There was a hum of a half-remembered song upon the lips of one Abigail Rook as she made her way back home, satchel slung over her shoulder with precisely no indication of how thoroughly she had filled it while she was out. That was one of the benefits of bags of holding, which she had yet to lose the novelty of, and, indeed, she was sure she would never not be at least a little grateful for. Not if her employer continued to send her out to pick up a multitude of odd little unlabelled packages from the sort of place she was quite sure would leave her mother in a swoon if she had even the faintest inkling they existed at all.
She nudged her way through the cheery, if not a little obnoxiously bright red door, which declared that she was 'returning home', which was true, and also it was nice to think the house liked her enough to consider her a resident. Abigail had lived there not only long enough to consider it her home, but to also find herself a great deal less prone to shock as she once had been.
There were, it seemed to her, three very distinct groups of unshockable people: doctors, vicar's wives, and the assistants for paranormal detectives. The first she had discovered through conversation with Mona O'Connor. The second she had been told by a poor woman she met on a case once who was having a frankly awful time. The third she had learnt from her own personal experience and found it immensely amusing.
The house was never the most orderly, neat place in the world. At its cleanest she still needed to do awkward oversteps at least twice whenever she was moving about to avoid stepping on something or knocking over something that had been precariously balanced somewhere it shouldn't have been. This was normal and she had simply accepted that this was a fact of her life, and frankly it had done a marvelous job of helping her hone her maneuverability. If one were to ask Jenny Cavanaugh, it was safe to assume that 'marvelous' would not have been a word that appeared in her description, but Abigail found herself rather fond of the chaos. It felt real, in a way, more organic than the sterile drawing rooms and meticulously cleaned parlors her mother had dragged her to, for they had always seemed to be stripped of any semblance of life. It was a mess, but it was real, and it was her home.
If it were possible, the house was in even more of a state than it usually was.
She had not had the privilege - a term used in the sort of way her employer might, through gritted teeth and the hint of a grimace - of seeing a library explode before, but she could assume the state the house was in at that moment would be a fair estimation of what that might be like. It was a relatively safe assumption that in the brief time that she had been out that Jackaby had dragged one of the improbably large chests that he had stuffed with old books down from the attic, only to spill its contents out onto any and every available surface in the immediate area. This was not quite as much of an exaggeration as it could have been too, as there was more than a shelf's worth of books laying about, some open, some left in haphazardous stacks.
It was not just the books that were taking up space in the living room, for her employer had company.
To call the man who had stopped in simply large would be an understatement and a half. Now, Jackaby himself was so tall that his friends - Abigail included - occasionally jokingly used him as a unit of measurement, but this man had a head on even the Seer's height, and had the proportions to match. He looked more than capable of crushing a person's skull with one hand without breaking a sweat, and thank goodness for this as the space where one hand once occupied, there now rested a large, menacing looking hook that was, at that moment, resting on his large thigh. His hair, auburn and of the slightly more red side, was shaggy and came to rest just before it reached his solid shoulders, just as wild as the beard that grew free upon his scarred face. His face was not the only part of him that wore these scars, the rolled up sleeves exposed the marks of a life well-lived decorating his sun-kissed skin.
One might have assumed the man was a rather imposing, frightening figure, but Abigail did not. She had seen the man weep openly over a kitten, she had heard the way he reassured her employer when things got too much for him, she had seen the way he ran with her fiance when the moon grew brighter. All in all, she was quite aware that Hank Hudson was a ray of sunshine and would not willingly hurt anyone without a good reason.
The tracker, one booted foot resting on the busy coffee table, had his attention turned towards a large map that had been rolled out across the table, the Seer had chosen to stand as he flicked through as many books as he was able to balance in his arms, occasionally glancing over to the map before returning to the texts again. If the combination of pins decorating the map and the teacups - one smelling of something decidedly stronger than tea, the other just smelling strongly - were anything to go by, the pair had been at work for some time at least. Not only that, but they were also definitely having fun with it all.
"What are you doing?" Abigail asked. She knew there was no real point in announcing that she had arrived, for she knew both the men had known she was there before she had known that they were there. If there were anyone in the world who could tell something was sneaking about trying to be unnoticed, she was sure it would have been them, and so she knew for certain that they knew she was there since she hadn't been trying to sneak.
"We're trying to find the safest path of travel for Mr. Hudson to leave port hereabouts so he can reach Wales in more or less one piece. Preferably more, obviously," Jackaby stated, not drawing his gaze from the book he was the most preoccupied with at that moment, "The trouble is, they hardly made it easy for us. You see, the cartographers used much the same iconography to depict unknown waters, the presence of any number of dangerous aquatic creatures, and hazardous waters with much the same symbols. I know I would personally not be the most pleased if I had been expecting a whirlpool or some rocky waters only to meet the jaws of a sea serpent."
"And the books?" the woman questioned.
"What books?" the man carrying an impressive, if not impractical pile of books, asked.
"Any of them. All of them, maybe?" Abigail's patience was a virtue and a necessity.
"Journals, travel logs, atlases, anything that might be detailing the path of travel across the area from as many sources as I could find," Jackaby returned, "Presumably, if there is anything that could possibly be an overlap of information between them then there would be more of a chance that some of what at least some of them say might maybe be true."
