The Magician's Dream (Oona Crate Mystery: book 3) (2 page)

Dozens of lighted orbs floated near the high ceiling, casting their enchanted light down through the branches in broken rays. Yet as fascinating as the library was, finding a book in the chaos was a daunting task. As far as Oona knew, there was no logical system or order to it. Samuligan, the house faerie servant, was the only one who seemed to understand its chaotic organization.

“Do you hear that?” Oona asked Deacon.

The giggling started up again, as if coming from deep within the forest.

“I do,” Deacon replied.

Oona stepped over several roots and ducked beneath a low-hanging branch. The deeper she ventured, the louder and more distinct the sound became. Rounding the thick-bottomed trunk of a book-laden oak, they came upon Mrs. Carlyle. The maid stood precariously upon one of the vine ladders and was dusting a bookshelf branch with one of the Wizard’s enchanted feather dusters. Each time the feathers tickled a shelf or book, the duster would begin to giggle uncontrollably in the maid’s hand.

“Hello, Mrs. Carlyle,” Oona said.

The maid let out a startled yelp and nearly fell from her ladder. One of the books flew from the branch and nearly collided with Oona’s head.

“Oh, dear,” Oona said, and reached out, meaning to break the maid’s fall. But the maid caught her balance at just the last moment. Oona stared up at her, wide-eyed. “Are you all right?”

The maid threw a hand to her chest and let out a sigh. “Oh, it’s you, Miss Crate. My, did you ever give me a fright.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“Oh no, it’s not your fault,” Mrs. Carlyle said as she climbed shakily down from the ladder. “I thought you might be that other.”

“Other?” Deacon asked.

“I think she means Samuligan,” Oona said.

“Aye, so I do,” Mrs. Carlyle replied. “Gives me the willies, he does.”

She looked nervously around, as if Samuligan might be lurking among the books in a nearby tree. A thin woman in her late forties, Mrs. Carlyle’s large round eyes and high cheekbones gave her the appearance of a skittish squirrel. She fidgeted nervously with her bonnet and then smoothed the apron of her black-and-white maid’s uniform.

Oona wished to put her at ease. She truly appreciated having another female in the house and hoped that Samuligan would not frighten off Mrs. Carlyle.

“Oh, don’t mind Samuligan,” Oona said reassuringly. “You’ll soon get used to him.”

Mrs. Carlyle shook her head. “I’m thinking probably not. Keeps popping out at me, all over the house. Asking if I need help, and then before I know it, he’s got the dishes flying about the ceiling like a flock of doves, or might be the table I’m dusting suddenly goes floating upside down, and me with it! I don’t like it, let me tell you. I get motion sickness, so I do. This here forest seems to be the only place I’ve managed to avoid him.”

It’s only a matter of time
, Oona thought, but knew better than to share it out loud.

“I’ll have a word with him,” Oona said, though in truth she knew that much of the magic that happened in Pendulum House was not due to the faerie servant.

Deacon, who appeared to be having a similar train of thought, said: “Not all of the unnatural occurrences are due to Samuligan. Pendulum House is steeped in magic, and many of the house’s peculiarities come from the random surfacing of the ancient power it holds. Nearly five hundred years ago, the Magicians of Old combined their remaining magic and placed it into the house. They then chose a custodian of that magic—a keeper known as the Wizard.”

Mrs. Carlyle ran a thumb across her feather duster, causing it to giggle several times. “All’s I know is that whenever that faerie’s around, funny things start to happen.”

The maid bent down to retrieve the fallen book. “Look at that. The strangest books you have in here.”

The book had fallen open to a page revealing a drawing of a large, hairy creature with the body of a man and the head of a bull.

“It is a minotaur,” Deacon said. “And that book is a rare copy of
Mortenstine’s Monstrous Conspectus
. Possibly the only copy left in existence. Please do be careful.”

Mrs. Carlyle peered at the creature and visibly shivered. “Sure would hate to come across him out on the street, so I would.”

Oona peered at the image and had to agree. “I looked through
Mortenstine’s Conspectus
several years back . . . and I had bad dreams for a week. I remember that minotaur was exceptionally vicious.”

“He’s not real, is he?” the maid asked.

Deacon, who seemed to have no interest in putting the maid at her ease, said: “He is.”

The maid appeared truly alarmed.

Oona threw Deacon a scornful look. “Yes, he is real . . . but what Deacon neglected to say was that no minotaur has been seen this side of the Glass Gates for hundreds of years. Nor most of the other creatures in that book.”

