The third (already almost fourth) magic grade was bored in one of the dusty auditoriums of Tibidox, where only the ghost of Mad Mathematician flew for the last hundred years. Mad Mathematician was a gloomy greybeard, strolling around on moonlit nights with a bloodstained square and searching for the Perpetual Sine, allegedly stolen from him by a mystical blond with a pimply nose.
Both departments — white and black — were in the audience. Along the board, tilting forward, Fuji was strolling and expanding on his favourite theme. The children sighed despondently. Stinktopp’s exam was replaced with a course of lectures from this half-wit from Magford! This was Slander’s idea, deciding to punish the entire grade as a warning in case someone nevertheless was mixed up in the story with the rejuvenating apple.
“Magic essence is the true essence of an object. It lies in it like a butterfly in a caterpillar or an oak in an acorn. Or another example! Visualize an egg! Who cannot imagine an egg?” Fuji asked.
“I can’t!” Seven-Stump-Holes’ voice was heard. The instructor of magic essences was so lost that he even jumped.
“Why can you not?” he fearfully asked.
“I can’t, and that’s all! I don’t have any imagination, and I’ve never seen an egg at all!”
Seven-Stump-Holes stated still more insolently. Fuji began to blink. He suddenly became so helpless and pitiful that one would want to give him a kopeck.
Tanya thought that Fuji was among those teachers not capable of giving rebuff at all.
She was sorry for him. “Holes, Be a stump!” she demanded.
“What if I will? What are you going to do to me?” he grinned.
“I’ll give you a bewitched pass at training! Gullis-dullis, Trullis-zapullis, or Figus-zatsapus. Or all three together. Depending on the mood,” said Tanya.
“And I’ll add a couple of balls so that it would take a long time to peel you off the shielding dome!” Bab-Yagun promised.
Seven-Stump-Holes bit his tongue. Even if he had the chance to catch Tanya’s pass, those of the telepath Yagun were simply slaughter. After them, the genies had to level out the sand continually with rakes.
Fuji glanced gratefully at Tanya. “So, an egg!” he continued. “Who, looking at it, can guess that inside is a chicken?”
“Or a yolk, or Koshchei’s death, or a dragon, or a crocodile!” Cryptova said with a challenge.
“An excellent example, Coffinia!” Fuji was pleased. “It can be anything you like in there! Or almost anything you like! I’m only trying to prove that the essence of a thing can never be determined by its external, everyday form. Do you catch my drift?” Fuji said. Fuji as a lecturer had a depressing habit. He lisped, drawled, repeated one and the same a hundred times, and after each time asked, “Well now, do you understand?” or “Do you catch my drift?” It seemed he sincerely believed that the weak-minded were sitting before him in the auditorium.
Finally, at the beginning of the second hour, when everyone was already slipping under the desks and even the egghead Shurasik had stopped scribbling in his notebook and was
casting looks at the teacher with mild astonishment, Fuji finished with theory. “And now let’s move on to practice! Better to see once than to hear a hundred times! Isn’t it true, excellently said? Do you catch my drift?” he asked happily. Katya Lotkova began to moan quietly. She had held laughter in check for so long that she was already barely alive.
Fuji cleared his throat. Having vigilantly looked with his watery eyes over the class, he decisively approached Kuzya Tuzikov. “Please give me your left boot!” he asked.
“W-why?” Tuzikov did not understand.
“Please give it to me, then you’ll understand!”
Kuzya unwillingly unlaced his boot and handed it to Fuji. Fuji lifted it up high before the entire class. From the boot fell out a forgotten crib-whisperer, and, quietly but distinguishably, it was muttering answers on protection from spirits. The exam, which Slander would be giving, according to the timetable, was at the end of the following week. Kuzya Tuzikov reddened deeply.
“Aha, reactive broom, they caught you! And still poses as an excellent worker!” Gunya Glomov started to neigh.
However, it was made clear, Fuji was not interested in the crib at all. He picked up the continuing-to-whisper paper and, after apologizing, returned it to the owner. After that, he placed the boot on his table, where it was visible to all. “And now I advise you to close your eyes tight!” he said, making some passes over the boot.
