Modern Magick

Jay was waiting for me down in the Waymastery Station. I don’t suppose anybody else calls it that but me, but it’s what it is. Unprepossessing, for all its exalted purpose: just a tiny room in the cellar, unpainted and virtually unfurnished. There’s an ancient henge under the floor, and that’s what Jay uses to whizz us about.

He had a small shoulder bag with him, which he opened when I came in. I took a peek inside, and saw a cloth-wrapped bundle snugly nestled within.

‘Bill?’ I ventured.

‘Bill,’ Jay confirmed.

I patted the bag I carried over my own shoulders. ‘I’ve got your stuff.’ Change of clothes, life-saving magickal artefacts, the usual. Indira had dutifully packed up his personal things and left them out for me, while Jay was off securing the book. I could well imagine his task was not an easy one; nobody wanted to see Bill go, and he had to try to squirrel him away without anybody noticing besides. Anyone but Val, that is.

‘Ready?’ I said, watching Jay’s face. He looked worried. A heavy frown creased his brow, and he couldn’t stand still.

‘Absolutely,’ he said, fidgeting with the strap of his bag.

‘Except?’

The frown deepened. ‘I’m worried about Indira.’

‘She’ll be fine. It’s not like there’s an army of orcs marching upon the House, or anything.’

‘I’m worried about what happens to her if anything happens to me.’

Oh. ‘Er, that’s a bit doomy,’ I tried. ‘We’re not in mortal danger.’

‘Then why the Sunstone?’

‘Bill is in mortal danger.’ I said this in a whisper, hoping that the book was too well wrapped-up to hear me. ‘We aren’t.’

‘She’s shy. It’s hard for her to manage without me.’

‘Even for a week or two? She needs to stand on her own feet sometime, Jay, or she’ll never be independent.’

He scowled at that; I’d irritated him. ‘Let’s go, anyway.’

‘If I may be permitted my opinion,’ said Bill, his voice doubly muffled by the cloth wrappings and the bag. ‘The little Spellwright is in no danger, either of harm or mortification.’

‘How do you know?’ said Jay snappishly.

‘She and I have had conversation together. I found her to be bright-minded, and more resilient than elder brothers are inclined to imagine.’

The fact that Bill and Indira had been chatting together was news to me, though perhaps not to Jay, for he just gave me a sideways look and then went on with his preparations to leave. ‘I hope you’re right,’ he said to Bill. I have no idea what he does when he’s making ready to use the Ways, so I just stand back and try to keep out of his way.

A breeze picked up in the room, and began to build. ‘Off we go,’ said Jay, and held out a hand to me.

I took it. Since I met Jay, I have had a little practice at travelling the Ways. Enough to know that it is a disorienting experience, and can leave a person feeling unpleasantly shaken up in the middle. It appears to have an even greater impact upon Jay, but he went about his work with an enviable composure, and betrayed no further signs of unease.

I do wish he had warned me before departure, however. Last time, we had waited until the Winds of the Ways had gathered themselves to quite a height before we set off. This time, the breeze had barely doubled in strength. There I was, tranquil enough yet in the expectation of its being a few more minutes before we would be going anywhere—

—and then I was away, tossing about in the wind like a miserable little leaf and clinging fiercely to Jay while the currents rattled my teeth and did awful things to my hair.

When the winds died down, they left us marooned on top of a low hill looking out over an expanse of drab fields. Stone monuments rose around us, which at first glance I took to be your typical ancient megalithic arrangement — except that, at a second look, the stones looked oddly new.

‘I forgot to ask where you were taking us,’ I said, a little breathless.

‘Milton Keynes.’ Jay sat cross-legged upon the ground in a pose of studied nonchalance, and looked around with more apparent satisfaction than I was feeling.

‘Milton Keynes.’ I got to my feet and took a couple of breaths, waiting until my knees steadied.

‘Yes.’

‘But why.’

‘Because of all the places you and I might heroically flee with a magickal book, who’d ever think of Milton Keynes?’

Who indeed. ‘And what in the name of Milady’s garters is this?’ I flicked a finger at the nearest lovely, smooth stone.

‘A new henge.’

‘A new henge?’

‘It isn’t their age that makes them effective, you know.’ Jay picked himself up with some care, and squared his shoulders. ‘Built last decade. Part of the city plan.’

One of the hazards of my trade: a tendency to start making overly simplified and accordingly fallible suppositions, for example: the older, the better. ‘I suppose it’s about as reasonable as putting in a train station.’

Jay’s lips quirked in a smile. ‘If only there were a few more Waymasters to make use of them. Somebody had dewy-eyed ideas about training up a lot more of us.’

‘Can’t manufacture that kind of talent.’

‘Apparently not. You okay?’

‘Of course!’ If Jay was determined to be Totally Fine then so was I. I looked around at the uninspiring landscape, and hoisted my bag higher upon my shoulder. ‘What now?’

‘I don’t know. Fancy a cup of tea?’

‘Last one to the cafe’s a rotten egg.’ I began to totter down the hill.

‘Which cafe?’

‘Any!’

But my phone buzzed before I was more than halfway down the hill, and I hastily grabbed it.

‘Ves?’ said Val. ‘Are you all right?’

‘Perfectly. Why wouldn’t I be?’

‘And Jay?’

I looked round to check, if it would make Val happy, and saw Jay wandering down the hill some way behind me, hands in the pockets of his ever-present leather jacket. ‘He’s fine. Val, what’s the matter?’

Val exhaled in a way that filled me with an unreasonable foreboding. How could I be so unsettled by a sigh? ‘Milady had me pull up everything we know about Ancestria Magicka, which proved to be embarrassingly little. So then she had me go comb the world for every new scrap of information I could find — in fact she put the entire library staff on it, and—’

‘Val, the suspense is killing me.’

‘Sorry. Ves, they have a Waymaster.’

I almost dropped the phone. ‘What? How’s that possible?’

‘Imported her from Hungary. She’s been on the job only slightly longer than Jay, but she knows her stuff. Graduate from a top magickal university, comes highly recommended, entire bidding war to employ her. Etc. I’m sending pics. Her name’s Katalin Pataki.’

‘And you think they’ll send her after us.’

‘Well, wouldn’t you? Why did they go to such lengths to get a Waymaster on the staff, if not for occasions like this?’

‘They can’t possibly know where we are, though, can they? Jay picked a destination at random, like Milady said. What are they going to do, travel to every single henge in the entire British Isles looking for us?’

‘Ves, I don’t have time to convey everything I’ve lately learned about this lot, but I’d advise against underestimating them. They may be new, but they’ve already got Milady worried.’

Curses. ‘Thanks, Val.’

‘Be careful.’

I checked the pictures and then put my phone away, a variety of thoughts flitting across my mind. Who were these people? They had gone pretty far afield in search of a Waymaster, and poured buckets of money into securing one. Why?

And if they had those kinds of resources to throw around after less than a year… who the hell was funding them?

‘Jay,’ I said when he reached me. ‘We may have a problem.’

‘Another one?’

I relayed Val’s news, but Jay did not react as I’d expected. He thought for a moment, frowning deeply, and then said: ‘A bidding war?’

‘That’s what she said.’

‘A bidding war?’ He looked thunderstruck. ‘You know, my parents told me not to take the first offer I received. They told me.’

‘So why did you?’

‘The Society’s legend. How could I refuse?’

‘Then it’s no good regretting that your salary isn’t higher. Can we talk about this later?’

‘Right.’ Jay shook himself and began to march off, heading for who-knew-where, but after a few paces he slowed again. ‘Was Bill under guard all night?’

‘No idea. Ask Bill.’

Jay began to root furiously through his bag, and at last extracted the book, stripped of its cloth wrapping. ‘Bill, have you been left alone at any time in the past twelve hours or so?’

‘No, sir!’ said Bill brightly. ‘I have been very much admired, and without pause, ever since the news of my existence was gratifyingly taken up.’

‘By whom?’ I said, warily.

‘Oh, by everyone! My acquaintance has expanded enormously.’

‘Did anyone tamper with you?’ said Jay.

‘Decidedly not!’ said Bill, outraged at the very idea.

But Jay was not satisfied, and neither was I. ‘The problem with Orlando,’ he said, turning Bill around in his hands, ‘is that he’s sometimes too clever by half. Those pearl-things you’ve got, for example; even a non-magicker could use them. A potent spell perfectly encapsulated inside something inoffensive; no particular skill required to use it, and therefore no discernible trace left for a paranoid Waymaster to discern, or even a touchy, overly talkative grimoire of a book…’ As he spoke he was inspecting Bill’s covers and turning over page after page, ignoring the book’s protests that he was a grimoire of enormous ability and no one could conceal a spell between his own pages and hope to escape detection.

