“This isn’t where it usually leads, is it?” Oliver asked. “Last time there was a balcony with an altar.”
“Turpin says the Special Collections like to rearrange themselves, being so close to so much magic makes it malleable. That’s why he doesn’t let anyone walk around here unescorted.”
“How are we supposed to find Holbrook? This place is endless,” Oliver whispered.
“Let’s just start walking.”
Together they walked past row after row of shelves lined with books. The next room was filled with scrolls stacked up in cubbies and the next jars of things in murky liquid Felipe didn’t dare look at too closely. They froze, Oliver throwing his body over top of them as a tremor passed through the floor and a shower of rock rained down on them. Quickening their pace, they made for the next room, but when Felipe looked over his shoulder, the room they had just come from had been replaced by the one they had started from. His heart thumped loudly in his chest. They could wander in circles forever and never reach Holbrook. Grabbing Oliver and Gwen’s shoulders, Felipe pulled the group to a stop.
“I think this place might be like the Dysterwood or at least plays by similar rules. Turpin said we had to know where we were going. In the Dysterwood, I asked it to take me to you, and the path did.”
“I did that upstairs when I tried to find you on All Hallows’ Eve. It’s worth a try.”
“So what are we supposed to do? All think of Holbrook?” Gwen asked. When Felipe shrugged, she frowned. “I’d prefer not to, but all right. Let’s hold hands, just in case. I don’t trust it not to separate us.”
As Gwen took each of their hands, Felipe tried to picture Holbrook in his mind.Take me to the intruder, he thought as he stepped across the threshold into the next room. Immediately, the tremors grew stronger. Stone cracked and tumbled into the chasm below, but when it quieted, Felipe could hear a man’s voice rising and falling with a rhythmic chant. The three of them exchanged a wordless look as they crept between the shelves toward the sound. In one of the balcony-like outcroppings, Morris Holbrook knelt in the center of a large sigil. His sleeves and pant legs were covered in chalk as he traced lines and added another layer of letters between chanted verses. Everytime Felipe had seen the man, he had been the picture of bland attractiveness, but now, his eyes were wild and his blonde hair askew and slick with sweat as he worked himself into a frenzy. Without breaking his chain of letters, Holbrook reached to the side and took a swig from a glass jug. Oliver stifled a gasp the same time Felipe realized he was drinking blood. It dripped down his chin, but Holbrook didn’t seem to notice. An ecstatic shudder passed through him, and a second later, the air thickened around them.
Oliver’s eyes watered as he held his nose to keep from sneezing. While he couldn’t see the magic running beneath the society, he could feel it pulse beneath his feet in an erratic tattoo. Where it should have flowed evenly, it beat against its banks, threatening to overflow with each pull from Holbrook’s amplified magic. Anger tightened Felipe’s chest. DeSanto had died, so he could do this. When the next crack echoed through the cavern, Felipe cocked the hammer on his revolver. Beside him, Oliver laid a hand on his arm and Gwen looked nervously between Holbrook and the stairs beyond him that led back to the surface. If they couldn’t beat him, they would still need to risk crossing him to leave.
“What do we do?” Oliver whispered.
“I’m going to distract him. If we can let the spell lapse, it will give Turpin and Van Husen a chance to stabilize the building.”
“And if that doesn’t work?” Gwen asked.
“Then, I’m going to kill him.”
Oliver looked like he wanted to object, but instead, he nodded and kissed Felipe. “Be careful.”
“I will. Stay out of sight, and if things go wrong, get yourselves out and come back with reinforcements. I’ll hold him off as long as I can.”
Leaving Oliver and Gwen in the safety of the stacks, Felipe approached Holbrook with his revolver raised. The man musthave heard his footsteps in the echoing cavern, but he didn’t so much as look up. “Morris Holbrook, you are under arrest for the murders of Enoch Whitley and Antonio DeSanto. Stop writing and step away from the circle.”
Holbrook chanted faster, the ground smoking beneath his palm as he wrote. A tremor rumbled beneath Felipe’s feet, and the air roiled over Holbrook’s head like summer heat.
“I said stop.”
Felipe pulled the trigger. The shot rang like cannon fire in the cavernous space, but when the smoke cleared, Holbrook remained unscathed in his circle.
“Did you really think that would work, inspector?” he said, never slowing his hand as he completed another circuit. “I have tasted power the likes of which you have never seen. I can bend the world to my will.”
He had heard of people being poisoned by magic like mercury, but he had never seen it. Left to his own devices, Holbrook would wear his fingers and knees to bloody nubs until he died glutted on magic, but they didn’t have that kind of time. By then, he would bring the whole building down on top of them.
“Would you like a taste of my power, Galvan?”
Locking eyes with him, Holbrook dragged the chalk across the stone in a screeching loop. The stones beneath Felipe’s feet clacked and danced. Lunging for the nearest shelf, Felipe clung to it as the ground where he was standing dropped to the void below. His heart thundered as he listened for the sound of impact but heard none. Felipe tucked the gun back into its holster and pulled out the demon-horn knife. If bullets didn’t work, there were other ways. He just had to lure him out of the circle. Climbing across the shelf, Felipe leapt onto the stones so close to Holbrook that if he let them fall, he would destabilize his sigil. The impact of his steps shifted the chalk at the edge of the circle, drawing a growl from Holbrook’s throat. Before Holbrookcould move, Felipe kicked the sigil. Chalk scattered at the edge, but the magic in the air never wavered.
Felipe tried to sweep his foot through it again, and his foot refused to move. A cold laugh broke from Holbrook’s lips, revealing blood-lined teeth, as he drew a twisting symbol. Felipe tried to jerk back, tried to step away, but his body refused to move. When he swung his arm, it dropped like a stone as the muscles in his arms went limp. With a twist of the chalk, Felipe’s legs caved beneath him, and he fell into the sigil. Chalk coated his mouth, but when he tried to cough, he couldn’t move his lungs. His muscles tightened and cramped as if he had gone into belated rigor. Felipe wanted to cry out in pain, but nothing moved. His heart fought the magic silencing the impulses keeping him alive, but it wouldn’t keep going for long. The knife slid from Felipe’s clawed fingers as the air refused to fill his lungs.
“Goodbye, inspector. Tell Antonio he should have kept his mouth shut.”
***
Oliver watched Felipe fall from between the rack of heavy tomes. Cold clots of fear crossed the tether and collided with his own as Holbrook slowly rose to his feet. That ad-worthy grin had been replaced with something rictus and cruel.Get up, Felipe. Please get up, Oliver silently pleaded. He had no weapons, nothing he could use to help him.
“Felipe’s still not moving. Gwen, can you get the knife before Holbrook does?”
“I’m trying, but the sigil’s blocking it,” Gwen said, gritting her teeth as she pushed against the magic.