“Why? What if I don’t want to?” Cryptova asked, but at this moment, Fuji shouted in a terrible voice, “Transcendentus Kantus burnoutis!” His ring flared up with dual, very bright sparks. Those who did not obey and did not close their eyes immediately started to rub their eyes. Others, who were not blinded, saw that Tuzikov’s boot had disappeared. A bat was flying around the classroom, running into walls.
“I ask you to pay attention that this was not a spell of transformation, but precisely the rite of liberation of essences! This boot — an ordinary boot introduced into the world by a multiplying spell from a moronoid model — turned out to have the essence of a bat! I admit I also expected something similar. I have a practiced eye!” Fuji continued.
“But my boot? What am I to do now, walk barefoot?” Tuzikov squeaked, examining his left foot. There was only a sock on it, and on top of that with a hole in one of the toes.
The instructor from Magford made a helpless gesture. “Alas, young man, nothing I can do… Your boot will forever remain a bat. I let out its essence in its entire excellent natural state, and it will no longer return into the shell of that pitiful egg, which Mr.
Seven-Stump-Holes never saw!” Fuji raised his voice.
Tuzikov leaned over and unlaced the other boot. “Then please make this a bat too!
Have to throw it out all the same!” he demanded.
“Useless. Your second boot will remain a boot, no matter how often I utter Transcendentus Kantus burnoutis. The majority of objects in both the magic and the moronoid worlds do not have an internal essence! Of course it is possible to change anything by force, but it won’t be the same…,” said Fuji, for some purpose pointing to Gunya Glomov. Gunya started to busy himself in a fidgety manner, with alarm turning over in his mind, what if, say, a chest of drawers lives inside him and Fuji will even free it from him?
“Yes well, some essence! There was a boot, but now there isn’t! No benefit, only harm!” practical Liza Zalizina said, making a face.
“Girl, you reason exactly like those who envied me in Magford!” Fuji said sadly. “They all took up arms against me after I changed the dean’s wife into a toad! But was it my fault that she had this concealed essence?! Do you catch my drift?”
An absolute storm broke out in the class. The laughter, held in control the entire lesson, escaped outside like lava in the depths of a volcano, listlessly dying to seethe. Bab-Yagun could not even exclaim “My granny mama!” and only screeched, “Oh, I can’t!” The instructor, who irreversibly converted the wife of Magford’s dean into a frog, instantly became a hero. In the concealed hierarchy of love-hate, which each student set up for himself, Fuji had instantly grown to one hundred points and rose somewhere next to Tararakh and Sardanapal, leaving Deni, Medusa, and Slander far behind.
Tanya looked at the boring instructor with entirely different eyes. Short, red-nosed, absurd, he suddenly seemed to her like a magician-romantic, freeing the souls of objects from the fetters of their absurd shells. “Transcendentus Kantus burnoutis,” she quietly repeated, wondering whether this spell would work without those passes that Fuji made over the object.
“Everyone may go! Same time tomorrow!” the Magford instructor said dryly. Likely, he sincerely did not understand what caused the laughter, and was even offended by such attitude towards him. He turned and, beckoning to the flying journal, left the classroom.
All those remaining dragged themselves out after him. Even Kuzya Tuzikov hopped out on one foot.
In the classroom remained only Coffinia and Tanya. Cryptova was searching for her pen, which had crawled away when Shurasik put an evil eye on it not so long ago. Tanya wanted to catch the bat, all the time still banging on the glass, to let it out. She had already almost caught the bat, when suddenly the double window of the auditorium was thrown open. Two cupids with an enormous basket of flowers flew into the classroom together with the moist oceanic wind.
Coffinia clasped her hands. “Pupie! It’s from him, I know! Only he’s so considerate!
Here, here, it’s for me!” she began to squeal.
But the cupids, with wings quivering, flew past her and made their way to Tanya. She made terrible eyes and showed her fist at the cupids, but the foolish winged babies did not understand hints. Moreover, they clearly had time to quarrel between themselves, dividing the pastries obtained from Puper as a reward. One cupid had a swollen lip and the other was suspiciously dark-blue under one eye. “Here, hold this! We’re flying in for candies after dinner!” they growled, dropped the basket of flowers on Tanya’s head, and flew away.
