I remember the light.
Light.
Light bathing everything, coming from all places at once.
Just…light.
I believe I must do a better job explaining myself, or what follows is just a bunch of nonsense. I am not a poet laureate or anything like that. But even I can do a better job of saying "light".
Let me try again.
I now find the differences between the records room and the atrium of Sophia to be glaringly obvious. The records room was small, cramped, and filled to the brim with objects, which made it look even smaller. Remaining there for long periods of time was a chore, and not a pleasant one.
The atrium, while in the same style of the records room, was nothing of sorts. To begin, it had light. Not just the poor dim light of strategically placed oil lamps. I am talking about a mixture of wax candles in large chandeliers hanging from the ceiling, and natural light coming from real windows.
Nothing made from untreated wood, as were the shelves in the records room. Mostly marbles and crystals. The new fashion of the industrial and neoclassical had made its way into this historical place. The few pieces of furniture made the place look emptier and larger. It was larger, I should correct myself about it. There was another thing that made it different.
We found people there.
I thought of Mr. Verne, alone in his room. In the cramped vastness of the records room, he reigned supreme. The almighty king of an empty kingdom. Here, people always moving around. Some carried documents, envelopes, or small polished wooden boxes. Though no one dared to stop or shelf any of the boxes, as the sparse furniture left little room to store anything on sight.
Against any rule in decoration or common logic, someone sat on a circular desk in the middle of the open foyer. It reminded me of the ones in fancy hotels in the future. We found a small man there. Round glasses, corvid-like. He sat in front of a large logbook, writing as calmly as he could.
Uncle approached the desk. At that moment, the small man saw him, and stood up, did a curtsy towards Uncle, and one to me.
Uncle portrayed Father magnificently when speaking. Though they both use the same tone and inflection, the accents differ due to their occupations. Uncle uses a more common and modern way of speaking and pronouncing words, mainly due to his work in the theatre. Father uses the standard receded pronunciation from someone in his station…I say like I have not had the same pronunciation from training.
“Good morning. I would like to know where your people stored an old scrying mirror. We sent it from the house a while ago, can’t recall exactly when. Can you be of assistance?”
“Of course, your grace. I just need to check the logbook.”
While the man looked at the enormous book, we spent a couple minutes waiting. When he came across the answer, he began to sweat, and, while adjusting his glasses tried to convey the information across a persistent stammer.
“I am deeply sorry to say this your grace. We appear to not have it here.” He checked the page again, just to be sure. “We have a requisition form from your daughter, and a signed send-off by the curator on the tenth. We sent it away on the twelfth.”
“That is utterly absurd, my good man. My daughter is right here!” He pointed at me. “I know for a fact that she has sent nothing of sorts!”
“No, your grace. Though Lady Alice could have sent a requisition, she did not. I am speaking about your older daughter, Victorie.” He adjusted his glasses. “She asked for us to send the scrying mirror to London, said it needed…restoration work.”
Uncle hit the deck with that. His voice thundered and made the glass from the chandeliers tingle. The man cowered down into his desk; probably afraid Uncle would smite him for his insolence. To be honest, not the first time something like that happened, but I had yet to see Uncle lose his temper in this way. Father and Mother are both hotheads, but Uncle always seemed to have no care in the world. I guess I was wrong about that too.
“Restoration work!? RESTORATION WORK!? Is everyone here out of their minds!? What the hell is wrong with you, people!?” He stopped on his tracks, his eyes darted at the staircase behind the desk. “Where’s Ariel!? WHERE THE HELL ARE THEY!?”
“The…the curator arrived this morning. But, your grace, I do not think- “
“That is the problem,” Uncle interrupted, and the man shrunk on his feet. “You do not. I will not deal with this nonsense anymore. Come, Alice. Now.”
He moved his hand, and the entire desk flew away, making it crash against an empty wall and out of his way. The man stood frozen in place, as Uncle walked towards the staircase and began walking up, followed closely behind by me.
As we walked above the atrium, and into the upper levels of the Tower, I managed to catch a glimpse of a few artefacts that they recovered through the years. Stood on small pedestals. Some of them made from stone, but most were from a dark type of wood. Velvet cushions under glass cases. Not even a miserable plaque or anything indicating what the objects were, nor original owner, now its purpose. That was it. That was all the protection the artefacts had. They lacked padlocks or something to keep the cases closed. Nothing except they being in the Tower. Tower which I had broken into twice in the last day.
After seven flights of stairs and three people who tried to stopped us -to no avail- we reached the offices. At least, what someone decided should act as an office. Fake walls, not out-of-place in a trailer park, had been prompted towards the banister and created an enclosure separated from the rest of the building. They had glued a plaque to the side of the door: “Ariel Bonheur, Curator”.
Uncle busted through the door without knocking or stopping.
Ariel Bonheur is a lot of things, that I now know. However, one thing they are not, is easily impressed. Sitting behind the desk, they kept writing despite Uncle’s outburst. Not even his obvious displeasure at the cramped office. Uncle wielded his cane around, threatening everything with it, from the small Egyptian figurines, to Ariel.
“I hope this is important”, they said, while writing. “I need to finish this report before noon.”
“Where is it?”
“Where is “what”, exactly? As you can see, we have a lot of things here.”
“Do not play dumb with me. You are no Thot, but dumb does not suit you. Marcus’s mirror. To whom did you send it?”
