Uncle Herman, Pipa, and Aunt Ninel.

“Oho-ho! And now I’m their favourite! Simply bursting with happiness if nothing else! ” Tanya exclaimed dejectedly.

It seemed, from surprise, she had uttered this too loudly. Coffinia began to turn in her sleep and, yawning, sat up on the bed.

“Hello, my dear! You’ve returned? Gunya and I were terribly worried when you fell! I can imagine what a misfortune it would be if the very dark did not win over the dark! You won’t object if I go back to sleep still? ” Coffinia again yawned and buried her cheek into the pillow.

“Oh no! Only don’t tell me that Coffinia is my best friend! One can go crazy! ” Tanya groaned.

This was the last drop. The bath of patience overfilled and flooded the neighbours. With a push of her foot Tanya indignantly kicked under the bed the case that was beginning to creak, jumped out of the room, and decisively made her way to the library.

“It’s necessary to understand eventually which one of us has gone crazy! Either I or all the rest of the world! Yagge said that everything began ten years ago. I’ll examine the magpaper files for the last eleven years! ” Tanya decided.

* * *

The genie Abdullah never slept and never ate. He was absolutely free from these harmful habits. But then Abdullah was suffering completely from a third, not less ruinous habit: day and night, during any free time he scribbled with a long feather from the tail of a harpy, continually dipping it into the poisonous saliva of the hellhound Cerberus.

The fundamental labour, on which the ancient genie expended all his senile energy, was entitled very simply and unassumingly — Poem of a Thousand Curses. This poem, as already deduced from its name, consisted of a thousand of the most fatal, the most murderous curses written in verse, which only the jesuitical imagination of the ancient genie could give birth to.

Getting stuck in the poetic quagmire comprised of names of ancient spirits and black magic reminiscences, Abdullah now and then was so carried away that he did not even notice what was taking place in front of his nose. The one who had the luck to come into the library at this hour could wander between the shelves as much as desired and even take books from the blocked access. Only it was not possible to carry them out: at the doors were the much too powerful identification spells. But then again, this blessed time came if and only if Abdullah was bitten by his scathing muse, which had a wasp sting in place of a tongue.

But, alas, this time Tanya was not lucky. The muse of the genie Abdullah had clearly zoomed somewhere else. The girl, using Fogus sneakus, had only carefully seeped through the closed door, when the zoomer began to crack.

A massive lamp under the ceiling flared up. At the same moment, appearing from who knows where, the genie Abdullah appeared before Tanya. On his plain face, woven as if from fog, appeared first a squinted eye, then a smiling mouth. The warts were completely absent — likely, the friendly little flock of them already had time to swim away under the turban.

“Night guests? ” He started to snigger, rubbing moist palms. “Perhaps you didn’t read the sign: Guarded by asps and basilisks? Pity I didn’t have time to let my little-ones out from the terrarium. Well, no matter, this is even better. I’ll immediately curse you with the most terrible curse! Glad to inform you that you’ll be the first on whom it’ll be placed. True, it’s necessary for you to suffer for about five minutes — my curse is very long! I’ll begin! By the way, I would advise you to enjoy its musicality, because afterwards you, naturally, will die... Here goes! ”

And Abdullah turned on the spot, muttering:

“ Erius findis kruntas trak demokritus areopag

Klio sferus gurtus shmyakus kamatozus psikhotapus.. ”.

“Hey-hey! Wait! ” Tanya shouted, but it was impossible to stop the obscure poet working in the rare genre of cemetery poem.

“ Shipus rhesus girkus rebus zhiromokrus eshbez-khlebus

Trenti-brenti syrotryakhus seven pelmenus from sobakus ”

Abdullah moaned with enthusiasm.

“What to do? Must escape somehow! But how? Run away? You can’t run away from a curse...” Tanya reflected anxiously.

For some reason it was not too scary for her: indeed the situation was too absurd — the cranky genie swinging his short arms, and the hundreds of shelves of books. It was not possible to believe that here her life could suddenly be cut short.

“ Sclerobus... Phew, not that... What is it? Aha! Scleroticus marasmoticus! ” She exclaimed, recalling one of Medusa’s lessons.

The ring of Theophilus Grotter spat out a green spark that slid into the genie’s ear. Abdullah broke off suddenly and started to rub his forehead. The poor library genie! As always, the length of his curses ruined him. Simply no one had enough patience to listen to them till the end.

