And The Quest

Sequel to The Heart of Magic

Episode 1: For the Thief's Chalice, chapter 1

Ezekiel Jones, world class thief, sat curled into the space between the top of the bookcase and the ceiling. Nobody even bothered looking for him these days, although Jenkins always seemed to know exactly where to find him if he was needed, or even just gone for too long. The old man seemed to know when to leave him alone, and when to break through his silence, too. He knew it would take a bit of time, a bit of adjustment, to their new roles in the Library. He didn't begrudge the others their time alone either. He liked his time alone, or with whatever birds he managed to chat up in the whole world of bars and clubs the back door now gave him access to. But there was something there that he hadn't had before, and he missed it. Real friendship. Stability. A sense of family. But that family had split up, gone its own way. At least it felt like that. Flynn and Eve had been the first to pair up and start disappearing on mission after mission. Now Stone and Cassandra had vanished off to some place in the Himalayas. Not the first time they'd left him behind either. He was happy for them. He didn't want to feel like a third wheel. He didn't really want to feel like the forgotten baby brother of the group, left at home while everyone else has a date for the prom.

It wouldn't be so bad, of course, if he weren't so bored. Stealing ordinary treasures was almost too easy now, and he had more than he could ever want, use or need already. Stealing magical treasures was more interesting, but not by much right now. Every job, every mission that his clippings book had sent him on was simple, straightforward and ridiculously easy. He had brought back at least twice as many items single-handed in the past month than either couple had managed to obtain. Maybe the Library was taking sides again. Maybe it was deliberately giving the tough, interesting jobs to the partners who seemed to think every mission was a date. Maybe it was giving him the easy jobs because he didn't have anyone to watch his back, or to make up for the fact it knew they would take twice as long over their jobs just through canoodling and stopping to admire the view. Maybe he was just more efficient right now. He was certainly more bored. A door slammed below him and the office filled with Cassandra's melodious giggling. He smiled. It was good to hear her laugh. Things had been so dark for her, it was always good to hear her laugh. He considered climbing down. Considered announcing his presence with a pithy comment designed to wind up Stone. And to make Cassandra laugh, even just a little. He had even begun unfurling from his hiding spot when he heard the doors swing shut, and the laughter disappear down the corridor.

"You could always try being visible when they get back," said a voice below him.

Ezekiel looked down to find Jenkins calmly replacing a book on a shelf. "They don't need me getting in the way," the thief half-laughed, waving his hand dismissively.

"Don't bet on it," replied Jenkins, thumbing through the books on the shelf. "They miss you just as much as you miss them." The old caretaker pondered that for a moment. "Well, perhaps not Mr Stone," he added.

"I just, I need something to do," complained Ezekiel, dropping lightly to the floor beside the old man. "And I don't mean more research, before you make that suggestion!"

"It never has been your strongest point," smiled Jenkins. He waved a book at Jones. "You've not been idle, though. If anything, you've been even busier than everyone else. Surely it's a vacation you need? Weren't you always talking of taking one?"

"I've been busy," the thief admitted, "but all the missions I've done lately have been even easier than a vacation. They've involved hardly any brain power at all. A local cop could have brought those items back, the jobs were so simple!"

"So it's a challenge you need?" Jenkins raised an eyebrow and tapped him on the shoulder with the book. "I think I may know just the thing."

"What?" Jones frowned at the book still waving about in front of him. "What is that?"

"This," began Jenkins, entering full lecture mode, "is a translation of one of the most epic stories of Scandinavian history. The original poem that this translation was taken from was written in England, but it tells the tale of a Danish hero..."

"What, like Hamlet?" Jones' eyebrows raised. That was a depressing story.

"That is a play written by the greatest playwright who ever lived, during the early seventeenth century in mediaeval English. This is an epic poem written in Anglo-Saxon England, around the eleventh century, in Old English!"

"Okay!" Jones raised his hands. "So I was six hundred years or so out! So sue me! Anyway: what's so special about it? Finally found a book older than you are?"

"It..." Jenkins started, then glared through narrowed eyes at the young thief as the age joke hit home. "It's the story of Beowulf. He was a Danish hero from the sixth century who killed a few monsters and became king of part of what is now southern Sweden. I suggest you take the time to read it, fully!"

