The Thief of Mirrors: 4 (Enchanted Emporium)

by Pierdomenico Baccalario

  “Maybe!” I lied. Then I quickly left the disturbing office and went right into Aiby’s room.

  Patches was still trying to impress the doorstop. “Patches, it’s not a real dog,” I explained to my indefatigable friend.

  Then again, in the Enchanted Emporium, you never knew.

  I entered Aiby’s room on tiptoes, stopped on the yellow rug, and looked around. There were thousands of things in it. Aiby’s bed was just a mattress resting on the floor. Next to it was a nightstand made from an old armchair. Dozens of adhesive stars clung to the ceiling. A small family of wooden penguins swung gently in the air. A copper candelabra with twelve arms sat next to a dream catcher with silver feathers.

  There was no wardrobe or dresser — in its place was a large bookcase with folded shirts, sweaters, and jeans in colorful stacks separated by books. There was a pair of sports medals (which is how I discovered that Aiby was a skiing champion) and drawings of animals hanging from the walls. And, impressively, one entire wall had been turned into a mirror, which Aiby had written on as if it were a blackboard.

  A large window overlooked the bay. In the opposite corner from the mirrored wall stood a small desk with a roll-top that could be turned over and closed in on itself like the lid of a bread box. It seemed like the perfect place for putting a diary. The desk even had a tiny lock. Naturally I didn’t have the key.

  Meb came up the stairs and joined me. She agreed that this piece of furniture would be the first place to look.

  “But how do we get it open?” I asked.

  “Usually a desk’s key is in a drawer,” she said.

  There were seven drawers — two on the sides over the legs, five where the top closed.

  “Do you know which drawer it’s in, too?” I joked, grabbing the handle of one of the drawers. Right away, I felt the normal magical tingling that I had learned to recognize as the presence of a magic spell.

  “This is the Drawer of Magical Things,” murmured the piece of furniture.

  At the sound of the voice, Patches barked and his tail stood on end.

  “A talking drawer … interesting,” I commented. “I’m guessing you won’t open on your own.”

  “Of course not,” the piece of furniture added in a kindly voice. “I’m a Secretary. I don’t let just anyone learn my secrets!”

  I didn’t take my hand off the handle. “May I at least ask what kind of secrets they are?” I ventured.

  “Of course not,” it said, still pleasant.

  “I’m looking for Aiby’s Carbon Copy Diary,” I said.

  “I know it well,” the piece of furniture replied. “I have it right here, inside the Drawer of Places.”

  “And what would the Drawer of Places be?” I asked.

  “You don’t know?” the piece of furniture replied, apparently alarmed by my ignorance. “The Drawer of Places is behind the Flap of Time.”

  Hmm, I thought. This thing likes to talk …

  I touched the lock. “Does that mean I should open this?” I asked.

  “Careful with those fingers!” the desk cried. “You’re tickling me!”

  “Sorry,” I replied. “Since I don’t have the key, is there any other way to open the Flap of Time?”

  “Sorry, the key is the only way,” the desk said.

  “And is the key inside one of these other drawers?” I asked.

  “I can’t tell you that!” the piece of furniture blurted out. “It’s a secret and I’m a —”

  “A Secretary, yes, I understand,” I interrupted. “But if you can’t tell me if the key’s in one of your drawers … how do you know someone else didn’t steal it?”

  “I’m keeping it safe,” the piece of furniture said proudly.

  A-ha! I thought.

  By now, I had a certain amount of experience dealing with magical objects. I let go of the small handle and tried to open the drawer next to it.

  “This is the Drawer of Luck,” the piece of furniture said right away.

  It was locked, too. “Apparently I’m not lucky,” I grumbled.

  Meb whispered to me, “Do you want a hand?”

  I signaled to her that I could manage this on my own.

  Having found the third drawer locked as well, I asked, “What should I do to open you? All the drawers are locked.”

  “You just have to tell me the correct secret, and I’ll let you open it,” the piece of furniture answered.

  “The correct secret?” I asked.

