Vellum and Green Vitriol
Copyright © 2007, S. Y. Affolee
The Final Conjuration
Seal XLII
"Isn't this entirely convenient?" I said as Rhys stepped into the boat.
"It's convenient, but do you see any other way out of here?" he asked. He held out his hand. I took it and climbed aboard. And nearly tripped over the bench. Thor yowled in disgust at my clumsiness. "What makes you sound so suspicious?"
"Maybe there's a trap at the end of all this," I replied. I managed to climb back on the bench. Rhys had sat down and used one of the oars to push the boat away from the platform. I put the glowing political tract near the prow. The book lantern cast green light into the water below and was reflected up to the ceiling of the underground canal. "We have to be prepared for the worst case scenario."
"I think it was by chance that we ventured all the way down here." Rhys moved the oars and they made a soft splash as they churned the water and propelled the vessel forward toward the first fork if the waterway. "How can someone be so sure that we would find that passageway? Even if someone alerted the librarian to the fact that we were in the library, how would anyone know that we would be able to go through that wall? It would be far more likely that library prowlers would find some kind of hiding place in the library first."
"I hope you're right."
The entire place was bricked in a simple style, the ceilings arching upward as if we were inside a gigantic mortared pipe. Other than the splashing of the boat going through the water and the rippling of the water lapping along the sides of the tunnels, there was no other sound. A watery tomb, I thought. But where there was movement, there was surely an end to all of this.
Nearing the fork, Thor jumped on top of the book lantern and angled his body so that the light was directed into the left tunnel. I looked at Rhys and he shrugged as he altered his efforts to row in the leftward direction. We might as well follow the cat since we had no other idea of how the underground canals were arranged.
After two more turns and a winding passage which made me doubt that we were going in any direction at all--perhaps Thor was playing with us and turning us around in circles--we approached a wide cavern where the water from all of the tunnels poured into a vast lake-like reservoir. But this cavern wasn't completely devoid of light. When we entered, yellow light spilled out from our right. There was another platform--this one was crowned with real lanterns which hung from poles at the corners of the platform. As Rhys rowed toward it, I could make out another boat, hidden in the corner shadows.
The platform appeared abandoned. Once Rhys docked near some steps, I tucked the book lantern back under my coat. Thor pounced ahead. When I finally got on the platform, I noticed that it was merely an extension of a vast room which petered out into corridors. Stone stairs at the back of the room led upward to somewhere. Below the stairs was a smaller recessed room cut off from the rest of the area by iron bars placed at a width too narrow for anyone to pass through. Beside the small room was a table and then on the wall, empty shackles.
But what finally caught my attention was the floor of the room. Someone had painted a gigantic circle inscribed with a triangle onto the stones beneath our feet. Symbols that seemed vaguely familiar but undecipherable were written on the outer edges of the shapes. In the light, the paint looked dark red, almost black.
"This looks like some sort of conjuring circle," I said frowning. "But I don't know what this says. I'm not familiar with these symbols."
"I can read them." His voice was cold. "Someone is preparing to do some bad magic. I need to read all of this before I can get a handle on what is going on here."
"What sort of bad magic?"
His lips thinned. "Trust me, it's probably very bad."
As he walked around the circle deciphering the sigils, I decided to explore the rest of the room. There were a couple of old barrels which looked like wine casks scattered about the place. Even an old wagon was sitting in a corner, slowly rotting away. I made my way toward the smaller recessed room under the stairs. It was then that I noticed that the table was not completely devoid of objects. Thor was sitting on the ground beside it, his eyes narrowed, his tail lashing silently back and forth. On the surface of the table was a book.
"Al!"
Well it's about time you got here, the Necronomicon grumped. I've been laying in this godforsaken corner for who knows how long.
"A couple days, I think."
Who cares? I can't keep track of time.
"Al, how did you get here? Who took you? And is he still around?"
Some man. I don't know who he was. Some minion of somebody. A crazy book collector, I thought. And then he decided to put me here. At least the cat was good for something. It followed me here and then came and got you.
"What crazy book collector? Was it Archibald Chesterfield? Did you hear any names?"
Too many questions which I don't know the answer to! Al sounded exasperated. Just get me out of this place.
"If you take that old grimoire, you'll have to take me as well."
The gravelly male voice made me jump back. From within the small recessed room, a face and a pair of hands appeared at the iron bars. Black eyes in a dirty face watched me. The man had a moustache and a short dark beard braided with wood beads. A black captain's hat covered his head. He wore a brown vest and a white linen shirt unbuttoned almost down to his navel. His pants were some sort of loose dark material and his boots were scuffed. He looked like a pirate.
"Who are you? Maybe someone locked you up for a very good reason."
"Look here, lass. No one deserves to be locked up here in the sewers! Let me out."
I put my hands on my hips. "I don't even know who you are."
He bared his teeth in a parody of a smile. "Septimus is my name. But I don't think now is the time for pleasantries."
"That doesn't tell me anything. You could be Al's kidnapper. You could be some crazy serial killer pretending to hide out here."
Al sighed in my head. Girl, that is the Liber Tutelarum.
"He's the Liber Tutelarum?" I could hear my voice go up in outrage, but I didn't care. I had imagined my sibling to be somewhat like me. Civilized, bookish, reasonable. Not this...this uncouth barbarian.
"You have a big mouth," Septimus told Al.
I have no mouth, you git.
"How can you possibly be the Liber Tutelarum?" I said. "You're nothing like me."
His brow angled down in a frown. "You're another edition?"
"The tenth."
"That explains it. All the later editions are all prissy. I'm sure you'll get along famously with Marguerite."
"Marguerite? Who's she?"
"Your older sister." At my bewildered expression, he clarified, "The eighth edition. She's a social climber. She loves Parisian fashion. It's all 'oh la la' with her." Septimus rolled his eyes. "We must simply get you a new hair dresser, Septimus dear," he said in a high pitched voice. "You can't possibly go out into polite society looking like you've just come back ravishing a village of native beauties in the South Seas!" He wrung his hands like a deranged chicken.
"What's wrong with him?" Rhys had wandered over to stand behind me. "Is he some mental patient?" He glanced down at the table. "Hey Al, how did you end up here?"
"He's having some family issues," I replied.
Septimus turned his back to us. "Go ahead. Make fun of me. I'm used to it. No one understands the life of a buccaneer. I'm a free spirit, I tell you. Free!"
"At the moment, you don't look free to me, dear brother."
"Wait. He's your bro-..."
When Rhys was abruptly cut off, I turned to see what the matter was. I only had a brief glimpse of his prone body on the ground when something loomed over me and pain crashed into my skull.
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