“Move the damn ladder, Fernando,” Sarah instructed. “I’m sure Ysabeau has a replacement for it if it gets damaged. Push that chair out of the way while you’re at it,”
A few nail-biting moments later, I was ripping into a box of salt that Linda had carried up in a Marks & Spencer shopping bag. I whispered prayers to the goddess, asking for her help finding this lost object while I outlined a triangle with the white crystals. When that was done, I doled out the pages from the Book of Life, and Sarah, Linda, and I each stood at one of the points of the triangle. We directed the illustrations into the center, and I repeated the spell I’d written earlier:
Missing pages
Lost then found, show
Me where the book is bound.
“I still think we need a mirror,” Sarah whispered after an hour of expectant silence had passed.
“How’s the library going to show us anything if we don’t give her a place to project an apparition?”
“Should Diana have said ‘show us where the book is bound,’ not ‘show me’？” Linda looked to Sarah. “There are three of us.” I stepped out of the triangle and put the illustration of the chemical wedding on the guard’s desk.
“It’s not working. I don’t feel anything. Not the book, not any power, not magic. It’s like the whole library has gone dead.”
“Well, it’s not surprising the library is feeling poorly.” Linda clucked in sympathy. “Poor thing. All these people poking at its entrails all day.”
“There’s nothing for it, honey,” Sarah said. “On to Plan C.”
“Maybe I should try to revise the spell first.” Anything was better than Plan C. It violated the last remaining shreds of the library oath I’d taken when a student, and it posed a very real danger to the building, the books, and the nearby colleges.
But it was more than that. I was hesitating now for some of the same reasons I had hesitated when facing Benjamin in this very place. If I used my full powers here, in the Bodleian, the last remaining links to my life as a scholar would dissolve.
“There’s nothing to be afraid of,” Sarah said. “Corra will be fine.”
“She’s a firedrake, Sarah,” I retorted. “She can’t fly without causing sparks. Look at this place.”
“A tinderbox,” Linda agreed. “Still, I cannot see another way.”
“There has to be one,” I said, poking my index finger into my third eye in hopes of waking it up.
“Come on, Diana. Stop thinking about your precious library card. It’s time to kick some magical ass.”
“I need some air first.” I turned and headed downstairs. Fresh air would steady my nerves and help me think. I pounded down the wooden treads that had been laid over the stone and pushed through the glass doors and into the Old Schools Quadrangle, gulping in the cold, dust-free December air.
“Hello, Auntie.”
Gallowglass emerged from the shadows.
His mere presence told me that something terrible had happened.
His next quiet words confirmed it. “Benjamin has Matthew.”
“He can’t. I just talked to him.” The silver chain within me swayed.
“That was five hours ago,” Fernando said, checking his watch. “When you spoke, did Matthew say where he was?”
“Only that he was leaving Germany,” I whispered numbly. Stan and Dickie approached, frowns on their faces.
“Gallowglass,” Stan said with a nod.
“Stan,” Gallowglass replied.