  “Each drawer has its own secret,” the secretary said.

  Figures, I thought. I had to admit, it was a pretty great system for keeping drawers locked. Secrets protecting a diary presumably filled with secrets. I didn’t have the slightest idea which secret would open it. So I guessed.

  “Aiby’s mom is dead,” I said.

  “That’s certainly not a secret,” the piece of furniture said.

  “How am I supposed to tell you a secret if you then tell me it’s not a secret because I know it, too,” I grumbled.

  “That’s why I’m an excellent Secretary,” the desk said proudly.

  Other than possibly trying to force the drawer with something, I was out of ideas. I looked to Meb for help but she simply shrugged.

  I decided to try to get more information out of it. “So you knew about Aiby’s mom?” I asked.

  “Everyone knows about her,” it responded.

  It was right. But then what was the secret? My mom always said that there are no better secrets than the ones that everyone knows, whereas my father once said that three people can only keep a secret if two of them are dead. Neither perspective seemed particularly helpful.

  “Last year I sealed the front door to school shut with glue and fishing wire,” I said.

  “So what?” the desk replied.

  “Well, it’s a secret,” I said. “I never told anyone about it. There was some homework in math class that I skipped doing, too.”

  “That’s a very nice secret,” the piece of furniture admitted. “But it’s your secret. You can use it to lock a drawer once you’ve opened it, but certainly not to open one that someone else has locked.”

  Do I even know any of Aiby’s secrets? I wondered.

  “Is a secret between two people valid?” I asked.

  “Only if neither of them has ever told a third person,” the piece of furniture said.

  I had to use a secret that Aiby had only told me about, but I couldn’t come up with anything. “I’m a fool,” I muttered.

  “That’s not a secret,” the Secretary retorted.

  I frowned. “Aiby hates Incantevole,” I said to the Drawer of Magical Items.

  “Askell is Aiby’s cousin,” I tried on the Bad Memories drawer.

  “I don’t know how to iron,” I said to the one for Magical Items.

  “Not valid, not valid, and not valid!” the desk said proudly.

  Maybe I have to reason this through differently, I said to myself. Not with my head. Or rather, I shouldn’t just reason with my head.

  I grabbed the Drawer of Bad Memories and said, “Aiby likes Doug McPhee.”

  No luck. I tried the phrase on all the other drawers just to be safe. The last one I tried, the Drawer of Friends, creaked.

  “Ahem, sorry,” the Secretary explained. “I made a mistake.”

  I let out a big sigh of relief. Meg giggled. I blushed.

  Patches stood up on his hind legs and leaned his front paws on my legs and tapped me with his nose to let me know he was getting bored. It was the same thing he did whenever Aiby and I were talking and he got jealous.

  “You know something, Patches? You gave me an idea,” I said to him, petting him with my free hand.

  I whispered to the Drawer of Friends, “Aiby like Finley McPhee.”

  “Ta-dah!” the
piece of furniture said, and the drawer slid open.

  I couldn’t help but grin.

  Inside the Drawer of Friends was a swimsuit that I immediately recognized. (It was the one Aiby had worn the day I kissed her!) Beneath it was a picture of a wolf — and the little brass key I was looking for.

  I opened the desk’s roll-top and scanned through the items inside. There were pens, paper, a small golden anvil, a ball of amber with an insect in it, a necklace that jingled, and five little drawers. The one on the left was ajar. Inside it was a small black diary. The title page read: Aiby’s Carbon Copy Diary.

  I opened it. The first few pages had been torn out. The diary began with an entry from the day before, titled: We’re leaving, finally!

  Clipped to the first page was a ticket for a bus line called Incognito.

  Below the ticket was a journal entry:

  I’m excited about taking this trip and especially about seeing all the Others again. I wonder who they’ll be and what they will tell us. Dad chose a magnificent place. If it weren’t for Professor Everett, perhaps we would never have known that the library the Sunken Castle was so near Applecross. But we still left late, as usual for us. Dad insists it’s impolite to be the last to arrive when you’ve organized a meeting, but I say not to worry about it.

