by Jason Winn
On one side was Nancy Mosby’s perfect script. It read: “Scout-Munk. Species: Siberian Chipmunk. Instructions: Say instructions and inhale aroma on return. View journey. Acquired 1961. Harbin, China.”
To Madison’s relief, checking under the parchment of the Scout-Munk’s drawer-mates revealed more note cards. At least Grandmother had seen fit to document everything.
She pulled out her phone and saw that she’d been down there for over an hour and felt a twinge of guilt for making the twins stand out in the rain for that long.
Resolute that she would return as soon as she could and spend as much time as possible, Madison closed the drawer and walked back into the central library room to pick the next door. She needed to hurry up.
The door to the left was next. More blue light greeted her, along with row after row of seven-foot-tall cabinets. These were similar to the other room, except that all the cabinets had doors on them like wardrobes. Deciding not to waste time marveling at the size of this room—Madison figured it was about the same size as the other one—she walked over to the closest cabinet and opened it.
Inside was a row of women’s clothing, old women’s clothing, along with the strong smell of cedar. Madison recognized relics from the 70s: blouses with embroidered accents, wide collars and earth-tone colors. She fanned through bell bottoms, flower print, silk shirts, knitted polos and checkered slacks.
Everything has a purpose.
If only there was an inventory somewhere that told her what everything really was, that would make things easier, but everything had to be a goddamned struggle to figure out, and the Shiloh Library wasn’t giving up its secretes as easily as Madison hoped.
As coincidence would have it, most of the garments looked like she could wear them. Tags with handwritten notes dangled from the hangers. Block letters spelled out “spirit suit” on several of them.
Madison had the same tall, thin frame as her grandmother. She wanted to just take a few things and get moving.
Why didn’t I bring my backpack? Dumbass, Madison.
She needed to find something she could carry a few choice items back in. That seemed preferable to simply balling them up and tucking them under her arm. Plus, while the twins seemed reliable enough, maybe they didn’t need to see what was down in the library.
Got to keep moving. Need to get a plan going when I get back to the mansion to come back and tear this place apart.
Stored in the fifth cabinet was an array of purses and bags. Madison found an empty leather messenger bag, opened it and went back to the first cabinet. Gently removing each corresponding tag, she grabbed a pair of pinstripe jeans, a red, knitted polo shirt, a blue, paisley silk dress and a leather jacket with a leopard print lining, which she’d found while looking for the messenger bag; was now bulging with clothes.
On to the next room.
The third room housed rows of books on metal shelves. Madison walked a few steps down the back of the room, to find a desk with a single chair next to it. The scents of leather, oil and dust wafted through the room.
Madison imagined Nancy taking a break from the trials of running Blue Petal International and coming here to read. Or, did Nancy do that out of necessity? Maybe it had been lonely for her here.
The stillness of the rooms reminded her of her mother’s storage space, in the basement of her condo building. The same space where Shelby had pulled a gun on her back in November, crying about her kids burning.
The kids hadn’t been on fire and after whatever Margaret had done to her, Shelby was back to her normal, manic self; carrying on with the life of a working mom with twin boys. That was one thing that had worked out: Shelby was okay.
Bankers’ boxes, and a few cabinets like the ones in the first room, mixed with the bookshelves. Tubes of various sizes sat in stacks, like neatly piled logs. Everything begged to be read or at the very least, touched.
Pressed for time, she walked down one row of shelves, running her finger along the spines. The words that weren’t faded were mostly in languages she didn’t recognize.
One gold-embossed tome caught her eye. She pulled it out and opened it to the first page. The title read Magiske Uddannelse. The next line down said, “English translation—Alexander Hamilton.” The final line read, “Property of Commander’s Library, Fort Black Rocks, Nevis.” There was no copywrite date or printing company name.
The pages felt thick, almost like leather instead of paper, and they were filled with handwritten words, calligraphy, in black ink. Penciled notes in a foreign language filled the margins, as if someone was trying to translate it back into another language.
Madison picked a random passage on page twenty-three. “A sorcerer’s journey begins with touching a pilot stone, cut from the mother star that fell to earth centuries ago (see appendix F for a list of all known pilot stones and their respective locations). From there, the study and practice of magic is a slow and tedious journey. The new magical mind must be gradually honed like the edge of a fine sword.”
I guess Langston was right, she thought. But where are all the pilot stones? Was there a cache of them waiting for her in one of the other rooms? And if she found one, did she really want to touch it? Did she want magical powers? That meant studying spells. That would take precious time she didn’t have. Had Grandmother touched one? Could that have driven her away almost eight years ago? Madison had come out here to get answers; instead she’d found a vast new world that begged to be meticulously explored.
While it was clear it would take years to go through everything just in this room, she was starting to get anxious, realizing that she should have at least gone back up and told the twins to go back to the camp and warm up. And, she didn’t want to leave Sarah wondering where she was, and she still had a several hours of hiking back to her car from the camp.
Madison carefully returned the book to its resting place. She wanted to stay, but the last room warranted a quick peek, before she headed back up to the surface.
Feeling the toll of being on her feet all day, and not getting enough sleep last night, Madison opened the last door.
