The Sceptre of Samnos

Ilandia Part 11

    They stared at her in stunned horror, until Shaun grabbed her around the throat. "You monster!" he yelled. "You unspeakable pile of filth! You'll tell us now or I'll throttle it out of you!"

     Diana and Matthew had to pull him off her. "It's no use, she won't tell us," said Diana. "She's right, we've got nothing to threaten her with. The only way is to give her what she wants."

     "Absolutely not!" said Shaun. "I completely forbid it! We'll find the Oracle another way, by going to one of the other places she mentioned!"

     "That could take months," said Diana calmly. "Maybe more time than we have. The Shadowarmies could invade at any time. We must take the quickest path to the Oracle, no matter what the personal sacrifice."

     "She's right," said Lirenna, "and I should be the one. With my shae blood I can expect to live two, maybe three hundred years. Maybe longer, as I'm three quarters shayen, not just half. I can afford to lose seven years much easier than you."

     "Rubbish," said Jerry. "As a nome, I could possibly live for up to six hundred years, if the Gods spare me, so by your own argument I should be the one. I'm fed up waiting to grow up, anyway. We nomes take a long time to mature, compared to you biggers."

     "It's my mission," protested Diana, "so I should be the one..."

     "Sorry, you're outvoted," interrupted Jerry with a grin. He turned to the Mad Woman. "Okay lady, I'm volunteering."

     "I need me hands untied," said the old woman, "and I need a coupl'a bits ‘n pieces from the next room."

     "How do we know she won't just kill us all as soon as we set her free to cast spells?" protested Shaun.

     "Good point," said Jerry. "Do you swear by the Gods, old woman, that you will cast only the spell you have described and no other, and that you will do nothing to harm any of us, either directly or indirectly, ever again?"

     "I do swear by ye Gods," said the Mad Woman, "with the provision that I cease ter be bound by it if any one of ye try ter harm me, either directly or indirectly."

     "Agreed," said Jerry. "Untie her, Shaun."

     With great misgivings, Shaun untied her, and watched as she crossed the room to a cupboard, opened it, and took out a handful of dried leaves. "Ye must eat these," she told Jerry, "and ye must submit ter me completely. The slightest bit o' resistance from ye'll ruin the spell, and I c'n cast it but once a year."

     Jerry took the leaves, glanced at the others for a moment, then put them in his mouth, but he found them so bitter that he almost spat them out again. He dutifully chewed them up and swallowed them, though, and the Mad Woman took him through to a bedroom, making him lie down on the hard uncomfortable bed. While the others gathered round protectively to watch, she sat next to him, put one dry, bony hand on his forehead and the other over his heart. With her hissing inhuman voice, she then spoke some archaic magic words in an ancient dialect of the language of magic that had not been heard outside the cottage for over two hundred years.

     The tiny nome screamed in agony as he felt something being torn out of him, as though his heart were being ripped out of his body. He doubled over in pain, and Shaun shoved the old woman away in fury while Diana examined him in fear and guilt. I should have been the one, she thought. What has she done to him?

     "He'll be right as rain in a minute or two," said the Mad Woman. "'Tis merely the shock o' losing so much life all at once."

     Sure enough, Jerry was already sitting up and opening his eyes, and although he was shaking and pale, he seemed to be more or less all right. He had changed a little, though. His short, stubby beard, which before had been a dark, luxuriant brown, now had flecks of grey in it, the beginning of the silvery white that characterised an adult nome, and a few faint lines had appeared around his eyes. He had indeed aged by about seven years.