Doctor Sandstorm: Chapter 3: Attack at the Vineyard

The third chapter of my first novella Doctor Sandstorm. This was written in September 2012, and is a bit rubbish. Don't worry, the story I'm writing now (50,000 words in!) is a lot better. I thought you could just have this because I haven't posted much lately. God, this is rubbish, reading it back.

Vir Astym ran the quick medical check on Clara, and decided she was all fine after her encounter with the terrifying Wraiths. She told him about her aching migraine, and he cast a spell on it and she instantly felt better – Clara thought she heard him say “Migrena scuti”. He and the elderly Aldred Lysander just vanished into thin air – a practice Sandstorm said was called risipi, and taught alongside apare at BASIL – leaving Doctor Sandstorm alone with Clara. Sandstorm decided not to speak for once, to let Clara have a quiet think. And the two walked out of the 'Conversion Chamber' up to see the sights of Transylvania.

And it was beautiful.

Clara and Doctor Sandstorm emerged from the Conversion Chamber to see a beautiful valley, with steep grassy hills on each side, with a large dip in the middle. The view was simply amazing – small, apple green fields, dotted generously with low emerald-green shrubs and small darkener leafy trees. Small clumps of dark green forest were visible in some areas, with tall trees reaching up to the sky. Red fruits grew from the trees, but Clara couldn't tell what they actually were, and smaller dips in the valley were filled with bigger, forest-green coloured trees. Large egg-shaped grey rocks stood upright, littered about the valley, some with primitive gates around them. Pristine white stone roads snaked around, and more significantly up, the valley like strands of spaghetti, but there were no cars or people.

Mountains loomed over the whole valley, as dark silhouettes on the horizon, with a blueish tint, like schoolteachers looking over children's work. This made Clara remember that it was Friday morning and she was supposed to be in New York at this moment. Just visible a long way off, but in front of the mountains, was a small town or settlement, with a few white buildings just available to see, clumped together in clusters. Beyond that were yet more trees.

Nobody was about, and Clara suspected nobody lived here. The sweet chirps of birdsong rang out in the air, and a group of song thrushes flew past, singing merrily and somersaulting almost in the beautiful blue sky. The whole scene was picturesque and fit for a postcard. If Clara had her camera, she'd have snapped that up, but she'd left that in her hotel room.

“Beautiful, isn't it?” said Doctor Sandstorm, surveying the view with as much wonder as Clara, despite having probably seen it on her way in to the chamber, and many times before.

“It is beautiful,” she agreed, wistfully. Then her tummy rumbled a bit. She was hungry. “So... why do you think that man-”

“Aldred Lysander”.

“Aldred, yeah. Why do you think Aldred said he would give me magic? I mean, I'm just a normal girl. Nothing special about me. What is it with me that made him think I could be a magician”.

“Come on, sit down then Clara”. And the two new friends sat down on the dry grassy knoll overlooking the valley.

“Aldred Lysander is a very clever man, and he can be a very dangerous man. He is very good at seeking out potential in a person, why is an asset to him and something I can not do no matter how hard I try. I'm a blunderer – I do whatever I like when I like, without thought. He's different. The magical community is not doing so well at the moment, so it's vital we bring new blood in, or new magicians basically, people who aren't born with any magic in their blood, but show potential to be a great sorcerer. Aldred can easily give people powers of magic – he is the magical supervisor, he can twirl magic around his fingertips and make it do his bidding, so it's good that he's a good warlock and not a malevolent one. So he decides, in times of trouble, maybe it's best to give ordinary people magic. And he saw potential in you, Clara, like nobody else. And he thought you would make a great witch”.

“Excuse me!”

“Okay, magician then”.

“What is the proper term?”

“Well, technically a magical person is a warlock if it's a man, and a woman is a witch, actually, so sorry about that. 'Sorcerer' or 'sorceress' – they're both generic terms, so we tend to use those, and we sometimes use the word 'magician' but that sounds like a cheap party entertainer for kid's parties , who also makes balloon animals in his spare time”.

