Jamie couldn’t link arms with me, as our hands were fully occupied, but she did walk close enough for our elbows to brush. “To your parents’ house for dinner?”
“We might as well. We both have purchases to collect, and they’re expecting us.”
“Okay.” She leaned in to speak in a lower tone, an invitation in her eyes. “And after, dessert can be at my place.”
I warmed to the idea immediately. “I look forward to it, my dear.”
I was sometimes teased by my sister about having no social life, but I did indeed have friends. I didn’t see them as often as Jamie saw hers, of course, because my acquaintances were more introverted, like myself. Still, we enjoyed each other’s company, and if something suggested a meet-up, we agreed readily enough.
I found myself in the odd position of instigating one of these meet-ups. I say odd because I rarely ever prompt such get-togethers.
Since Jamie was running her ducklings through the investigation of the other two stolen books, I took it upon myself to visit a colleague with only Phil for company. Leor Purves was one of the brightest minds I’d had the pleasure of working with in university, and he’d become a magical theorist once he graduated. Our work never intersected, of course, but I did love sitting with him sometimes and throwing ideas about.
Come to think of it, I really should invite Seaton the next time I met up with Leor. The three of us would have a splendid evening together, I had no doubt. Seaton enjoyed a good theoretical debate as well as the next man, after all.
The townhome I called upon was a sizeable one in a very distinguished part of town. Leor tended to work out of his own home most of the time. He claimed he could concentrate better there, and I believed it. My own colleagues were constantly popping in on me, and sometimes it became a nuisance, preventing me from staying focused on a single task. If not for the demands of preserving evidence at the station, I would have vastly preferred to work from home, myself.
I crossed the three stairs onto the porch with light feet, giving the door a sound knock, eyeing the left side as I did so. Dead flowers in pots on the front porch. Oh, dear. Who had been silly enough to give Leor something to tend to? The man didn’t even routinely remember to shave, for heaven’s sake.
The door opened, and Leor himself stared at me blankly for five full seconds. With the ink stain on his nose, black hair a little wild and tufted behind his jug ears, he looked like the mad scientist we accused him of being. He had not shaved recently, the stubble dark on his fair skin, but his clothes were clean and orderly around his bulky frame, so someone had tended to him recently. I gave him time to switch mental tracks and bring himself back into the real world. It wasn’t like I didn’t understand how that was, some days.
Then he blinked, and a smile blossomed on his face. “Henri! Good grief, is it that time already?”
“It is,” I assured him.
“Well, come in, come in. I’m delighted to see you, you know. It’s been a tree’s age, at least. Now, what’s this furry little companion on your shoulder? And is that a police badge hanging from the collar, there, or am I seeing things?”
I let myself in, but not far. Leor didn’t have much in the way of furniture, per se, but stacks of notebooks, journals, and books lined the walls. I didn’t have much room to maneuver in, as the foyer wasn’t wide to begin with.
“This is my Felix companion, and yes, that’s a police badge. He’s part of the department.”
“I’m Phil.” The Felix in question introduced himself and extended a paw to shake with.
Leor didn’t miss a beat, just extended a hand and touched a finger to that tiny paw. “A pleasure, Phil. I say, wasn’t your creator Jules Felix?”
In his light voice, Phil confirmed, “Yes.”
“I heard about you. He came ’round once to throw ideas at me. Fascinating, simply fascinating discussion. I’m quite glad to meet you in the flesh, see how his ideas panned out. Well, let’s not stand here. Henri, I made room in a chair for you.”
“Splendid.”
Chairs were not always empty in this house. I went directly right, as Leor had changed his parlor into his study. More room, he said, but I think it had more to do with the amount of light in here, coming in through the bay windows. He had indeed made an effort to clean up. Not only was a guest chair clear, but I could see part of the surface of his desk. Which was quite astonishing. Prior to this, I could not have sworn in a court of law that the furniture had a top to it, as I’d never seen it.
I settled into the chair, Phil moving from my shoulder to my lap and sprawling out as if he owned real estate on my thighs.
Leor took the chair next to me, crossing his legs comfortably. He noticed that Phil’s nose kept twitching, the little Felix scenting him and looking confused.
“Do I smell of magic, little friend?”
Phil nodded uncertainly. “But not like Henri.”
“No, indeed. I’m half-Baku, you see. Do you know what that is?”
“Dream-eater,” Phil answered, his confusion clearing immediately.
“Indeed. Being only a half-Baku, I don’t need or feel the compulsion to eat dreams, you see, but I do like the taste of them. And I sometimes have friends and family who visit me to eat a nightmare, which I’m happy to do. Do you have a nightmare you want eaten?”
Phil shook his head, golden eyes blinking slowly in that way he did when he was thinking hard. “No. Thank you.”
“The offer’s open if you change your mind later.” Leor gave me a smug grin. “I don’t need to ask you. I can tell you’ve only had good dreams recently.”
“Guilty,” I admitted without qualm. “I’ve started courting Jamie.”
“Oh, are you? I knew you were hesitant to do so, but I’m quite glad you did, Henri. I take it things are going well?”
