we are invariably pleased to welcome tourism

[cross_and_bow]

Sherlock is usually very puncutal. He's only one minute late, but that's still not quite as punctual as usual. Bella peers out the window, not yet allowing herself outright concern.

Comments

[pythbox]

"A common complaint," says Mr. Giles.

[cross_and_bow]

"Oh well, I was no great shakes at Spanish, and I bet I know someone who'll help me out if I get stuck on Latin," Juliet says, winking.

[dark_light]

Amariah decides to take advantage of her unnoticeability and peer behind the desk, where Giles keeps his personal stash of books. She doesn't walk around behind the counter, but she can lean on it and dangle her hand over, with Path clinging to it, and he can read the titles.

[pythbox]

Very few of them actually have titles on the spines.

"But don't speak Latin around my books until you know what you're doing," he cautions. "Some of them are excitable."

[cross_and_bow]

"Is it possible to accidentally do spells that way, really?" asks Juliet. "Can you accidentally do spells in other languages?"

[dark_light]

"I can accidentally do spells in any language if I speak it in verse and it's clear enough that it's aimed at an effect," comments Amariah, pulling Path back up and putting him on her shoulder again. "I wasn't allowed to read Shakespeare aloud in school."

[pythbox]

"It's closer to accidentally activating an artifact than accidentally doing a spell," he says. "A book of magic, or a book about magic, will tend to get... suggestible... with age. And Latin for some reason seems to be particularly, er, suggestive. So combining the two can have unpredictable effects."

[dark_light]

"Ask him if it's only speaking or if writing Latin has the same problem," says Amariah.

[cross_and_bow]

"Does writing Latin have the same problem? In my own notebooks, or in the - I promise it's not going to happen - event that someone wrote Latin margin notes in one of these?"

[pythbox]

He frowns thoughtfully.

"Your own notebooks should be fine," he says. "I'm less sure about the margin notes, but that should be a moot point."

[cross_and_bow]

"It is, I wouldn't write in old books," promises Juliet. "Should be fine even if I'm telling the Latin teacher I'm a fantasy nerd and doing all my homework exercises about magic to cement specialized vocabulary?"

[dark_light]

"I wish I could get my spells to work in writing. Not just automatically, but if I could write them in special ink, maybe, it'd be easier than reciting whole poems. Oh well," says Amariah.

[cross_and_bow]

Amariah gets a brief glance and a smile, though Juliet doesn't otherwise acknowledge her presence.

[pythbox]

"As long as you don't mix the Latin and the old books, yes."

[cross_and_bow]

"Are the books self-aware or anything? Because that would be weird."

[dark_light]

"And you'd have to be even more careful with them," comments Amariah.

[cross_and_bow]

"And, not that I'm not being careful with your books, but there's 'valuable possession' and there's 'maybe a person' on the scale of whether I can put it in my backpack or not," says Juliet.

[dark_light]

"Well, I sometimes sit in my Isabella's bag, if she's flying quickly and I can't keep up or hold on to her as usual," Path says. (He's just as covered as Amariah by the notice-me-not spell.) "Backpacks aren't so bad."

[pythbox]

"The books are not self-aware," he assures her.

[cross_and_bow]

"How can you be sure?" Juliet asks.

[dark_light]

"I can try to whip up a spell to check for it if he doesn't have a good answer, although I don't think I'd better cast it while there's someone in the room, it might break my notice-me-not," Amariah says.

[cross_and_bow]

Juliet attempts to disguise her nod as a roll of her neck.

[pythbox]

"I have never heard of a book becoming self-aware. I have heard of possessed books, but even those did not have actual awareness except as lent to them by their demonic residents. And none of my books are possessed."

[cross_and_bow]

"Do you check for possession on the first Wednesday of each month?" Juliet snickers.

[dark_light]

"Just because he hasn't heard of it happening any other way... I'm going to go ahead and whip up at least a verse-and-herb for it when we go back to your house," Amariah says. "Don't nod again, he'll notice you're acting funny."