reaction controlled?”

“A good question, Gillette,” Yoland responded. “To understand this, you need to know of what the reaction consists.”

Yoland leaned his elbows on the demonstration bench. “Come nearer, everybody. Scrotton,” he ordered as an aside, “the second
diagram, please.”

Scrotton obediently hung another diagram over the first. It depicted a uranium atom.

The club members edged forwards. Both Pip and Tim felt in their pockets for their clickers.

“The uranium atom,” Yoland explained, “is what we call unstable. Under certain conditions, it attempts to divide in two. This
is called fission. When it divides, particles of it are given off. Normally, when the uranium atom splits, the nucleus of
it — the core of it —forms a barium nucleus, a krypton nucleus and three spare particles called neutrons.” The laser spot
hovered over a drawing of an atom splitting into two, with three small particles moving off to one side.

“These neutrons,” Yoland continued, shifting the laser beam, “collide with other uranium atoms and cause them to vibrate.
This creates heat. To control this, there are placed in the reactor what are known as control rods. These are frequently made
of graphite, which absorbs some of the neutrons. Thus, by inserting or removing these rods you can manage the emission of
heat. Additionally, the fuel — the uranium — can be immersed in a medium of carbon dioxide — a gas heavier than air — water
or heavy water to further slow the particles down. This medium of gas or liquid also transfers the heat to make the steam.”

“Heavy water?” a club member questioned.

“That,” Yoland explained, “is water with its two ordinary hydrogen atoms replaced by two deuterium atoms. Deuterium is an
isotope of hydrogen.”

As he spoke, Pip observed the teacher. He looked hard into each pupil’s face, his eyes intent, as if he was deliberately focusing
on something, his lips vaguely
smiling. Pip and Tim fingered their clickers, ready to defend themselves.

“Finally,” Yoland announced just before the bell rang for the end of lunch break, “a fortnight today, on the first Friday
back after vacation, we shall be going on a club outing. I have booked the school mini-bus and you are all excused from your
afternoon classes.” He handed an envelope to each pupil. “Give these to your parents and ask them to sign the permission slip.”

“Where are we going?” one boy asked.

“I have arranged,” Yoland said with all the panache of a circus ringmaster, “for us to have a guided tour of the Jasper Point
nuclear power station.”

This news was greeted with a babble of excitement by all the club members but three…

When Pip and Tim went down to breakfast on Monday morning, they noticed a large white and blue builders’ van and a pick-up
truck parked outside the coach house. Several men were unloading a cement mixer from the truck. Others were removing sacks
of mortar, tools, bricks and lengths of drainpipe from the van.

“New drains,” said Mrs. Ledger, “and that means you two are coming to Exington with me.”

Pip and Tim looked in dismay at each other. This was not how they had intended starting off vacation.

“We’ll be all right here, Mum,” urged Pip. “We won’t get in the way, or underfoot, or anything.”

Their mother was adamant.

“Your father’s got a storyboard to get through for a shoot next week, and he doesn’t want to have any distractions. The builders
will be enough,” she added as, outside, one of the workmen started up the cement mixer, the engine puttering into noisy life.

“Promise,” Pip pleaded.

“Twenty minutes, out by the car,” Mrs. Ledger responded, unmoved.

By the time they reached the town, the High Street was already a bustling morning market, the pavements crowded with shoppers.
Mrs. Ledger found it very difficult to find somewhere to park and was finally forced to drive to the top floor of the parking
garage, a place she disliked intensely for, as she said several times as they ascended the ramps, driving in circles made
her dizzy.

For the next hour, Pip and Tim traipsed behind their mother, following her from a pharmacy to a stationer’s, a bookshop and,
finally, a fabric shop where she spent at least twenty minutes rummaging through vast piles of curtain samples. It was late
morning by the time they finally left the town for the supermarket on the outskirts.

“Can we sit in the car?” Pip asked. “I’m exhausted.”

“Out of the question!” replied Mrs. Ledger with a finality both of her children knew only too well. “You’re coming to the
supermarket with me. Tim, get me a large cart.”

The first area Mrs. Ledger visited was the fruit and vegetable section. At the far end were flower stands, by which an old
lady stood inspecting bunches of tiger
lilies and sprigs of waxy-petaled lilac-colored Thai orchids.

Her attention taken by the blossoms, the elderly woman did not notice a young man in a creased, mud-spattered leather jacket
lingering nearby. He was in his mid-twenties, dressed in worn jeans, dirty sneakers and a sweatshirt. His jacket was zipped
up the front, loose-fitting and probably several sizes too big for him, but the elasticated waist was tight around his belt.