Deborah Harkness - A Discovery of Witches

“No chance.” My steps were steady as I walked the boat inside. He grumbled something under his breath.

With the boat safely in its rack, Matthew easily talked me into breakfast at Mary and Dan’s café. He was going to have to sit next to me much of the day, and I was hungry after the morning’s exertions. He steered me by the elbow around the other diners, his hand firmer on my back than before. Mary greeted me like an old friend, and Steph didn’t bother with a menu, just announced “the usual” when she came by the table. There wasn’t a hint of a question in her voice, and when the plate came—laden with eggs, bacon, mushrooms, and tomatoes—I was glad I hadn’t insisted on something more ladylike.

After breakfast I trotted through the lodge and up to my rooms for a shower and a change of clothes. Fred peered around his window to see if it was indeed Matthew’s Jaguar pulled up outside the gates. The porters were no doubt laying wagers on competing predictions regarding our oddly formal relationship. This morning was the first time I’d managed to convince my escort to simply drop me off.

“It’s broad daylight, and Fred will have kittens if you clog up his gate during delivery hours,” I protested when Matthew started to get out of the car. He’d glowered but agreed that merely pulling straight across the entrance to bar possible vehicular attack was sufficient.

This morning every step of my routine needed to be slow and deliberate. My shower was long and leisurely, the hot water slipping against my tired muscles. Still in no rush, I put on comfortable black trousers, a turtleneck to keep my shoulders from seizing up in the increasingly chilly library, and a reasonably presentable midnight blue cardigan to break up the unalleviated black. My hair was caught in a low ponytail. The short piece in the front fell forward as it always did, and I grumbled and shoved it behind my ear.

In spite of my efforts, my anxiety rose as I pushed open the library’s glass doors. The guard’s eyes narrowed at my uncharacteristically warm smile, and he took an inordinate amount of time checking my face against the picture on my reader’s card. Finally he admitted me, and I pelted up the stairs to Duke Humfrey’s.

It had been no more than an hour since I’d been with Matthew, but the sight of him stretched out among the first bay of Elizabethan desks in one of the medieval wing’s purgatorial chairs was welcome. He looked up when my laptop dropped on the scarred wooden surface.

“Is he here?” I whispered, reluctant to say Knox’s name.

Matthew nodded grimly. “In the Selden End.”

“Well, he can wait down there all day as far as I’m concerned,” I said under my breath, picking up a blank request slip from the shallow rectangular tray on the desk. On it I wrote “Ashmole MS 782,” my name, and my reader number.

Sean was at the collection desk. “I’ve got two items on reserve,” I told him with a smile. He went into the cage and returned with my manuscripts, then held out his hand for my new request. He put the slip into the worn, gray cardboard envelope that would be sent to the stacks.

“May I talk to you a minute?” Sean asked.

“Sure.” I gestured to indicate that Matthew should stay where he was and followed Sean through the swinging gate into the Arts End, which, like the Selden End, ran perpendicular to the length of the old library. We stood beneath a bank of leaded windows that let in the weak morning sunshine.

“Is he bothering you?”

“Professor Clairmont? No.”

“It’s none of my business, but I don’t like him.” Sean looked down the central aisle as if he expected Matthew to pop out and glare at him. “The whole place has been full of strange ducks over the last week or so.”

Unable to disagree, I resorted to muffled noises of sympathy.

“You’d let me know if there was something wrong, wouldn’t you?”

“Of course, Sean. But Professor Clairmont’s okay. You don’t have to worry about him.”

My old friend looked unconvinced.

“Sean may know I’m different—but it seems I’m not as different as you,” I told Matthew after returning to my seat.

“Few are,” he said darkly, picking up his reading.

I turned on my computer and tried to concentrate on my work. It would take hours for the manuscript to appear. But thinking about alchemy was harder than ever, caught as I was between a vampire and the call desk. Every time new books emerged from the stacks, I looked up.

After several false alarms, soft steps approached from the Selden End. Matthew tensed in his chair.

Peter Knox strolled up and stopped. “Dr. Bishop,” he said coolly.

“Mr. Knox.” My voice was equally chilly, and I returned my attention to the open volume before me. Knox took a step in my direction.

Matthew spoke quietly, without raising his eyes from the Needham papers. “I’d stop there unless Dr. Bishop wishes to speak with you.”

“I’m very busy.” A sense of pressure wound around my forehead, and a voice whispered in my skull. Every ounce of my energy was devoted to keeping the witch out of my thoughts. “I said I’m busy,” I repeated stonily.

Matthew put his pencil down and pushed away from the desk.

“Mr. Knox was just leaving, Matthew.” Turning to my laptop, I typed a few sentences of utter nonsense.

“I hope you understand what you’re doing,” Knox spit.

Matthew growled, and I laid a hand lightly on his arm. Knox’s eyes fixed on the spot where the bodies of a witch and a vampire touched.

Until that moment Knox had only suspected that Matthew and I were too close for the comfort of witches. Now he was sure.

You’ve told him what you know about our book. Knox’s vicious voice sounded through my head, and though I tried to push against his intrusion, the wizard was too strong. When he resisted my efforts, I gasped in surprise.

Sean looked up from the call desk in alarm. Matthew’s arm was vibrating, his growl subsiding into a somehow more menacing purr.

“Who’s caught human attention now?” I hissed at the witch, squeezing Matthew’s arm to let him know I didn’t need his help.

Knox smiled unpleasantly. “You’ve caught the attention of more than humans this morning, Dr. Bishop. Before nightfall every witch in Oxford will know you’re a traitor.”

Matthew’s muscles coiled, and he reached up to the coffin he wore around his neck.

Oh, God, I thought, he’s going to kill a witch in the Bodleian. I placed myself squarely between the two of them.

“Enough,” I told Knox quietly. “If you don’t leave, I’m going to tell Sean you’re harassing me and have him call security.”

“The light in the Selden End is rather glaring today,” Knox said at last, breaking the standoff. “I believe I’ll move to this part of the library.” He strolled away.

Matthew lifted my hand from his arm and began to pack up his belongings. “We’re leaving.”

“No we’re not. We are not leaving until we get that manuscript.”

“Were you listening?” Matthew said hotly. “He threatened you! I don’t need this manuscript, but I do need—” He stopped abruptly.

I pushed Matthew into his seat. Sean was still staring in our direction, his hand hovering above the phone. Smiling, I shook my head at him before returning my attention to the vampire.

“It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have touched you while he was standing there,” I murmured, looking down at his shoulder, where my hand still rested.

Matthew’s cool fingers lifted my chin. “Do you regret the touch—or the fact that the witch saw you?”

“Neither,” I whispered. His gray eyes went from sad to surprised in an instant. “But you don’t want me to be reckless.”