Midsomer shouted, “Laura, what will you be at?”
“She is growing,” said Zacharias, as the wind howled, and thunder cracked the heavens open. It began to rain, big fat drops falling out of a darkening sky.
“I think she has lost her temper,” said Prunella composedly: her aura was keeping her dry.
•••
FORa brief period after Mrs. Midsomer vanished, there was nothing to be seen amid the surging steel-grey waves. Rollo hauled himself onto the rocky end of the Cobb, and thrust his head over the wall, seeming to have something of great importance to communicate.
“I say—” he said, but he was not permitted to finish his sentence.
Mrs. Midsomer burst out of the waters behind him and rose into the skies, growing with inconceivable rapidity.
Her bulk seemed to fill the world, blocking out the horizon and casting a shadow over the magicians huddled on the wall. The enchantment appeared to encompass everything upon her person, for as she grew, so did the fronds of seaweed draped over her, and the pretty amber pendant on her breast expanded till it was itself the height and breadth of a grown man.
“Midsomer!” roared Lord Burrow. “Look to your wife!”
“He can hardly miss her,” remarked Prunella.
“Think of our fishing—our ships—they will be overturned if her antics are not stopped,” said Lord Burrow. “Exert your influence, man. Govern your wife!”
“If you think, sir, that is within my power to restrain Laura,” said Midsomer wearily, “then all I can say is, you must not have been attending.”
“Murderer!” howled Mrs. Midsomer. She drew from the amassed storm clouds a bolt of lighting and flung it at Zacharias. It split the air with an almighty crack, and would have smashed the wall had Zacharias not fended it off with a spell. The bolt went into the sea, and steam rose from the bubbling waves.
“This is outrageous!” said Prunella. “The creature ought to know when she is beaten.”
She leapt nimbly off the Cobb before anyone could stop her, and was borne up by a white horse—a steed shaped from the froth on the waves and animated by magic.
“Hup hup!” cried Prunella, driving her heels into the creature’s flanks, and off they went, cantering over the heaving seas, while Prunella shouted impertinences at Mrs. Midsomer.
“Damerell, pray persuade her to return,” gasped Zacharias. Staving off Mrs. Midsomer’s hexes required all of his attention. They were wicked spells, fiendishly complex and prickly with malice, stinging his hands as he disenvenomed them.
“Miss Gentleman will do very well,” said Damerell, scarcelysparing a glance for the small figure vanishing into the grey murk of sky and sea. “You, however, want aid. Watch your head, there!”
Zacharias escaped being exploded only by Damerell’s intervention. The chantment ricocheted off Damerell’s counter-spell and detonated a pile of rocks at the end of the Cobb, where Rollo sat with his shoulders up around his ears. He jumped, and bawled out:
“Poggs!”
“Rollo, cannot you see that we are busy?” said Damerell. “If you wish to make yourself useful, you might go and find Miss Gentleman, and shield her from the attacks of that sea-woman.”
“But that is what I have been trying to say, only no one would attend,” said Rollo, injured. “She ain’t a sea-woman. She’s Lorelei, my own third cousin twice removed.”
“You don’t mean to say you are related to the wretched creature?” said Damerell.
“Known her since I was out of the egg!” said Rollo. “Lorrie had a frightful temper even then. She ate one of my brothers on a rampage, and he was a mere dragonet, not more than a week old. He had broken her favourite doll, but I don’t call that a meet response, do you? Still, that is Lorrie all over! My aunt gave her a right set-down over it. Aunt Georgiana was the only creature Lorrie would ever listen to.
“I had forgotten she was engaged to Leofric,” he added musingly. “I could never account for his liking her, though she is my own cousin. Do you know, the most astonishing thing is, ’twas she who cried off! He only came to the mortal world after, but I don’t believe the two things were connected, for it is my belief he intended to leave Fairy all along. He was always a great one for insects, and we haven’t many in Fairyland—they have a dashed peculiar habit of growing minds, and turning into fairies.”
Damerell said dangerously, “Rollo, you may not have observed that Zacharias is striving to contain a fireball, and I am in imminent danger of having my best pair of top-boots ruined by a hex. We are notat leisure to discuss your family’s eccentricities. If you are so well acquainted with the lady, however, may I suggest that you ask her to desist? She might take it better from her cousin than from any of us.”
“She never liked me above half,” said Rollo, unconvinced. “The only reason I was not ate was because I was too old and tough, for I am sure I broke half a dozen of her dolls.”
Still, he spread his wings and flapped up towards the upper air where Mrs. Midsomer’s head was shrouded by mist and rain. His uncertain voice could be heard through the clamour of the storm:
“Lorrie? I say, Lorrie!”
“Rollo Threlfall?” boomed Mrs. Midsomer, in a voice mingling the crash of the waves and the howl of the wind. “What business have you here?”
