and Agnes knows some people who are very good with computers. She is being very helpful. We should have her over for dinner.”
“We’re paying her, right?” I asked Mr. Tom. “The deal was—”
“She’s charging by the hour, yes, miss.” Mr. Tom waved it away.
“The book he purchased was a complete history of this house and its various…interesting assets, complete with a great many of the house’s little jokes, a.k.a. vulnerabilities. He purchased a different book from the store about the various heirs. That led me to question what else he might have snapped up about this house.” He traced the orange string around the room. “From what Agnes’s friend’s people could find, most of the sources containing the house’s secrets were acquired by Elliot Graves.”
“He has a great fascination with this house,” I murmured.
“A fascination he had before it even chose a new heir,” Austin said.
“Yes.” Edgar followed a different string, leading him back our way. “We can rest easy in the knowledge that he is not the kind of man to collaborate with other masterminds. He has never joined forces with anyone, neither during his climb to the top nor in the years he’s spent fighting to stay there. He’s also known for taking his time when he wants something. He studies. He plans. He moves in slowly, corralling his target, cornering them, and only then pounces. He’s as meticulous as he is powerful, as organized as he is persistent. So… What’s the good news?”
“You have the spell and a way to get around it?” I asked, holding my mug between both palms.
“No, but I do know the spell exists.”
“Well, we all know it exists,” I replied, frustrated. “The house knows it exists. We saw it with our own eyes.”
“All this madness for hours on end”—Mr. Tom gestured around the room—“just to tell us what we saw in plain sight?”
“Why wouldn’t the spell be in there?” I asked.
“The vulnerabilities are not spelled out,” Edgar said, “probably because she doesn’t know how it is done. If she did, she would be able to circumvent it. If a past heir figured it out, they never amended the book. I think that is something you should do—find the spell, find the counter-spell, and make note of them in the book. But that is for another day.” He held up his finger. “There is good news. Elliot Graves has been moving slowly. Incredibly slowly, considering he started all of this before you were chosen. He’s testing his theories on you. That’s the best-case scenario, given the speed at which you’re growing with Austin’s help. You’re ahead of the curve.”
“Until this spell…” I reminded him.
He paused. “Well, yes. But that is okay. The spell itself is not in here, but there’s information about the nature of it. This second book is a breeze to translate—only two languages, and one of those is English. It is meant to be consumed more than studied. I see now that the first book is the training wheels. We’ll have plenty more work to do once you finish with it.”
“Fine, so if Agnes doesn’t come through with anything helpful, I’ll at least know more about the spell Elliot’s using. If I figure out how it’s fooling Ivy House, maybe I can reverse engineer a way to dismantle it. I mean, that’s just logic, right?” I scratched my head.
“The other good news is, as far as Ivy House knows,” Edgar said, “it has not been leaked that the heir is capable of fully controlling the house’s defenses. He might not know you’re just as deadly without it.”
Austin crossed his arms over his chest and rubbed the dark brown stubble on his chin. “That’s smart.”
“Who…” Edgar backed up a pace and put his fingers to his chest before looking around. “What is?”
“Even if Elliot knows or suspects you have the power to control the house defenses,” Austin went on, “he might not know you are able to yet.” He held out a finger. “You are brand new to magic as a whole.” A second finger. “You didn’t know anything about this house before you moved here by other means.” A third finger. “You just learned to fly a couple months ago…” He put his hand down again. “You should lean into that. Lean into your seeming inexperience when you’re dealing with him. Make him think you’re behind where you currently are. It’ll give you an edge.”
“What if they were around, watching me train?” I asked.