“Astonishingly so. I’m almost embarrassed for hesitating, in fact.”
Leor looked as pleased as if he were the one dating. “I always felt if you just found the right person, things would go well for you. Out of all my friends, you’re the most thoughtful, after all. You must introduce me to her at some point. From what you’ve said before, she has an amazing vault of information.”
“She does. One of the more intelligent women in my acquaintance, and you know how smart some of my colleagues are. I think she’ll keep you on your toes. I’ll try to arrange a dinner.”
It pleased me that he was interested in meeting Jamie. And I did feel it healthy for him to step out of the house at least once this month.
“Yes, do so. I’ll make time for it.” Leor clapped his pudgy hands together. “Now. Let’s get to the topic that brought you to me. I’m sure you’re busy, what with investigating crimes. You said this is about the Reaper’s Set?”
Henri nodded. “I was at a book faire yesterday, and there was a theft of a grimoire, a volume from the Reaper’s Set.”
Leor let out a low whistle, his bushy eyebrows winging up into his hairline. “No! I just had mine stolen, too!”
I blinked, then immediately whipped out my notebook. “Leor, you should have led with that!”
“Well, I thought that was what your note was about,” Leor responded acerbically. “You just said in your note you wanted to know more about the Reaper’s Set, and I’ve got one—or had one. What else was I to think?”
“Alright, well, you now know I’m investigating the theft. When did it happen?”
Leor looked a bit sheepish as he admitted, “I really can’t tell you when the theft occurred. I just noticed it missing two weeks ago, is all.”
Considering the state of this house, it was something of a miracle he’d noticed at all. Leor was not what one would call organized.
“Can you guess at all when? Night? Day? Why do you not have a ward up?”
“Back of the house is being renovated,” Leor explained. “I’ve some water damage because of bad flashing; it’s affecting the mortar in the brick. I had to take the ward down until construction is
finished.”
“Ah. Poor timing. Unless the thief targeted you specifically because your ward was down. But not even a temporary ward?”
“Well, I have one around my bedroom. Now. Because being robbed was very unsettling.”
“I bet it was.” It was so like Leor to absentmindedly deal with the situation after the fact. “Were you referencing it? Is that why you noticed its absence?”
“Yes, in fact. The volume I had—oh, it was volume seven—dealt mainly in magical theory. Fascinating, truly fascinating. I only understood about half of it, to tell the truth. Sometimes, when I like to break my brain, I’ll try to read it straight through. At any rate, I’d gone looking for it, to reference something I’d remembered, only to come up empty. I tore the house apart, in fact, for three whole days. I was convinced I’d mislaid it.”
Leor sighed, shoulders slumping.
I looked around the room, noting that it was indeed dusted and tidy, even the stacks on the floor neatly arranged.
“So, you actually organized your house in an effort to find it?”
“I did, and—you must admit—the state of the house is an improvement.”
I shrugged in acknowledgement. “No room for disagreement there. But still no book.”
“No. And I found later, the back door’s lock was broken. The mechanism had been harmed in such a way that it was impossible to mistake it as anything but a burglary. I’ve replaced the lock, but I still have the old one if you want to take a look.”
“I certainly will. How many people knew you had this volume?”
Leor sat back, propping a foot up on the ottoman nearby.
“I think several people knew. It wasn’t precisely a secret, and I had colleagues over sometimes to help me decipher parts of it. Most of the handwriting in the grimoire is very neat and precise, but the handwritten notes in the margins weren’t usually in the same style.”
“I see.” I jotted that all down, now more alarmed than I had been before. “You said your volume dealt more with magical theory. I was told by the broker that most of the set dealt with death or destruction in some manner.”
Leor grunted agreement, although his expression was sour.
“Half the set, to be precise. The other half was brilliant, in my opinion. A bit dark in topic, but really. People will always find a way to twist things to their own ends.”
“I can’t say I disagree. Jamie likes to say people will always find a more creative way to murder.”
“She’s unfortunately right.”
Leor’s gaze shifted to a particular spot on the bookshelf, which I noticed was predominantly blank. A very telling thing, in this room crammed with books.
“Lady Radman gave us a chance to read some of them before selecting who to sell them to. It was very kind of her to do so. Practical, too. She wanted each grimoire to go into the right hands. Hang on, you said a volume was stolen from a book faire? What in dark magic was one doing at a faire, of all places?”
“The broker had acquired it through an estate sale.”
“Which volume?”
“Four.”
“Oh,” he said in a deflated voice. “That would have been Secilia Bardoff. I hadn’t heard she passed. Shame, that. Quite a brilliant woman.”
I made a note of the original owner. “But truly, Leor, you can’t think of when it might have been stolen? I have no timeline to work from.”
“I know, I’m quite vexed as well. But I didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary. I don’t really use the back kitchen door much, you see. I’m quite depressed over the grimoire’s theft, to tell the truth. There was so much more for me to learn from its contents.”
“I’ll try to find it, along with the other stolen volume,” I promised.
“Thank you, Henri. I did report it, but the police officer I spoke to didn’t seem to grasp the importance of it.”
