Midnight Hour Read online

  ‘Good evening, we’re here to see the Library,’ said Tarquin.

  The goat-man picked up a pair of half-moon spectacles from where they dangled at the end of a chain round his neck and brought them to his eyes. They had a huge bridge in the middle to go over his broad nose. Emily was pretty sure he only put them on just so he could look down over them.

  ‘I see. I’m afraid all usage of the reading room must be cleared with the Keeper of Printed Books.’ As he spoke, a whiff of tobacco and cut grass drifted from him. ‘I see no note about an appointment here . . . sir.’

  There had been a good second before that ‘sir’. He inspected a blank piece of paper in front of him, then looked back up with a thin smile. At no point did he look at Emily. She recognized his type straight away, goat face or not.

  Tarquin was unfazed.

  ‘I’m afraid you’ve misunderstood me . . . sir.’ He held his hand out to Emily without looking at her. ‘Miss Featherhaugh, the card please.’

  Emily was impressed at this coolness, although less so at the ‘finger-snapping-at-assistant’ mode he had fallen into. She had a quick scrabble in her bag and then, stepping straight past Tarquin’s outstretched hand, slapped the library card on the counter.

  ‘We’re here to see THE LIBRARY,’ she said with extra emphasis. ‘My good man,’ she added, just in case it wasn’t clear she was patronizing him.

  The goat-man took one look at the card and blanched. Well, she was sure he had, but it was hard to tell with the hairy face and all. What he did do was push his stool back with a nasty squeaking noise, to be further away from the card and them.

  ‘You’ll . . . you’ll need to go straight ahead. Down the corridor, big green door, go straight into the reading room.’ He was looking anywhere but directly at them. Emily leant in and grabbed the card back. She caught Tarquin’s eye and shared a quick conspiratorial smile.

  ‘Well, thank you, you’ve been EVER so helpful.’ Quick count to three. ‘Sir.’

  They bustled off down the corridor goat-man had pointed to. As they passed the desk, Emily glanced back.

  ‘Ha, knew it! Goat feet!’

  They entered the reading room, and Emily let out an involuntary, ‘Whoa!’ The room was circular and huge, lined with books right up to where the incredible dome of the ceiling arched off above them, all blue, cream and gold. Moonlight spilt in through the central skylight and the many slanted windows, setting it all aglow. Emily spun round and round as they walked, mouth open at the mass of leather bindings of every colour that lined the shelves. From the walls in were aisle after aisle of concentric shelves, curved to match the walls, and looking like a labyrinth from above. The open centre of the room was filled with chairs and reading desks, all spread with books. It was a little bit of heaven, although there was no obvious sign of a kettle or biscuit tin, which was an important part of any reading experience in her opinion.

  The shelved walls around them were filled with a mass of books, papers and scrolls, and the air with a deep, musty perfume of ancient dust and ink. As the warm glow of their little victory over the goat faded, she thumbed the library card in her pocket. What had the wide-nosed git been so chicken of? Where exactly were they going? She turned to ask Tarquin, but his clenched teeth and hesitant steps gave away that he was more scared than the goat had been. Great. A little chill started to spread up her spine too, and her hand moved to the bad pennies. She stroked them, letting her finger graze each coin, the patterns on them rough under her fingers, and the chill receded.

  ‘So, this is what, a secret base or something, right?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘This whole “the Library is an Older Power and very important” bit. This is their secret base or something, yeah?’

  He stopped, eyes narrowed.

  ‘Their base? No, this is where all the books are. Where else would you find the Library?’

  Way down a long, curved aisle lined with red leather-bound folios, there was a flicker of movement. Tarquin squinted into the shadows thrown by the shelves, his yellow eyes flaring into liquid gold, and grabbed her arm.

  ‘There she is.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The Library, of course.’ He squeezed her arm harder. Too hard, in fact. Was his moustache trembling? ‘Now we must approach quietly and respectfully. She may be . . . unusual to deal with.’

  ‘Wait, you mean the Library is a person?’

  ‘I don’t think I could have been any clearer, could I? Come on.’ He started to edge towards the movement at the end of the aisle.

