Spellbinder (18 page)

“Wait.” Steve had drifted around the corner to the next set of shelves. “Latin! Maybe . . . yes! Ancient Greek!”

He ran back, brandishing a small book that was almost as thick as it was wide. Belladonna joined him as he opened the book at the Ancient Greek to English section, but then their faces fell. It was in Greek. Proper, Cyrillic alphabet Greek. They stared at the strange letters.

“What’s the point of that?” said Steve, exasperated.

“I suppose it’s useful if you’re trying to translate an
old document, or a carving or something,” mumbled Belladonna, crestfallen.

Steve snapped the book shut and shoved it back onto the shelf. “Well, I just hope the stupid word doesn’t mean something like ‘vicious murderer who eats children for breakfast with bran flakes,’ ” he said, “because if it does, we’re stuffed.”

Belladonna had to agree. What was the point, she thought, of giving them a clue in a language that no one outside of universities spoke any more? How were they ever supposed to work it out? On the other hand, it was given to them by a creature that used to write its prophecies on dried leaves and let them blow around, and Belladonna had to admit that compared to that method of communication, an actual, real word was probably an improvement.

“Come on,” she said, “let’s go and look at that other arcade.”

Steve nodded and led the way back out onto the High Street, ’round a corner onto Umbra Avenue, and along past the launderette to a small shop that Belladonna had always assumed sold records. The window was small and blacked out and the dark green door was chipped and festooned with dozens of stickers, which turned out not to be for bands at all, but for games. Steve pushed the door open with the authority of one who has wasted more than a few hours standing in front of CRT screens with a steadily diminishing pocketful of change.

Inside, it was dark and uncomfortably warm, though with the same cacophony of ear-piercing sound effects and thundering music as at the other arcade. Unlike the other place, however, there was a small desk and change window near the front, behind which sat an incredibly old man with a long, scraggly white beard that appeared to have much of his lunch entwined within its grubby depths. He was wearing a threadbare red cardigan with a huge white (and much-used) handkerchief hanging out of one pocket. Steve nodded a greeting to him, but the old man merely grunted and returned to counting the small stacks of coins he had laid out on the desk in front of him.

“He’s always like that,” whispered Steve.

Belladonna peeked back at him through the piece of hair that had dropped in front of her eyes again. He was still counting his money, but she had a feeling he was watching their every move.

Steve led the way past the newer games at the front of the shop and into the even darker recesses toward the back. Belladonna couldn’t believe the place was so big—it had seemed tiny when they’d first walked in. The back of the arcade was a disorganized no-man’s-land of the broken and outdated. Machines, whose screens had been smashed, electronics fried, or cash boxes jammed, shared space with fully functioning games that no one wanted to play any more. At the very back were three one-armed bandits, a dusty
fortune-telling machine, and an old claw game. Belladonna’s jaw dropped.

“That’s it!” she whispered.

The claw game was housed in a large cube-shaped box, topped by the head of a snarling red dragon with one talon extended and two small batlike wings. Beneath the dragon in the Plexiglas box were dozens of small cheap toys of the teddy bear, toy car, and plastic doll variety. Above them, a large mechanical claw hovered above a chute that led down and out to a catch-bin on the red-painted exterior of the machine.

“But where is it?” asked Steve, squinting at the dusty, jumbled box of toys.

“There!” said Belladonna, pointing. “There! Underneath the ambulance!”

He peered at the toys and followed Belladonna’s pointing finger to the far left of the machine. There, lying next to a particularly ugly kewpie doll and half underneath an old-fashioned ambulance, was a large triangular red stone set into a gold-colored medallion. The stone wasn’t particularly shiny, but it had a depth and glimmer that told even the jewelry-challenged Steve that this was no plastic trinket.

“How much change have you got?” he asked, plunging his hands into his pockets and coming up with a collection of coins.

Belladonna reached into her own pockets, then stopped. “Oh, no,” she said.

“What?” asked Steve, without looking up.

“Look!”

He looked up. There, just above the catch-basket, was the coin slot, and right next to that the words “Three tries for 1/-!” were written in appropriately gothic script.