“Hello! Now, we’re fucking talking.”
Chapter 11
Shelby’s third meeting of the morning ran thirty minutes over. Agent Greg Cassidy would not shut up about how ridiculous it was that he was getting assigned to babysit some mob trial witness.
“I mean, you know what I’m talking about, right?” asked Greg.
“Yes, Greg. No one likes this, but in the end Assistant Director Jensen is the boss.”
“Yeah, well, I should write a memo.”
“You do that.” And, it will be the end of your career...and the agency will be better off.
Shelby did her best to empathize with the little whiner, but she eventually had to walk out of the room. Her daily life at the FBI seemed to be nothing but meetings and reports. Having watched Silence of the Lambs in high school, she wanted to be Agent Starling; out there in the field, making a difference, using her wits, training and courage to take down some sort of criminal mastermind.
That’s not at all what ended up happening. After her time in the academy at Quantico, she was assigned to the Salt Lake City field office, which may as well have been on Mars to her. It was a daily grind of meetings with other agencies, the DEA, IRS, and US Marshals; reviewing the psychological profiles of tax cheats, cop killers, drug lords. Some days it was Border Patrol or INS, other days it was the Department of Interior folks about poachers. Every now and again she’d be assigned to give a talk to SWAT teams in the region about nonviolent conflict resolution, a subject few SWAT guys wanted to hear about.
Right around the time her grandmother disappeared, Shelby was promoted and assigned to the Atlanta field office, where she met her husband Jacob. A few years later, she made it to the center of the FBI universe, the J. Edgar Hoover building in Washington, DC. Jacob willingly moved, happy to get away from his “crazy” family. They weren’t that crazy in Shelby’s opinion. They w
ere just a little more vocal in expressing their concern for him marrying an FBI agent than he wanted to hear.
It was noon and the office was clearing out for lunch. On the way back to her office, she stopped at her admin’s desk. “Tanya, I’ll be in SCIF for a bit.”
“Okay,” said Tanya, not bothering to look up from her monitor.
The Sensitive Compartmentalized Information Facility, or SCIF for short, pronounced “skiff,” was the super-secure computer room in the basement of the J. Edgar Hoover building. All of the highly classified information the FBI needed to be keep secure from foreign intelligence, pissed-off hackers, and most importantly, the American media, resided on computers in the SCIF.
Shelby had virtually unfettered access to this information as the deputy director of national intelligence. Her role at the bureau was to elicit information from persons, residing in the US, who may be able to assist in upcoming or ongoing FBI investigations. She had contacts from street thugs to the corporate elite who would be willing to tell her, or one of her agents, anything. In some cases, that information came at a cost. Others gave it up willingly, wanting to be good little citizens and help out Uncle Sam.
After leaving her cell phone in the cubby outside the SCIF, Shelby sat down at a computer terminal and logged in. Protocol prohibited any outside electronic devices in the secure room. Almost everyone was still out to lunch, so there was little chance of someone coming up and bothering her.
At the information search screen, she put in the word “moonmilk” and waited for the results. She could feel her heartbeat quicken as the computer churned on the search term. And at that point, Shelby wondered if she really wanted to know what would come up. This was career poison, using government assets for personal work. She hadn’t slept at all last night, wondering if the search would find anything.
“Hey, Shelby.”
Shelby almost jumped out of her seat. She turned to see Cilia walking over to her. The twenty-something woman wore a smile and her usual “I don’t ever get to leave this basement” sweater and jeans.
“Cilia,” Shelby replied, as calmly as she could.
Cilia was part computer technician assigned to the SCIF and part expert assistance. She mainly helped all the old men who had to come in here from time to time and couldn’t be bothered to learn how to use a cell phone, let alone the state-of-the-art data mining software the bureau employed. She held a top-secret clearance, which meant she never spoke of anything she saw in the secure room.
“You okay, girl?” asked Cilia. She stood on the other side of the desk, not able to see what Shelby was typing.
“Yes, of course I am. Why?”
“You look like you’re about to puke all over that screen.”
Shit, is it that obvious? Shelby realized the flaw in her plan—Cilia would have no one to help during lunch in the SCIF. So, that actually drew more attention to her.
“I’m fine. I’m just starving, but I’ve got this...this thing I need to check out before I go to lunch.”
“You need help with anything?”
“No, thanks.”
“Come on, let me take care of the search and you can go on to lunch. Files will be waiting for you in your account, when you get back.”
The screen mercifully returned the search results—none.
Shelby let out a sigh. “Nothing.” She was both relieved and concerned. Relieved that whatever this Moonmilk was, it wasn’t a code word for a chemical weapon or new superbug. On the “new search” screen, Shelby entered in “Rose Widow,” only to wait and see the same results—”none.” But she wasn’t going to let this go.
No way this is a dead end.
She pursed her lips and shook her head.
“Can’t find what you’re looking for, eh?” said Cilia. “You might try the physical archives. You never know.” She was referring to the zillion metric tons of paper files, still waiting to be digitally scanned and archived into the bureau’s computer systems. The problem was these were stored in warehouses up in Pennsylvania, and responses from the physical archive department could take a week or more. Just kill me now. Shelby shuddered at thinking what a mess she would be if she had to go a full week without sleep. She wasn’t in college anymore.
