The dragon-pig gave me a serious side-eye, then proceeded to ignore me.
I thought about leaving messages for Myra and Jean, but they’d check their phones. Unless I scribbled a note and slid it under their doors, they would be onto my plans too quickly.
I couldn’t let that happen.
There was no way in hell I was going to let my sisters follow me to the demon king’s lair. They were staying home, safe. They were staying here so I didn’t have to worry about them getting hurt. Or killed.
I’d said we’d all go together. I’d agreed we’d all go at dawn.
I’d lied.
The familymagical library was supposed to be passed down to me, along with the ability to be the Bridge for the gods, when Dad died. Dad had instead willed the library to Myra, a decision I’d always agreed with.
Until tonight.
The god weapons were in the library vaults. So were all our other most deadly magical items.
I needed weapons. Powerful weapons. I needed that axe that could kill the king.
I parked in front of what looked like a little pumphouse, and turned off the engine. The night was dark, and here, in the hills on the east side of town, among the tall cedar and spruce, there was almost no light.
The moon and late summer stars were hidden behind thick, dark clouds that had rolled in at sunset and hadn’t moved on to the valley.
“What do you think my chances are of convincing the library to open for me?” I asked dragon-pig. “Fifty-fifty?”
The dragon grunted, but it didn’t sound like an encouraging grunt.
I got out of the Jeep and used the light on my phone to guide me to the ring of mossy stones that formed the outer barrier of the space. If I were the key, all I’d have to do was stand there, maybe touch one of the rocks, and the entire library would unfold into this space and time.
“Library,” I said, positioning myself between two stones that acted as a gate. “I am Delaney Reed, eldest born daughter. I know you respond to Myra, because she is the key. I am her sister. I was going to be the key once too.
“You know me. You know my heart. Please open, just this one time, and let me in.”
Nothing.
I waited. Wind stirred and hushed through the trees.
“Please.”
The air shimmered, and a soft song of chimes drifted on the breeze.
“Just this once.”
The library appeared, a hodgepodge of a building that had been built and added to by generations of Reeds. Its patchwork nature somehow made it more wonderous, gave it a sense of whimsy, a bit of the fairytale.
I couldn’t believe it had worked. I couldn’t believe the library had showed up for me.
“Thank you,” I breathed.
Then Myra walked out the door. “Delaney,” she said. “Like I wouldn’t know you’d try this.”
She wore black, from boot to jacket, and had a knit cap pulled over her hair to keep her bangs out of the way. “Looking for weapons?”
I could lie. But not really. Not to her. My sisters knew me too well.
“Yes.”
“I can’t believe you thought you could go to hell without us,” she said, shifting the straps on her shoulders, which were attached to sheathed weapons—the demon axe and the demon sword.
