Laurel Wilde hadn’t even noticed that her daughter had been missing, of course. She had been too busy drinking expensive sparkling wine and talking about the latest money-making scheme invented by her glamorous publisher, Skylurian Midzhar.
‘The first billion-pound book in the world,’ Skylurian had said to Laurel Wilde over tea that Saturday afternoon. ‘Imagine.’
Raven had been eating her sandwiches and cake quickly so that she could go out on Echo, and had pretended not to be listening. Skylurian and Raven ignored one another most of the time anyway. Laurel Wilde wrote about witches (and warlocks) who went to a magical school, but she didn’t believe they truly existed. She was half right because there really was no such thing as a warlock. But Laurel Wilde would have been very surprised to learn that both her daughter and her publisher were powerful witches, and, what’s more, that they had recently been on different sides in the same battle. Skylurian had never actually done anything bad to Raven, though. Indeed, she still occasionally tried to befriend her. It was all rather creepy.
‘Imagine, darling,’ Skylurian had gone on. ‘And a whole 7 percent of it will be yours.’
‘I thought we agreed on 7.5 percent,’ Laurel Wilde had said.
‘Whatever,’ breathed Skylurian dismissively. ‘It hardly matters. After all, what’s 0.5 percent of one billion?’
It was actually five million, but no one did the sum.
‘We will be rich beyond our wildest dreams, darling. And all because you were so clever and wrote such a beautiful book.’
Raven had never completely understood why her mother’s first book, The Chosen Ones, had done so well. It had sold over ten million copies worldwide, and been made into a film and a board-game. It was about magic, of course, but not the real magic that Raven did. In the normal world, the one Raven lived in, anyone could awaken their magical powers if they tried hard enough (or if, as in Raven’s case, someone had given them a precious boon from the Otherworld). But in Laurel Wilde’s books only a few people were magical.
The Chosen Ones, as they were called, were all born with a strange rash behind their left knee. If you’d been born with the rash, you had almost unlimited supernatural powers. If not, well, bad luck. You were one of the ‘Unchosen’: unpopular, ugly, often fat, and doomed to a life of having spells cast on you by the Chosen Ones, who were not just beautiful and powerful but quite smug, too.
In the real world, Raven’s world, magical power was limited. In Laurel Wilde’s books, anyone born with the rash behind their knee could do pretty much anything they wanted with simply a flick of their thin, white wrist (they were all white). Despite all the magical power at their disposal, the Chosen Ones actually spent much of their time having midnight feasts and worrying about their lost homework. If any of the Unchosen bothered them, they got turned into frogs.
The Chosen Ones was set a very long time ago when people wore frilly bonnets, went on steam trains to boarding school and spent their summer holidays being locked in the cabins of ships or kidnapped by gypsies. Raven had given up halfway through the first one, but most children had read all six in the series.
‘And you’re sure Albion Freake will buy it?’ Laurel had asked Skylurian that previous Saturday afternoon over tea.
‘Of course, darling. I have his word. If we can create a limited-edition single volume of The Chosen Ones, bound in calf leather with real gold leaf on the page edges, he will give us a billion pounds for it.’
‘But every other copy of the book in the world will have to be destroyed first?’ Laurel Wilde had looked a bit sad at the thought of that.
‘As already discussed, that is indeed what we mean by “limited-edition single volume”.’
‘But . . .’
‘Everyone’s read it, darling. Who needs to keep a copy of a book they’ve already read? And for 7 percent of a billion pounds . . .’
‘Or 7.5,’ said Laurel.
‘With 7 percent, you’ll be rich, darling, and that’s all that really matters.’
Echo snorted. His breath froze into tiny crystals in the mid-November air. Raven put all thoughts of her mother’s books out of her mind. Out here on the moor she felt free of all those unimportant worldly things. Out here she felt closer to nature. Closer to her true spirit. And closer to something she didn’t recognise or understand, but was definitely there.
Echo snorted again. ‘Is that it?’ he asked Raven, nodding to the left. ‘Your bog in the moonlight?’
And sure enough, up ahead, slightly to the left, was the shimmering mystery.
‘Give me the ring,’ said Dr Green again.
‘No,’ said Effie.
Feelings of courage, strength and daring were rippling through her. This always happened when she was wearing the ring, and now even sometimes when she wasn’t. She could feel power in her shoulders, down her back, through all the muscles of her legs. Effie was only eleven years old, but she would always fight for what she thought was right and true.
‘You are going to regret this, young lady,’ said Dr Green, who began to turn a shade of purple that looked quite wrong set against his brown suit and yellow shirt.
Effie took one step towards the door, but Dr Green took a step in the same direction, blocking her.
‘Don’t you dare defy me! I have never—’
‘Please let me pass,’ said Effie.
‘Give me the ring first.’
‘I thought you said you could make me give it to you,’ said Effie. ‘You obviously can’t. Now please would you get out of my way?’
‘I have never heard such utter rudeness,’ said Dr Green. ‘Unless you give me that ring right now, you are expelled from this class. Do you hear me? Expelled.’
‘Fine,’ said Effie. ‘Expel me. I don’t care. I don’t think you know anything worth learning anyway.’
‘You impudent little . . . I have never, in all my years of teaching this class – which I do for free, mind you, out of the goodness of my heart – heard such rudeness from a child. You, young lady, will be hearing more about this from the Guild of Craftspeople. Threatening a teacher. It won’t do. Never in all my years . . .’
‘But I didn’t threaten you. I—’
‘You are expelled. Didn’t you hear me? Now get out.’
3
The Old Town was quiet and cold. The frost was now calmly working its way around rooftops and the tops of chimneys.
The sundial in the small walled-garden of the Apothecary Museum was entirely draped in silver. The cobblestones were slippery under Effie’s feet as she walked down the hill towards the Writers’ Monument, which now looked as if it was wearing a white bed-cap. Into the black of the sky came the brief flicker of another small meteor. An owl hooted again, sending into the Cosmic Web news of the frost and the meteor and many other things besides.
Effie wondered what the Guild of Craftspeople would do to her. She remembered that they had once forbidden her grandfather from practising magic for five years. Five years! If that happened to Effie, she didn’t know what she’d do. She’d only recently epiphanised and found out she was a true hero. She didn’t want to lose her powers so soon afterwards. That would just be too unfair.
Not that she had ever done any real magic, of course. It came so easily to her friends Maximilian and Raven. But Effie’s skills seemed more annoyingly practical. She had once defeated a dragon, but had not used a single scrap of magic in so doing. Had being expelled meant she’d