Pure Dead Brilliant (12 page)

Titus sank his head into his hands with a small wail.

“What's the matter now?”

“Think about it, Pan. If the batteries are dead, how do you propose to replace them? We can't just amble down to Auchenlochtermuchty and buy a new set. We don't know if the village still exists, and even if it does, what if you can't buy those batteries anymore? Maybe batteries are
obsolete
in 2022. Maybe money is obsolete—maybe . . .”

“Maybe you're missing the point. Here, stop worrying and take these.” Pandora passed Titus two batteries, keeping two for herself. “Stick them in your armpits, like I'm doing.”

“Excuse
me
?”

“Just do it. Put them in your pits and hold them in place by clamping your arms flat against your sides like this. . . .”

Utterly mystified, Titus obeyed, shuddering as the cold metal touched his skin. “Ugh. Freezing,” he moaned, puzzled at the appearance of a smile that crept across Pandora's mouth.

“Precisely. They're cold. Mrs. McLachlan taught me ages ago that if you warm up a dead battery, you can sometimes squeeze a wee bit more power out of it before tossing it in the bin. Let's give them ten minutes and try again.”

In the absence of anything better to do, they leant against the gnarled rhododendron trunks opposite the silent glass house and eavesdropped on the muttering coming from under the hood of the Aston Martin.

“What a mess,” the man in overalls grumbled, standing up and gently lowering the hood. “People like that don't deserve to own such a bonnie motor. . . .” He wiped his hands on an oily rag that dangled from his overalls and then dug around in his breast pocket to produce a cell phone. After a longish pause he spoke. “Yup, Ted here . . . Aye, I've given it a full service, done ma best to repair the steering rack, but the client's really dinged it . . . Aye, aw bent out of shape. Must've been flooring it—there's wheens of metal filings in the engine ile . . . Yeah, it's a shame. . . . Aye, a real waste . . .”

“Whooo, Titus. Tsk tsk tsk. Who's been a bad boy, then?” Pandora wagged her index finger reprovingly at her brother.

“Don't, just don't. I'm so ashamed of myself. Do you have any idea what those cars cost? Thousands . . . hundreds of thousands. What a dork I'm going to be—”

“Shhh—listen. He's having a real go at you.”

“More money than sense, wur Mister Borgia.” The mechanic looked disgustedly in the direction of the glass house. “Oh, aye, he's rolling in it. Doesnae blink when you tell him what a whole new engine's going to cost. Sma' change to the likes of him. And
fat
? I tell you, it's a wonder the car can take his weight. Still, even wi' all that money, and yon big hoose and drop-dead-gorgeous wifie, he's not a happy bunny. Take it from me, pal, it's just like they say, money can't buy you happiness. . . .”

Pandora dug Titus sharply in the ribs and wiggled her eyebrows meaningfully. He ignored her, keeping his attention fixed on the man in overalls.

“How do I know? Because I keep ma ear to the ground, is how. I hear things, me. He hasnae spoken to his sisters for years. He chucked his parents oot the family home, demolished it, and replaced it wi' this architect-designed fish tank. . . . Why? What I heard was that it was something to do wi' having no attic that spiders could breed in or some such nonsense. . . . What does he dae a' day? He eats—a' the time. He's stuffing his face, the wifie hates him, and he's aff to see a shrink three times a week since his last suicide attempt. . . . Nahhh. I wouldnae change places wi' him for a' the money in the world. . . .”

“Titus,” Pandora whispered, “give me the batteries. I think you'll overcook them—your face looks like it's on fire.”

Beet-red with shame at the discovery of what a moral midget he was going to become, Titus dug the two tiny cells out of his armpits and passed them over.

Ffup leant her massive head on Pandora's shoulder and moaned. “How long
now
? I'm awash in Nestor's milk. . . .”

Snapping the batteries into place, Pandora closed the compartment, checked the display, and, praying that it would work, pressed the knob.

Titus screamed, Ffup roared, and suddenly their nostrils were assailed by a truly evil smell.

“DO YOU
MIND
?” yelled a familiar voice. “Don't jump out on me like that! Is there nowhere in Argyll that a griffin can take a dump without turning it into a spectator sport?”

