Page 9
Theo lived with Sera because his parents were afraid of his magic.
He’d been seven years old when his magic had made itself known and a few days shy of his ninth birthday when Sera’s aunt Lilja, who had found out about Sera’s own magic when Theo’s had first appeared, had called her in tears to say she couldn’t do it anymore.
She couldn’t sleep for fear that Theo would burn the house down or make the hymnbooks dance in church, she’d said, and nothing Sera had said could convince her that witches didn’t actually do things like that in real life.
So Sera had flown to Reykjavík, taken one look at Theo standing anxiously at the edge of the room like he was trying not to frighten his parents by saying or doing the wrong thing, and said, “You can come stay with me if you like.”
It was a splendid idea, in theory. Theo spoke fluent English already, a phone call to the village school had assured them that he’d have a place there as soon as he wanted it, and Jasmine had been thrilled at the prospect of having someone new to fuss over.
How Theo would get to Batty Hole Inn, however, was another matter. A new witch could not come to live in the country without the Guild’s permission, and Sera could not conceive of a universe in which they were likely to grant her any favours.
Fortunately, the Wise Women of Reykjavík had pulled some strings, and within a week, Sera and Theo were on a flight home.
Two years on, Theo was still here. He had never asked to go back, his parents had never suggested he go back, and Sera didn’t want him to go back unless he had a safe and welcoming place to be.
He FaceTimed with his parents every week, had made friends, was thriving at school, and, as far as Sera could tell, seemed happy.
So Sera would be immensely displeased if, after all that, Theo were to be locked up in a dungeon.
She returned to the living room. Francesca had taken a seat in an armchair by the log burner, but Sera’s eyes skated past her and landed in the corner of the room where, out of Francesca’s line of sight, the house had shaken loose a translucent memory of Sera’s much younger self.
Thirteen or fourteen years old, in her Guild school uniform, at the peak of her friendship with the old Francesca, bouncing excitedly on her toes like she was trying to get this Francesca’s attention.
Sera, too accustomed to the house’s tricks, didn’t react. A blink later, the ghost was gone and Francesca looked up as Sera entered the room. “Well?”
“Here,” Sera said, handing the jumper-covered spellbook over and collapsing wearily into the opposite armchair.
Francesca unwrapped the book, folding Theo’s jumper neatly and placing it on the arm of her chair. “Out of curiosity, why didn’t they just take a photograph of the spell you wanted? Wouldn’t that have been easier than absconding with the entire book?”
“Much easier, but Theo left his phone here. I’m assuming his reasoning was that if Jasmine or I happened to glance at his location on our phones, we’d see him safely at home.”
“So he didn’t want you to know where he was?” Francesca raised her eyebrows. “You really didn’t know about this, did you?”
Realising she’d said too much, Sera backtracked.
“No, I knew. I must have misspoken about the phone thing. It was all my idea.” Technically, that last part was true.
Sera had once said to Clemmie, sarcastically , that stealing the spellbook would be easier than convincing the Guild to let her look at it.
And look where that had got her. “Do whatever you need to, but leave Theo out of it.”
Almost as if he had not stayed put as he’d been told to, and had in fact been listening in from just outside the door, Theo burst into the room. “No! They can’t blame you for something I did!”
Sera glared him into silence. Francesca looked between them. “What about Clementine?”
“What about her?”
“She was obviously involved.”
You’re welcome to have her, Sera wanted to say, but didn’t. She’d regret it later. Clemmie had gone too far, as she so often did, but she’d been a part of Sera’s life for too long for her to abandon her now.
“You have evidence there was a fox with Theo,” Sera said. “You can’t prove the fox is Clemmie. Like I said, this was my idea.”
There was a long pause. Theo was practically quivering with outrage, his jaw set so mutinously that Sera just knew he was getting ready to insist all over again that if anyone ought to be punished for his youthful wrongdoings, it should be him.
Really, this was all Nicholas’s fault for putting ideas about knightly honour and noble sacrifice into Theo’s impressionable young head.
To her surprise, however, Francesca smiled. “Still loyal to the bitter end, I see.”
Sera said nothing.
“As soon as I saw which book had been taken,” Francesca went on, “I knew it was the restoration spell you wanted. This is about getting your magic back, isn’t it?”
There was no point denying it, so Sera nodded.
Francesca held The Ninth Compendium out. “I’m afraid it’s not quite as easy as that. Take a look.”
Wary of a trap she couldn’t yet see, Sera took the spellbook.
The edges of the book were uneven, the pages not all the same size, the parchment varying from yellowed whites to faded browns.
