“Do you have anything else here that is…ummm…enchanted?”
“The odd bit or two,” Asher said between sips of tea. “There’s a berry-picking basket which works quite well, though I find that I enjoy the task so much that I hardly ever use it. I did have an enchanted axe that would do to chop wood for the fire, but given how that blasted brush performed, I got rid of it.”
“Probably a good idea,” Phinnegan said, putting the finishing touches on the last strip of bacon.
“I thought so,” Asher said with a wink. “I don’t have much use for magical this or an enchanted that, to tell the truth. But,” he said, dropping his voice and leaning forward as though sharing a secret, “I do have one item of which I am particularly fond. And it serves my…position very well.”
“What is it?” Phinnegan asked, his curiosity causing him to lean forward as well, giving the appearance that the two plotted together.
“Ah, young master. Do I sense that you are intrigued by all things magical?” Asher asked with an upward nod of his head, before wrinkling his nose and frowning slightly. “But of course you are, the first thing you asked was not about me or
why
I helped you, but it was about that bedeviled brush.”
Phinnegan looked embarrassed.
“I’m terribly sorry,” Phinnegan said, his cheeks reddening. “You are quite right, you risked your life to help me – “
“Ah, it was nothing as grand as that!” Asher exclaimed with a chuckle. “And besides, don’t let it trouble you. We all have eyes for the magic when we’ve only just come here.”
Phinnegan’s eyes widened.
“You mean you’re human as well?”
“Human as well…” Asher said incredulously, before barking a loud, but pleasant laugh.
“Of course I am! You mean you can’t tell the difference?”
Phinnegan looked abashed and shrunk himself down in his chair.
“Well, I thought I could…but then there are the Aged…”
“Ah, yes, yes. The Aged. But once you’ve met a handful, you’ll see they’re nothing like a human. Most are altogether grumpy as well.”
“I’d noticed that…”
“Yes, well, it’s one of their most obvious qualities.” Asher leaned back in his chair, sipping his tea and eyeing Phinnegan over its lip.
“You are rather young to be here, aren’t you?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, just what I said. We’re usually older when we’re brought here, aren’t we? I was just shy of thirty myself. Been here nearly thirty-five years now, more than half my life.” When he finished speaking, Asher looked hard again at Phinnegan.
“Are you sure you are supposed to be here? You don’t look a day more than thirteen.”
“I’m twelve, actually.”
“Twelve! Do tell! Did they have to ask your mum and dad’s permission?”
“For what?” Phinnegan asked, startled by the question.
“Why, to bring you here! There are rules, you know, about age. In addition to all the other guidelines that must be followed.
“I don’t know what you are talking about,” Phinnegan said flatly. “But no, no one even asked
me
whether I should like to come to this place.”
Asher’s eyes-widened, but he quickly recovered himself, though his lips pursed slightly as he looked at Phinnegan.
“Truly? Brought you against your will did they?”
“Sort of. It was more of an accident, really.”
Though his brow twitched in opposition, it ultimately furrowed and Asher brought his hand up to finger his beard absently.
“Hmmm. Quite strange.” He continued to eye Phinnegan while he fingered his beard, leaning his chair back on its rear legs and rocking slowly. The man’s gaze made Phinnegan feel quite uncomfortable, and he squirmed in his seat beneath it. The movement must have broken Asher’s concentration for he slammed the forelegs of his chair down on the floor and placed his hands flat on the table, pushing himself to his feet.
“Well, would you like to see it?” Asher said.
“See what?”
“Have you forgotten?” Asher leaned forward, a sparkle in his eye. “My magic item.”
“Oh, yes, of course,” Phinnegan said, a little thrown by the change in topic.
“Follow me, follow me,” Asher said, his grin returning once more. He left the table and went through the adjacent room, Phinnegan following him closely. They went into the hallway and past the door both to the right and left, before coming to a stop at the dead-end wall.
“Where are we going?” Phinnegan asked.
“Just up the stairs,” Asher replied. Phinnegan turned about but he saw no sign of any stairs.
“What stairs?”
“Just through here,” Asher said a moment before he stepped through the wall in front of him.
“It’s only an illusion,” Asher’s voice came from just beyond the wall, though as loud and clear as if he were standing right next to Phinnegan, which, he was. “It’s like a false wall in our world only, well, magical. It won’t hurt, just walk right through.”
Phinnegan did as he was bid, walking through the wall, though not without squeezing his eyes shut and bracing for what his mind told him would be a sharp impact.
But when he felt nothing, he opened his eyes to find that he stood in front of a large and ornate staircase. He also saw that the “cottage” was much larger than he had originally guessed, for there were more doors beyond the staircase on either side, as well as the second-story above. Looking back, he could see down the hallway and into the sitting room at the front of the cottage.
