Faculty of Fire (41 page)

Naive walked back about ten paces and ran at the door with a bloodcurdling screech. His corpulent frame went hurtling past us at a respectable speed, there was an appalling cracking sound, and then Naive went flying past us in the opposite direction at an even greater speed.

“Hey now,” said Neville watching him go by with a surprised expression on his face. “If those are flimsy doors, then what are the strong ones like?”

Neville and Steel went to bring Naive round, and Caiten and I walked over to the door.

“Look, it has nothing to do with the door.”

He was right, the door was cracked all over, and through the cracks we could see the empty corridor. The only thing holding the door in place was a long bench that had been used to block it shut.

I put my hand through the biggest crack and pulled the bench aside.

“After you,” I said and pushed against the door, which collapsed and fell apart into little pieces.

“Well done,” Caiten hissed. “Anyone would have to be deaf not to hear that.”

I wondered if any deaf trolls had taken part in the attack. But anyway, what had I done, really? When Naive rammed the door with his head, nobody had said anything to him. Ah, and there he was.

Steel and Neville were leading him by the arms.

“I’ve feeling a bit dizzy,” our fiery boy complained.

“Into the next corridor, quickly!” Caiten commanded.

But we didn’t manage it quickly. That is, we ran as fast as we could, but a troll intercepted us again at the teleports. I might have been mistaken, but I thought it was the same one.

The immense carcass stepped out of a teleport, clutching a man in blue livery in each hand. And for some reason he was holding them by the legs.

“Well lookee here, new prey,” the troll exclaimed in delight. “No, wait a moment,” he said, frowning and taking a closer look at us. “It’s the old prey running away. Now that’s not right!”

The troll set his load down on the floor carefully, almost tenderly, and strode towards us.

“What are we going to do?” I asked Caiten nervously.

“I don’t know,” he replied. “Unfortunately, there aren’t any windows on this floor, so it’s impossible to get out, except through the teleports.”

“Well, that’s good news,” Neville sighed. “I don’t think there’s any point in playing hide and seek with them, is there? Trolls don’t get tired.”

“The Vickers never surrender!” Naive suddenly declared.

That lad constantly amazed me. Behind that mask of amiable stupidity lay a personality deserving of respect.

“Listen,” said Steel, looking at us quizzically. “You studied in a School of the Arts. Is a troll really a serious opponent?”

“Sure,” Neville grunted, fingering his swollen forehead once again. “More than just an opponent – he’s a walking wall.”

Meanwhile the troll had walked up close, and he looked down on us from above: “Will you go back on your own, or shall I help?”

“Who’s been dropping litter round here?” asked a squeaky voice behind the troll.

The stone creature turned towards the voice and almost sat down on the floor – or rather on us - in surprise.

“Who are you?” he asked suspiciously.

“The janitor!” Naive exclaimed joyfully.”I told you, but you didn’t believe me!”

Neville and I looked at each other, dumbfounded.

“Pinch me,” said Neville.

The janitor, enveloped from head to foot in a mysterious loose, brown robe, prodded the two bodies with his foot.

“They seem to be alive,” he remarked in the same squeaky voice. “Why are you dumping good stuff like this?”

“Well, you know ...” the troll began. “It’s ... I still have to deliver them somewhere.”

“You still have to deliver them somewhere,” the janitor said, mimicking him, and picked the two bodies up by the scruff of the neck with no real effort. “But I have to clean up after you.”

“Hey,” said the troll, starting to recover his wits. “Where are you talking them?”

“Where else? – I’ll take them to the druids, and they can fix them up,” said the janitor and unhurriedly carried the bodies off into the next corridor. We couldn’t see his face under the brown material, but I thought he was smiling. I don’t know why, but it just seemed like that to me.

“You can’t take them to the druids!” the troll roared after the janitor, and went dashing to intercept him.

The janitor was holding the two grown men at arm’s length without even the slightest effort. And the troll caught up with him when he had already turned the corner into the next corridor.

The troll disappeared from our field of view for a second. We expected to hear the sounds of a fight, scuffling and yelling, anything but deafening silence.

The troll’s stone head came rolling out slowly from behind the corner.

“May a dragon take me,” Steel whispered quietly.

“Likewise,” I agreed. “May a dragon take you.”

Steel didn’t get my joke straight away. Or maybe he didn’t even get it at all ...

The five of us cautiously walked up to the corner and looked round.

Lying on the floor was heap of stones, which not so long ago had been a troll. The janitor was sitting on top of this heap, shaking his hands.

“All that dust...” he sighed.

“Whoah,” said Caiten with a gulp. “I just hope he’s on our side.”

“I’m on my own side,” the janitor said immediately in that repulsive squeaky voice.

I must confess that I had certain suspicions of my own concerning the identity of the janitor. Only a vampire could have that kind of strength ... and I had only met one representative of that species in the Academy – not counting Alice, of course.

“Velkheor?”

“Where?” the janitor growled, leaping to his feet, but a second later he was completely calm again. “I’m sorry ... an old habit, I still haven’t got out of it ...”

His voice was somehow less squeaky and repulsive now. Or rather, it was simply gentler and more pleasant ... like the voices of all vampires.

“Sorry, I was mistaken,” I apologised.

But then Caiten asked in a soft voice, “Kel?”

“Ah, look at that,” said the janitor, starting to unwrap his costume. “Can’t even carry off a decent joke any more! And the moment I get a decent job, something odd has to happen.”

“So where have you been hiding all this time?” Caiten exclaimed in delight, obviously speaking to an old friend.