Squatting in the rhododendrons next to them was Sab. Pandora noticed that the griffin had a roll of toilet paper clutched in one claw and the sports section of the local paper in the other. Sab's expression veered between outrage and embarrassment as Ffup walked over to harangue him.

“The house is rather overendowed with bathrooms, you know.” The dragon looked as smug as was possible, given that her chest appeared to be leaking like a colander. “You don't have to do a poo in the bushes when you could take your pick from the bogs inside.”

Trying to muster any dignity while hovering above a pile of one's own steaming ordure is almost impossible, so Sab opted for full-on belligerence.

“D'you not think I
tried
that? D'you think I'm a wild animal or something? A beast that goes for a casual cack in the shrubbery? I tried the downstairs washroom; Marie Bain's got the runs and she's annexed it. I tried the guest bog; one of the guests is using the cludgie as a giant china cauldron. I went to our mistress's suite, but she's got her head down the pan, giving it big heaves; the nursery bog's got a diaper stuck in it; the family bathroom's engaged because Tock snuck in for a bubble bath; the second-floor shower room's got a mountain of tighty-whities and thongs dripping from the rail; and Latch's bathroom's being used as a frog repository—”

“STOP!” Pandora begged, covering her ears and running for the house.

“No, I won't stop. I insist on defending my griffinal right to excrete in the bushes. As I was saying—”

Branches cracked overhead and a shadow fell across them. Looking up, Titus saw Knot's head appear over the canopy of green leaves. The yeti's furry face rumpled in an approximation of a smile when he caught sight of Ffup.

“You'd better go feed your wee babby,” he said. “It's wailing its
head off. . . . What's that smell?”

Breathing through her mouth, Ffup rushed off to placate Nestor. Knot sniffed several times, in a crescendo of in-snorts, each louder than the one before.

“Mmmm . . . ,” he said appreciatively.

“No—
don't
. Don't say it. Bleaaargh.” Titus turned pale.

“Yummm. What's for lunch? Smells delicious, whatever it is.”

Titus bolted out of the bushes and ran for the house, one hand over his mouth, the other over his stomach.

“Mmmm-hmmm?” Knot stopped in mid-snort and looked puzzled. “Something I said?”

A Little Dish of Revenge

A
bsorbed in their studies, the group of student witches assembled in the meadow had been utterly unaware of the dramas taking place in the nearby shrubbery. In turn, they had been rehearsing the spells that they required to pass the practical part of their forthcoming end-of-term exams. Each student had chosen one standard grade enchantment from the second-year curriculum and, aided by the others, was attempting to put the magic into practice. The prospect of looming exams had focused their efforts considerably; there was no idle chitchat, no sarcastic commentary, and no amusing trick hexes to raise a laugh. The group was unusually subdued and diligent, frowning in concentration as Hecate Brinstone struggled with the visually stunning but fiendishly complex
Floreat Aetherum
.

Two witches were missing from the group: Signora Strega-Borgia, under Mrs. McLachlan's instructions, had gone back to bed; and Fiamma d'Infer was helping herself to the contents of a gin bottle that she'd hidden in the greenhouse for emergencies. Slugging down a stiff measure of neat alcohol, Fiamma peered through a mossy pane of glass at the eleven distant figures in the meadow.

“Stupid fools,” she muttered, taking another large swallow from the bottle. “Idiots, with their pathetic little conjuring tricks . . .” Out of sheer spite, she snapped her fingers in front of her mouth and, in an alarming simulacrum of a flamethrower, caused fire to blaze out from deep in her throat. Seeking something to destroy, she applied herself to the ancient grapevine that grew along the back wall of the greenhouse. If plants could have given voice to their feelings, the vine would have shrieked in agony. Minutes later, satisfied that no grapes would grow at StregaSchloss for many years, she strolled out of the greenhouse and crossed the flagstones to where the formal lawn rolled down to the meadow. The air was heavy with the scent of blossom, and bees buzzed drowsily in the herbaceous borders. Fiamma noted with disgust that Hecate was managing rather well with the
Floreat Aetherum,
much to the admiration and encouragement of her classmates.