She reached over and closed the book in the maid’s hands before attempting to change the subject. “Will you be attending Mrs. Molly Morgana Moon’s campaign rally on Wednesday?”

“I will if your uncle will give me the time off. Takes place in the middle of the day, and those are my usual work hours.”

Oona was surprised. “What do you mean if Uncle Alexander will give you the time off? Of course he will. We can go together. After all, I might not have known about the rally if you hadn’t told me it was happening.”

Mrs. Carlyle smiled. “That’s good of you, Miss Crate. But don’t go making trouble.”

“Trouble?” Oona asked. “What do you mean?”

Mrs. Carlyle sighed. “It’s just that most householders would not let their servants attend such functions during work hours . . . and I do need this job. So please, if he insists I stay here and do my work, don’t argue with him. I can support women’s rights on Saturday, when I vote.”

Oona opened her mouth to protest, but seeing the concerned look on Mrs. Carlyle’s face, she realized that as much as the maid was concerned for women’s rights, she was also concerned for her job. Oona didn’t think the Wizard would mind; after all, they had gone over half a year with no maid at all, and he himself was a supporter of Molly Morgana Moon’s politics. But rather than drive the point home, Oona once more steered the conversation to a less-upsetting subject.

“I see you are using one of the enchanted dusters.”

“Oh, this,” Mrs. Carlyle said, frowning. “I forgot my own at home, so I grabbed this one from the cleaning cupboard. It keeps laughing at me.”

“It’s not laughing at you,” Oona explained. “It’s just very ticklish. It’s one of the novelty objects my uncle sells in his enchantment shop . . . though it’s not one of his most attractive creations. It’s not exactly a best seller.”

“I can see why,” Mrs. Carlyle said, and then smiled. “Speaking of attractive, how’s that young Mr. Iree?”

Oona’s face grew suddenly warm. “Oh, he’s . . . he’s just fine. At least he seemed so the last time I spoke with him.”

“And when was that?” Mrs. Carlyle asked.

Oona grinned. “Yesterday.”

“Really?” Mrs. Carlyle said, feigning surprise. “I must hear all about it.”

Deacon cawed loudly from Oona’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Carlyle, but Miss Crate has some research to do, so if you don’t mind—”

“There’s no need to be rude, Deacon,” Oona snapped, and she felt a sudden wave of embarrassment. This was one of the reasons it was so nice to have another female in the house. As much as she loved Deacon and her uncle, and Samuligan, too, there were just certain things she could not talk to them about.

Deacon rustled his feathers uneasily. “But your first battle test is at three o’clock. That gives us little enough time to research as it is.”

Mrs. Carlyle continued to smile fondly at Oona, as if she had not heard a word Deacon had said. “I must have been about your age when I first met the boy who would grow up to be my husband: Mr. Carlyle. Even back then I knew he was the one, because—”

“I’d say, that’s quite enough!” Deacon squawked. “And I’d ask you, Mrs. Carlyle, to please stop putting ideas of matrimony into Miss Crate’s head. She is far too young to be thinking of such things, and she has very important magical research to do. Now please return to your duties.”

“Deacon!” Oona half shouted.

She was suddenly furious. Not just because Deacon was being so rude to Mrs. Carlyle, but because he had interrupted her just when the maid was going to tell her how she knew that her husband had been
the one
. Oona desperately wanted to know what the clue had been.

Mrs. Carlyle turned abruptly to the ladder and began to climb back to the branch she had been dusting. “Oh no, Mr. Deacon’s quite right. If you have research to do, I shouldn’t be getting in your way.” She stopped halfway up the ladder and turned. “Then again, there are other places to do research that you might find more . . . informative.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Deacon said. “The Pendulum House library contains Dark Street’s most rare magical texts. Indeed, I believe it is safe to say that it houses perhaps the most obscure books written about magic in all of the World of Man.”

“World of
Humans
,” Oona corrected him.

Mrs. Carlyle gave her a wink.

Deacon sighed. “Regardless, many of these books are one of a kind. Where else would we find information on your apprenticeship battle training?”

But Oona understood that Mrs. Carlyle was not necessarily referring to information about apprentice battles, and that she was more than likely suggesting that Oona could find the answers she was seeking about
the one
somewhere else—like, for instance, a place where a certain tattoo-faced boy happened to be working as a shelving assistant. Somewhere like . . .