  The three Van de Maya sisters — April, May, and June — will definitely be there, confirming they’d left Flanders on Wednesday. Yuram Legba will come alone, which is a good thing since his last guest practically destroyed the hotel room. The Tiagos — Alejandro and Maria — will arrive together in their hot-air balloon. Teobaldo Scarselli promised to cook for everyone at the end of the meeting. He brought the ingredients for his unbeatable recipes with him. He said, “Although it’s not true that you can’t eat well in England, in Scotland, it’s guaranteed.” Two of the Moogleys will be there: that thug, Willard, and Tupper, whom I’ve never met because he was too young to join us when we went to New York to meet his uncle.

  After arriving at the castle, Dad confirmed (for the umpteenth time) that the gifts we’ve prepared for the attendees have already been delivered to the castle the library. When he finally saw Doug McPhee arrive, he breathed a sigh of relief. Luckily Finley wasn’t coming, because then we would’ve left tomorrow.

  At that point I closed the diary and passed it to Meb. “If you really want to read it, go ahead,” I said. “I don’t think I can stand it.”

  Meb skimmed through a dozen pages of entries, many of which were crossed out. Some pages had been torn out, and there were quite a few drawings.

  When Meb reached the last page, she cried out, “My goodness!”

  “My goodness what?” I asked.

  “It says right here that Askell came to the meeting,” Meb said.

  “That’s impossible!” I said. “Semueld Askell was a pillar of salt up until the other day! And he certainly wasn’t invited to the meeting!”

  “Nonetheless, it seems he went,” Meb muttered. She leafed backward through the pages of the diary. “It says here that he stepped out from a mirror.”

  “How did he do that?” I asked.

  Meb shrugged. “But two lines farther down the same entry, Aiby wrote a name: Imagami.”

  “That’s not the name of one of the magic shopkeeper families,” I said. “It tells us nothing.”

  We sat down on the floor next to each other. “What else did she write?” I asked.

  “It’s not very clear,” Meb said. We read another of Aiby’s entries:

  Askell is dead serious, and he didn’t come alone. My father senses great danger. I’m afraid. Mr. Tiago is worried, and so are April, May, and June, who haven’t spoken for more than half an hour. The mood is tense. We told Semueld that his actions were ridiculous and dangerous and that no one had ever rebelled against the families in such a way. “The pact has changed,” Askell replied. “The only way to avoid a revolt among the magical creatures is to surrender the Ark of the Passages to them.” My father told Semueld that he was speaking nonsense. Askell was surly and sullen, and he just kept insisting that the Ark was in Applecross and guarded by the Enchanted Emporium. He said this meeting was a farce and that we Lilys were deceiving everyone.

  My father asked Askell why we would keep the Ark hidden in the shop, and Askell shouted, “The same reason you always have! To control magic!” Then Legba asked Semueld why he wanted to find this mysterious Ark of the Passages. Askell said he’d been given the task by the Queen of the Others — a woman also known as Imagami. Legba asked if anyone had ever heard of Imagami, and everyone shook their heads. “She’s not a Wizard, nor an Ancient, nor a Builder, nor even a Sleeping Queen! What does she want from us?” Legba added. Askell let out cackle.

  Then Teobaldo Scarselli stepped in and said that “All the Askells are magic weapons sellers. And weapons sellers only know how to do one thing: prepare for war.” Legba got to his feet and stared Askell in the face. “Are we at war?” he asked. “Don’t be a coward — stand up and justify your actions! Are the families at war with this Imagami?” Askell smirked. “Yes, we’re at war. And now you’ll be locked up while the war rages!”

  Meb and I exchanged worries glances. “Uh-oh,” she whispered.

  “Then they’re trapped?” I said. “In here?”

  We leafed through the other pages, but there was no explanation. At the bottom of another entry, however, were a few shocking sentences:

  Finley, I beg you! If you read these pages, come to rescue us. You have to use the ticket I left for you to get to the Sunken Castle — before it’s too late!”

  Meb and I remained seated on the yellow rug in Aiby’s room, staring at each other.

