Dime Store Magic (43 page)
The one librarian stereotype Margaret did fulfill was that she was timid. Not the studious timidity of the intellectual, but the vacuous timidity of the, well, the… intellectually challenged. I've always thought Margaret decided to become a librarian not because she loved books, but because it gave her a chance to look intelligent while hiding from the real world.
"Victoria is very angry with you, Paige," Margaret said as she cleared books from a chair. "You shouldn't upset her so. Her health isn't good."
"Look, I need to talk to you about a couple of grimoires I borrowed from the library." I tugged the knapsack from my shoulder, opened it and removed the books. "These."
She frowned at them. Then her eyes went wide. "Where did you get those?"
"From the library upstairs."
"You aren't supposed to have those, Paige."
"Why? I heard they don't work."
"They don't. And we shouldn't have them, but your mother insisted we keep them around. I forgot all about them. Here, give them to me and I'll see what Victoria wants done with them."
I shoved the books back into my knapsack.
"You can't take those," she said. "They're library property."
"Then fine me. I'm in enough trouble with Victoria already. Keeping these books isn't going to matter."
"If she finds out—"
"We won't tell her. Now, what do you know about these grimoires?"
"They don't work."
"Where did they come from?"
She frowned. "From the library, of course."
Okay. This wasn't getting me anywhere. One look at Margaret's face and I knew she wasn't holding anything back. She wouldn't know how. So I explained what Eve had told Savannah about the books;
"Oh, that's nonsense," Margaret said, fluttering her long fingers.
"Absolute nonsense. That girl wasn't right, you know. Eve, I mean. Not right at all. Always looking for trouble, trying to learn new spells, accusing us of holding her back. Just like…"
She stopped.
"Like me," I said.
"I didn't mean it like that, dear. I've always liked you. A bit impetuous, but certainly nothing like that niece of mine—"
"It's okay," I said. And, to my surprise, it was. I knew I wasn't "just like Eve," and didn't want to be, but the comparison didn't rankle as it once would have. I continued, "You said these spells don't work, right? So how come I can cast four of them?"
"That's not possible, Paige. Don't be telling stories—"
"Shall I demonstrate?" I grabbed the first grimoire from my bag, opened it to a marked page and thrust it at her. "Here. Follow along. It's a fireball spell."
Margaret clamped the book shut. "Don't you dare—"
"Why? You said the spells don't work. I say they do. And I think you know why."
"Be sensible, Paige. If they worked, why would we keep them?"
And that, I believe, was the smartest thing Margaret Levine ever said.
No one was covering up anything. The Coven really didn't think these spells worked; otherwise, they wouldn't have kept them. What a horrible thing to admit, that the very group designed to support and aid witches would have destroyed their strongest source of magic.
"I want to see the grimoires," I said. "All of them."
"We aren't trying to hide anything from you, Paige. You have to stop accusing us—"
"I'm not accusing you of anything. I just want to see the library."
"I don't think—"
"Listen to me. Please just listen. Why do you think I'm here? Some sudden whim to learn new spells? I'm here because I need to know that I've done everything I can to protect Savannah. To protect your niece.
That's all I want. Let me see the library and, I swear, when this is over, you can tell Victoria what I've done. Tell her I stole the grimoires. I don't care. Just let me see what's up there."
Margaret threw up her hands and headed for the stairs. "Fine. If you don't believe me, come up and see. But you're wasting your time."
Stopping By for a Spell
THE FIRST THING I DID WAS INSPECT THE LIBRARY CLOSET
for hidden compartments. You know, sliding panels, loose floorboards, massive books with incredibly boring titles that really contained forbidden grimoires—that sort of thing.
While I looked, Margaret paced behind me making noises of exasperation. I ignored her. Finally, though, I had to concede that there was no secret niche or hidden books, so I scanned the rows of titles, looking for the ceremony tome. When Margaret paced out of sight, I slid the thin volume into my knapsack. She probably would have let me take it anyway, but I wasn't taking the chance.
With the ceremony book in my bag, I turned my attention to looking for potential secondary-spell grimoires. That didn't take long. Of the forty-three books in the library, there were only four that I hadn't read before. A flip through each assured me they were just as dull and useless as their titles implied.
"The grimoires are all right here," Margaret said, waving at a half-shelf near chest level. "All of them."
