The four children stared at one another in utter dismay. Their worst nightmare had been confirmed.
‘Lord Aldor’s going to swallow who?’ Ernest croaked.
‘The magicians will be omni…what?’ Nettle cried.
‘They’re going to rob where?’ Leo whispered.
‘Not if we can help it,’ Milli declared.
She surveyed the scene below. It was the Shadow Keepers that interested her most. They had not once broken their formation or abandoned their sacred duty, not even to allow Lord Aldor into the circle. A shimmering red light danced around their robes as they hovered in the air, the sparkle of a spell. Milli’s eyes settled on the Shadow Keepers’ claw-like hands, the bones visible through papery skin. They were clasped tightly together. It was this bond that must first be broken.
On ground level, Lord Aldor was looking triumphant. He had plunged his hand into the fissure and now, in his fist a small and fluttering wisp wriggled helplessly. The shadow struggled against its captor, but its tiny form, as flimsy as the tulle on Milli’s dress, was no match for Aldor’s strength. As the shadow writhed, the children could just make out the impression of a face. A face Milli knew only too well. It was her father’s.
Milli was hit by a sudden memory. She was sitting at the kitchen table and Dorkus was sitting under it. The two of them were watching their father cook. Mr Klompet, in a food-splattered apron, held a wooden spoon in one hand and a whisk in the other. Three pots bubbled merrily on the stove and a pear jam sponge had just been popped in the oven to cook. The kitchen was filled with the warm, comforting smell of baking cake. It was a happy memory. How long had it been since any of them had had a happy moment? Too long.
Milli felt a rising anger begin in her toes. It spread like a fungus until her whole body was burning with rage. Keeping one eye on Lord Aldor and the other on the trestle tables (abandoned now the show had begun), Milli edged her way silently down the steps. The others followed close behind. None of the magicians noticed their soundless descent, so engrossed were they in the spectacle unfolding before them.
Lord Aldor laughed viciously as he raised Mr Klompet’s shadow high above his head. With a crack, he dislocated his jaw, which slowly, very slowly, began to drop. I cannot even open my mouth wide enough to fit my fist inside; Lord Aldor’s jaw extended as if it were made of elastic, right down to his chest, the way you and I have only seen happen to cartoon characters. In his left hand he held his chin, and with his right he dangled the shadow threateningly above the elongated pit that was now his mouth. At the exact moment Lord Aldor let the shadow drop, something miraculous happened. Well, it wasn’t really a miracle as there were no saints involved. It was more of an ingenious plan implemented by a team of very angry, underage adventurers. SPLAT! Instead of a mouthful of shadow, Aldor found himself with a mouthful of cherry cream pie!
‘Take that, you big bully!’ a voice cried.
Stunned and affronted, Lord Aldor wiped the whipped cream from his eyes to see four militant children each standing upon their own trestle table armed with several dishes of dessert.
Despite seething inwardly with humiliation, Lord Aldor managed a snigger. ‘You think you can sabotage my lifelong plans with a bit of cream pie?’ he said scornfully.
Milli was about to offer an impertinent reply when an indignant screech echoed through the cave.
‘Crumpet! Gumm! What do you think you are doing? Get down from those tables immediately!’
Mrs Mayor, hands on hips, was glaring furiously at them. The children ignored her.
‘Let the shadows go, Aldor,’ Milli warned, ‘or we’ll—’
‘You’ll what?’ Lord Aldor sneered. ‘Throw puddings at me?’
He gestured towards the tight ring of Shadow Keepers. ‘As long as this formation is strong, the shadows won’t be going anywhere. The Great Guzzle will proceed as planned!’
‘I am warning you, children, there will be serious consequences for this!’ Mrs Mayor threatened uselessly. ‘You will wear plain smocks for a week!’
Lord Aldor raised Mr Klompet’s shadow as if it were a goblet, toasted the children, and for a second time that evening let his mouth stretch beyond acceptable proportions. But Mrs Mayor’s threat had given Milli an idea. Plain smocks—what a relief that would be. Milli could feel the veils of her handkerchief hem fluttering around her ankles, as wispy as one of the stolen shadows themselves.