“I’ve heard this complaint before. I’ll straighten the record out, I assure you. For now, tell me more about the set. I don’t know much about it.”
“Ah, well there are fourteen volumes in total.” Leor hesitated, then corrected himself. “Fourteen official volumes. There is one more people like to include in the set, but it was a diary, not a grimoire.”
I waved him on, taking notes quickly on the arm of the chair, as Phil had no intention of moving from his spot.
“The entirety of it was written by a brilliant magician in the late Revolutionary period, Lord Kerey Radman. He’d actually enclosed the volumes in one of the walls in his home to keep them from being used during the war. Of course, he died on the warfront, and it wasn’t until decades later—when his home was bought and renovated—that they found the volumes.
“To be precise, the volumes’ protections were long since faded, and it was warping the building in some astonishing ways. They had to excavate them in order to be able to renovate and put the building back to rights. The new owner very kindly handed the grimoires over to Radman’s descendants, who eventually decided to sell them—but not as a set. Frankly, we were all very aware of how much they were worth, and the community as a whole couldn’t have afforded to buy the full set. Pieces of it went in every direction.
“My own volume wasn’t something purchased, but received as a gift. I’m a friend of Marvella Radman’s, and she gave it to me as a graduation present. It’s what twists the knife in the wound. I do not look forward to telling her it was stolen.”
This was excellent information, and it gave me something of a lead.
“Marvella Radman, you said. Did she or her family keep any part of the set?”
“Yes, the diary. That, they wouldn’t part with. I can give you her address, if you’d like to speak with her?”
“I would dearly love to. She might know of someone who’s trying to lay hands on the set. Or a volume stolen, as the case may be.”
“Now that you mention it, there was a broker who contacted me a while back, trying to buy my volume. Sasson Walcott, I believe his name was. Said he was trying to collect them all.” Leor snorted. “I have no idea who’d have sufficient wealth to manage the entire set. It would cost a king’s ransom. Even the royal library was only able to afford one.”
My interest was piqued. “The royal library has one?”
“That’s what Marvella told me. Or, at least, they bought one. Who knows if they still have it.”
I made a note to check on it, and wrote down the name of the book broker, too.
“Henri.” Leor put his hands together in a praying fashion, mouth pursed in discomfort. “It truly disturbs me to hear another volume has been stolen. While brilliant, the spells in those grimoires could do irrevocable damage. I shudder to think of them in the wrong hands. Marvella’s family was very careful who they sold each volume to. She only gave the seventh volume to me because she knew I would both put it to good use and use the knowledge inside wisely. I was not the only one gifted a volume in order to keep it in the right hands.”
“I understand,” I assured him, and I truly did. Knowledge misused was often the downfall of people. Not to mention civilizations. “I’m not keen on this myself. What kind of spells were in yours?”
“There weren’t many, really. As I said, it specialized in magical theory. Which, if you understood it, I suppose could be used in the wrong ways. But most of the set had spells best used for interrogations, compulsions, even seeking spells that bordered on unethical.
“I read through parts of the other volumes, you see. And, frankly, they were disturbing. I could see how easily they could be misused. I have nightmares about mine falling into the wrong hands, much less anyone else’s.”
After hearing that list, I knew I’d have nightmares, too. I’d seen what happened when a magician was careless in his craft—he’d started an epidemic in the city. But someone with cutting-edge spells crafted by a genius some claimed was mad? I had to assume the epidemic would look mild in comparison.
“I assure you, we’ll do everything we can to
find them quickly. Especially since the volume at the faire was stolen without its protective box.”
Leor’s head jerked up, and he stared at me with jaw dropped. “No! Great dark magic, that’s even worse!”
“No one was happy to have that reported.”
“No, you don’t understand, the grimoires have no sealing hex inside their covers.”
I jerked, startled, then groaned, my head sinking. I really wished someone had informed me of this terrible news earlier.
“At all?”
“None at all. It was part of why the Radman family was so careful in choosing the grimoires’ owners. Kerey Radman clearly never intended for his work to be handed over to another.”
Phil took this in, expression serious, which was an adorable look on his tiny face. “But that means there’s no protections on the books.”
“None at all.”
I could have used better news, not…this. At least Leor had given me people to interview, which might drum up some leads, but I had no faith they would hand me a solution.
“Leor, tell me good news. Your box for the grimoire, was it taken, too?”
“I’m happy to say it was. Well, happy isn’t the right word…you know what I mean.” Leor made a face. “In this case, I’d rather have the box stolen than the grimoire without its protective box.”
I breathed out a sigh of relief. “Yes. That means we currently only have one unprotected volume of deadly spells freely out in the public.”
Leor gave it a beat. “I think that sounded more reassuring in your head than it did aloud.”
Grimacing, I admitted, “It did. That’s still the stuff of nightmares.”
Leor was well able to read me and offered, “Good luck? And find them quickly.”
“Thank you.” I sighed. I did not look forward to telling my better half any of this. “I’ll need it.”
Grimoires and Where to Find Them Page 4
