“Well, we don’t have time to stand here and yap about it,” said Dwale. “How about we stop stroking the walls and just try to get to Mirthwater before your little mage brings the tunnel down about our collective ears?”
“Dwale is right, Netta,” said Patrick. “We can investigate this later.”
I didn’t appear to need a spellbook, or even a spell, to channel bone magic, if that’s what it was. The most that reading a spell had ever done was cause my Hair to float. Where others needed words and books to focus their power and intention, I seemed to be able to use my needle—the real needle, or my imaginings of it.
I was not ready to tell Patrick about my bone magic theory yet—even if I suspected he might share it. And certainly not in front of Dwale. I first wanted to understand it better myself.
We had been hearing the distant thunder of water for some time, growing louder and louder. Finally, we stepped out onto a ledge, a winding path beside an immense underground river.Now that we stood practically on its bank, the great rush and roar of it sounded like the wrath of an underworld god. It writhed like a vast serpent through the passage, snapping and snarling against the stone banks where its darkness turned to white froth. Baldbeak gripped my shoulder painfully tightly.
Angry water, was his only comment.
“The Mirth,” said Patrick.
“The Mirth? Really?” I couldn’t imagine anything less mirthful. I couldn’t believe that this great shining serpent was the same river as aboveground.
“By the time it reaches the surface, it is less …”
“Terrifying?”
“I was going to say less tumultuous, but yes.”
We walked alongside the river for a long time, picking our way carefully over the slippery stone. More than once, I had to grab Patrick’s arm when my boot slid sideways a little on the moss. Baldbeak fluttered up when I tripped, but he always came back to hunch on my shoulder again, disliking flying in the closeness and blackness of the tunnel. The men fared better, in their sturdier boots, but there was little talk as we all negotiated the narrow path.
After a time, the tunnel widened, and instead of the narrow stone pathway, there was a flat expanse of beach; stones and gray sand all tumbled together. After the slick rock, however, this uninviting surface seemed a luxury.
We made a makeshift meal of some dry biscuits and hard cheese that Dwale had in his pack, while Patrick read through the stack of letters between my mother and the black market bookmaker. I hovered beside him impatiently. He had refused to read each one out loud to me, not yet at any rate, arguing that it would take too long, and he would just share the most important parts.
“It may be distressing, also,” he said.
I felt impatience rising hot in my blood. “Tell me.”
He looked at me searchingly, then sighed. “Here,” he said,pointing to a list written in black ink. “The materials: Teeth. Hair. Fingernails. Skin. And blood.”
“Animal?” I asked, although I already knew the truth.
He shook his head. “I’m afraid not. It looks like your mother was consulting with him about making a spellbook from … organic materials. For years. And she promised him a share of its profits, which, by the looks of it, would be substantial.”
I took the letter from him, although of course I could not understand the words. The thin parchment seemed sinister, emanating a kind of dry, matter-of-fact evil.
“Whose?” I said through dry lips. “Whose … organic materials?”
“It does not say. Maybe one person’s. Maybe many.”
“Anthropodermic bibliopegy,” I said.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Binding books with human skin. The Book Man told me …” My voice trailed off. I needed a moment before I could continue. “If it is a mage’s body, that would imbue the book with added power, perhaps. But he said they would have to consent to it, or the spell inside would be cursed. That was his guess, anyway.”
“Cursed?”
“Yes, if they were murdered, or if parts of them were taken without their consent … But if they agreed to it, then it could make the most powerful spellbook of all.”
“I wonder what would make someone agree to such a … procedure,” said Patrick with distaste. He took the letter back from me, handling it with the very tips of his fingers, as if some corruption might pass from it to him.
“Perhaps if they agreed to it on their deathbed …”
“Perhaps.” His eyes flickered to me again, and I realized what he was thinking—what he did not want to say aloud.Mother.