"That doesn't sound very reliable, sir."
"Naturally, that is because it isn't," came the Seer's reply, "People don't tend to be very fond of detailing encounters with what was commonly considered a 'sea monster', lest they find themself unfairly accused of suffering from a form of sea madness. So hints in journals paired with marks on maps are usually the best we have to go off."
"You do this often?"
"I never go nowhere without gettin' this one," Hank remarked, gesturing to the other man with his hook, "To give the path a quick once over when I can. It don't always mean much, but I reckon there's as much said 'bout it not sayin' anythin' as it does sayin' everythin'."
"I would prefer it if you asked for my help as often as you claim you do," Jackaby returned with a coolness that did not entirely cover the good humour in this, "But if I am not mistaken, you have always been just as likely to go running off into danger as danger is as running into you."
With all the dignity in the world, the tracker stuck his tongue out at the Seer, a mischievous twinkle in his dark eyes. Abigail was not entirely successful in hiding her giggle behind her hand, which won a conspiratorial, good natured wink from the man. Jackaby pretended to have not seen any of this happening although it was perfectly obvious that his attention to one of the books had been exaggerated for show.
"You wanna help?" Hank asked, "It'd do good to have an extra set of eyes and," he paused before adding in a stage whisper, "It'd save that one from havin' to do a jugglin' act to find anythin'."
"Of course," came her reply, "Are we marking the paths that seem the safest, or those that are to be avoided."
"Avoided," returned her employer, "That way I will be able to record the nature of the paths in a more reliable manner so that we only need to do this once."
"Here, have a look at this one, it's a bit of a doozy," the tracker nudged a journal that was nearer to the woman over to her, "Got the last journey of a ship what was carryin' a vampire what was snackin' on them along the way."
"Oh," she began, picking the book up from the ground on much the same motion that left her claiming the least book covered chair she could, "I thought vampires didn't travel across moving waters."
"They don't, that is why it was a more prominent incident than other vampire attacks were at the time," Jackaby reply, "However unless Mr. Hudson has decided to start relocating vampires along the way without telling me, I cannot imagine it would be of much help at the moment. This, here, feels more useful."
Abigail had barely vocalised a questioned repetition of her employer's use of the word 'feels' before she had the book he was referring to dropped onto her lap from the stack he had been carrying. This was swiftly joined by another book, and then a third. The first was a weatherbeaten old leather journal with yellowing pages and a smell of the ocean. The second was the smallest of the books and was a dusty pink with little purple decorations and held a list of different coasts and port cities. The third was an atlas which had absolutely seen better days as it seemed something had taken a bite out of one of the corners, which was either a very good sign or woefully unhelpful.
At first, Abigail was worried she was butting into something that wasn't for her. After all, it was clearly something the pair had done together for long enough to perfect it to an art. But the worry that she was only being included because the others felt obligated had more or less faded entirely by the time she placed her first pin into the map. With something that felt like a success under her belt, it felt as though the little group was actually making progress transferring what they did and did not find in the written word onto the map.
At some point, she had acquired a cup of tea and the others had their cups replenished. She had not gotten up for it - if the tingling in her foot telling her she had been sitting on it weird for a bit too long without moving it - nor could she recall the others getting up for anything other than fetching a book or two. It was nice to know that Jenny was cheering them on even if she was quite sure the resident ghost was not the most pleased about the mess that the process was making.
Eventually, it seemed they had done about as much as they could do without getting sidetracked. Okay, maybe they got a little side tracked a few times - in Jackaby's defence, it was a little interesting to follow a migratory pattern of the cinnamalogus and the widespread distribution of cinnamon as a result - but more or less they managed to get to what seemed like a natural conclusion. There were a great many pins, the silver (rocks and rough water) and the gold (beasts and creatures, decorating the map with any and everything that they had managed to glean from the multitude of texts.
Having completed their work, the three looked down at the map.
"That looks like-" Jackaby began in a deadpan.
"A terrible idea?" Hank finished for him, a bright grin crossing his scarred face.
"Quite." came the Seer's reply, the flatness of his voice wavering with a note of amusement.
"Will you reconsider going?" Abigail asked.
"Nah, not likely." The excited twinkle in the trapper's eyes made it all too clear that he was definitely not going to be deterred in any shape or form.
The cluster of pins that, between the three of them, had been distributed managed to take up precisely the entire path that Hank Hudson was planning to take. In fact, it was almost entirely reserved to just all of the path he had planned, as both the wider ocean and closer to the coastline had managed to be a little safer.
"I suppose I shall have to find you a horseshoe or two to travel with."
And with that said, Jackaby wandered out of the room. It was not entirely clear if he was actually looking for a horseshoe or if he was simply out there wandering. Both were equally likely, but Abigail didn't have the chance to question it even if she had planned to. Instead, she had to catch the journal that the trapper had tossed at her. Unlike Jackaby, at least Hank was nice enough to make sure she was paying enough attention before he tossed another one at her. This, it seemed, was a habit that her employer and the trapper shared, in such a way that she could wonder if one had shared the habit with the other during the time of their friendship.
The poor packages that she had fetched earlier that day, it seemed, would have to sit about in the satchel for a little while longer as she was going to be a little more preoccupied for longer than she had necessarily intended to be.