Suspended in the air above the young witch's head were thousands of tiny flower buds, their petals tightly curled as they hung magically in the still air. Hecate paused in her careful incantations and looked up, shading her eyes against the sunlight. A tentative smile hovered round her mouth and, heartened by her success thus far, she continued,
“In nomine floris—aperte!”

Fiamma couldn't resist. Unobserved on the edge of the meadow, she muttered a counterspell under her breath, a hex designed to scramble Hecate's words and turn them into the magical equivalent of alphabet soup. Like witchcraft's version of a computer virus, its effect was catastrophic.

Before the witches in the meadow could run for cover, the hovering cloud of flower buds changed color from pale sugar-pink to a deep and angry orange. Moreover, its shape altered, appearing to vibrate as it did so. A distant buzzing grew into a loud and menacing hum. Fiamma turned her back on the resulting mayhem. Behind her, screams and oaths faded into distant squeals and grunts as the witch let herself into StregaSchloss by the door from the kitchen garden. The kitchen was empty except for Marie Bain, who was locked in mortal combat with a vast pot bubbling on top of the range. Wincing at the smell, the witch ignored the cook completely and headed downstairs through the wine cellar to the dungeons, where she hoped to find Nestor unattended, unprotected, and ripe for a spot of bloodletting.

“Ees ze sole Véronique,” Marie Bain explained to Fiamma's retreating figure, continuing doggedly despite having no audience. “Ah . . . but zere was no sole, so I find some—how you say?—‘keepers,' een ze smokehouse, and zen I go find some grapes for ze sauce, but
zut alors,
ze grape vin is . . . piff! Finis! Kaput! I use raisins instead. But zere ees supposed to be a glass of
vin blanc
in the sauce, and I cannot find a drop of zat, zen I see a leetle bottle of Muscat at ze back of ze fridge, so I pour eet in . . . and”—the cook paused to inhale ecstatically—
“magnifique!”

In the dustbin under the sink, the little bottle of Muscat lay under a rancid pile of kipper heads and tails. The label on the empty bottle had an addendum scrawled across it in Signora Strega-Borgia's distinctive handwriting:

which was not an obscure vintner's reference to the grape or indeed the vintage, but a reminder that the bottle had been recycled as a vessel in which to lay down a particularly fine example of Multitudina's urine, rat pee being a student witch's handy cupboard staple, essential for certain arcane enchantments.

“Ees ready!” Marie Bain announced. “Launch ees served!”

Lunch was also being served at the nearby Auchenlochtermuchty Arms (
Taste of Scotland,
1989, eight bedrooms with ensuite bathrooms, four-star dining, under new management), but thankfully of a quality far superior to Marie Bain's inedible offering. The dining room was deserted save for one solitary guest, a bulky man who sat in the darkest corner, his back to the room, engrossed in reading what to even the most casual observer appeared to be an Italian newspaper. A waitress brought him the menu and inquired if he'd like a drink while he was waiting, or some wine with his meal. Squeaking his order from behind his newspaper, Don Lucifer di S'Embowelli Borgia, uncle to Titus, Pandora, and Damp and half brother to Signor Luciano Strega-Borgia, was attempting to appear as normal as possible despite his nightmarish appearance. The plastic surgery he'd undergone eight months before to reduce the size of his nose had been executed with disastrous consequences for both surgeon and patient. Immediately following the operation, the surgeon had been dropped to the bottom of the river Tiber, held fast on the riverbed by the simple device of having had his feet buried in a ton of concrete prior to immersion. The patient was on the waiting list for extensive corrective surgery to reinstate a human nose, instead of the ghastly rat-like obscenity that currently twitched and wobbled in the middle of his face. Don Lucifer di S'Embowelli Borgia had ordered the concrete overshoes in revenge for not only bungling his nose job, but also for the rat-tail that, post-surgery, he had discovered dangling from his rear, and the rattish squeakings that he now emitted every time he opened his mouth. . . .

“Eek, eek squee?”

