Welcome to Bordertown

by Holly Black

  As the Packers laughed, a human girl in a green “Respect the Realm” T-shirt said, “Don’t dis the fair folk! There’s too much hate—”

  Hammer Tat told her, “Stay out of this, elfy-welfy.”

  Jed or Ted added, “Read the old tales, kid. Last time around, elves hunted us, seduced us, tricked us—”

  The green-shirt girl said, “I have read them! The sidhe wanted to live in peace, but we harrowed them back under the Hill!” She looked hopefully at the Bloods. “Isn’t that right?”

  Watching the Packers, the Pillow Book buyer smiled and said softly, “Truth doesn’t matter. Their minds are fixed.”

  Her partner reached into his jacket pocket. “Should anyone doubt we can defend what is ours by right—”

  Hammer Tat put her hand in her back jeans pocket. “Elves ran before, and you’ll run again.”

  The other watchers scattered. Someone would call the Silver Suits, but by the time they arrived, the fight would be over. Even if there were bodies on the ground, no one who was smart would’ve seen anything.

  I stepped forward, raising one hand in a peace sign and grinning. I hoped they would laugh and move on. But I could hear heartbeats racing and smell anger growing.

  The male elf sneered at me. “Your people always want peace when the folk have the advantage. Step aside or fall with your fellows.”

  Jed or Ted told me, “A pointy-eared freak cursed you, Wolfboy. Join us for some payback.”

  “They’re not pointy-eared freaks!” the green-shirt girl shouted. “Humans once drove them away, but they’re giving us a second chance! Don’t you see? It’s time to heal the hate!”

  The Pillow Book buyer said, “I’m quite comfortable with hate, so long as its companion is fear.”

  The green-shirt girl screamed, “We’re not all like them!” Her wave included me with the Packers. Tears of frustration coursed down her cheeks.

  “True that,” said Hammer Tat as she drew out a hunting slingshot and pulled the cord tight.

  The Pillow Book buyer whipped her arm from her jacket. A Faerie dueling sword snapped out from its handle with a soft snikt.

  I was extremely aware that I was standing in no-man’s-land with no good place to go.

  Then I heard, “A plague o’ both your houses!”

  The cord of Hammer Tat’s slingshot broke, and the blade of the elf’s sword fell from its handle.

  Everyone froze, or maybe time just seemed to slow way, way down. If you thought we all looked stupid a moment earlier, we looked stupider then.

  Jed or Ted offered the obvious explanation: “Man, magic in B-town has extra weird sauce today.”

  I nodded emphatically as I slipped The Secrets of Seven Sages into the side pocket of my cargo pants. Then I picked up the blade of the dueling sword and handed it to the Pillow Book buyer. Taking it, she told the Packers, “So it seems.”

  Hammer Tat shrugged. “The Pack agreed this is common ground. If you want to meet, you know where to find us.”

  The Bloods nodded, the Packers walked on, and both Bloods strolled away. The green-shirt girl was shaking and sniffling, struggling to hide her tears. Some people laugh at elfy-welfies, but I remembered coming to Bordertown, hating what I was expected to be and longing for a better world. I gave her a smile and a thumbs-up.

  She just frowned at me and walked away, so I shrugged and forgot about her. I had more important things to worry about.

  I pulled out a notepad and wrote, “Book? Is Nixi’s trouble spell used up now?”

  Fortunately, I didn’t have to worry about how to show a note to a book. It whispered, “What’s done is done.”

  I wrote, “What’s that mean?”

  It whispered, “What’s done can’t be undone.”

  I wrote, “You weren’t programmed to answer questions, I take it.”

  It whispered, “We know what we are, but know not what we may be.”

  I wrote, “You couldn’t just say no?” I waited until I was sure the book wasn’t going to answer. Either its magical batteries had run down, or it didn’t have a quote in its database to cover what it wanted me to know.

  Copperjean looked up from Yotsuba&! as I walked in. I showed her The Secrets of Seven Sages. For a second, she was perfectly still. Which, for an elf, means nothing at all. Then, tugging a strand of her burnished hair, she said, “Shall I call the Silver Suits?”

