“So, it drove the whole family crazy?” Lefse asked as he furiously scribbled down details. Taking notes remained the only thing Isaac knew the man could do with speed.

“That it did.”

“And made them into violent cannibals?”

“Yes.”

“Did they mention if we taste like chicken?”

Isaac chuckled. “I think the matriarch had a recipe book, but I didn’t have a chance to grab it.”

“Shame. I’d have loved to read that. My bet is that we taste more like pork, although I base that on absolutely no research at all. I’d imagine we’d need a lot of seasoning too. Possibly a marinade as well, for simmering. They’re using a crockpot was probably a good call. Taste-wise I mean.” Lefse set another ornate wooden box on his desk. Much like the one used previously for the Black Tarot Cards it had been perfectly molded for the totem that Isaac pulled from his Everbag. Lefse made a face like he’d been poked with a needle when the static-fueled whispering reached his ears. “Damn. I can see how this could drive you mad if you were dumb enough to hang around with it. Put it away.”

Like laying a small body in a tiny coffin, Isaac sealed it in the box and the whispering vanished, blocked by the runes etched in the wood. “Just go ahead and wire my payment to the usual accounts.” Thinking they were finished he started to stand but paused when Lefse pushed the box to him. “Huh?”

“You can deliver this one yourself.”

“To the basement?” Isaac’s curiosity bristled.

“No. Upstairs. To the Head Librarian. His name is Mabahazi.”

“Maba what?”

“Mabahazi. It’s obviously not his real name. You magicians and your silly fake names.” Lefse made an unimpressed pfffft sound.

Isaac faked offense. “You’re the one who gave me the last name Unknown.”

“Yeah, well, it certainly has a better ring than Isaac Smith,” Lefse conceded.

“Maba-Fake-Name a magician then?”

“He is, although I’ve never actually seen him do any hocus pocus. His ability to pick out fancy suits is strong, and his condescension talent is off the charts, but other than that I have no idea what he’s capable of. So, I couldn’t tell you if he had the power to wipe out a house full of crazy rednecks.”

“Probably not. It’s a specific skill set.”

Lefse escorted him to the second floor.

***

Within seconds of meeting him, Isaac knew he wasn’t going to mesh well with the Head Librarian. Mabahazi had the smarm of a car salesman who had faked a magician resume. The suit he wore was just stylish enough to show that he didn’t get his hands dirty. Magicians shouldn’t have the time or ego for such indulgences.

“Isaac Unknown,” the man said. His voice dripped with an overly pleasant syrupiness as if they were longtime friends. “It is a pleasure to finally meet you. Your reports from Lefse are always must-reads.”

“He takes good notes.”

“That he does. He’s one of our best researchers. And you have been one of our best field agents.”

Isaac mumbled a half-hearted thank-you as he digested the title of field agent and found that he didn’t like the taste. It made him sound like a real employee whereas he considered himself more of a freewheeling contractor. He set the totem box on Mabahazi’s desk.

“Ah, the latest relic. Is it true that it drove the whole family mad?”

Isaac found this question disappointingly redundant, but he played along to satisfy the man’s morbid curiosity. “Prolonged exposure to it seems to cause violent madness. I don’t know if it unlocks subconscious evil desires or totally creates them. From what I gathered this family wasn’t a bunch of winners before they somehow ended up with the totem, but they weren’t eating people either.”

“How did it do it?”

“It speaks, sort of, with a non-stop, migraine-inducing whispering.”

Mabahazi’s eyes lit up. “That’s fascinating. Did you hear it?”

“I did, but it was just garbled nonsense to me. I got the notion that it’s more effective on the weak-minded, and even then, over a prolonged period.”

“How would such a powerful artifact end up with such an insignificant group of people?” Mabahazi’s voice mixed equal parts condescension and jealousy.

Isaac had no answer for this. He resisted the temptation to needle the man further by informing him that cannibals had not one, but two, relics in their possession. No one seemed to know about Jughead, and the magician preferred keeping it that way. Once he ascertained that the liquid that poured from the possessed jug was untainted, he had no desire to part with the little bastard.

