Tanya Grotter and the Throne of the Ancient One

In one of the June evenings Tanya, Vanka Valyalkin, and Bab-Yagun were sitting in the common room and despondently looking at the cracked malachite. Near the malachite, giggling like an idiot, soared the recently hatched spirit of omniscience.

“I told you: don’t overdo it in freezing weather! It wasn’t necessary to put the stone in the basement!” Vanka said dejectedly.

“What basement? Didn’t we really need the cold? Simply Tanya shouldn’t water it with those tears!” justifying himself, Bab-Yagun stated.

“What those tears? Perhaps Goyaryn is no longer a dragon?” Tanya was indignant. She adored Goyaryn and visited it almost each day. The terrible Tibidox dragon had gotten so used to her that it allowed her to clamber onto its back. When she stroked it on the nose, it squeaked contentedly. Being with Goyaryn, Tanya felt as peaceful and secure as in the double bass case in early childhood.

“Of course it’s a dragon, no one is arguing, but it’s old. I said, one must get tears from Mercury,” said Bab-Yagun.

“Here you could get it from mercury. Who’s stopping you? Not enough empty jars?” Vanka said noncommittally.

Yagun threatened Vanka with a fist. “And you hold your tongue, soccer shirt! No one stops me. It’s Mercury itself… It would not begin to sob into the jar, even if you collapse. And you can’t even get within ten metres of it…” he snapped.

The friends were fighting because they knew: this attempt to enlist the support of the spirit of omniscience was the last for them. Even if they were to do everything correctly now, the new spirit would hatch no earlier than in three weeks, when it would already be useless. Time was moving on. Exams, although they so did not want to think about them, were moving with the speed of an express train. Every time before exams, Tanya experienced the unpleasant feeling that she knew absolutely nothing. Vanka asserted that this was all because of Slander, who set pre-exam jolting upon the school, alleging that it would help everybody study better.

Shurasik was sitting in a corner by the stove and with concentration leafing through Self-taught magic self-defence. Spells, incantations, curses. Group battles with spirits and evil spirits. Advice for the nervous. “Someone please attack me, huh, people? Why will no one attack me? I awfully want to test the spell for smearing on the wall – Smackus wholus capitalist. Or at least let someone whack me with a sledge hammer – I feel wretched!” he whined.

“Why do you feel wretched?” Vanka Valyalkin was interested.

“Why? You really don’t know? They exempted me from exams!” Shurasik complained piteously.

Bab-Yagun gave him a searching stare, trying to understand whether Shurasik was playing the fool or this was actually bad news for him. “Really? Some simply heartless people! You, brother, stand firm! The school for difficult-to-raise magicians isn’t a health resort! They practice the most terrible tortures here since olden times!” he sympathized.

Shurasik jumped. In his eyes blazed a wild fire. “They said that I answered well in class! But I know that I answered poorly! Think for yourself, Yagun: of the thousand questions I only solidly know nine hundred and ninety-six!” he shouted and, grabbing Bab-Yagun’s shoulders, started to shake him.

“A nightmare! And they indeed keep such dimwits in Tibidox! Glomov and I are ashamed of you!” Bab-Yagun said. He jerked from side to side, vainly trying to be freed.

In agitation, the slender Shurasik assumed the strength and tenacity of a vampire. “I’ll suffocate you, you lucky thing! It’s not right! Why will you get to sit for exams, but not me? I don’t want to be on vacation a month early! Better let them throw me behind the Sinister Gates!” Shurasik squealed, fingers squeezing Yagun’s neck.

Yagun wheezed. It was time to hurry to his aid. “Steamus releasus!” Vanka Valyalkin whispered, letting out a green spark, which slid into Shurasik’s ear. Shurasik relaxed. They moved him to the couch and covered him with the little magazine Gossips and Fantasies, which Rita On-The-Sly had forgotten on the table. The periodical rustled its pages to lull him to sleep. Occasionally nonsense, similar to large insects with human faces, fell out from it and, shouting, sped to the corners. A few tried to hide in Shurasik’s ears. The unconscious honour student began to giggle blissfully.

“It’s for his benefit! After Gossips and Fantasies, many smart fellows became normal. It was even possible to talk with some,” said Vanka.

“Really? Somehow I don’t believe it!” Tanya said.

“This I tell you!” Vanka began to argue.

“Look at the cover!” Tanya proposed.

The colourful little magazine Gossips and Fantasies had transformed before their eyes into the starkly designed Herald of the Highest Magic. The insects with human faces rose up on their hind legs and assumed the appearance of tiny professors-astrologers. Each of them with a sense of self-respect carried a flag. On the flags flickered the inscriptions:

How to determine fate according to three thousand stars and a can of beef.

Twelve formulae of magic stuttering.

Transformation of hobbits into moronoids. To and back.

