Beetle took the kettle off the burner and poured the water into the mugs, which immediately frothed up and began to overflow with chilled pink foam. He handed one to Septimus.
“Oof, that’s a good one!” Septimus spluttered as the FizzFroot went straight up his nose.
“Funny thing happened this morning,” said Beetle after a few restorative gulps of FizzFroot. “Someone said they were you.”
Septimus took another gulp of FizzFroot and sneezed. “Atchoo! Me?”
“Yeah. Weird kid. Wanted the scribe job.”
“So what did you say?”
“Well, I told him he wasn’t
you, and he didn’t take it too well. But I had to tell him that he could come back later. Not my job to say who can apply to be a scribe. Hope Miss Djinn can see he’s as nutty as a fruitcake. I shall tell her he knows a few Darke tricks, too.
Don’t want any of that stuff in here.”
“Darke tricks?” asked Septimus.
“Yeah. You know, the flame coming out of the thumb one. Used to be considered highly insulting in the old days. Not nice even now.”
“No. I wonder who he was.”
“Hmm. Well, I’ll let you know if he comes back.”
Septimus and Beetle sat for a while, drinking their FizzFroot, until Beetle remembered that before everything had gone crazy that morning he had been hoping Septimus would drop by. “Hey, Sep,” he said, suddenly jumping to his feet with a smile back on his face, “we can kill two birds with one stone. I’ve got something to show you.”
“What?”
“You won’t know unless you come and look, will you?” Beetle grinned.
11
DRAGON-WATCHER
M r. Pot!” yelled Marcia, striding across the Palace lawns, her quarry in sight. “Mr. Pot!”
Billy Pot did not reply; he was pushing a large wheelbarrow of dragon dung and was not in a good mood. Billy had completely forgotten how pleased he had been when Septimus had allowed him to start collecting Spit Fyre’s dragon dung. But that had been in what Billy now considered to be the Good Old Days, when he had a regular job mowing the Palace lawns with his Contraption. Billy’s Contraption worked on organic principles, which meant that it contained about twenty hungry lawn lizards in a box that Billy wheeled—extremely slowly—across the grass, while the lawn lizards ate the grass—or not.
Billy kept hundreds of lawn lizards in lizard lodges down by the river, and as the lizard population grew he began to have trouble keeping them under control. The dragon dung had worked miracles—at first. Fearing that a monster lizard had moved into their territory, the lawn lizards instantly became manageable. However, after some time passed and the monster lizard had not materialized, the lawn lizards, which were not stupid, realized something was up. And now they were just as uncontrollable as they ever had been and—having seen off a massive rival—they were arrogant too, and had taken to snapping at Billy’s ankles. Billy was done with lawn lizards.
The last straw for Billy had come when, after a long day’s mowing and several changes of lizards, the Contraption—never the same since it had been trampled by Simon Heap’s horse—had finally fallen to pieces. Sarah Heap had seized her chance. Disgusted with the great piles of dragon dung littering the Palace lawns, Sarah had dispatched Silas to the Port with strict instructions to return with a state-of-the-art lawn mower. Silas was unusually efficient and came back on the return Port barge with an impressive machine.
Billy hated it. It had horrible sharp blades instead of lizards and had to be pulled by horse. Billy was a reptile person; he didn’t like horses.
But the dragon dung had kept right on coming.
Sarah Heap, who was finally getting used to telling people what to do, provided Billy with a large field beside the Palace lawns and told him to shift the dragon dung into the field now
and get to planting vegetables. Billy didn’t like that. He didn’t like vegetables, either.
Billy Pot now made a point of not talking to anyone who looked like they might be trouble—and the ExtraOrdinary Wizard yelling at him ticked all Billy’s trouble boxes. But Marcia was not easily put off. She chased after Billy, who saw her coming and did his best to pick up speed, but was not entirely successful, hampered as he was by his heavy wheelbarrow.
