La Vida Loca

The trio awoke early the next morning. Dedalera showed Viola where the well was. Viola filled an old tin bath with water and heated it magically so she could get clean, then did the same for Dedalera and Bert. The little girl had clearly been living alone and in horrible conditions for some time; she squealed with delight at the scented shampoo Viola let her use. After that, Viola heated a clean bath of water one more time and levitated it through to the cooking area so Bert could wash up last night's dishes and the pot that he'd used to cook the rabbit stew.

Finally, they could put it off no longer. It was time for Dedalera to teach Bert and Viola the spell.

After two hours of trying to get her tongue round the strange syllables, Viola sat back and rubbed her eyes vigorously. "It's no good, I'm never going to learn what all these little symbols mean, let alone how to read them out."

Bert was hit with inspiration. "Do you need to learn it?"

"Eh?"

"Well, you're not going to cast it, are you? It's just as easy if I memorise it and teach it to whoever needs to know it. We had a kid with dyslexia at St Jude's; Cass and I taught him everything by rote. When we go back, I'll teach it to whoever needs to cast it."

"Sounds good to me. Just make sure you get it right. If we turn Ethelina into a feathered serpent she'll probably eat us."

While Bert and Dedalera kept reciting the Mayan spell over and over again, Viola wandered around the ruined farmhouse. Every room was shabby, dirty - a sad echo of the beautiful place it had once been. Viola wanted to see Dedalera somewhere safe, with a family who loved her and looked after her. The child was clearly gifted and deserved a decent education.

As she had no interest in listening to Dedalera chuntering away in Mayan with Bert imitating, Viola decided to return to the village to stock up on local delicacies. She picked up her rucksack and Bert's purse of money and trotted off to Santa Maria de los Milagros.

There was only one shop in Santa Maria, and Viola was half-surprised that it stayed open. She doubted many of the inhabitants had much to buy or sell. The houses looked a bit ramshackle with age, and even the fountain in the main plaza seemed meagre, although the grumpy donkey of the preceding day was enjoying a drink from it. The village shop was dingy and not exactly welcoming from the outside.

Inside, however, everything was clean and smelled good, and the man behind the counter smiled nervously at Viola as she entered, but said nothing. Viola gave him a friendly grin and said, "I'd like a bag of rice, four onions, some tomatoes, some garlic, some smoked paprika and a couple of chorizo." The man clearly spoke English and understood her. Hooray for all the other British idiots who've come here without speaking Spanish, thought Viola.

As is the custom in Spain, the man bustled around fetching the things Viola had ordered, putting them all into the rucksack. The chorizos were plump and dark red with orange fat, and Viola's mouth watered at the prospect of eating them later. "Are you new to the area?" the man asked, having taken a careful look around first.

"I'm only visiting," Viola explained as she paid, adding, "I'm staying at the Cortes house."

The man shook his head. "I heard there were strangers here. Everyone said people would come, even if we tried to make them stay away, after what went on with the last English visitors. It's a shame what happened to that family. That poor little girl, all alone..." He put a box of biscuits into the rucksack. "Give these to her, she's a sweet child."

Viola was intrigued. She did talk a lot - but she was a professional journalist, and also knew exactly when to listen. "Dedalera appears to believe that people here are responsible for her parents' deaths."

"No... not exactly. Perhaps we could have stopped it, though. Our cowardice may harm us in the end. Don Hernandez says we must keep the child here, and put her somewhere safe, but no one can catch her."

"Why does the village need the Cortes family?"

The man shook his head. "I have said too much. But look after the child while you're here - and leave her here when you go, for all our sakes."

Viola walked back towards the house, musing on what she'd been told. There was more going on here than met the eye. This was going to be just the sort of holiday she liked.

A Don, Viola knew, was someone pretty influential. Wizards didn't tend to bother with things like titles, even if some purebloods were as obsessed with heredity as a medieval king, so she wasn't sure how important a Don would be. Nonetheless, she guessed that he'd have a big house, and that would be somewhere to start looking. Santa Maria de los Milagros was a small village, and the Hernandez family, while once rich, probably lost most of their land to Muggles years ago if it was outside the area protected by the spell.

Set a short way back from the rest of the village, but still within the parish boundary, was a large and beautiful cortijo. It was less scruffy than most buildings, and was surrounded by olive, almond and citrus trees. Viola saw it from the track to the Cortes farmhouse. On a whim, she left her rucksack beside the road and darted down towards the other farm.

