The Frost Fair Affair by Tansy Rayner Roberts

Author:Tansy Rayner Roberts [Roberts, Tansy Rayner]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780648763987
Publisher: Tansy Rayner Roberts

Every second counts.

Mneme stood frozen for a whole second after Thornbury fell through the ice. And then she reacted.

Mr Zephyr would have been proud of her. She wasn’t thinking at all. She let her magic do the panicking.

She exploded.

The tent went flying up above her, slashed to ribbons. Lights and sound flared from her fingers. Around her, she saw a whirl of unexpected transformations spiral outwards. The glassblower’s animals came to life and danced in a parade before her eyes: pot-bellied pigs, and kittens, and hedgehogs. Of course, there were hedgehogs.

“HELP!” she screamed. Her magic bled into the sound, amplified it.

Help came running in the form of watchmen and stallholders. Mneme didn’t need to say anything — the yawning pit of broken ice spoke for itself.

“Icebreak!” hollered some. Others dropped back to steer worried patrons away from the danger area.

“How many down there?” the nearest watchmen yelled.

“One man,” Mneme gasped. “No, two.” The thought of rescuers dredging up whomever was dead under the printing press and leaving Thornbury down there was beyond the pale.

They had a practiced routine for these situations — and they all knew the rules. Magic users came forward quickly, joining hands and sending light probes into the deep water, flickering darts. Others gathered blankets at the ready.

“Flipping printing press,” one of them muttered. “Should be banned. Might as well bring on the blinking elephants.”

A woman from the cider stall drew Mneme aside, and wrapped an extra coat around her shoulders. Mneme realised that she was shaking, her teeth chattering wildly. She tried to raise a charm to warm her hands, and came up empty — she had poured every scrap of magic into her warning cry. It would take time to recover her energy. No wonder she felt like falling asleep on her feet.

“They’re good at this,” the cider-wife assured her. “Is he magic, your man?”

Is he magic? Mneme wanted to laugh. Wanted to explain to the woman about that last tendril of a charm Thornbury had thrown at her, securing her against the tent wall even as he fell.

“He is,” she managed.

“He’s got the best possible chance, then.”

It felt like hours passed, though it was only a few minutes before the crumpled figure of Mr Thornbury, dripping and limp, was hoisted up out of the hole in the ice.

“Savage break,” muttered one of the helpers. “Lucky it was contained.”

The last threads of Thornbury’s self-protection spell snapped as his feet hit solid ice. Mneme stumbled to him, but the efficient volunteers were a wall between them. She had to let them help — they had warming charms at their disposal, while she had nothing but exhausted panic and cold hands.

“Not too much,” the cider-wife called out. “Easy there, Eamonn. Gotta thaw him slow, or he’ll end up with charcoal for skin. Get them to the Pickled Pear,” she added to the volunteers who had come forward with a sledge. “I’ll see them right.”

“Everyone’s so kind,” Mneme whispered, her cheeks stinging as she helped a shuddering Thornbury into the sledge and tucked blankets around him.

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