Chapter the Seventh of Part the Fifth
In which the narrative recounts acts from the life of Polnar in Baschdynn.
Polnar watched the escalating ferocity of the argument between the herding children with growing alarm. When men and women from both camps came running, Polnar hoped they would put a stop to the fighting, but instead, they plunged straight into it, so that it a full-blown battle was on the boil. For a time, Polnar saw a stalemate between the two groups of people and the accusations being flung at Danzigger Passenell and himself, but gradually, everybody came together and turned towards the spirit speaker’s apprentice and his friends. But even when the Baschi surrounded the three boys, Polnar could not believe his eyes when he saw two boys pick up stones. He believed his eyes even less when he saw other children and then their elders do the same. Passenell groaned in despair.
“HE’S GIVING OUR LASHAMPAS TO THEM!”
“HE’S STEALING OUR LASHAMPAS!”
“We’ve got to stop it,” said Polnar.
“How can we?” Passenell asked.
Polnar yelled out a high note just as a stone hit Danzigger on his shoulder. The Spirit Speaker’s apprentice fell over and covered his fiddle with his body. Polnar’s yelling had caught the attackers’ attention and they held their stones tensely.
“HOW CAN YOU STONE THE ONE WHO WILL BE YOUR SPIRIT SPEAKER IN THE DAYS TO COME?” Polnar cried.
“He’s stealing our lashampas.”
“He’s mixing up our lashampas.”
“No he’s not,” Polnar insisted.
“Yes he is.”
“You aren’t a Baschi,” said a woman.
“You’re trying to steal our lashampas, too!”
Suddenly everybody was yelling at the three boys.
“It’s hopeless,” said Passenell.
Passenell was right. Another stone struck Danzigger in the head, sprouting a pool of blood. Polnar dodged a stone himself by bending down to pick up his fallen friend.
“Take his fiddle,” said Polnar.
Passenell, his face blanked out, took the fiddle. Polnar looked for a place to run to but there was nowhere to go, but straight into the hill. The only hope was to trust Merithwell to save them.
“Passenell! Here!” Polnar cried.
With Danzigger in his arms, Polnar ran straight at into the hill as a stone hit him on the leg. To his relief, the hill opened.
“Come on!” Polnar urged Passenell.
Passenell unfroze just enough to follow Polnar into Merithwell with the fiddle in his arms. Once inside of Merithwell, Polnar was stopped short by the screams of several boys and the sight of a group of robed figures with flames blazing from the sleeves of their robes. Polnar cowered and positioned himself as best he could to protect Danzigger, but the flames on the sleeves of the gray robes suddenly fizzled to little more than a soft glow. The gray-robed figures turned out to be Malcoomb Nordrench, Raissa, Gwendarin, Morrass, and another boy Polnar had not met. The sound of boys laughing alerted Polnar that Brendan and Luke and Mark had just arrived with a large number of boys from both their choirs. Mark and the boys from his choir were dressed in handsome light brown suits, but they looked as if they had just fled from a monster of their world. Brendan and Luke and their friends were dressed the way they always had been.
“FIRE AND LIGHTNING BURN THE BOWELS OF ALL WHO LAUGH AT ME!” Malcoomb yelled.
Malcoomb’s outburst wiped the smiles off the boys’ faces momentarily, but when the glow on his sleeve fizzled out and Malcoomb’s face took on the expression of someone who had swallowed a frog by a mistake, the smiles and laughter returned.
“Don’t mind him,” said Raissa, “I think I know now why Malcoomb couldn’t sing his way into this place himself.”
“What do you mean?” asked an angry Malcoomb.
“I don’t think this place likes you,” said Gwendarin. “I don’t blame it.”
With the worry of being torched by a sorcerer’s spell laid to rest, Polnar directed his attention to Danzigger, who seemed to have lost consciousness. Polnar laid him on the carpet at his feet and created a pillow for him with his hands. Passenell, seemingly dazed into uselessness, sat down beside him.
“Where’s Dunsland?” Mark asked the student magi, just when Polnar was about to say something about Danzigger’s plight.
“Dunsland has been entrapped by the Premiere Master Magus Donanskorall in a sorcerous shaft because he would not sing a musical attack spell,” said Raissa.
“What’s that?” asked Mark.
“It’s a shaft of frozen lightning that traps its victim then tortures that victim in small doses,” Morass explained.
“Then we have to free him!” Brendan exclaimed.
“DANZIGGER’S HURT!” Polnar yelled desperately.
That drew many faces in his direction and then brought several boys and Raissa and Gwendarin around him and Passenell.
“Is he ever!” Luke exclaimed. “What happened?”
“They started to stone him,” said Polnar. “Passenell got hit, too.”
“I was afraid something like that was going to happen,” said Luke.
“The two of you don’t look that great, either,” said Raissa as she eyed Polnar and Passenell.
“At least I’m not blacked out,” said Polnar.
Passenell, however, showed few signs of being conscious, even though he was still sitting up.
“And we just got driven out of our world,” said Mark Streeter.
“What happened?” asked Pir Min.
“We were giving a concert and a guy who remembered us as pickpockets stirred up the audience against us,” said Tormo.
“Did you say the only thing that happened to Danzigger was that he got stoned?” asked Raissa.
“Yes,” said an anxious Polnar. “Isn’t that enough?”
“You’d think so,” said Raissa, “but something else is wrong. I think we can do a enough of a healing spell to stop the worst bleeding, but it won’t be enough.”
“Dunsland is good at healing,” said Polnar.
“And Dunsland is trapped in a sorcerous shaft,” said Morrass.
The two girls and Morrass started to mutter spells over Danzigger, but nothing much happened.
“Our spells don’t seem to be working very well,” said Raissa in dismay.
“Real magic never seems to work in this place,” said Malcoomb in disgust.
For a second time, Malcoomb looked as if he had swallowed a frog. His fellow student magi eyed him strangely as well.
“This place seems to have reversed the most masterful spell you have cast in your life,” said Morrass with uneasy smugness.
Malcoomb turned away and paced back and forth in a corner at some distance from everybody else.
“What’s eating him?” asked Peete.
“He stole Dunsland’s voice in exchange for his own,” Gwendarin explained, “but that spell has just come undone.”
“Dunsland can do magic here,” said Brendan. “He made all these lamps and the furniture we’ve got.”
“That means we have to get Dunsland back before we can heal Danzigger,” said Mark.
“Kyle would be good for this, too,” said Brendan.
“But where is he?” asked Polnar. “We’ve got to have him if we’re going to save Danzigger.”
The question was no sooner asked then a blond girl, wearing a blue and yellow dress that sported a fancy crest, dashed into the Merithwell. She stopped short and let out a quick cry when she realized she was not where she thought she was. A whirling look about the room only confused her further and made her all the more frantic.
“Where am I?” she asked.
Proceed to Chapter the First of Part the Sixth