  I shook my head. Even if I convinced a judge that a book quoting Shakespeare proved Nixi was pulling a fast one, the worst he’d get was a fine. Which he would pay off by scamming someone new.

  I went to the chalkboard behind the counter and wrote, “How did a cheap dust jacket get on a rare book?”

  Copperjean said, “Someone must’ve swapped it when no one was watching,” and went back to her manga.

  I glanced at the shelf over the front window. Another dark, old book was where The Secrets of Seven Sages had been. I put The Secrets of Seven Sages back in my pocket. Maybe it wriggled as it settled in place. It might’ve purred.

  I told myself it was just a magical book worth a lot of money, got the stepladder from the rear of the store, and took down the book that had been substituted for The Secrets of Seven Sages. It was a volume of The D’Artagnan Romances, which I returned to the shelf labeled “Slashing Wit.”

  For the rest of the afternoon, I wanted to talk this over with Sparks and Milo, but I didn’t dare leave Elsewhere. I wished I wasn’t suspecting what I was suspecting. I had been so grateful we’d found someone who knew books. I hadn’t thought to wonder why an elf fresh from the Realm would know the books of the World.

  When the sun got low, Copperjean left while I put a sign in the window: “Closed means closed,” and, in smaller print, “Beware of wolf.”

  Then I ran upstairs, told Sparks I would be back in an hour or two, and tailed Copperjean. You may think it’d be hard for a werewolf to tail someone without being noticed, but people don’t check who’s behind them unless they expect to be followed, and my wolf nose is good for more than looking sharp. I stayed a block back and let her scent lead me.

  Straight to Fair Folk Books.

  Color me unsurprised.

  When I spotted the crowd in front of Nixi’s store, I noticed only their races: about two-thirds were human and the rest were elf and halfie. A sign in the window said “Together, Elves and Friends of Elves Will Heal Bordertown. Meeting Here Every Night at Sundown!” Under the sign was a table of shirts and pamphlets next to a big donation box labeled “End the Hate! Give Until It Feels Good!” The box was nearly full of coins and bills from the World. Not cheap ones either.

  That made me give the crowd a closer look. Most of the humans and all of the elves and halfies wore clothes made by fashion designers who specialized in ripping off street styles. This crowd was a mix of noobs from the World and rich kids from Dragon’s Tooth Hill.

  When I pushed my way inside, I saw Nixi and Copperjean behind the counter near a bulletin board, talking quietly like lovers or longtime friends. The only thing about Copperjean that had changed was what I knew, but that was enough. Now she just looked like an elf from the Hill who had dyed her hair and donned old clothes to go slumming in Soho.

  When Nixi and Copperjean looked up, they stank of guilt. I so wished I could say, Speak of the devil.

  Nixi said, “You found us out. No hard feelings?”

  I pulled out a card, wrote, “Help needed at Elsewhere. Ask for Wolfboy,” stuck it on their bulletin board, and walked out.

  As I left, Nixi called, “It’s only business, Wolfboy!”

  Questions needed answers, so I headed straight to First and First. The old car lot was filled with vintage autos that Milo collected, but I didn’t pause to admire them. When I entered the former showroom, he looked up from a desk covered with computers and chemistry tubes. “Wolfboy! Try this!” He held out what looked like a piece of chocolate.

  I signed, “What is it?”

  “The 1812 Overture.” He pointed at hi
s desk and said proudly, “I made a scanner that turns music into candy!”

  Having music involving cannons in my stomach didn’t seem like a good idea. I signed, “Sorry. Dogs and chocolate, you know.” Before he could offer me anything else, I pulled out The Secrets of Seven Sages. “What’s the backstory on this?”

  He squinted at it, then waggled his finger in the air. I think he’d seen too many movies about mad scientists. “Ah, yes. Toni the Bookman sold it to me a couple of years ago. She didn’t say where she found it.”

  I’d heard stories about Toni the Bookman exploring the Never-never and returning with books everyone thought had been lost forever. She’s one of my heroes. I signed, “Didn’t she disappear about two years ago?”

  Milo stroked his goatee, and I wondered whether that was supposed to be an evil genius or a mad scientist gesture. It worked for both, but it looked a little silly when Milo did it. “I never saw her after that. I figured she hadn’t found anything I’d be interested in.” Milo must’ve thought the stroking was silly, too, because he quickly steepled his fingers.

