The Book Man, Chapter 88-89 (Revised)

88 DAWN

When the Fair-folk had finished filing through the portal, the hellhounds, night-mares, banshees, and giant spiders went through one at a time. Christian’s hellhound and spider stopped long enough to nuzzle him and receive some last-minute petting. He would miss them—but, he had to admit, it would have been difficult to keep two such conspicuous creatures as pets.

Narodnaya offered him an embrace before leaving. He hugged her in return with no regard for her clammy skin. He was pleased to see her hug Minerva as well, the glances they exchanged as they shared a silent conversation after their partnership in battle. Then she, too, vanished through the portal.

Only the fairies remained, the fairies and Morrow and Neva.

Aurelia and her sisters hovered before the trellis, looking at Neva anxiously as though expecting him to tell them they were still banished.

Neva said, “You may go.”

There was a gentle sigh like a breeze from the group of fairies. As one, they rushed forward through the portal in a blur of glowing color, thousands of fairies ecstatic to return to their home. Aurelia alit on Minerva’s shoulder.

“Now you must say goodbye to Water Girl,” she said to Christian.

For a moment, he did not understand what she meant.

“What?” he said. “Why?”

“My sisters and I are leaving, Book Man. We have been away from our home for far too long. You see that most of them have gone on already. Without our magic, nothing in the gardens shall be as it was. The Fair will cease to exist. The statues shall be nothing more than statues.”

Christian hardly knew what she was saying. Minerva a statue forever? No, that wasn’t possible. There must be another way.

“Why can’t Minerva go with you?” he asked.

“I have told you before the statues are bound to the park. They cannot leave.”

“Then you’ll just have to stay here,” Christian said belligerently. He could not accept it, the injustice of it. Minerva abandoned by the same stupid magical creatures she had taken care of for so long. Almost two centuries of dedicated servitude, and what did she have to show for it? A missing arm and spending the rest of time as an immobile marble statue.

“Book Man,” Aurelia said, “I would stay for her, and for you. But one alone is not enough. My power would be drained in one night.”

“The portal—”

“Even the portal I could not open alone, you remember, and that is a different kind of magic. That magic connected us to our home and flowed to us from it, and so we needed little of our own power. I would have no help if I stayed. You would have one night and nothing more. Better to say goodbye now and move on.”

But Christian rounded on Neva, who stood watching the proceedings with a look almost of curiosity on his beautiful face.

“You,” Christian said, pointing a shaky finger at the angel. “You’ve got powers. You stopped the other creatures, the ones that still wanted to fight us—you imprisoned your brother—you made Morrow’s dad immortal. You could—you could—”

“What could I do?” Neva asked in his silky baritone.

“You could bring her to life every night, like they’ve been doing. Or you could—you could turn her human.”

As he said it, Christian knew that was the answer: Minerva could be made human. Alive all the time, not just at night, flesh and blood instead of marble. And then—well, he could not let himself think that far ahead, just in case, but still, just for a moment, he had a vision of a second chair in his reading-room, and Minerva sitting in it as he read aloud to her.

Already Neva was giving him a mirthless smile, his lips strangely colorless. The vision shattered as if it were made of glass.

“That I cannot do,” Neva said. “Powerful I may be, but it is not within my authority to make things change their base nature. She is not a human; therefore she cannot be human.”

“But she can,” Christian insisted angrily. “She has been, here, every night!”

Neva shook his head. “Not a human. Just a garden statue animated by a spell.”

Just a garden statue? No, Christian thought—no. She had stood in her place at dawn, had watered the roses dutifully, that was true, but there was so much more to her. Her love of the emperor moths flitting through the gardens; her secret and precious hoard of books left in the park by daytime visitors. The way she would not ask a question until the end of a story, even if it meant hearing the story without understanding it, and the way she would not let go of the question once it had been asked. Her habit of tracing her lips with a forefinger when she was thinking. How fearless she was, fearless in a way Christian knew he was not and never could be because it was a fearlessness borne of not knowing she was meant to be afraid.

“You can’t tell me it’s a spell I’ve fallen in love with,” he said in a strangled voice. “She’s not just a garden statue. She’s—”

Then his voice failed him and he stopped. Minerva looked at him with shining eyes.

“Christian,” she said, “Christian, for some time I have suspected it would be this way. But I was happy—you were happy. It was inevitable you should find out eventually. I am prepared for it.”

“You can’t tell me you’re alright with this—this bloody abandonment,” Christian said. “After all you’ve done for them—”

She laughed, a little bitterly.

