Page 47
On the way to Miscellany, Fia had asked Penbrook if she could tell Grace about his curse, assuring him that her best friend held secrets like a vault. They exchanged a look now, and he rather bluntly said, “I’m cursed.”
“Sounds like you need a muffin.” Grace thrust the box toward him.
“Ah, if not a cure itself, at least it’ll satisfy a craving.” As if he hadn’t just devoured the scone.
A surprised laugh burst from Grace that almost had her choking on her own muffin. She sneaked a look at Fia, a smile on her face that said I like him, then skirted around the counter, and gathered up an armload of books from an overstuffed shelf while throwing a million questions at Penbrook like she meant to know him in a matter of minutes.
Chatting the whole way, they followed Grace to the back of the shop, where the Lus had positioned antique sofas, chairs, and writing desks, all of them beautifully constructed and restored—wood gleaming, handles shining, fabrics soft and clean, if a little faded by the passage of time. A long dining table sat in their midst, and this was where Fia and Penbrook settled themselves, barely able to see each other over the tall stacks of books Grace brought over.
“Start with these,” she insisted, tapping a dangerously towering pile in front of Fia. “And you,” Grace said, turning to Penbrook, who was half concealed by his own soaring stacks. “There’s going to be a birthday picnic for Montrose on the thirtieth. You’ll have to come, if you’re still around.”
“I certainly hope to be,” Penbrook said somberly, as if she’d been referring to his cursed fate and the question of whether he’d still be alive. “But there’s really no telling.”
“I meant if you’re still in town!” Grace, who was seldom rattled, let out a too-loud laugh, then dashed off to greet a couple who’d just come into the store.
“You knew what she meant,” Fia reproached.
Penbrook leaned around the stacks so she could see his amused expression. “Yes, I did.” Then his eyes traveled the spines of all those books. “This is going to take an eternity. I think the curse might claim me before I can make it through all these books, let alone the picnic.”
“Oh, you’re not leaving it all to me. I’ll kick you under the table if I have to, to keep you awake.”
“You can’t reach me from there. Your legs aren’t nearly long enough.” Penbrook grinned, then ducked out of sight like a cat slinking around a corner.
With a small smile of her own, Fia pulled one of the many spellbooks toward her and cracked it open, inhaling the wonderfully papery scent—and a trace whiff of licorice.
“What are you sniffing over there?” Penbrook’s disembodied voice drifted over the stacks.
“The books,” she said, wondering how anyone could open one without breathing the pages in.
“You do know you’re supposed to read a book, not smell it?”
“Read a book and smell it,” she countered.
Penbrook snorted, or maybe he took an exaggerated sniff of a book. “Ah, nothing better than the scent of musty paper and old cigars.”
“Laugh if you want.”
“I want,” he replied, and even though she couldn’t see him, she could picture him exactly, all curled lip and dozy head tilt.
Shaking his imagined face from her thoughts, Fia bent to read, determined to focus.
After only a few pages and a review of the index in her licorice-scented book, she could see the enchantments were fairly basic, written by someone competent enough, who’d built them with sturdy foundations but not much flair. And there was no mention of curses, so she discarded it in favor of another.
One by one, she went through the books, falling into that hazy place where she was aware of only the words on the page before her and not the passing of time—the occasional thumping of a discarded book evidence that Penbrook hadn’t drifted to sleep at the opposite end of the table—until the volumes were scattered around her instead of placed in neat stacks and her eyes burned from the strain. Setting her hand on the page of the current book she was reading, Fia glanced up.
Penbrook had also downed his towers, so she could see him without obstruction—his slouched shoulders and pale face, the careful way he turned each fragile page, and the sleepy, lash-heavy look of his eyes… behind his glasses.
Fia had never seen him wear them before, and she must have been staring, because he said, “I need them for reading.”
“How nice.”
How nice? She didn’t even know what she meant by that. It was his eyes she’d been thinking of—their singular dark coloring. Framed by the glasses, magnified just the slightest so he looked at once both serious and silly, his eyes like the farthest depths of the Fateful Sea.
Before she could all but fall into them, she dropped her gaze. She was supposed to be reading, not… whatever this nonsense was.
Resolutely, Fia returned to the disagreeable passage she’d been browsing on curse work, hoping to find something more insightful and altogether less skin crawling. She’d stumbled upon more gruesome spells than she liked, from magically stitching together a snitch’s mouth so no seam remained to bidding a liar to spit up an eel for each untruth they told. Penbrook’s curse might have been lethal—which was obviously worse—but in comparison, drifting off to an endless sleep seemed far gentler a fate.
“You’re squinting,” Penbrook said as she reached the end of another distasteful chapter.