‘Ah,’ said Jay then, and took up something that sparkled when he held it up to the afternoon sunlight. It was round, and about an inch across; pale and translucent, so much so that I wondered Jay had spotted it at all. The kind of thing, in short, that no one would much take note of. If you didn’t know better, you might have said it was some kind of sticker, or a patch, or perhaps a bookmark.

‘That’s a tracker spell,’ I gasped. I had seen them before. Orlando’s technicians craft a lot of them, and they’re wildly popular across the Society. These aren’t the type of thing even a non-magicker could use, but they’re among the simplest of charms to manipulate, requiring only a trickle of magick.

Jay tossed it to me. It lay in my palm, warm and faintly buzzing.

I dropped it at once.

‘We’d better go.’ Jay spoke tersely, already packing Bill away into his bag again.

‘My most abject apologies!’ Bill was babbling as Jay closed the bag upon him. ‘I had no notion—’

‘Not your fault, Bill,’ I said. ‘You’ve been out of the game for four centuries.’ I was looking around as I spoke, as though I expected some kind of obvious course of action to occur to me if I moved my neck and blinked enough.

Blank mind. Palpitating heart. Not good.

‘It doesn’t matter where we go as long as we go quickly,’ said Jay, and departed at a jog.

But he was too late, for a flicker of movement atop the hill caught my eye. I stopped, squinting against the light. What was it, a bird? Or worse?

‘Ves!’ yelled Jay behind me.

It was not a bird. A woman stood up there, her figure indistinct in the distance, but I could discern enough to be sure. She matched the photos Val had sent: tall, a shade too thin, long dark hair.

She had a man with her, too. He was holding what looked unpromisingly like a Wand.

I turned tail, and ran like a rabbit after Jay.

Turn page ->

‘Morning!’ I said brightly, and slumped into the vacant chair at Jay’s elbow. ‘Disaster?’

‘Not quite,’ said Jay, and awarded me half a piece of toast slathered in peanut butter. ‘Just some, uh, sub-optimal developments.’

To be honest with you, I really don’t need feeding up; I’m quite comfortably proportioned as it is. But who can resist peanut butter on toast? I skipped over the question of Jay’s inscrutable motives in sharing his food with me — trying not to notice that he was doing the same for Indira — and focused on the article instead. It was light on information and heavy on rumour, but it had the salient facts down: a book featuring a previously unheard of, and extremely powerful, enchantment had come to light, and stood to revolutionise the way magickal libraries operated. They had spared no efforts to promote the story to its widest extent; every page glittered with come-hither-and-read magick.

To my further dismay, there was another picture inside: Jay holding the book.

I jabbed a finger at it. ‘Who took that?’

‘No idea,’ said Rob grimly. ‘But it must have been somebody at Home.’

I glowered into my berry-bowl, and comforted myself with a spoonful of yoghurt. It was one thing for the Society’s members to be a bit too seduced by the marvels of Bill to resist making a trip to see him; it was quite another to sell the story to the media, complete with photos.

‘Does Milady know?’ I asked.

‘We’re preparing a delegation,’ said Rob.

Hence the leaden atmosphere at the table. We were all going to get it in the neck.

‘Straight to bed, and without any supper,’ I said glumly.

‘A thousand lines each,’ added Val. ‘I must not reveal the Society’s secrets to the newspapers.’

Jay said, ‘How long before we get the swarms of reporters beating down the doors?’

‘No need to worry about that,’ said Rob. ‘The House is pretty hard to find, if you’re not familiar with the route.’

Jay looked sceptical. ‘Journalists have a way of getting around problems like that.’

Val set down her mostly-empty coffee cup with a snap. ‘One disaster at a time, if you please.’

‘Sorry,’ said Jay, contrite. ‘Milady first, reporters later.’

The first person dragooned into the role of peace envoy was Nell, seeing as she is our media co-ordinator and suchlike. I don’t actually know what her official job title is, if she even has one. She manages a lot of our technical requirements — she’s spent decades building a huge database of basically everything we know that we know, and her team fixes all the tech bits that go wrong. She’s also responsible for our internet presence (such as it is), which means our website and social media. That makes her our PR person, right? She’ll be spending half of her morning putting together the kind of press release that puts out fires, or so we hope.

The second person volunteered for duty was yours truly.

‘You’re so good at it, Ves,’ said Nell, fidgeting with her glasses. She had a second pair tucked into the coiffed coils of her grey hair; did she know? Apparently I was not the only person feeling wrong-footed by the events of the night.

‘What, exactly, am I good at?’ I said, trying not to sound quite so frosty as I felt.

‘Making things sound good,’ said Nell bluntly.

‘Charming people,’ muttered Jay.

‘Persuading Milady to let you off,’ said Rob, though since he teamed his comment with a smile of genuine affection I felt less like kicking him than I did the others.

‘You talk a good talk, Ves,’ Val said, arranging herself upon the side of my enemies without a trace of apology. ‘It’s one of your talents.’

‘Lucky me,’ I muttered.

I looked at Indira, in case she wanted to join in with the stone-throwing. But she stared back at me with big, guarded eyes and said nothing at all.

She looked, to my horror, as though she were more frightened of me than the rest of us were of Milady-in-anger.

I set that problem aside.

‘Fine,’ I said, magnificently gracious. ‘Your poor, beleaguered Ves will sally forth and take a few bullets while the rest of you… what?’

‘Review security,’ said Rob.

‘Figure out what in the world to do with Bill,’ Val put in.

I looked at Jay, who shrugged. ‘I’ll come with you.’

‘What? Voluntarily?’

‘Why not?’

I narrowed my eyes. ‘You’ve seen how hard everybody else worked to get out of this.’

‘Except you.’

‘I’ve been betrayed by my own troops, sent forth as sacrificial victim—’

‘But with backup.’

I smiled, rather touched. ‘That’s kind. So kind I’d even give you that toast back, if I hadn’t already eaten it.’

Jay wrinkled his nose. ‘Er, no need to go to extraordinary lengths.’

In the event, Milady wasn’t even angry. But she was extremely alarmed, which was far worse.

‘Tell me everything,’ she ordered, when Nell and Jay and I had trailed into her tower-top room and stood lined up on the carpet like a row of naughty children.

We did, though not in any coherent fashion. Milady listened to our fragmented account of the previous day’s happenings in a taut silence that I found excessively uncomfortable. When we arrived at the developments of the morning, and held up the newspaper for her perusal, the air practically vibrated with tension.

When at last we stopped talking over each other, interpolating corrections upon each other’s narratives and generally confusing everything, Milady went so long without speaking that I began to wonder whether we’d lost her altogether.

At last, she spoke, and though her words emerged in her usual crisp fashion, and with every appearance of total composure, I could hear a note of something else lying behind them; something like fear. ‘While I appreciate Rob’s confidence in the elusiveness of this house, and his no doubt excellent efforts to assure our security within it, I must disagree with his conclusions. You are quite right, Jay: those with a strong enough motive to find us will surely contrive a way. That goes for reporters, and some other, rather more unsavoury characters as well. It is my conviction that this troublesome book must be taken out of the House at once, and conveyed to a safer spot.’

That caused a little stir. I exchanged a foreboding look with Jay, who looked as worried as I felt.

‘Jay, as our Waymaster, you are able to carry the book farther and faster than anybody else. I encourage you to choose a destination entirely at random; that way, it will be harder for others to guess the book’s location, and all but impossible for anyone to follow in any timely fashion. Do not linger at any henges. Take Ves with you; she is a woman of significant resources and will be able to resolve any difficulties that arise.

‘Nell, it falls to you to make a suitable announcement. By all means, confirm the find; it is too late to hope to deceive anyone on that score. Don’t try to play down either its significance or potential. What I want you to do is to mention, as casually as you can, that the book is no longer at Home. I am not at all concerned what excuse you come up with to explain its removal, provided only that it is unexceptionable. The more mundane, the better. I would not have anybody coming here expecting to find that book, nor do I wish it to be known that we are expecting exactly such an attempt.’

This barrage of instructions left all three of us a little stunned. I, being Ves the Glib (apparently) recovered my wits first, and said: ‘Forgive me, Milady, but why are we expecting such an attempt?’ I mean, I’d had no trouble grasping Bill’s importance to the magickal communities of Britain, but Milady was talking as though serious trouble was not only likely but inevitable.

Her response was swift, crisp and disdainful. ‘Ves. Nell. You have been with us long enough to be only too aware that we are not the only organisation in this country with an interest in ancient magickal artefacts. And you are as well aware that they do not all operate upon the same motives.’

