Shamanka.

Jeanne Willis.

For Sylvie Jane Wilc.o.c.k, because she's magical.

With thanks to Cher Adeyinka, who knows a trick or two.

THE MAGICIAN'S OATH.

As a magician, I promise never to reveal the secret of any illusion to a non-magician without first swearing them to the Magician's Oath. I promise never to perform any illusion for any non-magician without first practising the effect until I can perform it well enough to maintain the illusion of magic.

Signed________________________________.

WE MEET AT LAST.

You might think you are alone, but I can see you. You can't see me because I'm in disguise, but one day you will see me. You might even see straight through me. After all, you have spectacular hidden powers.

You do realize you have hidden powers, don't you? We all have them, but most people are too lazy or too stupid to use them. Not you though; you have great potential.

Shortly, you will no longer be where you are now. There's no need to get up. You don't have to move a muscle. I will simply wave my wand and shift the scenery around ... like so!

You are sitting in the front row of a grand old theatre. I've given you the best seat so you won't miss a trick. There will be many tricks because this is a magic show, and I have volunteered you for the main act. While this may come as a shock, please remain calm. Do not attempt to leave during the interval. If you do, you will miss out on a whole lot more than the ice cream lady.

There are people around you rustling and fidgeting, waiting for the show to begin. They want to be surprised and fooled by magic. They're weary of this world and its harsh rules. They yearn to be taken to a place where the impossible happens; where elephants hide under teacups and ladies smile when they're sawn in half. Oh, to be able to forget about sorrow and suffering and rise above gravity! Or to become invisible. Or to produce anything you desire out of thin air. How happy we would be.

Hush! The lights are dimming. There is a roll of drums. As the curtain begins to rise, the chattering stops. Children with their own hopes and dreams merge into one child in the darkness, eyes drawn to the centre of the stage by the hypnotic spotlight; you are no longer aware of your surroundings or yourself.

There's a thunder crack! A puff of scarlet smoke! You are mesmerized as it uncurls like a phantom serpent. As the smoke clears, a strange figure in a mask emerges from an impossibly small cauldron; how did the Masked Magician ever fit inside it?

There's no time to puzzle it out or you will miss what happens next. The magician produces a rope out of nowhere and throws it into the air. Somehow, this rope which you know to be bendy stands upright and hovers with no visible anchor.

The Masked Magician whistles into the wings. A monkey disguised as a boy (or could it be a boy disguised as a monkey?) bounds across the stage and climbs to the top of the rope. You wonder how it's possible for him to do this without the rope collapsing; can the laws of nature really be broken?

The Masked Magician instructs the creature to come down at once. It refuses.

It climbs higher and higher, then vanishes ... just like that! Perhaps you blinked at the wrong moment. You thought your eyes were open, but you blinked.

Again, the magician asks the invisible monkey to come back down. It just cackles and hurls tomatoes, which splatter on the stage. It must be up there still, this monkeyboy; tomatoes don't just fall from theatre roofs.

The Masked Magician pulls out a cutla.s.s, climbs the rope and slashes wildly with the flashing blade. There are curdling screams as a shower of severed limbs thump into the cauldron below.

A little girl is bundled out of the theatre by her mother; this is not suitable entertainment for children. Where are the rabbits? The top hats? The pretty silks?

But you are not afraid; you're fascinated. You're watching to see how the illusion is done. You're certain it's an illusion and you hold your eyelids open with your thumb and finger so that you won't blink. The Masked Magician climbs back down the rope to a cacophony of hisses and boos; the audience is outraged by the barbaric slaughter of the small a.s.sistant.

The magician shows no remorse and, with a wand, stirs the limbs in the cauldron adding squashed tomatoes all the while. Is the poor creature to be cooked?

Watch carefully and you will see a foot begin to twitch, then an arm, then a hand, then out leaps the monkey, alive and well! The whole theatre sighs with relief. There is laughter, applause, disbelief...

"How? How? How?"

The magician floats to the front of the stage, stops right in front of you and bows deeply. Two glittering eyes stare into yours, boring through the slits in the mask. A shiver plays along your spine. You have been singled out for attention and, while you feel uneasy, isn't it exciting?

Here is the truth: the whole show has been put on just for you. Now the Masked Magician beckons with a long, gloved finger. You rise from your seat and walk onto the stage as if in a trance.

We meet at last! I am the Masked Magician, allow me to shake your hand. Your palm is sweating. It leaves an imprint on my glove. Don't be nervous, I'm happy to answer your questions. Who am I? What do I want from you?

All will be revealed. But only if you join me on a quest which will take you to the four corners of the Earth. This journey has only ever been attempted once by a child, but she was wiser and braver than any adult that ever lived at least she was until you came along.

