Fathomless

by Anne M. Pillsworth

  “I see.” The corners of Helen’s lips twitched.

  “So?”

  “So, tomorrow Theo and I are going to meet with you and Daniel individually. We’ll talk about your study plans, any concerns. Any situations. For now all I can say is you’re part of our program for as long as you want to be.”

  If he had to wait, he might as well be cool about it. “Okay, great. You’ll tell me about it tomorrow. And you’ll tell me about my mentor, too? Like, is it going to be Mr. Geldman?”

  Helen stood up. “Tomorrow, Sean.”

  “I bet it is.”

  “You’re not teasing anything out of me.”

  Nope, because she was out of the common room before the Civic’s horn blatted down by the garage. Geldman, yeah. Helen had blinked, so it would probably be him, which cheered Sean up for the unpacking ahead.

  * * *

  It took an hour to stow the bikes and kayaks and haul their suitcases to their rooms. Then Eddy had to hang up half her clothes, refold the other half, and arrange everything in this monster armoire Sean hadn’t noticed before. Seriously, if he had that in his room, it would keep him awake expecting its mirrored doors to creak open and Nosferatu to float out, all rat teeth and raptor claws. When he shared this perception with Eddy, she said, “How about you go unpack your own clothes?”

  “Done. Let’s take a walk.”

  “I’ve got to take my books upstairs.”

  “They’re books, Eddy—they’re not going to get wrinkled or anything. Come on. Just across the green and back.”

  “Or to Geldman’s?”

  “It might not be open. Not if you rush up to it.”

  “Even if it’s closed, I want to see it.”

  They walked across the MU green, over the Garrison Street Bridge with its view of Witch Island, and up Gedney Street. The old barbershop and the ratty newsstand and the Portuguese grocery were the same as the first time Sean had passed them. Nothing like that first time was Geldman’s Pharmacy: it was in closed mode, bricks and trim corroded, canvas awning like shredded skin on a rusted skeleton, windows boarded over or caked with grime. They rubbed themselves spy-holes and peered in at the hanging urns, empty except for spiderwebs; at bottles scattered in dust as thick as snow; at a doctor’s scale lying on its back, round face shattered.

  Across the street at Tumblebee’s Café, Eddy put a happy latte-swilling face on her disappointment. Maybe that earned her a reward. On their way back down Gedney, they turned together and saw Geldman on the sidewalk, same air of unaging middle age, same unruly aureole of young Einstein hair around his placidly amused face, same spotless lab coat. He was painting fresh grime over their spy-holes, and he saluted them with his brush. A whisper tickled Sean’s inner ear: Come another time, with the young lady. Welcome back to Arkham, Sean.

  Tightness left his chest. It would have majorly sucked if Geldman’s had been closed for good.

  At the Arkwright House, they found a note from Helen. She’d be at MU until seven, and then they could all go out for pizza. Eddy went up to deal with her books. Sean went to check on the carriage house reconstruction. They’d gutted the place and were starting on interior framing—Joe-Jack would have been impressed by the probable cost of the job. Helen said the Order was paying for it. Where’d it get the deep pockets, just private donations and secret government funding, or did it have a third revenue stream? Part of the foundation was so new, it was still damp: steel-reinforced concrete three feet thick, like the walls of a vault meant to house all the treasure the Order had unearthed and all the artifacts it had recovered from cultists, or worse.

  Eddy had to come see the vault. Lucky for Sean, his run up to the third floor left him too breathless to yell something stupid before he realized Eddy’s wasn’t the only voice coming from the common room. The other was a guy’s voice, and then a guy’s laugh, followed by Eddy’s “No, you’ve got to read it.”

  Sean waited until he’d stopped panting to walk to the common room door.

  Eddy knelt at one of the fireside bookcases, surrounded by her sacks of books and her backpack of books, and the books she’d already stacked on the floor. The guy at the other case had one backpack still crammed full and another lying eviscerated on an ottoman. He wore a foam collar-brace-whatever around his neck, and so he had to be Daniel Glass.

