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The Keeper of Magical Things - Softcover

Leong, Julie

 
9780593815946: The Keeper of Magical Things
Softcover
ISBN 10: 0593815947 ISBN 13: 9780593815946
Verlag: Penguin Publishing Group, 2025

Inhaltsangabe

An almost-mage discovers friendship—and maybe something more—in the unlikeliest of places in this delightfully charming novel from the USA Today bestselling author of The Teller of Small Fortunes.

Certainty Bulrush wants to be useful—to the Guild of Mages that took her in as a novice, to the little brother who depends on her, and to anyone else she can help. Unfortunately, her tepid magic hasn’t proven much use to anyone. When Certainty has the chance to earn her magehood via a seemingly straightforward assignment, she takes it. Nevermind that she’ll have to work with Mage Aurelia, the brilliant, unfairly attractive overachiever who’s managed to alienate everyone around her.

The two must transport minorly magical artifacts somewhere safe: Shpelling, the dullest, least magical village around. There, they must fix up an old warehouse, separate the gossipy teapots from the kind-of-flaming swords, corral an unruly little catdragon who has tagged along, and above all, avoid complications. The Guild’s uneasy relationship with citizens is at a tipping point, and the last thing needed is a magical incident.

Still, as mage and novice come to know Shpelling’s residents—and each other—they realize the Guild’s hoarded magic might do more good being shared. Friendships blossom while Certainty and Aurelia work to make Shpelling the haven it could be. But magic is fickle—add attraction and it might spell trouble.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Julie Leong is a Chinese-Malaysian-American fantasy author who grew up across suburban New Jersey and Beijing, China and managed to feel equally out of place in both. She studied economics and political science at Yale University and was very briefly an investment banker before coming to her senses. She now lives in San Francisco with her needy dog, less-needy husband, and one thoroughly self-sufficient Meyer lemon tree. When she’s not writing, she enjoys making unnecessary spreadsheets and flambéing things.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

One

Certainty Bulrush was in the midst of arguing with a particularly intractable quilt.

Which, as far as morning chores went, was not really something to complain about. Not when other novices were stuck transcribing dusty old scrolls, or mucking out the stables by hand for reasons as dubious as "it builds character" and "the horses like to see you work." No; Certainty knew she was lucky to be warm and dry in the laundry rooms, with only a few dirty blankets between her and freedom.

But still. It'd be so much easier if the bedding could just be a little more reasonable.

"Don't you want to be nice and clean? That ink stain makes you look a mess; why don't we just get rid of it . . ."

"I am a quilt. I display patterns. My purpose is to be beautiful." The object-voice of the quilt was soft and muffled in Certainty's mind, but gave the strong impression of pouting nevertheless. The problem was simply that the quilt liked its splotchy new ink stains.

"Yes, but you're also meant to keep people warm in bed, and no mage wants to sleep under a dirty quilt," she cajoled.

"I'm not dirty," it insisted. "I'm decorative."

But she sensed a tremor of hesitation in its words. Aha-there was her angle of attack. What objects wanted, above all else, was to be used. To fulfill the purposes for which they had been made. To be valued.

Certainty knew this well because she was a physical mage. (Well, a mage-in-training.) However, unlike the Guild's more powerful physical mages-ones who could hurl boulders great distances (preferably in the direction of an enemy army), or ones who wove enchantments into precious metals-her abilities were slightly more . . . mundane.

By touching objects, she could speak with them to understand their purposes and convince them to do small things for her. She could sweet-talk a cup of tea into being less bitter; she could shame a shirt into unwrinkling-but, unfortunately, that was about the extent of her powers.

Hence her being here in the Guild laundry rooms. A sixth-year novice, magicking ink stains out of bedsheets while trying not to think about how her entire family had pinned their hopes on her magical career.

Certainty set her jaw and pressed on.

"Just the other day, I saw a steward get rid of some pillowcases. A novice spilled some potion ingredients all over them-wyvern blood, you know, impossible to clean-so the pillowcases had to be thrown out."

There was a pause as the quilt absorbed this information.

"Thrown out? You mean-discarded?"

"Left for rags," she confirmed. "Latrine wipes, I think."

The fringes of the quilt twitched in alarm. "But I'm a good quilt! I'm very comfortable . . ."

"I'm sure that's true." Certainty patted the quilt, trying to be both stern and reassuring. Then her fingers skimmed over its dark splotches, and she frowned. Now that she was looking more closely, there was something funny about the way the ink had spilled . . . It almost looked like a floral pattern-were those roses? "How did you get this stain, anyway?"