While Tanya was getting out from under the flowers, Coffinia like a tigress ran up to the basket and snatched out the postcard hidden there. On the postcard depicting cooing pigeons was written with a red marker:
“Tania, to you, my love! Soon will be fall! Gury.”
For a minute Coffinia remained motionless, and then…however, I will not even risk describing this… I will only say that even the water in the pond by The Ancient One’s guardhouse came to a boil.
“How did you do this?” Coffinia breathed out, when her fury was more or less under control and she had stopped sprinkling Tanya with evil eyes and curses, which Tanya barely managed to block.
“Pipe down, Crypt! No one wanted this. It’s entirely your spell! I moulded the figurine from dough, and also uttered the spell. Here’s the result! Should have thought about this sooner!” Tanya said, shrugging her shoulders. She experienced pity for Coffinia, although Coffinia was in no way like the helpless Fuji and generally could give rebuff when she wanted. Not waiting for Cryptova to sprinkle her with sparks again, she slipped from the auditorium and shut the door.
Coffinia remained alone. Weeping from malice, she trampled the flowers. Then she burned the basket with a flamethrower spell. “It didn’t work! This scoundrel fell in love with Grotty! But I won’t give up! I’ll use extreme means! He’ll be sorry that he picked her and not me! I… I’ll resort to the aid of magfia! They’ll get him for me from under the earth!” she shouted.
Coffinia set off for her room, locked herself in, turned over her bed, and pulled out her secret box. “Only try chattering to anyone!” she threatened Page, turning the skeleton with eye sockets to the wall. Page cracked its teeth in offence. The musketeer feathers on his hat drooped disappointedly.
After taking out a notebook from the secret box, Coffinia tried to open it, but the notebook suddenly became a rat and attempted to bite her finger. “Here’s a forgetful one!
Relativis beaconis!” Cryptova said, offhandedly releasing a red spark. The rat grew quiet and again became a notebook. Leafing through it, Coffinia finally discovered what she needed — one of the hundred most dangerous forbidden spells. In order that it would not disappear, as many spells transferred onto paper had a habit of vanishing, Cryptova contrived to copy it using special student cipher. Continually looking over at the door, Coffinia in a whisper read the long incantation, ending with the words “Maniacus imposonus magfioso yakuzacus!” A red spark flared up. Black Curtains in horror inflated into a bubble and immediately deflated, fringes trembling.
Through the half-open window, a cupid slid into the room, looking around. It was a sullen baby of magfioso appearance, in reflecting glasses. The bow placed in his quiver was much bigger than that of the other cupids’. The same could also be said about the arrows. They were of such length that the quiver with them hung much lower than the chubby cupid legs, slightly disrupting the general magfioso impression. “Problems?” the baby asked in a squeaky voice.
“An order!” shaking, Cryptova said.
The cupid silently stretched out his plump hand. Coffinia pulled out Puper’s photograph from under the pillow and showed it to the cupid. The magfioso took the photograph and slid an indifferent look along it. Cryptova decided that he did not recognize Gury, but it was soon revealed that it was not so. “How much?” he asked.
“Two bars of chocolate!” Cryptova blurted out.
The cupid burst out laughing and returned the photograph to Coffinia. “Bad idea! They guard the client well. Two bars is the price for a moronoid…”
Coffinia grew gloomy. “How much?” she asked.
The cupid showed her five fingers, and then five more. Not a single cupid, even a magfioso, knew how to count to more than ten. “So many now! And so many, when the work is finished.”
Cryptova sighed with relief. She threw back the pillow and handed the previously prepared bars to the cupid. “Fine, Plague-del-Cake takes you! If Puper falls in love with me, you will burst with chocolate!” she said.
The cupid smirked and poured the bars into his quiver. “My arrows never miss the mark, mistress! He will fall in love with you like a bogey with rotten meat! Head over heels!” he promised.
“Have in mind: he’s already bewitched with a figurine of dough and loves another,”
warned Coffinia.
The cupid winced with such contempt that the glasses jumped off his infantile nose.
“You don’t know my arrows. Three arrows and he’s yours forever,” he assured her.
“Only don’t forget the control arrow! Everything must be dead certain,” ordered Coffinia.
