The Accidental Keyhand (25 page)

After Savi and the others disappeared, Dorrie felt a sick wildness inside. “I wonder if we'll remember anything about any of this.”

“How could we?” Marcus said. “We won't have had the experience to remember.”

Dorrie's head throbbed at the thought of such things.

“Maybe somewhere deep in your cells you'll know,” said Ebba.

“Great,” said Marcus dully. “I'm not exactly on regular speaking terms with my mitochondria.”

“We'll remember you,” Ebba said, her voice soft. “At least you'll be in the
History
of
Histories
book.” She pulled a watch on a chain up out of her blouse, glanced at it quickly, and then began to rummage in her satchel.

“I don't want to be part of the Lybrariad's history!” exploded Marcus, “I want to figure out a way to bust Timotheus out of prison! I showed him those rhythms he got in trouble for.”

Dorrie looked hard at her brother. For the first time in weeks, she really noticed the words on Marcus's T-shirt. “Apathy Is Hard Work.” The shirt looked too small for him.

Marcus picked up one of Moe's eggs and hurled it down the corridor. “I want to take a whole year of Casanova's stealth and deception practicum!” He sank into a dejected heap. “So should we just sit here until history changes?”

Ebba pulled a folded bit of paper out of her satchel. “I forgot. This is for you. It's from Master Casanova.”

Dorrie unfolded it. “I don't believe him!” She looked up. “He's still going to stage
The
War
of
the
Stars
tonight for the conference guests, and he's expecting us ‘barring a time-stream disappearance' to still play our parts.”

“I think he's big into ‘the show must go on,'” said Marcus.

Dorrie read more. “All cast members are expected to meet in the Mission Room at four o'clock to run lines.”

“It's four o'clock now,” said Ebba. They found bicycles and creaked through the hallways, Dorrie taking in every familiar corridor and room, feasting on them with her eyes, and taking great whiffs of the leathery, papery smells until at last they reached the Mission Room.

Dorrie pushed open the door. A cheery fire still crackled below the fireplace's marble mantelpiece, but now the room was utterly filled with people.

Ebba hugged Dorrie. “Everyone wanted to say good-bye,” she said in a choked voice. Dorrie hugged her back tightly. Marcus was pulled into the room by Saul and Mathilde, and propelled through the crowd.

When Ebba finally let go of her, Dorrie turned around and found herself face-to-face with Millie, who had her hands jammed in her pants pockets.

“I'm sorry things didn't work out,” she said. Dorrie thought she looked horribly pleased. Millie hesitated. “And I'm sorry if I was hard on you.” She paused and attempted an expression of deep maturity. “I just had to look out for the Lybrariad. Nothing personal.”

“…You morons,” whispered Marcus in Dorrie's ear as he passed by.

Dorrie faked her own smile at Millie and moved on to say good-bye to Egeria and Phillip, Sven and Kenzo, Callamachus, Izel, Mistress Wu, and Casanova. Even Mistress Lovelace had come to see them before they disappeared, and she didn't say a word about the disintegrated chitons. Apprentices and lybrarians, some whom they'd never met, shook Dorrie and Marcus's hands, and thanked them for their efforts to get back Petrarch's Star.

Efforts
, thought Dorrie bitterly.

At last they came to Hypatia. She stood in front of the fire in her rustling, blue silk tunic. Dorrie looked fearfully into her face, unsure of what Hypatia thought of her now.

To Dorrie's relief, Hypatia smiled at her. “I want to thank you for reuniting us with Kash.”

Dorrie cleared her throat. “Elder, um, Kash, told us that the boy who helped him escape from the Stronghold gave him something to drink. Something that would let Elder navigate the Stronghold's slips. Elder told us it turned his fingernails black for years.” For some reason, it felt unpleasant to Dorrie to have to say the next part, but Hypatia was listening carefully. Dorrie held out her hand so that her thumbnail showed.

“Same as this. I think Miranda, my sister, took a bottle from Mr. Biggs and poured something out of it into my orange juice the day we came here. I was thinking it could have been the same stuff.” Dorrie took a deep breath. “Maybe that's why I could…”—she forced herself not to look away from Hypatia—“go back and forth into Athens.”

