Carry On

“But that wasn’t personal, Simon,” Agatha says. “It’s because you’re a Normal.”

“How am I a Normal?” He throws his hands in the air. “I’m the most powerful magician anyone knows about.”

“You know what I mean,” Agatha says, and she’s being sincere, I think. “There’s never been a Normal at Watford.”

She’s right, but I wonder who she’s parroting.

“I was prophesied,” Simon says, and it sounds so pathetically defensive, I try to think of a way to change the subject.

Simon was prophesied.

Or someone was. Over and over.

The most powerful magician ever to walk the earth was coming, and he (or she) was supposed to get here just when the World of Mages needed him most.

And Simon did.

The Humdrum was eating our magic, the Mage and the Old Families were at each other’s throats—and then Simon arrived. He came into his power and lit up the magickal firmament like an electrical storm.

Most magicians can remember exactly where they were that day. (I can’t. But I was only 11.) My mum was giving a lecture. She said it felt like touching a raw wire and feeling the electricity shake you from the inside. Raw, scalding, scorching magic …

Which is still how Simon’s magic feels. I’ve never told him so, but it’s awful. Just standing near him when he goes off is like taking a shock. Your muscles are tired afterwards, and your hair smells like smoke.

Sometimes Simon’s power seduces other magicians; they can feel it, and they want to be closer. But anyone who’s actually been close to Simon is long past feeling seduced.

Once, he went off while protecting Agatha and me from a clan of worsegers—like badgers, but worse—and Agatha twitched and ticced for a week. She told Simon she had the flu, so he wouldn’t feel bad. Agatha’s less tolerant of his power than I am; it might be because she has less of her own. It might be that their magic is incompatible.

That can happen sometimes, even when two people are in love. There’s an old story, a romantic tragedy, about two lovers whose magic drove each other mad.…

I don’t think Simon and Agatha are in love.

But it isn’t my job to tell them so. (And also I’ve already tried.)

Anyway, Mum says that when the Mage brought Simon back to Watford, it was like he was calling bluff on the whole World of Mages. Here’s that saviour you’ve been talking about for a thousand years.

Even the people who didn’t believe it couldn’t say so out loud. And nobody could deny Simon’s power.

They did try to keep him out of Watford. The Mage had to make Simon his heir to get him into school—and to have him entered into the Book of Magic.

There are still a lot of people who don’t accept Simon, even among the Mage’s allies. “It takes more than magic to make a mage,” is what Baz has always said.

It sounds like classist nonsense, but in a way, it’s true:

The unicorns have magic. The vampires have some. Dragons, numpties, ne’er-do-wolves—they all have magic.

But you’re not a magician unless you can control magic, unless you can speak its language. And Simon … Well. Simon.

He gets up now and walks over to the window, opening it wide and sitting on the ledge. His wand is in his way, so he pulls it out of his back pocket and tosses it on his bed.

No. 4, I write in the air, The Mage.

“So we know the Mage’s Men are raiding…,” I say. “And, Simon, didn’t you say they were unloading things back in the stables? We could sniff around back there.”

He ignores me, staring out the window.

“Agatha,” I say, “what else have you heard at home?”

“I don’t know,” she says, frowning and fiddling with her skirt. “Father’s had lots of emergency Coven meetings. Mother says they can’t meet at our house anymore. She thinks our Normal neighbours are getting suspicious.”

“All right,” I say, “maybe we should move on to questions now—what don’t we know?”

I start a new column in the air, but Agatha stands up and starts walking out. “I really need to study.”

I try to stop her—“Agatha, wait, you’ll get caught if you leave by yourself!”—but she’s already closing the door.

Simon exhales loudly and runs his hands through his hair, making it stand up in curly bronze chunks. “I’m going for a walk,” he says, marching towards the door, leaving his wand on his bed.

Part of me wishes he were following her, but I don’t think he is.

I sigh, then sit down on his bed and look at our meagre lists. Before I leave, I blow my words out the window with a “Clear the air!”

24

AGATHA

I don’t know what I’m hoping for.

That he’ll see me standing at the wall, my hair whipping in the wind and my dress billowing out around me …

And that, what?

That it will mean something to him?

That he’ll see me up here, waiting for him on the ramparts, and really see me for the first time—There’s the answer, he’ll think. And he’ll unfasten my ribbons and tie them around his arm, or his thigh. And, Morgana, what would that even mean?

Something.

Something new.

I know that Basil, I don’t know … thinks about me. Or at least thought about me. That he used to watch me. Especially when I was with Simon.

I know that he hated what Simon and I have. And wanted it. That he’d do anything to get between us.