Kylie took out twenty dollars. “It’s the best I can do.” Kylie seemed dangerous at that moment, as women often do when they know what they want.
“It won’t hex me to have dealings with you, will it?” Edward asked, hesitating, before he took the cash. He’d had some run-ins with left-handed magic when working as a delivery boy for the shop and had a missing tooth to show for it.
“Of course not,” Kylie said, even though the clerk would likely have a bad case of hives by morning, with a hex from The Book of the Raven that was more sleight-of-hand trickery than real magic, a small reminder that he had done his best to extort her. That’s how the left-hand path began, with small resentments and bitterness receiving the first dark responses. “Go on, then,” Kylie urged.
Edward proceeded to prattle on about a private library not far from where she was staying, near Lancaster Gate, across from Hyde Park. “They’ve got everything you could be looking for. Names, faces, places. Only thing is, you’ve got to be a member to get in. And don’t mention me to anyone there. I’ve made a few deliveries to them. They tend to get pissy about their privacy.”
* * *
The Invisible Library had existed for hundreds of years, but had been at the same address since the mid-nineteenth century when the neighboring blocks of terraced houses were built in the Georgian style. If you didn’t know what you were looking for, you would never see it. If you narrowed your eyes and half spied it, a woman named Mrs. Hempstead, a housekeeper of sorts who lived in the basement apartment, would come out and chase you away, accusing you of disturbing the privacy of nonexistent tenants.
The collection of books of magic had begun in 1565, funded by wealthy men who were interested in magic, but who didn’t wish their curiosities and pursuits to be made public. It had occasionally been forced to shut down, during the war, for instance, when bombs were falling in London, and then in the eighties, that egocentric decade, when it had been impossible to find a librarian willing to take on a position that was quite thankless. One had to be on call twenty-four/seven in case of emergencies, and the silence of the job had driven one librarian mad at the turn of the century. In the sixties another librarian, high on pot and willing to expose the library’s membership and location, had spoken with a reporter, but thankfully the journalist could never find the address to document the story.
There was a metal box at the top of the steps in which people could leave manuscripts, with a notice on the lid firmly warning that once deposited, a manuscript could not be returned and that there was no assurance a book would be accepted. People brought books they had found in attics and at jumble sales, books their grandmothers or aunts or they themselves had written, books of family lore, personal Grimoires whose owners had passed away, books with brown-paper covers that were said to make a reader lose his or her vision, left-handed books that stank of sulfur and fish.
Kylie knocked on the door to the library, not the usual way to gain entrance, for members had keys and let themselves in. If Gideon were with her, she would likely have had more courage; she wished she could conjure him to stand beside her on the step.
When no one answered, Kylie tried the brass door knocker. Nothing happened. She imagined Gideon whispering in her ear, the half Gideon who was there in her imagination. You can’t give up now.
Kylie took The Book of the Raven from her backpack and invoked an entry incantation.
What you were, you will no longer be. What has been broken, will be restored. Open to me.
When Kylie and Antonia were growing up, their mother had told them if they ever were lost it was always best to find their way to a library. The sisters had depended on one another from a young age. I love you was always answered by I love you more. But if they were alone or separated, if they were in need, or in trouble, if they were in search of knowledge, or a friendly face, or simply a phone to use to call home, all could be found in a library.
Please Kylie added to her entreaty. Please let me in.
Her voice was barely audible, yet she heard the lock click. She stumbled on the stair, and the librarian, a man in his seventies, reached for her arm and ushered her inside.