  Talk about being way off. Sean had imagined the other magic student as a pale skinny dude with hollow eyes, an invalid. Instead he was slim and swimmer buff, only about Eddy’s height, but not because he was humpbacked or spine-twisted. He dressed sharp, too, in loafers and khaki trousers and a red polo shirt that screamed high-end prep. Maybe his hair was a wig, though. It looked like the one Elijah Wood had worn as Frodo, dark brown with curls going in every direction. Hobbit hair.

  “I thought I heard someone coming,” Eddy said.

  The guy turned to the door, and Sean. “I think you were right.”

  Not to look like a total lurking loser, Sean stepped into the room and said, “Hey.”

  “About time you came up,” Eddy said. “I figured you’d impaled yourself on construction equipment or something.”

  “So when were you coming to check?”

  “After I put my books away.”

  The guy started to laugh again, caught himself, dropped his eyes from Sean’s. His face was pale, without the swimmer’s tan to match his swimmer’s build, and it showed a flush with brutal clarity.

  Eddy got up. “Introductions. Daniel, that’s Sean Wyndham. Sean, this is Daniel Glass.”

  Trying not to be obvious about looking for a fake hairline, Sean crossed the room. Daniel Glass offered a fist bump instead of a shake; too bad he blew his hipness factor by wearing cologne. Sean knew only one guy their age who did that: Mitch Chafee, another preppy jock from school. At least Daniel’s cologne wasn’t an olfactory deflector shield, just a light scent of cut grass and herbs, faintly familiar. Did Dad have an aftershave like it? “So,” he said. “You got here this morning?”

  Daniel lifted his eyes. They were Frodo-like, too, blue and protuberant. “First thing.”

  “Did you come from far?”

  “Not so much. New York City.”

  “Cool. You live there?”

  Daniel nodded. “In Chelsea.”

  Sean didn’t know Chelsea from Swansea, but he nodded, too.

  Eddy saved him from whatever lame conversational gambit he would have tried next. “Hey, check this out—I’m not the only one who brought books. And we brought a lot of the same ones. Perdido Street Station and Gormenghast and Jonathan Strange and what else?”

  “Franny and Zooey,” Daniel said.

  “Oh my God, Franny and Zooey! I can’t believe that. And it’s your favorite book, too?”

  “Pretty much,” Daniel said, and looked from her to Sean, and dropped his eyes again. “My father gave it to me because we have the same last name as the characters.”

  “I’ve never had anyone to discuss it with before.”

  Because Sean hadn’t even gotten through the first part, all that soul-searching in restroom stalls.

  “How many times have you read it?” Eddy went on.

  “Around five, I guess.”

  “Four here. That bathroom scene, where Bessie sits on the toilet and talks to Zooey? I’d have to drown myself if my mom did that.”

  There was a bathroom toilet-sitting scene in addition to the restroom toilet-sitting scene? Sean stifled a snort. Salinger dude had a one-track mind.

  “Zooey’s behind the shower curtain, though,” Daniel said.

  “Yeah, but still. Your mom.”

  Daniel hesitated, then agreed: “Yeah, your mom.”

  Anyhow. “It must be time for Helen to come back,” Sean said.

  Eddy chucked her stacked books onto the lowest shelf. “Hope so. I’m starving. You, Daniel?”

  “I could stand some pizza.”

  “Well, I’ll finish the books later—better go change.”

  As usual when on a
mission, Eddy was through the door like a house cat escaping into the forbidden outer world. Eyes wide, Daniel turned to Sean, who had to laugh.

  Which turned out okay, because Daniel laughed, too. “She’s on the track team, right?”

  “Track team and cross-country and swim.”

  “I should have known. This place we’re going for pizza? Do we have to change?”

  “You don’t,” Sean said. He checked his T-shirt and shorts. There was sawdust on his right sleeve, but it brushed off. “And I don’t feel like it. I think I’ll crash until Helen’s ready.”

  He fell into a recliner. Daniel pushed his empty pack off the ottoman and perched there. “Ms. Arkwright asked me to call her Helen, too. I was surprised when I got here. I thought she’d be older.”

  “So’d I, when I heard she was an archivist at MU. Well, assistant archivist. Professor Marvell’s the boss.”

  Daniel’s teeth, perfectly aligned, gleamed movie-star white. Whatever else they had in Chelsea, they had killer orthodontists. “You don’t call him Theophilus?”

