by Tania Hutley
He studies me without speaking, a frown creasing his pock-marked brow. I must have been right that the Veritas can make innocent people confess anything. So much for truth. She’s clearly the council’s tool to get rid of people they deem inconvenient.
“What about the other council members?” asks Xander.
“I’ve already warned my uncle. He said the council were taking precautions.”
He taps his pen on the page. “Who do you think is most vulnerable?”
“Dallas is a mess right now, and probably not being careful. But I’m the last person he’d want to see or listen too. Magnus Fox is head of the council, but he won’t help us either. The Veritas is sheltered in the council chambers.” I snap my fingers. “Amber’s the earth witch who replaced my father on the council. Sylvia mentioned she was spending all her time in the library, working with the archivists to record some new spells. I bet we could find her there.”
“Which library?” asks Xander.
“Yes,” I say, unable to resist. “Exactly.”
He gets it right away and his eyes light up. “There’s a witch library? Can’t wait to see it.”
He flips his notebook closed and tucks it in his pocket as though it’s a done deal. He must think visiting her there will be an easy thing to do.
Little does he know.
Twenty
“This is just the George Peabody Library,” says Xander as we walk up the stone steps to the historic library for the John’s Hopkins University. He sounds disappointed.
The whole way here, he asked a million questions about witches. Now he’s decided to include magic in his world view, he’s trying to fill his detective brain up with all the facts. I have to hand it to him, he’s taking the whole thing well.
“Not exactly,” I tell him. “Where we’re going, there are a few differences.” I’m feeling grim, but determined. This is going to be difficult without magic. Maybe impossible. But we need to try.
Our footsteps are loud as we cross the lobby, then we cross through the exhibition gallery and go into the spectacular reading room. No matter how many times I see it, the interior of the library always takes my breath away. Five levels of books, all visible from the ground floor as you look up through nineteenth century railings and architecture. It’s beautiful.
A few students are studying at the desks in the center of the atrium, and a small group of tourists are taking photos, but the library is relatively quiet. I head to the back, into the far corner of the lower floor. Usually, witches use magic to cover their tracks and make sure no mundane sees where they go. I don’t have that luxury. I’m going to have to be stealthy.
Finding the right set of book stacks is easy. The next bit I’m less certain about. I used to come here with my mother, but she was the one who always got us in and I’m not exactly sure how.
My heart contracts at a sudden, vivid picture of my mother bringing me here when I was young. Once I asked how long it would take to read all the books in the library. She laughed and told me I should let her know how long it took after I’d done it.
I miss her so much, and I hate not wearing her ring. My hand feels naked and I’m more vulnerable without my mother’s talisman. I wish she were here now. She had such powerful magic that with a little blood, it seemed she could solve any problem.
All I have is the stubbornness I was born with.
Browsing my way along the shelves, I take a deep breath and close my eyes.
“What are you doing?” asks Xander. “Maybe I can help?”
I shake my head, concentrating. Searching with my mind for the tingle of magic. It’s harder because of the grimoire I’m still carrying in my backpack. Its terrible dark magic hums at the edge of my perception, clouding everything else.
Squeezing my eyes tighter, I concentrate harder. It must be here somewhere.
There.
A faint tickle in my brain. An awareness of power, coming from a little way ahead.
With my eyes still closed, I let that tickle guide me forward. It grows into the uncomfortable sensation of pushing through a powerful protection ward, before my outstretched fingers brush the spine of a book. The source of the power.
On the shelf, the book looks like all the other hard-cover historical reference books around it, except older, more worn, and less appealing. The words have faded on its cracked spine, so its title is illegible. “This is it.” I pull the book out of the shelf. “This’ll get us where we need to go. I hope.”
The front cover of the book is nothing like its spine. It’s bright and modern, with a familiar face on the cover. Xander eyes its title. “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets?”
“It was Roald Dahl’s The Witches when I used to come here with my mother.”
“That doesn’t look like it belongs here. What’s to stop an unsuspecting member of the public finding it? Or one of the staff?”
“Here.” I hold the book out, offering it to him.
He reaches for it, but his hand only gets halfway to the book before it moves sideways.
“I can’t touch it,” he says, trying again. “The air around it is slippery. My hand slides right past it.” His eyes are wide. “This is weird. How is it doing that?”
I glance around to make sure we’re alone. The tourists are still near the entrance, and we’re tucked far enough into the corner that none of the students can see us.
“You think that’s impressive? Watch this.” I flip the book open and a portion of the bookcase behind it shimmers and fades into nothing.
“What the—?” Xander reaches toward it and his fingers disappear into the hole. “Oh shit,” he whispers.
Unlike Sylvia’s athenaeum, the secret basement room the portal leads to does actually exist in this time and space continuum, so it doesn’t feel like walking through jello.
“Come on.” I put the book back before stepping through the shimmering black hole into the space beyond.
So far, so good.
The doorway closes behind us and dim lighting shows us the way down the metal spiral staircase. The rail gives us something to hold onto as we descend round and round. The difference between this stairwell and the last one we went down together isn’t lost on me.
