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ONE

THE GLOVES ARE OFF

Tempest ate her grilled cheese sandwich hastily behind the till, keeping a watchful eye out for Clement. If her stepfather caught her eating on the job again, there would be words. Not that she had ever, would ever, risk soiling the books. They were far too precious, and she didn’t have sufficient magic to work a cleaning spell on her own.

She heard a distinctive rap, tap, tap-tapping footfall coming toward her from the classics section. Quickly she tossed the waxed paper wrapper in the trash and wiped her fingers on her jeans. No time to wash her hands and put on the white cotton gloves she always wore while handling the merchandise.

“Ugh! Pestie! There you are…” Her stepbrother Barnabas’ nasal voice dripped with unwarranted reprobation. It wasn’t as if she was hiding. She was sitting at the main register in the front annex of the legendary Owl’s Bookshop. Beside her, on the intake counter, was a stack of used novels and textbooks with ink stained and curling edges waiting to be catalogued and added to the inventory. She’d had a lovely conversation with the elderly couple who’d come in to sell them, before taking her six-minute lunch. They’d requested store credit instead of cash, so she’d been a little more lenient than usual about the amount of damage.

Barnabas saw the stack and wrinkled his nose. “Honestly, Pestie. You bought these? What are you planning to do with textbooks? We’re not a collegiate bookstore and even if we were, these are hopelessly out of date. They’re fireplace fodder.”

“I don’t know.” Tempest shrugged. She fought back the instinct to run a finger along the leather-tooled spines. “I think they’re charming. There’s some lovely old maps and interesting artwork in them. Someone might want to use them to⁠—”

Barnabas wasn’t listening to her. He’d stepped away to hold the glass front door open for his burlier twin brother, Archibald, who was wheeling in a stack of boxes on a dolly. Archibald was followed by their red-faced and rotund father, Clement, who was breathing heavily. He huffed and puffed as if he were the one exerting himself, and not merely out of shape.

Barnabas checked the labels. “Dan Wilder’s books are here! How fortuitous! I was just about to have a chat with Pestie about finishing the window display for his event.”

“I bet you can’t wait to meet this guy can you, Pestilence?” Archie snorted. “His dorky trivia buff stuff seems up your alley.” Her stepbrother couldn’t help it that he was stupid, but it was no excuse for his casual cruelty. Mocking her was his favorite pastime.

“What alley is that, Baldy?” Tempest shot back. She couldn’t stop herself. Her stepbrother turned a deep shade of beetroot and ran a hand self-consciously over his bare pate.

“Pestie!” Her stepfather Clement sucked in a sharp breath of air through his teeth. “You know we don’t tolerate that kind of abuse in the workplace! It’s not appropriate to mock a coworker.”

Tempest’s fingers curled into a fist. She didn’t have the time or energy for this argument. Nor was she likely to win it. There was little hope for her and “the ABCs” as she collectively called her stepfather and stepbrothers. They’d never be close. She had only continued to live above and work at the bookshop for all these years for the love of their customers and the books. She couldn’t just walk away from it all. Owl’s was supposed to be hers. The shop was built from a collection of books that had been handed down from her mother’s line for centuries. The books were her legacy.

But now the entire empire belonged to Clement.

Fortune, Tempest’s parrot familiar and a beloved fixture at the shop, chose that moment to let out a bloodcurdling shriek from her perch beside the till.

“Baldy! Barn animal!” she squawked, taunting the stepbrothers. Collectively, the ABCs fumed. Tempest bit back a smile, quickly pasting a bland, innocent look on her face. She knew Clement wouldn’t dare say a word. Not to Fortune. Though the bird was technically Tempest’s, she was the shop’s good luck charm, and they couldn’t run the business without her.

Clement had tried banishing her to the back on multiple occasions. Every so often he announced his plans to send her to a shelter and replace her with a proper, silent Owl mascot. But the consequences for Clement’s threats were swift and dire. Sudden floods from malfunctioning sprinkler systems. A small electrical fire.

The last time he’d berated Fortune, the doors wouldn’t unlock for two whole days. They had to pretend the shop was closed for “planned renovations.”

“Don’t just sit around like the Queen of Sheba, Tempest! Shake a leg. Give your brothers a hand,” Clement snapped. He wiped a puddle of sweat off his brow with a dirty handkerchief.

Tempest stepped out from behind the counter and crossed to the front window where Archibald and Barnabas were already unloading boxes thoughtlessly. They were piling the books high on top of stock she still needed to move, effectively doubling the amount of work she’d need to do.

Barnabas waved a box cutter at the window, gesticulating wildly. “I was thinking we could remove everything in the front window here and fill it with Dan’s books. Maybe hang a banner in the background. Something splashy, with a quiz from one of his chapters. There could be floating cards, with multiple choices for answers checked off and⁠—”

Tempest took a step back as he slashed alarmingly close to her. This was the first talk she’d heard about a banner, and the book signing was only a week away. “Is the author sending us a banner? Or did you have a designer working on it?”

“What? No?” Barnabas froze. His lip twitched twice before curling into a sneer. He elbowed his brother.

“I would never bug an author for something like that. Honestly, isn’t decorating part of your job? How hard could it be?” Archibald grabbed a book off the stack and considered it. “Just work off the cover. Here you go. Keep this copy. On the house.” He threw the book at her.

Tempest’s hands flew up, reflexively. She caught it.

The instant her bare skin contacted the smooth, glossy, glass-green cover, the messy bookslide began. She was carried away on a slippery tide full of sharp pointy-edged facts and feelings.

She could never predict which parts would stick when she got swept away. She always accumulated random details during these encounters. It gave her a distinct advantage at crossword puzzles and while playing along with game show quizzes. The ABCs mocked this, too. They said she was full of “pointless trivia.”

Old books held the most psychic material, but every book came with snippets. Even the new ones. She felt them in blurry flashes, saw them like images reflected on the surface of a rippling pond. She saw a boy sitting on a stoop, crying silently. Then a man receiving an award. She felt the firm handshake against her own palm. Then more numbers, figures, words, words, words. The sound of pages flipping, faster and louder, filled her ears with a roar.

“Pestie! Where’d you go, Pest?” Barnabas snapped his fat fingers in front of her face and made “pss-pss-pss,” sounds like he was calling a cat, but she could barely hear him. He was so far away.

“Oh, gremlin spawn!” Archibald pointed at her hands, which were clutching at the book. “Look. She’s doing it again. Stop pretending you’re having a seizure, Pestilence. You don’t have to be so melodramatic.” He rolled his eyes and smiled a smug little smile.