“Mr. Pot!” Marcia jumped in front of the barrow, caught the heel of her pointy purple python shoe in an old rabbit hole and promptly fell over. Billy peered over the pile of dragon dung only to find that the ExtraOrdinary Wizard had disappeared, which was all right by him.
It was only when Marcia staggered to her feet, clutching the snapped heel from one of the pythons, hair awry and with an extremely irritable glint in her green eyes, that Billy thought it wise to set the barrow down.
He peered over the top. “What?”
“Mr. Pot…ouch…I have a job for you,” said Marcia.
“Look, Your ExtraOrdinariness, I already collected the last lot and I ain’t got room for no more until the end of the week. Got that?”
“Oh.” Marcia was a little taken aback. After twelve years as an ExtraOrdinary Wizard she was used to a little more respect.
“I gotta get on now,” Billy growled. He picked up the barrow handles and set off toward the vegetable garden at a slow trudge.
Putting on a fast hobble, Marcia waylaid the wheelbarrow again. “Mr. Pot,” she said very insistently.
Billy sighed and let go of the barrow handles. “What?” he asked.
“As I said, I have a job for you. It’s a new vacancy—Dragon-Watcher. I think you would be eminently well qualified.”
“What d’you mean exactly, Dragon-Watcher?” asked Billy suspiciously.
“I’ve written out a job description,” said Marcia, handing Billy a crisp piece of paper. He took it dubiously and stared at it. Billy didn’t like paper very much either, especially fancy pieces of thick paper with writing on them. Actually it was the writing that Billy really did not like—he had no idea where to start with writing.
“Other way up,” said Marcia.
“Oh.” Flustered, as once again a piece of paper got the better of him, Billy turned the paper around. “You read it.
Haven’t got my specs,” he mumbled. He handed the paper back to Marcia, who took it cautiously between finger and thumb, trying to avoid the thick, grimy fingerprints that now covered the edges.
“‘Dragon-Watcher job description,’” Marcia began. “‘Number one: Dragon to live out, i.e., at Dragon-Watcher’s residence and or workplace.’”
“What?” Billy frowned, puzzled.
“Spit Fyre will live here,” said Marcia.
“Here?”
“Yes, here. The vegetable field will be ideal.”
“What about the veg?” asked Billy, suddenly discovering a new concern for vegetables.
“He’s not fussy; he’ll eat anything.”
“That’s what bothers me,” muttered Billy.
“‘Number two: Dragon-Watcher to have total responsibility for dragon when in his care. Number three: Apprentice may visit dragon on alternate evenings and weekends only, and is allowed one half-hour flight only at those times. Number four: rates of pay by negotiation—but I suggest double what you are currently getting from the Palace.”
“Double?” Billy gasped, shocked.
“Very well, triple, then. But that’s my final offer. Will you take the job or not?”
“Yes! Er, yes, ExtraOrdinary. I would be honored.”
“My Apprentice will bring the dragon over later today. The builders will be arriving this morning.”
“Builders?”
“To construct the dragon house. Good day to you, Mr. Pot. I’ll send a contract down for you to sign later.”
“Oh. Right. Um, good day, Your ExtraOrdinariness.”
As Marcia limped off, Billy Pot sat down on the riverbank and scratched his head in amazement. He immediately wished he hadn’t. Dragon droppings were really hard to get out of your hair.
12
TERRY TARSAL
T erry Tarsal, shoemaker and reluctant
keeper of a purple python, liked a quiet life. Most of the time he got it—and the times he didn’t usually had something to do with purple python shoes.
Terry was a small, wiry man with large capable hands worn rough and callused after years of working with leather. He had a long, narrow shop down Footpad Passage just off Wizard Way, which smelled of dust, leather, waxed thread and, on that particular day, linseed oil. Terry enjoyed his work. What he did not enjoy was keeping a purple python in the backyard of the shop. But Marcia Overstrand was one of his best customers and over the ten years that Marcia had been ExtraOrdinary Wizard, Terry had steeled himself to look after the snake and collect its sloughed skins for when Marcia ordered her next pair of shoes.