‘Chancers, rogues and thieves, the lot of them,’ I murmured for Jay’s benefit.

‘Quite,’ said Milady. ‘Not all of our rival organisations can fairly be described in such terms, of course, but one or two of them can. In particular, you may have heard rumours of a new group calling themselves Ancestria Magicka.’

Jay choked. ‘Really?!’

‘I’ve heard of them,’ I confirmed, rolling my eyes. ‘Treasure hunters, the worst kind. No respect for heritage. Pirates, if you will.’

‘Snappy name,’ muttered Jay.

‘Formed last year, they have swiftly grown in both power and ambition. I have not made it generally known across the Society, but since January of this year there have been three known attempts by members of Ancestria Magicka to infiltrate our House. They were all foiled by the efforts of Rob Foster and his excellent team, and we do not yet know what, precisely, was their goal. Was it espionage? Theft? And more importantly, have there been other attempts that were successful enough to escape detection altogether?

‘The news that somebody from among our own ranks has been responsible for giving news and photographs to the press is a matter of some concern to me. It might have been done thoughtlessly, or it might have been the product of something much more reprehensible. The House itself may be able to provide some information upon this point, and I shall investigate that possibility as soon as possible. But in the meantime, I cannot feel that the book is as safe here as I would like. Its presence here is an open invitation to Ancestria Magicka, and to any other group with similar ambitions. Are there any questions?’

Jay said, ‘How long do I have to dance about the country with Bill?’

‘You’ll be notified when it is safe to return, or you may be called upon to hand off the book to somebody else. You will receive information, Jay.’

‘Right.’

‘Er,’ I said. ‘When you spoke of my “resolving difficulties”, what exactly did you have in mind?’

‘I hardly know, Ves, but Jay’s picture with the book has been helpfully spread around, hasn’t it? I do not know whether his status as Waymaster is broadly known outside of the Society, but it may well be. It is not impossible that somebody may guess, therefore, what we would do with the book, and come for you. That is why I advise staying away from the henges.’

‘In that case I’d like Rob with us, really,’ I said, though with only faint hope.

‘I cannot spare Rob at this time. He is needed here. But consider yourself approved to take whatever you want from Stores. I know that will please you.’

It did, for I was rarely given so complete a carte blanche. Whatever I want meant anything at all, up to and including the shiniest, most powerful toys.

‘I want a wand,’ I said.

‘Take the Sunstone.’

The Sunstone Wand is one of the Society’s prizes. It is a beautiful object, made from spangled Norwegian sunstone all fitted up with silver filigree (well, it was made in the nineteenth century, and they were not known for their restrained sense of the aesthetic). It is shorter than you might expect. The long, thin, delicate wands of popular imagination are lovely to look at, but hard to carry around without getting them broken. The Sunstone Wand was made to be used, not just admired, so it is only about a foot in length, and sturdy at half an inch thick.

Wands are popular for channelling magickal energies in all manner of useful ways, but a real wand — the kind you spell with a capital W — is a rare and fine thing indeed. Those Wands are made from pure crystal, crafted by a master Spellwright, and they tend to be heirlooms.

I presented myself at Stores in a state of such anticipation I was forgetting to breathe.

This time, Ornelle was there.

‘Back already?’ said she, eyeing me with the kind of suspicion I have in no way deserved.

I eyed her right back. Ornelle’s one of the few trolls regularly employed by the Society (most of the others are cooks). She’s splendidly sized and invariably splendidly dressed, with a penchant for big, dangly jewellery. A fellow magpie, she’s been in charge of Stores for years, and she is ferociously protective of the contents.

I usually try to slip by when she’s not there.

‘Milady sent me for supplies,’ I said, and tried (futilely) to make my short self look just a little bit taller.

‘All right.’ Ornelle slipped on a pair of bejewelled glasses and took up a clipboard. She proceeded to escort me every step of the way, and made notes about everything I took up. Infuriating. I may sometimes be slow about bringing things back but I’m not a thief.

She made some difficulty about the Wand.

‘You need the Sunstone again?’ There was an offensive emphasis on the word again.

‘Again!’ I echoed in outrage. ‘I’ve only had it once before and that was three years ago!’

‘And it took you almost six weeks to bring it back.’

‘I needed it for a while.’

‘And this time?’

‘I don’t know. I’m being sent out into the wilds of Britain with a protégé and an artefact to protect, not to mention my own hide. It might take some time.’

Ornelle wanted to make trouble, I could see that she did. But for all that she sometimes distrusts me, she knows I wouldn’t outright make up an order from Milady. Who would be mad enough to do that? The truth will always out.

She wrote down: “Sunstone Wand to Cordelia Ves” in big, blocky letters and underlined it, with the date written beside.

When I made to leave, she blocked my way. ‘Vesper,’ she said very seriously.

‘Ornelle.’

‘If anything untoward happens to that Wand, I’m repossessing everything you’ve ever been given.’

Everything? ‘You mean like my tea cup?’ It’s enchanted. Gives a different flavour of tea every time.

‘Like your tea cup.’

‘And the Curiosity that does my hair?’

‘Everything.’

I gulped. ‘I will defend it with my life.’

I didn’t need such an admonition, of course — we would all defend artefacts like the Sunstone Wand with our lives. That’s what we’re for. But Ornelle required reassurance, and apparently felt pacified.

‘Best of luck,’ she said as she cleared out of my way.

I wasn’t sure whether she was talking to me or the Wand, but I answered anyway. ‘Thanks.’

Turn page ->

‘Good morning Vesper, Jay,’ said Milady as she admitted us to her room. The air sparkled as her disembodied voice spoke.

‘Milady.’ I took up my usual station in the centre of the sumptuous blue carpet, and made her a curtsey. Jay produced the same courtly bow he’d offered to Bill earlier.

‘Very fine form, Jay,’ Milady complimented him.

Jay grinned. ‘Thank you.’

‘He’s been practicing,’ I said.

‘He will make a fine ambassador to the Courts someday.’

That shut me up. Jay! The Society’s representative at the magickal royal courts! Since I’d secretly coveted such posts for some years, I could not help feeling a twinge of envy at the idea.

‘Not before you, Ves,’ said Jay, apparently reading my feelings. It was so kindly said that I instantly forgave him for his earlier teasing.

‘Have you ambassadorial ambitions, Ves?’ said Milady.

I sighed. ‘I’m a little susceptible to the glamour of the post, I can’t deny it. But while I think I would suit such a post well, I would probably grow bored after a while.’

‘You would, in fact,’ said Jay, though whether he was referring to my assertion of being well-suited to such a job, or to my conviction that it would eventually bore me, I could not determine.

‘Very well, I shall not rush to reassign you. And we cannot yet spare Jay from Acquisitions, either. What can you tell me about that terrible book?’

We told her everything about the terrible book. I personally chose to gloss over the close relationship I was beginning to enjoy with dear old Bill, but Jay had no such scruples.

Milady seemed more struck with the book’s history than its present configuration. ‘I am astounded,’ said she when we had finished, ‘that this sorceress should have faded so completely from all memory or record, considering the extent of her accomplishments. Such a book must qualify as a great artefact. In fact, I have rarely heard of so spectacular an achievement in magick. Valerie had nothing to tell you?’

‘I got the impression she had some kind of an idea,’ I replied. ‘But too shaky an inkling to share, just yet. I’ve hopes of hearing something more concrete from her before long.’

‘I am sure she can be relied upon to unearth something,’ Milady agreed. ‘As to the book…’ She trailed off into silence, and Jay and I waited patiently while she thought the matter over. ‘I think it had better be kept a secret, for the present,’ she finally decided. ‘Such a powerful object would be so highly sought after, were it known to exist — even now, we have nothing in magick to equal it! I fear there could be trouble over it.’

‘Absolutely, Milady,’ I said. ‘We won’t spread it about.’

‘Should be easier to keep a lid on it, now that Bill’s calmed down,’ added Jay.

‘Yes,’ said Milady. ‘There I must agree with Bill. Zareen’s methods are somewhat to be deplored, but they do appear to have done the trick this time.’

‘That’s why we have Zareen,’ I said. ‘She does the questionable stuff, so most of us don’t have to.’

‘Not that it stops you from trying,’ muttered Jay.

‘Sometimes, the strangest tasks require the most difficult procedures,’ Milady gracefully agreed, letting Jay’s comment pass. I knew that Zareen was often given leeway on this kind of thing, more so than the rest of us. I had never resented it, because I knew it was part of her job; Toil and Trouble, indeed. She paid dearly for the privilege of not being decapitated for such transgressions as, say, copying famous proposals of marriage into ancient books.

