Page 13 of With the Key in the Office
“What kind of maintenance?” Jessie asked lightly.
“Catalog wards,” Ms. Maple said too fast. “The shelves carry signatures. After a major event they need tuning. We had a major event. The stacks complain when the wards aren’t quite right. That’s what you smell, old bindings waking up. I’ll finish and file the form about the adjustments I’ve made.” Her gaze slid to the pile of spiral books and back to us. “If you’re here for ghosts, the third aisle on the left. Green spines. No, blue. I’m wrong. Green is better.”
Her charm brightened again. She pressed it flat to her sternum and whispered a small apology to the air. “I should check something before the window closes. Excuse me for one minute.”
She darted past us with quick little steps, skirt swishing, expression pinched with purpose and nerves. The glow near thedesk softened to a halo as her magic left the area, and the chalk marks seemed too dull.
Jessie leaned closer without touching anything. “Containment theory,” she read off the topmost titles. “Resonant bindings. Migratory curses. Not a casual selection.”
Jaylyn studied the chalk. “Those marks belong to a protective lattice,” she said. “Set the wrong way and it snaps at fingers. Set right and it tucks danger back into its box.” She tipped her head. “I can’t tell which thing she was trying to do from here.”
“Should we… follow her?” I asked.
“Probably not,” Jessie responded with ease. “She’s technically not doing anything wrong. Besides, we don’t really have any information that points to her. It’s probably not fair to bother her just because she’s an odd duck.”
She had a point. “Good idea.”
But then, she leaned in, “although her charm is definitely suspicious.”
“Is it?” I asked, thinking back to the thing.
“The way it glows… and when it glows… it’s just off,” Jessie whispered.
I was still so new to this world of godmothers and sugardaddies. I felt like a child at school, learning something new and exciting every day. Apparently, today’s lesson would include learning about magical charms.
Jaylyn reached out for one of the books, hesitated, then dropped her hand. It was as if she was afraid she’d get burnt. Not that Iblamed her. We had no idea the ins and outs of the magic the librarian was using.
A low thrum ran through the shelves. “We shouldn’t hover,” Jessie said. “Let’s take what we came for and read where we can pet the cats.”
I grinned. “They’d like that.”
The aisle with the green spines held three primers on spirits, two on echoes, and a slim book on spectral mimicry that insisted it wasn’t all myth. I opened the table of contents. An entry on contact jumped off the page. Most ghosts don’t shove their way through a doorway. Most ghosts don’t handle warded objects without an anchor. Our intruder had shouldered a living woman and lifted a key that should’ve scorched an unapproved hand. The words on the page didn’t make the knot in my stomach loosen.
Footsteps clattered down the stairs. Ms. Maple reappeared with a clipboard hugged to her chest. The charm at her throat had gone quiet and a little color had climbed back into her cheeks.
“That’s pretty,” I told her, pointing to the charm.
She smiled and touched it. “A family heirloom.”
“My family didn’t leave me anything like that,” Jaylyn says, followed by a laugh.
“Mine either,” I said, grinning.
“I finished the work I needed to get done,” Ms. Maple said. “I can help now. What do you need?”
The truth was we didn’t need any help. We just needed to focus on the material before us and piece it together to figure out how it could help us to see what happened with the ghost and the key.
“We’re just taking a few primers, so you don’t need to worry about us,” Jessie said. “You’re welcome to go back to your, ah, calibration.”
Maple glanced at the circles and columns. “It isn’t pretty, but it keeps books from chewing through wards.” She waved a hand toward the reading tables and managed a small, apologetic smile. “You’re welcome to sit down and read through your chosen books. I’ll be in the back if you need anything.”
She didn’t flee, not exactly, but she seems to be relieved to be retreating from us, which further raised my suspicions. The three of us stood there with the same quiet question. None of us wanted to accuse the woman who brought lemon bars and talked to shelves, as if they had temperaments, of any wrongdoings. But we also couldn’t ignore the circle of evidence around her desk, nor our instincts that were whispering that something was wrong with the woman.
We checked out the books, signed our names in Maple’s tidy ledger and left the library. The cats met us at my door with equal parts joy and judgment. Tilly curled around my calves and mrrped a greeting that also counted as a complaint. Simon trotted to the food shelf and sat with perfect manners in front of the tins. I scattered treats and opened a fresh can with a flourish that declared me a reliable provider.
Robbie arrived a few minutes later with a bag of muffins. He passed them out, parked the bag where Simon couldn’t raid it and pulled a chair closer to the bed. Jessie flipped open her notebook and drew a clean grid. Four columns appeared. Shewrote names across the top. Maple. Unknown entity. Pranksters. Outside caster working with a ghost.
Jaylyn tapped Maple’s column. “She bumped into a spectral person with Cendi’s face. She carries a charm that glows when wards strain. We found chalk patterns around her desk that match a protective lattice. She keeps odd hours.”