Year of the Griffin. Diana Wynne Jones

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СКАЧАТЬ Claudia, and I’ll make you one.”

      “Yes, please!” said Lukin.

      It was one of those muggily warm autumn days. Every student in the place seemed to be outside, sitting on the refectory steps. Olga put their six cups of coffee on a tray and carried it over to the statue of Wizard Policant instead, where they all sat on his plinth, except Elda, who spread herself out at their feet, alternately bending down to sip at her straw and raising her big golden beak to sniff the mushroom and wheatstraw scent of autumn, carried in from beyond the town by the faint, muggy wind. Something in those scents excited her; she was not sure what, but it made her tail lash a little.

      “A fire and a griddle,” Claudia said. “If I could do it unjinxed, I’d fetch you both, Olga. Why, with all this magical ability there is in this University, doesn’t anybody make the food at least taste better?”

      “That’s an idea,” Ruskin grunted, banging his dangling heels against the plinth. “I’ll do it as soon as I learn how. Promise. Charcoal roast and mussels with garlic. How about that?”

      “Newly-caught trout with parsley butter,” Olga added yearningly.

      “I’ve never had mussels,” said Elda. “Would I like them?”

      “You’re bound to. Your beak looks made for opening shellfish,” said Felim.

      “And chicken pie to follow,” said Claudia. “What pudding, do you think?”

      “Claudia,” said Lukin, “stop encouraging everyone to think of food and tell me how to deal with Wermacht. If he calls me ‘You with the second-hand jacket’ once more, I may find I’ve opened a mile-deep hole underneath him. I won’t be able to help myself.”

      “And I might savage him,” Elda agreed, “next time he calls me an animal.”

      “Let’s think.” Claudia leant forward, with both bony hands clasped round one of her sharp knees. Her eyes took on a green glow of thought. In some queer Marshperson way, her hair seemed to develop a life of its own, each dark lock coiling and uncoiling on her shoulders. Everyone turned to her respectfully. They had learnt that when Claudia looked like this, she was going to say something valuable. “I’ve heard,” she said, “that Wizard Wermacht is the youngest tutor on the faculty, and I suspect he’s very proud of that. I think he’s rather sad.”

      “Sad!” exclaimed Ruskin. His voice rose to such a hoot that students on the refectory steps jumped round to look. “I may cry!”

      “Pitiful, I mean,” Claudia explained. “He swanks about with those heavy feet, thinking he’s so smart and clever, and he’s never even noticed that those other wizards make him teach all the classes. Why do you think we’re so sick of being taught by Wermacht? Because all the older ones know it’s hard, boring work hammering basics into first-years and they let Wizard Wermacht do it because he’s too stupid to see it isn’t an honour. That’s what I mean by sad.”

      “Hm,” said Lukin. “You’ve got a point. But I don’t think it’ll hold me off for ever.” A grin lit his heavy face and he flung an arm round Olga. “If I get angry enough, I may tell him he’s being exploited.”

      Olga leaned her face against Lukin’s shoulder. “Good idea.”

      The rest watched with friendly interest, as they had done all week. Olga was extremely beautiful. Lukin was almost handsome. Both of them were from the north. It fitted. On the other hand, Lukin was a Crown Prince. All of them, even Ruskin, who was still having trouble grasping human customs, felt anxious for Olga from time to time. Elda had her beak open to ask, as tactfully as possible, what King Luther would think about Olga, when they heard, quite mystifyingly, the sound of a horse’s hooves, clopping echoingly through the courtyard. There was a great, admiring “O-o-oh!” from the refectory steps.

      “Riding in here is illegal, isn’t it?” asked Felim.

      Well-known smells filled Elda’s open beak. She clapped her beak shut and plunged round the statue, screaming. In the empty part of the courtyard beyond, a superb chestnut colt was just trotting to a halt and folding his great shining carroty wings as he did so. His rider waited for the huge pinions to be laid in order before slinging both legs across one wing and sliding to the ground. He was a tall man with a wide, shambling sort of look. “Dad!” screamed Elda, and flung herself upon him. Derk steadied himself with several often-used bracing spells and only reeled back slightly as he was engulfed in long golden feathers, with Elda’s talons gripping his shoulders and Elda’s smooth, cool beak rubbing his face.

      “Lords!” said the horse. “Suppose I was to do that!”

      “None of your cheek, Filbert,” Elda said over Derk’s shoulder. “I haven’t seen Dad for a week now. You’ve seen him every day. Dad, what are you doing here?”

      “Coming to see how you were, of course,” Derk replied. “I thought I’d give you a week to settle down first. How are things?”

      “Wonderful!” Elda said rapturously. “I’m learning so many things! I mean, the food’s awful and one of the main teachers is vile, but they gave me a whole concert hall to sleep in because the other rooms are too small and I’ve got friends, Dad! Come and meet my friends.”

      She disentangled herself from Derk and dragged him by one arm across to the statue of Wizard Policant. Derk smiled and let himself be dragged. Filbert, who was a colt of boundless curiosity, clopped across after them and peered round the plinth as Elda introduced the others.

      Derk shook hands with Olga, and then with Lukin, whom he knew well. “Hallo, Your Highness. Does this mean your father’s allowed you to leave home after all?”

      “No, not really,” Lukin admitted, rather flushed. “I’m financing myself, though. How are your flying pigs these days, sir?”

      “Making a great nuisance of themselves,” said Derk, “as always.” He shook hands with Felim. “How do you do? Haven’t I met you before somewhere?”

      “No, sir,” Felim said, with great firmness.

      “Then you must look like someone else I’ve met,” Derk apologised. He turned to Claudia. “Claudia? Good gods! You were a little shrimp of a girl when I saw you last! Living in the Marshes with your mother. Do you remember me at all?”

      Claudia’s face lit with her happiest and most deeply dimpled smile. “I do indeed. You landed outside our dwelling on a beautiful black horse with wings.”

      “Beauty. My grandmother,” Filbert put in, with his chin on Wizard Policant’s pointed shoes.

      “I hope she’s still alive,” said Claudia.

      “Fine, for a twelve-year-old,” Filbert told her. “She doesn’t speak as well as me. Mara mostly rides her these days.”

      “No, I remember I could hardly understand her,” said Claudia. “She looked tired. So did you,” she said to Derk. “Tired and worried.”

      “Well, I was trying to be Dark Lord in those days,” Derk said, “and your mother’s people weren’t being very helpful.” He turned to Ruskin. “A dwarf, eh? Training to be a wizard. That has to be a first. I don’t think there’s been a dwarf wizard ever.”

      Ruskin СКАЧАТЬ