“The new public library,” Oona said.

Deacon shook his head. “It is highly unlikely that the
public
library will possess any information if the
Encyclopedia Arcanna
has none to offer. I suggest we find a book here. We should call for Samuligan’s assistance.”

“Yes, you are right, Deacon,” Oona said, before shouting: “Samuligan!”

“You called?” came the silky, sly voice from above.

Mrs. Carlyle screamed in surprise, dropping the duster and slipping down several rungs on the ladder. The duster continued giggling like a loon as it tumbled through the air, letting out a loud honk of laughter upon hitting the floor. Samuligan’s long face poked out from between two sets of books in the exact place the maid had been dusting. He grinned his horrible smile—a smile that showed too many teeth.

It took Oona a moment to understand what she was looking at, and then she realized that the branch that the maid had been dusting had not been a branch after all, but was actually Samuligan, who was wrapped in his dusty old cloak and sticking bizarrely out of the side of the tree.

He sat up, the books toppling to the floor, and Mrs. Carlyle hurriedly scurried down the ladder to hide behind Oona. The faerie’s long jacket had been transformed into the same dark brown texture as the bark of the tree, but as he hopped to the library floor, the coat once again took on its normal shade of midnight black.

The faerie servant, who stood nearly six and a half feet tall, tipped his black cowboy hat at Mrs. Carlyle. The maid gave a little whimper from behind Oona.

“Now, Samuligan, that was not very nice,” Oona said. “You startled Mrs. Carlyle.”

“My apologies,” Samuligan said, though he did not sound too apologetic. Oona knew this was the best she could expect from him. There would be time to speak to him about his behavior later. For now she needed to hurry if she was going to get in all she wanted to do in the day before her first battle test at three o’clock.

“Samuligan, we need to find a book,” Deacon said.

“Yes, we do,” Oona said quickly, before the faerie could respond. “So please . . . bring around the carriage. We’re off to the public library.”

Deacon groaned.

The Faerie Carbuncle

“Bizarre,” Deacon said.

“You say that every time we come here,” Oona said.

“I can’t seem to help it,” Deacon replied.

Oona stepped from the carriage and craned her neck back. Above them, built directly on top of the enormous stone fortress that was the Museum of Magical History, the new public library towered over the street looking like a battered old witch’s hat. Four stories tall, the building coned to a floppy point as it rose toward the purplish-blue sky. The brim of the hatlike structure drooped over the edges of the museum like sagging cloth, while a stone hatband displayed the words
public library
in letters carved a full story tall.

“According to the
Dark Street Tribune
,” Deacon added, “this was the only place big enough to host the new facility.”

“The design is supposed to celebrate the magical heritage of the street,” Oona said as she started up the stone steps toward the museum door.

“Looks more like someone left their hat out in the rain,” Deacon said.

Oona laughed. “Someone with a bigger head than you?”

“Me?” Deacon quipped. “I’m not the one who thinks I can pass a magical battle test unprepared.”

Oona pulled open the museum door and stepped through. “Who says I’m going to be unprepared? There’s plenty of time to—”

Oona came to an abrupt halt in the entryway. Composed of tall curving walls and a high beamed ceiling, the room was home to an awe-inspiring circle of enormous monolithic stones—an exact copy of Stonehenge in England, except unlike their English counterparts, these stones had been perfectly preserved. The museum was a seldom-visited place, and more often than not, the tall gray stones stood stark and lonely.

But today the entryway was a bustle of activity. Along with the usual museum guard, three police constables occupied the circle of stones, as well as what looked like a second museum guard whom Oona did not recognize. One of the police constables, a tall man with a potbelly and arms that seemed too long for his body, stepped to one side, revealing two more people.

The first was the museum curator, Mr. Glump, a short man with a neatly trimmed beard and pointy nose. Oona had once questioned him about a pair of magical daggers that had been stolen from the museum. If she remembered correctly, the curator had had a streak of bad luck while gambling at the Nightshade Casino.

The second person Oona saw was none other than Inspector White, the tall, extremely pale-faced man who had taken over Oona’s father’s position as head of the Dark Street Police Department after her father had been killed in the line of duty. Inspector White was speaking very animatedly to the second museum guard—the one Oona did not recall having seen before. Oona’s heart began to thrum, and a tingle of excitement raced up her arms.

“It appears to be some sort of crime scene,” Deacon said, and then quickly added: “Perhaps we should come back later.”

