Chapter 2
Chapter 2
“So, he wants us to find this book,” Fleur repeated. “This book that this… Geoffrey of Monmouth used over 800 years ago? How are we supposed to find a book?”
“Same way you find anything that is misplaced,” Hermione mused. “You start with the last known place it was seen and then go from there. And it would seem that the last known place was in Geoffrey’s possession, but it wasn’t found with him after he died, not as far as we know anyway. That could mean one of two things, either he returned it to the Oxford library archives, or someone took it.”
“Isn’t this all a bit…” Fleur searched for the right word. “Comment dit-on… ah… redundant? Don’t we already know the truth about Arthur because of the… you know…” She looked around and lowered her voice. “Magical world.”
“Ah…” Hermione pulled a few books off of one of the shelves and set them down on the closest table. Grim had left them shortly after they concluded their business in the rare book room, and made his way back to his office to get ready for his next lecture. The two women were escorted out of the rare book room, but Hermione decided to take advantage of the temporary library admittance cards they were granted and look through Bodley’s main collection. She missed having access to the library. The Black family library was excellent of course, and nothing could compare to the British library, but something about the imposing presence of the Bodleian library, it was awe inspiring.
"Technically," Hermione started, opening one of the books. "We really don't know much about Arthur either. I'm not sure about France, but records for the… well, our world, don't extend all that far back. We have a few records from the founding of Hogwarts, but very scant information before that… and even after is suspect. The witch trials did a number on our records, and then before that, the collapse of the Roman Empire destroyed many of the earliest records of magic in Albion."
"But… we have records of Merlin at least, surely?"
"Do we?" Hermione questioned. "What's the earliest document recalling Merlin, Morgana, Mordred, any of them?"
Fleur struggled to come up with an answer, but her words failed. They learned about Merlin in history of magic classes, and she never thought to question what was said about the legendary wizard. Some reports claimed he attended Hogwarts during the founding years, others claimed he helped the four founders of the Scottish castle infuse it with magic, and even some of what she learned in her own classes claimed that Merlin was court wizard for a French king for a time. She never questioned the information told to her, or even the very existence of the legendary figure, but the expression on Hermione's face told her she was waiting for her to realize something. "Those documents and reports, they were all a lie?"
"I wouldn't say a lie, more looking for legitimacy. It's very common in cultures around the world to legitimize their own presence by recalling the past…" Hermione's voice trailed off as she looked through her books. "Ah, here we go." She gestured for Fleur to sit down next to her as they looked at the information on the page. "Here's a timeline. The foundations of magic have always been present on the British Isles, as noted with the construction of the various henges around the isles. With the invasion of the Roman Empire and the attempted subjugation of the Celts, a lot of magical history was destroyed." Hermione moved her finger across the timeline, "When the Emperor Constantine declared Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire, more traditions fell and the splitting of the empire into the Western and Eastern, Byzantine, empires, more fracturing occurred. Disorganization and chaos got most of the Western Roman empire's records, and when the Eastern Roman empire fell to the Ottoman empire, more information was lost. Some records and traditions might have been kept through word of mouth, but that only works if people are alive to spread the information. That is what led to a lot of breaking down of West African magical traditions, side effect of colonization and the slave trade, too many people died, people that knew magical history. And that most likely happened in the Celtic nations as well-"
Fleur could have let her carryon, she could have let her continue ranting about the loss of information due to human stupidity and greed. The fire in her voice and the spark in her eyes stirred something within the blonde, and she could sit here and listen to the other woman for hours if she wanted. Their time in the library was limited since the passes they were given were only day passes, and they would not be able to access the library collection again until the other woman put in for a card for the general reading room, and judging by what the old professor and Hermione were saying, cards like those for non-students are difficult to acquire. No, if there was something to be found in the Oxford library, it would have to be found that day, and to do that, Hermione would have to stop ranting. She reached over and carefully slapped her hand over the brunette’s mouth, careful to ignore the sensation of her lips pressed against her skin. “Désolé, I would love to listen to the entirety of your rant, but we have limited time, what does this have to do with our current situation?”
Hermione’s first instinct was to lick the hand that was covering her mouth, an action she used to do whenever Ron or Harry dared to try to silence her as she was scolding them for not completing their work. As soon as her tongue made contact with the hand covering her mouth, she froze; her mind stopped, her heart stopped, everything stopped. Why did I do that, she cursed at herself. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
The blonde pulled her hand away sputtering. “Ah, um, yes, right, well, ah… um… King Arthur?”
“Right, King Arthur, um… right.” Hermione pulled out the book she was first looking at and pushed it between them. “So non-magical historians can’t agree if Arthur was a king, a general, or even if he was an actual person. Historia Brittonum and Annales Cambriae, that would be History of Britons and Annals of Wales are written accounts several centuries older than Geoffrey’s text that both mention an Arthur figure, but reference him as a warrior figure. Both date this ‘Arthur’ figure to the 5th or 6th century, which was right around the decline and collapse of the Western Roman Empire. Since both of these documents were later, 9th and 10th century respectively, neither can be classified as primary documents for the time period the ‘Arthur’ figure reportedly lived. Multiple documents referencing him point to his existence, but it’s all very theoretical still.” The woman leaned back in her chair and crossed her arms, “And despite what magicals will tell you, we are not much better record keepers than non-magicals. The numerous wars and conflicts destroyed a lot of family lines, and with them records. And of course the ‘goblin rebellions’ were problematic, though they probably weren’t performing the banking service for magicals much before the founding of Hogwarts anyway.”
