By Paths Coincident

Chapter 20

The Librarians' job in Newfoundland had escalated to the point where Cassandra and Ezekiel had called in Eve as reinforcement. Apparently the garage sale included a collection of antique jewelry that had the power to turn its wearers into berserkers, and three of those items had been purchased before the Librarians in Training had arrived to lift the remainder. Ezekiel had managed to steal back two of the missing three with good, old-fashioned pickpocketing, but the other was a signet ring that the unfortunate buyer had slipped on her finger. Fortunately, the victim was only 4 feet and 11 inches tall, 87 years old, and roughly spherical in proportions. Nevertheless, under the influence of the artifact, she had subsequently gone on a rampage that had left a dozen people injured, three of them seriously. Local law enforcement were on the scene which was complicating matters because they were likely to proceed forcefully against the perpetrator without questioning the possibility of magical interference.

Ezekiel was making good use of his talent for escaping by alternately antagonizing the victim and running like hell, drawing her out of range of other bystanders as well as the police, when Cassandra arrived back with Eve in tow. The two women emerged at the public restrooms of the National Historical Site on Signal Hill, a frantic, badly-spelled text from Ezekiel having informed them that this would provide the closest door.

By the time the three of them had cornered their surprisingly spry adversary, the sunset colors were reflecting in the Atlantic. From Signal Hill, the view was spectacular; however, the Librarian team members were unable to appreciate it since the berserker woman chose to leap off the cliff rather than be apprehended. Which meant that Eve had found herself hanging on desperately to a snarling, biting, magically altered female while Cassandra and Ezekiel nearly dislocated their arms trying to drag the two of them back up onto level ground as night descended.

Eve solved the problem of how to get the ring back from the woman with a precise blow that put her out like a candle. Ezekiel removed the ring and added it to his collection.

The remaining hours that it took to settle the debacle involved Cassandra attempting to soothe the traumatized and disoriented victim with trumped up, pseudo-scientific explanations of allergic reactions to chemicals released by old gemstones and recommendations for garlic and orange juice cleanses, while Eve flashed her NATO id. at the over-awed local police while hinting at chemical warfare and terrorist threats and assuring them that everything was under control, that all illegal items had been confiscated as evidence, and that the prosecution for the violence was so far out of their jurisdiction that God himself could not locate it with a radio telescope. Ezekiel, of course, got to take the artifacts back to the Annex and go home to a good night's sleep.

Eve and Cassandra, who had also watched the sunrise in Newfoundland, an even more spectacular sight than the sunset, arrived back at the Annex with four and a half extra hours until dawn provided by the change in location on the planet. Cassandra hauled out the first aid kit to treat and bandage Eve's mauled arms, and the two of them walked home to their apartments together. By the time they got there, it was starting to rain again.

It was 3:30 a.m. when Eve finally threw herself, fully-clothed onto her bed. Only then did she have the leisure to wonder if Stone had tried to contact her. Taking out her phone, she checked for missed calls or messages, but none had appeared.

Her anxiety returned tenfold. She debated attempting to contact him again, but if he were back and asleep, did she want to disturb him? She decided she would set her alarm for 6 a.m., and then sleep be damned, she was calling Stone.

Even though she had only slept with her head on Stone's table for a few hours in the last couple of days, Eve could not fall asleep. She tried getting into her favorite, over-sized, sleep T-shirt. She tried reading something from one of the most boring books Jenkins had recommended to her. She tried resting in the dark but ended up twisting her bedding into a trap that she had to struggle to escape.