“Later?” Oona scoffed. “But look, Deacon. It is a case.”

“I was afraid you might say that,” Deacon replied. “But don’t you think we should head back to the Pendulum House library to research your tests?”

But Oona was already approaching the first museum security guard, who happened to be the closest person to her. A thickset man in a gray uniform, the guard did not seem to notice her approach, but when Oona tapped him on the arm, he jumped nearly an inch off the floor.

“What? Huh? What?” He glanced around looking confused before settling his gaze upon Oona and Deacon.

“Hello,” Oona said.

“The museum is closed,” the guard said, “but the library upstairs is open, if you wish.”

He gestured toward the stairs that had been built along the curved wall.

“What has happened here?” Oona asked.

The guard eyed her suspiciously, looking as if he were about to tell her to mind her own business. He glanced in the direction of Inspector White, who was now speaking with Mr. Glump. After a moment’s consideration, the guard shrugged and spoke in a half whisper.

“Break-in.”

Oona’s eyes widened. “Someone broke into the museum?”

The guard nodded toward the man in the circle of stones who, like himself, was dressed in a museum guard’s uniform. The unknown man was rubbing at his wrists and listening to the conversation between Inspector White and Mr. Glump. “That’s Elbert Hackelsmith. He’s the night watchman. I found him all tied up there in the circle of stones this morning. Tied good and tight. I had to cut the rope to get him out.”

He gestured toward the tangle of white rope that lay in the center of the room.

“What was stolen?” Oona asked.

The guard once again glanced in the inspector’s direction before answering in a hushed tone: “The Faerie Carbuncle.”

Deacon gasped, but Oona only shook her head. She had never heard of it.

“What’s a carbuncle?” she asked.

“It’s none of your business, Miss Crate,” said a high, irritating voice.

Oona turned to discover Inspector White striding in her direction. His long black coat wafted about his lanky legs as his impossibly white face pinched into a dissatisfied scowl.

“Hello, Inspector,” Oona said. She smiled in an attempt to put him at his ease.

“Don’t ‘hello’ me, Miss Crate. This is a crime scene. And what have I told you about crime scenes?”

Oona placed a finger to her lips, as if trying to remember. “Hmm, let’s see. You mean the bit about not interfering with an ongoing police investigation?”

The inspector shook his finger at her. “Don’t get smart with me.”

Oona frowned. “
You
asked the question. I simply answered.”

“But you should not be answering at all, Miss Crate, because you should not even be here.” He paused for a moment, rubbing at his ghostly chin before adding: “Not unless you had something to do with the theft of the carbuncle.”

Oona had to work hard not to roll her eyes. “I don’t even know what a carbuncle is.”

Deacon rustled his feathers and spoke from her shoulder, expounding upon his encyclopedic knowledge of the magical world. “A carbuncle is a large cut gemstone, usually red, and highly valuable. In this case, the stolen object appears to be the infamous Faerie Carbuncle, an enchanted ruby attached to a golden necklace. It is purported to give the person wearing the necklace the same extraordinary magical powers as a faerie, provided the wearer recites the ancient incantation that activates it. But the activation spell has been long lost. Now the Faerie Carbuncle is nothing more than a very rare and expensive bit of jewelry which has been part of the museum collection for several hundred years.”

“Quite right,” said Mr. Glump, who now stood at the inspector’s side. “That is a remarkably smart bird you have, Miss Crate. But unfortunately, as I believe I have told you before, there are no pets allowed in the museum. Now, off with you both.”

The inspector and the curator walked back to Elbert Hackelsmith, the night watchman.

“Pet?” Deacon nearly shouted. “I never.”

Oona shushed him before whispering: “I have an idea.”

“An idea? For what?”

Oona did not answer, but instead bid the daytime museum guard good-bye and made as if she were heading toward the staircase to the library. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw that the guard had turned his attention back toward the center of the room. Oona quickly jumped behind one of the enormous rectangular stones.

“What are you doing?” Deacon asked.

“Getting closer so I can listen,” Oona said, as if it should be obvious.

“We don’t have time for this.”

“Shush.”

Like a pouncing cat she leapt the open distance to the next stone. She paused a moment with her back against the stone, waiting for someone to come looking. No one came.

The conversation between the night watchman and the inspector was louder now, but she needed to get closer still if she wanted to hear everything that was being said.

“I need to get closer.”

“Have you completely lost your mind?”

