He rummaged through the box. There was another summoning stick, like the one the verge guards had confiscated. He also found three triangular obsidian blades, a dark blue polished stone sphere, a pink crystal egg, a small silver hammer, a clay ball with a wick, and a wooden bead carved into a flower.
At the bottom of the box lay a little glass bottle containing a transparent violet-blue liquid, stopped up with a cork. Merrick held it to the sunlight, squinted, and, despite his professional curiosity about what might be a perfume, decided to be smart and not open it and sniff it.
These, not the journal, were surely the real treasures. Finding a shocking historical document might gain him some renown, if he chose to share it. But a box full of magical charms created by Rosamund Highvalley? Those he was keeping. No way would he hand them over to the passel of crooks in the government offices in Dasdemir.
He set the bottle down and returned to the book. The last drawing in its pages was something he recognized: the immovable bed, in the Canopy Bedroom. Next to it, she had written the words To Lava Flower and a sketch of a flower.
The flower sketch appeared to match the wooden bead from the box. It was a bit larger than an Eidolonian cent, had a hole in its center, and was carved into the five-pointed shape of a lava flower, a native flowering succulent that grew in lava beds.
Lava Flower, not Lava Flow, but …
Maybe she was referencing the Lava Flow charm, which would be a useful thing to bring along when facing the risk of fae enchantment. Calling it “lava flower” could have been a play on words. And perhaps the charm wasn’t this bead, but the bead was the key to unlock its hiding place—which could be in the immovable bed. Merrick could find it and use it to cure his father.
His hands tingled with the desire to rush to the Canopy Bedroom and start searching.
But he had work to do in the perfume lab with Cassidy. His exploration would have to wait.
After setting everything back in the box, he carried it to the house. He trotted up the stone steps to the tall front door, shouldered it open, and threw his weight against it to shut it once inside. The whump resounded upward into the rotunda. Highvalley House was a huge round building, three stories of red and black volcanic stone topped with a dome. Its style was allegedly inspired by Radcliffe Camera at Oxford University, though Rosamund had intended it from the start as her countryside residence rather than a collegiate library.
Merrick strode out across the light-and-dark-brown checkered tiles. Wisps of dog, cat, and rabbit hair swirled in the corners. Cobwebs laced themselves between the tops of the pillars holding up the second and third floors, and the glass dome had become spotted and grimy. Merrick supposed Rosamund had kept the place cleaner than they did, requiring nothing but a flick of the wrist and a burst of magic. None of the Highvalleys after her had possessed quite that much power. Nor had they retained their status as nobility—he and Cassidy, despite owning Highvalley House, had only meager savings and the modest income from Mirage Isle Perfumes, and no connection to the palace anymore.
A scampering of claws echoed through the hall. Jasmine, their corgi, shot out of the kitchen and skidded over to circle Merrick’s ankles, yodeling in delight.
“Shh.” Merrick bent to pet her between the ears. “Jaz. Hush it up.”
“Merrick?” Cassidy stuck their head out of the door to the perfume lab, on the north side of the ground floor. “Where have you been? I’m doing all the work here.”
He used Jasmine as a shield to hide the box, which he set on the floor next to her. “Sorry. I was in the garden. You’re right, that gargoyle’s broken. You could probably repair it if you want.”
“Ugh.” Cassidy waved a white strip of paper under their nose, probably sprayed with one of their Water Festival scents. “It was hideous. Not sure it’s worth it.”
“True. Well, I’ll be in soon.” He waited until Cassidy vanished back into the lab, then he grabbed the box and bolted up the stairs.
He’d show Cassidy the box eventually. But they’d only talk him out of using anything in it. He just wanted to investigate a little first.
No harm in that, surely?
CHAPTER 5
BY ELEVEN O’CLOCK, CASSIDY AND ELEMI HAD gone to bed in their rooms on the second floor. Merrick’s room was on the third floor, same as the Canopy Bedroom. Using the flashlight on his phone, he crept along the curving balcony above the entrance hall. The lava-flower bead, threaded onto a red string, was tied around his wrist so he wouldn’t drop it under a piece of furniture. Barefoot, he kept to the rug runner that topped the polished stone floor to deaden his footsteps. Their Flemish giant rabbit, Hydrangea, who usually slept on a blanket in Merrick’s room, followed a few steps behind, occasionally pausing to nibble the rug. She limped a little, one of her front paws still bandaged from a scuffle yesterday with the cat, but kept up with him easily.
Dew misted the skylights in the library; starlight filtered through in a fuzzy glow. He continued past the bookcases and on to the Canopy Bedroom, almost stepping on Hydrangea when she hopped in his way. She jumped aside, affronted, ears twitching, then was diverted by a magazine on the floor, which she began chewing. Merrick turned the brass doorknob and entered the bedroom.
His flashlight splashed along the faded colors of the Turkish rug. He considered switching on the overhead light, then, with a glance at the window, opted against it, in case Cassidy woke up and looked outside and wondered why a light from the house was shining on the trees. He picked his way between a rocking chair, a trunk, and a settee, all banished from other rooms, and reached the bed.
The entire bed frame, including posts, canopy, and lion’s-paw feet, could not be moved, taken apart, chipped, dented, or even painted over. It imperviously resisted all such attempts. Its posts were decorated with carved figures with closed eyes and swords held pointed down their bodies. Cassidy and Merrick’s grandmother had set a mattress on the bed frame with a sheet tucked over it to make it look less abandoned, and there it had stayed.
She had died seven years ago. By then Cassidy, Elemi, and Merrick lived here too and had converted the ground floor parlor into a perfume lab, with her blessing. Whatever this piece of furniture concealed, it likely wouldn’t live up to the tales his grandmother had spun about the house’s hidden magic.
A pang touched his heart. He imagined her voice urging him on: Well, see what you can find! Show me!
On his knees on the mattress, he examined the wooden headboard by flashlight. It stood almost six feet high, coming to a rounded point in the middle, its edge carved into curls. He couldn’t find any whorl in the carvings that looked like a lava flower, nor anything that seemed to be a keyhole of sorts, assuming this bead was meant to be a key. He pivoted the light toward a bedpost. His other hand settled on the headboard. The bead, on its string, clicked against the wood.
A crack resounded through the room, a jolt that started at his fingers and slammed through his whole body, like someone had struck the headboard with a giant hammer. Merrick jerked his hand away. The bead and the bed both seemed undamaged, as did his hand, aside from tingling a little.
Then he lifted his gaze, blinked, and refocused.
The headboard was shimmering, disappearing. The posts, canopy, and mattress remained; only the headboard had turned into … a window? A portal? The shimmer was clearing, revealing a tangle of foliage, with a starlit space beyond.