The citrus trees smelled lovely. The ripening fruit were mostly oranges, with some lemons and even a couple of grapefruit. A dark-haired and deeply tanned young man was among them, examining the soil.

Well, ho-la, thought Viola. There may be a distinct lack of beach on this trip to Spain, but this place has its compensations. I wouldn't mind a gardener like that in my flat - I'd even buy a window box for him to work on. She waved at him, and he scowled at her and said something in Spanish.

"Hola!" she said cheerily, walking over to him. "Erm... soy Viola."

Another intense scowl and stream of Spanish followed, and then he waved his wand threateningly at her.

"I say," Viola said, "Is that made of olive wood? It's beautiful. We don't have that in my country - see this, yew and dragon heartstring, very flexible and tough as old boots." She presented her own wand to him, pointing it away from both of them so as not to scare him. She knew he probably didn't understand what she was saying, but thought it best to sound friendly. Viola pointed towards the house. "Don Hernandez?"

"Si," the gardener said. Another stream of invective followed, then he gave up and stamped back towards the farm. Viola trotted after him, pretending not to understand when he tried to shoo her away. The shooing motion was pretty much universal, and anyone from any part of the world would guess what it meant, but she ignored it. She decided that, as good looking as the Spanish wizard was, he was far too grumpy. She much preferred Bert's open smile. In fact, she liked an awful lot of things about Bert...

Viola was amazed when they reached the house. A wide entryway opened onto a gorgeous courtyard with a tiled fountain at its centre. Water tinkled gently, and the scent of jasmine filled the air. As the gardener turned and shouted at Viola one last time, a frail voice piped up. Columns surrounded the courtyard, and the first floor of the house was slightly larger than the ground floor, so the overhang provided shady areas around the patio. There, in the shade, was a pretty woman about the same age as Viola. Even from a distance Viola could tell the woman was desperately ill. This was no place for her to intrude - in her professional career Viola had sought the truth to help people, not pried to hurt them. She turned and left.

***

Bert and Dedalera had given up studying by the time Viola returned to the farmhouse, and were instead discussing plants and herbs. Viola tutted at the pair of them. "I dunno, I leave you two for a morning and you're slacking off already."

"She says we're lazy," Bert told Dedalera. "Even though she's the one who's been shopping." Dedalera giggled. She liked these funny foreigners. "How on earth did you cope with the shopping?" he asked Viola.

"The shopkeeper speaks English. I guess there must've been a few expat witches and wizards visiting the town over the years... he said something strange, though. He hinted that something bad had happened to the last English visitors. Ask Dedalera if she knows what happened to them."

When Bert quizzed her, Dedalera shrugged. "There used to be many, years ago. Some came to visit just before my parents died. That was when my father tried to leave. Everyone died. Everyone except me, and I ran away."

Bert recognised the expression in her face; he'd seen it on those of the youngest pupils at his school, and in the mirror once upon a time. It was the face of a child who had seen too much. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to upset you," Bert said, patting her shoulder awkwardly.

"Papa said we had to leave, or people would die. Then they killed us anyway."

Bert translated for Viola, who looked sorrowful. She reached into her rucksack and picked out the biscuits and tossed them to the little girl, who eagerly opened the box. "You know," Viola said, "I'm not sure that we've got the story straight here."

"What do you mean?" Bert asked, watching Dedalera devour the biscuits. "For some reason - probably for that codex - someone or a group of someones in this town wiped out an entire family. It's obvious."

"So far, we've met a bar-owner who was terrified when two foreigners tried to ask about Dedalera's father, and I've met a shopkeeper who was genuinely upset about what happened to them and blamed their deaths on cowardice, not actual malice. There's a Don who insists the villagers keep Dedalera safe. We only have Dedalera's word that the villagers killed her family."

"Why would she lie?"

"She might not be lying. She might be telling the truth as far as she knows it. However, try looking at it like this: strangers come, Dedalera's family die, and Santa Maria de los Milagros, never open to Muggles, now shuts itself off from foreign wizards. These people aren't bad, Bert, they're scared. I don't believe they're killers."

"Perhaps the other British visitors were trying to tempt the family away. Perhaps they knew why the villagers would die if Dedalera's family stayed, but the villagers didn't, and they killed the family rather than see them leave."

"Or perhaps the strangers would have hurt the villagers to make her father do something. My gut tells me the villagers aren't trouble, trouble came for them."

"If you say so. You've got time to nose around, anyway. That spell is a git; it's going to take a long time for me to memorise it. Dedalera also keeps saying something odd, that the spell is in the blood and the blood is the spell."