The waitress's brow wrinkled. “I'm sorry, sir,” she said. “I didn't catch what you said.”

“Squee eek, ‘Eek, eek squee?'” Don Lucifer jabbed his index finger at an item on the wine list.

“The house red is Rioja de Toromerde,” the waitress explained. Then, lowering her voice to a whisper, confided, “I'd avoid that one like the plague—I wouldn't even use it to clean toilets. It's disgusting. How about a nice claret with your steak?”

The Don squeaked his agreement, hoping the waitress would now disappear. This was torture, trying to communicate in high-pitched noises that made him sound like he needed oil, not wine. But worse was to come.

“Now, sir. How would you like your steak?”

“Eek ike ick aww.”

“Raw, sir? Not rare? You mean raw, as in cold, uncooked?”

“Eek.”

“But—it's not a dish best eaten cold, sir. . . .”

Don Lucifer brought his hand thudding down on the table. “Eekeek ike eek ishh esst eek'n aww!”

The waitress retreated, clutching the menu to her chest like a shield. Charm school reject, that one. And ugly as sin. Looked like he'd lost an argument with a mincing machine. . . .

Don Lucifer was all too aware of the effect his appearance had on most members of the general public. Cloistered away from humankind after his catastrophic surgery, he'd had plenty of time to bemoan his hideously altered reflection and plan his revenge. First the surgeon, he thought, and then, that item ticked off his “To Do” list, next—next comes my half brother, Luciano Strega-Borgia. Little lily-livered Luciano, who had the audacity to escape from the death trap I laid for him. Who managed, against impossible odds, to escape from a locked and burning room in my palazzo without leaving so much as a DNA smudge from his supposedly vaporized remains. . . . Luciano, whose eldest brat, Titus, is due to inherit the millions that I, Lucifer, was promised by my dying father. Luciano, whose meddling messed up the Borgia Inheritance, an unbroken chain of money (or so my dying father had said) that had passed down the male line for centuries since—since Italians
ran
this stupid little island.

Hissing through his teeth, Don Lucifer began to write a list in the margin of his newspaper:

Item first:
he scribbled,
Buy gun oil.
He'd retrieved his beloved Beretta from the ashes of the palazzo, and it badly needed to be taken apart, oiled, and reassembled to restore it to its former deadly perfection.

Item second: Reconnaissance.
Had Luciano really escaped being incinerated? He needed to find out exactly who was currently living in StregaSchloss.

Item third: Animals.
He had the suspicion that Luciano kept pets, since all Christmas cards from his half brother bore the weird names of several individuals as well as those of the immediate family . . . probably guard dogs, he decided, so—

Item fourth: Buy dog food for item the third.

Item fifth: Buy flashlight
—in case he did the job at night.

Item sixth: Buy waterproof trousers and jacket
—to protect his clothes from blood spatter, and finally—

Item seventh: Assemble state-of-the-art incendiary device and enter detonation code into cell phone—

“Your lunch, sir.” The waitress put a plate in front of him, adding, “Your
raw
steak, sir. Will that be all?”

Don Lucifer waved her away with a dismissive squeak. Pushing the gruesome plate to one side, he continued planning his lethal assault on StregaSchloss, which at this stage appeared to involve nothing more sinister than a major shopping trip to Auchenlochtermuchty.

“Your wine, sir.” The waitress reappeared with a bottle and a wineglass, both of which she placed in front of Don Lucifer. “Ochhh, you're not enjoying your steak, sir. A bit too bloody, is it? Shall I take it back to the kitchen and ask the chef to do something with it?”

“Eek.”

“Medium rare? Medium? Medium- to well-done? Well-done?”

To each inquiry, the surly guest shook his head. Seizing his pen, the waitress waved it in front of his face. “Write it
down
. Tell me what you want the chef to do with it.”

Snatching his pen back and stuffing his incriminating newspaper under his seat, Don Lucifer scribbled something on his napkin and held it up. The waitress peered at the pen marks bleeding into the linen.

was the terse instruction written on the napkin. For some reason this one word filled her with foreboding, and she felt her flesh creep. Without another word, she picked up the plate and fled the dining room.