“It’s a shame that all the cannibals were killed. It would have been of great interest to speak to one—to really hear first-hand about what madness they were experiencing. But then, you do have an uncanny knack of leaving nothing behind but corpses.”

Isaac’s eyes narrowed just a hair. “Well, it’s not like I can carry them with me. They’re heavy and don’t fit in my bag.”

Mabahazi attempted a fake laugh but it released as a snooty scoff. Then his eyes drifted back to the box. “I can only imagine what secrets we could decipher from it.”

Isaac grew annoyed enough to call the man’s bluff a bit. “Pop it open. It won’t kill you. It took weeks to do its dirty work on the family.”

The gleam in his eyes faded, replaced with trepidation and Isaac saw his gaze go from the box to the phone. The temptation etched on his face softened. “No. Probably best that I don’t. Arrangement can react poorly to such decisions.” His tone became more authoritative. “Which brings me to why I really wanted to meet with you. You did a job a few months ago where you retrieved several Black Tarot cards. Six of them to be precise.”

Isaac kept a straight face, but his blood ran just a touch colder. “Yeah. From Maloc.”

“Yes. The demon. Must have been a horrific encounter. Everyone in that scenario died as well if I remember correctly?”

Isaac didn’t really care about the loss of life, but he didn’t like the way that failure framed the question. “Yeah.”

“But you completed the assignment. That’s the important part. The only problem is that all of our information pointed to Maloc having more than six cards. But again, six is what you brought back.” Isaac foresaw the destination of the topic and readied his best lying voice but didn’t get out a word before Mabahazi leaned across the desk and whispered, “I know you kept some, so don’t bother with a defense.”

Isaac froze, locking in the current expression on his face lest he give anything away. He’d questioned himself as to why he bothered stealing the cards. They were far too valuable to pawn and too incredibly dangerous to use. The theft had been a pyrrhic victory at best and sheer folly at worst.

The Gorgon. The Bone March. The Iron Gate. The Chained Man.

He really had no idea why he had selected those four. Since the night with Maloc they had sat untouched in his Everbag, deemed too unstable to even study first-hand. He’d resorted to only reading about them in literary sources. Now he had to determine just how much trouble they had caused him.

“Look, Isaac,” Mabahazi said reassuringly, “I don’t want to punish you. I don’t even want you to hand over the cards. We’re both magicians so I understand your motivation. The lure of such knowledge and power is irresistible and I don’t fault you at all. I just want you to answer one question. How did you get away with it?”

There seemed little point in arguing so Isaac shrugged. “I just kept them.”

Mabahazi didn’t like the answer. “That’s it? No spell of concealment? No illusions.” The man looked utterly defeated. “How does Arrangement not know? How did it not act? You never heard anything from the Voice?” He kept glancing at the phone as if a restless scorpion lurked under it.

“No. I just assumed I got away with it.”

“Don’t be daft. It was obvious. I just don’t understand why Arrangement let it go. The Voice is letting you keep them. Why?”

“Ok, I’m a little confused. Aren’t you the boss here? Aren’t you part of Arrangement?”

“I’m the head researcher and collector at this facility, but even I don’t know what Arrangement is.” He glanced at the phone, played absent-mindedly with his tie. “There’s a power that drives it, but if there is a rhyme and reason to its actions it’s beyond my...our...understanding.” He corrected himself to not be alone in ignorance. “In the end, we serve only its whims. Servants. That’s all we are.”

Isaac frowned. When Mabahazi busted him on the Tarot Cards, he had assumed that he would be terminated from employment and quite possibly from this plane of existence. Now he knew the Head Librarian wielded no power, or even influence, with Arrangement. He was another in-the-dark servant, just like the rest.

Servant. Isaac didn’t have much pride to bruise but the word didn’t sit well with him. When he had entered the office, he’d been a field agent. Then he’d been demoted to servant. He decided to get out of the room before being relegated to a non-paid volunteer.

Mabahazi, lost in thought, barely acknowledged the magician departing.