  Emily stood stock-still and glared at his back, grinding her teeth. Was throwing a book at his head an arrestable offence?

  As they moved closer, the movement resolved itself into a form. At the end of the row of shelves stood a lanky beanpole of a woman, with long white hair and olive skin. She wore a long, tattered white drapery of silk and lace that might just have been the remains of a wedding dress, with one silk slipper on and one bare foot. She was holding one of the huge books one-handed, as if it weighed no more than a paperback. She was talking, under her breath but with great intensity, perhaps reading aloud. She wasn’t looking at the book though.

  Tarquin cleared his throat, and without glancing up, she moved away from them around the curve in the shelving, placing the book down, still open, as she did. Emily wouldn’t have sworn to it, but she might have floated off rather than walked. Emily and Tarquin looked at each other with wide eyes, raised open hands in a shrug, and headed after her. As they picked up their pace, there were other open books, discarded here and there, on the floor and shelves, all left half-read and abandoned, a trail of literary breadcrumbs. As they rounded the curve, at the far end of the aisle was the Library, as tall as the tallest shelves, in the middle of a snowdrift of books stacked in haphazard piles around her. She was holding a small green book, still muttering, and not looking back at them. Yup, definitely floating.

  ‘I don’t know what to do,’ Tarquin said. ‘The only thing I’ve ever heard about her is that you mustn’t disturb her when she’s reading.’

  ‘What? So, we could die of old age whilst the hovering book hoover ignores us and my mum and dad stay lost?’ Emily slid from fear into anger like pulling on a pair of comfy old slippers. ‘Stuff that.’

  She cupped her hands into a cone and shouted through them, even as Tarquin tried to grab at her to stop her.

  ‘OI! BOOKFACE! WE WANT TO TALK TO YOU!’

  The Library stopped in mid-float and spun towards them with a dancer’s grace. There was a still, silent moment, then her eyes flashed, and she flew towards them at great speed, gabbling in tongues. They both screamed and clutched at each other as she crossed the distance in a flash. She stopped an inch from them, her long-nosed face full of outrage, her eyes a terrible roiling mix of black and white, like ink in water. An electric shock of fright shot up Emily’s spine as the Library’s long white hair slicked out around her and brushed Emily’s face. The ragged white dress billowed, floating as if the Library was underwater, and she screeched in a hundred languages, right in their faces. Not one word in ten made sense but snatches of phrases came through as Emily pressed herself back against the shelves.

  ‘Thou hadst been better have been born a dog, than answer my waked wrath!’

  ‘Rage –Goddess, sing the wrath of Peleus’ son Achilles, and its devastation’

  ‘Give me yourself and your hatred; give me yourself and that pretty rage.’

  There was no end to it. Tarquin was statue-rigid and had closed his eyes. Brilliant. Emily inched a hand into her pocket and pulled out the library card from under a quivering Hog, and then thrust it in front of those alien eyes.

  ‘I’M HERE BECAUSE OF MY MUM AND DAD!’

  The noise stopped. Emily had closed her eyes as she’d shouted, and when she opened them the Library had moved back a couple of metres and was standing (well, hovering) in perfect stillness, face turned up to the dim lighting above. Her haunting eyes were shut, her who
le face pulled tight, and her head was moving in spasms as if some vast internal battle was being fought. Her hands were clenched into fists, tawny knuckles white with effort. She stayed that way for several seconds, long enough for Emily and Tarquin to exchange bewildered glances, then she breathed out, unclenched her hands, and opened her eyes again. She still stared at the light above, but her eyes were back to normal, not the nightmare pools they had been.

  ‘Are you here?’ The Library’s voice was dry and dusty, and rattled in her throat. She still wasn’t looking at them.

  ‘Erm, yep, pretty sure we are. Deffo.’

  ‘Good. So many words, over so much time. Sometimes it’s hard to know which are happening right now.’

  ‘Erm, yeah, I totally understand,’ said Emily, who didn’t. ‘My mum never knows what day it is either.’

  The Library spun in the air to face them and her one bare foot and one slippered foot touched the floor. All of a sudden, she was more vivid than she had been before, more present, as if she’d come into focus. She looked them both up and down without smiling.