“How far does this go down?” asks Xander.
“Several floors. I remember feeling like the stairs would never end when I came here with my mother.”
“Was that the last time you were here?”
I nod. “Not much need for magical books when my magic is all messed up.”
“You said the problem is that you have two types of magic now, right?”
“I used to just have earth magic, and was learning lots of spells to use it for different things. But adding animal magic made both types a lot stronger. They get tangled together and normal spells aren’t powerful enough to control them.”
“But the Unseen said there was a way to control them both?”
“Dark magic,” I mutter, grimacing.
“What’s—?”
I cut him off, not wanting to explain about dark magic. “I’m not supposed to use my magic and I haven’t had access to them for a long time. The council bound them to keep any accidents from happening.” I think of Agnes and flush.
“What was it like, having magic?”
A question like that deserves a proper answer. I stop. “Everything was easier. I didn’t have to fight to get by.”
He stops on the step below mine, turning to face me. “Has it been hard? Living without it?”
In the dim light, his eyes are in shadow. There’s nobody else to hear. No reason not to answer honestly, with a simple ‘Yes’. But my throat closes on the word, so I just nod.
The last few years, I haven’t even admitted to myself how hard it’s been. I always tell myself I don’t miss it, but Xander can probably see the truth in my expression.
“I’m sorry.” He’s on the step below me, so he doesn’t look as tall as usual, but his bulk is still comforting. I
like having him with me. All these years I’ve had to be strong and get on with things. I’m glad I don’t have to do this alone.
“It’s fine,” I say, taking a deep breath. “I’m used to it now. I’ve got a good life. And the truth is, I don’t think I’d want my magic back even if I could control it. Having power made me soft. Learning to do without it was difficult, but I’m stronger now. It was a crutch, and now I don’t need it.” I smile at myself and shake my head. “Does that make any sense at all?”
He puts one hand on my arm and suddenly I’m very aware of how close he is, and how we’re alone in the semi-darkness. The shadowy stairwell accentuates the masculine angles of Xander’s face and the hard line of his jaw. When he leans closer, I breathe in his scent. He has a fresh, slightly woody smell, like he’s been out chopping firewood in a field of long grass.
His hand tightens on my arm to draw me even closer. “Since I’ve met you, my world’s been turned upside down.”
His voice is low. Intimate.
“In a bad way?” I ask.
“Nothing’s the way I thought it was.” His gaze drops to my lips and his thumb skims across the flesh of my arm.
“That didn’t answer my question.”
“Saffy.” His voice has a rough edge now. “I want you to know I—”
The lights flicker off, plunging us into darkness. Metal groans and the ground shudders. I clutch the stair rail to keep my balance, my heart pounding.
Then the lights come back on.
“What was that?” demands Xander.
“I don’t know. But I think we’d better hurry.”
We take the rest of the stairs at a run. The bottom of the staircase looks like a dead end. There’s just a wall with a large statue of a gargoyle in front of it.
The gargoyle is carved from stone. Its eyes are stone too, though its pupils are black obsidian.
“Let us through,” I tell it. “It feels like something bad might be happening.”
“Who seeks entry?” the gargoyle asks. Its stone jaw moves as though it’s alive. When I was young, I was fascinated by it, trying to work out how stone could move like that. Now it reminds me of the living statues in the council lobby and looking at it makes my bile rise.
“Sapphira Black and Xander Trent.”
Its cold stone pupils move slowly from me to Xander and back again. “Prove your magic.”
“I can’t. My magic is messed up.”
“Then you cannot pass.”
“I have magic, I just can’t use it.”
The gargoyle is silent.
“What does it want?” Xander frowns. “And where would we go? There’s nothing down here.”
“My great grandfather created you,” I tell the gargoyle, my voice rising. “He was a powerful earth witch, and I’m his descendant. You really want me to let my power go when I can’t control it? Anything could happen. Chaos and mayhem. It could turn you into a hamster. You want to spend the next hundred years squeaking at everyone who comes down here?”
The statue doesn’t respond. It’s as quiet and still as a… well, you know.
The floor shudders again, and I grab Xander’s arm to keep my balance.
“What’s going on?” he demands, and I’m not sure whether he’s talking to me or the gargoyle.
“Nothing good,” I say grimly. “An earthquake, maybe. Or explosions. The way things have been going, it wouldn’t surprise me if the entire building falls down.”
Xander glares at the gargoyle. “I’m a police officer. Let us in now.”
I bet that commanding tone works well on his subordinates. But as far as the gargoyle is concerned, he may as well be talking to himself.
Dammit, I’m going to have to cut myself and let my magic out. It could bring the building down on our heads, but without being able to prove I’m not mundane, we’re not going anywhere. I just wish I wasn’t carrying the grimoire in my backpack, because the low, unpleasant buzz of power it emits sets my teeth on edge and makes it hard to…
Wait a minute.
Gritting my teeth against the icy-cold, nasty feel of the thing, I pull out the grimoire and present it to the gargoyle as though inviting it to choose a meal from an all-black menu.
“Here’s magic.”
