“Mom, this is Elizabeth,” said Anjali.
“Elizabeth Rew, yes? I’m Krishna Rao,” said Mrs. Rao, holding out her hand. “I’m so very glad to meet you at last. Anjali has told me so much about you.”
“She has?”
“Oh yes!” She had a high voice like her daughter’s, with a melodic accent. “You work in the repository with Anjali and you go to Fisher High School and you are a great fan of basketball. Did I remember everything? It was so very kind of you to invite Anjali to the basketball game. I know how much she has been looking forward to it.” She gave my hand a last squeeze and let go.
I glanced at Anjali, who seemed tense. “Our games are nothing compared to Fisher’s,” she said. “Fisher is so much bigger than Wharton, and of course Wharton is all girls, so Fisher’s literally out of our league.”
“That’s right, and we have some amazing guys on the team. Like our star forward,” I said, a little pointedly. “I think you know—” Anjali shook her head slightly with a panicky look, so I changed course. “You know what a blast the games are,” I said instead.
Mrs. Rao beamed at me. “You are staying for dinner, of course? Do you like spicy food?”
“Oh, I . . . I don’t know.” I looked at Anjali, trying to get a sense of whether I was really welcome. She nodded almost imperceptibly. “I mean, yes, I love spicy food.”
“Why don’t you call your parents, then?” suggested Mrs. Rao.
As if they’d care, I thought, but I called home and got Cathy. “You were supposed to clean the bathroom tonight, but I guess you can leave it for tomorrow,” she said.
“My stepmother says it’s fine,” I told Mrs. Rao. “Thank you so much.”
“Lovely,” she said. “Anjali, tell Aarti not too spicy. We don’t want to scare away Elizabeth on her first visit.”
Anjali’s bedroom was vast for Manhattan, big enough for a queen-size bed, a desk, a small sofa, an armchair, and two floor-to-ceiling bookcases.
“So,” I said, “we’re going to the basketball game.”
Anjali sat in the armchair opening a sewing box. It was made of dark wood, elaborately carved and inlaid with contrasting materials—ivory and mother-of-pearl. She bent over it so I couldn’t see her face.
“I hope you don’t mind. I wanted to meet Merritt and watch him play,” she said. “But my parents . . . my parents think I should date Indian boys. Or nobody. Preferably nobody.”
“Well, you can certainly come to the game with me. It’ll be nice to have someone to go with.”
Anjali looked up. “Thanks,” she said. “Really, thanks. Do you have that button?”
I handed it to Anjali. As soon as she touched it, she looked startled. “This is from your coat?” she said. “Where did you get your coat?”
“Hand-me-down from my stepsister. But I lost the original top button. Dr. Rust gave me this one when I passed the sorting test.”
“Oh! Should I sew on an ordinary button, then? I think I can find one that would fit.” She handed it back.
Holding it up to my face, I knew at once it was no ordinary button: I caught a faint whiff of smell that reminded me of the Grimm Collection. Where had Dr. Rust gotten it? What do magic buttons do?
“No, let’s use this one. Dr. Rust must have meant it for my coat—it matches the rest of my buttons,” I said.
Anjali pulled the head of her gooseneck reading lamp closer and threaded a needle.
As I watched, something caught at the edge of my vision, something out the window. How many floors up were we? Fourteen? A noise came from my throat, half gasp, half scream.
“What? What is it?”
I pointed to the window.
Anjali jumped out of her chair and snapped down the shade. She pulled the silk curtains shut. “What did you see?” she asked.
“I’m not sure. I think it was the gigantic bird again. Was Marc right—is it following you?”
“There’s nothing there now.”
“You’re right. I could be imagining it. We’re both jumpy.”
From behind the door I heard a little shuffle. I gasped again. Anjali spun around. “Jaya!” she cried.
She leapt across the room to slam the door shut, but it was too late. There was a foot in the way—a biggish, sneakered foot on a skinny leg. Anjali seemed to grow bigger, like a great, glaring, black-feathered hawk herself. “Out!” she shrilled.
The sneaker didn’t move.
“Jaya! I said out!”
“Anjali!” wailed the voice behind the sneaker. “What’s following you?”
