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I step forward, my senses prickling, Lucas close behind to guard my back. Even with the vines cleared, it’s a treacherous journey. The hardwood is a mangled wreck, and I can’t scan the darkness for grimoires while carefully stepping over ripped-up paper and black pits.
The path branches. The one on the right leads to the far back of the shop and the one to the left heads towards the front. I take the left path, but Lucas grabs my shoulder, stopping me. My magic surges, crackling along my fingers in little sparks that light up the darkness, but he shakes his head and points with the sword towards the path to the right.
I shake my head, silently saying, No, we need to head to the front. I nod towards the path I want. The basement where the body is can only be accessed through the back room behind the front register. Getting sidetracked will not help us. The Guild might show up any minute with their freshly arrived reinforcements to storm the bookshop. But Lucas is adamant, shaking his head and pointing more firmly towards the path to the right. His eyes are wide, like he’s trying to tell me something without using words. He keeps his hand on my shoulder and gently tugs.
The temptation to ignore him is strong, but if he’s delaying our progress, thus delaying saving Astoria, then this must be important. Besides, he is much more familiar with Astoria’s hellish shop than I am. He could know something I don’t.
With a sigh, I nod and step before him.
Lucas is close to me, his one hand remaining on my shoulder. The weight is an annoyance. It relaxes me too much when I need to be on edge and focused. And yet, I let him keep it there.
Lucas stops me. He holds out his hand, and his threads slither out.
I hiss, “Do not—” but I see why he brought me here.
A brick wall is utterly destroyed, the building’s framing exposed like a gutted stag. Shattered crystal pieces flicker and paint flakes off the fragments of brick.
Lucas whispers the suspicion within my heart aloud. “This was the heart of the shop. Tor’s pentagram.”
My heart thuds, a prickling unease crawling up my spine. I scan the perimeter, noting the absence of hiding grimoires. The stacks are mostly still upright and barren. I step closer to Lucas so we’re back to back, the warmth of his presence easing the prickling. “Was a grimoire trying to claw its way out?”
Lucas’ hair brushes my neck when he shakes his head. “There are better places along the wall that would be easier to try to claw through.”
I frown at the destruction. “There are no claw marks. It’s almost like an internal detonation. Is there a grimoire in here that could wield magic like that?”
“No, but I wouldn’t put it past Tor to ‘forget’ to tell me if there was.”
I snort, the corner of my lips lifting in a hint of a smile before I wipe the amusement from me. “Cover me.”
Lucas spins the black sword over one wrist while his other hand flexes to control his rings. It takes me a moment to recall the hand symbols, but I flip through the sequence and hiss the incantation into existence. Shadows of the brick lift, soaring back to where each originally lay along the wall in a reset of the space. The spell replays the demolition. The grout cracks, then dust rains down when it crumbles away. The bricks shift, then explode outwards into the pattern the pieces now lie in.
I pause the illusion and carefully step over piles of ruined brick to get a better look at the wall. I frown at it. “What was hidden within the pentagram?”
“Nothing?” Lucas crosses the destruction on swift feet. He scans the perimeter once more before stepping behind me to see what I see. “What is that?”
I reach my hand out and trace the illusion of the plain, unremarkable notebook that is coated in the dust of the grout, as if Astoria covered it in the cement before burying it at the center of the pentagram. My finger slips through the illusion to touch the slight indentation where the book once was. As I do, I murmur, “If I didn’t witness her giving her grimoire to the Amur, I would assume that this was it. When they’re young like hers was, they look like ordinary books.”
“Could she make a second one if she has two threads?” Lucas wonders.
I shake my head. “She said both of her threads were woven into her grimoire. Besides, burying a young grimoire would make it inert. It needs to be communed with regularly.”
I permit the shadow of the detonation to continue. The buried notebook is removed with no imprint of who plucked it from the hiding spot. My body tightens, and my gaze flits around the perimeter.
“No grimoire could’ve done this, not even the ones that can become creatures. This has to be a magic wielder, a skilled one at that.”
Lucas crouches, smoothing his hand over the wreckage, his threads slithering all around like snakes. The instinct to snap at him to preserve his magic is strong, but I hold my tongue in hopes that he discovers something that I might’ve missed.
The gold threads withdraw, and he frowns. “Whoever it was, they’re good at covering their tracks. I can’t catch any signature. But that could be because the lingering magic from the pentagram and the grimoires all around is making it difficult to decipher the subtle differences. Whoever stole the notebook could’ve gotten lucky.”
I shake my head, lowering my voice. “The spell I cast to replay the detonation should’ve picked up on some sort of magic signature from a wand or a Soul Thread. The fact that it didn’t means that whoever did this knew exactly how to cover their tracks.”
Lucas straightens with a sigh. “I can do it, but that’s because of my rings. I don’t know of another token that has the power or capability to do it.”
I don’t respond. I don’t need to. Our eyes meet, and the word passes between us. Weaver.
We need to move fast. If a weaver was here, they might’ve broken into the basement. Hopefully, luck is on my side; they were only here for the mysterious notebook, and are long gone. The way Lucas’ hand tightens his sword tells me he’s wondering the same thing as I am. Are we alone?
No more wasting time. I nod towards the path, and Lucas falls in line. We backtrack until we follow the path that leads towards the front of the shop. Destroyed grimoires coat the way, their shredded pages and mangled spines hanging from the shelves.
