Page 31 of My Blind Date is a Ghost

“Well, I usually use a bit of glamour magic when I come back here to keep anyone who might see me from looking. I guess it worked on ghosts too.”

“I guess so,” I say. I walk along one side of the room, looking at the oddities and curiosities sitting on shelves. I see a fossilized fairy with even its wings preserved, a taxidermy miniature woolly mammoth, a mermaid skeleton, and many other things I cannot identify.

“This is where I keep magical items that are too dangerous for anyone but me to get their hands on,” Beverly says. “Things that could be used in powerful spells or dark magic.”

“Dark magic?” I ask.

“Come here,” she says. She is standing next to a shelf of books, all bound in dark leather. None of them have names on the spines. “These are books of magic that have been confiscated by our coven over the years. Supposedly, it’s the largest collection of banned books in the world.”

“Banned books?” I ask.

“Yes.”

I scoff. “Well, why are they banned?”

“The information within them is too dangerous to get out.”

“Well, what’s to keep you from using it?” I ask.

“A prudent question. There’s nothing to keep me from using them. But don’t look at me like some prudish human librarian. They aren’t banned forever. They can be used, but only by people who will use them properly. Most of them were confiscated from witches far too young to use such power without blowing up the city.”

“Then why are you showing them to me?” I ask. “I’m no witch.”

“No, my dear, but you are something else entirely. There could be something in one of these books that can help you harness your powers.”

I gulp. “I don’t know about that. My powers are frightening enough as it is.”

“Well, take this one for example.” She reaches up and pulls down a seemingly random book down from the shelf, but it really wasn’t random at all. It was exactly what she was looking for. It makes me wonder just how well Beverly knows the books she has locked away back here. “The Book of Noldor. Noldor was a great warlock who lived long before you, back in the fifteenth century. He was very interested in communicating with the dead. After his death, his daughter wanted to carry on his work and accidentally summoned a demon who killed her whole family. Thus, why the book ended up confiscated.”

She offers me the book, but I hold my hands up and stand back. “No way! I’m not touching that thing.”

“It doesn’t hurt to just read it. The information obviously wasn’t meant for Noldor or his daughter, but it might help you very much.”

“Or I might—as you said—blow up the town! No, get it away.”

“Oh, fine,” she says, putting the book back. “What about this one?” She pulls down another book. “This is much safer.”

“If that were true it wouldn’t be in this room.”

“Touché, my dear. But this is actually a book by a human. Her name was Eusapia Palladino. She was a Spiritualist who was born in the 1850s. While many people thought she was a fraud, they could never prove it. Even Harry Houdini and Marie Curie could not explain how she did what she did.”

While Miss Palladino sounds fascinating, I hesitate to take the book. “Why is her book here?”

“It’s actually just extremely valuable. It was written in her own hand. Not even a copy of it exists. I haven’t had time to read it myself. If nothing else, it should be interesting.”

I sigh but cannot contain my curiosity. “Thank you,” I say, taking the book and holding it reverently.

Beverly seems satisfied for the moment and motions toward the doorway. We step through and she conjures up the cabinet before locking the door and placing the key back in her bra.

“Thank you for trusting me with such a valuable secret,” I say.

“It’s my pleasure,” she says. “It’s been killing me to not tell someone about it.”

“I had an interesting chat with Olivia,” I say, “about the animosity between witches and werewolves.”

“There’s no animosity, I would say. I did set her up with Adrian after all.”

“So she said.”

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