Free The Amulet of Samarkand by Jonathan Stroud Page B

by, eyes shut, seemingly asleep. Nathaniel grew very bored. His legs began to ache. Evidently this particular demon had decided not to come. All at once, he noticed with horror that several of the candles in one corner of the workroom had toppled over. A pile of papers was alight, and the fire was spreading. Nathaniel gave a cry of alarm and stepped—
    "Stay where you are!"
    Nathaniel's heart nearly stopped in fright. He froze with one foot lifted. His master's eyes had opened and were gazing at him with an awful anger. With a voice of thunder, his master uttered the seven Words of Dismissal. The fire in the corner of the room vanished, the pile of papers with them; the candles were once again upright and burning quietly. Nathaniel's heart quailed in his breast.
    "Step outside the circle, would you?" Never had he heard his master's voice so scathing. "I told you that some remain invisible. They are masters of illusion and know a thousand ways to distract and tempt you. One step more and you'd have been on fire yourself. Think of that while you go hungry tonight. Get up to your room!"
    Further summonings were less distressing. Guided only by his ordinary senses, Nathaniel observed demons in a host of beguiling shapes. Some appeared as familiar animals—mewling cats, wide-eyed dogs, forlorn, limping hamsters that Nathaniel ached to hold. Sweet little birds hopped and pecked at the margins of their circles. Once, a shower of apple blossom cascaded from the air, filling the room with a heady scent that made him drowsy.
    He learned to withstand inducements of all kinds. Some invisible spirits assailed him with foul smells that made him retch; others charmed him with perfume that reminded him of Ms. Lutyens's or Mrs. Underwood's. Some attempted to frighten him with hideous sounds—with squelchy rendings, whisperings, and gibbering cries. He heard strange voices calling out beseechingly, first high-pitched, then plummeting deeper and deeper until they rang like a funeral bell. But he closed his mind to all these things and never came close to leaving the circle.
    A year passed before Nathaniel was allowed to wear his spectacles during each summoning. Now he could observe many of the demons as they really were. Others, slightly more powerful ones, maintained their illusions even on the other observable planes. To all these disorientating shifts in perception Nathaniel acclimatized calmly and confidently. His lessons were progressing well, his self-possession likewise. He grew harder, more resilient, more determined to progress. He spent all his spare waking hours poring through new manuscripts.
     
    His master was satisfied with his pupil's progress and Nathaniel, despite his impatience with the pace of his education, was delighted with what he learned. It was a productive relationship, if not a close one, and might well have continued to be so, but for the terrible incident that occurred in the summer before Nathaniel's eleventh birthday.

10
     
    Bartimaeus
     
    In the end, dawn came.
    The first grudging rays flickered in the eastern sky. A halo of light slowly emerged over the Docklands horizon. I cheered it on. It couldn't come fast enough.
    The whole night had been a wearisome and often humiliating business. I had repeatedly lurked, loitered, and fled, in that order, through half the postal districts of London. I had been manhandled by a thirteen-year-old girl. I had taken shelter in a bin. And now, to cap it all, I was crouching on the roof of Westminster Abbey, pretending to be a gargoyle. Things don't get much worse than that.
    A rising shaft of sunlight caught the edge of the Amulet, which was suspended round my lichen-covered neck. It flashed, bright as glass. Automatically I raised a claw to cup it, just in case sharp eyes were on the lookout, but I wasn't too worried by then.
    I had remained in that bin in the alley for a couple of hours, long enough to rest and become thoroughly ingrained with the odor of rotting