Suddenly I got it. This wasn’t just the Lost and Found. They kept these things safe…from being discovered by Shadowhunters, who would be bound to investigate.
Emma smiled brightly. “I can’t imagine anythinginteresting gets left behind much anymore,” she said. “What’s still here must be ancient. Too old for anyone to care much about anymore.”
“The Ruelle used to be a lot different than it is today,” Spoon allowed. “We’ve worked hard over the years to make it more respectable, a place where Downworlders can find a little peace and quiet. That’s a rarer and rarer commodity, peace and quiet. Intrigue and adventure they can get in all the rest of the city, and I wish them the best.”
I nodded and hoped that he felt we had an understanding. “You were telling us about the fish slice,” I said.
“Quite,” Spoon said, blinking. “Shortly after I came on, we set a new policy for the Dark Magic Room. Anything over a hundred years old was getting binned. Or at least, it wasn’t staying here. Immortal we may be, but it’s my feeling that if a vampire or a warlock doesn’t need something for a hundred years, they’ve probably forgotten it.” We nodded. Spoon folded his arms. “So I traded the fish slice to a phouka for a hat.”
The last sentence was so abrupt that I just said, “Pardon?”
“I traded the fish slice,” said Spoon in a reasonable tone of voice, “to a phouka. For a hat. This hat, in fact. You see it has holes for my ears to stick through.”
Emma nodded thoughtfully, speechless. “Couldn’t you cut ear holes in a regular hat?” I said.
“Of course not,” said Spoon. “That would ruin thehat.” We nodded again, unsure what one could say in response to this. “This one was made for ears like mine. Also, as I said, I was trying to get rid of the fish slice. Just having it around was upsetting the mermaids. They were very relieved to see it go. Fish slicing indeed.”
“But it doesn’t actually slice fish,” Emma said. “It’s a spatula.”
“Fish slicing indeed,” Spoon said. “Upsets them. Cuts them to the bone, you know!” And then we had to wait about a full minute while he laughed at his own joke.
Finally, we get to the heart of this letter: we’re trying to track down this phouka and hoping Kieran might have a thought. A phouka who…makes hats? Maybe he often brandishes a silver spatula? It’s a long shot, but it’s our only lead at the moment. We don’t want to spook this phouka, so if you do find him, you can tell him we want to commission some hats. I mean, we don’t need holes for cat ears. But it did seem to be a well-constructed hat.
My love to K and C. Hope to hear from you soon.
J
TY
Hello Dru,
I’m back from London, and Julian and Emma told me to tell you “hello” and also “they send their love.” But that is not the important part of the letter, which is later. But you shouldn’t skip to that part. You should read the whole thing straight through.
Blackthorn Hall is actually pretty cool. It’s big and it’s old, and lots of parts don’t work properly yet, but Emma and Jules have done a lot to make it nice. There’s lots of bedrooms. I picked out one for me, which they called the “gray bedroom,” even though all the bedrooms are kind of gray. They said it’s so we can paint them if we want. They’ll be our rooms permanently and we can decorate them how we like.
You’ll have to pick out the one you want when you visit, but I found one that I bet will be your favorite. It overlooks the gardens, which I think will be the last thing to get fixedup, and so will continue to look creepy for a long while. There are all these broken statues with plants grown over them, like they were slowly devouring the statues. It looks like if you went walking down there the vines would wrap around you and pull you underground. You’ll love it.
I didn’t sleep well before we traveled to London and I think it was because I was worried. Anush says our bodies often tell us how we are feeling even when our minds aren’t conscious of it. Like feeling sick before an important test. You probably know what I mean.
But it was good to go to London. Especially to see Jules and Emma. I hadn’t realized how much I missed them until I saw them. I felt it like Anush says, a weird pressure in my chest that went away when Jules hugged me. Maybe it’s the same for you. Or maybe you already know how much you miss them. Anyway, I thought it was important to say I also miss you and it’ll be nice when we can all be in the same house together again. I think Irene the lynx will like it there too.
Ragnor’s map was helpful, so it was good he came. He found a couple of places in London to check for more of those cursed objects, so that’s one step closer to un-cursing the house. I know, it would be cool to live in a cursed house. But it wouldn’t be fair to Rupert the Ghost, since he’s trapped there by the curse. And the builders refuse to do a lot of the necessary projects for the house until the curse is lifted. It would be good if they could fix the roof so it didn’t leak. That might be a little too gloomy even for you.
Okay, now we’ve talked about the bedrooms, the house, and Ragnor, so if anyone asks you can tell them those are the things we discussed. We are now at the part of the letter where I have to tell you important things, but I wanted you to have news you could share in case someone asked if you had heard from me. I mean, if someone important asks. If someone we don’t know asks, Anush says you can say “Make like a tree and leave,” which I don’t understand but he says will definitely work.
So, the important part. Rupert the Ghost. I wasn’t really thinking when I wrote up above that it will be nice for us to all be together. I mean, it will be, but it’s not quite that simple, at least for me. See…Rupert saw Livvy. She wasn’t hiding or anything, and she didn’t act surprised that he saw her. But I’ve spent so much time worried about other living people finding out about her. It hadn’t even occurred to me that of course there are ghosts everywhere, all over the world, and they’ll all see her. The ghosts here at the Scholomance know about her, but Edvard and Prudence keep to themselves and nobody pays them much attention. Prudence is always in the library pretending to shelve books (or actually shelving ghost books, I can’t tell) and Edvard paces slowly through the halls and barely ever talks. Sometimes he moans, but that’s just him complaining about being a ghost.
Rupert and Livvy had a couple of conversations just the two of them, I guess about ghost stuff. She says she made him promise he wouldn’t say anything about her,but ghosts can lie. What if he says something to Emma or Julian? What if he can tell that something is weird with the way Livvy is a ghost and he mentions that?
The thing is, it’s not just Rupert. Even if he stays quiet, I already almost made Emma suspicious by talking to Livvy myself. I had to tell her I was talking to you on the phone. I know about Rupert and I know about Edvard and Prudence, but there could be ghosts anyplace I go, and if someone else is there and a ghost starts interacting with Livvy, things could get very awkward. I got used to Edvard and Prudence ignoring her but Rupert drifted right into the bedroom and asked her who she was.
Livvy says I shouldn’t worry. She reminded me that any Shadowhunter can see ghosts who want to be seen, like Edvard and Prudence, but that it’s much harder to see a ghost who doesn’t want to be seen, and that’s most ghosts. She says Rupert wanted to be seen—first by Emma and Jules and then by Livvy and me, though I couldn’t see him very well—but if he didn’t, I’d never have known he was there.
She says she’s able to hide herself from almost all living people (even Jace, and he has special inborn ghost-seeing powers), and even able to hide herself from a lot of ghosts. And even if they do see her, they won’t necessarily know who she is. It’s not like ghosts can just identify each other on sight. And she says if she has to, she’ll lie to them.
She said a lot of reassuring things. But it still gave me a cold feeling, which is my body telling my brain that I’m afraid. If Julian and Emma found out about Livvy, they wouldn’t just be angry. They’d feel like they had to do something, like lay her to rest. People don’t think ghosts can be happy, but Livvy is happy. She helps me with work, and she tells me advice to give Anush (he has a crush on Rayan’s sister Nasha), and when we’re alone we play games or I read to her. She can’t do everything but why would being all the way dead be better? Everyone calls it “rest” but no one really knows, do they?
Maybe you have ideas. Tell me if you have ideas.
