Several days and one family meal with Virginia later – which resulted in talking more about the Woodsons than I’d planned since they now knew I knew them – I boarded a plane with Sophie, her wife Audrey, and Riven, heading towards a remote supernatural library. Sophie and I planned to try to research the construct’s barrier, and constructs in general if we could, while Riven wanted to see if there was any information about soulmates that might help with explaining things to people about what happened to Ren turning back from dark fae. Audrey was just along for the ride, apparently enthusiastic about taking a trip to a secret supernatural facility. Ren, on the other hand, was very unhappy about being left behind but he needed to try to learn how to use dark magic, so he was getting training from a nightwing police officer friend of Sorrel’s and couldn’t really spare the time to come with us given the short timeframe. Knox had some things to practice with Beatrice – Riven’s naga friend – or with Ren while we were gone.
Sophie and I were the only ones who’d been to the library before, and given our shared interest in history and research, we were both excited about the trip.
Audrey raised one eyebrow when I verbally agreed with Sophie about looking forward to seeing the library again. “You don’t look excited.”
Right, well, that was true. “I do not, but I am.”
This puzzled Audrey, apparently, but Sophie cared less about my external attitude than whether I could just do the job – and upon discovering that I was actually good at research and knew things even she didn’t know about history, she had become eager to work with me. To her mind, it seemed that, excited or not, at least I could get the job done, and that was what counted to her.
Riven caught my eye and gave me a sympathetic smile, though, and I got the feeling he would probably explain some things to Audrey later.
Sometimes I felt a bit embarrassed that anything even needed to be explained to other people, but this…this is how life was for me. I couldn’t let it get me down every time someone didn’t understand me, or I’d almost always be knocked down.
I decided to focus on my own anticipation for the library instead, tuning out the others as I thought over my past visits, all the old books I had wanted to read but couldn’t, and maybe this time I might get to look at some of them. Not all – it would take years to get through a library of this size – but some.
When we reached the library and got settled into the guest quarters, we split up from Riven to head to the buildings that housed materials on spells. Sophie and I had a rough idea of where we might be able to find what we needed, so we headed straight there while Audrey followed after, just taking it all in.
Sophie got Audrey set up with some travel guides – apparently Audrey’s cup of tea when it came to books – and then she and I dove into skimming hundreds of volumes to attempt to find the information we were looking for.
To some people, this kind of work would probably be tedious. To me, it was fascinating. Each book offered a different look into whatever topic the book was about and each page could offer information that could be used on a later occasion. Granted, I wasn’t in the business anymore, but that didn’t mean I still didn’t like to stockpile information. Maybe I should have considered retiring here at the library and just trying to read every single volume here, although…if I’d done that, I wouldn’t have my new friends. Even if I had been thrown into a dangerous situation through my friendship with Sorrel and his family, I was more than willing to accept the danger for the privilege of being friends with them.
I set aside a couple of books with potentials for Sophie to look at. I knew the basics of spells, but I wasn’t a witch – this would be something Sophie would have to confirm since she would understand how the spells actually worked. By the time lunch hour had passed, I was fairly pleased with my progress and went to find Sophie, carrying three books with me for her to take a look at.
Sophie was behind a stack of books, seated on the floor, frowning at the book.
“No,” she mumbled to no one in particular – or maybe to the book? “No, no, no. That’s all wrong, that’s not even how magic works!” She looked up at me, but rather than stop or seem embarrassed that I’d caught her mid-rant, she just continued. “Look at this, it’s a textbook and they have the spell all wrong! This would break the thing they’re trying to put a barrier on. That’s no good. I mean, if they cast it on a living thing, it could kill them.” She frowned and reached for a pen, then paused, frowning deeper. “I’m tempted to correct the spell but ugggh, I guess I can’t, can I? If they ever need a copy of the original to prove liability for whoever the author got killed with their negligence, it has to be the original. Plus it’s not my book, I’m not allowed to mark on library books,” she grumbled more to herself than to me.
I was somewhat amused by her rant. I could understand the frustration at bad information in books, but sometimes the information was so bad it was laughable rather than infuriating. Granted, this sounded like an instance where it could potentially be more dangerous than funny, but the fact that she was over here lecturing the pile of books – and me – about it was kind of entertaining.
“I think I might have some possibilities.” I set the books on top of one of her piles of books.
Sophie immediately seized the top book and flipped to where I’d placed a slip of paper for a marker. “Oh, huh, no, well – this is for like keeping stuff clean while on display. I don’t see how it would be helpful here.”
A little awkwardly, I joined her on the floor. “But what if the original people who designed it, when they made them dormant, they used a spell like that? Something that would keep it in the original condition for storage purposes, almost.”
I could almost see the gears turning in her head. “It’d be keeping the construct protected, but not like a protection mark, keeping it from damage caused by wear and tear. I’ve never heard of this spell being cast on something that moved, but, but – it would do it, wouldn’t it?” She chewed on her lower lip. “That could be the spell that’s on it. Creates a barrier between the construct and the world, but not something your average person would even think about. It would unintentionally help the witch out a bit by helping protect the construct from making an impact – yeah…yeah, this could be it! Probably with some modifications.” She shoved some of the books out of the way, plopped the book down in front of her, and grabbed a sheet of paper which she began scribbling on.
“We need to look into this idea specifically,” she told me without looking up. “See if there’s any alternative designs. There should be a counter-spell that would basically cover anything in this ‘family’ of spells, as it were, but I just want to make sure there shouldn’t be anything special.” She paused and looked up at me. “Do you think we could try casting the spell on something to see if it works like what we’re thinking? It’d have to be something metal and inhuman, hmm, the car, maybe?”
I had the feeling she wasn’t actually talking to me, so I reached over and selected one of the other books I’d brought over, flipping it open to reveal a similar spell. Sophie immediately grabbed the book and started reading furiously.
I left her to that and went back to the shelves, this time looking specifically for more information on preservations spells like what a museum might use. Actually, what a library like this one might use for their books, to ensure no harm came to the books. Anything that wanted the object to remain untouched by time.
By the time I got back with a few more volumes to show to Sophie, Audrey had returned as well and was trying to carry all the rejected volumes back to the shelves for restacking. Her efforts made Sophie frown since she was essentially deconstructing Sophie’s castle of books around her, but Sophie didn’t stop her, either, so I presumed she’d survive the loss of her book towers.
We spent the rest of the day carefully combing through the books, copying the spells and any information we deemed helpful. By the time we left to find Riven and get something to eat, Sophie and I were feeling pretty optimistic that we were on the right track. This spell could account for exactly what was going on with the construct, and Sophie had a potential counter-spell for it. The downside was that she would have to be physically close to the construct to cast it, but we could work with that. I wanted to double-check tomorrow just to make sure there wasn’t another option we were missing, but for now, it seemed promising that we might have found our answer.
I noticed when we met up with Riven that he didn’t seem as upbeat as we were. He admitted that he hadn’t gotten as much work done on his own topic as he wanted, but hopefully tomorrow he’d have more success.
For his and Ren’s sakes, I hoped so. It would be nice if we all got the answers we needed at the library.
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