  I signed, “Who wrote it?”

  Milo shrugged. “No one knows. It’s a collection of spells. They say the Seven Sages assembled it, but no one knows for sure.”

  “Seven Sages?”

  “Seven elfin wizards. This would’ve been centuries ago, if it’s true.”

  “Why the doubt?”

  “Because the Seven disappeared.”

  “Like in a puff of smoke?”

  “Like without a trace. Gone, and no one knows when, where, or why.”

  “Did you know the book talks?”

  Milo smiled in his shyly pleased way. “It’s got the standard protection spells: warns you if it’s being stolen, won’t let anyone take it if it hasn’t been bought honestly, et cetera.”

  “All in Elizabethan English.”

  Milo shrugged. “Elves like Shakespeare.”

  “There’s a bit of disappearing in its history.”

  “That doesn’t necessarily mean anything. Toni might show up tomorrow with her latest find. And for famous magicians, disappearing can be a way to retire in peace.” He frowned. “Or maybe some secret enemy got to them.”

  “Like who?”

  “Wolfdude, if I knew, it wouldn’t be a secret.”

  “Oh. So who would want the book?”

  Milo laughed.

  I signed, “What’s so funny?”

  “I traded it to you because I didn’t want it. I offered it to Ms. Wu first, but she touched it and said it wasn’t part of her path and gave it right back.”

  “Somebody wants it. Nixi tried to scam me out of it, then tried to buy it honestly when that didn’t pan out. Speaking of, he put a curse on Elsewhere.”

  Milo’s pale eyes opened wide. When I nodded, he closed his eyes, mumbled something that made my ears hurt, frowned, and repeated it more quietly, which made my ears hurt worse.

  When he looked at me, he said, “The bad news is I can’t remove the spell. It doesn’t feel like the work of a local mage. Nixi must’ve gotten it off someone from Faerie.”

  “What’s the good news?”

  “Well, the not-so-bad news, anyway. The spell is mild, the psychic equivalent of making a day warm and muggy so people will be more irritable.”

  “So customers won’t want to hang around the store?”

  Milo nodded sadly. “I’ll find a way to break it, but that might take a while.” He gave one of his shy, pleased grins. “I could cast a similar spell on Nixi’s shop.” Then he frowned. “No. You don’t want to escalate a magic war. Not when we don’t know who or how good the mage is.” Milo drummed his slender fingers on the desk, then grinned so wide he should’ve been drawn with a lightbulb coming on over his head. “Teliamonde!”

  I shook my head to ask, “Who?”

  “A recent magician from Faerie. She asked if I wanted to sell any of my library. She didn’t mention The Secrets of Seven Sages, but I did say I’d traded everything I no longer wanted to you. After she agrees to a fair price, say, twelve thousand aurei, tell her you also want something to break a discord spell.”

  “Twelve thousand?” As Milo nodded, I thought, Dear powers that may or may not be, please damn Nixi to a bookman’s hell. I wrote, “Know where Teliamonde lives?”

  Milo closed his eyes, then said, “Three Persimmon Lane on the Hill.”

  I grabbed him, gave him a sloppy wolf kiss on the cheek, and signed, “You’ll be the guest of honor at our housewarming!”

  Then, as Milo blushed and backed away so I couldn’t kiss him again, I ran out because sometimes a wolf is so happy he just has to run.

  It seemed too late to visit Teliamonde—surprising magicians isn’t a survival trait—and Sparks would be wondering where I was, so I raced back to Elsewhere and charged upstairs. Our apartment was tiny, the furniture was old, the view was of the buildings across the street, but Sparks had made chile rellenos, black beans and rice, and fresh corn tortillas. That smell made any place a palace.

  No, Sparks did. She’d dyed her hair purple this month, and she wore a yellow and green poncho, blue tights, a brown mukluk beaded with violet and white flowers on one foot, and a white cast decorated with red magic marker on the other. She smelled, as always, better than anything.

  I signed, “Hey, mi reina,” and her smile was all the reward any knight-errant could want. While we ate, I told her about Nixi, Copperjean, and The Secrets of Seven Sages, leaving out the parts about the curse so she wouldn’t worry, and the value of the book so she would be surprised when I gave her the key to the house with the red door.