On impulse, she tore a veil from her outfit and sent it sailing into the air. Automatically, the hooded face of every Shadow Keeper jerked upwards. For a split second nobody moved and Milli felt a sickening rush of fear. If this plan failed, she and her friends would be as good as minced meat. But the Shadow Keepers were fiercely loyal and unwavering in the carrying out of their duties. Their chief responsibility was to guard the shadows. When the fragment of tulle whooshed into the air, the Keepers, mistaking it for a shadow, instantly gave chase!
Lord Aldor roared as, in a flurry of red robes, the Shadow Keepers took to the air. They swooped through the caverns, colliding with one another in pursuit of their prey. The captives, however, remained locked in the rock visible only as flashes through the fissure. This the children had not anticipated. The shadows, having been imprisoned for so long, did not register this opportunity for escape.
‘Go!’ Milli encouraged. ‘You’re free now. You can leave!’
But the shadows remained in the confines of the rock. Through the opening, she could see them spinning in circles.
‘They’re confused!’ Leo shouted. ‘They need help.’
‘What more can we do?’ Milli despaired.
‘Do you still have that phial?’
‘Yes, in the pouch.’
‘It might work. Quickly, before the Shadow Keepers come back!’
Astride on a trestle table, Leo took careful aim. Bending his arm back, he hurled the phial as though it were a javelin. Leo was strong and the blue glass hit its target, smashing into fragments against the stone and releasing its magic contents. There was a loud grinding sound as plates of rock cracked and shifted. With a cascade of crumbling earth and rubble, the fissure opened. This time, the shadows were left in no doubt as to what they must do.
Lord Aldor pounced on them, grabbing wildly at the black forms as alarmed shadows flew from the fissure in all directions. He tried desperately to retrieve them, but the shadows were too quick for him and Aldor was left lunging ineffectually at the air.
With the shadows safe for the time being, the children turned their attention to the magicians.
‘Destroy them! Don’t let them escape!’ Lord Aldor screamed.
The conjurors advanced on the children, who had anticipated this and were not in the least bit concerned.
‘You asked for it,’ Leo muttered under his breath, beginning to enjoy himself now.
Arms piled high with ammunition, the children simply did what children do best and a food fight ensued.
The magicians were completely taken aback! The tattooed pirate (like many others) suddenly found a large mud cake obscuring his view of the targets. It hurtled through the air and hit him fair and square on the side of the head. A pixie discovered a cupcake with strawberry icing fixed to the end of her pointy nose. Eclairs rained down, flying treacle ripped out patches of hair, and jelly beans blinded anyone that got in their way. Leo mashed a vanilla pudding into a witch’s straggly hair and was consequently pursued by her angry gremlin friend, whose wide nostrils ended up stuffed full of custard. Nettle was perched on a rock, lobbing walnut brownies at a cluster of real brownies, who were shaking their fists and didn’t seem to find the irony of the situation at all amusing. Ernest smeared an ogre’s spectacles with hot fudge sauce so that he staggered around blindly before bowling over a good number of guests and causing a pile-up. Milli devoted all of her energy to pelting Lord Aldor, who by now looked more like a wobbling heap of mangled desserts than a menacing villain.
A horde of shrieking fairies (of the hostile variety) sou
ght shelter in crevices, knowing that their wings would be useless if caked with dessert. Several witches growled and dived towards the children, but were bowled over at the last minute by a troupe of fleeing princesses whose ballgowns were far too expensive to be subjected to a food fight. The trolls, being naturally uncontrollable creatures, quickly found themselves caught up in the frenzy. This confused some of the other magicians, who thought the food fight was part of the merriment and happily hurled pies at one another. A dishevelled Mrs Mayor tore around the caverns with boiled sweets in her beehive hair, screaming at the top of her lungs. When Mr Mayor tried to lead her to the safety of a nearby rock, Mrs Mayor bellowed at him in gibberish and accidentally pushed his face into a bowl of mint jelly.
