This is the sequel to "A Gloomy Library" I promised! It's more like a detective story, and sometimes it will get real scary. Nevertheless, I hope my readers will like it! So, there's the first chapter.

Chapter 1. Daphne's plan (a little flashback)

6.30 in the morning

Sabrina's POV

I came to the watchtower, still blushing and remembering the Editor's declaration of love to me. Luckily, Daphne was too excited to notice it. She had come up with a new plan of defeating Mirror and Atticus.

"Well?" I asked. "What's your plan, Daphne?"

She smiled proudly and started explaining:

"Sabrina, you understand that we need to kill Mirror without hurting Granny Relda. It can be possible only if the Wicked Queen puts Mirror into another vessel, and we destroy this vessel. Last night I thought of that and then realized: in that case, why can't Bunny Lancaster put Mirror inside Atticus? We'll kill Atticus and get rid of both of them! Isn't that amazing?"

"Yes, it is – in theory," I hesitated. "But practically we are going to face lots of problems".

"Wait a minute!" Daphne cried. "I have thought about all that! My plan is going to work like a perfect machine, if you let me explain it and we do everything properly. Now listen, Sabrina, please!

"Our problem number one is Mirror's distraction. If he's distracted, Bunny can come closely to him and take him away from Granny's body. But how can we distract him? That's the question. My answer is simple. We find him and let someone very powerful, like Baba Yaga and the Blue Fairy combined, attack him, launch spells, do something like that. Mirror's going to focus on the self-defense, thus allowing Bunny to set Granny free of him. Great, huh? I doubt Mirror can harm the distraction group seriously. He's not this powerful".

Daphne looked at me triumphantly.

"This idea's great indeed," I laughed. "But don't forget that we need to have Mirror's vessel nearby. How can we urge Atticus to be possessed by Mirror?"

"This is the problem number two," Daphne replied. "Someone has to lead Atticus to the place where everything's going to happen. Someone fast, and shifty, and cunning comes to Atticus, and begins to whet his anger. Atticus chases him and comes to the place where Mirror is fighting with our distraction group… wherever that is. The vessel's ready – hooray! Bunny puts Mirror into Atticus, and then everyone kills him… them, I mean. Mirror's going to be shocked by the transition, so he'll stand still for several seconds. During these seconds, we defeat him. The end!"

I was stunned. Daphne had become wonderfully wise! I praised her and we discussed the details of the plan. We decided that the Revisers would bring Atticus to us, because they're the fastest and shiftiest creatures ever born. And then Mirror&Atticus would be attacked by our whole army. The plan seemed excellent. Daphne and I wrote it down, and read it aloud to each other like two crazies, and brought our family to the watchtower to tell them about it.

Then all of us delivered the plan to Charming, Canis, and Mr. Seven. They were delighted and told us they would discuss it when they returned. They were in fact coming out of the fort to attack the Hand already. We said my goodbyes to them and wished them luck. Then we went back to the watchtower, where the Everafters who didn't fight were still celebrating the creation of the wonderful plan.

We joined them. I was able to do several things at the time: I was cheering and also checking if our water cannon worked properly.

In the middle of this odd celebration, I heard a painful cry from the fort's garden. Daphne and I shared a worried look, and I suddenly noticed that the Editor and Puck weren't on the watchtower with everybody else.

We both rushed to the garden. As we approached it, we stood in shock. The scene we saw was terrible.

The Editor and Puck were fighting with swords they may have found in the armory. They both were already injured: the Editor's left arm was bleeding violently; Puck had several minor wounds, plus his face twisted with pain every time he treaded on his right foot. Exactly the moment we came, he did tread on his right foot and collapsed to the ground with a kind of short sob.

"Goodness!" I cried. "Were you really fighting?"

It sounded silly, it was obvious that they weren't playing games.

Both had turned to us. Puck sat on the ground, still groaning. It was also obvious that the two of them needed medical attention urgently. I told Daphne to call Nurse Sprat as quickly as possible. Then I turned back to the fighters:

"That was foolish of you both!" I scolded them. "We all need to defeat the Scarlet Hand, not to fight each other. Who started it?"

The Editor and Puck both blushed, then Puck said:

"Er… well, ugly, I did. I challenged the Editor to a duel… for you. I almost… um… defeated him, but in the middle of the fight I twisted my ankle, and he almost… defeated me. The moment you came… yeah, I was close to losing the battle".

I could feel my face reddening. They fought for me! I was sure such duels were forgotten in the end of the 19th century. In any case, duels are stupid. I said:

"I'm flattered that this was for me. But I don't want any duel to happen again. Now, please, promise me it won't happen again".

The Editor and Puck swore in unison that they would be peaceful and friendly since this very moment. After listening to them, I looked around to see Daphne and Nurse Sprat running to us. Nurse was horrified to see the wounds of our duelists, so she started treating them without even asking anything. While she was doing this, I told Puck and the Editor about our new plan. They were aching to see it!

When Nurse applied the bandages to the injuries, Daphne and I accompanied the two unfortunate duelists to the watchtower.

We explained the plan once more.

"Great!" Puck exclaimed. "I can't wait to destroy Atticus and Mirror with one strike!"

"They are going to pay for the mess they caused inside my Book," the Editor added. "Let's start preparing for this Final Battle right now!"

This chapter wasn't very exciting, sorry… The next one will be better and scarier, that's certain! I'll update tomorrow. Or maybe even today. :)

Thanks to the reviewers!