‘Do keep me informed,’ said Milady. ‘In the meantime, Ves, I understand you have some few articles withdrawn from Stores, which might wish to be replaced?’

‘Er, yes.’ I felt a little shame-faced. I’d gone a bit mad in the store-rooms on the last mission, and gleefully carted off all manner of shiny charms, magickal trinkets and minor artefacts. Most of which I had not even used, and I had indeed forgotten to return some of them.

I do have terrible hoarding tendencies sometimes.

‘Jay,’ continued Milady serenely. ‘Your sister is in the development labs with Orlando. She is feeling overwhelmed, I believe, and would benefit from some family time.’

‘Absolutely,’ said Jay.

Knowing ourselves to be dismissed, we made our parting obeisances and left the tower, clattering back down the stairs in some relief. I’d half expected Milady to be appalled at the way we’d handled the book, and was pleased to find that we were not in disgrace.

‘Your sister’s with Orlando?’ I asked Jay as we wended our way back down. ‘How!’

Orlando’s the Development Division’s star employee, and a typical eccentric. He’s an inventor, of sorts; he mixes old magick with new technology in genius-level ways, and he’s responsible for some of our best tools (and weapons). He’s very secretive. He lives tucked away up in the attics somewhere, and the only people who are regularly allowed to go into his workrooms are his wife, Miranda, and his assistant, Jeremy.

‘She’s very bright, and very talented,’ said Jay with obvious pride. ‘They’re considering her for Orlando’s new assistant.’

‘New? What about Jeremy?’

‘They think Orlando could do with some more help.’

Perhaps he could, at that. His inventions were so popular with the Society, I could well believe he might have trouble keeping up with the demand. ‘You’ve a very talented family,’ I observed.

Jay smiled. ‘Indira will be the best of us. She’s had a rough time of it lately, though. No sooner did she arrive here than she broke her arm, and now it sounds like she’s homesick. I’d better go right away.’

I realised suddenly that I’d seen her already, a week or two before. Our doctor, Rob, had been tending to her. ‘How did she break her arm?’

Jay grimaced. ‘Fell down some stairs.’

Perhaps that explained a little of Jay’s aversion to them. I filed that away. ‘Isn’t she a bit young to be apprenticing already? Though perhaps Milady was in a hurry to scoop her up.’

‘Yes, and yes,’ Jay admitted. ‘Though she’s older than she looks. She’s almost eighteen.’

I’d thought she looked fifteen at most. I felt a surge of sympathy for her, remembering the distressed look on her youthful face when I’d seen her in the infirmary. ‘That way to Orlando’s secret attic hideaway,’ I said a few moments later, pointing down a dark passageway that led away from the second set of stairs. ‘He won’t let you in, but hopefully he’ll send Indira out.’

Jay gave me a salute in thanks, and wandered off. I trailed back downstairs alone, feeling oddly forlorn. Perhaps it was because I had to give up the remains of my hoard to the Stores again. I do so like my trinkets.

I wondered, on the way back to my room, how Bill was getting along with Val.

Swimmingly, I found. When I’d finished guiltily gathering up my temporary acquisitions and conveying them back to Stores, I trawled back to the library to find Bill holding court from the centre of Val’s desk. His courtiers consisted of the entire library staff — students from research and reference, veterans from the archives, everybody. Val herself sat enthroned in her usual spot, but she looked harassed.

‘Madam,’ I heard Bill say as I approached. ‘You do have the most delightfully smooth fingernails.’

He was addressing Anne from Archives, who blushed to match her fire-red dress and stroked Bill lovingly. ‘You’re so kind to say so.’

A young man I didn’t recognise said: ‘What about the curse of Thetford in 1453? Real or hoax?’

‘Most likely a hoax,’ said Bill firmly. ‘The story was fabricated by a linen-weaver called Wymond Bowe, who hated his brother’s wife with such a passion that he accused her of sorcery, and claimed that she had cursed the townsfolk with a host of unpleasant ailments. The evidence he presented was certainly spurious, but it is fair to note that the good people of Thetford did exhibit an unusually broad range of complaints during that year. There were claims in some quarters that the curse was real (or curses, I should say), and that Bowe was in fact the source of the troubles himself.’

‘But you don’t believe that.’

Bill considered. ‘My mistress was acquainted with Bowe in some distant fashion, and did not give the story much credence.’

‘This is brilliant,’ said the young man, and immediately began typing furiously into his phone. He snapped Bill’s picture.

‘Val—’ I tried to say, but she could not hear me over the clamour of Bill’s audience, and I couldn’t get near her either.

But Bill detected my presence, for he cried with alacrity: ‘Miss Vesper! Surrounded as I am with extraordinary beauty, still you cast all others into the shade.’

I began to wonder whether our precious book wasn’t so much Bill Darcy as Bill Wickham.

I also wondered a bit about Drogryre. Had the book always been so devastatingly charming? (At least up until it came into contact with John Wester).

‘Bill,’ I said, pushing my way through to the desk with a brutality born of mild desperation. ‘Val. Can we please clear everyone out?’

Val looked relieved to have an excuse. ‘All right, back to work!’ she shouted. ‘There’ll be more Bill later.’

Disgruntled, but somewhat mollified by this appended promise, the library’s staff drifted away, leaving me alone with Val.

‘Milady wants him kept secret,’ I hissed.

‘It’s a bit late for that order.’

‘So I see.’ I grimaced. ‘I ought to have known Bill would cause an instant sensation.’

‘He’s like a search engine for magickal history, at least up until the sixteenth century. And he’s got a vast deal of information that’s never come to light before. Of course he’s a sensation.’

‘Not to mention his talent for flattering with sincerity.’

Bill ruffled his pages. ‘It may have escaped your attention, madam, but I can hear you.’

I patted Bill’s soft leather cover. ‘I mean no disparagement, Bill. You’re every girl’s dream, aren’t you?’

Bill appeared pleased with this tribute, and settled down.

‘What can we do?’ I said, despairing. ‘Milady says there’ll be trouble if word spreads, and she could well be right. Can you imagine what a book like this would fetch at auction?’

Val began to look worried. ‘Spreads where, though? We might receive a few purchase offers, but I can’t think who would cause trouble.’

I could think of a few possibilities, but I kept them to myself. It might never happen, and Val had clearly had a trying enough morning already. ‘I’m sure it will be fine,’ I said. ‘Only perhaps we’ll keep him under better wraps for a while.’

‘We can try,’ said Val.

For the rest of the afternoon, I had some of that rare, lovely stuff they call “free time.” Jay didn’t reappear, and my favourite activity — browsing in Stores — would put me too much in the way of temptation. So instead I spent it on my other favourite activity: browsing in the library.

With Bill. And Val. And half the rest of the Society. My esteemed colleagues kept wandering in all through the afternoon, having just happened to remember some vital errand they had to run in the library and which absolutely could not wait another instant… oh, is that the talking book? A quick peek? Bill, do you happen to know the recipe for Gulgorn’s Palliative? It’s been lost since at least the early fifteens… you do! Let me jot that down! All right, all right, I’m going. Brilliant book you have there.

This went on all day. It was of no use bleating about Milady’s orders; our visitors patently did not care, and it was just as obviously too late for us to bother caring either. Oh, nobody would outright flout Milady’s wishes, but it was so easy to come up with an excuse to stop by for five minutes, and since everyone else was doing it…?

Milady ought to have known, I thought darkly, when at last Val grew tired of this and closed the library. It was late in the evening by that time, and we had to turn people away at the door. I did not ask where Val stashed Bill for the night; I only established that it was somewhere suitably fiendish by way of security, and properly unguessable.

‘You’re sure nobody will find him?’

‘Perfectly,’ said Val wearily.

‘He’s behind a few stout locks, of course?’

‘Of course. Will you please go to bed, Ves.’

‘I’m going.’ And I did, but I was back in half a minute. ‘How many stout locks?’

‘Several. Go!’

I went, but I passed an unsettled night, my head full of paranoid imaginings. See, I have never been involved with such a spectacular find before. The pressure weighed upon me rather more than I cared to admit to anybody. Upon rising the following morning, I strove to erase the signs of a poor night’s rest from my face, or at least to draw attention away from them through the use of my sparkliest cosmetics.

I was accordingly a little late reaching the dining area. It’s a bit school-cafeteria down there, to be honest, with great cauldrons of food lined up behind a long series of counters, and little clusters of tables spread about the floor. But they have a way of serving all my favourites — a positive feast of berries this morning, and an entire vat of yoghurt, the full-fat kind — so I don’t much mind.

Jay was already seated at our usual table near the biggest window. He had Indira with him. Val was also there, and Rob, and Nell. They looked formidably as though they were holding an emergency council, which hardly seemed reasonable at that hour of the morning.