It was not long before the ochre cavern walls were smeared with vibrant caramels, yellow custards and pastel icings. The Shadow Keepers were still up in the air, doggedly tracking the wisp of tulle and Lord Aldor had given up screaming at them to come down. He stood alone before the empty fissure, fists clenched by his sides. Shards of faded red light shimmered in the air—the remains of a broken spell. Lord Aldor’s once blazing eyes had grown black with fury. He dodged a flying pecan flan and watched powerlessly as all around him pandemonium broke loose.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Taking Flight
But Lord Aldor wasn’t completely powerless just yet. He jiggled his pinkie and a net dropped from the ceiling of the Shreckal Caverns, wrapping itself tightly around Milli. The others ran to her assistance but were intercepted before they could go more than a few steps in her direction. The Notorious Nine, their hair and clothes splattered with food, parted deferentially to let Lord Aldor pass. The evil magician made his way towards Milli with arms outstretched and an expression of devilish wrath in his eyes. Even with his mask askew and his robes now an assortment of colours, he was still a terrifying sight.
But the shadows had not forgotten the feisty girl who had set them free. Sensing she was in difficulty, they braced themselves and swooped. By the time Lord Aldor the Illustrious realised what was happening, it was too late. A swarm of murmuring shadows fashioned themselves into a thundercloud and plunged towards him. They whipped around him like a tornado. Amidst the resulting skirmish, the children caught flashes of familiar faces. Was that really Bernardo Bernardini snatching at Lord Aldor’s hair? Could it truly be Mr Trevor Treble tearing at his red cloak in an effort to rip it off? Surely that was not Miss Linear tying the conjuror’s shoelaces together! The other magicians watched on in horror, but made not the slightest move to help their leader.
Finally, encrusted in dessert and bedraggled from the shadows’ onslaught, Lord Aldor could stand it no longer. Furious, and too exhausted to float (for floating requires a good deal of concentrated energy), he fled, tripped over his own feet (thanks to a job well executed by Miss Linear), stopped to kick off his shoes and continued running.
‘Until we meet again, Miss Klompet!’ Lord Aldor panted as he sped past her, a throng of angry wisps hot on his heels. ‘Don’t think you’ve seen the last of the Shadow Thief!’
The band of magicians trooped dolefully after Lord Aldor, through the damp tunnels of the Shreckal Caverns and out onto the rock plateau where they had landed and where the ceremony had begun.
Lord Aldor took a flying leap into the nearest gondola and, seizing an oar began to row furiously. When he reached the sizzling rocks of the Malevolent Mermaids, his boat soared out of the Lurid Lagoon and into the sky. The children watched in astonishment as the gold and black gondola climbed higher and higher, defying gravity until it disappeared into the clouds taking the dishevelled Shadow Thief with it.
Their captor gone, the throng of shadows turned on Lord Aldor’s guests.
It became immediately obvious that concepts like loyalty and teamwork were non-existent in the Conjurors’ Realm, for in one big writhing heap the magicians (abandoned by their leader) scrambled, shoved, bit and scratched their way back to the boats. Many of them fell headlong into the lagoon in their haste to retreat. Others were pushed in by the shadows.
It was no surprise that Mr and Mrs Mayor were among the few who managed to get hold of a gondola, although, with Gristle refusing to assist them, they were stranded without an oarsman. They cowered in the cabin, hoping for the first time in their lives to go unnoticed. But going unnoticed was not something they could easily pull off and they were soon bickering about whose fault it had been to trust such vagrant children. Unluckily for them, their bickering soon alerted the shadows to their whereabouts and they pounced on them. Mrs Mayor was hysterically tearing at her beehive in an effort to remove the wriggling wisps that had burrowed into it when the shadows capsized the boat!
Two wretched heads bobbed out of the water, coughing and spluttering. Mrs Mayor’s mascara ran down her cheeks in rivulets and her soggy beehive hung over her face, obstructing her vision. Although a dancer, she was not a strong swimmer and had to flap her arms like a chicken in order to keep from sinking. Mr Mayor, on the other hand, was kept afloat by his nappy-like loincloth, which had inflated in the water and was helpfully serving as a lifejacket. But he was preoccupied with trying to remove his plumed helmet, which had filled up with water and was stuck fast. They were a sad and comical sight! It was impossible to feel anything but pity for them, despite all the wrongdoings they had committed.
