The Cornerstone (15 page)

It was late afternoon by now. The shadows lengthened on the ground and the chill October air was starting to bite.

Max shut the front door and walked into the kitchen.

‘Afternoon, bog breath,’ said Monica Bloom from the breakfast bar, where she was munching a chocolate pop tart.

Max was actually glad to see his little sister, underlining how bad a day he’d had.

‘Evening sis. How’s it going?’ he said and smiled, which immediately made her suspicious.

‘Where have you been, then?’ she asked.

‘Why do you want to know?’

‘Coz I do!’ Monica was now half convinced that her brother had spent the whole day planning some horrible practical joke. He was never nice to her. Something must be up.

Max sighed. ‘Ok, if you must know, I was sucked into another dimension by a magic book and spent the day being told I’m a powerful wizard. It sounded like a bad idea, so I came home.’

Monica screwed her face up. ‘You’re a right git,’ she said and left the kitchen in a huff.

No pleasing some people.

Max rummaged around in the fridge, having realised how ravenous he was.

Once the hunger had been kept at bay with a large chicken and salad cream sandwich, he had chance to reflect that Merelie no doubt shared his little sister’s feelings.

Max knew he’d done the right thing by leaving the Chapter Lands before getting more involved in Merelie’s paranoid fantasy of brain sucking monstrosities laying waste to the populace - but that didn’t stop him feeling just a tad guilty about deserting her.

He couldn’t care less what the wizened old custodian thought of him, but Merelie had been very pretty and he couldn’t stop re-living the hurt he’d seen in those glorious blue eyes as he’d buggered off across the dimensional void.

Alright, she had insulted his entire species and made him out to be something he wasn’t… but she’d asked for his help and he’d snubbed her.

The fact there was no evidence that purple void monsters were about to eat Merelie’s brains didn’t make him feel any better.

It was best, he decided, to put the whole thing behind him and move on with life – possibly using the experience as the basis for a best selling fantasy novel when he grew up.

He’d call it ‘The Cornerstone’, which sounded nice and dramatic.

With dreams of fame and fortune puttering around his head, Max Bloom left the kitchen, went to his bedroom and stuck the X Box on, knowing a few rounds of capture the flag would cheer him up.

- 2 -

Three weeks passed and November’s arrival was greeted without much enthusiasm.

The weather outside went from cold and drizzly to
very
cold and
extremely
drizzly. This annoyed everyone, making them wish for the heady days of October, when you could go out of the house without three coats and a pair of thermal underpants.

Max got on with the business of being an idle teenager.

Despite some strange dreams and a tendency to wince when somebody in purple walked past, the Chapter Lands experience hadn’t had a negative effect of him.

Had he been in his thirties, extensive post-traumatic therapy would’ve probably been the order of the day. By that age you think you’ve got a firm handle on how the universe operates and are unlikely to cope well when proved comprehensively wrong.

Teenagers have no idea how the universe operates - other than the fact it revolves around them - and can better assimilate such a massive shock to the system; going on the proviso that it doesn’t matter how many dimensions of existence there are, as long as they all have a healthy supply of cheap cider and spot cream.

Max told no-one about his travels - not wanting to spend his remaining days locked in a room with padded walls. He almost let slip to Figgy one night while playing Call of Duty, but couldn’t take the look of blank incomprehension and two hours with a flip chart and visual aids he’d have to employ to explain.

There was one bleak afternoon when boredom once again had him in its deadly embrace. He was sat in the lounge, staring at the motley collection of books his parent’s owned, wondering if he could make one of them float in mid-air if he concentrated hard enough.

What followed was a feeble experiment that involved staring at several books, willing them to burst into song and start flashing like an epileptic fire-fly.

He tried holding them open, closing them, standing on them, shoving them down his jeans, putting them on his head… and even head-butting one before giving up, having gotten not so much as a squeak out of any.

This proved - if there were any doubt remaining - that the chances of him being a Wordsmith were zero.

In this assessment he was, of course,
spectacularly
wrong.