“You are, obviously. Get out of my room.”
“I’m not in your room.”
“Your foot is.” Anjali kicked at it.
“Don’t stomp! I’ll tell Mom!”
“Go on, tell her. Run along and tell her and get your foot out of my door.”
The foot didn’t budge. “Come on, Anj, let me in. I want to meet your friend. I promise I’ll sit very quietly in the corner; you won’t even know I’m there. If something scary is following you around, I have a right to know. I could help. Or I might even be the one it’s after.”
“Yeah, right. It’s a pest eater.”
“Come on, Anjali! Please?”
“Oh, let her in,” I said. “What’s the harm?”
Anjali paused and looked pained. “This is a mistake,” she said, slowly opening the door. A bundle of knees and elbows, topped with eyebrows, liquid black eyes, and a spiky dark cloud of hair flounced in and threw itself on the bed.
“Jaya! Get your sneakers off my quilt!”
Jaya shifted slightly so that the sneakered part of her legs was sticking out over the edge of the bed. She turned the eyebrows my way. “You’re Elizabeth, right? You go to the school with the good basketball games. Can I come too?”
“No,” said Anjali.
“But I want to see Merritt play!”
“Jaya! You disgusting little spy!”
“Oh, don’t worry, I won’t tell Mom and Dad. Who’s Merritt, anyway? Your boyfriend?”
“Get off my bed! I mean it, get off!” Anjali lunged. I was amused to see she was so bad at sister-wrangling. Was this the poised, unflappable Anjali I’d been admiring ever since I started work at the repository?
“Anji has a boyfriend! Anji has a boyfriend!” Jaya singsonged, kicking her feet in the air. Anjali looked ready to tear her to pieces.
I stepped in hastily. “Do you play basketball, Jaya? You look like you’d be good at it,” I said.
“Really?” She sat up and looked at me. “Why?”
“You’re tall for your age, and you have those long arms and legs. Get up, let me see you.”
Jaya jumped up, leaving the quilt crumpled behind her.
“Catch!” I tossed a little lace pillow from the sofa. She snatched it out of the air and threw it back.
“Gently,” I said, throwing it again. “You want to go for precision and control. Yeah, you’d definitely be good. You’re not just tall for your age, you’re quick too.”
“How do you know I’m tall for my age? Do you know how old I am?”
“Ten,” I said.
She looked disappointed. “Did Anjali tell you?”
“No, you look like a ten-year-old.”
“If I look like a ten-year-old and I am a ten-year-old, how can I be tall for my age? If I’m tall, I should look like a twelve-year-old.”
“You look like a tall ten-year-old.”
Anjali was starting to look impatient. Still, at least Jaya wasn’t talking about Marc anymore.
Now that she was no longer lying on Anjali’s bed, Jaya threw herself around the room pretending to shoot baskets with the pillow. “Put that down, you’re going to break something,” said Anjali.
“Here,” I said. I held my arms in a circle. Jaya made the layup, and I kept the pillow. I kicked off my shoes, stretched out on the sofa, and tucked the pillow under my cheek. Jaya pouted, then walked around the room, picking things up.
“Put that down, Jaya! It’s fragile.”
Jaya was holding a sandalwood fan. “Is this the fan from Auntie Shanti?” She inspected both sides. It was elaborately carved with what looked like stylized feathers.
“Yes. Put it down.”
Jaya flounced carelessly over to the sofa where I was lying and fanned me. The air coming off the fan had a faint, disturbing, familiar smell. Sandalwood, yes, but what else? That fresh smell in the air after a thunderstorm? Vinyl? Toast? “Can I see that a sec?” I held out my hand.
Jaya looked at me suspiciously. “Why?”
“I want to check something out.”
“Promise you’ll give it back.”
“We’ll see.” I kept my hand out.
Curiosity won over contrariness. She handed it over. I fanned my face and sniffed; I sniffed at the back, the front, the handle. Definitely magic. I looked at Anjali. “What is it?” I asked.
She shrugged. “Sandalwood?” Was she just being discreet in front of her sister, or did she really not know? I handed the fan back to Jaya. “Put it back on the shelf,” I said. “Carefully.”