  ‘Yes, let us talk of your mother, Emily Featherhaugh.’

  ‘H ow do you know my name?’

  ‘If it is written of by man, then it is part of me. There is little new writing in the Midnight Hour, but some of it has concerned you.’ She looked at Emily, and a flicker of a smile passed across her lips. ‘Also, you have your mother’s card, and mouth it would seem. The resemblance is striking.’

  ‘You do know my mum!’ She’d already known they were connected but hearing it direct from the giant floaty book lady was just downright odd.

  ‘Where is she? Where’s my dad? He was coming here.’

  With a sniff of policing in the air, Tarquin regained the power of speech.

  ‘Great Lady, what has gone on here? The boundaries of the Midnight Hour have been breached, we’ve been attacked by the Hungry Dead and an Ancient Beast, and I don’t know what the Sarge is going to say.’

  The Library turned a hard stare on him.

  ‘Well, I don’t. He’s very shirty.’ He flushed, coughed, then looked at his shoes. The Library continued as if he hadn’t spoken.

  ‘Another force is at play. She threatens us all.’

  Emily’s eye began to twitch.

  ‘What? I seriously need you to explain what is going on, or I’m going to . . . to . . . fold all your pages over, and . . . move all your bookmarks, or something.’

  The Library raised one thick eyebrow at her.

  ‘Listen then,’ said the Library and her voice was different now, harsher, as dried out as the old papers around them. ‘We were three—’

  ‘Wait,’ Emily interrupted. ‘Are you quoting again?’ It was her turn to receive an arch look from the Library, and she too found her shoes to be fascinating straight afterwards.

  ‘We were three sisters, first of the Night Folk, sprung from your dreaming minds at the dawn of humanity. I am Language, the youngest. My sister Art was before me, daubed on cave walls in ochre and blood. But before us both was our oldest sister, Music. She was born with the first stamp of feet, and clatter of sticks, with the whistle of the wind and the cry of the wolf.’

  The Library’s hands swayed at her sides as she spoke, and her hair started to stir again. If she was starting at the dawn of time, how long was this story going to take?

  ‘Aeons later, facing the death of magic, we forged an agreement with your queen, Victoria, to make the Great Working. We would leave your world for ever to preserve the magic and save our people.’

  Emily sneaked a glance at Tarquin. He was looking down and his eyes were suspiciously moist-looking. What had upset him?

  ‘Our oldest sister, known as the Nocturne in this age, did not agree. She is wildness and raw beauty and would not be contained.’

  The Library’s face rippled with shadows and was terrible, sad and majestic all in one. In that moment, she was difficult to watch.

  ‘The Nocturne lured many of the Angry Dead to her cause and would have warred on your world instead. I love her but . . . could not allow it. There was a terrible battle. Art and many others were lost to our sister’s rage but we won and left for ever.’

  ‘What’s any of this got to do with my mum?’ Emily said.

  ‘Your mother was the hero of that battle. She deprived the Nocturne of a terrible weapon. We couldn’t have won without her. ’

  ‘What? When? Do you mean long-ago times?’ said Emily. ‘Why was my mum in a battle?’ She didn’t quite shriek, but there was a definite raising of voice as she went on. Tarquin shot her a warning look she ignored.

  ‘Your mother has been our bravest defender since before we entered the Midnight Hour; its greatest protector once we did.’

  ‘WHAT?’ said Emily.

  ‘So, she was a Librarian?’ gasped Tarquin at the same time.

  The Library inclined her head in a nod.

  ‘Uh?’ said Emily

  ‘Very important,’ gabbled Tarquin out of the side of his mouth. ‘Secret missions to protect the Midnight Hour.’

  Emily closed her eyes. She definitely had a headache coming on.

  ‘Yes, a loyal servant of Midnight,’ said the Library. She paused and twitched her head round, as if hearing something behind her. The corners of her eyes were filling with blackness again. She turned back to them, and her expression was different; wistful, and melancholy. ‘Midnight. We have heard the chimes at midnight, Master Shallow.’

  ‘Woah there!’ said Emily. ‘Back in the room. We’re here!’

