Jessica turned slowly away from the squabbling pair of apparent magical scholars—however strange a pair it was. They were old. Likely to mistakenly recognize her for someone she clearly wasn’t. That had to be what this was.
“Now, I’m sure you have important business to attend to,” Boris continued in his rumbling growl. “But if you’d be so kind, we’d very much appreciate your time. Just a sliver of it, mind you.”
“Yeah. It’s not every day you see a Guardian out and about with the rest of us.”
Jessica froze, her gut twisting in on itself. “What?”
“Look at that.” Reynaldo tittered again. “She’s put on such a modest show for us, Boris.”
The dryad’s small, glowing green eyes narrowed. “I wouldn’t go so far as to presume it’s a show, old chap.”
“Ha. Well then she’s quite different from her predecessor that way, wouldn’t you say?”
“It’s only been two weeks.” Boris stretched out his head from behind the armchair, his neck elongating unnaturally as both the wood-adapted skin and the armchair creaked again. He nodded slightly at Jessica. “Still, I’d say you’ve done quite the job of it over the last two weeks even then.”
“Sorry.” She swallowed. “Like I said, I don’t think I’m who you—”
“Tabitha instilled quite the sense of caution in you, didn’t she?”
Jessica’s mind went completely blank for a split second, then a single thought came crashing back into it.
How the fuck did they know?
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Jesus, she sounded like the fourteen-year-old version of herself that had gotten caught shoplifting too many times to count in the beginning. Felt like it too.
“Ha!” Reynaldo shook his head, grinning like a loon. “Brilliant show, girl. Quite convincing. You’ll do an excellent job, I’m sure of it. But don’t worry about keeping up that front for us. We’re fairly harmless. Well, I am, at least. This old wilting bag of sawdust still has a few—”
“Be quiet.” A dry, brown vine shot from the tip of Boris’ finger and lashed down around the gnome’s ankle before jerking harshly and nearly yanking Reynaldo out of his chair. The gnome shrieked in surprise and kicked against his friend’s tendrily grip.
“We agreed you wouldn’t do that after—”
“The agreement stipulated your ability to keep silent when my patience grows thin.” Boris jerked his arm away from the gnome. The tendril retracted, knocking small bits of bark from the dryad’s skin.
Reynaldo muttered something under his breath as he struggled to right himself in the armchair.
The chair supporting Boris trembled in place again, and the room filled with a loud crack and snap as the dryad pushed himself to his feet. Jessica tried not to stare, but he’d made it pretty impossible now. The guy stood nearly nine feet tall at the far side of the room, the purple fireplace casting his flickering shadow farther than it should have across the floor. His green eyes flashed, and his grin revealed sharp, pointed teeth interspersed with small hairlike roots dangling between them.
He took three long strides across the well-polished wooden floors. The dryad’s feet were large knobs of wood with thinner branches protruding from the center like long claws. A shiver of bark rained down around him with the movement. “We know exactly who you are, Guardian.”
Jessica took one step back toward the bookshelf behind her and clenched her fists. “That’s far enough, thanks.”
So her secret was out. Not that it was a secret so much as something she had no idea random magicals in the center of Denver knew enough about to recognize her face in public. After everything she’d done to keep her anonymity over the last eight years—most of which now included a Peddler wiping her memories, apparently—the bank had just ruptured her ability to keep sliding by beneath the radar. No wonder Tabitha never left the building.
A dark crackle of black light raced around her fist and up her wrist. Just a warning.
Boris’ green eyes flickered down toward her hand, and his grin widened. “And can I just say it is a pleasure to finally meet you in the flesh. As it were.”
“What?” Jessica blinked and immediately let go of the burning tingle brought by what was left of her deadly magic racing through her.