She sat upright and gestured at the books on the table, “Long story short, a lot of the information about Arthur, Merlin, Camelot, all of it, a lot of it is from legends that were added to the original story much later. It’s all hearsay. In my experience though, the truth lies somewhere in-between what we have and what we can prove.”
Fleur’s brow furrowed as she thought about what Hermione said. It was sobering to think that much of historical records had been lost due to strife or hubris. It was even more alarming to realize that information long taken as fact in the magical world had no basis for evidence either in the magical or non-magical worlds. She didn’t know why she was surprised though, the treatment of her people over the years, the rumors that spread long told her about how witches and wizards view fact and fiction. “How do we find clues for someone we’re not even sure existed?” Fleur asked. “And this… this book that Grim wants us to find, what is its importance?”
“If Geoffrey utilized it to help him write his own manuscript, then it is possible that it is an earlier document, maybe something dating from the time of the Historia Brittonum, or before. It could even be a primary document supporting the existence of Arthur, Merlin, and Camelot. We won’t know until we find the book.” Hermione flipped one of the books on the table in front of her closed. "Our task is to find the book and investigate the contents."
"How do we even find a book missing for centuries? What is the chance it is even still around?"
"If the book has been destroyed, then that's that, but if there's even a small chance it's still in existence, then we have to take that chance." The brunette hummed, "As for your second question, where's the best place to hide a needle?"
"In a haystack?"
Hermione shook her head, "It's better to hide a single needle in a stack with other needles. So the best place to hide a book…" She gestured around them, "Is in a place with a lot of books."
"Here," Fleur replied. "You think the book is here?"
“No no, definitely not, but it was here. Well, in the Oxford collection at some point anyway. In my line of work though, I’ve found that things leave remnants of themselves wherever they go. A trail, little clues, memories… even after all of this time, something will be here. And besides, the best way to find something is to go to its last known location, and we know that Geoffrey had it while he was studying at Oxford so might as well start here.”
Hermione started leafing through the books, trying to get a clear picture of Arthurian legends in order to locate the distinction between myth and legend, and then legend and history. Growing up, she loved reading stories about King Arthur, Sword and the Stone was one of her favorite Disney movies. She watched it on repeat for hours until the VHS wore out and her parents refused to get another one. She made due with the local library’s copy until the day she went to Hogwarts, and at that point, she wanted to find out if any of the stories were true. Between her magical and non-magical studies, and keeping Harry and Ron alive during their hairbrained schemes, she didn’t have much time for extracurricular studies, but she did carve out enough time to devour anything she could find relating to the legend of King Arthur.
She didn't notice the inconsistencies right away, she was too enthralled with the stories and the magic to really notice much of anything else. That was why she originally missed much of the falseness in Gilderoy Lockhart's books. Once she knew the lies were there, it was easy to spot the inconsistencies. Unfortunately, she noticed much of the same things when relating the history of the British Wizard World, including the legends of Arthur, Merlin, and Camelot. All of the books she found agreed that Arthur was a non-magical king, so technically unimportant to the magical world except for his connection with the great wizard Merlin. The reports differed, he was a Slytherin, a Griffyndor, a Ravenclaw… He was the Founders' teacher, he was their first pupil before the founding of Hogwarts. The tales went on and on, but the only thing Hermione could take from them was that the magical world believed that Merlin existed, but they didn't know much about him. She idly wondered if the goblins would know anything, but dismissed the idea. If she was right and the time period matched with right at the fall of the Western Roman empire in the fifth century, that was before Gringotts was founded and goblins started hoarding wealth for humans. They did their best to ignore humans until they had to work with them, so they would not have had any contact with Merlin when he was alive. And it seemed like the non-magical world was doing a better job of digging up history and truth than the magical world anyway.
Hermione wasn't sure how much time had passed when a loud crash broke her out of her thoughts, and she looked up to see an older woman sprawled on the floor next to a book cart and a few overturned chairs. Both women hurried over and helped the woman up. “Ms. Merck?” Hermione questioned after seeing the woman.
The woman blinked and focused her eyes on the brunette, “Oh, oh Hermione Granger-Balck isn’t it? Or Your Grace, yes you were a student here a few years ago, always in the library reading. Are you back attending school or are you working on a project?”
“Just here for the day Ms. Merck, I thought you retired?” Hermione replied. The brunette remembered the older woman from her time as a student a few years prior. She worked as one of the reference librarians, and Hermione was sure she had the entirety of the collection memorized. The woman has announced her impending retirement during her second year, so seeing her again was a nice surprise.