A little to my surprise, Jaya obeyed, sniffing it herself on the way over. She reached for an inlaid box next to it on the shelf, but Anjali said, “No!” in a new, quiet voice.
It was clear she meant it; even Jaya paused. “Leave that,” Anjali said.
“But I just want to see inside,” said Jaya.
“Leave it alone. I mean it. Auntie Shanti said it’s bottomless, and so will you be if you touch it.”
Was she kidding, or did she mean it literally? And what was Anjali’s family doing with these magical objects?
In a way, I thought, it wasn’t any weirder for Anjali’s family to have magic than for magic to exist at all. And after all, they had lots of things most families didn’t have, like carved tables and inlaid chests and fancy flower arrangements. I wondered again what magical properties the fan had.
Jaya shrugged and threw herself on the sofa next to me. “So, what’s the scary thing that’s after you?” she asked conversationally.
“Oh, Jaya, go away,” said Anjali. “Don’t you have homework or something?”
“Already did it. What’s the scary thing?”
“Nothing.”
“Then why was Elizabeth screaming?”
“She wasn’t screaming.”
Jaya turned to me. “Is something scary after you? Because I know a good protection spell.”
“You do?”
“I need a piece of string. Or thread or ribbon or something.” She flung herself up off the sofa like a fountain of sticks, pounced on Anjali’s sewing box, extracted some fuchsia yarn, and snapped off a length with her teeth.
“Jaya, that’s disgusting,” said Anjali automatically. She knotted off the thread she had been using to sew on the button and snipped it neatly with little bird-beaked scissors.
Jaya ignored her. “Hold out your arm,” she ordered. She wrapped the yarn around my wrist twice and began working on a knot, biting her lower lip, tucking the ends under and over, making loops around her fingers.
At last she took an end in each hand—pinching me slightly—and declaimed, “By this charm, be safe from harm!” With that she pulled the knot tight and grinned at me proudly.
I looked at my wrist. It had a bracelet of hot-pink yarn with a lumpy knot and slightly frayed, spit-wet ends. “Thank you, Jaya,” I said.
“Don’t take that off. As long as it stays on your arm, you should be safe—from bad magic, anyway. I don’t think it works for muggers or car crashes.”
“Where did you learn that? Auntie Shanti?” asked Anjali.
“No, Miss Bender.”
“Who’s Miss Bender?” I asked.
“Sewing teacher.”
“You guys take sewing?”
“Of course. All Wharton girls learn how to sew. It’s an important part of a young lady’s education,” said Jaya. She sounded like she was quoting a teacher.
“Miss Bender’s the one who got me the job at the repository,” said Anjali.
“Oh. I see.” Anjali’s equivalent of Mr. Mauskopf.
If their sewing teacher—Anjali’s connection to the Grimm Collection—was teaching the Rao girls magical spells to ward off evil, perhaps Mr. Mauskopf would have some that would help me, I wondered. Should I ask him? What a difference this job was making in my life! On the plus side: magic! And maybe even more important: friends. On the minus side: also magic. The dark, scary kind—the kind that makes you worry about warding off evil.
We heard a knock on the door. “Anjali? Jaya? Dinner is ready.”
Anjali’s parents ate with their fingers. It sounds messy, but it wasn’t, not at all—they had elegant table manners, delicately scooping and pinching morsels with bits of thin flat bread or clumps of rice. Mr. Rao saw me looking nervously at my plate. “Didn’t Aarti give you a fork?” he asked me. “I’m sorry, I should have told her; that was thoughtless of me. Aarti! Silverware for our guest, please,” he called. He was a portly man, genial and commanding. He looked a lot like his younger daughter, despite her skinny spikiness. “Do you need something else to drink, Elizabeth? Some ginger ale?”
“Yes, please, I’d love some.”
“Ginger ale, please, Aarti.”
“I want some too,” said Jaya, jumping up.
“Sit still, Jaya. Aarti will bring it,” said her mother.