“One what?” he said, squinting at the unfamiliar symbol.

“Shilling,” explained Belladonna. “Old money. It only takes shillings!”

They both stared at the coin slot, suddenly deflated. Steve put his money back in his pocket.

“Wait,” said Belladonna. “My Mum keeps a box on her dressing table that’s full of old money. Maybe there are some shillings in there.”

Steve nodded, then looked back toward the front of the shop.

“You know,” he said, “there’s not much point having this game here unless people can get their hands on shillings.”

“Yes, but it doesn’t look like it’s been played in years.”

“Let’s ask.”

Belladonna followed as Steve marched through the shop and up to the old man on the desk.

“Excuse me,” he said, almost shouting.

“Yes? What?” said the old man loudly, cocking an ear toward Steve.

“We want to play the claw game!”

“Eh?”

“At the back!”

“You’ll have to speak up! My hearing’s not what it was!”

“The claw game!” yelled Steve. “At the back! It only takes shillings!”

The old man heard that, alright. He started laughing a wheezy, squeaking laugh that soon turned into a hacking cough. He coughed for a few minutes until his face turned red and tears started to stream from his rheumy eyes, then he took out his handkerchief, wiped his face, and was back to business.

“Shillings,” he said, opening a drawer and taking out a handful of the old coins, “50p for five.”

“But that’s not fair!” said Belladonna. “They’re only worth 5p each!”

The old man leaned over the desk and peered down at her as if he’d only just noticed she was there. “Well, aren’t you the clever one, missy?” he said. “But the fact is, I have ’em and you want ’em, so they’re 10p each.”

“We’ll take five,” said Steve quickly, handing over the money.

The old man grinned toothlessly and counted out the shillings.

Belladonna and Steve scurried back to the game and then stopped, suddenly nervous. Steve held out a shilling.

“You go first,” he said.

“No,” Belladonna shook her head. “You go. You play more of these than I do.”

“Not these old things,” said Steve, but he dropped a coin in the slot anyway.

There was a clank as the shilling hit the coin box, then the whole machine seemed to lurch and the claw moved sideways. Steve grabbed the joystick and began trying to move the claw over the Draconite Amulet. The machinery clunked and juddered as it moved first forward and then to the left. When he thought he was above it, he dropped the claw and made a grab but got nothing. He started to try again but his first turn ran out. He pushed the button, but came up empty-handed on his second try as well; the third time, he managed to grab the ambulance and move it aside, opening up the approach to the amulet, then the first shilling ran out and the machine ground to a halt.

Steve solemnly handed Belladonna the second shilling, but she had no more luck than he did. She moved the ugly kewpie doll and once even dropped the claw right on top of the amulet, but couldn’t actually pick it up.

“Maybe the machine is broken,” she said as Steve dropped in the third shilling.

“I wish,” he said, giving the joystick a yank to the right. “Me and my Dad went to the seaside once and there was one in an arcade there. It was just the same.
Even when you pick something up, half the time the claw is set to drop it before it reaches the chute.”

“You mean it’s rigged?” she said. “Isn’t there some government agency that’s supposed to regulate things like this?”

Steve looked at her like she was certifiable as the third shilling ran out. Belladonna took the fourth and dropped it in. She decided to try a meticulous approach this time, and moved the claw as slowly and carefully as she could. She dropped it on the amulet, closed and raised it, but inexplicably found that the claw had grabbed the kewpie doll instead.

“What? But I was nowhere near the stupid doll!”

“No,” said Steve, squinting at the machine suspiciously. “There’s something hinky about this game.”

“Of course!” said Belladonna. “There’d have to be, wouldn’t there?”

“Come again?”

“Well, if you’re going to hide the amulet here, you couldn’t risk just anyone being able to get hold of it.”

“No, but that really doesn’t help.”

“What if it was a real dragon?”

“What?” Steve was clearly beginning to worry about Belladonna’s sanity.

“Not a game. What if it was a real dragon with a real treasure? What would you do?”

“Run away, get a tank . . . I don’t know. It’s stupid.”

Belladonna looked at him. She knew he couldn’t
believe he was actually spending his time hanging around with the weirdest girl in school. He probably thought he should be with his friends, playing football and making the chess club’s lives miserable.