“Eh-eh... Things aren’t going this way! Where did I stop? Gundobus stydobu from vonyuchkas bulonus? No? ” He asked again in dismay. “Wait, I’ll now run for the book, from which I got the quotation! By the way, you don’t happen to remember where it is? Ah, it seems, somewhere on the shelves! Let’s do this! You stay here and I’ll go find it and curse you then! Okay? Only, mind you, don’t go away anywhere! ”

The library genie shaped himself into a question mark and, giggling idiotically, flowed to the shelves. Tanya followed him with a thoughtful look. Taking into account that there were two hundred thousand books in the library and Abdullah clearly already did not remember where anything was, the search threatened to stretch to infinity. Moreover, the spell Scleroticus marasmoticus only progressed with time. In other words, in approximately an hour Abdullah would forget altogether whom he intended to curse.

Having found the pile of magpapers, Tanya began from the oldest file of eleven years ago. For a long time at first the magpapers were made flashy with foolish titles like Astrocactus the Paranoid and the Formula of Absolute Magic, or: Whose moustaches are longer? Usynya and Academician Sardanapal, or: Nagiana Pripyatskaya and Blue Beard — New Pair of Stars. Who will be unlucky this time?

Reckoning that not so long ago she saw and heard Nagiana Pripyatskaya on the zoomer, Tanya assumed that this time precisely Blue Beard was unlucky. Smiling involuntarily, she glanced at the title of the next magpaper, and — suddenly the letters began to jump before her eyes: Academician Sardanapal villainously kills Leopold Grotter and his wife Sophia. The baby will be brought to the sorceress Plague-del-Cake for education. ‘Leo Grotter was my best friend, ’ she confirms.

“This cannot be! What nonsense! ” Tanya muttered.

Having torn up the magpaper, she flung it away, but the following magpaper informed her: The world is saved from the villain Sardanapal! Plague-del-Cake has the Talisman of Four Elements.

The letters in the titles jumped maliciously like on the black tombstones. It seemed that the magpapers, which no one had turned to for a long time, had time to become bored without readers and now in a hurry blurted out all kinds of new filth:

White magicians undergo forced treatment from kindness virus.

New rules of dragonball: without balls and dragons.

Professor Stinktopp: ‘To defile a neighbour is ze foundation of an outstanding mood. To not defile a neighbour is to spend a day in fain! ’

The killer of the Grotters Academician Sardanapal is forever incarcerated in the basement of Tibidox.

The white department of Tibidox is closed. White magic is forbidden. The students of the magic schools set off for voluntary zombification.

At the numerous requests of the fans dragonball is renamed rottenball.

In the next magpaper Tanya saw a terrible animated photograph. A bony old woman in a raincoat, and in her arms a baby whom the old woman concealed in a double bass case. An inscription under the photo explained:

Plague-del-Cake tearfully returns the orphan Grotter to the moronoids for education. Indeed, if anyone, the Durnevs will be able to give the girl a fitting education.

After this, for a long time a lull was set in the magpapers. Only after nine years of filing she stumbled upon a boldfaced title: Tanya Grotter returns to Tibidox. A touching farewell with the relatives (in the photo: Tanya kisses H. and N. Durnev).

“Oh, no! And Pipa is also deeply affected! She’s giving me a box of candies as a present! But what’s this here? Mummy, shoot me so that I don’t suffer! ” Tanya groaned, examining the following magpaper: The daughter of Grotter enters the very dark department (in the photo: She-Who-Is-No-More and Slander Slanderych take the oath of the new student on the skull).

“What abomination! And where did they dig up this skull? However, better not ask, ” said Tanya.

Having looked over yet forty more magpapers, she discovered in the forty-first a small note: Tanya Grotter advances in dark magic (in the animated photo from left to right: Bab-Yagun, T.Grotter, C.Cryptova).

“Brr! ” Tanya shivered, “Coffinia and I hugged one another! What came over me? Perhaps I was overfed on rotten tomatoes? ”

Several months of magpapers kept silent, and then again began to flash with large-scale titles:

Plague-del-Cake: this girl is born for rottenball.

Victory in rottenball tournament. The griffins rest. Tatiana Grotter throws seven lumps of decaying meat into the skull of the darks.

T.Grotter turns down additional lessons on Worm Studies. ‘The sport loads are too great, ’ she says.

“Ugh, at least one piece of good news! ” Tanya muttered, returning the magpapers to their place.

She already understood that the magpapers, well packed with all kinds of nonsense and one-day sensations, did not intend to tell her the main thing: how did reality change. Moreover, it did not simply change but back over eleven years!