"Pop quiz at the end?" Jones quipped, taking the book now pressed to his chest.

"Missing treasure," replied Jenkins curtly. "Read it through, then ask yourself what happened to the chalice - the cup the slave stole - not to mention the rest of the dragon's hoard."

"Dragon?" Jones' eyebrows were now heading for his hairline. "I've dealt with dragons. Dragons do not like me!"

"The dragon is dead. Spoiler alert: Beowulf kills it," snapped Jenkins. "You said you wanted a challenge. Here one is, just waiting for you. A dragon's lost treasure, with no dragon to guard it!"

"Won't it have been found, already?" Jones asked. "You know: archaeologists and metal detector fiends?"

"I point and laugh at archaeologists," said Jenkins, regaining some of his better, if not good, humour. "No, it's never been found. At least the chalice hasn't. There have been a few likely candidates for the rest of the hoard, but not that."

"What's so special about the chalice?"

"Its power, of course," replied the old man, as if the answer was as obvious as the colour of the grass or sky. "That's why the thief stole it in the first place. Legend has it that the chalice acts as an amplifier. Drink even the slightest dose of a lethal poison from it and you're dead. Drink a drop of the weakest healing potion and all your ills are cured. Well, those ills that the potion targets, anyway, or I would have sent someone out after it much earlier. I strongly suggest avoiding alcohol, also: it is a poison, after all!"

"So why are you sending me after it now?" Jones frowned. "It hasn't come up in the clippings book."

"No, this is one I've had on a back burner for a while," nodded Jenkins. "I've been researching it myself for years. Thought I'd found it once too, but that poor girl was just very good with poisons, at least after the first attempt."

Ezekiel looked sideways at him. "What poor girl?"

"Lucrezia Borgia. Used by her family, abused by her husbands, surrounded by death and destruction all in the name of power. Is it any wonder she took matters into her own hands to remove the more stubborn of her woes."

"You know, I've never really thought about it like that..."

"Well, history is written by the victors, and the archaeologists," sighed Jenkins. "We simple witnesses do not get many opportunities to let our words echo through the ages."

Ezekiel opened his mouth to say something, then changed his mind with a shake of his head. Some things he didn't want to know. He turned the book over in his hands. "So this chalice: you think you've got a lead?"

"Hmm," Jenkins waggled his head from side to side. "Not so much a lead as a lack of leads, you might say."

"You've got nothing?" Jones' eyebrows rose. "You've been after this for what? Nearly six hundred years? At least! And you've got nothing!"

"An expert summation, yes," nodded the old man.

"How exactly does that help me find it?"

"Well, as you say," shrugged Jenkins, with a turn of his hand, "in... over six centuries of searching I have found nothing. I have chased down, and yes I do mean chased, every lead I could find. I have followed every rumour, every legend, every whisper. I have looked in every possible museum, university and gallery. In every private collection I could gain easy access to, and every other one I couldn't. I've searched the length and breadth of every continent for this thing, and still I have found nothing. That tells me one thing."

"It doesn't exist?"

"No, I know it exists," he sighed. "I saw it once, long ago, with my own eyes. But then I was on a quest for an entirely different chalice. However, it was because of that one sighting that I was convinced the thief's chalice had been taken from the hoard and hidden elsewhere. Now I am not."

"I don't follow."

"I shall endeavour to contain my surprise and shock," murmured the old man. "Let me put it this way, Mr Jones: if one finds an odd sock in the wash, and no amount of searching the washing machine delivers up the missing partner, what conclusion must we draw?"

Jones frowned, then his brow cleared. "That the sock was never in the wash," he said. "It never left the laundry basket. You think the chalice is still with the hoard!"

"It is my belief that the chalice is in one of three places," he replied. "First, and most likely, it is with the hoard in the dragon's lair. Dragons do not keep all their wealth in one place - there is simply too much of it - so it is conceivable that part of the hoard may be found but not all of it. Second, there is the possibility that the chalice was buried in the tumulus with Beowulf's remains. Third, and by far the most problematic possibility, the chalice lies with the thief who originally took it."

"Why is that the most problematic?" Jones asked.

"Well, I know where the other two are," said Jenkins, waving a hand in the direction of the stairs. "I suggest you start with the tumulus."