When I reached the table with my bowl of breakfast delights, I saw a newspaper spread out in the centre. They were the colour pages from the front, the headlines, and my heart sank like a stone because there in enormous letters was the announcement: ‘Spectacular Find at the Society!’

And Bill’s picture.

Turn page ->

All things considered, Jay and I made an executive decision not to take the book straight back to Val. We carried it instead to my favourite study carrell, which happened to be safely situated two large rooms and a corridor away from the library.

It was pleasant to tuck back up in there again. It’s a modest place — just a desk (albeit a splendidly well-preserved nineteenth-century example, all mahogany and mother-of-pearl), and a chair (ditto), placed in a concealed alcove off one of the reference rooms. I’ve spent untold hours there with stacks and stacks of books, researching one obscure topic after another. It’s undoubtedly my study nook.

Jay took to it at once, for I caught him glancing around with an admiring, speculative look.

‘Mine,’ I told him.

‘Sorry.’

I put the book carefully down upon the desk and — checking first to make sure nobody was too near to us — I opened it again.

‘Good morning, madam,’ said the book. ‘Good morning, sir.’

‘You can call me Jay,’ said Jay.

‘That would be an improper mode of address, sir, particularly in view of the fact that we have not yet been introduced.’

I summoned my best manners, and formally introduced Jay to the book. Jay made a decidedly courtly bow, which impressed me no end.

Then he introduced me, and I felt it incumbent upon me to match his exquisite etiquette with a curtsey.

It was an odd business.

The book was kind enough to overlook the irregularities in our behaviour, mostly because, as he said himself: ‘I am not fortunate enough to have a large acquaintance here. In fact, I know no one else except for the odd, vulgar woman with the green hair, whose identity remains a mystery.’

Jay stifled his laughter — barely. ‘You have no objection to Ves’s pink hair?’

‘The arrangement of Miss Vesper’s hair might be highly irregular, but there is nothing to fault in her manners.’

I was glad he’d said that, for I was quite attached to my hair colour of the day. Rose pink (the dusky, antique shade), and perfectly curled. ‘Thank you, Bill,’ I said, beaming.

‘We can’t call him Bill anymore,’ said Jay.

‘An unnecessarily abbreviated name,’ agreed the book.

‘We can still call him Bill,’ I offered. ‘Darcy’s first name was Fitzwilliam.’

‘Bill Darcy it is.’

The book objected, but I overrode him. ‘Matters are not as they were when you were written, Bill,’ I unhappily had to inform him. ‘You had better get used to our unnecessarily abbreviated modes of address.’

‘If you insist, Miss Vesper.’

I gave up.

Secretly, I rather enjoyed being called “Miss Vesper.” Jay, however, did not take so enthusiastically to “Mr Patel”. ‘That is my father,’ he said sternly. ‘Jay, please.’

The book heaved a resigned sigh, and capitulated.

Having got the formalities out of the way, it was time to do as Zareen had suggested, and launch a clever and subtle interrogation of Bill. I began with: ‘Where does your map lead, Bill?’

‘To the grave of my mistress.’

‘Mistress?’ said Jay.

‘Grave?’ said I.

Jay began to laugh. ‘So much for treasure.’

‘I do not at all understand the modern fixation upon “treasure”,’ said Bill in disgust. ‘It was all that green woman would talk of.’

‘That’s acquisitions specialists for you,’ I said by way of apology. ‘The hearts of magpies, all of us.’

‘To return to my mistress,’ said Bill stonily, ‘She was the greatest sorceress of the age, and my noble creator. In this respect, perhaps, she was a far greater treasure than any mere gold.’

This was interesting. ‘Go on. Why did she make you?’

‘I was to serve as her grimoire, but of a far cleverer design than any that had yet been created. My task was to absorb not only my mistress’s knowledge but anything else that should come in my way, and to repeat it upon command.’

‘That is clever!’

‘I believe I did save my mistress a great deal of time and trouble,’ said Bill modestly. ‘And won for her no small number of esoteric secrets, besides.’

Jay brightened at the word “secrets”. So did I. Occupational hazard. ‘We,’ I said to Bill, ‘are going to get along very well, I think.’

‘It is my dearest wish that we should, Miss Vesper.’

‘He definitely likes you,’ muttered Jay.

I awarded the book a tender little pat of approval. ‘What about the map?’ I asked. ‘And your first few pages? They were not written by your mistress, clearly.’

Bill bristled with indignation, his pages curling in a bookish grimace. ‘Her death was sudden—’

‘How did she die?’ interpolated Jay.

‘A form of plague.’

‘My condolences.’

‘Thank you. Her death was sudden, and I was lost for some years among a number of other, lesser volumes from her collection. We were lodged for a time in the library of the great house, until one day we were stolen by a deplorable varmint of the name of John Wester. If you have read those pages, madam, then you will have already experienced his disgraceful mode of expressing himself and I need not elaborate.’

‘I haven’t, yet, but you did give a rather excellent demonstration of them.’

The book looked a trifle sheepish, and shuffled about upon the desk. ‘I did not, at first, trouble myself to speak much to Wester. I was delighted to be removed from the dusty shelf upon which I had so long languished, and entertained some hopes of finding my new master congenial. And I was curious as to his reasons, for he took only two books from the house’s collection, both from my mistress’s former possessions: a slim treatise upon the most ancient and respectable practices of star-magick, of which my mistress was a devotee. And me. But if I hoped that his second choice, at least, indicated that he understood some part of my value, I was to be disappointed. He had noticed only that my pages were apparently blank, and secured me in order to serve as a receptacle for his own records. My dignity was sunk indeed.

‘The matter which absorbed all his curiosity was the search for my mistress’s grave. He was under the impression that some article of great value had been buried with her. He was, in other words, a treasure-hunter. He had received some hint of the grave’s location, but I understood that, by the time in question — some years after her death — its precise situation was no longer known.’

‘What kind of thing was buried with her?’ I said, greatly intrigued.

‘That I never learned from him. I am not convinced that he knew it himself. He was an opportunist and an adventurer, and not at all averse to taking a chance.’

‘Grave-robbers and thieves, plagues and dark sorceresses,’ said Jay. ‘This is getting good.’

‘Zareen will be delighted.’

Bill gave a slight, polite cough. ‘I have almost finished.’

‘My apologies. Do go on.’

‘I did not particularly take to John Wester,’ Bill continued, unnecessarily. ‘Particularly since the free use he made of my early pages seeped into my consciousness, as was inevitable, and my turn of phrase inevitably adapted itself to his. I made rather free use of his more vulgar vocabulary, and abused him with such spirit every time he dared to approach me that he soon gave up the endeavour. To my great satisfaction, he rid himself of me by selling me to that rare form of travelling merchant who understands when he has met with an object of true worth. I was sold for a mere few shillings, which was a source of some embarrassment to me, but since I afterwards was placed, through a series of subsequent trades, into the grand collections at the Court of the Trolls, I was able to recover my dignity in time.’

‘And there you stayed for hundreds of years, until Jay rescued you.’ I beamed at Jay, who smiled uncertainly back.

‘I am appalled to learn that my sojourn there was of such extended duration,’ said Bill. ‘I believe I must have slept through most of it.’

‘Very likely.’ I fell into a reverie of reflection for a little while, pondering Bill’s extraordinary tale. Some few questions stood out, at the end of my musings. ‘Did they know what you were, at Farringale? Did you speak to them?’

‘Scarcely at all, madam. I knew my vocabulary and general speech to be most unsuited to a place of such vaunted learning.’

‘A pity, perhaps. All your potential has been wasted.’

‘Until now, Miss Vesper. I have some hopes of enjoying a second spring of activity.’

‘What became of John Wester, I wonder?’ said Jay. ‘Did he ever find the grave?’

‘And was there anything of interest in it?’ said I. ‘Good question. Sadly it seems history has forgotten the answers, though perhaps Val might know something.’

Bill gave his polite cough again. ‘I wonder if my apologies might be conveyed to the green woman? I have been disgracefully rude both to her and about her, but it strikes me that, without her interference, I would be still condemned to express myself with all the excessive vulgarity of John Wester’s cant.’

‘Her name is Zareen—’ I began.

‘—or Miss Dalir, if you prefer,’ Jay put in.

‘—and I have no doubt she will forgive you, for she enjoyed the mystery you presented very much indeed.’

‘She might be disappointed to learn that you aren’t a treasure map, though,’ Jay cautioned.

‘I doubt it,’ I disagreed. ‘Given the choice, Zareen would always go for a good disinterring over a treasure hunt.’

Jay looked faintly appalled.