Why was the academician Sardanapal accused of the murder of her parents? Why did Plague, who took possession of the talisman, not kill her, not even take possession of her body, but made her the favourite student? Why did the white magicians surrender almost without a fight? And finally, if Plague got her wish and obtained the talisman, why did she not open the Sinister Gates and let out the spirits of chaos?

Senile giggling reached from behind the shelves.

“Interesting, what he’s doing there? ” Tanya thought and sneaked to the shelves. The genie Abdullah was sitting on the floor and with enthusiasm turning over moronic magazines for adolescents, cutting out with scissors photographs of winking half-dressed little witches. He clearly intended to put together a whole harem for himself.

On noticing Tanya, Abdullah looked at her fearfully and pressed the magazines against his chest.

“Leave or I’ll bite! I won’t give back my pictures! ” He yelled.

Tanya moved back, thinking that she had overdone it with the spell.

“Well okay! It’s still possible to cure Scleroticus marasmoticus, indeed something precisely you can’t say about the curses of Abdullah, ” calming herself, she decided and walked between the shelves.

Thousands of book rootlets hung from all sides and attempted to weigh their multiplicity down onto the child’s unsettled psyche. Some books were riveted to the shelves by chains. Others clumsily stirred and rustled. A third puffed up to improbable sizes in front of her eyes.

Something with a chirp jumped out near Tanya’s feet. It, jumping up highly and pushing off from the floor with worn pages, was a speeding slender booklet. On its cover appeared: Klavdia Yauznik and Count Fomanov. Theory of Snitching.

“No, this way I’ll simply find nothing. But what if we try something different? ” Tanya thought.

Standing still, the girl concentrated, shot out a spark from her ring and loudly stated:

“ Checkis trackis ransackis. If nothing else I want to understand something! ”

The green spark did not have time to go out when a rustle was heard. Towards Tanya rolled a lump of rumpled paper — a page pulled out from some book. On the outside the lump was covered with a thick layer of dust. Likely, it had been necessary for it to lie somewhere under the shelf for many years.

Turning the paper, Tanya perceived something solid inside. Onto her palm fell an ancient ring with a small seal. It seemed to the girl that she had seen it once already, but where exactly and on whom? The ring of Theophilus Grotter jealously muttered something unintelligible.

Tanya already wanted to throw the paper in which the ring was concealed, but by chance she glanced at it and recognized... her own handwriting.

More precisely, her hand only traced out some lines here. Other lines and the absent words were clearly written by someone else, possessing an old-fashioned handwriting with many curls.

Heaven trembles from tempestuous lightning —

Into the wall’s thickness miracles will not go hiding.

No one will trick the glass of gloom —

A faceless evil will show in doom.

The old stove is hotly ablaze —

And into the crack crawls the Leech in haste.

The villainous networks are set up so clever

Two firsts will collide — and the Rope will sever.

The curse of ancient graves will chance.

And Plague to the head of dark forces will advance.

Only he who will forget the pain will conquer …

And it was all that could be deciphered. The bottom edge of the page — now Tanya had understood by this time that this was the last page from the book of the vanished Hugo the Sly — was missing. Probably, at the last moment, already understanding that he could not slip away, Hugo hurriedly pulled out the sheet and, hiding his ring in it, with his magic teleported the deciphered prophecy under the shelf in the library. He was sure that sooner or later it would be found there.

“The spirit, the Leech, and the Rope. When the last event occurs, the ancient curse is freed. Not surprising that the world was turned upside down. I’m a friend of Pipa, a friend of Coffinia, and the favourite student of Plague-del-Cake... Simply insanity! ” Tanya thought.

She tried to remember the end of the prophecy, its most important line now torn away, but in her memory everything was already blurred. It seemed The Ancient One proposed to step somewhere, but where exactly? The only one who probably could still answer this question was Sardanapal, languishing in the basement of Tibidox. Here one also does not have faith after this prophetic hogwash of Professor Stinktopp!

The stained glass window of the library was flooded with the tender bloom of a suckling pig. It was dawn. Baby Grotter, as many likely called her here, considered that it was time to return to magic station. Hiding in her pocket the ring of Hugo the Sly and the sheet with the prophecy, she slipped out of the library.

The genie Abdullah was dying of happiness in the embrace of paper beauties and was filled with shrill laughter. The harem from magazines fearfully looked sideways at those shaking scissors in the senile hand.

The previous world serenely flew into the nether world...