Read Online Rough Magic by Caryl Cude Mullin - Free Book Online Page A

thing, Caliban? And after my father brewed this potion for you, too!”
    â€œTo heal me from the pain he gave me!” Caliban yelled.
    Miranda flushed red. “You made us ill, Caliban. You might have killed us!” Her eyes opened wide with horror at the thought.
    â€œIf I wanted you dead, you’d be dead,” he snarled. “I just wanted to teach both of you a lesson.”
    â€œTeach us a lesson; I like that!” Her cheeks flamed redder. “What lesson could you possibly teach us, Caliban? You’re a brute. That’s what father says, and he’s right!” She snatched up the cup and turned on her heel.
    Searing white rage flooded him. He leapt forward and grabbed her arms, flinging her back around to face him. She stared up at him, outraged and terrified.
    It was the mermaid who had put the thought in his head, he told himself afterward. And that was true, though it was no excuse. Prospero came over the ridge to find him pushing Miranda to the ground, covering her with his own weight. A bolt of sizzling magic struck him, and he lost consciousness.
    When Caliban woke he found himself bound to a rock by chains.

II.v.
    Caliban stood on the forward deck of the ship, staring at the smudge of land in the distance. The day had only just broken, turning the sky pearl gray and sending the stars to sleep. It was quiet, the few sailors going about their tasks with silent ease. No one stared at him, or teased him.
    They had been at sea for a week. So little time had passed since Prospero had raised a storm and snared a ship with his magic. And not just any ship. It was carrying Antonio, Prospero’s usurping brother who had stolen the wizard’s dukedom and cast him adrift at sea with Miranda. The King of Naples and his heir, Ferdinand, were also aboard. These noble men were accompanied by jester named Trinculo and Stephano, a foul, drunken butler. Caliban blushed with humiliation when he thought of these last two.
    They were the first of the shipwrecked men to find him. He’d been gathering wood in the middle of the storm when the jester came along. Caliban thought he was one of Prospero’s pesky servants come to torment him again. Ariel may have been the most trusted, but he was not the only spirit who served the wizard. There were many that seemed to delight in pinching Caliban while he worked. So when Trinculo appeared, Caliban tried to hide by lying down on the ground and covering himself with his rough cloak. Trinculo thought he was dead, struck by lightning, and crawled in under the cloak as well to shelter himself from the rain. That made Caliban flail about, thinking that he was about to be pinched and abused.
    Stephano found them like that, shrieking and kicking beneath the cloak in the middle of the storm. He dealt with the situation in the way that he dealt with everything. He poured liquor down his throat, and for good measure poured it down Caliban’s as well.
    That drink had been like a divine nectar to Caliban. It filled him with boldness. The two stumbling men were his chance to win back the island. He called Stephano his god and convinced the drunken man to kill Prospero, promising him Miranda as reward. “Steal his books,” Caliban told them. “He’s nothing without them. Then drive a nail through his head. You will be the island king and we will be your servants.”
    Of course he planned to take it all for himself. But Prospero knew about their plot. One of his spying spirits had told him. Caliban, Stephano, and Trinculo were sent on a hopeless, floundering walk all over the island. The home he’d known all his life became foreign to Caliban, and Prospero’s spells landed him in a bog with the two cursing men. When they finally found themselves at the hut, that drunken idiot Stephano had put on Prospero’s clothes, playing at being a king. Before long spectral hounds chased them away. When the three of them could run no