"It's not a stain," said the quilt, still sulky. "I made it with some of the extra magic floating around. I thought people would like it."

Extra magic . . . ? What could that mean? Sometimes objects spoke in riddles. Certainty supposed that they experienced the world rather differently, on account of being things and not people, and Mother and Sons knew that people were hard enough to understand as it was. She shrugged it off.

"I'm afraid not. And even if they did, you'd never match with the rest of the decor, see? Look, you're a lovely quilt already, we can all see that-quality stitching, padding still nice and thick-so let's just shake off all that messy ink so we can put you back where you belong, hm?"

The quilt wavered, rustling indecisively under her hand. ". . . latrine wipes? Really?"

"Really."

The quilt shivered once more, and then-thank the Mother-finally complied, with a reluctant sigh like the whisper of fabric against skin. The ink welled up from the fibers, tracing the quilt's edges before dripping in dark rivulets onto the floor. A puddle of ink gathered on the stones, and the quilt was soon crisp and clean once more.

Certainty beamed down at it. Hours of scrubbing saved, just like that.

"Well done, quilt. Thank you!"

A sullen silence was her only response. Certainty shrugged and withdrew her magic. Carefully, she refolded the quilt and balanced it atop the basket of clean bedding in the corner. The quilt was the dean's favorite, apparently; the laundry staff would be grateful that she'd managed to salvage it. The Guildtower servants always were whenever Certainty was able to help with a favor like this. It was just too bad the servants weren't the ones who decided which novices got to advance to magehood.

Certainty sighed and went to fetch the next basket of laundry-and that was when, as her da would say, everything went thoroughly pear-shaped.

First came the sudden deadening of noise-a heavy, disorienting silence that plugged her ears up as if she'd just jumped into a lake. Then there was a great shrinking sensation, as if the Guildtower itself were contracting with Certainty at its center. Her stomach swooped in a highly unpleasant fashion, and a little late, she wondered whether she ought to start panicking-then-

WHOMP.

The sound was so loud, yet of so low a register, that it vibrated right through the stone walls of the laundry room, rattling the contents of the shelves, the baskets, and Certainty's skull in the process. She wobbled and grabbed at the wall for balance, heart thudding and breath coming short and jumpy. Was the Guildtower under attack? Had the alchemists blown up their laboratories in the Paper Quarter again?

But no further whomps or strange shrinking sensations followed, so Certainty edged toward the door, cursing the fact that she was alone. Blasted unlucky that the laundry staff were all taking their break and gossiping in the courtyard instead of here with her, where they might be able to protect her from . . . whatever this was. Certainty was not built for combat.

Still, a weapon couldn't hurt. She grabbed a wicker rug beater from its hook on the wall before poking her head through the doorway to see if anyone else knew what was going on.

"Hello?" she called out.

Nobody responded, but strange and muffled noises were coming from the kitchens down the hall . . .

Mustering her courage and brandishing the rug beater like a floppy sword, she followed the sounds down the stone corridor and approached the kitchen entryway with caution. Then she breathed a sigh of relief. Everything inside looked fine: There were partially sliced loaves of bread on the counter, glistening chickens and ducks roasting on their hooks above the fire, an enormous stewpot simmering merrily away in the corner, cabbages rolling around on the floor . . .

Wait. Cabbages?

Ordinarily, the kitchen was staffed with a dozen-odd people: cooks, bakers, off-duty pages loitering hopefully near the ovens, and so on. It had been bustling and noisy with the day's preparations when Certainty passed by earlier.

But now . . . the kitchen staff was nowhere to be seen.

And instead, there were a number of large, round cabbages, green and squeaking on the kitchen floor.

"Oh dear," Certainty breathed.

The Guildtower was, of course, a place of magic. Unusual things happened often in places of magic; Certainty had seen her fair share of them. But they generally happened in controlled environments under the supervision of a senior mage-and transforming the kitchen staff into leafy greens didn't seem likely to be on anyone's syllabus.

She crouched down to examine the cabbage closest to her. It was a marvelous specimen...

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Verlag
Penguin Publishing Group
Erscheinungsdatum
2025
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0593815947
ISBN 13 
9780593815946
Einband
Taschenbuch
Auflage
1
Anzahl der Seiten
369
Kontakt zum Hersteller
preigu GmbH & Co. KG
mail@preigu.de

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