  “Do we have a backup plan?” I asked after a particularly long moment.

  Meb leafed through the diary, front to back. “Hmm,” she said a short while later. “Do you know who this Angelica is?”

  “No,” I said. “Why?”

  “Aiby wrote here that she feels like Angelica, one of the Sicilian Puppets,” Meb said. “Angelica is the woman the two famous Paladins of France fought over. Aiby says that you and Doug are like Orlando and Rinaldo.”

  I blushed. “Anything else?” I asked.

  Meb read from the entry: “‘Luckily Angelica knows what should be done.’”

  “Wait!” I cried out, remembering something from two evenings ago. “Angelica is the name of the puppet Doug gave me!”

  Meb’s eyes went wide. “And do you have her with you?” She asked.

  “Well, no,” I admitted. “Not … not exactly.”

  “What did you do with her, Finley?” Meb said, more of an accusation than a question.

  I pointed at Patches. “I was furious! I gave the doll to Patches to bury,” I said. “It’s his fault!”

  My trusty friend hid his head behind his paws. Meb put her head between her hands.

  My shoulders slumped. “How badly did I mess up?” I asked.

  “I don’t know,” Meb replied, pulling herself to her feet. “But it’s possible you ruined our only plan B. Either way, we need to retrieve that puppet.”

  Meb sped toward my home in her little car. Upon arriving, we leapt out and ran to where Patches had buried Angelica.

  I dug through the dirt, fist over fist. Thankfully, Patches hadn’t bothered to bury her very deep — but before doing so, he had gnawed on her a bit. Angelica was still a beautiful wooden puppet, though, with blond hair, tin armor, and a terrifying temper.

  “You lout,” she yelled after spitting out a fair amount of dirt. “Now I’ll bury you! You’re all as cruel as beasts from the zoo!” She had a piercing, rhythmic voice — and an annoying habit of speaking in rhyme.

  I covered Angelica’s mouth and told Meb to go distract my parents. While the three of them sat and chatted on the porch while watching the stars, I snuck the puppet to my room and closed the
door. I laid her on my bed and removed my hand from her mouth. She began waving her arms around and screaming orders like a banshee.

  “Scamp!” she cried. “Lout! I hope you get gout!”

  Getting Angelica to talk had been easy, but getting her to shut up was starting to seem impossible. Thankfully, Aiby had written instructions in the letter:

  Finley,

  I don’t know how to express how terrible I feel right now, but I hope that one day you’ll be able to understand. All I can tell you right now is that my father is very worried about you and thinks you in particular are in grave danger. If he’s right, and the seagulls come to find you, ask Angelica what to do. To get her to speak, just turn her head to one side and say “Orlando!” to her. Then turn her head to the other said, and say, “Rinaldo!” I warn you that Angelica is not very polite, but she is conscientious. Tell her who you are and what you need her to do, then follow her instructions without question (which no one ever does since they think they can’t learn anything from toys).

  Please burn this letter after reading it.

  - Aiby

  I didn’t burn it since it was summer and the fireplace wasn’t lit. Instead, I tore it into little pieces and placed them under my pillow. I peered out the half-open window. Meb was still chatting softly with my parents.

  I sat down on the bed and picked up Angelica. “I’m Finley McPhee, Angelica,” I said to the puppet. “Aiby and her father haven’t returned. I believe they’ve been imprisoned by Semueld Askell.”

  “In jail! In a cell! Do not fail! She’s your belle!” Angelica said. “Come now, and go! Don your anger, don’t be slow! You’re the hero, you’re in the right! Have no fear, go win the fight!”

  “What should I do?” I said, rubbing my temples.

  “You’ll be armed, don’t be alarmed!” Angelica cried. “You’ll have your gear, just look under here! Then make a wish!” I stared at her blankly. Under her breath, Angelica added, “Why’d we ever choose this fish …”

  I frowned at the smart-alecky doll, then lifted the edge of the bed sheet. To my great surprise, I saw that someone had slipped two suitcases beneath my bed.