Hypatia looked intently at Dorrie and Marcus. “There is much the Lybrariad does not yet understand about your arrival here, and of course, who is operating within the Stronghold and what their intentions are. It's possible that the star or the substance from Mr. Biggs's bottle forced a way into Petrarch's Library for you. It's also possible that Petrarch's Library opened for you of its own accord.”

Please let the Library have opened for me, Dorrie found herself wishing furiously. “What about the star book?” she thought to ask. “Won't it disappear when we do?”

“I have our Irish monk friends copying it at a furious speed right now,” said Hypatia. “What's made in the Library stays in the Library, no matter what happens outside of it.” She looked around the room at the other lybrarians and apprentices. “We only wish that we could copy you as well.”

“Even Francesco?” Marcus said dubiously.

“Even Francesco,” repeated Hypatia firmly, “once he hears what's happened.” She reached into a soft cotton bag she carried and pulled out two silver circlets, each set with a black stone alive with pricks of light and cloudy white swirls.

“Apprentice armbands,” Dorrie murmured.

“If it was in our power,” said Hypatia, “we would have offered to take you on as full apprentices, hoping that perhaps one day you would fully embrace our calling and work toward the possibility of becoming keyhands, or at very least”—she glanced at Marcus—“true ninja lybrarians of Passaic.”

“Even after losing the
History
of
Histories
page?” quavered Dorrie, “and not telling you about going to Athens?”

“Sooner would have been better, but you did the right thing eventually,” said Phillip, his nose looking oddly red and swollen.

“They're yours,” said Hypatia, holding them out. “You've earned them.”

Dorrie and Marcus took them carefully from her.

“We won't even remember getting them,” said Marcus, his face slack.

“Well, at least in this moment, you know that we value you.”

Dorrie thought she knew what Hypatia meant. “I'm sorry we couldn't get the star back.”

“We get Kash back,” said Hypatia, “and now we know about the star's existence. For that we are deeply grateful to you.”

Ursula stuck her head into the room. “Kash is awake. He'd like to see his rescuers.”

“Good-bye,” sobbed Dorrie, hugging Phillip fiercely again. “Good-bye to all of you.” After another round of desperate hugs and handshakes, the room emptied. Hypatia, Callamachus, and Phillip followed Ursula down the hall. Dorrie and Ebba were about to follow them when they heard Marcus call out down the corridor. “Egeria, wait!”

Turning back, Dorrie saw Egeria pause and look at Marcus expectantly, her head cocked to one side. Marcus ran to her and bit his lip nervously. “I just wanted to…once…since we're never going to meet again…”

Dorrie's eyes and mouth flew open as Marcus leaned forward and quickly kissed Egeria full on the lips. Egeria took a step back, looking at Marcus the way Dorrie had seen her mother look at Miranda when her little sister had tried to clamber up on a too-big bicycle.

“I'm definitely going to remember that,” Marcus said faintly. He fled past Dorrie and Ebba.

In the repair and preservation department, they clustered around Elder's bed. He stirred. “Ursula,” he said slowly, the love of a dear friend in his voice.

“Hello, Kash,” Ursula said, her voice shaky.

“It's been a while,” Elder said. He looked from Callamachus to Hypatia to Phillip, and touched his gray hair. “For me, at least.” Elder squeezed Ursula's hand. “I'm terribly glad to see you all again.” He turned his head to the side and caught sight of Dorrie, Marcus, and Ebba. “Well, well,” he said, holding out his other arm to them. They approached him shyly. He took Ebba's hand. “I see you're all right with leaving the Library these days.” With his other hand he patted Dorrie's arm. “That was some Sword and Pen Festival, wasn't it?” He turned his head so he could see the other side of the room. “Where's Savi?”

Ursula took his hand. “He went to Kom Ombu with a team. To get younger you out.”

Elder struggled to sit up, his face deeply troubled. “To get me out? You have to stop him!” he croaked. “Right away.” He fell back exhausted, as the keyhands looked at one another in consternation. A wild bumping began in Dorrie's chest, as Elder went on speaking. “I don't want anything about the way I've lived my life to change. It's been a good one. An unexpected one, but a good one. I missed you all so much, and I know I'm not all I was—I forget things, I'm slow and weak—but I saw and did important things. There's so much to tell you.”

He looked around the room. “I don't want that life to disappear. And at least now we know wheren to look for the star. If you succeed in getting the younger me back, there's no guarantee that we'll ever come this close to it again. Anything can happen.”