  “No way. He’s definitely Professor to me.”

  “Me, too.”

  “Not like he’d get mad, but anything else wouldn’t sound right. He’s got like this—” Sean hunted for the right word.

  “Authority?” Daniel suggested.

  That’s what you got for reading as many books as Eddy: a quick-draw vocabulary. “Yeah, authority. Where’d you go with him today?”

  Daniel foot-scrabbled his empty backpack into reach, then folded it. “I’ve never been to Arkham, so he was showing me around.

  “Did you go to Horrocke’s Bookstore?”

  Daniel nodded. “That back room’s amazing.”

  “Where the tomes are?”

  “Exactly.”

  Should Sean ask about the real secret of the North End? Why not. “Did you go to Geldman’s Pharmacy?”

  Not satisfied with his first go at the pack, Daniel shook it out and straightened the straps. “Yeah, we walked by.”

  “Was it, you know, open?”

  Daniel nodded. “But we didn’t go inside. He was out sweeping the sidewalk. He said he’d seen you earlier, and a young lady. That must have been Eddy?”

  Like Sean hung with a few dozen young ladies. Still, nice of Daniel to give him the benefit of the doubt. “We went to Tumblebee’s. The pharmacy looked closed, but he let us see him when we were leaving. So we wouldn’t worry he’d kicked or something.”

  Daniel shelved his pack and rested his hands on his knees. They did have scars, thin red lines on the inner sides of the fingers. “Mr. Geldman can’t, can he? Die, I mean.”

  “I don’t know. I think he’s super old, at least.”

  “Like Redemption Orne?”

  Hearing the name from someone who had no reason to know it made Sean kick the recliner leg rest down too hard, smack. “You’ve heard about him?”

  Daniel blinked. “A little, from Professor Marvell.”

  Heard about Orne and how he’d gone after Sean? But chill: After all, Helen had told him and Eddy personal stuff about Daniel. “Orne’s been around for three hundred thirty-eight years. Maybe Geldman’s been around even longer, if you can believe it.”

  “I can believe a lot more than I used to.” Daniel took a deep breath. “What Professor Marvell said about Orne wanting you for an apprentice and sending you that spell? I was like, this Sean guy’s incredible, summoning a familiar the first magic he ever did. That’s major league.”

  Sean felt a cheeks-to-neck burn of gratification. “But, see, I summoned the wrong familiar.”

  “You got rid of it, though.”

  Marvell must have left out all the shit that had gone down between the summoning and dismissing. Maybe sometime Sean would tell Daniel the whole cautionary tale. “Well, after a bunch of other people helped me. So. Anyway. What did you do to get here?”

  “Nothing much. No real magic.”

  “Then why’s the Order think you’re magic-capable?”

  “More because of my family. They say there’ve been a lot of magicians on my mother’s side. Including my mother.”

  “I get it from my mom, too! Not that I knew for sure until last year. Did you know about your mom all along?”

  “No, not really.” Daniel went to the door. “Eddy’s calling us.”

  The guy had good ears—Sean heard her only when he followed Daniel into the hall, and by the time he’d grabbed a hoodie from his room, Daniel was swinging around the second-floor newel post and onto the last flight down.

  4

  Helen drove them to Mama Jo’s in Kingsport, Sean’s favorite pizza joint east of Providence. Afterwards they hung out in the common room, where Helen and Sean played cutthroat Scrabble and goofed on how Eddy and Daniel, busy at the shelves, kept discovering they’d read the same book.

  With so little sleep the night before, Sean crashed early, and if any ghosts visited him, he slept through the electromagnetic field fluctuation. He’d have slept through breakfast if Eddy hadn’t pounded on his door. Daniel, on the other hand, had been up long enough to make a mushroom frittata. Seriously, a mushroom frittata, plus home fries. Helen and Eddy had brunchgasms, and Sean had to admit that the guy could cook. Nobody was going to be impressed on Sean’s days to fix breakfast, but at least Daniel wasn’t all Iron Chef about it. Helen’s compliments turned his face tomato red, and he snuck apologetic glances at Sean like, Dude, did I overdo it?