‘She always was a trifle macabre that way.’ I picked up Bill, cradling him in my arms — I was growing rather fond of him by then, I admit — and squared my shoulders. ‘No help for it. It’s time to see Val. But we’ve such a fine story to tell that I hope she won’t disembowel us too badly.’

‘Disembowelling is pretty absolute,’ Jay said. ‘You either lose your entrails or you don’t.’

‘I’m hoping Bill can be relied upon to present his side of the story with such style as to spare us that fate.’

‘I shall be happy to, madam,’ said Bill, slightly muffled.

It occurred to me to be grateful even for John Wester’s highly questionable behaviour. If he had not stolen Bill back in the sixteenth century, then the book may never have ended up at Farringale, and he would never have come to us. Even if he had, without Wester’s journalising the book would have retained his original turn of phrase, which I imagined to be extremely civilised — in a Chaucerian kind of way. Middle English is not precisely my strong point.

‘You’re quite wonderful, Bill,’ I said with fervour.

‘Thank you, madam.’

‘It’s an unusual name,’ said Valerie some half an hour later, poring over Zareen’s sketch of the map and the single word that adorned it. ‘I can’t even decide how to pronounce it.’

‘Medieval,’ said Jay, as though this was both explanation and apology enough.

Val apparently agreed, for she merely nodded.

Our initial half-hour in the library had been a bit sticky. While Val was relieved to find our Bill so tidily reformed, she was every bit as horrified by the manner of its accomplishment as I had feared.

‘Ten years in the dungeons!’ she hissed, and began searching through her desk drawers for her phone.

‘The House has dungeons?’ Jay repeated, awed.

‘Excellent ones,’ I said. ‘They’re only cellars really, but “dungeon” sounds much more impressive. And there are signs with one or two of them that they might have been built to serve as dungeons in the first place. One of them even has something of the oubliette about it, which is fascinating considering—’

‘You’re babbling, Ves,’ said Jay.

I was. ‘Sorry,’ I babbled. ‘Val, don’t murder Zareen. She did us a favour.’

‘I’m not going to murder her, I’m going to throw her in the oubliette.’

‘She’ll love that.’

Val looked uncertain, and stopped searching for her phone. ‘She will, won’t she? I’ll have to think of something else.’

‘Disembowelment,’ suggested Jay helpfully.

Val’s face set into steely lines, and her dark eyes glittered. ‘With a spoon.’

‘What did I tell you?’ I said. ‘Stop helping, Jay.’

‘Sorry.’

‘Listen,’ I commanded, and put Bill down upon the desk. ‘Tell her, Bill.’

‘I am in Miss Dalir’s debt,’ said Bill obligingly. ‘Her methods may have been invasive and uncouth, but the results are so much to my taste that I cannot long hold her coarseness against her.’

Overwhelmed by this display of generosity mixed with disdain, and all couched in such elegant terms, Val could only blink at the book in amazement. ‘He really is reformed,’ she said.

‘Oh, completely,’ said Jay. ‘He delivers his insults in such stately style, now.’

‘He’s a refined, sophisticated book,’ I objected, ‘and did not enjoy turning the air blue any more than we enjoyed hearing it.’

Val gave me an odd look.

‘He admires and loves Ves,’ said Jay. ‘Ardently.’

‘Apparently it’s mutual.’ Val’s eyebrows went up.

I coughed.

So did Bill.

‘Anyway,’ I said brightly. ‘Bill’s creator?’

‘I’ll see what I can come up with,’ Val promised.

‘The name doesn’t ring any bells?’

‘Not quite.’

I wasn’t sure what “not quite” meant in this context, but it sounded more promising than “none whatsoever.” So I scooped up Jay — not Bill, unfortunately, for Val claimed him for research purposes — and whisked him off. ‘It’s high time we reported to Milady.’

‘The gruelling climb,’ Jay groaned.

‘It’s good for your health.’

‘Tell that to my knees when I’m ninety-five.’

I pictured Jay at ninety-five, wizened and white-haired and still grumbling about the stairs. I had to laugh.

‘Your sympathy is touching,’ said Jay. We had by that time arrived at the first of the several flights of stairs — stone-cut, narrow and winding, naturally — that led up to Milady’s aerie tower, and I laughed even harder as Jay visibly braced himself.

I did not really suspect him of deliberately hamming it up. Not until I noticed a secret half-smile just vanishing from his face as he marched away from me, moving upwards at a smart pace.

‘You’re teasing me,’ I said with strong disapproval, and made sure to overtake him at once.

It was Jay’s turn to laugh.

Turn page ->

In my room at Home, I’ve got a little stash of Curiosities, minor artefacts, and assorted odds and ends. Some of them are useful, some of them aren’t. Probably my favourite of the latter category is a beautiful old scroll, the real kind, made of vellum and with rowan-wood supports. It even has a tooled-leather case. It’s paired with a quill pen — owl feather, not goose! Both are enchanted, so that anything I might choose to write upon mine will appear at once upon the matching scrolls of some other member (or members) of the Society. They used to be standard issue, but they stopped handing them out before I joined. I once found a whole, sorry stack of them in Stores, and took pity on this set because… because they’re pretty.

What can I say.

The reason for their obsolescence, of course, is the mobile phone. When we all wander about with smartphones surgically attached to our wrists, who needs quills and scrolls anymore? A sad casualty of cruel, inexorable time.

But, I have to admit, a fair one. For when, a few hours later, my own personal scroll-killer buzzed and began to play Sussudio, it got my attention at once, and within two minutes I was rattling back down to Research and Zareen’s broom-cupboard of a room.

Zareen opened the door right away. ‘You’re going to like this,’ she said, grinning and ushering me inside.

I eyed the book with misgivings. It lay quiescent upon the desk, quiet as a proverbial church mouse, but I didn’t trust it. ‘I rather doubt that.’

‘Oh, don’t worry. It’s much nicer now.’

‘It is? What did you do to it?’

Zareen wouldn’t meet my eye. ‘Uh, just some minor tweaks. Never mind that. What do you think I found inside?’

‘You’ve read it!’

‘Sort of. There isn’t much to read, as it turns out. Only a few pages have been used. It looks like a journal, used to record somebody’s progress upon some kind of journey. Late Middle English, I’d say, so it’s hard to read, and written in such deplorable chicken-scratch I can hardly make it out. So the destination’s unclear — or at least, it was at first.’

Zareen was bursting with news, and very smug about it too. I didn’t want to stop her, but I had to ask: ‘Wait, where’s Jay?’

‘No idea. Anyway, the—’

‘Stop right there.’ I grabbed my phone and called Jay, ignoring Zareen’s eye-rolling disgust. ‘Toil and Trouble,’ I told Jay when he answered. ‘All due haste.’

‘Be right there.’

I put my phone away. ‘It’s Jay’s book,’ I said. ‘And I’m his… mentor, I suppose. Can’t leave him out.’

Zareen waited with an exaggerated display of patience.

‘What’s the problem with you two, anyway?’

‘Oh, nothing really,’ Zareen replied with a roll of her eyes. ‘I think he’s a prude and a stick-in-the-mud and he thinks I’m reckless and irresponsible.’ She gave me a half-smile. ‘Just squabbles, Ves. Don’t worry about it.’

Me, worry? I wanted to disclaim this charge at once, until I realised I was wearing my worried face. I hastily smoothed out my features and adopted an air of proper unconcern. ‘I feel responsible for him,’ I said by way of explanation.

‘I don’t think you need to be. I’ll say this for him: he’s far from stupid, and he’ll always be okay.’

‘Mm.’

Zareen looked at me shrewdly. ‘He feels responsible for you, too, I think.’

‘Me!’

Zareen grinned. ‘Surprised? He was given the job of making sure we don’t lose you somewhere.’

‘Making sure I don’t lose myself somewhere, you mean? Fair.’

‘No easy task.’

I couldn’t argue with this judgement, since it was true. Thankfully for my dignity, Jay showed up just then. He was polite enough to greet Zareen with a nod, and looked at me. ‘What’s the news?’

‘Your moment’s arrived,’ I said to Zareen. ‘We’re ready to be impressed!’

Zareen leaned back in her chair, put her booted feet up on her desk and said, ‘It’s a treasure map.’

‘What?’ said Jay. ‘Bill?’

‘Sort of. The book, as I’ve just said to Ves, contains a somewhat wandering and confused account of somebody’s journey in search of something unidentified, to places unspecified. Not at all edifying, and so poorly written I can’t even decipher most of it. Only the first few pages have been written on, and one page at the back, which contains a sketch.’

‘A map!’ I said.