There was a stunned moment of silence, and then Hypatia swept to the foot of Elder's bed. “You're certain?”

“Dead certain,” Elder said.

“Is there any chance of catching Savi?” Marcus asked, touching his lips as if to make sure they were still there.

Nobody answered.

PASSAIC

Strong mid-morning sun woke Dorrie from the exhausted slumber she had finally succumbed to. She stretched her legs and winced. All yesterday's fighting had made her sore. It had been some Pen and Sword Festival. Dorrie pushed her covers back and scooped up some random clothes from the floor. She wiggled into them.

In the hallway, she nearly collided with her father, who was carrying a toolbox. Miranda held his other hand.

“Dad!” cried Dorrie. “You're back!”

She thought he looked very handsome, even with the scruff on his chin and his faded work clothes. She hugged him tightly and enjoyed feeling small for a moment. Miranda wrapped her own small arms around them both.

“Well, that's a nice good morning—though not very piratical,” said her father. He held her at arm's length. “How was the Pen and Sword Festival?”

Tiffany's jeering face flashed before her. “I survived.”

“You must have exhausted yourself. Mom said you and Marcus were asleep before she and Miranda even got home.”

Dorrie hesitated, not sure how much to tell him. “We did a lot. Our regular performance and the Melee.”

Her father raised his face to the heavens dramatically. “Do you realize that because of your selfish need for sleep, I had to eat a half-gallon of ice cream all by myself?”

Dorrie raked her fingers through her tangled hair. “Is Marcus up yet?”

“Oh, I do love a good joke in the morning. Wake him up, will you, and tell him to come help me out in the workshop. Some days this place seems to fall apart faster than other days.”

“Okay,” she said, starting for Marcus's room.

Her father headed down the staircase. “And keep an eye on Miranda, would you?”

Dorrie ran back, grabbed Miranda by one plump hand, and hauled her to Marcus's door. She was about to open it when she glanced down at Miranda's ever-present necklace of random objects. Today, her ribbon held three CDs, a hole punch, and a squat, silver bottle. Now that Dorrie looked at it closely, she saw that it was the shape and likeness of a walnut. Dorrie slowly knelt beside Miranda.

“Where'd you get that?” asked Dorrie, pointing to the silver bottle. It had a little screw-on top, with the letter B engraved upon it.

Miranda shrugged. “From that big man's pocket.” She shook the bottle. “And you can't have any more medicine 'cause I already gave it all to you.”

“You gave it to me?”

Miranda stomped her foot. “I already told you that. I put it all in your juice so you'd get strong for sword-fighting.” Miranda began to pick her nose.

Dorrie stared at the little walnut-shaped bottle. “Well, I like it anyway. I'll trade you something for it. Anything in my room you want!”

“It's got to be something
big
,” said Miranda.

“Sure, big,” said Dorrie. “Let's wake up Marcus first.”

Inside Marcus's room, Dorrie let go of Miranda's hand and picked her way across the patches of floor that could be seen beneath the piles of half-dissected appliances, books, and glasses full of molding liquid. Miranda squatted happily in front of a keyboard. Marcus was sprawled diagonally across his bare mattress, the sheets balled up underneath him.

“Marcus,” Dorrie hissed. “Marcus!”

She rolled him back and forth. He turned over, smacked his lips a few times, and began to snore. Dorrie ran to the window and released the drawbridge so that it crashed loudly onto the roof of the chicken shed. Marcus rolled over again and slid off the bed entirely.

Dorrie climbed over the bed and peered down at Marcus, who had gone on snoring despite his slide to the floor. “Unbelievable.”

Beneath Miranda's fingers, the keyboard suddenly produced a crashing cornucopia of notes. Dorrie covered her ears.

“I'm up, I'm up,” Marcus said, getting to his feet with his eyes still closed. He swayed and then collapsed on the bed, nearly crushing Dorrie.

Outside Marcus's window, Dorrie heard her father opening his workshop door, and then a sort of strangled choking sound. “Good grieving gargoyles!” he finally shouted.

“Wait a minute,” said Marcus, sitting bolt upright, his eyes wide open.

“Yeah, about time!” cried Dorrie. Together, she and Marcus pushed up their sleeves, grinning. Just below their left shoulders, bands of silver, set with white-flecked black stones, encircled their arms.