“I am Boris Monoclure, Abestoreum of the Illicit Inquiry.” The dryad dipped his head as he towered above her, then gestured with a long arm toward the gnome. “And Reynaldo de la Burieve, the former—”
“Steward of Hroom,” Reynaldo added as he leapt from his chair and hurried toward them. He slid to a halt beside his friend, looking comically short beside the dryad, and clapped a hand to his chest. “They voted me out after an unseemly mishap with the Foreign Judiciary, but I stick to my story. I had absolutely nothing to do with the fall of the Inner Court.”
Boris rolled his eyes and snorted. A tiny, dry vine burst from his nose and bounced across the floor. He looked down at it and sighed. “Terribly sorry, my dear. It’s harder and harder to keep myself from falling apart over time.”
The gnome glanced at the snorted projectile and shrugged. Then he stepped quickly toward Jessica and held out a pudgy hand. “Pleasure and an honor. Leave it to the walking tree to forget the most important part.”
“Well…nice to meet you.” It sounded more like a question even to her own ears, but Jessica took the gnome’s hand anyway for a brief shake. He grinned and stared at her with those giant eyes behind such thick lenses.
“The honor is ours,” Boris added. He had to lean down to extend his barky hand toward her but held it out far enough that he didn’t tower directly over her. “I only ask that you keep the fireworks display on hold, you understand.”
She looked up at him, then down at his gnarled hand reaching toward her and shrugged. “No problem.”
What was she doing, shaking hands with two strangers who knew more about her than any stranger had the right to know? There were worse things, she supposed. Like these two ganging up for some kind of attack in a room she’d just promised she wouldn’t destroy. Again.
Jessica clasped the dryad’s outstretched hand, which was a lot warmer than she expected, though it felt exactly like wood as Boris’ fingers closed around her own. A black beetle scurried from some hiding place in the guy’s hand and made its way onto Jessica’s, where it paused to twitch its antennae in her direction. She withdrew her hand and stared at the beetle. “I think you…left something…”
“Ah, yes. He does enjoy a good adventure from time to time.” Boris chuckled.
With a derisive snort, Reynaldo shuffled forward and scooped the beetle off her outstretched arm. “You can’t just let these things wander off wherever they want. I don’t know how many times I have to tell you that after what happened with the Inquiry—”
“That was ages ago. Stop fussing.” Boris ignored his friend returning the black beetle to its place on the dryad’s cracked, creaking skin and nodded at Jessica. “I do hope you won’t mind indulging the curiosity of two old fools past their prime.”
She shrugged and scratched her arm where the phantom legs of the skittering beetle still itched. “That depends, really.”
Was she actually doing this? Standing in this room and chatting away with a gnome and a dryad like they’d known each other for years? They knew her at the very least. Or thought they did.
Boris chuckled and slowly lifted a branchlike arm to scratch at his bald head, sending flakes of bark toppling down over his shoulders and making quite the mess on the floor. The gnome glanced down at the scattered wood chips and sighed.
“I would love the pleasure of your name, Guardian,” Boris said. “Unless, of course, you wish to remain known only as such.”
“Which is absolutely fine if that’s the case,” Reynaldo added quickly, spreading his arms. “Tabitha never cared for titles, as I’m sure you well know. How is she, by the way? Have you heard from her?”
Jessica swallowed the lump formi
ng in her throat. It was one thing to tell every client who came through the bank’s front doors about Tabitha’s fate and her own ensuing ownership of the bank. It was something else entirely to be talking about it in a public place—mostly public—with two oddball magicals who seemed to have known the scryer fairly well. “You haven’t heard?”
“Of course we have.” Reynaldo straightened the front of his velvet vest, then tugged on the cuff of each crisp white sleeve beneath it. “But she’s a scryer. And she had connections. It stands to reason she’d keep using them from the other side. Ha. Just like everything else she kept.”
They really did know Tabitha. And Jessica was glad that at least she didn’t have to explain Tabitha’s murder by Requiem member one more time. “I’ve received a message or two.”
