the next shelf. At this rate, he’d have to ask the old woman—
Encyclopedia of Runes until 1804, a book spat at him. The spine was the same width as his hand, and when he pulled it free, he grunted at its weight. The thing might as well have been made of iron. He expected dust, but got little. Either the tome was used often or the stewards of the library took their jobs very seriously.
He searched for a table, but the only other one was back by the woman and her apprentice, and he’d rather have privacy. So he returned to the quarter-full shelf and set down both the lamp and the book, opening the latter.
It had three to four spells per page, labeled in alphabetical order. Fortunately, the thing was also segmented into four sections: novice, intermediate, advanced, and master spells. He flipped to the last quarter and slowly turned the pages, moving the lamp closer.
So that’s what the ambulation spell looks like, he thought, tracing his fingers over the complex coils of the spell he’d tried so hard to obtain. A spell he no longer needed, thanks to Elsie. His stomach tightened. He ignored it.
The ambulation rune would do nothing to teach him the Latin spell that would actually enable him to use it. The name had a plus sign by it. An advanced master spell, then.
He turned the page. Upon closer inspection, the ink was actually colored to match the alignment of the spells. The physical spells were blue, rational spells red, spiritual spells yellow, and temporal spells green. The yellow ink had faded, making the spiritual runes hard to read in the poor lighting, but Bacchus had a mind for only the physical runes.
He dismissed spell after spell, turned page after page. Thought he heard the woman and boy move from their table to the stairs. He neared the end, turned the page.
Saw the rune immediately.
His breath caught, and he slammed a hand onto the page as though the rune might leap away. The blue ink was faded nearly to black, and the name had two pluses by it. A very strong spell.
The letters seemed foreign for a moment. Bacchus held the lamp even closer. The word revealed itself. Siphon.
He formed the syllables with his lips. Siphon. A siphoning spell? And on the following page, the rune was inversed. Squinting at the faded text beneath the images, he read on the first, Dare, and on the second, Accipere. Latin. To give and to receive.
A physical aspector had somehow placed a high-ranking master spell on his person and . . . siphoned his strength away from him? Given him symptoms two doctors had diagnosed as the early onset of polio? Had the aspector kept the stolen strength for himself? Bottled it up? Let it drain out with the sea?
Why?
He gripped the edges of the book until his fingernails left marks in the covers. His only consolation was knowing that whoever had benefitted from sapping his strength could no longer tap it. But where had it happened? Barbados? England? He’d been to New York and France as well, but he had absolutely no memory of the event . . . or of the person who’d done it. Had a rational aspector been present as well, to wipe his mind clean?
Now he was getting into the absurd.
Siphon. He knew when, roughly, it had happened. Before his parents had brought the first doctor in. But . . .
Closing his eyes, he racked his memory. He’d come to England often as a boy. Gotten seasick once on the journey back. Had that been the start of the siphoning, or had it not occurred until he was home in Barbados? But Barbados was not renowned for its aspectors. Bacchus has been one of few, though American spellmakers were known to holiday there during the winter months . . .
He slammed the book shut. He couldn’t make sense of it . . . and he had to accept that he might never know. He could investigate in Barbados first, ask his aging nursemaid, but she had never accompanied him and his father on their trips. She’d fretted over him. Wept over the diagnosis! Had she known anything, surely she would have said so. And to think his father would never know the truth . . .
He pulled away from the shelf, dragging the light with him. Let it go, he heard his father say in his memory. It will do you no good,