“Okay, so balloon animals are bad, and you're a witch or a sorcerer”.

“Sorceress is more polite. You'd call a headteacher 'sorceress'”.

“If said headteacher had magical powers”.

“Well, it's not uncommon. Beatrix Arwald, she had magical powers and she was headteacher of BASIL when it was founded in 1689. She decided to resign in the late 188s after two hundred years to retire. Then it got handed over to a man called Hind Balux, who had the job until the 192s, when he gave it to a woman named Adriana Morina, and then finally a few years ago, she resigned and gave her job to Vir Astym. Incidentally, his deputy headteacher and eventually his successor, will be a lovely young lady named Komanius Russo”.

 

“Right”.

“Come on, up you get. I've got business to do,” said Doctor Sandstorm, standing up, taking her top hat off and dusting it, before putting it back on.

“I thought you were taking me back to the station”.

“There's a little something I need to check. There's a little vineyard near here, makes lovely wine. Well, not the vineyard itself, but the grape farmers do, and I need to ask them, specifically the owner Manuel, a few quick questions about the safety precautions regarding a rather dangerous object I've left there. Nothing to worry about, though. And also, my friend Vir, you saw back there, he rather likes his Romanian wine. They make very good wine, do Romanians. I'll get him a bottle. You'll got to see it”.

“See what?”

“Vir Astym, drunk. Come on, off we go”.

 

And the two departed.

*

After some time, Doctor Sandstorm and Clara reached a small vineyard. The stone path of the ground turned to chalky orange-white soil as the pair reached the heavy, rusting iron gates, beyond which was a wonderland of grapes, white and red, purple and green. Vibrant colours shone, and a few grape farmers could be seen rummaging about in the snaking grape vines, sweltering in the blistering heat of the beating sun.

“Is this it?” asked Clara.

“Of course it is,” replied Sandstorm. “Finest vineyard in Transylvania, with excellent safety precautions. No mere mortal could get in here. Deschide!” she cried, and the gates flew open. “But I'm not just a mere mortal. Breaking and entering. Don't you just love it?”

One of the grape farmers ran up to Sandstorm and Clara. He had slightly greying, curly brown hair, a tired hair, wizened with age and with gaping age lines, green dungarees on over a white T-shirt and brown trousers, and black sunglasses perched on his nose.

“Doctor Sandstorm, is that you?” he asked, groping the air anxiously.

“Yes, Manuel, it is. It's good to see you”.

“I would say the same, but I can't see you”.

“I need to have a quick word with you, and buy a bottle of the usual for my friend”.

Sandstorm turned to Clara. “He's blind. Come on”.

And Manuel led Sandstorm and Clara to a large barn, which upon entry Clara found was lined with wine. Three walls of the massive wooden barn were completely taken up by shelves on all levels, hanging off from the wall or riveted to the floor. And upon each shelf was a bottle of wine. They were all different.

“There must be enough wine in here to fill a swimming pool!” breathed Clara.

     “Fifteen swimming pools,” corrected Manuel.

“Don't even think about it,” warned Sandstorm.

“Think about what?” asked Clara.

“Getting drunk”.

“I wasn't planning to”.

“Oh. But you were considering it, weren't you?”

“No! I'm twelve!”.

“Okay. Um... back in a mo”.

Sandstorm and Manuel walked out of the barn to a little anti-chamber of a room, a tiny room leading off from the barn. Clara, ever the inquisitive, sneaked over to the brown oak door and cupped her ear to it. It was a very good door; Clara couldn't make out a word they were saying. She heard quite muffled conversation, and that was all.

Suddenly she heard a small noise behind her. Like a foot scraping on a stone. She realised that the floor of the barn was made of stone. She heard the noise again, and quickly turned around. Nobody was there. But there were so many shelves to hide behind. She hadn't imagined the noise. There was somebody in the barn with her.

