Free Brothers: Legacy of the Twice-Dead God by Scott Duff

damn. I’m sure it’s something only the rich can
feel, but money is not what I wanted or needed right now.
    Shrank flew in the room after an hour and a
half, asking if I needed anything. Depressed as I surveyed the
papers laid out on the desk, I glanced up at Shrank in the doorway
and noticed the bookcase nearest the door glowed with a faint
yellow tint. I got up and walked to the case, squinting at it
closely. The top three shelves had a yellow shimmer to them that
none of the others had.
    “Shrank,” I asked the pixie as he hovered in
the doorway, “do you see anything in the bookcase?”
    “No, sir,” he said, swinging around me to
inspect the shelves, “but the top is a façade so there might be
something underneath.”
    That threw me for a loop. A façade?
    “So there might be a catch somewhere that’ll
open it, right?” I asked him.
    “Yep, but it’s probably a lot more
complicated than that,” he squeaked, flying up to the second shelf
and jumping on it repeatedly. “See? It feels real. Façade, not
glamour.”
    “Would you get Kieran for me please?” I hoped
he would know more about these things. How Dad would hide them
maybe. I pushed lightly all around on the shelf below hoping
something obvious would show, gently moving books back and forth.
Kieran stepped quietly into the room behind me and examined the
shelves as I poked and prodded everything. I moved to the next
shelf down, methodically trying every item there, pushing the sides
and back, too. I turned back to Kieran to see him staring at the
shelves with a glazed look.
    “What do you think?” I asked him.
    “I think Father does absolutely beautiful
work,” he said smiling. “This is an oubliette under a façade. Most
likely an even exchange of space but not necessarily. The question
is how do we unlock it?”
    “Can we break in?” I asked him.
    “Yes, I can easily break the lock,” he said,
crossing his arms resolutely, grinning broadly. “Then we would
never find the opening. That’s the genius of trap doors, these
oubliettes. And he hid it so well! I’ve been in here three times
and didn’t see this. Are there others in the room?”
    “You’re asking me?” I said in disbelief,
looking around the room. “Remember? I’m Seth, the one who doesn’t
know anything.”
    Something must have happened on the bookcase
behind me because Kieran straightened and came closer. I turned
back to it again to see whatever he was seeing. It looked the same
to me. “Say that again,” he said.
    “Say what again?” I asked.
    “Your name, say your name to the bookcase,”
he said. His eyes glazed over again.
    “Seth McClure,” I said tentatively, feeling a
bit foolish talking to furnishings. When I did, the tint changed
colors to a more solid green. I don’t know why I did it, but I
reached over to the shelves and rather easily pushed them upward.
The top three shelves collapsed into nothing revealing two more
shelves as they rolled rather effortlessly up,. I sat down in the
floor to examine the contents.
    “See? Beautiful work. Your name spoken by you
as the password,” Kieran said with pride as he sat down beside me.
Yeah, Dad was good at everything. And I was his biggest failure,
best shoved in a hole and forgotten.
    “The top shelf looks like financial records,”
I said, pushing those thoughts back. “I don’t know what the second
shelf is at all.”
    “Grimoires, mostly. Some histories, from the
spines,” said Kieran, sliding a book out. “Picture albums. Is this
your mother?”
    “Yes,” I answered, looking at the page he
held open. It was the only picture on the page: a black-and-white
photograph of the two of them dancing at a formal ball somewhere in
Europe. Mother’s face was bright and lively in the picture and the
dress showed her figure well. Dad’s back was turned in the dance at
that moment so you couldn’t see his face at all, but it was
definitely him. “That was from the night they met. She talked