“I will not pretend I’m not a little afraid. But this is how it must be.” She slipped her hand into his. “Will you wait with me?”

Christian let out a sigh that held in it many unshed tears, but when he spoke his voice was steady. “Of course I will.”

A faint frown crossed Neva’s face as he gazed at them. In a moment it was gone, and the white forehead was again smooth with unconcern.

“Our magic will linger until dawn,” Aurelia said. “You have until then.”

She flitted from Minerva’s shoulder to hover by Christian and touch his cheek. “I thank you for what you have done for us. The name of the Book Man will long be heralded in the Otherworld.”

“Thank you,” Christian said, “but it’s a poor consolation.”

Aurelia nodded. From just inside the trellis, a cry went up from Aurelia’s sisters: Come on, come on, hurry home, hurry home! Aurelia zoomed upwards, her golden eyes blazing.

“Home!” she cried. “Wait for me!”

She zipped through the portal and vanished. Neva spread his wings, launched himself through the portal and vanished as well. The space between the trellis crackled, wavered, and was still. The portal was closed.

Now only Christian, Minerva, and Morrow were left in the park.

Christian did not let go of Minerva’s hand as they walked through the trellis toward the bench where they had spent so many hours reading together. Morrow disappeared into the trees, heading in the direction of Tirion’s grave.

“I’ll be sorry to leave you, my friend,” Minerva said. Christian was astonished to see tears falling down her face.

“You won’t leave me,” he said. “Not really.”

She smiled through her tears and kissed his forehead before he helped her up onto her pedestal. Then they stood together in silence, waiting. Already the sky was shot with gold. Where had the night gone? It had been the longest night Christian had ever known, yet now it receded before daylight far too quickly. Minerva squeezed his hand once and then let go.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “If I don’t let go now, your hand will get stuck.”

“I would not be entirely unhappy about that,” Christian said. She gave a hiccoughing laugh and wiped her face.

A feeling of panic engulfed him as the sky lightened to pink. She was not even looking at him but eastward, watching for the sun. He could not let her go without saying something—anything—without seeing the happiness that lit up her eyes when she looked at him. Or one more smile, a real smile he could remember when it was replaced with the lifeless, mechanical smile of her marble form.

“The sun,” she said.

No, Christian thought. No. Not yet.

“Minerva—” he said.

She turned her head and smiled at him gently, but a flash of light blinded him as the sun edged over the horizon. He threw up an arm to shield his eyes. When he lowered it again, the smile was frozen on her face.

89 THE END OF THE BOOK HOUSE

Christian dragged himself across the street and into the Book House. He stopped by Tirion’s grave to tell Morrow he was headed home, but the Rover merely grunted. The accountant nodded and continued on his way. They both wanted to be left alone.

As Christian let himself into the house and sat in his reading-chair, he realized how long it had been since he had been home. The cuckoo clock on the wall was silent; it had run down while he was out and no one had been there to wind it. Dust motes swirled in the sunlight that fell through the windows and shone on the floorboards. The orange cat brushed up against his leg and meowed for food and attention.

He realized his copy of The Hobbit was lost somewhere back in the park with his wagon and his tea kettle and all of his other things.

The silence of the house bore down on him like a weight. In the Otherworld during his travels there, in the park at dawn, the birds had been deafening, but he could not hear them through the closed windows of the Book House. The cat had given up its mewling and gazed at him reproachfully from the loveseat. He could hear nothing except the sound of his own breathing.

Christian drummed his fingers on the arms of his chair, reached for a book almost automatically. Flipped through it. His eyes blurred and then focused on a line on the page.

He had seen her beauty with his own eyes, and had heard with his own ears how sweetly she could sing and what a lovely voice she had.

He slammed the book shut and flung it away from him. Somehow he found himself standing before the bookshelves on the wall, staring up at his thousands of books. All at once he found they were too much for him and yet not enough. His chest heaved. There was not enough air in the world to fill his lungs, and this space in particular was too small and airless.

He swiped a hand across the shelf, knocking books to the floor, and when that shelf was empty he began pulling books from the next shelf and the next. He tore them from their orderly rows and threw them to the ground. He moved through the house, scattering novels off tables and field guides from his desk, tugging and pushing at the walls until they toppled over and strew books across the floorboards. The cat darted away with a hiss to hide in the corner of a closet.

At last all that was left were the outer walls, the interior supports, and the pipes sticking skeletally up around the bathroom. Christian went through the house and opened all the windows. The summer breeze drifted in with the smell of honeysuckle and roses, the call of a robin. He inhaled deeply, calm again. Exhausted, he lay down and fell asleep amid the piles of books.