“Just one more stone,” she said, and poked her head around the corner. There was a problem. If she crossed now, she would be in clear view of the daytime guard. She pulled back behind the stone and bit her lip, thinking. “I need a distraction, Deacon.”

“Don’t look at me,” he said. “I’m supposed to be gone, along with you.”

“That’s true,” Oona said, and then, realizing she had no alternative, she pulled her magnifying glass from her dress pocket and gripped it tightly at her side. Peering around the corner of the stone, her gaze fell upon a portrait on the other side of the room: a rather hairy-looking goblin wearing a wooden crown. With his saggy green skin and large fanged teeth, the goblin king looked old and feeble, not to mention quite angry that he had been forced to sit so long for the portrait.

Oona raised her magnifying glass and took aim at the portrait. “
Aldis-tractio
.”

A wisp of misty light shot from the end of the magnifying glass and struck the portrait between the eyes. The goblin began to blink his eyes rapidly before letting out a horrific sneeze.

The museum guard turned and began to walk in the direction of the sound as Oona bolted across the open space between the stones and came to a sliding stop. Deacon joined her as she peered around the corner to discover the day guard standing in front of the goblin portrait, his brow furrowed in confusion.

“Let’s go over it one more time,” Inspector White said.

“I’ve already told you twice,” came a voice that Oona assumed to be the night watchman’s.

“Perhaps you are forgetting something,” Mr. Glump said.

“I’m not forgetting anything!” the inspector snapped.

“No, Inspector, I was speaking to Mr. Hackelsmith.”

“Of course,” the inspector said. “I knew that. I was just testing you.”

Oona placed a hand over her eyes and shook her head. She still could not believe that this buffoon was the head of the Dark Street Police Department.

“So, it was nine o’clock last night when I stepped out the front door for some fresh air and to eat my apple, see?” Night Watchman Hackelsmith began. “Nothing out of the ordinary. I always have an apple around nine o’clock out on the steps, but last night was different. See, last night, I’d just taken a bite when a woman comes running up the steps waving her arms and all out of breath like, right? I can hear her saying something about needing help, but it’s all under her breath.”

“Did you get a look at her face?” the inspector asked.

“No,” Hackelsmith said. “Her face was all in shadow on account of the great big hat she was wearing, and all the streetlights were behind her, so she was . . . what’s that called, when the light is behind and their front is too dark to see?”

“Silhouetted,” Deacon whispered in Oona’s ear, and Oona grinned. One of the many books stored in Deacon’s brain was the
Oxford English Dictionary
, which, along with the
Dark Street Who’s Who
—a book that briefly described the lives of nearly every inhabitant on the street—came in quite handy. Thinking of the
Who’s Who
, Oona made a mental note to ask Deacon about Mr. Hackelsmith.

“You mean the woman was
silhouetted
?” asked Mr. Glump.

“Yeah, that’s it,” the night watchman continued. “I couldn’t see her face. But when I moved forward to see what was the matter, something hit me on the back of my head and I just sort of . . . well, it all went black.”

“And how long were you out?” the inspector asked.

“Not sure. Next thing I know, I’m all tied up, and my head is fit to burst. Takes me a minute to realize that I’m lying right here, in the middle of the entryway, and I hear voices.”

“What did the voices say?”

“Well, it was hard to understand them, ’cause there’s a terrible ringing in my ears, see? Everything had a strange echo, but the first voice was definitely a woman’s. That I’m sure of.”

“The same woman you heard on the steps?” The inspector asked.

“Possibly,” Hackelsmith said. “Like I said, my ears were ringing. Anyway, she says: ‘We’ve got it. Let’s get out of here.’ And then comes a man’s voice. He was harder to understand, ’cause of my pulsing head, but I’m pretty sure he says: ‘Shush, he’ll hear you.’ Then the front door slams, and I’m forced to lie there all night until Victor finds me and cuts me free in the morning.”

“Victor is the daytime guard?” Inspector White asked.

“Yeah, that’s me,” came the deep voice of the day guard. But to Oona’s surprise, she realized the voice was not coming from the other side of the room, but from right behind her.

She jumped as she spun around to find the thickset guard staring down at her, arms crossed, fingers drumming his forearms. She winced, rebuking herself inwardly for getting so lost in the conversation that she had failed to notice the guard sneak up on her.

“Look at what I found here,” the guard said, and grabbed her by the arm. Deacon cawed threateningly at the big man, and the guard jerked back from the bird’s fluttering wings, but he did not let go.