“Per requisition from Lady Victorie Fawkes, we sent it to London a week ago.” They spoke with a bored tone, as if reading from a report. “This was approved by His Grace before doing so.”
“I haven’t approved a thing!”
Ariel stopped writing. Their eyes lifted to meet Uncle’s furious gaze. They began to speak slower, trying to prove a point.
“You and me know you are not His Grace, Marcus.” They folded his hands above the desk. “Listen, we had to send the mirror to a specialist. A crack appeared in it ten days ago.”
“A WHAT!?”
Uncle was so shocked he dropped the cane. As soon as he did, the spell vanished and his clothes changed. He went back to his dandier, more natural, ones. Ariel didn’t even react to it, limited themselves to put the piece of paper away into a wooden letterbox.
“A crack, you want me to say it again? A moron, who obviously does not work here anymore, dropped it while cleaning the surface.” They pulled another sheet of paper. “Since we could not get a hold of you, we spoke with Victorie. She took it to Marigold Bartlett, the antiquities restorer.”
Uncle seemed like he was going to faint at this news. All colour had drained from his face, and he leaned to the wall, afraid of collapsing under his own weight.
"You sent my mirror, my personal mirror, the personal mirror which contains my powers and existence, to an antiques dealer?", he asked, slowly. “I mean, Bartlett is an artist in what she does, but still…”
“We tried to contact you. Through the Alhambra, through your partner, Hypnos, even through that boorish poetic society you go sometimes in Edinburgh. Nothing! We did what we could with what we have. And Bartlett has said she will have it restored in a week.”
“Those are good news, not going to lie.”
“Good. Now, can you please step outside? I have a few questions to ask your niece, and you saved me the trouble of going after her."
Uncle did not argue or talked much after this. He stumbled outside, closed the door behind him. I was alone in the office with Ariel, who now opened a drawer on their desk. They took out a small red box, with a handful od papers glued to it.
“Yesterday morning I received the new batch of records. The latter, regarding this…thing.” They opened the box and showed me a familiar watch. “After reading it, I came to one of two conclusions. Either this is part of Jules’ next novel, or he had the help of a very knowledgeable person about the subject. Which one is it?”
“I have no idea what you are talking about,” I lied through my teeth.
“As a general rule, I would attribute it to an over-eager imagination. But I went to the records room about twenty minutes ago, and noticed we have some records missing.” They looked at me. “Records which, I assume, are under your possession now.”
“How can you say something like that?” I feigned indignation, but did not work.
“Because I am no idiot. I know from His and Her Grace that you have tried to enter the Tower from the outside. It was a matter of time you found a way in, and managed to terrorised my poor scribe.”
Ariel had the ability to make one feel small with one look. Very small. Their eyes pierced through everything, but, before they could speak again, a noise came from the outside. They walked out, but not before giving me another look to stay put.
As I waited, I noticed details in the improvised office. Everything, though thrown together, had care on its placement. Almost everything was covered in documents, and the areas which were not, had statuettes and silver frames with a permanent Egyptian theme to them. As Ariel, during more powerful times, had been the god Anubis, their style of decoration would not surprise anyone.
I feel somewhat silly, speaking about Ariel on such common terms. Gods require certain respect; with special care we should speak when dealing with deities. Especially those from… However, Father still has an absolute rule on using divine names on Earth. I am not talking about casual conversation. I am talking always and everywhere, even on the written record. So, this is the only situation on which I will talk about the subject.
I looked at the watch again. Though I recognised it in an instant, it seemed…off, somehow. It looked dull, unpolished. As if it just began to show the years it should have, even considering the constant time travel. When I approached, I even noticed new scratches, on the outside, and the inside of the lid. Certainly it had neither the last time I held it.
“We recovered it, again, Thursday morning,” Ariel noted. “In a gravesite near Derby.”
“How, why?” This piqued my curiosity. “I thought Father brought it back here the day after my arrival.”
“His Grace did. Mind you, the watch did not go to Derby by itself. It dragged away one of our associates. It took him to Derby in-” they checked their notes- “1512. We found him dead, of course. Or, at least, what we assume was his corpse and a note.”
At that point, while Ariel spoke, I noticed they did not dare to touch the watch itself. They had it hanging by the small and thin chain latched to it. The watch glowed slightly. It reminded me of something Father had told me a while ago. A bargaining chip towards my own goals. I decided to use it.
“I can help you with that.” I moved my hand; the watch flew to me. “I can deal with it without issue. Been doing it for years. I believe I am the only one who could safely store it without it sending me packing back to the Dark Ages.”
The moment those words came out of my mouth, Ariel looked at me funny. A mixture of incredulity and suspicion. I have seen a lot of people look at Father the same way, and I felt strangely powerful. They opened their mouth, but closed it and their lips turned white from the pressure on them. Through their mind probably flew thoughts of those who dared to make deals with someone on my family. Rumours. The Athenida Family, though small, has a firm grip on our dealings; particular interest on those which were moved not by personal interest or financial gain, but towards forbidden knowledge.
Rumours which are, of course, right. Where’s the fun in letting everyone know?
Ariel smiled, almost defeated.
“If you happen to help, what would be the price for your…helpfulness?” they asked.
The watch in my hand glowed. I smiled, first at it, and then at Ariel, who took a small step back. Barely noticeable. I noticed.
“I would like…information, please.”
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