"All of them" comprised exactly six books. One contained the current collection of Coven-sanctioned spells.
Another held spells that had been removed in the past few decades, which my mother had let me copy from her grimoire into my journals.
The other four were books of spells long forbidden to Coven witches.
There were two reasons why these hadn't been destroyed. First, my mother would never have permitted it. Second, the damn things were practically useless.
For years, I'd known that these "forbidden" spellbooks existed. For years, I'd pestered my mother to let me see them. She finally capitulated by sneaking them out for me as an eighteenth birthday gift. Inside I found useless spells, like ones to evaporate a puddle of water or extinguish a candle. I hadn't bothered to master more than two dozen of the hundred-odd spells in these books. Most of them were so bad, I almost didn't
blame the Elders for removing them from the Coven grimoire, if only to conserve space.
As a last resort, I flipped through one of these grimoires. I paused at one spell I'd learned, an incantation for producing a small, flickering light, like a candle. The Coven-sanctioned light-ball spell was far more useful.
I'd learned this one only because it involved fire, and I was always trying to overcome my fear of flames.
When I glanced at the spell, something in it snagged in my brain, made me pause. Under the title "Minor Illumination Spell" the writer had added
"elemental, fire, class 3." I'd seen that notation before… just a few minutes ago, in fact. I yanked one of the two secret grimoires from my bag and flipped to the dog-eared page for the fireball spell. There it was, under the title: elemental, fire, class 3.
Oh, God, could that be it? My hands trembled as I flipped to another spell I'd mastered in that grimoire, a wind-summoning spell. Beneath the title: elemental, wind, class 1.1 racked my brain for the names of the two dozen spells I'd learned in the forbidden manuals. What was that one…
Yes, that was it! A spell for extinguishing fire. A silly little spell that summoned a mere puff of wind, barely enough to blow out a candle. I'd tried it a few times, got it to work, then moved on. Grabbing another grimoire from the shelf, I flipped through until I found it. "Minor Wind-Summoning Spell: elemental, wind, class 1."
These were the secondary grimoires. I knew now why I'd mastered four tertiary spells, because I'd learned the secondary spells from these books.
Eve had been unable to cast any tertiary spells because she'd probably taken one look in the secondary spell books and decided they were too useless to risk stealing.
The doorbell rang. Margaret jumped like a spooked cat.
"It's Savannah," I said.
I scooped all four grimoires from the shelf, shoved them into my bag with the other two and headed for the stairs.
"You can't take those," Margaret called after me.
I bounded down the stairs and opened the back door.
"Lucas says we have to go," Savannah said. "It's getting late."
"I'm done. Just let me grab my shoes." I remembered our other purpose and turned to Margaret. "Could I borrow your car? Just for tonight.
Please?'
"I don't think—"
"I'll be careful. I'll fill it up, wash it, whatever. Please, Margaret."
"Savannah?" She noticed her niece for the first time and turned to me.
"Did you leave her outside alone? What are you thinking, Paige?"
"I didn't leave her alone. Now, I really need to borrow your car."
"Who—" She stopped, peering outside, her eyes picking out Cortez's form in the yard. She slammed the door. "That's—you—you left my niece with a sorcerer?"
"Oddly enough, I'm having trouble finding baby-sitters."
"Lucas is fine, Aunt Margaret," Savannah said. "Can we borrow your car? I need the stuff for my first menses—"
"Savannah just got her period," I cut in. "I'm out of supplies for menstrual tea, and she's having very bad cramps."
Savannah pulled a face of sheer agony. Margaret looked at her and blinked.
"Oh, yes. I see." Her voice softened. "This is your first time, isn't it, dear?"
Savannah nodded, lifting wounded-puppy eyes to her great-aunt. "It really hurts."
"Yes, well… I suppose, if you need to use my car…"
"Please," I said.
Margaret retrieved the keys and handed them to me. "Be careful in parking lots. I had someone dent the door just last week."
I thanked Margaret and prodded Savannah toward the door before Margaret could change her mind.
Next stop: Salem, Massachusetts, world-renowned epicenter of the American witch-hunt craze.
One can argue about the causes of the witch craze that visited Salem in 1692. Theories abound. I even read something recently that attributed the madness to some kind of blight on the rye crops, a mold or something that drives people crazy. What we do know, without question, is that life