That was putting it mildly. But one pre-recorded warning by potion and another delivered straight from a necromancer’s mouth were a little too complicated to get into now. Or she just didn’t want to go into details.
“Yes, perfectly expected.” Reynaldo adjusted his glasses again and sniffed. “Well?”
“Well what?”
“We’ve introduced ourselves.” The gnome spread his arms again. “And—”
“And if the Guardian wishes to keep her name to herself, that is her decision,” Boris scolded, turning a scowl onto his friend. “You always take these things too far.”
“I do not.”
Shaking her head, she glanced up at the dryad’s hulking form and gave him a tight smile. “Jessica.”
“Ah. Jessica…” Her name rolled through Boris’ mouth in long, drawn-out syllables. “From the Hebrew yiskah, in this world, yes. To behold. Quite fitting, if I do say so myself.”
“She has no interest in linguistic interpretations, you hulking trunk.” Reynaldo slapped his friend’s timbered arm with the back of a hand, sucked in a sharp breath, and scowled as he rubbed at the scratches he’d inflicted on himself.
Jessica hardly noticed, because the dryad’s statement took her right back to the bank’s warning yesterday morning. “In this world.” That definitely meant there was another. And she had no doubt the doorway in the hall right outside her bedroom had something to do with it.
“Listen, as nice as this little chat is, I really need to—”
“Search the shelves!” Reynaldo nodded vigorously. “Yes, yes. Get back to your work, Miss Jessica.”
She fought back a grimace at the moniker. At least he’d actually remembered her name correctly the first time.
“We have our own reading to continue. And Boris here doesn’t miss a thing when it comes to literature.” The gnome tittered again and waved her off as he turned to shuffle back toward the hearth and the armchairs.
A low, creaking rumble emanated from Boris as he stared down at her. “I am quite familiar with the volumes stored in this room, my dear. Perhaps I can be of assistance.”
Right. Because she was about to unload everything she didn’t know onto this dryad she’d just met. Not very likely.
“I’m fine. Just…browsing, really.”
“Ah.” Boris nodded slowly, his limbs creaking again and snapping as he turned halfway back toward the fireplace. One long, twisted arm pointed toward the right-hand wall of the magical restricted section, the leaves on his wrist and fingers fluttering in the still air. “Might I suggest the section on the top half of the far shelf there? If you have the time, of course. Very interesting reading on pre-colonial establishments and their occult purposes. Only a few remain, of course. The most important ones.”
“Thanks…” Jessica took a sharp breath, completely confused by the recommendation. Either the dryad was giving her clear-cut instructions to look for her answers there, or he was just offering his own favorites among the Denver Public Library’s extensive collection. If he’d been anyone else, she would’ve guessed he was screwing with her, but she had a feeling this particular dryad didn’t quite have the energy for it.
They both seemed nice, anyway. And she knew just how useless seeming nice was in determining anyone’s character. She’d learned that the hard way more than once.
After the giant dryad and the gnome returned to their armchairs, Jessica continued browsing the shelves as she made her way toward the section Boris had indicated. It was worth a shot, at the very least. Still, she only had an hour. And instead of using all of it to find what she’d needed, she’d just wasted at least ten minutes chatting with a couple of old guys who spent their Monday afternoons reading in this room for fun.
With a quick glance back at them, Jessica abandoned her attempts to reach the shelf without the strangers catching on and made a beeline for the pre-colonial establishments and their occult purposes section. Bit of a mouthful, but it was as good a place to start as any.
The far shelf was full of unbound scrolls without any titles or organization at all, but she wasn’t looking for esoteric rituals or centuries-old spellbooks. This was a search for pure history. Facts. Something she could burn into her mind and use to figure out what was required of her next. She needed that much at least, if the bank was no longer a viable option for getting any answers at all.
After another five minutes of scanning the book titles—Teleportation Wells as an Art, Indoctrinating Local Practitioners, Time to Move Away from Time—she found the only book that seemed remotely relevant. Portals of North America: A History.