The janitor slowly wound the brown cloth off his head. He looked about the same age as us, but those red eyes were the eyes of a hereditary vampire. They were frightening ... now I really understood what Caiten had in mind when he said Alice wasn’t an ordinary vampire.

“Hiding?” the vampire repeated. “Yes, that’s exactly what I’ve been doing. Hiding like a coward after making that unsuccessful attempt on the life of the Emperor.”

After he said that, we ought to have seized the vampire with cries of “Long live the Emperor”, but all we could do was gape at him amazement. And Steel didn’t even manage that, he just frowned.

“It’s wasn’t so very unsuccessful,” Caiten laughed. “The Emperor still hasn’t recovered from the shock, and now everything’s run by his honourable senior adviser. By the way, he was the one who foiled your villainous attempt.”

The vampire stood up. The Vickers brothers and I involuntarily recoiled, which brought another smile to his lips. Steel recoiled too, after a slight delay.

“Ah yes, our adviser is a real hero,” the vampire agreed. “And now I’ve become bloody Velkheor’s partner – he took part in the assassination attempt too, you know.”

The full meaning of this conversation escaped me. But there were some things I did understand. Kelnmiir had been involved in the attempt to assassinate the Emperor, after which our ruler had taken to his bed. Velkheor, who was a friend (!?) of Romius, had also taken part in the assassination attempt. The Emperor had been saved by his adviser who, as it happened, was also a hereditary vampire. A few months earlier the news had been a huge sensation in Lita, but I hadn’t paid any attention to the details. I should have shown more interest. From the tone of the conversation between Caiten and Kelnmiir, there seemed to be something fishy about this. And then again, how did three vampires come to be here in the Academy, the Craftsmen’s fortress, all at the same time? Wasn’t that rather too many for an institution into which the “bloodsuckers” had never been allowed in the whole of its history?

“I’m glad you’re here,” Caiten remarked. “Without you, we’d have been in a rather tight spot.”

“Don’t tell me that one pitiful troll can stop five Craftsmen.”

“But magic doesn’t work on them,” Caiten reminded him.

We nodded in support.

It didn’t work. But what if it did? What good was that if there was no energy?

“It doesn’t work directly,” the vampire replied. “Is it really my place to teach you simple things like that?”

“Why shouldn’t you? Anyway, I would have dealt with him easily enough, if not for the sabotage at the Energy Reservoir ...”

“Sabotage,” Kelnmiir repeated pensively. “Music to my ears ... what a pity I didn’t think of that? Well anyway, why don’t you introduce these young people to me?”

“These are pupils of the faculty of fire, in fact I’d say the best pupils. Zach, Naive, Neville and Steel. Lads, let me introduce you to Kelnmiir.”

“Pleased to meet you,” we responded in confused chorus.

“But where are the people the troll was carrying?” Naive suddenly asked. “Are they alive?”

“Yes, they’re alive,” the vampire replied. “Lying unconscious in the next study, and they’ll lie there for a few more hours at least, the troll hit them on the head pretty hard.”

“Okay, we’ve no time to worry about them right now,” Caiten decided. “Before we met the troll and you, we were on the way to Romius’s study, it has ...”

“A teleport,” the vampire concluded. “I know.”

“For us – unlike yourself – it’s the only way of moving between levels. And now we need to get to the History Museum and find some appropriate weapons.”

The vampire brightened up at that: “The History Museum? The one on the top floor? That’s interesting, I couldn’t get in there, although I did try.”

“I’d be glad to hang about here chatting with you, but all the Craftsmen and pupils are besieged in the Main Hall. I’m afraid that if we don’t hurry, it will be too late...” said Caiten, demonstratively turning his back to the vampire.

“I agree,” the vampire replied. “Let’s go quickly.”

He jumped lightly down off the heap of stones and hurried toward Romius’s study.

“I see you know the way very well,” Caiten observed.

“I’ve found out
a lot
about the Academy while I’ve been here,” said Kelnmiir, emphasising the words “a lot”.

We followed him at a slight distance.

“Do you understand any of this?” Neville asked me in a low voice.

“Not much, and even that’s a real struggle,” I replied in a whisper.

“Guys, do you know who this vampire is?” asked Steel, who was walking behind us.

“Apparently, he’s the one who made the attempt on the Emperor’s life ...” Neville said uncertainly.

“I didn’t mean that,” Steel said dismissively. “This vampire belongs to the ruling clan and, if I’m not mistaken, he was the ruler of the Kingdom of vampires ... you know, when it still existed. And the Kingdom of Miir actually fell apart during his reign. The phrase he used when he destroyed an entire state – ‘I’ve had it, I’m leaving’ – became a byword.”

The vampire turned towards us: “Actually, in the original the phrase wasn’t exactly that, it was a bit coarser.”

We didn’t say anything for a while after that, remembering how superb vampires’ hearing is.

Kelnmiir turned back to Caiten: “But I see you’ve been demoted. What gets someone excluded from the ranks of the Craftsmen these days?”

Excluded from the ranks? Demoted? So Caiten used to be Craftsman, did he?

“Disagreeing with the policy of the Academy,” Caiten replied. “As if you didn’t know that yourself. How long have you been hi... living in the Academy?”

“You overestimate me. The only way I could get in was with the new intake of pupils. And then only by pure chance.”

We listened to the conversation between the two old friends with bated breath.

“It’s not that easy to overestimate you,” said Caiten, opening the door of Romius’s study. “I don’t think anyone else could have sneaked into the Academy and remained undiscovered for three months.”

“And where is Velkheor?”

“Velkheor has help and, anyway, he’s here officially.”