Magic beards. Trimming methods. Styling.

Computations of timetables of fading of magic sparks in different climatic zones.

“Well now, the whole index is scattered about! And just how did Shurasik manage to change one magazine into another? But then it’s now understandable why he’s always giggling!” Tanya was surprised.

“No! Shurasik is incorrigible! Must slip away before he comes to,” Vanka sighed.

They had already gone out, taking with them the cracked malachite in order not to leave any evidence for the sharp-sighted Slander, when Shurasik, even in drowsiness, raised himself on the couch and shouted, “Smackus wholus capitalist!” His ring released a red spark. The friends hurriedly bent down. Still, there was something Shurasik, limp after Steamus releasus, did not count on. His couch leisurely rose into the air, gathered momentum and, at the last second turning on its side, slammed Shurasik himself into the wall. The honour student, shaking his head, his eyes gradually becoming intelligent, looked out from behind the inverted couch.

“Akela has missed!” Bab-Yagun said sympathetically.

“Now he missed – in five minutes he’ll hit. He’s bothersome,” said Tanya.

To avoid meeting Shurasik, they dived into the corridor where the rooms of the dark department were. At the end of the corridor, the friends slid around the corner and listened. Shurasik was not chasing after them. Must be he had not yet come off the wall.

Unexpectedly Vanka Valyalkin stood still in a hunter’s stance, like a setter sensing game. “No one heard anything?” he asked.

“I didn’t,” said Tanya.

“Me neither. Perhaps you have glitches again? Medusa set them loose on you when you wrecked her experiment, remember?” Yagun reminded him. Glitches were small dreary fellows with musical gifts. Vanka had just finished with these meticulous invisible beings.

Vanka shook his head. “Ne-a, not glitches. Here’s something else!” he said.

Suddenly the door nearest to them began to shake, as if Nervous Tremor, one of the mad poltergeists of Tibidox, who, by the way, had secretly fallen in love with Lieutenant Rzhevskii, was beating it from within with a fearless head. The friends involuntarily moved towards each other.

“Well, what did I say? Who has glitches now?” Vanka exclaimed triumphantly.

“Everyone has glitches. They usually roam in groups,” Tanya remarked philosophically.

Vanka placed an ear to the door, attempting to understand what was taking place on the other side. “This is Goryanov’s room. What if something has happened to him?” he asked.

Bab-Yagun winced. “With Damien? What can befall him? I can’t even sit with him at the same table – my soup turns sour.”

At this moment, someone on the other side shouted loudly, “Wildus chamberus!” A red spark burst dully. Its reflection was visible even in the corridor through a crack. The rings of Tanya, Yagun, and Vanka Valyalkin glowed by themselves. A moment and the door again began to shake like mad.

“Oho! Did you see this spark? Such doesn’t happen with ordinary magic! Someone there uttered an incantation from the list of hundred forbidden ones! See what it did to our rings, they simply went berserk!” Vanka Valyalkin said, blowing on his ring.

“The hundred forbidden ones?” Tanya was startled. “Never thought that Goryanov was capable of such!”

“Really? Say also that you imagined to yourself Damien as a cupid with golden wings!” Yagun cut her short.

Something began to rattle on the other side of the door. The floor under the children’s feet started to vibrate, to thump with resonant impacts. “Ahhh! Save me! Forty people hold me!” someone began to squeal shrilly. Tanya, Yagun, and Vanka broke into the room and froze on the threshold.

In the room were Gunya Glomov, Seven-Stump-Holes, and Zhora Zhikin. The owner of the room, Goryanov, was lying on his stomach on a bulky wooden bench, clutching it with his hands. The bench was furiously bucking and shooting up almost to the ceiling, pushing off with its short wooden legs. Likely, it was aspiring to throw Damien off itself at any cost. “Help! What are you all waiting for? It’s kicking me!” Goryanov yelled, continually hitting the bench with his nose, which had already swollen up like a pear.

During one of the jumps, Goryanov let go. The bench bucked. Damien plopped like a toad down onto the floor. The bench fell on top of him like a dead hippo. It seems it was gratified by the thought of holding a second post as a monument. After thinking about this, Goryanov issued a blood-curdling howl and hurriedly crept away under the bed, escaping the solid wooden legs of the gone berserk furniture.

“Solidus realismus!” Seven-Stump-Holes said, pronouncing the abolishing incantation. The bench froze. Stump looked it over, felt the legs, checking if there were any cracks, and was satisfied. “Threw down one more. Who’s next? Perhaps, dandy here?” he said, turning to Zhora Zhikin.

Zhikin started to puff in embarrassment and somehow quite elusively moved away to the door. “Generally I’m not against it. But I have an appointment today. Extremely important! I don’t want to show up at it with a nose like yours,” he glibly said.