Her name was Sam Khaan and she learnt the truth about magic the hard way. This is your chance to take the easy route. Shortly, you will re-trace her footsteps. I will be with you throughout the journey, disguised as a camel or a cloud or a cat, depending on circ.u.mstances. In case you lose sight of me in my ever-changing guises, here are my travel tips observe them or be d.a.m.ned.

1. As you travel through these unchartered pages, keep your mind open but your mouth closed. This will keep the sand out and the secrets in.

2. Lay your soul bare, but wear a big hat in the hot sun or your brain will bake.

3. Watch out for anacondas and anagrams. Remember: An anaconda is the name of a snake that twists itself around you. An anagram is a name that twists around itself, like a snake.

Now you know what's afoot, you can either put this book down like a coward and forget I exist, or you can turn the page and we will set off around the globe. I hope you will join me because you really are wonderful company and a lot more fun than your friends.

First you must relax. Loosen your clothing and let your shoulders drop. Let the rest of the world and all its sounds and distractions fade into the background. Concentrate on my voice, the voice of the Masked Magician. Breathe slowly and deeply. In ... and out. In ... and out. Drifting away ... drifting ... drifting.

On the count of three, I will take you back in time to when Sam Khaan was almost thirteen and living in abject misery with her mad, bad, sad Aunt Candy in London. Here we go.

One ... two ... three.

HOW TO PUSH A CUP THROUGH A TABLE.

The masked magician places a coin on the table, lifts up a cup and brings it down hard over the coin. The cup goes right through the table and drops from underneath it.

THE SECRET.

You need: a plastic cup, a paper napkin, a coin, a table 1. Sit at the table with your audience facing you.

2. Place the cup over the coin and wrap the cup in the napkin.

3. Lift the cup and tell the audience to concentrate on the coin.

4. Secretly drop the cup onto your lap, still holding the napkin, which should be in the shape of the cup. This is known as an "ashra" device the audience thinks the cup's still inside it.

5. Place the napkin "cup" back on the table, grab the audience's attention and smash your hand down on it.

6. Drop the real cup from your lap.

7. Show the audience there is no hole in the table and the coin is still there!

MAD BAD, SAD AUNT CANDY.

We have travelled back in time to 1985. We're in London, looking through the back window of a top floor flat in a crumbling house in St Peter's Square. We can't see through the front windows; they're boarded up. The panes were smashed in a fit of rage and they were never replaced. You'd think the flat was unoccupied if you looked up at it from the street but it's not.

There is a dreadful commotion going on. The neighbours can't hear it, because there are no neighbours. A woman is screeching at Sam. The voice you can hear is Aunt Candy's but I'm afraid it's a little slurred.

"You've been practising your dirty magic tricks behind my back all along haven't you, Spam? Remove that hat! If there's a rabbit under it, I swear I'll skin you both alive!"

Aunt Candy hates magic but she loves gin. She's been drinking it for breakfast. She gets drunk because she's unhappy, but the drink doesn't make her forget; it makes her remember, and then she hates Sam even more.

Why does Aunt Candy hate her? Sam has no idea. She is a good child, grateful for a roof over her head (even if it does leak). She lives with her aunt because she has no mother and her father has disappeared to the ends of the earth or so she's been told.

Aunt Candy is demanding to know why Sam is dressed in that ludicrous ringmaster's hat, that nasty velvet cloak and that ridiculous silver leotard. The leotard is baggy, partly because it belongs to Aunt Candy and partly because Sam is so thin; she has to survive on sc.r.a.ps. If she were properly fed, she might be pretty, but Aunt Candy couldn't stand that. She's already jealous of Sam's green eyes and her blueblack hair, which has a tantalizing streak of natural blonde.

She knocks Sam's hat off with her umbrella and pokes her in the ribs.

"I hate you, hate you! Did I say you could borrow my stage clothes, Spam? Take them off before I hurl. They remind me of my stupid, wanton sister."

Sam leaps to her mother's defence.

"Why must you say such wicked things about her?"

Aunt Candy has good reason to hate Sam's mother, Christa, but she won't tell her why. She staggers into the front room, wrestles the cap off the gin and dabs some behind her ears like perfume, as if to remind herself she was glamorous once. She takes a long swig. It sounds like bath water gurgling down a plughole.

"Your mother never wanted you!" she snorts. "You were an accident, Spam. When you were born, she took one look at you and died of shame. Your own father left the country! Face it, daaahling. You're not very popular, are you?" She has told Sam many stories about her parents, none of which are the same.

"But the last time I asked, you said my father went abroad because he was an intrepid explorer. Why won't you tell me the truth, Aunt Candy?"

