All the books are on the left with various reading areas in the center part of the back end of the building. On the right is the help desk with its book return slot facing the doors, the library offices just beyond a door behind the desk, and a central archive for certain sensitive magic tomes that cannot leave the library. There are persistent rumors that the real Necronomicon is stored in these files, but…well, let’s just say some stories aren’t worth looking into too deeply.
Some people spend all their days here, but not me. Most days, I’m tied up with running the Angel Apothecary, a family business which specializes in all natural (with the occasional bit of supernatural) cures for my many clients. I’ll never get rich running it, but I’ll never starve either. But, this day, I was in the library on business…well, civic duty mixed with a bit of business.
I love the place I’ve called home all my life, enough to help out when the local constabulary ask me to help combat the fallout of a major drug epidemic. Of course, Millie would add that when the request comes from one David Trew, I’m twice as inclined to be helpful.
Whatever the reason, I was quick to offer my services as mentioned above. And so here I was, poring over the shelves of the public magical section, enjoying the rich texture of the leather bound volumes as I pulled them from their slots. There were any number of Unawakened people who came to peruse this section as well as Awakened witches like me. But the contents of these shelves were deemed fairly harmless by the library staff, so that anyone could check out these volumes. Still, what I was looking at turned out to be anything but what I was looking for.
The leader of my cat-pack, Onyx, was by my knees as I crouched down to pull a hefty tome from the lower shelf, and jumped a little as I slammed the third of four books on Egyptian magic shut. I have another seven of these furry creatures back at the Angel Apothecary, where I work. You’ll find out more about the other cats and The Angel in due course, of course!
“I take it that one was less than sufficient?” Onyx asked, taking a break from his earnest face washing.
"You missed a spot," I noted, pointing to a smudgy bit of grime at the top of his left ear. Onyx didn't hesitate to give his ear another once-over with a freshly licked paw.
FUN FACT: When cats speak, they tend to use about sixteen “cat words” to talk. All the Unawakened ever hear are various meows from my cats. But I can hear them talking just like I would any other human out there.
“Not only is this one less than sufficient,” I said of the Egyptian Lore book Onyx was referring to. "They all are!"
I shoved the volume back into its place on the shelf. “Egypt was one of the greatest civilizations on the planet, had a magical tradition that stretched across four thousand years and the most this library has is four lousy books on its lore?!”
“Careful,” Onyx said, his bright eyes shifting to the right. A woman in her mid-twenties and her little girl were staring at me as if I’d grown another head.
“I talk to my cat sometimes when I’m frustrated,” I explained. It was the truth. But they didn’t need to know about the part where the cat talked back.
The alarmed look on the woman’s face remained as the pair of them walked away. The little girl giggled -- maybe because Onyx's ear was inside out from his vigorous cleaning efforts.
“This library allows for the presence of familiar creatures like myself, Hattie,” Onyx patiently reminded me, one ear in, one ear out. “But we need to be more cautious about certain laws. In particular, the ones about not revealing what we truly are to the Unawakened public.”
I nodded at the sage advice from my head kitty. Onyx was always right and this was a bitter-sweet arrangement for me. Sometimes I wanted to be right, you know? His infinite wisdom was why he was the unofficial Captain of his brother and sister cats under my roof.
Their official name was The Lemniscate, but I preferred to call them The Infiniti. It seemed a lot less archaic and took a lot less explaining to inquiring minds. Onyx, of course, still upheld the honorable Lemniscate label, and I admit it did sound cute when he used it, usually when introducing himself and his brothers (and sister) to an Awakened person. He would often take a regal bow as he uttered the ancient word to an impressed audience. The Infiniti were a family heirloom, passed down the generations from time immemorial on my mother’s side. The Infiniti were immortal, in case you hadn’t clued in on that yet. The Lemniscate symbol -- a horizontal “8” -- is the symbol for infinity.