Shelby made a show of gratitude. “Good idea. I’ll try them next.”
Defeated, she made her way to the break area on her floor. She pulled out her sodium-laden microwave crap, nuked it and trudged back to her desk.
As she choked down her lunch, Shelby filled out the search request for the archive department, knowing she’d get the same results as she did back in the SCIF. At least the paper records search was on the FBI’s internal website, so that saved the time it would take to have it sent via the bureau’s courier service. She doubted anything would turn up, but she wasn’t about to leave this option unexplored. She acknowledged the fifty-two paragraphs of FBI policy on paper records searches and hit submit. If anything turned up, an encrypted e-mail would be sent with scanned copies of the files.
The afternoon was full of meetings to look forward to and then soccer practice for the twins, and Jacob wanted to continue binge-watching some show on Netflix she’d lost interest in three episodes ago. But she would miss the soccer practice and Netflix. The last thing she did before rushing off to her next meeting was to pull up the directions to Camp Peterson. She could make it there before sundown.
Chapter 12
Madison gazed at weapons in the final room. Glass and wooden cases were stuffed with swords, axes, bows, muskets, and even a lance. Along another wall, cabinets held neat rows of firearms. She could make out rifles and pistols. Madison’s heart began fluttering at the awesome sight of so much forged steel.
As she walked in she noticed more glass cases to her right, some of which housed musical instruments, paintings, movie posters, and enough jewelry to cover ten kings, a museum of magical ass-kickery. The value of the Shiloh Library just went up exponentially in her estimation.
The need to touch and feel everything was more overwhelming than ever in this room, and for good reason.
Nope, nope, nope. Madison kept reminding herself that she needed to stay just long enough to do a quick mental inventory and be on her way. But, oh, the toys. She wanted to take everything from this room back to the mansion. That’s where all of this really belonged, right?
But no, she told her inner adolescent. And besides, how was she also going to carry a bastard sword all the way back to the car, without anyone seeing her, without anyone—with a badge—stopping her and taking her shiny new toy away?
No. She had to be sensible. Figuring out the powers of the clothes alone would probably take months. Finding some sort of master manual or at least an inventory would be the top priority for the next trip. Whenever that was going to be. Plus, there was always the possibility that there was one hiding in the mansion somewhere, but, Madison thought, that would leave too much to chance. It wouldn’t do for some burglar to find a manifest of the world’s most powerful magical items lying around the mansion. That sort of thing would easily end up with someone bound to a chair with a gun to their head.
Someone like Reese. Madison had repressed her feelings about his murder. The only thing she’d said to people was that it was a random act of violence. Everyone believed the police report that said Reese had been carjacked and shot. That was the story that fit with how he was found, his car missing and his body on the side of the road. The cops had been quick and polite. Letting her know that her boyfriend was dead, and that had been all.
Madison considered how Reese had unknowingly died to protect the place where she was standing right now. He never knew what it was, or what was in it. Reese was a soldier that died in the war’s first battle, never knowing the outcome.
The war isn’t over, and it looks like I’ve got the biggest armory now.
A silver ring caught her eye. That was small enough to walk out with. Who would say anything about that? Madison opened a cabinet door, pulled
out a tray of gem-covered gold and silver rings, and took one of silver with a black onyx stone. She slid it on her finger, slid the tray back into place and closed the cabinet.
Her legs ached as if she’d been dicing vegetables for Sky Garden’s buffet for the last eight hours. She took one last glance at the armory and walked out of the room.
As she was about to ascend the ladder back to the surface, she darted back into the animal room. With the greatest care she removed the Scout Munk drone from his wooden cubby, along with the parchment paper—that little guy had to have some practical use—and put him, or her, into the messenger bag, with the clothes.
A moment later, she was climbing back up the ladder, granny glasses resting on her nose. She was met with the soggy air and it felt as though her clothes gained ten pounds from all the humidity.
“That didn’t take long,” Lammy shouted.
The twins were right where she’d left them, standing right outside the metal shed.
“Yeah, sorry I was down there for so long.”
The two men could barely hold back raucous laughter.
“I mean,” Buddy said, trying to cover his mouth, “we’ve been out here for an entire minute, young lady.”
“What?” Madison wasn’t getting the joke. She was tired and just wanted to sit down. She pulled off the glasses and stuffed them in her pocket.
“You see, Nancy did some other witchcraft to this place, we didn’t get a chance to tell you.”
“What’s that?” Madison asked with all the enthusiasm of a teenage girl trying to get away from her parents. What the hell difference did it make? Could they just get going?
“You’re never down there for more than one minute. Doesn’t matter how long you’re actually down there, you’re only down for one minute. You could have stayed down there for a year and we’d never know.”
Just like that Stephen King book about killing Kennedy, with the whole two-minute time travel thing. Neato. Maybe he’d met Nancy once and gotten the idea from her, who the fuck cared at this point? It was sittin’ and drinkin’ time.