23

So I haunted the other white phone booth, and found that all of the books there were illegible. I got frustrated and brought one book back with me to see if I could find anything that I might match up with one of the English books. I found one that had the same type of covering and the same embossed sigil on the front, which meant to me this one was probably identical in content to the other, just translated to English from the original.
I put the book down on the reading table and turned to the front page, and two identical translated pages sat in front of me. I blinked and about feel out of the chair in surprise. I could have sworn it not translated. I went over to the shelf and pulled a book at random, and looked at it. It was complete gibberish. I took it over to the desk and laid it down and opened it. It was in English. The circle must hold a spell that translated the books to English, or maybe to the main language of the reader as long as she was inside the circle.
I decided to go against my instinct and looked with my wizard sight, and just about went blind. Everything glowed, and glowed fiercely to my sight. It hurt like looking at Cobb had hurt. Everything seemed to have magic pouring out, forming a glowing haze that surrounded me like a bright, blinding fog. I shut my eyes and waited for the after flashes to go away. I hate it when my instinct is right and I ignore it. When my eyes cleared I went back to the book and looked it over.
The book I had pulled was one on romantic poetry. I began checking the shelves to see where the books had resided before being placed in that pile by the desk. I found all eighteen locations, and they were clustered on three shelves, which made me think the shelves were organized in some way. I took all the books down from those shelves, and set them by the desk.
As I got ready to look through the first of the books, Cobb came in and looked around. “Are you done yet?” he said, and I had to bite my tongue to keep from tearing into him. “Why didn't you tell me this translated the books? I could have gone through them rather than trying to fine English copies.” I snarled at him testily. I had been reading and making notes that I forgot to eat, and my temper and stomach were both at me to go find something to eat.
Then I smelled something different from him. Chagrin. He actually felt embarrassed that he had forgotten to tell me about the desk. He gave me an explanation sounding like he was bored, but there was a definite odor of embarrasment. “To use the table you just place the book on the table and it changes the script to what you are used to reading. You can ask the table to collect particular books by saying out loud the information you want” he finished saying, and left hurriedly.
That was way out of character for Cobb, and it bothered me to think he might be trying to manipulate me even now that I was working on this service he'd tricked me into. I set aside the books and exited the room and went back home to get some food. I decided to stop by Larry and Fawn's to see how his luck researching things had gone. We had arranged to meet at a small restaurant called “Hole in the Wall” near his shop. We sat down, ordered our food and then got to talking business.
“Dragons are a serious piece of bad news Fernie. I have everything I could find out so far here” he said as he handed me a spiral notebook. It was about a third full of notes. “You can look through it but most of the stuff isn't in any kind of order so it may not make sense. I think I'll need about four to five more days to go through the basic stuff. Probably another month to track down all the esoteric entries and collate my notes into a readable report. How about we set up a time each day to compare notes we have?”
I looked over at my brother-in-law. The thought of Cobb using him to open the Way back up really angered me. That I was used to try and make that happen angered me more, and that helped keep me focused. I shoved those thoughts aside and got a smile to my face and said, “sounds good. I'll bring mine tomorrow. Meet at the downtown library?”
“Yeah, that's great Fernie, I can work until you get there. I have a few friends watching the shop for me while I'm doing this, so I'm not losing any business.” He chuckled and looked at me with his lopsided smile. “I'd forgotten how much fun it is just to do research. Thanks Fernie.” “Thank you Larry, without you, this would be a real pain to do.” I told him. the water brought our meals and we tucked in to a good dinner. I beat Larry to the check. I'd hired him after all, and it was fun to see him grump about me paying.
I went back the next morning and Cobb again escorted me to Underhill, and to his mansion. He didn't say one word to me the whole time, which didn't bother me at all. Talking meant he was trying to manipulate me, so I enjoyed the silence. I went back to the first white phone booth and stepped through. the books had been stacked neatly next to the table, and the torches flickered and the shadows danced on the wall shelves as I walked to the desk and set my backpack down.
As I straightened, i caught a glimpse of something that flickered and sped towards me. Instead of bracing for an impact I pulled the same trick I had used before, dive into the legs. I passed tough some thing that felt dry cold, and cobwebby, and something fell in front of me in complete silence. I rolled to my feet and took a step towards my backpack, and then sprinted for the doorway. I exited into the room just as something shredded the back of my sweatshirt.
I felt a cold impact that had no force and then felt a wet trickle down my back. Then the pain hit, and I screamed in agony and managed to stagger away from the phone booth. I looked behind me and there was a thick, glistening blood trail from the door leading from me to the door, and a vague outline of blackness in the door. It hovered for a moment, then it flicked back into the room and disappeared from view. I tried to stagger back towards the entrance and felt my body go numb as I moved. My arms and legs got hard to move and th wounds felt like fire. I tried to scream for help, but the room spun and tilted crazily, and I lost consciousness.