Polly Shulman - The Grimm Legacy

“I did?”

“Yes. Not only did you choose correct answers, but you did it without peeking at the key. Well done, Elizabeth Rew! And now, I’m pleased to present you with the key to the Grimm Collection. Guard it with care and use it with wisdom.” Doc unclipped the binder clip from the exam and put it in my hand.

“This is the key? A binder clip ?”

“Exactly.”

“But . . .” Well, I thought, Anjali’s key was a barrette. Why shouldn’t mine be a binder clip? “How does it work?” I asked.

“Come downstairs and I’ll show you.”

“. . . Let me in and all is well,” I sang, pressing my binder clip against the door that had so frustrated me only an hour before. Doc was impressed by how quickly I’d memorized the rhyme—and by how calmly I’d taken the news that the room was full of genuine magic. Naturally, I didn’t explain that I’d seen it already.

I had more trouble with the exit tune, but I got it right after six or seven tries. My music teacher, Mr. Theodorus, would have been proud of me.

“What if I forget the exit song? Will I get stuck here?” I asked, remembering my panic and hoping it wouldn’t show. “Doesn’t that violate all sorts of fire laws?”

“Technically, I suppose. But if there’s a fire, the Grimm Collection is the place to be. As far as fires go, it’s the safest room in the entire repository—besides the Garden of Seasons, of course, if you can call that a room. You’ll see there are some pretty powerful objects down here, with powerful senses of self-preservation. And the guards we set on the door will keep out most natural threats.”

As if on cue, the door opened from the outside. I jumped, but it was only Ms. Callender. She hugged me. “Congratulations, Elizabeth! See, I told you there was nothing to worry about, sweetie. Gumdrop? Go ahead, take two—you deserve it. Did Dr. Rust show you around?”

“Not yet,” said Doc. “Want to help?”

“Of course! Where should we start? Let’s see . . . Elizabeth, do you have a favorite fairy tale?”

“Sure, lots of them. If I had to pick just one, though . . . I love ‘The Twelve Dancing Princesses.’”

“Then you’re in luck. This way.”

I followed Ms. Callender through the aisles to the shelves of shoes. I couldn’t stop myself from glancing nervously at the boots I’d just shelved. They were sitting right where I put them, looking dull and harmless.

“There you go!” With a flourish of her hand, Ms. Callender pointed to the twelve pairs of shoes I’d wondered about, the ones with holes in their soles.

“Those are the princesses’ shoes?”

She nodded. “Twenty-four of their shoes, anyway.”

“Can I touch?”

“Go ahead.” She picked up a purple silk pump and handed it to me. “Here’s the twelfth princess’s pair.”

The smell of magic was so strong in this room, and my nerves were so fluttery from everything that had happened, I couldn’t quite tell whether I was feeling my own excitement or actual magic. “Does it . . . I mean, is it . . .”

“Is it what?”

“Is it—you know—magical?”

“No, not the shoes.”

“Oh.” I was disappointed. Still, this wasn’t just any dancing shoe—it was the shoe that the youngest princess had worn to dance with the smart soldier who figured out how the princesses were sneaking out at night. Magic or not, that was pretty amazing.

“You don’t have the soldier’s cloak here, do you?” I asked. “The cloak of invisibility that he used to follow the princesses to the dance?”

Doc and Ms. Callender exchanged glances. “We’re not sure,” said Doc at last. “It’s supposed to be here, but nobody can find it.”

“Did it get misshelved?”

“I don’t know,” said Ms. Callender. “It might just be invisible.”

“Oh. But you have other magical things, right?”

“Yes, many.”

“Could I see one?”

“Of course,” said Doc. “Let’s see, what should I show you? . . . Do you remember ‘The Spirit in the Bottle’?”

“Is that the one where the student lets the spirit out of the bottle, and the spirit says he’s going to cut his head off, so the student tricks the spirit back into the bottle by taunting him and saying he doesn’t believe he’ll fit?”

Doc nodded. “That’s the one. Do you remember what the spirit gives the student in exchange for letting him out again?”

I shook my head.

“Come. I’ll show you.”

We walked down the aisles again, past rows of glass bottles, bowls of all shapes and sizes, dozens of spinning wheels, and on and on until we came to a chest full of cloths carefully folded and labeled. Doc took one out and shook it open. It was ragged and dirty.

“Wait, Lee! Test it first!” said Ms. Callender sharply.

“Don’t worry, I’m going to! That’s why I chose this bandage. I want to show her how very dangerous the objects in this room can be. Elizabeth, did you see the bottles we passed?”

I nodded.

“If you opened the wrong one without thinking, a spirit might come out and cut off your head.”

“Why couldn’t I trick him back into the bottle like in the story?”

“That only works once,” said Doc. “Our bottled spirits know better—they would never fall for that again. So don’t assume anything in here is harmless or manageable. Everything is dangerous in a different way, but everything is dangerous.”

Ms. Callender was nodding her round face in agreement. “Even the stuff that sounds safe is dangerous,” she said. “Like the pot in ‘Sweet Porridge.’ When you say, ‘Cook, little pot, cook,’ it makes sweet millet porridge. Sounds harmless, right?”

“Yes, I remember the story,” I said. Nobody told the pot to stop cooking until it had filled half the houses in town with porridge. The householders had to eat their way out. The story didn’t say whether anybody drowned.

“Okay, Lee. Show her the rag,” said Ms. Callender.

Doc took out a pocketknife, unfolded it, and—to my horror—made a deep cut across the base of one finger.

“Martha, will you do the honors?” Doc held out the rag. “I don’t want to drip blood over everything.”

“Sure.” Ms. Callender took the rag. “Elizabeth, do you have some small object you could spare? A penny or a pen or something?”

I felt in my hoodie pocket and found an acorn I’d picked up in the park a few weeks ago. “How’s this?”

“Perfect.” She rubbed it with the rag. Nothing happened. She turned the rag over and rubbed it again, with the other side. She held it up, smiled, and handed it to me.

It was heavy and cold, white-gray and shiny. It had turned to silver.

“Wow!” I said, staring. “It’s so—so cute! It’s like a perfect little silver acorn.”

“It is a perfect little silver acorn,” said Doc.

“Now give me your hand, Lee. Elizabeth? You watching?”

I had still been staring at the acorn, admiring the tiny silver scales on the cap, but I turned to watch the librarians. Ms. Callender had taken Doc’s hand and was rubbing it with the cloth.

The cut closed up as if it had never been there.

“Wow! Can I see your finger?” Doc held it out. I inspected it closely. I couldn’t see any sign of the cut.

“I remember the rest of the story now,” I said. “One side of the bandage turns things into silver, and the other side heals wounds.”

“That’s right,” said Doc. “And if Martha had used the wrong side, I would now have a silver hand. Pretty, but useless.”

“But that thing could save lives! Why is it here? Why don’t you give it to a hospital or something?”

“Yes, it could save lives,” said Doc. “But it would certainly also cost lives. Not just by turning people into silver, but by starting more wars than it could ever heal the wounds from.”