  The Library shook her head as if trying to get water out of her ears, and the black in her eyes receded.

  ‘I-it is . . . difficult for me since the creation of the Great Working. I am not as I was.’

  The Library’s face was bleak as she said this and, without thinking, Emily reached out and patted her on the arm. Tarquin coughed a choking noise and his eyes bulged.

  ‘Are you okay? Are you . . . hearing voices?’ said Emily. That was not a question she had expected she was going to have to ask anyone this week. The Library came close to another smile.

  ‘I am voices, Emily Featherhaugh. I come from words and thus all your voices are in me.’ She waved her hand to indicate every shelf in the reading room. ‘But now, shut off from your world, without new words from you, I fade into my memories. It was the sacrifice that had to be made to save the Night Folk.’

  For once, Emily didn’t know what to say. The Library gathered herself and continued.

  ‘We stopped the Nocturne back then, but now she has re-emerged, still strong, while I am reduced to a shadow of my former power. I do not know why my sister has not faded, but she plots in my weakness.’ The Library looked straight at Emily. ‘It is she who has taken your parents.’

  ‘What do you mean, taken?’ Emily shouted. Tarquin jumped bolt upright at the noise.

  ‘Someone signing himself, “your faithful servant, Peregrine” sent a note, addressed to my sister. He has an “old nag and her feisty husband in chains”.’ The Library’s voice changed to a languid posh drawl Emily recognized as she channelled the writer’s words. ‘But he, “missed both child and the prize due to having Pooka troubles”. Your parents, I presume?’

  ‘Yes! Why didn’t you say this to begin with?’ said Emily from between gritted teeth.

  ‘Because the note has only just been written,’ the Library said, as if it was obvious.

  ‘Why does she want my mum and dad? How do we get them back?’ Emily was lion-fierce now and wanted to kick somebody right in the shins.

  ‘The Nocturne wants what she always wanted. Freedom from the Midnight Hour. She took your parents to further that aim. She must hunt you for the same reason.’ The Library raised a hand, palm out, like a priest giving a blessing. ‘If you would rescue your parents, you must first stop the Nocturne.’

  ‘Er. What?’ said Emily.

  ‘You must find out her plans and stop them, like your mother before you. The Nocturne thre
atens the Hour, I know it.’

  Emily stopped dead. Shin-kicking plans were cancelled.

  ‘You have got to be kidding.’

  ‘It must be you.’

  ‘My name’s not flippin’ Frodo!’

  The Library tilted her head in confusion, but Emily sailed on. ‘You must be loopy!’ She cocked her thumb back at Tarquin. ‘Phone the Spooky Police or something. Send the Moon Army!’

  ‘She cannot be defeated that way. As I am words, she is living music. All who hear her tune fall under her influence. An army would simply become hers. It must be you.’

  Tarquin was shaking his head, dumbfounded. This was one of the rare times Emily agreed with him.

  ‘Why me? What’s the matter with you people?’ She was hopping mad now. How had this become her life? How?

  ‘Because you can resist her. So few can, but your bloodline is special. You are . . . difficult, as is your mother.’

  ‘I’m not flippin’ difficult!’ she shouted.

  The Library just looked at her.

  ‘Oh, right. I suppose so.’ Emily kicked a shelf, hard. ‘I still can’t do it! Why does everybody want me to do mad things on my own?’

  As they argued, the Library had started to slump, her weight making the shelves creak as she leant on them. She twitched her head this way and that, as if hearing voices again. In the corners of her eyes, tiny black tears had started to trickle down her cheeks.

  ‘Please, you must stop her. She cannot leave without magic. I fear she plans to . . .’ She trailed off.

  ‘Plans to what?’ said Emily.

  The Library did not answer, but stared around until she saw them, and started with surprise. ‘I-I . . . are you here?’

  ‘Yes! This can’t be the plan. You have to get someone else to help me. Please.’

  The Library’s mouth flapped without sound and her eyes started to fill up with black again. From this close, it became clear what it was: words, endless tiny words, in all languages, swirling in ink through her eyes. The Library spoke once more, her voice little more than the rustle of pages.