Fascinated, Sera touched the edges of the paper with a careful finger, thinking of all the possible places these spells might have been found, imagining the rustle of a scroll in the Library of Alexandria or the puff of an old man blowing dust off his late great-grandmother’s trunk and finding a spell tucked between her gloves.
(Of course, none of these spells could have actually come from the Library of Alexandria, not just because any such spells would rightfully belong to Egypt or Greece but also because the oldest spell in all twelve compendiums was only about four hundred years old.
The old man and his glove-wearing, trunk-owning great-granny, though, could have been real.)
The witch who had compiled the volume had created a table of contents in neat, beautiful handwriting, the ink bleeding very slightly. About halfway down the list were the words A Spell of Restoration . Sera turned to the right page, fingers trembling slightly.
Her heart sank a bit. “Oh.”
Theo, looking eagerly over her shoulder, was confused. “What is that?”
There were words on the page, in dark, slightly smudged ink, but they were not written in any script Sera could read.
“It’s a spellcasting language that predates the one we use now,” Francesca explained.
“I know.” Sera had come across it a few times as a child.
Every time she’d expressed an interest in learning it, Albert had reminded her how lucky she was to be apprenticed to him and had made it clear that he had no intention of wasting his time teaching her outdated, unnecessary things.
It had not escaped Sera’s notice that he had clearly deemed those outdated, unnecessary things worth learning, but it was only much later that she’d really appreciated how much of the five years she’d spent with the Guild had been dominated by Albert trying to keep as much knowledge from her as possible.
“Look,” Francesca said quietly, “I’d rather pretend this never happened. I don’t want to punish either of you for, shall we say, borrowing the book. I have to take it back with me today, but if you wanted to take photographs of the spell before I go, I wouldn’t stop you.”
Sera was quite certain she had to be misunderstanding this, because surely, surely , Francesca wasn’t actually helping her?
Theo ran out of the room, excitedly yelling, “Clemmie! We’re not in trouble! And Sera gets to take photos!”
“Theo, I am on the lam .” Clemmie’s outraged voice could be heard in reply. “You can’t just announce my presence to the blooming Chancellor of the Guild!”
“I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that,” Francesca said to Sera.
Sera was still at a loss. “Why are you doing this?”
Francesca shrugged, one hand toying restlessly with a single loose thread on the cuff of her jacket. “Why not?”
“When we were kids, you used to fidget with your clothes when you were hiding something,” Sera commented.
Francesca yanked her hand away from her cuff. “Can we not overthink it? Don’t you have better things to worry about? Like, say, how you’re going to translate the spell?”
“I have no idea how I’m going to translate the spell! How many people still alive today have studied this language? A handful? And I can’t imagine any of them helping me!”
Francesca opened her mouth and then shut it again.
Sera frowned. “What?”
“Nothing.”
“No, it was definitely something. What were you going to say?”
Looking rather annoyed with herself, Francesca said, “Do you remember Verity Walter?”
“Professor Walter? Yes, of course. She was one of the few people who spent more time in the library than I did. Your father would try to put me off reading books that were, quote unquote, too advanced , but Professor Walter would put them in my hands, wink, and walk away.”
“She would have helped you. She can’t , which is why I didn’t say it, but she would have. Under different circumstances.”
Sera narrowed her eyes at her. “What are you talking about?”
“I can’t really tell you the—”
“Well, you’re going to,” Sera shot back. “Why can’t she help me? And why are you so sure she’d even want to?” A sudden, horrible thought struck her. “Has she tried before? When? What happened?”
“Ugh,” Francesca huffed, her carefully cultivated poise abandoning her altogether. “Father told Professor Walter that if she helped you, he’d make sure she’s never allowed into the Guild’s libraries again.”
“When?” Sera asked again. “Last month? Last year? How long after I lost my magic?”
Reddening, Francesca said, “Straight after.”
“Straight after,” Sera repeated, her voice tight with rage. “Straight. After.”
Table of Contents
- Page 1
- Page 2
- Page 3
- Page 4
- Page 5
- Page 6
- Page 7
- Page 8
- Page 9 (Reading here)
- Page 10
- Page 11
- Page 12
- Page 13
- Page 14
- Page 15
- Page 16
- Page 17
- Page 18
- Page 19
- Page 20
- Page 21
- Page 22
- Page 23
- Page 24
- Page 25
- Page 26
- Page 27
- Page 28
- Page 29
- Page 30
- Page 31
- Page 32
- Page 33
- Page 34
- Page 35
- Page 36
- Page 37
- Page 38
- Page 39
- Page 40
- Page 41
- Page 42
- Page 43
- Page 44
- Page 45
- Page 46
- Page 47
- Page 48
- Page 49
- Page 50
- Page 51
- Page 52
- Page 53
- Page 54