Might as well.
Jessica had to stand on her tiptoes just to get the book down from the shelf almost too high out of her reach. The thing was heavy and solid in her hands, and the spine creaked when she opened it at the back to search for a list of terms and keywords. She pressed her finger down on the old page, sliding it along the words under “G.”
There it was. Gateway. Page 728.
She leaned back against the bookshelf, flipped furiously to the right page, and found herself frantically skimming the content. All this stuff about how to cast portals, the dangers of casting them, how inconsistently they responded to a magical’s intentions. Which of course were subject to said magical’s state of mind and whatever magic they had at their disposal at the time.
Then she found it.
The majority of portals in existence from the 18th century to present were created by casters on Earth to move freely across this realm at any given time. Those remaining today have been protected and upheld by the original casters’ disciples, apprentices, or other such entities tasked with the responsibility.
The only exception to this—in history both recorded and within living memory—is the Gateway.
Yes. Finally, she was getting somewhere.
The problem now was whether or not this somewhere would lead her into more than she’d bargained for.
Chapter Ten
Jessica quickly flipped to the next page, her stomach fluttering as she realized she was finally on the verge of finding her answers.
As required by declaration of the Magic Judiciary Council circa AD 1351, any in-depth analysis of this long-standing portal is strictly prohibited. For further reading, see Argyle Belarious’ The Magical’s Guide to Long-Term Collections, Chapter 5 – “Investing in Arcane Banking Systems”.
“What?” she whispered, then quickly looked up at the armchairs by the fire. Boris and Reynaldo had returned to their intent studies of whatever magical books had drawn their attention, and neither seemed to notice her frustration.
She quickly skimmed through the rest of the one chapter where the Gateway had been referenced, but there was nothing else. Completely useless.
And now she’d just found out about a law almost seven hundred years old that basically said no one could write about this long-standing portal. Or at least not an in-depth analysis. So where the hell was she supposed to find the information she wanted?
Jamming the heavy book back into its space on the shelf above her, Jessica gritted her teeth and scanned the other surrounding titles. The Magical’s Guide to Long-Term Collections by Argyle Belarious wasn’
t up here with the others. Because it was a book on gathering and maintaining artifacts, collections, valuables, and whatever else someone thought was important enough to stick in a damn safety deposit box.
Turning to scan the other shelving sections within the room, she stopped when a glimmer of flashing blue lights along the back wall between two corner bookshelves caught her eye.
That hadn’t been here the last time she’d visited the restricted section. Then again, a lot changed in three years, didn’t it?
Jessica approached the far corner and studied the device mounted to the wall. The screen display flashed the words “Please Enter Your Desired Search” in soft blue letters, and she scoffed. Of course the magical section had a more advanced catalogue-searching system than the dinosaur computers out in the lobby. This had to have something.
She slowly reached out to brush her fingers against the bottom where any sane person would expect a keyboard to be. The box flashed with blue light again, but instead of a keyboard, a drawer opened at the bottom, filled with a slimy off-white gel pulsing with light.
Great. All she had to do was stick her fingers in there and let the device pull up the rest for her. Except for the fact that she wasn’t sure what exactly this thing would actually pull up or what kind of database it was connected to. The similarities between this and MJ Penitentiary’s booking process when she’d been incarcerated for actual crimes were eerie.
Jessica looked over her shoulder one more time at the gnome and dryad engulfed in their reading and puffed out a sigh. What other options did she have?
She raised both hands and stuck all ten fingertips into the off-white gel within the drawer.
The Gateway. The Gateway. Just think about the Gateway.
The magical search box responded instantly with a brilliant flash of white light across the screen before the words rearranged themselves. Jessica jerked her fingers out of the gel to keep the thing from reading any more of her thoughts.
Search Not Found in Registered Titles.
The Cursed Fae (Accessory to Magic Book 2) Page 9
