Grimoires and Where to Find Them Raconteur, Honor (read along books TXT) 📖

in his eye. Like a cat that had done something it wasn’t supposed to but had enjoyed immensely, anyway.

“I stopped by the station in question and had a little chat with the officer who took the initial report.”

I shook my head. The whole city would understand the importance of books by the time we were done with this case. Mostly because Henri would get up on a soap box if he had to.

“Alright, so we have two books stolen from this series. Great. Was this another doom-and-gloom volume?”

“Yes and no.” He waffled a hand back and forth. “Predominantly, no. The volume had a great deal of magical theory in it, hence why Leor had it. He’s a magical theorist. The good news is, he’s given me the names of three other people to speak with, including the woman who gave him the book in the first place. They all have a part of the collection and might be able to shed some light on matters. He mentioned a broker had contacted him a month ago, inquiring if he’d be willing to sell the volume, but Leor ignored it.”

I was happy to hear we had names. People to talk to always helped.

“How did the broker know he had it?”

“According to Leor, it wasn’t a secret. So, who knows?”

Good point. Word did get around about stuff like this.

“That’s the good news, but what’s the bad news?”

Henri’s expression became very pained, his mouth in a long frown that reached the floor. “There are no protections on the books.”

Niamh hissed in a breath, actually drawing back in her chair.

The rest of us were clueless.

Gerring looked at Henri uncertainly. “You mean…like the box is missing, or…?”

Henri shook his head. “No, I mean there’s no sealing hex on the signature pages.”

We all collectively groaned in understanding. He’d explained the importance of that at the faire, in broader strokes.

I couldn’t help but ask, “But does it really make that much of a difference? I thought the box was the main protection, anyway.”

“We do the hex on the signature page for a reason, my dear. It’s not for redundancy. The sealing hex is to prevent magic from splashing against the cover and damaging the volume, but also to contain the magic within the pages and keep it from bleeding out and into something nearby.”

Henri shook his head, looking like someone had kicked his dog and stolen his truck.

“And the entire Reaper’s Set has no such precautions. There are no protective hexes to be found anywhere within its cover or pages. The box created for each volume is its sole ward.”

Oh god in heaven. Noooo, that was not good. I felt my stomach drop at the thought.

Foster spluttered, “But that means the volume stolen yesterday is liable to cause problems, right?”

Henri looked about as happy as a fried frog when he admitted, “Unfortunately. And these books are filled with things I’d rather not have loose in society. My dear, I hate to say this, but when we finally do find the location of the grimoire, you might need to step back until I can evaluate it. The magic leaking from those grimoires might be…too much. Or it might be safe for you to be nearby. But I won’t know for certain until I evaluate it.”

With the chaotic state of my core, I didn’t know if I would be able to assist him. It still took regular visits from Sherard to keep me stable and balanced, although he kept tweaking the spell, giving me a slight boost now and again. We were all cautious about the kinds of energy I encountered, as some types could undo Sherard’s hard work in a second. (A certain explosion in a charms shop comes to mind…). On the other hand, I was immune to almost everything, thanks to Belladonna’s meddling. It was hard to judge it in advance.

I gave him a thumbs-up. “We’ll play it by ear.”

Henri gave the others a warning look. “The rest of you should steer well clear of it. Call me immediately for help and stay at least a half a street back, if at all possible.”

It was a good warning. I trusted them all to be sensible enough to take it.

“Question. Can our thief craft wards around it?”

“Technically, yes. It would take a great deal of time and skill, however. Each protective box would take weeks to make. Especially in this case, with no protection around the Reaper’s grimoires, that isn’t time the thief has.”

“Good point. Are you absolutely certain the thief is not a magician?”

“I would give it very low odds at this point. I’ve seen no sign of magic used in the breaking and entering, and even Leor’s book was stolen when the ward was down.”

Another good point. I could see why Henri was half-convinced. Magicians use magic as a default. Why break in with lockpicks when a spell works just as well, and faster?

Henri turned to Gerring. “You checked with police records, correct? Anything?”

“No one wrote any reports about stolen books, grimoires or otherwise,” Gerring reported with a sour expression. “And there have been a few cases of magical backlash, but it was stupid people applying multiple charms on top of each other. I checked into those.”

“So, not a lead for us.” It figured. I shook my head and asked my boyfriend, “Alright, so, who can we speak with? You said you had names.”

“I’d like to divide and conquer.” Henri looked between my ducklings. “I want to look up all the brokers in the city and notify them of these two thefts. Let’s see if they know anything. It’ll mean a great deal of legwork.”

Gerring waved this off. “All detective work is legwork.”

I knuckled a tear from my eye. “They grow up so fast.”

I got poked in the shoulder for that comment. I did love that Gerring had gotten comfortable enough with me to both dish it out and take it.

“But I think the three of you can divide this up and get most of it