  Yeah, but chowing on his third slice of frittata, Sean could forgive him. Besides, he was too stoked about the meeting with Helen and Marvell to work up a good surge of resentment. Pretty soon he’d know who his mentor was (had to be Geldman). Maybe the mentor (Geldman) would even pop in. Plus Helen would reveal what she’d told Dad on the phone, which wasn’t that Sean was getting expelled before he started, so how bad could her big secret be?

  Marvell arrived as they came up from the kitchen. Eddy immediately went fan girl on him: “Whoa, Professor! That’s an awesome tan.”

  Marvell’s white-toothed smile made his skin look even darker. “Thanks, Eddy. Two months in Greece helped.”

  “Were you on an archaeological dig?”

  “No, just visiting relatives.”

  Oh, right, because Marvell’s mother was Greek, which explained his dark brown hair and eyes and that scary first name of Theophilus. To poke at Eddy, Sean asked, “Your relatives aren’t archaeologists, Professor?”

  Marvell must not have realized it was a joke, because he didn’t smile when he turned to Sean. “I’m afraid not, Sean. Glad to see you arrived without incident.”

  “No problems. Eddy drove.”

  “Ah, that explains it.” Marvell smiled again, at Daniel. “Good morning. All well?”

  “All well, Professor.”

  “To business, then. Let the tyranny of the alphabet prevail, Glass before Wyndham.”

  “I’ll warm up the rack for you,” Daniel whispered before following Marvell and Helen into the library.

  Eddy curled up in a front parlor armchair and started rerereading Franny and Zooey. Apparently, Daniel was also rerereading it, so they could analyze the book together at lunch. That sounded like so much fun that Sean went out to watch carpenters lay the carriage house subfloor. He’d helped Joe-Jack lay floors, but the foreman here gave him dirty looks if he drifted near the work zone. His loss—Sean would have worked for nothing to pass the long hour before Daniel came outside, his pale skin flushed. “Was it that bad?”

  “No. It was good. You better go in.”

  After a pit stop to wash off secondhand construction grime, Sean slipped into the library. Marvell sat at the head of the conference table, with Helen to his right. The chair to Marvell’s left was askew, so Daniel must have sat there. Good enough for Daniel, good enough for Sean. “So,” Marvell said as he settled in. “How’s the carriage house coming? The crew must have arrived by now.”

  They hadn’t heard the nail guns? Come to listen, Sean didn’t hear t
hem either, even though the windows were open and the chirrup of sparrows drifted in from the side garden. “Yeah, and they’re making a racket.”

  “But not in here,” Helen said.

  “Is it magic?”

  “A ward that filters out unwanted noise,” Marvell said. “Too bad we can’t ward away the mess, but it’ll be worth it once the Order’s housed in one building instead of scattered around campus.”

  “And the basement, Professor? Looks like it’s going to be a vault.”

  Marvell’s eyebrows arched. “Part of it will be. We’ve collected many irreplaceable items, some dangerous. That area will be closed to students, of course.”

  In fortune-teller singsong, Helen added, “But someday you’ll have a key to all the mysteries.”

  “Nobody has that key,” Marvell said, so totally serious that Helen got busy with the canary yellow binder in front of her. To Sean, he said, “You saw Orne’s aether-newt the other night?”

  So the small talk was over. “Yeah, Professor. But it didn’t bring any message. Not unless the way it wags its tail means something.”

  “The gestures probably have meaning for its master and his regular contacts. Helen says you spoke to the newt. Do you think that was a good idea?”

  Marvell had borrowed Dad’s you-screwed-up voice, and his Back Bay accent made it sound even more ominous. “I didn’t think it would matter. I mean, I didn’t tell it any secrets.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I asked why it was letting me see it. All it did was flick its tail, like it was flipping me the bird.” Marvell gazed at him unamused, but there was no going back. “So I told it and Orne to fuck off.”

  As if Marvell smelled something nasty, his nostrils flared. “In those exact words?”

  “Uh, yeah. Then the newt disappeared.”

  “I don’t suppose it did any harm, Theo?” Helen put in. “Orne did provoke Sean, showing him the newt.”

  Sean nodded. “Like he did it to prove he’d keep stalking me even though I’d picked the Order over him.”

  “And how would Orne know you’d picked the Order? Have you talked outside the warded houses about studying with us?”