“Come on, come on,” Asher encouraged, as he himself was already halfway up the stairs.
With one last glance back down the hall, Phinnegan hurried up the stairs after him.
A Man and A Quill
The stairs ended at a large landing, three hallways leading off in three different directions: one to the left, one to the right, and one straight ahead. Asher led the way, heading for the hallway on the right. The light was dim and Phinnegan stayed right on the old man’s heels until they ducked into the first doorway on the right.
The room they entered was full, from floor to ceiling in most cases, with books on top of books. Bookcases stood edge to edge along each wall, the books on their shelves having long ago ceased to have room to orderly arrange themselves. Some were stacked horizontally; others lined the edge of a shelf with their cover facing out instead of their spine.
But it did not end with the shelves: more books plagued the room, stacked several feet high from the floor and strewn across every table in the room except the center one.
Instead of mounds of books and papers, this table held only two books. One book was old and the pages had yellowed to a light brown. The other looked quite new. But it was the quill that truly caught Phinnegan’s attention. For this quill, though it looked like any other quill, moved by itself, drawing a beautiful script across the empty pages of the newer book.
“What’s it doing?” Phinnegan asked as he approached the center table.
“Why, it’s copying of course. See, this one,” the old man laid a finger on a darkened page of the older book, “has just about fallen apart. I can’t even read it. And there’s nothing I hate more than a book I can’t read.” He paused for a moment, squinting down at the faded print of the ancient book.
“Now,” he said, pointing to the new book, crisp, cream pages in black leather, “this one is blank. The quill is copying the text, word for word, from this old book to the new. It can read nearly any language and translate as it copies.” Asher took a moment to lean back and cross his arms over his chest, a smile on his lips.
“Wonderful, eh?” he said.
“Uncanny,” Phinnegan whispered as he watched the quill continue to copy. “So you copy all of the old books and then throw them out?”
Asher threw his arms up with a cry of surprise.
“Throw them out?! Never!”
Phinnegan was taken aback when Asher snatched the old book from the table, clutching it to his chest covetously. The book was in such a state of disrepair that several pages fell from the binding onto the table.
“I would
never
throw out a book, even one I can’t read. Books…why they have a life and a story of their own, beyond the pages which they carry. And even some are written in their master’s own hand.” Perhaps recognizing that he was hugging a book, Asher eased the book down onto the table.
“Asher, you old fool,” he said, speaking to himself in a whisper. “Always in love with your books. But that’s why they chose you, isn’t it?”
“Chose you for what?” Phinnegan ventured.
“This,” Asher said, opening his arms wide as a gesture to the room, the books, or perhaps the entire house.
“To be a Guide.”
“A Guide? A Guide for what?”
“For whoever needs it.”
“You mean for the Faë?” Phinnegan asked, still puzzled.
“Yes, mostly,” Asher said, seating himself at the table and gesturing for Phinnegan to do the same.
“You see, there are many things the Faë can do, and there are others that they can’t.”
“Sounds like everyone in general,” Phinnegan said, drawing a satisfied smile from Asher.
“Very true, very true, young master. But the Faë are unable, or possibly unwilling, to do things which you and I might consider quite simple and basic.”
“Like what?”
“Ah, well let me see if I can explain. Faë are…well they’re a cheeky bunch for one, but above all they are rather selfish and irresponsible.”
“I’ll say,” Phinnegan mumbled.
“Had a few run-ins already, eh?” Asher asked.
“You could say that,” Phinnegan said, but hurried to return to the subject. “Well what can’t they do?”
“Well, for one they could never be trusted to care for such knowledge as this.”
“What do you mean?” Phinnegan asked, a puzzled look on his face.
“These books around you,” Asher said, gesturing to the room with a wave of his hand. “This is more than three millennia of history, law, art and magic.”
“Three
millennia
? You mean three thousand years? How is that possible? There are a lot of books here, but not
that
many.”
“True, true,” Asher said, nodding his head and laying a finger beside his nose. “But there is more to these books than the eye can see. Take this one for example.” With surprising quickness, Asher sprang from his chair and snatched a worn, red book from the shelf just behind Phinnegan.
“This is also why I don’t throw away the original,” he said as he began thumbing carefully through the worn pages. “There are some things even a magic quill cannot copy.” He turned the book over and laid it in front of Phinnegan.
“Put your hand just there,” the old man directed, motioning to a peculiar design in the bottom right-hand corner of the right page. Phinnegan reached out his hand and pressed two fingers gently against the design.
He gasped sharply, blinking once and then a second time.
“That was amazing…” Phinnegan breathed, leaving his hand on the book. “I saw a huge tower made of solid ivory, trimmed with gems and gold. And there were Faë, thousands of them, all milling about on the ground beneath the tower. There were two others, a man and a woman, standing on a balcony waving at the Faë below.” Phinnegan looked at the old man.