  Which meant most of my story was about the book breaking up the fight between the Packers and the Bloods. Sparks patted its cover. “Bestest book ever.”

  It definitely purred then.

  Sparks said, “We can’t sell it.”

  I signed, “It’s a book. That’s what we do.”

  “But it protected you!”

  “It protected itself. I was just holding it.”

  Sparks looked at the book. “Book? What should we do?”

  The book said, “To thine own self be true.”

  Sparks’s mouth fell open. Then she laughed. “See! We gotta keep it.”

  “We’re not magicians. Things should go to people who’ll use them.”

  “Yes, but …” She let the sentence die. “Every time it rains, I’d swear the ceiling leaks more. Could we get enough for a new roof?”

  I kept my face straight. “Maybe.” Then I signed, “Until I make the sale, we can’t hire anyone we don’t know.”

  “So we ask people for recommendations.” Sparks smiled. “Nixi might’ve done us a favor. It’s a good excuse to get in touch with friends.”

  I nodded. I never thought my dog face was that expressive, but Sparks said, “What?”

  I swallowed, then signed, “I was remembering who we can’t ask. Leda, Tick-Tick, Strider, Leander—everyone who died or went back to Faerie.”

  Sparks squinted at me. “Is that why you hired Copperjean? Because you miss our elf friends?”

  I signed, “No way! She was just the first person who knew anything about books.…” Then I stared at nothing.

  “What?”

  “A human kid knew his shit. I’d decided to go with him, but I felt sorry for Copperjean because she was new to town, so …” I stared at my hands until Sparks leaned down to put her head in my line of sight. I signed, “Yeah. I miss them.”

  She snuggled up next to me, pulled my arms around her, and said, “Me too.”

  And pretty soon I just thought I was the luckiest.

  The next morning, I went downstairs to put the Help Wanted sign in the window and saw a sheet of green paper stuck on the front door. I stepped outside and jerked the flier free. The large print read:

  ELVES and FRIENDS OF ELVES!

  HEAL THE HATE!

  BOYCOTT ELSEWHERE BOOKS!

  The small print said we had fired our elfin staf
f and we refused to do business with stores owned by elves. I began laughing when I got to the part about Elsewhere carrying kids’ books that literally belittled elves, and fantasy novels that made elves into “noble elf” wish-fulfillment figures.

  I was still laughing when one of our elf customers walked by. I smiled at her and shrugged. She looked away and walked faster.

  Then I noticed that green fliers adorned walls and light poles as far as I could see.

  That’s when I knew we had a problem.

  Thinking, Powers that may or may not be, any hell for Nixi will be fine, I scribbled, “Everyone is welcome to apply” to the bottom of the Help Wanted sign, then told Sparks we would open a little late.

  Ripping down fliers in Soho was like chopping hydra heads. Every block had at least one. I told myself most people ignore fliers, but as I yanked them down, I got looks that made me feel more like a freak than ever before. One kid told me, “I knew there was a reason I never shopped at your place.”

  When I got home, Sparks asked, “How did it go?”

  I signed, “I love you.”

  “That bad?”

  “They plastered B-town with their account from a parallel universe.”

  She smiled, and I decided to leave it at that. Why make her worry? It would blow over, right?

  I opened the store after lunch with a new poster in the window: “Inventory sale! Help us achieve outventory!” A couple of customers wandered in, an elf and a human. I was stamping “Elsewhere Public Library” onto books for the freebie bin when a crowd gathered outside. Nixi, Copperjean, and some kids in green T-shirts had signs: “Boycott Elsewhere!” “Elves and Friends of Elves United!” “Why Won’t Elsewhere Hire Elves?”

  I stepped out front with a slate: “Elves have always been welcome at Elsewhere. They always will be.”

  Copperjean pointed an elegant finger at the Help Wanted notice. “May I have my job back?”

  I shook my head.

  She said, “So, the folk are good enough to pay for your wares, but you still won’t hire us?”

  Before I could try to answer, someone began chanting, “Hey, ho! Hey, ho! All the haters have to go!”