I was looking over the last book (and finding nothing useful) when someone else walked into view. I, thankfully, could afford to be a little less discreet with David Trew. Not for the first time, it struck me that he could hide behind those John Lennon glasses all he wanted. It would never mask the romance cover model good looks hiding underneath his garb. But that was something you noticed second. The first thing that got your attention was the way he carried himself. David moved with authoritative ease, an attractive certainty in his every step and gesture.
Today, he was wearing his usual worse-for-wear suit that had been washed one too many times, complete with faded red tie. In his hands, he had a book of his own. I recognized it from a quick glance at the cover, a “lost” treatise on foreign chemical substances by Paracelsus.
“Having any more luck than I am?” David asked as he knelt down to mine and Onyx’s level.
“Put it this way,” I said with a weary sigh. “There are only three books on Egyptian magical lore -- four if you count the Book of the Dead -- in the whole library, and the last one is in my hand.”
David scanned the shelves before us. “I don’t get it. The Romani lore is well represented here—“
“That’s an understatement,” I muttered, contemplating the entire row of bulging shelves on the subject.
“But everything else is given short shrift,” David finished. “Egyptian lore, Babylonian, Norse, Greek…these are not the sort of things that would be left out by anyone who is genuinely interested in representing the ancient arts.”
“My customers complain about this all the time,” I said, tapping my finger on the hardcover of the book I was holding. “But it wasn’t until today that I now know what everyone's getting so heated about. I had no idea it was this bad. What is Druida up to, exactly?"
I wondered about our zany librarian's behavior of late. She seemed to have taken on an unhealthy leaning toward Romani lore and nothing else. Strange, for someone who allegedly hailed from the Celtic Shores.
"The irony is that I’m not even looking for the magical practices here. I just wanted to see if there were any promising substances that could help us counteract the Strand psychosis.”
“You’re sure that you went over everything your grandma left you?” David asked, his tone unconsciously switching to the one he used in interrogation.
“Twice,” I replied. “I’ve even combed through the Book of Shadows section of Grandma’s journal, which is something I usually refuse to do…but, no, nothing.”
David gave me a sympathetic look. He knew the reasons I refused to practice magic. He had a few of his own for not dabbling in the arts himself. But the way things had worked out over the last little while, I was doing a heck of a lot more magic than I was comfortable with and not always voluntarily, I might add.
“Alchemy section is slightly better stocked,” David said, holding up his book. “Not sure there’s anything in here that might help. Paracelsus, from all the accounts I've read so far, was an egomaniac who refused to believe there was an alchemist out there better than him.”
“He is where we get the word ‘bombastic’ from,” I said, feeling a smile come on my face as I remember how that word had been derived from Paracelsus’ last name: Bombast.
“Sure, but he did know a lot about strange substances,” David said. “I figured even he would have heard of the Strands of Araby, being as they were blowing across the sand-lands, even in his day.”
I shrugged. It was a reasonable hypothesis.
“Just t
he same, acknowledging, let alone battling, drug addiction, didn’t really get started until the early 20th Century, even in our circles,” I pointed out. “Are you sure—”
“Not really,” David admitted with a sigh. “But alchemists are usually pretty good when it comes to finding antidotes to lethal substances, and the Strands are just that, in large enough or frequent enough doses.”
I grunted in frustration. "What about old Aurel Nugget? Can we ask him?
I thought back to poor Orville sinking into Stranded oblivion at Midnight Hill as I added, "Surely he'd be more than invested in finding a cure for his boy?"
Onyx grunted himself and said, “Good thinking, Hattie.”
“Aurel Nugget is exactly the man we need, it's true,” David admitted. “The only snag is that he has already jumped in on this one. Being the faithful and thorough scientist he is, he dabbled in the Strands himself to determine their effects. He wanted to save Orville, so he thought he could find a cure by making himself the test subject. Poor guy is now in a padded cell in the Shadowlands Institution on Nanker. No room at Midnight Hill, as you can imagine from our last visit, or he would have been there with Orville. In any case, he is about as capable as his son right now. ”
My shoulders slumped at the news. So the father-son duo of esteemed alchemists were out of the picture.