"Hmm." Viola looked thoughtful. "Oi, Dedalera, out of there!" She batted Dedalera's hands away from the rucksack. "Bert, you'd better get on with lunch before she eats everything raw. Oh, and does Dedalera have an owl?"

Dedalera had tamed a little owl, so Bert and Dedalera went to prepare lunch while Viola wrote a letter. "You should marry her," Dedalera told him. Bert jumped and slipped and, for the first time in years, cut his finger instead of an onion.

"I think you have to be in love for that," Bert told her, wrapping a sticking plaster from his rucksack around his finger.

"She's never far from you," Dedalera said simply.

"That's because she can't speak to anyone else. And, believe me, she talks far too much."

"I could stay with you if you were married," Dedalera said longingly.

Bert put down his knife and squatted down to look her in the eyes. "We'll find someone to look after you, I promise. It just won't be us."

The little girl trotted off, and Bert felt sorry for her. He and Viola had entered her life, and given her things she'd probably forgotten she'd ever enjoyed: food she hadn't had to scavenge; conversation; new clothes. He still didn't have a clue what they'd do about her when it was time to leave.

Dedalera returned. "Hold out your hand," she ordered. Bert did, and she dropped a strange ring into it. It was made of gold, with flat jade beads all the way around. "When you marry her, give her this." She then turned her back on Bert and walked away. Sighing, he put it into his pocket, resolving to hide it somewhere in the house later on. He'd tell Dedalera where to find it when they had left.

*****

Despite having told Dedalera that Viola talked far too much, Bert quite enjoyed their evening chats after the little girl had gone to bed. He could never talk to Muggle girls about his family - not in any depth - and witches didn't usually understand what it was to be a squib. Viola just took his inability to do magic for granted, a rare thing in a witch. He supposed it was part of what made her good at her job. She took people as they were and listened to their stories.

"Who did you owl today?" he asked.

"My dad. I want him to come over... I saw a sick woman today, and I want to make sure she has good medical treatment."

"The villagers don't like strangers. She'll probably send him away again."

"People are much more willing to tolerate things they don't like if it'll save their lives," Viola said bluntly. "Once one person's benefited from contact with the wider wizarding world, they'll all be more friendly." Bert wasn't so sure about that; sometimes people still preferred what they were familiar with.

"Oh, Dedalera's given me a present for you. Hold out your hand." Bert dropped the gold and jade ring into Viola's palm. "She's too poor to go giving away things like this. You can just leave it behind, I thought we could hide it in one of the disused rooms."

Viola turned the ring over, looking at the way the jade beads reflected the moonlight. "Oh, that's lovely. Why didn't she give it to me herself?"

"I don't know." Bert turned to look into the dark to avoid blushing. He had no intention of getting into a relationship with Viola, so he might as well show her the ring now. "It's one of her Mayan things, I think."

"I'll just try it on to see how it looks... It won't come off!" Viola had put the ring on, and it stuck tight to her finger. Bert took her hand and tried to pull it off. "Ow! Let go. I would like to have a finger at the end of this!"

Viola tugged at it, tried an expanding Charm on it, and even had a go at Transfiguring it into an earthworm, all to no avail. The ring was extremely resistant to magic. "Bloody thing! Bert, do something - I can't take this from that little girl."

Bert ran into the house and nudged Dedalera awake. "That ring's stuck on Viola's finger," he told her. "Is there a spell to get it off?"

Dedalera smiled sleepily. "You gave it to her. It won't come off until she doesn't love you any more. That's the whole point of it. It tells you she loves you."

He returned to Viola, who was staring out at the stars. "What did she say?" Viola asked.

"Um... it's kind of tricky. It'll come off when you next fall in love with someone." She can't love me, Bert thought. She's a pureblood witch. I'm just a squib. I can't even manage a Muggle illusion, let alone real magic. The ring is probably reacting to some physical attraction. It'd fall off for the next handsome wizard who came along.

"Weird people, the Mayans," Viola mused. "Although I can never remember which bits were them and which were the Aztecs and who it was who had that temple where you can clap your hands and hear the eagle sound. But they were good with gold."

Bert glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. When she stopped talking for five minutes so he could get a word in, Viola Beanacre made very pleasant company. In fact, he was even starting to miss her chatter when she wasn't around. He wasn't entirely unhappy that the ring was stuck on her hand, even though he was sure it was temporary. "They were good with gold," he reflected.