Zareen nodded, grinning. ‘It’s got an X-marks-the-spot and everything.’ She displayed for us a piece of notepaper, upon which she had apparently copied the map in red pen. Her X in the middle was huge and exuberant, marked in bold.

‘How do we know it’s a treasure map?’ said Jay, prosaically.

I sighed. ‘Ancient maps with an X marked somewhere upon them are always treasure maps.’

Zareen nodded. ‘That, and there’s an obscure reference on the third page to a bounty of some kind, if I’m reading it right. There’s no description as to what manner of treasure the writer was after, but he obviously expected to discover some grand prize.’

‘Any idea as to the identity of the writer?’ I asked.

‘None.’

‘Did you ask Bill?’ said Jay.

‘I tried. He wouldn’t stop insulting me long enough to answer my questions.’

Jay and I both looked in silence at the book. It hadn’t spoken a word since I’d entered the room, fully quarter of an hour before. ‘I’m curious,’ said Jay. ‘How did you shut it up?’

Zareen shifted in her seat, and avoided Jay’s eye. And mine. ‘Er, I haven’t. He’s just a bit less noisy now.’

I considered pressing the matter — Zareen was obviously skirting around the edges of something — but on reflection I let it pass. Sometimes it’s best to circle around the point. So I said: ‘What’s the likelihood that Bill, or wherever that voice is coming from, is the same person who wrote the journal entries and sketched the map?’

‘You mean, is this a haunting? I don’t think so. When he wasn’t insulting me, he was protesting against the very idea that he’d write such uncouth nonsense, or hare around searching for treasure just because somebody drew a map. Whatever became of the writer, I don’t think it’s Bill. And I’m not convinced that the book’s haunted by anybody else, either, for he’s showed no signs of having any kind of history that he can remember, and ghosts can usually talk about little else. You’ll want to interrogate him a bit more yourself, see if you can’t get more out of him.’

I reached for the book.

‘Later,’ added Zareen hastily.

I sat back again. ‘So it’s not a haunting. A curse, then?’

‘Could be, but it’s the oddest curse I’ve ever come across if so. Yes, he was keeping idle hands from opening the book and thereby keeping anybody from reading it, but it’s a clumsy form of protection. It didn’t take much to get around that problem.’

‘Oh?’

Zareen indicated a pair of heavy marble paperweights upon her desk. ‘It took a few tries, but I peaced it and put weights upon its pages. Bill went off for a nice little nap, and when he woke up it was too late to take up snapping at my fingers again.’ She paused and added reflectively, ‘He took it rather well, all things considered, which again leads me to think that he isn’t there to deter people from reading it. He’s just a bad-tempered grouch.’

‘But if he’s not a ghost or a curse, what is he?’

‘A spell,’ said Zareen with a shrug. ‘Though I grant you, it’s a sophisticated enchantment, and more complex than anything I’ve ever met with before. Quite intimidating. But considering where you got the thing, I shouldn’t be surprised.’

I took it from this that Zareen had no more idea what the spell was intended to accomplish than I did. And how intriguing a puzzle. A complicated enchantment which had gifted an (apparently) ordinary book with sentience — and an extraordinarily foul vocabulary? One which had, considering the nature of that vocabulary, been placed upon the book some four or five hundred years ago? And one which, for all its sophistication, Zareen had managed to get around with quite a simple charm?

Very curious indeed.

‘If someone was going to go to all that trouble,’ said Jay, ‘I wonder why they didn’t make it more… polite.’

I couldn’t help but be tickled by the idea. ‘That’s a sense of humour I can appreciate.’

Jay grinned. ‘It doesn’t quite fit with the legends of old Farringale, though, does it? The royal court, a place of learning and high art, blah blah.’

‘You’d expect it to express itself in the courtliest language, and with perfect etiquette.’

Zareen looked shifty again. ‘Er, yes. You would.’

‘So the map,’ said Jay, and leaned over the book to get a closer look at it. ‘Where does it lead to?’

Zareen pushed her sketch nearer. ‘Might want to consult Val. There’s only one word on it, and when I did a search I didn’t get any hits.’

‘Drogryre,’ read Jay.

‘No hits at all?’ I repeated, incredulous.

‘Not one. So this place is—’

‘—even more lost to the mists of time than Farringale,’ I finished.

‘Or just an extremely well-kept secret,’ suggested Jay. He picked up the map and stuck it in his pocket, then made to collect the book, too.

Zareen stopped him. ‘Where are you going with those?’

‘To find Drogryre. Isn’t that what we do next?’

‘Let Ves take the book.’

This requirement made as much sense to me as it did to Jay, who looked irritated. But he complied, stepping back to make room for me.

I picked up the book very carefully, still expecting it to hurl abuse at me. But it remained blissfully quiet.

‘Don’t open it until you get to the library,’ Zareen recommended.

‘Why not?’ I said.

‘It’s asleep right now.’

‘What do you mean by—’ I began, but the door was already closing behind us.

‘Bring me back something with bones!’ yelled Zareen through the door as we walked away.

‘There’s something fishy about all that,’ said Jay.

I had to agree. We made it halfway back to the library before curiosity overcame the both of us. ‘I have to open it,’ I said.

‘Go on,’ said Jay.

We stopped in an alcove beneath a big, bright window and I took hold of the front cover. ‘Here we go.’

To my relief, the book suffered itself to be opened without trying to bite my fingers, and without snapping itself shut again. Nor did it drown me in a barrage of abuse.

But it did speak.

‘Madam,’ said the book. ‘You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.’

I slammed the book shut.

Silence.

Then Jay said, in a strangled voice, ‘Is Bill quoting Pride and Prejudice?’

‘Dear Jay,’ I said faintly. ‘I could not be more impressed with your familiarity with the utterances of Mr. Darcy, I assure you.’

‘Why is it coming out of this book?’ said Jay, ignoring my implied question with superb grace.

Gingerly, I opened it up again. And there, on the first unused page, was the whole of Mr. Darcy’s ill-fated proposal to Elizabeth Bennet, written out in Zareen’s rounded handwriting.

‘Val,’ I said slowly, ‘is going to kill all of us.’

‘Probably with a dessert spoon.’

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Guess who was landed with the job of looking after the foul-mouthed book?

‘Get this horrid thing out of my library!’ said Val. It was an order, but she looked at me in a desperate, pleading way which, as her friend, I could not ignore. ‘Ves!’

‘Something must certainly be done about it,’ I agreed, though my mind was blank as to what, exactly, one could do with an unusually lively sixteenth-century tome with all the tender sensibility of a guttersnipe.

‘Base, beetle-headed fool!’ raged the book, hovering still before poor Valerie’s face. ‘Thou hast cracked my spine!’

‘Beetle-headed?’ whispered Jay to me. ‘Now it’s just making them up.’

‘I have not!’ protested Val, and truly, I could hardly think of a more vicious insult to direct at our head librarian. She’d probably die before she would handle an old book so carelessly as to damage it. ‘But I will, if you don’t stop,’ she added, and I blinked, shocked.

‘Cracked,’ repeated the book. ‘Next thou shalt bend thyself to the creasing of my pages! To the turning of my very corners, and the pinching of them, until, full broken, they have not the means of righting themselves!’

‘I suppose “dog-eared” must be a recently coined term,’ reflected Jay, watching the book with the dispassionate, arms-folded stance of an intrigued scholar.

‘I like his version,’ I protested. ‘Verbose, elegant, poetic—’

‘Windy, flowery and over the top.’

I had long suspected that Jay lacked something in the way of soul. Here was complete proof.

‘Jay!’ thundered Valerie, making both of us jump. Admittedly, she did have to raise her voice considerably in order to be heard over the abominable book, which ranted on and on, unabashed. ‘This is your doing, and you will fix it at once!’

‘Mine?’ gasped Jay. ‘How is it my fault?!’

‘You brought it here!’

‘Together with several other works of great historical interest, all of which are far better-behaved,’ I reminded her.

‘Yes,’ said Valerie, and smiled. ‘Thank you for those, Jay.’

‘You’re welcome.’

‘But get rid of this one!’

Jay looked not only reluctant to saddle himself with such an object (and who could blame him), but also at a loss as to what to do with it if he did. It was only about his third or fourth week with the Society, after all, and this was a species of magickal heritage that even the veterans amongst us had never seen or heard of before (most assuredly including yours truly). So I hastily stepped forward and, feeling heroic and martyred, swept up the book.

‘Thank you, Ves,’ said Valerie, instantly mollified.

I only sighed. ‘May I ask how it came to start talking? For it was as silent as any a book should be, all the way here from Farringale.’

‘I opened it.’

‘That’s it?’

‘That’s it. It started shrieking blue murder at once, and I did not even get to read any of it because the vile thing kept slamming itself upon my fingers.’