David exhaled a weary breath. "But, I swear to the Lady, Hat, if I find anything promising, anything that might be able to help, you'll be the first to know."
‘The Lady’ David was talking about is Lady Justitia; spiritual patron of the Coven Isles various constabularies. To swear by her was as solemn an oath as any law enforcement officer could make.
“Like I’d doubt that you would, CPI Trew,” I said with a resigned smile. “By the way, did you hear the news about Milosh Besnick?”
“Sure,” David confessed as we both got to our feet and I took hold of the kitty leash once again. “We got the news of the ruling before the press did…denied parole and left to rot in Steeltrap Penitentiary for the rest of his natural, rotten life. It’s just what that old Strands kingpin deserved.”
“For all the good it’s doing our current situation,” I noted, my lips turning into a sour frown. “I guess they still haven’t nailed him for his cruel sideline, then? It might add a few years to life sentence. No disrespect to the SPCA, but they haven’t really done much on that front.”
“I know, I know,” David said with a weariness only a career cop could pull off. “I don’t like the idea of Sabretooth tigers getting poached for their teeth any more than the Supernatural Protective Coven Association does. But comparing his animal trade on those Siberian steppes with what's happening here? Well, what we have here is a little more pressing right now.”
“Didn’t really solve the problem either,” I added, my eyes scanning the shelves in one last desperate attempt to find a potentially valuable edition. “I mean if Milosh's imprisonment had wiped out the trade—”
“Never going to happen,” David said with a shake of his head. “Crime is like any other business; if there’s a market, there will be suppliers. You can wipe out one cartel and another will pop up in an instant. Still, things didn’t get this bad until that civil war in Yemen I told you about broke out.”
I sighed, getting back to my feet. “Hopefully, I’ll eventually find something that will work.”
“Don’t doubt it for a minute,” David said, giving my shoulder a friendly squeeze.
The electricity leaped from his hand and into my skin. Concerning the two of us, these charged exchanges tended to happen a lot. But we never talked about it; never acknowledged it. We just usually did what we did right then: ignored it completely.
“I’ll see you later at the shop, okay?” he asked, a little too quickly.
“Sure,” I said back with a smile that I hoped didn’t look too forced.
Onyx looked as though he wanted to say something about this. I just glared at him. Not one word, kitty. He looked back at me, his face serene, wise, his tail circling in a composed dance of restraint. Then his shoulders started shaking, and then his eyes clenched up, and then my main moggie was convulsing in fits of laughter. In fairness to him, he tried to hide his mirth behind both of his paws, To no avail, however. I just rolled my eyes. Not going there. Shaking my head, I walked up to the front desk to speak to Druida Stone, Gless Inlet's head librarian, about the poor book selection.
Now, if someone were new to Glessie, they’d wonder why I was getting so tense about going to see our head librarian about finding more books than were currently on the shelves. After all, that is what librarians are supposed to help with, among other things.
Nor, in looking at Druida Stone, would you necessarily conclude that you had anything to worry about. She was somewhere in her mid-forties but could pass herself off as late twenties easily. She wore way too much make-up, but you could still make out a swarthy complexion underneath the face paint. I’d have pegged her for Mediterranean if I hadn’t heard that her heritage was from the Celtic Shores. Even with the thick application of foundation, you would swear she wasn’t a day over twenty-five. Her skin was flawless, and not for the first time, I idly wondered what her skincare regime was.
While her clothes were professionally cut, they were also professionally crazy. Druida chose some seriously gaudy fashion items that included huge hoop earrings, and a multi-hued vest with all manner of mythical creatures emblazoned on its surface.
Today she was wearing a boldly colored paisley silk scarf, which, on closer inspection, looked like it was adorned with a hundred different hued snakes. The jeweled tones seemed to coil together and slither across the fabric.
