She probably would have done so, in fact.
If it were not for the shadow that suddenly slanted across the sweetness she had conjured. And the voice, deep and sardonic, cutting into the focus she had only just managed. “Well, what do we have here?” he said.
And of course it was him, of course it was.
Who else was it going to be, ruining her moment?
Yet still, somehow, it shocked her. She stood so fast and so violently it knocked the table. Two books spilled onto the floor, heavily enough that the bang they made echoed up to the rafters. She heard what sounded like birds up there flutter in the aftermath. Someone somewhere shushed loudly.
But they needn’t have.
The only sound that followed was her harsh breathing.
And him speaking so softly no one but her could have ever heard it.
“I suppose it shouldn’t surprise me to find that you think your salvation can be unearthed between the pages of a few dustytomes. Yet oddly, I think I am. Like I thought better of you, somehow. Even though you’ve given me so little to go on,” he said. Casually, like he was talking about the weather. Instead of being so scathing it felt like getting a paper cut clean through her skull.
She couldn’t reply, for a second.
She had to take a calming breath first.
“Five more minutes, and maybe I’ll have a lot more for you.”
“Was that a threat, little bookworm? Well, aren’t we getting bold.”
“Not bold. Just honest about what I might soon be able to do.”
He gave her a withering look—eyes rolling and then sliding sideways. “Yes, I saw you practicing. Your form is dreadful, by the way.”
“It was enough to grab you in the maze.”
“You got lucky.”
“So maybe I will again.”
“Let’s see then, shall we,” he said; then just as she was about to argue back, he added one last sudden spat word.
“Draw.”
Like a gunslinger, she thought wildly.
Though she didn’t expect him toactuallygo for his wand. That seemed ridiculous, impossible—until his hand whipped down, and then up, so fast she didn’t even have a chance to move out of the way. All she could manage was grabbing the nearest book and holding it in front of her body. Like a shield against whatever spell was emerging from the end of the sharp little thing he had jabbed at her.
Something violent, she thought and braced.
But the book didn’t just explode, or maybe end up with a hole through the middle. Instead, it seemed to collapse in her hands. Itspilled between her fingers and poured over her palms, so quickly she didn’t at first understand what was spilling and pouring. She just felt it; she just had the impression of something brown and in bits.
And then she realizedthe brownandthe bitswere soft.
They were small and furry.
Spiders.
He had turned the book into a great writhing heap of spiders, scurrying and sliding and scampering to get away. They flowed like a waterfall to the floor, where they raced around her feet. Or at least,someof them did. Others went up, instead of down, and oh god, they were in her hair. They were tangled there, too frantic to easily swipe way. She swiped and swiped and batted, and still they skittered over her scalp.
It was unbearable. It was infuriating.
“You fucking demon,” she spat, as she flung the last one away. She watched it melt into the shadows between books. But he didn’t seem furious that she had managed. Or that she had spoken to him that way. His expression was flat, featureless. She couldn’t figure it out at all.