Farefield library closed its doors to the public at 5.30pm most days, except on Thursday when it stayed open for the poorly attended book club, and on Friday when it shut early at 4.30pm - obeying the universal law that no bugger wants to do any work after 4pm at the start of the weekend. 

To Imelda Warrington’s immense relief today was indeed Friday. She was looking forward to closing early and going home for an evening in front of the soaps, with a bottle of pinot grigio and a box of Maltesers.

While Imelda still felt like a Wordsmith of the Chapter Lands now and again, she’d be the first to admit to going native since being posted here twenty years ago. In a world of such comfort and distraction, maintaining your vigilance was difficult.

She did miss her homeland from time to time - especially the respect she’d enjoyed as a Wordsmith of Carvallen. Nobody there spoke to her like she was muck, as so many of the locals in this dreary little town tended to do on a regular basis.

Over the decades her word shaping skills had blunted.

She’d vigorously practised the arts in the first few years, but after ten had passed, the desire to stay sharp had faded. No-one here could word shape, so what was the point?

The duels she used to have with the Wordsmiths of the other Houses were long behind her and blasting old Mr Lovetree across the library for returning a book late again would be overkill of the highest order.

She still did the job she’d been tasked with, though. No-one could say that Imelda hadn’t provided many essays and interesting anecdotes about our world, written in the pages of The Cornerstone - which whisked them back to be added to the Library’s store of knowledge about Earth.

She’d also sent many books over to swell the ranks… though Paris Hilton’s biography had probably been a mistake in hindsight.

Until three weeks ago her job had been easy, but then that damned boy had found Merelie’s note and all hell had broken loose.

God knows how long the message had sat in that silly book, like a ticking bomb waiting to blow up in Imelda’s face.

If only she’d found it first!

If it had appeared between the pages of a Catherine Cookson novel, she would have - having gone through the author’s entire back catalogue twice. But no… it had to wind up in some stupid light weight piece of rubbish that nobody had picked up in years.

Even worse, it had come into the possession of a teenage boy with far too much back chat and enough curiosity to kill several nosy cats.

If one of her old ladies had discovered it - Mrs Blot for instance, who was as deaf as a post and happily senile - she could have explained it away with no problem. Instead, there had been two unauthorised trips to the Chapter Lands.

Damn that Merelie and her silly ideas!

Imelda locked the front door, set the library alarm and walked back to the main desk, intent on tidying away some returned books.

This was a mindless task, but one she enjoyed. Her people were naturally inclined towards a passion for books anyway and she loved looking through the pile to see what people had been reading - and why.

Today’s pile was a little anaemic when it came to classic prose, but was a fair representation of what the public liked: mass-market paperbacks with exciting covers and familiar storylines.

There were three Tom Clancy’s and a Robert Ludlum, borrowed by someone who probably thought the moon landings never happened. A couple of Mary Higgins Clarke’s sat with a James Herbert, taken out by a person who wanted to believe in ghosts. Fahrenheit 451 and Slaughterhouse 5 had been hired by somebody trying to impress their friends - and the last book on the pile was a guide to dental health, indicating the reader’s last trip to the dentist had come with a warning.

Imelda was sorting through these with an abstract smile on her face when The Cornerstone started to scream like a tortured cat.

She nearly fell out of her chair as the hideous high pitched bawling of a million people filled the library. Somebody had evidently got tired of the choir just
aaaahhhing
their way through life and decided to spice things up by tipping boiling oil over their heads.

Flashes of silver light erupted from the book as it flew off the 50p shelf and started to flop around on the floor like a dying fish.

Imelda sprinted across the library, knowing she had to shut the thing up before somebody heard and came to investigate. Visions of police officers breaking the door down to find her holding a flashing, screaming book entered her head. Explaining it away in an interview would be next to impossible.

She shielded her eyes and tried to grab hold of the thing, but it was bouncing around so much she couldn’t get a grip.

Imelda had a moment of inspiration. She tore off her jacket and held it out, ready to capture the maddened Cornerstone like a trout in a net.