Glessie's librarian had taken to wearing outlandish hats and shoes too, just recently. Currently, she had a basket of fruit and taxidermied birds on her head. I spotted her banana yellow shoes when I first entered the library. As if the banana color wasn't a bad enough choice for footwear, Druida had opted for a pair that featured plastic bananas on the uppers too.
Somehow, the old witch did manage some kind of restraint with the rest of her attire. Underneath all the brash colors and textiles, she wore a plain gray, conservative suit, one you'd expect to see any sane librarian wearing, in fact.
Druida's curves were subtle, yet shapely. She attended Woga classes so frequently that she now taught a class herself once a week. Witch Yoga. Hmm, I should probably start thinking about taking a class or two myself. I felt my jiggling thighs tense at the prospect of a hot Woga class. Focus, Hattie. Focus.
I approached the counter tentatively, forcing a smile that likely didn't even touch my eyes. I was hoping for a pleasant exchange, but I also knew that if pleasantness came out of this, it would be a very rare occurrence.
“Yes?” Druida snapped in her high, querulous voice. The sound of it had my shoulders hunched up in defense as soon as I neared her domain. Her eyes were hard, black beads, and she stared imperiously down the bridge of her slender nose at me. So much for hope.
“I was wondering if you had any more books on traditional Egyptian magic behind the counter? Or in the archives?” I asked, doing my best to keep my tone neutral and professional.
“Why would you bother?” she asked back in that hard-to-place accent that sounded anything but Gaelic. Could Druida, in fact, be Bitchanian? Or Hardasslish? “If it is not in the Romany section, then it is not worth knowing.”
She scowled. Her words were clipped and forceful. As if she had just rammed them down my throat without my consent.
I bristled a little. “This isn’t about building a better love potion. I honestly think that some information on the Egyptian arts could help me combat a public health crisis.”
“What, Strands?” Druida asked dismissively. “I would think that you are taking this opportunity, like any other successful businesswoman, in making a profit off any ‘cure’ you might find.”
She went back to her work in front of her, apparently thinking that the conversation was
over. But this was the point where Druida’s words were abusing my patience the same way her fashion choices were assaulting my eyeballs.
Still, I made one last try at civility. Um, sort of, anyway. “Whatever money I might make from a cure is irrelevant. I’m more concerned about finding a cure."
And then I cracked. "Which seems to be more than YOU are doing about the problem right now!” That came out as a bit of a hysterical scream.
My outburst immediately drew a crowd of curious spectators. Given Druida’s reputation, I had a pretty good idea of who this gaggle of Awakened and Unawakened patrons were rooting for.
Druida noticed it too. She then leaned forward on her desk and said with slow, dripping acidity, “You think you’re smarter than me, don’t you?” Her flinty eyes had narrowed to mere slits.
“Not any more than the next girl,” I said with a slight shrug.
“No, no, no,” she countered with a savage smile. “Deep down, you really think that you are smarter than everybody around you. That’s why you’re—”
That did it. I slammed both my hands on the counter with a hollow bang, tugging poor Onyx's head on the kitty leash as I did so. Looking Druida in the eye, I all but roared; “Ms. Stone! I do not say what I do not mean, which is why, right here and right now, I mean it when I say you can go to TARTARUS!” The ultimate insult, Hattie. Was that really called for?
I turned and strutted away from the desk, my face burning red with indignation. Onyx was embarrassed by my lack of control. I could tell because his ears were pressed back and flat against his adorable little head. Everyone else around me, on the other hand, was laughing at what they’d just seen and applauding with the sort of clapping you’d expect from a standing ovation at the theater.
“If it’s any consolation, Hattie,” Onyx said after glancing over his shoulder. “Druida Stone is still looking at you in shock.”
Some of my anger starting to recede, I asked my live-in therapist cat, “Did I just screw up?”
The Witch of Bohemia: A Paranormal Cozy Mystery (Hattie Jenkins & The Infiniti Chronicles Book 3) Page 2