Probably one of the grape farmers, she thought, but somehow she didn't quite believe herself. She turned back to the door, wondering whether Sandstorm had finished yet. She felt safer with Doctor Sandstorm, even if the two had only met an hour ago.

Again, the noise came, but this time there came a faint muttering. Clara's heartbeat started to become faster. Her blood turned hot and a shiver went up her spine. Then she saw it; just protruding from behind a wine crate – a shining, glimmering knife-tip Clara had no doubt that it was connected to a knife. She thought about running out of the barn, but that put her away from Sandstorm, the only person she could trust, and closer to the person with the knife.

“Who's there?” she asked. “I can see the knife”. And then the killer came out.

He wore a seedy brown frock coat and brown trousers. He had a long face and a mouth crammed full of sharp, yellow teeth. He had an evil face, an evil grin, and drooled horribly from his mouth.

“Ocurnus Solihull. I'm going to be your killer”. He sneered at her and then, unexpectedly, lunged at her, brandishing the knife as if he did this every day. Clara realised with fear that he probably did.

Clara just moved out of the way in time and Solihull’s knife jammed into the barn wall. He ferociously pulled it out of the wall and again lunged at Clara, missing again, but only narrowly. He snarled.

“Got you now, I have,” he leered.

Clara tripped on a loose wine bottle that had fallen on the floor. Helpless on the floor, she realised that her ankle hurt: she had probably twisted it as she fell on it. Ocurnus Solihull walked up to her, sneering, snarling and smiling ferociously. His knife glinted in the sun streaming from outside.

“Please, no,” pleaded Clara, whispering.

Ocurnus grabbed her and pulled her up from the ground, ready to stab his knife into her chest, but then Clara had an idea: she had no hesitation in carrying it out.

She kicked as hard as she could, lashing out at Solihull as hard as she could. It hit him straight in the shins and he fell to the ground whimpering. Clara legged it, running out of the barn doors to the sweltering heat of the vineyard outside. She then realised she had made a big mistake: she had left the killer with his knife.

She ran as far as she could, but she could see Solihull running close behind her, and her ankle made her limp. Eventually Solihull caught up with her. Clara whizzed round. She tried to concentrate hard – she didn't want to die, she didn't want to die, she didn't want to die, she didn't want to die, she didn't want to die...

She splayed her hand, pointing it straight at her pursuer. She pursed her lips. “Impiedica,” she said, speaking in a language she didn't know. A gust of wind erupted from just in front of her and slammed into her killer. Solihull crashed to the ground as Doctor Sandstorm came running up.

“What's the problem?” she asked.

“Bit... late there... Doctor,” panted Clara.

“Oh”.

“Yes. You... need... to work on that”.

“I do, don't I? Why is this unusual man, noted convict and all round creep on the floor whimpering?”

“He... tried to kill me with that knife. But... I kicked him... and ran outside, to here, but then... well, I just thought about... I thought about how much I didn't want to die, and... I spoke in a language... a language I didn't understand, and I said a word, and he fell to the floor and dropped his knife. I think I'm going to faint”.

“Clara, you spoke in Romanian. You spoke a magic spell, in fact you probably used the Romanian word for 'prevent', and... you've done magic, Clara, without being given the powers of magic. Clara, I don't know how this has happened. You're unique. I promise you, that you do not have magic naturally – you weren't born with it, Vir Astym checked you on that and found that you don't have a hint of magic in you. So how did you do that? That's frankly a bit mystifying. I don't know how you did that – that's actually impossible. You're a very unusual person, Clara Green. And now it's time to meet my friends – the gang. And to meet them, you need to meet another of my friends, in fact my closest friend probably”.

“Um...”

“My car”.

“Sorry, didn't you understand me? I said, I'm going to faint. Could you do something about it?”

“What, like catch you?”

“Yes please. That would be lovely”.

Clara keeled backwards and her vision turned to clouds of black.

 

Really, really, really rubbish stuff. My other stuff's better. I'll put more stuff up soon.