Aunt Candy sprawls around on the sofa.

"I was trying to spare your pain," she sneers. "But if you want the truth, you can have it. Your father wasn't an intrepid explorer, he was a womanizer. A trickster! A back street bungler, and his name was wait for it, because it's quite hilarious his name was Bingo Hall!" She laughs until she coughs. "And here's the crunch! Your mother went looking for him in the jungle and was eaten by a crocodile snap, snap! That's why we never visit her grave, may she rest in pieces!"

"You're making it up!" cries Sam.

"Oh, there, there. All right, she wasn't eaten by a cwocodile. She went to Wonga Wagga and married a cannibal so you have lots of lickle cannibal brothers and sisters."

"Aunt Candy, you're lying."

"There's no fooling you, Spam, is there?"

Aunt Candy has rolled onto her stomach so her head is hanging off the sofa. Her legs are doubled up behind her at such a spine-snapping angle, she's actually folded herself in half. The gin bottle is held between her toes and she is tipping alcohol into her mouth with her feet. The reason she can a.s.sume this grotesque position is because she used to be a contortionist, performing under the dubious t.i.tle of Candy, The Human Cobra. Sam shakes her head in despair.

"You know what, Aunt Candy? I don't care if my brothers and sisters are cannibals. If only you'd invite them to stay, at least I'd have someone to play with."

"Well, ha, ha. They're not coming. Your darling mummy didn't marry a cannibal. Auntie made it all up. Seriously and this is the truth your daddy murdered her and she came back as a zombie to haunt him!"

Aunt Candy slides off the sofa. Her blonde, nicotine-stained wig has slipped sideways. Her scarlet lipstick is smeared into a lopsided gash. She lurches towards Sam, eyes rolling, hands outstretched as if she is about to strangle her.

Just then, a ginger ape leaps out from behind the sofa, bares its teeth at Aunt Candy and s.n.a.t.c.hes off her wig. This is Lola, Sam's pet orang-utan. If it wasn't for Lola, Sam would have died long ago. Aunt Candy clutches her head and screams.

"Get that flea-ridden beast away from me! I'll have it destroyed!"

"Lola doesn't have fleas, Aunt Candy. The only time she ever had fleas was after she borrowed your hairbrush, remember?"

Sam's voice is low and calm, which annoys her aunt even more. Her face turns purple. She tries to rearrange her few remaining wisps of real hair in the mirror, shrieks at her bald patch, then blunders back into the kitchen and jams a tea cosy over her head. Now she threatens Sam with a teapot.

"How dare you encourage that monkey to mock me!" she splutters. "I've put up with you for all these years and what thanks do I get? Rudeness and tricks! I never wanted you here!"

"So you keep telling me, Auntie. In which case, why did you take me in?"

Sam steps backwards to avoid being jabbed with the spout of the teapot. She's asked Aunt Candy this question many times before but has never had a satisfactory answer.

"Your only friend, the orange monkey, turned up with you on my doorstep like rubbish blown in from the street," she snaps. "Could I shoo her away? No! She barged past me and put you to bed in my knicker drawer. She wouldn't even let me throw you out of the window. I've been stuck with you ever since."

Sam folds her arms defiantly.

"Lola isn't a monkey and she isn't smelly. She's an ape and she's been a better mother to me than you ever have."

This much is true. Aunt Candy showed no interest in caring for Sam when she was a baby. She worked in a night club and any money that she earned went on clothes and beauty treatments, in the hope that one day the man she loved would come back and marry her; but he never did. Meanwhile, Baby Sam had to sleep in the knicker drawer. Aunt Candy gave her no cot, no comfort and no love. I think she had none left to give.

Luckily, Lola was very maternal. She loved Sam as if she were her own baby. She fed her with a bottle, combed her silky, dark hair and knew just where to rub if she had wind. She bathed her in a washing-up bowl and carefully powdered her. She put her to bed in the knicker drawer and if she cried, she would rock her in her long, strong arms until she fell asleep. She never left Sam's side she daren't, for fear that Aunt Candy would kill her.

Sam hardly ever cried. She was too young to realize how much she had to cry for; but on the odd occasion when she did, Lola would amuse her with magic tricks she'd learnt from her previous owner. His name will become familiar to you soon.

For now, it's enough to know that Lola could make a pebble appear from nowhere, then puff! she would make it disappear, and little Sam would gurgle with delight. Lola could make a white daisy turn into a pink one, and once she turned a frog into a raspberry bun. It was a good illusion. Lola was so silent and dextrous, the lady on the bench next to theirs (to whom the bun belonged) never saw her take it.