We ate a sort of bean stew and a puffy thing and a vegetable I didn’t recognize. It was all delicious; I happily accepted second helpings. I was sorry when the meal ended and a little scared too—scared to walk out into the cold, dark streets where the bird might be lurking. Anjali offered to walk me to the subway, but of course I said no.
I fingered the yarn around my wrist nervously and buttoned the top button of my coat tightly around my throat. But the sky was empty all the way home. Whatever the bird was after, evidently it wasn’t me.
Chapter 11:
A feather and a key
I went looking for Mr. Mauskopf on Monday. Evidently he’d been looking for me too. “Elizabeth,” he said. “When do you next work at the repository?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Good. Will you give this to Dr. Rust for me?” He handed me a largish package wrapped in brown paper and tied with string. “Put it in Lee’s own hands. It’s very important. Do not entrust it to anyone else. Can you do that?”
“Sure.”
“And don’t open it.”
“Of course not!” As if I would open someone else’s mail!
“Thank you, Elizabeth. How are you getting on at the repository?”
“It’s fantastic—I love it. They gave me a key to the Grimm Collection.”
“Yes, Lee told me. Congratulations! They don’t give out those keys lightly, you know. If things go well, you’ll have borrowing privileges soon too.”
“Really, you think so? That would be so awesome! I can’t believe the things they have in the collection!”
Mr. Mauskopf smiled. “No, I couldn’t believe it at first either. You understand what an honor it is to be asked to take care of them, don’t you? An honor and a responsibility. It’s not always easy.”
“Yes, I know. Mr. Mauskopf, a strange thing has happened. Remember how you said you’d heard the rumors about an enormous bird? I think we saw it—me and the other pages, Marc and Anjali and Aaron. It was hovering near the skylight at the repository, and then when I went over to Anjali’s apartment, I thought I saw it again.”
“You saw the bird! Tell me, how big was it?”
“Bigger than me. It was definitely no ordinary bird.”
Mr. Mauskopf looked worried. “I’m glad you told me. If it makes you feel better, I’ll have a word with Griffin. I’ll tell him to keep an eye on you.”
“Griffin? Your dog?” I wanted to ask what good that would do, but it seemed too rude.
“That’s right. And I think you’d better take this.” From his shirt pocket, with t
wo long, bony fingers, Mr. Mauskopf plucked something small, brown, and smudgy, which he held out to me. It was a feather.
“Thank you. What—what do I—?”
“Keep it safe, and when your need is great, give it to the wind. And remember to take care with that package.”
I wanted to ask him more, but the second bell rang and I had to run or be late for French.
Mr. Mauskopf’s package was too wide for my backpack, so I carried it under my arm, clutching the string with my gloved fingers. A faint smell rose from it, like swimming pools, reminding me of summer. Swimming pools and bananas . . . no, something else. Tire swings, maybe? I walked downtown along Fifth Avenue beside the park, trying to tease apart the shifting components of the magic smell and watching the sinking sun paint the snow with purple shadows. It felt good to be walking; the cold pinched life into my cheeks. A flock of crows passed overhead, silhouetted against the sunset. Something odd about the birds caught my eye, and I stopped and looked up. One seemed too big to be a crow. A hawk? I couldn’t see it any longer, but I had a bad feeling, like at Anjali’s. I picked up my pace, craning my head behind me.
Then the enormous bird appeared again. It spun and swooped, coming right at me. I started to run.
Something even bigger than the bird appeared from behind a clump of trees, crossing the sky. It didn’t look like the bird—it was the wrong shape, more rectangular, like a horse or a lion. They were both coming at me fast. I panicked, running faster while looking at them over my shoulder instead of where I was going. I crashed straight into someone, hard, and my package went flying. I landed facedown in the snow, but at least I was alive and had only been hit by a human.
“Are you all right?” A man stood over me, holding out his hand. He pulled me to my feet.
“I’m so sorry!” I said, brushing off snow. “I’m okay—did I hurt you?”
He smiled, a crooked smile amid a neatly trimmed little beard. “No, no, I’m fine. You were in quite a hurry.” He bent over to pick up the envelopes and packages we had dropped, and I recognized him—he was the creepy little man from the Main Exam Room who liked to stare at Anjali.
The Grimm Legacy Page 11