Made of stone or not, the gargoyle flinches.
The wall behind the gargoyle shimmers and dissolves, granting us access to the library. When I shove the grimoire back in my backpack and step past the gargoyle, I find shelves full of books. The most powerful grimoires are held in secret athenaeums like Sylivia’s, but there are still hundreds of magical books here. They make my skin tingle.
Wait, I can smell something. Is that smoke?
“Stay close,” says Xander. “A fire may have started. In a library, that can’t be good.”
The acrid smell of smoke gets stronger as we weave our way through the shelves, heading toward where I remember Amber’s office was, at the back of the building. I can’t see or hear anyone.
“The place shouldn’t be empty.” I speed up. “It’s the middle of the day. There should be people here. And if there’s a fire, shouldn’t the alarms and sprinklers have gone off?”
Then something powerful stops me dead. A shock of power makes my hair stand on end. My nostrils fill with the stench of rotting meat and dog hair, and with it comes a wave of nausea. My stomach roils and I bend over and gag. The magic feels dark and old and dangerous.
“Are you okay?” Xander puts his hand on my back. “What’s that smell?”
With my hands on my knees, I lift my head. “Something’s happening. Not far ahead.” Not just something. I know exactly what it is. It feels exactly like when Sylvia and Mireya died, only worse.
Much, much worse.
The floor shakes again, sending books tumbling to the floor.
“Can you walk?” asks Xander. “I can carry you if—”
“I’m okay.” I move forward, clenching my jaw and forcing myself toward the terrible thing I can still feel. The books vibrate with power that’s far stronger than I would have expected to feel from them. The dark magic has awakened them. The air is awash with so much energy, I’m amazed Xander can’t feel it.
“What’s that?” Xander’s voice is sharp. “Something moved up there.” He points, and we round the corner together.
Blood spatters the books around us. Blood is everywhere.
A person stands over a body on the floor. No, it’s not a person. It’s a demon. It has a jackal’s head and a man’s body, and is wearing a cloak that hides its clothes, with only its hands uncovered. Human hands, covered in blood. More blood cakes the jackal’s muzzle. Its stench is overpowering.
The demon snarls at us. At its feet is Amber. But there’s a hole in her chest where her heart used to be. We’re too late.
“Get back.” Xander shoves me behind him, then tugs out a gun I didn’t know he was carrying. “Police,” he yells. “Get—”
The jackal creature launches itself at us.
A gunshot almost deafens me. The demon flies backward, its body toppling the shelf behind it. All the books crash to the floor.
The demon pulls itself up to standing. Blood leaks from below its shoulder where Xander shot it, and even from where I am, I can feel the dark power that surges through the blood, making it glow.
The beast charges again. It hurls me into Xander and we hit the shelves hard, going over with them.
I lie sprawled awkwardly amongst shelves and books, expecting the monster to attack before I can scramble to my feet. A drop or two of its blood must have landed on me because my magic is surging.
“Are you alright?” demands Xander as I pull myself out of the downed shelves.
“I’m not bleeding,” I say curtly. It’s a relief, because if I were, there’d be no way I could keep my magic contained. “Where’d the demon go?”
“Up the stairs.”
“We can’t let it get away.”
Xander nods and races after it. I follo
w, a little slower because the sheer amount of magic in the air is making my head swim.
A gunshot blasts from in front of me. Xander must have the demon in sight. I want to warn him that it seems immune to bullets and could probably kill him without too much trouble, but it takes all my energy just to keep up, especially racing back up the stairs we came down.
At the top, the doorway shimmers. Xander leaps through it after the demon as though he’s been travelling through magical doorways his entire life.
When I burst through after him, back into the regular mundane library, the demon has Xander by the throat. Xander scrabbles at its hands, trying to get free, but the demon is too strong. It lifts him off his feet. Its muzzle opens, horrible tongue lolling.
It’s squeezing the life out of Xander.
Tearing at the skin on one wrist with my fingernails is an instinctive reaction. So is reaching for the forces inside me. As my blood oozes, I pull my magic free of what remains of the council bindings. Struggling for control, I manage to picture the demon being flattened, trying to focus the energies on it as they tear out of me.
My animal magic hits it so hard, the demon staggers and drops Xander, who scrambles backward. The animal magic pours into the demon, while I collapse to my knees in shock.
It worked. I can’t believe it. My magic did what I wanted.
My moment of amazed celebration is cut off as my earth magic hits the ornate marble column behind the creature, creating an explosion that sends chunks of marble flying. A moment later, I feel the animal magic dissipate. I didn’t draw enough blood.
The demon turns on me, snarling. It looks unharmed.
Shit.
I brace myself as the demon charges.
There’s nowhere to go, nowhere to escape. The creature slams into me, sending me flying into the column behind me. Pain explodes through my body and the column crumbles, pieces of stone raining down. Part of the second level of the building collapses, and big chunks smash into the marble floor, narrowly missing me.
With my hands around my head to protect it, I curl up to try to avoid as many falling rocks as I can. One bounces off my shoulder. Another smashes on my leg.