‘You!’ Mrs Mayor gasped and pointed at the children, histrionic and delusional as ever. ‘You rascals! Just wait till we get home. There will be serious repercussions for this errant behaviour. We may be lenient if you throw us a lifejacket!’
Just as she finished this admonishment, the shadows gathered into the shape of a pair of bellows and blew over the Lurid Lagoon, causing a column of water to crash down on Mrs Mayor, conveniently sweeping her and her equally despicable husband out into the expanse of open water where they bobbed like corks.
In a matter of minutes, all that remained of Lord Aldor’s guests were a few vivid items of clothing drifting like wreckage on the lagoon. Some of the magicians had turned themselves into ice statues, but melted when the shadows blew their hot breath over them. Some had liquefied into the slippery slime of the Malevolent Mermaids and were now destined to live out their days as shimmering puddles on the water. Some thought that if they stayed absolutely still they might escape justice, and others drank a morphing potion that transformed them into speckled toads and hopped away to live a carefree existence on a tasty diet of flies. In truth, nobody really cared what became of them.
There was a clicking and a rustling of paper behind the children. They turned to see Pandora Scoop, an éclair sticking out of her bun, scribbling in her notepad with inky fingernails. Bud Snapper’s camera flashed as he recorded the fracas for posterity. This was, after all, the story of the decade.
Pandora’s voice was syrupy sweet as she picked her way undeterred through the debris. ‘Who was the mastermind behind tonight’s debacle? Was it one person or did you all chip in together? The Talisman Times would be most interested in purchasing your story. When can I set up a meeting? Don’t make any decisions without talking to me. Any ideas about what Lord Aldor might do now? You did snap him covered in lemon meringue, didn’t you, Snapper? What about your new parents, children? Will you be rejoining them any time soon?’
‘I heard Aldor say he’d be giving private interviews in the back tunnels after the show,’ Milli fibbed outright.
‘He did?’ Pandora squealed. ‘Well, we mustn’t keep His Excellency waiting, must we? Ready, Snapper?’
Still scribbling, Miss Pandora Scoop marched back into the Shreckal Caverns, already formulating insightful questions to form the basis of a groundbreaking story. Bud Snapper followed her, but only because he was secretly afraid of the dark.
‘Somehow, I don’t think Mrs Mayor’s good side is going to make the front page,’ Leo tittered.
‘Look!’ Ernest cried gleefully.
They all turned to see what could possibly warrant such enthusiasm after the
events of the evening. Despite being bruised and shaken and wet and sticky with food fragments, they couldn’t help but smile when they saw what Ernest was pointing to. The cloud of shadows had taken on the form of a giant tick.
‘They’re congratulating us,’ Nettle said.
The shadows scattered briefly before reassembling into the image of an all-too-familiar town.
‘They want to go home,’ Milli whispered.
There was a slight pause as they all wondered what Drabville would be like once the shadows were returned. They felt that, apart from one other, they didn’t really know the townsfolk. After all, their true characters had been buried for so long.
Although excited by the prospect of returning home, the children wearily contemplated the long voyage ahead. Not one of them offered to pick up an oar and row. But the shadows, whose dark feathery forms had altered several times already that evening, fluttered quietly above their heads, merging into one another. They grew longer and wider until, right there on the gondola’s deck, appeared a shadow mast. Some shadows then began to extend forming a tall triangular shape that rippled gently in the breeze. They had built the children a sail.
The journey home was subdued, with each member of the craft lost in thoughts of their own.
Ernest thought about his mother and father. What would they say when he saw them in a few hours? Would they be angry about his absence or glad of his return? He was comforted by the thought of his rock collection and feeling able now to shout as loud as he liked if anyone so much as went near it. It was time to finally put the Perriclof family’s silence games to rest. Ernest even allowed himself to contemplate the possibility of a companion with whom he might share the thrill of expeditions into rocky ravines. They would carry matching backpacks and examine their findings over a cut lunch. Nettle seemed just the kind of girl who would be open to such new and thrilling experiences.