“No problem, mistress! I see you have experience. Please consider he’s already yours,”
said the cupid. He straightened his suspenders, picked up the glasses, and flew away, fluttering very well the magfioso golden wings.
Coffinia followed him with a pensive look. She then drew Black Curtains and sat down by the windowsill. “Nightmare! I placed an order for Puper! I don’t recognize myself.
Here’s what passion does to black magicians!” she said.
* * *
And on another morning, even before everyone gathered for breakfast in the Hall of Two Elements, an utter storm broke out. Everything began sufficiently normally: lolling in bed, Verka Parroteva according to her habit listened to the zoomer, enriching herself with themes for today’s gossips. As always, they drearily muttered about the rates of toad warts and green corns and that someone cursed the weather above the continental part of Europe, and suddenly…
“Bad morning, my un-dears!” the zoomer started to rattle. “With you is your Nagianie Pripyatskaya! Kiss-kiss to everyone on your beak, ears, and bald patch!
“And now tie yourself by ropes to a little chair! Prepare valerian drops or hemp for soothing! Ready? Then please listen! Today at seven in the morning, an unknown cupid carried out an attempt on Gury Puper, when he, with his broom under his arm, was on his way to morning training. Hiding behind a cloud, the cupid shot four arrows at the dragonball star with two hitting the mark. Fans of Gury and the composite Tibidox team members pursued the cupid; however, that one managed to hide himself, using the high clouds… Puper is hospitalized in a severe amorous fever. At the present time, the magpital keeping Puper is under the control of substantial detachments of maglice. They do not allow journalists and photographers in to him. Magciety of Jerky Magtion has already issued a statement on this, sharply condemning similar actions. ‘This is universal magrorism! I will not be surprised if its roots lead to the east, to Afghanistan or even somewhere else!’ Koshchei the Immortal, representative of Magciety, stated. In turn, the American magician Uncle Sam has clearly let it be known that his magents are already studying the version about the participation of Vamdam Gussein and Bam Khlaban on the attempt on Puper’s life. Bam Khlaban, as usual, refrained from comments. He teleported to some unknown place and was hidden from magents and magjudges, the fact by itself is suspicious. Vamdam Gussein again rejected all charges in his address and in a temper converted seven more correspondents into gophers. Altogether, at present eight of our associate-gophers are languishing in Vamdam’s captivity. Some from grief have already acquired descendants…”
Verka Parroteva slipped down from the bed and on all fours — to walk she could not
— ran out into the common room. “They shot at Puper! Some crazy cupid! Gury is injured! He’s in an amorous fever!” she began to yell.
Dusya Dollova, not warned about the need to prepare herself with hemp, became white as a sheet and fainted. Together with her, Liza Zalizina and Rita On-The-Sly toppled over. True, the last one was more for company, since she, on the whole, was completely indifferent to Puper.
“Scoundrels! I’ll find out who did this, I’ll curse on the spot!” Katya Lotkova yelled.
“Exactly! A nightmare!” Coffinia agreed with her, though all the time her soul was singing with happiness. “I’m indeed more indignant than everyone! Lotkova, if you will curse someone, call me. I’ll help you!” Cryptova accurately laid the copy of Moonless Magyouths on the floor, carefully settled herself down on the magazine shyly turning yellow from stale gossips, and simulated a deep faint.
Chapter 13
The Wedding of the Ghosts
Exams, like a bowling ball knocking out from summer the entire second half of July and the first ten days of August, were finally over. Some passed them; for those who had to retake them, they were postponed to the fall, but this was no longer important. The children, gladly detaching themselves from textbooks, really discovered for the first time that, besides the auditoriums, stern instructors, and the library of the mad genie, there existed on Buyan the sun, the oceanic coast, and the forest. Life doused them with sparkling happy drops of its waterfall.
Exams, like a bowling ball knocking out from summer the entire second half of July and the first ten days of August, were finally over. Some passed them; for those who had to retake them, they were postponed to the fall, but this was no longer important. The children, gladly detaching themselves from textbooks, really discovered for the first time that, besides the auditoriums, stern instructors, and the library of the mad genie, there existed on Buyan the sun, the oceanic coast, and the forest. Life doused them with sparkling happy drops of its waterfall.