Gabriel looked over then, interest lighting his expression. Newgrange was the site of the greatest thaumaturgic mineral deposit in all Ireland, and considering how magical in general the island was, that really was saying something. Elodie grinned up at him.A new trove,their mutual gaze said. (Also,God, I want to kiss you, but each translated this in the other as eye strain.)
A gasp sounded as Mumbers and Algernon arrived on the scene. Elodie could not discern which of them had gasped—Algernon with horror at the faint thaumaturgic smoke, or Mumbers in excitement.
“Ancient pagan designs!” the latter exclaimed. “I simply must get a picture!” He pulled a sketchbook from his jacket pocket and passed it to Algernon. “Will you draw me beside the rock? And Miss Tarrant, stand with me!”
“Mrs.Tarrant,” Gabriel growled, taking off his kit and pushing his sleeves up farther as if he were planning to challenge Mumbers to a boxing match.
“Actually, I don’t think these designs are ancient after all,” Elodie said, her excited grin fading as she ran a finger over the stone’s surface. “The indentations are sharp-edged, not weathered, which suggests they’re only recently made. Also, there’s no lichen on the rock.”
“Knob,” Professor Jackson said through a mouthful of bread and chicken. Everyone looked at him confusedly. “Devil’s Knob,” he clarified, waving his sandwich at the monolith. “It marks a doorway that Arawn takes out of Annwn on Nos Calan Gaeaf, according to the locals.”
“The Welsh king of the underworld!” Mumbers exclaimed, his eyes growing wide as if expecting Arawn to appear at any moment and claim his soul (which would be a jolly sensagger indeed!).
“Folklore often conveys local knowledge about thaumaturgic activity, and serves as a warning that people should stay away,” Gabriel grumbled, clearly wishing the three men would take that warning to heart.
“I doubt it’s a warning,” Professor Jackson argued, “considering Mr. Parry, the innkeeper, offered to bring me up here on a sightseeing tour, complete with a chance to see and pat one of Arawn’s supernatural hounds, all for the cost of one shilling.”
“There’s no sign of thaumaturgic material in the ground itself,” Elodie said as she bent over the hole from whence the monolith had toppled. “And this worm population appears healthy and normal. I’m guessing what happened is that the thaumaturgic energy we’re seeing here is an overspill from another source, and the rock has absorbed it. In fact, I think—oops!” She straightened hastily, batting at a strand of magic that sizzled in her hair.
“The thaumaturgic pressure is building,” Gabriel said, sounding like he was talking about the weather—although maybe not that, considering their profession, but some other, boring subject. He frowned at his thaumometer. “Overspill or not, this is powerful energy, and I don’t know that the granite will contain it for long. Judging from these readings, there could be a perforative eructation at any minute.”
“A perfor-what?” Mumbers asked warily.
“It’s about to go boom,” Elodie explained, fisting her hands then opening them to illustrate.
“We’re all going to die!” Algernon wailed.
“Nonsense,” Professor Jackson scoffed. “You’re perfectly safe, trust me.”
Crack!
A split opened in the monolith, blue sparks shooting from it. Everyone ducked.
“Aaahhhh!” Professor Jackson cried out, flinging up his sandwich as it spontaneously metamorphosed into a large white hen. The bird flapped frantically, squawking and pecking at hisface, then it fell to the ground and scurried off while the professor was swaying in shock at having had his carnivorism literally come back to bite him.
“Aaahhhh!” Algernon screamed, because he was Algernon.
“I say, jolly good fun!” Mumbers exclaimed, blood dripping from a cut on his forehead.
The air around the monolith began to glow with a pulsing silver radiance. Elodie and Gabriel stepped closer to it.
“The tip is blue,” Gabriel noted. “It’s going to discharge from there.”
Elodie grinned. “Would it be unladylike of me to point out the phallic imagery?”
“Yes.”
“Where’s it pointing?”
They squinted at the horizon. “Aberystwyth,” Gabriel said.
“Egad!” Professor Jackson exclaimed. “There are medieval books in the university library that will cause mayhem if magic hits them!”
Pivoting on a heel, Elodie gestured urgently at the others. “We have to turn it! Hurry, before it erupts!”
“It’s a whopping great rock,” Mumbers said with a laugh. “We’ll never be able to lift it.”
“The magic has eroded its relative density,” Professor Jackson said. “It’s as light as a feather.”
