Page 88 of The Society of Unknowable Objects
What about him? What do I do about Frank? I need to get him away from here.
“I know what this does,” Lukas said again, placing a hand on the face of the book. “This makes all the things.” He opened the book again and turned a page, studying the next image for a moment. When he spoke again his voice was quiet. “How does it work? Tell me.”
Magda felt Frank stiffen next to her. “Absolutely not.”
Lukas looked at Frank, his face without expression, then he flicked almost idly through more of the pages, saying nothing. He closed the book and opened it at the very front. There was a single page there that was not attached to the book. Magda saw Lukas’s brow crease and she could see his lips moving silently as he read the words on that page.
“God, he barely knows how to read,” Frank muttered.
“‘This isThe Book of Wonders,’” Lukas said finally, lifting his eyes to Frank, then Magda. “‘Hold it in your hand and create wonderful things.’” Lukas smiled, and the flowers on all sides pulsed, momentarily flaring brighter in the gloom, branches creaking and writhing more rapidly.
“Don’t, Lukas,” Magda tried. “Please.”
“What’s he going to do?” Henry asked. “I don’t understand.”
Lukas closed the book again and held it in both hands. Frank shouted, “No!” and jerked forward, both arms thrown out in front of him. “Don’t you dare!”
A single thorny branch shot down from high above, as fast as a bullet, and whipped around Frank’s wrist, then another around the other arm. Frank made an odd sound, like an animal kicked, surprised and scared, before a third branch wriggled around his throat, forcing him to stop.
“Frank!” Magda yelled in a panic.
“I’m fine,” Frank grunted, despite all evidence to the contrary: his head was pulled back awkwardly, the thorns visibly pressing into the flesh of his throat.
“Lukas, let him go!” Magda begged. She was aware of Henry stepping backwards, and then sideways, moving towards Frank.
Lukas lifted the book and closed his eyes, a small smile playing around his lips. “I want a magical thing,” he announced, his voice loud and clear. Lukas opened his eyes again and turned his head to scan the surroundings, perhaps expecting the thing he wanted to suddenly be there. His smile faded. “It’s not working,” he said, and he looked at Magda, as if she might explain this to him.
“It takes time,” she said, trying to make him not sad. She didn’t like to think what he might do if he was disappointed. “It doesn’t come immediately.”
Lukas was shaking his head, disagreeing with her.
“I can see the magic,” he said, and he waved a hand through the clear air above the book. Then he pointed at Magda. “I can see your wings. And the magic of your pendant and that woman’s ring.” He turned his head to gaze off through the branches, down Bell Street. “I can see the box you took from me and the magic item in the pocket of the man whois holding it.” He dropped his eyes to the book in his lap. “And I can see the magic in this book and it’s not working. I would know if it was working.”
Frank chuckled, a dry, ugly sound, and Magda looked at him, seeing a smile on his face, even as sharp thorns drew blood from his wrists and pressed into his neck. “It won’t work for you,” he said. Magda hated how cruel Frank sounded. This wasn’t the man she knew.
“Why?” Lukas asked, tilting his head at Frank.
“Because you’re not human.”
Magda wondered if she had time to snatch the book back from Lukas while he was distracted.
And do what with it? Once you have it, you can’t escape, can you? You can’t fly through branches.
“What do you mean?” Lukas asked Frank, entirely without emotion, his flat eyes unblinking.
“Look at the last page,” Frank spat, his lips pulled in a sneer, his teeth bared. “You weremadeby the book. You are an object. You’re a magical thing that just happens to look human.”
Magda saw Lukas blink once as he stared at Frank, then he did as Frank suggested and flicked through to a loose page in the back of the book. Again he read the words, his lips moving. While he was distracted, Magda watched Henry scamper over the branches to reach for Frank, ghosting him. Immediately the branches fell through his body, loose in the air, and Frank was released.
“Come on, old man,” Henry said to him. “Let’s get you out of here.”
“I already told you twice: I’m not going anywhere,” Frank muttered back at her, trying to shrug off her grip just as he had shrugged off Magda.
“Do you want to die?”
“I want to end this.”
Magda wanted to plead with him, wanted to argue with him to go, but part of her also wanted him there. Part of her needed his knowledge and experience, his confidence.
