I shot him a bewildered look before I understood what he was suggesting. And then, my jaw fell open. “You want to steal the keys to the crypt? You can’t be serious!”
Casimir rolled his eyes. “You’ve watched me glamour an elderly librarian, steal a precious necklace, and break Monty Prescott’s finger?—”
“Hand,” I corrected.
“—But no, it’s the idea of stealing aset of keysthat really offends you…” He shook his head in mock disappointment. “I’ll meet you outside the library at midnight. Unless you’d rather steal the keys yourself?” he offered.
I arched a brow. “I guess you really meant it when you said you hadn’t corrupted me thoroughly enough.”
His answering grin was wicked. “I make good on all of my promises, Farrow. You’ll learn that soon enough.”
28
It felt strange to be wandering the halls of the Labyrinth after hours. Criminal, even. Apart from the occasional torchlight, the endless rows of books stretched out in almost complete darkness as we made our way toward the entrance to the underground crypt. Devoid of the comforting rustle of pages being turned or the muffled whispers of students, the library’s usually cheerful atmosphere was transformed into something foreign and unnatural.
I half-expected some overzealous hall monitor to jump out from behind one of the shelves and accuse us of breaking and entering, but none did.
I glanced at Casimir walking in front of me, trying to determine from the slope of his shoulders whether he too shared my unease, but he was apparently unbothered by the eerie silence.
After descending a narrow spiral staircase at the east end of the library, we found ourselves at the foot of a low-ceilinged passageway, at the end of which stood a large iron door. Compared to the rest of the Labyrinth, this place felt neglected, as if the caretakers had all but forgotten its existence.
“This is it,” he whispered.
I didn’t dare ask how and when Casimir had stolen the keys to the crypt. He tried to insert several in the lock before he found the match. At last, one clicked, and the door wrenched open with a metallic screech that made both of us cringe.
We stepped into sepulchral darkness. The damp, stale air, combined with the eerie feeling of having trespassed upon a place where we did not belong, made my skin crawl. The crypt was downright creepy. I was about to suggest we leave to search for a torch when Casimir withdrew a lighter from his pocket and lit an old oil sconce on the wall. The soft glow of lamplight revealed the interior of the crypt.
Apart from several sinister-looking, chipped gargoyles, the interior mostly consisted of a tower of yellowing papers, old filing cabinets, and haphazardly stacked boxes. A small coffin lay against a stone wall. Casimir whistled as he stepped around a box of ancient-looking scrolls.
“This is going to be impossible,” I groaned. For once, Casimir did not disagree with me.
“You take that side, I’ll start over here,” he instructed.
After a fruitless half hour of searching through the mess, I began to doubt the Book’s clue. Even if there was a magical object hidden amongst this disorder, how were we supposed to know what it looked like?
“Casimir, how exactly do you identify a magical object from an ordinary one?” I called out.
“Enchanted objects contain remnants of magic,” he explained. “Like with theBook of Erebos. I’d wager you felt its magic the moment you touched it.”
I considered this. It was true, the first time I’d held the Book—truly felt the weight of it in my palms—an icy chill had gathered over my skin, as if, all at once, my body had grasped what my mind could not; that the Book was embedded with dangerous magic. To summarize it, Casimir expected me to determine whether I’d come across an enchanted object purely based on evil vibes.
I heaved a heavy sigh and then resumed my search. One box held a collection of unlabeled bones. Grimacing in disgust, I forced myself to examine each one but found no traces of magic. Nothing in the crypt was alphabetically organized, or indeed, sorted by any kind of rational system, and the longer we remained, the more uneasy I became.
I was rummaging through a box of funeral masks and taxidermied pigeons when?—
I stifled a gasp as the palm of my hand caught on the edge of something sharp—a piece of stained-glass—wincing as the cut smarted. I did my best to stem the flow of blood by wrapping my fist in a handkerchief.
“Everything okay over there?” Casimir called out.
“All good,” I answered, grimacing down at my injury.
A moment later, he spoke again. “Farrow, come over here.”
“Why?” I whined.
No response.
Resignedly, I abandoned my box and walked over to the corner of the crypt Casimir was now occupying.