The Prof Croft Series: Books 0-4 (Prof Croft Box Sets Book 1) Brad Magnarella (ink book reader txt) 📖

symmetrical pattern. A circle with two squares inside, one rotated like a diamond. Intersecting lines, smaller marks on the corners. It looked like some sort of alchemy symbol. And whether or not it was my imagination, a force seemed to pulse from the cold metal.

“The necklace is an heirloom,” Grandpa said. “It is meant to protect.”

“Thank you.” I glanced at his serious face. “But protect against what?”

Grandpa took the necklace by the chain and placed it around my neck, the coin settling over my sternum. As the subtle pulse from the metal radiated through bone—I wasn’t imagining it now—the force became something deep and tidal, making me feel larger.

Grandpa looked me over and nodded, as though approving the fit of a suit.

“Wear it in the city, under your shirt.” He wasn’t asking. “And be very careful the words you speak.”

I returned from the memory, one hand touching the place on my chest where the coin hung. My headlamp illuminated a curving wall with deep stone shelves. The atmosphere tingled with energy. I blinked twice. The hell? I had been walking as I reminisced, yes, and I vaguely remembered having made my way down some steps. But … I rotated slowly, my chest tightening at the idea.

I had come all the way to the vault of forbidden texts?

My heart leapt in panic. The curse of Dolhasca had led me here. I was sure of it. I was wheeling to rush back up the steps, to fresh air and space and safety, when I recognized the energy of the room. The night I had broken into Grandpa’s old study, I had felt it near the bookcases. The same bookcases whose titles had changed when Grandpa spoke that word.

Svelare.

The thought of it seemed to send a small shudder around the room, and I could have sworn something fluttered on the verge of my vision, deep in the bookshelves. Gone now, but it had looked as though something was trying to take form.

I drew in my breath, hesitated on Grandpa’s warning—

Be very careful the words you speak.

—and released the word.

“Svelare.”

The syllables vibrated from my mouth, establishing a kind of tonal resonance in the vault. Deep in the shelves, oscillations. I blinked twice and shone my headlamp around. A second ago, the shelves had been empty. Now they were crowded with leather-bound books.

Shut the fuck up.

I reached forward and pulled one from its slot. The dark leather cover was extraordinarily well preserved. I opened it to the first hand-written page—calligraphy in old Latin. Translated, it read, Gospel of the Egyptians, an early Christian text believed lost.

“I don’t believe this,” I whispered.

Behind me, something scuffed over stone. I wheeled, a shout lodged in my throat. Expecting gargoyles, I was surprised to find a flash of lenses. But the lenses weren’t aimed at me. They stared around the vault.

“They are here,” Bertrand marveled, removing his glasses as he emerged from the staircase. “By God, they are here.”

13

Bertrand shoved past me and pulled down a book, his lighter flickering over the pages. “Oh my, a Sappho,” he said. “Composed hundreds of years before Christ.” He seemed to be speaking more to himself than to me. “And this…” He pulled and opened a second book. “Ha-haa! Yes, this is an old Persian prayer book, translated into a liturgical Latin—the only one of its kind.”

I looked from him to the books, stunned by the sudden appearance of both. Bertrand must have slipped from his room and followed me. I returned the book I had pulled and scanned the others. The Book of Souls would be among them, and something told me I needed to find it before Bertrand did.

“It is a treasure,” he said of the collection. “A treasure!”

I was reaching for another book when he seized my wrist. He pulled himself close until I could smell his sour sweat. In a thick whispered voice, he said, “We must not tell the others.”

“You want to keep this from them?” I asked. “Besides being impossible, we agreed to share our findings.”

“You agreed to share. Not me.”

I yanked my arm from his grasp. “I don’t give a damn what you did or didn’t agree to. We’d both be decomposing right now if Flor and James hadn’t saved us from the wolves and gargoyles.”

He looked from me to the books, shadows climbing over his bony face. “Fine. We tell them. But not tonight. Not until we catalogue the collection.”

Before I could answer, he shed his pack and began digging through it. When he straightened he was holding two notepads and a pair of pens. He pushed one of each into my hands. “You begin on that side. I will start over here. Then we check each other’s work. Ensure there are no omissions.”

Whether or not the man was a phony, Bertrand had proven his proficiency in old Greek and Latin as well as in ancient texts. And his proposal held merit. By working through the night, we could complete a catalogue by the morning, one the four of us could work from for the next several days. Plus, it would prevent anyone—including Bertrand—from making off with a text.

I nodded, my phobia returning to sit on my chest. “All right.”

My list grew faster than Bertrand’s, mostly because he was stopping to peruse the texts, while I was on a mission to find a single book. I hid this by working through the collection systematically. Two hours before dawn, eyes dry and strained, fingertips chaffed, I pulled down a thick tome. Even before peering on the black leather cover, its weight spoke to me. A symbol, similar to that on my coin pendant, had been burned into the leather.

On the first page, large letters confirmed my growing certainty: Liber de Animis. Book of Souls.

Like a child, I sat cross-legged with the book. The rest of the vault seemed to draw back, as though on tracks. Breathless, I read the first line: “Herein lie the Grimoires sacred to the Line of Michael, Defender