A Book of Spirits and Thieves

“Spirits are . . . drawn to me,” Maddox began. “Contrary to what Livius asserted, I’ve never consciously called them to me from the land of darkness itself. But those spirits that are close by can find me. And, yes, I can trap them when they do. That’s all I really know about my magic.”


He chose not to confirm that he could choke a man from a distance if he was properly motivated.

The goddess considered this in silence. “Do you think that you could summon the witch’s spirit if you tried?”

“Say yes,” Becca urged. “She doesn’t want any other answer. We can figure it out later. I mean, we don’t even know if this girl is dead.”

He nodded slowly. “Yes, Your Radiance. I can certainly try.”

“Good. I will give you until tomorrow to rest and gain your strength, and then you will do as I ask of you.”

“And . . . apologies, my goddess, but what will happen if I fail?” he ventured.

“If you fail, I’ll have no further use for you.” She smiled as she continued to pet Aegus’s scaly head. “And you will follow your guardian to his grave.”





Chapter 10


CRYSTAL



Whenever Crys needed time to think, she developed film. Something about being in the darkroom—mixing the developing solution, the stop bath, and the fixer, and then the tricky-but-all-important moment of getting the film out of the canister and onto the reel in total darkness, popping it into the tank, timing everything just right—helped to clear her head.

Today she developed twelve rolls of film and made prints of her favorite exposures.

The ornery old man she’d stalked on Friday afternoon was a great shot, just as she’d known it would be. She decided to call him Ralph. Angry Ralph. Did Ralph have any idea how interesting his face was?

The last shot she’d taken in this batch was of Becca, just before the book had changed everything. It was slightly blurry since her sister was moving, trying to block her face before Crys could click the shutter. Becca’s dark blue eyes—which were translated on the black-and-white film to an intense charcoal—flashed with annoyance, and half her face was in shadow. Her thick blond braid was in motion like a bolt of lightning. She looked ready to take on the world.

Stop looking at life through that lens, Becca seemed to be saying. And talk to me. Be my friend again, not a stranger. Stop pushing me away. I need you.

Guilt slithered through Crys.

Why wasn’t she at the hospital? Why was she wasting time in the darkroom when she should be with her sister?

She quickly cleaned up—since the darkroom also doubled as the main family bathroom, she knew she couldn’t keep her chemicals in the bathtub and live to tell the tale. Then she headed for the hospital.

It seemed Crys wasn’t the only one who’d had this idea. She arrived at the room to see that her mother had already claimed the padded chair by Becca’s side. She sat there reading a book—one of her favorites, a fourth-edition copy of To Kill a Mockingbird. If she’d had a first edition, she would have definitely kept it under glass to protect its value.

Crys had read To Kill a Mockingbird at least five times, back when she was a voracious reader like Becca was now. She’d stopped reading novels in her free time shortly after her father left, associating him with the bookshop since he had always been there working from open till close.

How stupid to abandon something I loved because someone I loved abandoned me.

“Did you feed Charlie?” were her mother’s words of greeting.

Crys hadn’t spoken to her since Saturday. She hadn’t said a word about going to the AGO, feeling the need to process everything her father had told her in private.

“Yes,” she replied. “He’s got a feast that will last him days. He’s going to get nice and fat.”

“A quarter cup of food per day is all he’s supposed to have at his age.”

“I’m kidding, of course.” Crys sighed and studied Becca’s pale face. Her sister’s eyes were closed today, so Crys tried to fool herself that she was only sleeping. “Any change?”

“No.”

Crys tried to will Becca to wake up. To pop open those indigo eyes, stretch her arms above her head, and say, “Why does everyone look so worried?”

But she didn’t. That book—whatever it was—had done this to her. It had made everything that made Becca Becca vanish from the world, leaving behind only a shell.

“What is it, Mom?” Crys asked.

She put her book down and looked at her daughter wearily. “What is what, Crys?”

“That book.”

Julia Hatcher’s expression tensed up as she stood. She went to the window, where she pushed the curtains aside to gaze out at the cloudy sky and the cityscape of tall gray buildings and people down on the sidewalk, hustling around like ants. “Don’t mention that here. Someone might be listening.”

Her mother had a talent for summoning Crys’s frustration like a psychic with a wandering spirit. “Yeah, you’re right. Someone might hear me mention . . . a book. I’m sure that would strike anyone as a bizarre conversation topic for a bookshop owner and her daughter-slash-employee.”

“You should go home.”

“I just got here.”