‘A deserved torment, craven wench,’ the book informed her.

Valerie cast it a look of intense dislike. ‘Sorry to land you with that, Ves,’ she said. ‘But I can’t have it in the library all day. It’s making far too much noise.’

She was right, of course. We were only in the library’s entrance hall, in fact, where Val’s grand desk stood; the library itself was through a handsome archway a few feet to my left, whereupon it stretched away and away for some distance. Nonetheless, I had no doubt that the book’s ringing tones could be heard all the way at the bottom of the library, which would be pleasing the Society’s scholars to no end.

‘I don’t suppose you have any suggestions…?’ I ventured, feeling almost as much at a loss as Jay.

Valerie massaged her temples. There were deep shadows under her dark eyes, and I wondered how long she’d been grappling with the book before we’d finally arrived. ‘I don’t know exactly, but there’s no doubt this is one of our weirder acquisitions. A curse, or a haunting? You might try Zareen.’

‘Oh, yes,’ I said. ‘This is right up her alley.’

‘Good luck.’ She gave me a grim smile, which I just about managed to return.

Away went Jay and I.

Ordinarily, Jay is much better at finding his way around than me, and I am forced to follow him about like a trusting little lamb while he marches us off to wherever we’re going. But not at Home. It’s a huge, sprawling old place, and while it was built in the sixteen-hundreds it’s had all kinds of additions, alterations and expansions made in the centuries since. Having spent more than a decade wandering its winding passages, I know it extremely well.

Thus I was able to sweep out of the library, chin high, and strut confidently away, with Jay trailing meekly along behind me. Felt good. I waited for Jay’s inevitable complaint — on the topic of Zareen, most likely, towards whom he has reportedly developed an instant (and mutual) antipathy — but he was silent.

So was the book.

This surprised me so much that I stopped walking, having travelled only about twenty paces down the tapestried corridor. ‘Hello?’ I said, tentatively.

‘To whom do you speak?’ said the book, after a moment’s pause.

‘Why, to you.’

‘Well met, lady.’

‘How polite. I had rather expected curses.’

‘Thou hast not merited such treatment.’

Jay said, ‘Better not open it.’

I had to agree. Cradling the book carefully, I ventured on, and Jay fell in beside me. We had not far to go. The structure at Home is as chaotic in the organisational sense as in the geographical; we are loosely separated into divisions, but there is so much bleed-over between the daily duties, challenges and obstacles faced by our various groups that the structure often falls down. Jay and I, for example, are officially part of Acquisitions, but I’m periodically seconded into Research (happy days, those), and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Jay ends up handed off to Zareen’s division more often than he’s going to like.

Technically, Zareen is part of Research, albeit in an unusual capacity. But she consults for Development from time to time, and I bump into her in Acquisitions here and there, too. She runs an obscure little division almost single-handedly, clumsily shelved under Research because nobody knows what else to call it. And since it has never been given its own, official name, we’ve collectively dubbed it the Toil and Trouble division.

In other words: when anything particularly weird comes up, we all call in Zareen.

She’s usually holed up not far from the library, in a tiny nook of a room buried deep in the west wing. The door is always shut.

‘Would you mind knocking?’ I said to Jay once we had arrived. ‘I don’t want to risk dropping the book.’

‘Perish the thought.’ Jay shuddered, and knocked smartly upon the door. He then adopted a pose of such studied nonchalance as clearly displayed his discomfort, and I tried my best not to notice.

‘Hang on a minute!’ yelled Zareen. There came some clattering noises from the other side of the door, and we were left to enjoy the chill of the dim, stone-walled corridor (bare of tapestries, paintings or anything else in this part of the House) for half a minute longer.

Then the door swung open, apparently by itself, revealing Zareen seated at a desk tucked into the corner of the room. The place was a mess, as usual; books and notepads were stacked everywhere, along with a host of such peculiar paraphernalia I’d have no idea where to begin in describing it. Case in point, though: a collection of skulls, apparently human, sat clustered at one end of her desk, except that they were palm-sized, and as usual she had an odd contraption made of woven string, jewel-charms and bones hung upon the wall above her chair. Her curse-catcher, she calls it. I’ve never been able to figure out whether its purpose is merely decorative, or functional — and if the latter, what its function is supposed to be.

The lady herself looked me over with considerable goodwill, and then Jay with rather less. She had green streaks in her black hair today, very neatly done, and she sported a matching green jewel in her nose ring.

‘Peridot?’ I enquired.

‘It’s new.’ Zareen grinned and swung around to face me, giving me a full view of the new jewellery.

‘Suits you.’

‘Doesn’t it?’ Zareen turned her amused gaze upon Jay, who bore it rigidly. ‘I’m still working on Ves. What do you think, nostril or septum?’

‘I’ve told you,’ I said hastily. ‘I’ll think about it when you find me a good unicorn stud, and not before.’

‘You can’t wear a unicorn in your nose. Pick something smaller.’

‘I can’t? Then I’m not getting my nose pierced.’

‘Navel maybe,’ murmured Zareen, but she was watching Jay.

‘Do the women of this miserable age commonly engage in bodily mutilation?’

It was the book speaking, of course, but since I had yet to warn Zareen of its capacity to do so, she narrowed her eyes at the only male in the room: Jay.

‘That was not me!’ he protested. ‘Did you see my mouth move?’

‘Just the kind of prissy thing you would say,’ retorted Zareen, ignoring his question.

I headed off what was clearly an impending fight by laying the book in front of Zareen. I’d been clutching it to my chest until then, with my arms wrapped tightly around it, and since she was used to seeing me carting books everywhere (who wasn’t, indeed?) I don’t suppose it had occurred to her to take note of it. But the book got her attention at once, as I’d known it would, for on the front of its dark leather cover there was engraved a motif of a complex star, a flame blossoming at each of its twelve points.

‘Ooh,’ said Zareen, captivated.

‘Don’t open it yet,’ I warned.

She was itching to do so, already reaching for it. ‘What?’

I explained.

Zareen was not impressed.

‘You’ve brought me a centuries-old book from Farringale,’ she said with emphasis. ‘A book no one’s read since the sixteen-hundreds, containing who knows what esoteric wisdom, and I can’t open it?’

‘Well, you can,’ I allowed. ‘Only get some ear plugs first, maybe.’

‘And watch your fingers,’ put in Jay.

Zareen scowled at him. ‘I’ve handled difficult artefacts before.’

Jay rolled his eyes. ‘By all means, try it.’

Zareen did, though to her credit she looked a little wary, and opened it with a hesitancy unusual for her.

‘Fool-born haggard!’ erupted the book, right on cue. ‘Dost thou dare to venture upon mine innards? Thou wouldst disembowel me of all my goodness, wouldst thou, and with narry a by-your-leave!’ The book slammed shut with a crisp snap of disapproval.

‘Ow,’ said Zareen, shaking the pain out of her fingertips.

Jay, wisely, refrained from airing the I-told-you-so I could see hovering upon his lips. Instead he said, ‘We’re calling him Bill.’

‘As in Shakespeare?’

‘Quite.’

‘Slightly less elegantly verbose, I’d say?’

‘His full name is Bill the Boor.’

‘Churl,’ said the book.

‘Boor,’ said Jay.

‘So,’ I said brightly. ‘Bit of a problem, no? Val would’ve skinned me alive if I hadn’t taken it away at once, and I’m afraid nobody could think who could possibly fix it but you.’

Alone among those who had come into contact with the wretched book, Zareen looked intrigued — even a little bit excited. ‘Nice,’ she murmured, and turned the book around on her desk, examining all the features of its covers and spine. She ignored its ongoing diatribe with admirable grace.

‘Curse or haunting, do you think?’ I asked, remembering Val’s words.

‘Could be either! Really interesting stuff.’

‘I can’t tell you how glad we are that you think so.’ I had no hesitation in speaking for Jay as well as myself, for I could see the relief on his face. Tinged, maybe, with a hint of fascinated disgust.

Well, it takes most people a little while to get used to Zareen.

She was barely listening, already absorbed in the many questions posed by the book. ‘Thanks, Ves,’ she said vaguely. ‘I’ll call you when I’ve figured it out.’

What bliss it was to walk out of that room, and close the door behind us! We walked quickly away, pursued by the muffled and increasingly distant sounds of sixteenth-century cursing.

‘She’s got a strong stomach,’ I offered.

‘Madwoman,’ he replied, though he didn’t sound as negative as I’d expected. Perhaps Zareen had actually won herself a few points with Jay for her willingness to take the thing off our hands.

‘Cup of tea?’ said I.

‘Yes.’

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