The book stopped flopping about for a split second and she threw the jacket over it, covering both with her body.

The book continued to thrash, but at least the light wasn’t getting out anymore. Now if only she could so something about the hideous screeching…

A massive pulse of energy exploded from the book, ripping her jacket to tatters and throwing her away violently, half blinded and deafened.

The Cornerstone flew upwards, smashed into the ceiling and fell back to the floor, face up and cover open, light burning from the pages.

Imelda struggled to her feet as the light grew more intense, casting a circle of radiance across the whole ceiling. The screaming got louder and became so unbearable Imelda had to cover her ears.

As if it were the most torturous birth in history, a limp body flew out of the book, putting an end to the screaming and light display as it dropped to the floor.

Imelda stumbled over on shaky legs to see who had been so forcibly pushed into this world.

It was Merelie Carvallen, unconscious and looking like she’d been through hell.

Twice.

- 3 -

Twenty minutes later, Merelie lay on the brown sofa in the staff room. Imelda sat dabbing a cool, damp tea towel on the girl’s head and eyeing The Cornerstone on the coffee table with extreme suspicion.

It was under several large books, the microwave and a heavy pot plant.

Imelda couldn’t rouse Merelie and was worried that the girl may have suffered serious injury. She had no visible signs of damage, but wouldn’t stir at all. Her violent entry into this world and the book’s hideous screaming indicated the trip had been very unpleasant.

Imelda thought about taking Merelie to hospital, but that would raise more questions than she was prepared to answer. If it came to it though, she supposed she’d have to and be damned with the consequences.

Travel from the Chapter Lands to Earth was a serious breach of the laws laid down by her House. It was bad enough that Max Bloom had used it to cross dimensions, but now Merelie being here on Earth?

Ten times worse.

Once more, Imelda found herself in the dark and waiting for somebody else to tell her what was going on.

Using The Cornerstone was absolutely out of the question. Even if it decided it liked her again, she didn’t want to risk it given what had just happened.

Merelie’s eyelids fluttered and she let out a low moan.

‘Easy girl, you’re safe,’ Imelda said.

Merelie mumbled something about purple eyes and lapsed back into unconsciousness. Imelda ran the cool towel over the girl’s face again, hoping she would come around properly sometime soon and explain herself.

At the same time Merelie Carvallen was making her painful entrance into Farefield library, Max Bloom was curled up on the floor of Steve Figson’s bedroom with his hands pressed to his ears, trying to block out the screaming of a million choir members being covered in boiling oil.

He’d been thrashing Figgy at Halo when the sound had hit him like an auditory hammer and he’d collapsed, screaming his head off. Figgy had panicked and run, managing to kick Max in the head in the process, right where Borne had belted him three weeks ago.

Luckily, Figgy’s mum was a nurse and five minutes later Max was sat in her car being taken to A&E, wondering what the hell was going on.

Merelie’s eyes opened and focused on Imelda Warrington’s concerned face.

‘Where am I?’ she said in a weak voice.

‘On Earth. In my library,’ Imelda replied. ‘How are you? In any pain?’

 ‘No pain. It just feels like my head’s been squeezed in vice.’

‘I’m not surprised. Travel by Cornerstone sometimes makes people groggy, and that didn’t look like a normal trip.’

 ‘Where is it? The Cornerstone?’ Merelie said, her eyes darting around the room.

‘It’s under there.’ Imelda pointed at the coffee table and the odd centre piece she’d recently built. ‘It’s not going anywhere.’

 ‘I wonder how long it will take them?’ she said, half to herself.

‘To do what?’

‘To figure out how to do it… to come through after me. They’ve got The Cornerstone on that side now.’ Merelie was wide eyed with fear.

‘Do you mean your father’s men? Are they after you? What have you done girl?’ Imelda demanded, taking on the tone of a school mistress.

‘Nothing! And it’s not my father’s men.’

‘Then who do you mean?’ Imelda remembered what Merelie had whispered in her unconscious state. ‘You mean people with purple eyes?’