“Okay,” he said gloomily, dropping the last shilling into the machine. “If it was a real dragon, I’d have a sword—”

“And armor.”

“Yes,” he muttered, “and armor. And I’d ride up to its cave, dismount, and say something like . . . like . . .”

He looked at Belladonna for help. She knew it was because she was the one who kept spouting magic words in forgotten languages, but she just stared at him expectantly, biting her lower lip, her hair hanging in front of her eyes.
Maybe
, she thought,
just maybe I’m not the only one
. Steve was clearly glad there was hardly anyone else there. He took hold of the joystick and closed his eyes.

“Eliantor!” he said, in a commanding voice. He opened his eyes.

“Carry on! Don’t stop,” said Belladonna.

Steve rolled his eyes; this really was so dumb. Belladonna gave him a sharp nudge in the ribs and nodded him on. He closed his eyes again.

“Eliantor! As you value your life and the lives of your brood, and in the name of the Champions of Arianrhod, give up your jewel!”

He opened his eyes and turned to Belladonna, and for the first time he looked really scared.

“What was that? Is this what it feels like when you . . . ? This isn’t right, I think we should go—”

He never got any further; the joystick suddenly lurched in his hand and the claw flew across the box. It hovered over the amulet, then plunged down. Then . . . nothing. Steve held his breath and slowly raised the claw. There in its grasp was the Draconite Amulet. He moved the claw back across the field of toys to the chute and let it go.

There was a clang and a rattle. Steve and Belladonna both looked down: There was the amulet, blood red and twinkling darkly, in the hopper of the machine. Steve reached down and picked it up.

“How did . . .” he began.

“It doesn’t matter,” said Belladonna. “Let’s go.”

Steve shoved the amulet into his pocket and followed Belladonna as she strode purposefully past the change kiosk.

“Win anything?” asked the old man, before collapsing in a mixture of explosive wheezes and coughs that sounded like he was about to die on the spot, but which Belladonna realized was actually laughing.

“Not really,” she mumbled, pushing the door open and stepping outside. Back on the street, she turned around and looked at Steve. He still looked a little stunned, but out there, in the glare of the afternoon, she could see that he thought it seemed ludicrous to believe that any mumbo jumbo that had popped into his head could’ve done anything. And yet . . .

They marched up the High Street toward the old theatre. Steve took the amulet out of his pocket and looked at it. The chain and setting seemed to be gold and decorated with impossibly complicated, intertwining geometric designs, but the stone itself was like nothing they’d ever seen. Belladonna stared into its depths. It was red, she was sure, but toward the middle it seemed to become black and to go on forever, like a bottomless well.

Steve held it up in front of his face and peered through it. Then he stopped walking and stood motionless, barely breathing.

“Belladonna . . .”

She turned back. “What?”

“Come here,” he said quietly. “Tell me what you see.”

He handed her the jewel and she held it up toward the sun just as he had . . . and gasped.

“Do you see it? You do, don’t you?”

She did. What she had expected to see, of course, was the end of the street looking a bit red as though she were looking through cellophane, but what the amulet was showing her was not the end of Umbra Avenue leading into the High Street with Sunday shoppers and families out for a drive, but a place of arid plains and splintered mountains, where great winged creatures flew, silhouetted against a cloudless sky, while others battled on the ground, spitting flame from gaping jaws and slashing at each other’s armored flanks with scythelike claws.

“Dragons!” she whispered.

“I think we’re seeing it through his eyes,” said Steve. “The dragon’s—the one that the stone belonged to.”

Belladonna nodded. She couldn’t take her eyes off the scene before her; it was awful, yet mesmerizing.

“It didn’t come from the Land of the Dead,” said Steve.

“What?”

“Didn’t Dr. Ashe say that the ghosts might have disappeared because something from one world had caused an imbalance in the other?”

“Well, yes, but—”

“Well, if the amulet wasn’t from the Land of the Dead in the first place, how could it cause an imbalance there? It should be causing one here, if anything.”

Belladonna lowered the amulet and handed it back to Steve.