“It’s Hilda dear,” Hilda replied. “And I did retire, found it utterly boring, so I decided to volunteer a few days a week. I still live locally and I’m familiar with the collection, so the new research librarians didn’t mind letting me shelve books and tidy up every now and then.” She gave the younger woman an exaggerated wink, “And it gives me an excuse to be reading my way through this collection. One of the finest collections of old books in the world, if I were twenty years younger and had more free time…" She sighed wistfully as she gazed at the books around her. "Oh, where are my manners," she started, seeing Fleur standing next to Hermione. "Hilda Merck, MLS," she said, holding her hand out to the blonde. "Bodleian reference librarian, retired."
"Ah, Fleur Delacour," Fleur replied smoothly, her accent clear and pronounced as she spoke her name. "Bonjour."
"Ah, Français? Bien sûr!" Hilda's eyes twinkled as she spoke. "I hope the two of you have a nice visit. And keep an eye on the time because we'll be closing in a little over an hour."
Hermione shook her head and was about to step away to leave the woman to her books when a tapestry on the wall caught her eye. She wasn't sure what it was that drew her attention, but she knew she had never seen the tapestry hanging there before. "Ms. Merck-"
"Hilda," the woman replied, setting books back in her cart.
"Hilda," Hermione amended. "I don't remember this tapestry being here when I was a student."
"It probably wasn't dear," Hilda answered. "The Oxford collections are vast, and the curator likes to switch out the tapestries every few years. I think this one was brought out… about a year ago. It wasn't donated by an Oxford graduate, so it doesn't get as much attention as some of our other pieces, but he was still significant so it does get put on display from time to time."
"Who donated it?"
The woman gestured towards the plaque next to the tapestry. "Sir Robert Cotton, it was bequeathed by his estate after he died. Little odd though since he was a Cambridge man and all, but probably wanted to leave something to an educational institution." She set her cart right and started trundling away, humming as she went.
Hermione stepped closer to the tapestry, studying it with careful eyes. There wasn't anything special about it or automatically significant, so she wasn't sure what caught her eye, but she knew something about it was strange. It displayed a gathering of five men and was crafted in the traditional Medieval style of tapestry making that was always in style with the nobility. The closer she got to the work, the more details she could see, and she realized it was the men themselves that drew her attention. "This… is a very odd tapestry," Hermione murmured.
"What is odd about it?" Fleur questioned. "It looks like many other tapestries we passed in here."
"The men themselves, it is odd seeing them together," she replied. She pointed to the man on the left and moved right, "Brutus, Plato, Marcus Aurelius, Aristotle, and Catiline. It is… unusual to see them together. They are from different periods, different cultures, why are they together…"
"I am familiar with Brutus, Plato, and Aristotle of course, and Marcus Aurelius was a famous emperor, but Catiline…?"
"Catiline was a Roman senator in the first century BCE, and was responsible for the attempt to overthrow the Roman Republic and destabilize the power of the Senate," Hermione replied. "And Marcus Aurelius, while known most for his position as emperor, was also a philosopher. So there are three philosophers, men that furthered education and knowledge, flanked by two men who are known for keeping secrets and betrayal."
"And there is an inscription," Fleur said, looking at the plaque next to the tapestry. "This says that there are words woven around the figures that translated says 'answers are found by those who seek, wisdom is found in the collection of the wise.' Well that's something."
“Answers are found by those who seek… wisdom is found in the collection of the wise… are you sure it says wise?”
Fleur hummed, “That is what the plaque says.”
Hermione turned her eyes back to the tapestry and took in everything she could see until her eye caught something on a shield propped near Marcus Aurelius’s legs. It was a standard coat of arms with a rampant Iberian lynx on a black background. Her eyes widened when she saw it and she pulled away from the tapestry and walked back to the table. Hermione’s mind whirled as she considered the implications of that coat of arms present on the tapestry. “Hermione,” Fleur started, studying the woman. “What is wrong?”
The blonde’s words broke Hermione out of her thoughts, and she started stacking her books at the end of the table for the library workers to catalog the in-house usage. “We need to go,” she said, grabbing her things. “We can’t stay here.”
“Pourquoi?” Fleur asked, alarmed by the frantic movement of the other woman. Hermione didn’t seem to hear her question, so Fleur grasped her arm to halt her movements. “What is wrong?”
The brunette glanced around, “We have to go.” She held up her hand when Fleur went to speak, “Not here, we’ll go somewhere else. There’s a pub not far from here, it’s a favorite with the students, plenty of outdoor seating, we’ll go there.”
Fleur followed the other woman out of the library and down the street until they came to an old, 12th century pub nestled among colleges and other small businesses. It could be easily overlooked if you weren’t looking for it, a small, white stone building with little room inside but plenty of tables outside. They ordered a few pints and baskets of fish and chips, and sat down at a table far enough away from the few students lingering closer to the bar. Fleur studied Hermione as they waited; the woman seemed… unnerved, jittery almost. She jumped up when their order was announced and walked inside to retrieve it. Fleur set her hand on Hermione’s arm when she walked back to the table. “Ma cherie,” she started. “You’re shaking, what has you so… nerveuse?”
Hermione carefully looked down at the chips in her basket, the crystals of salt and smell of vinegar prominent next to the beer battered cod. “That tapestry,” she started. “There was something odd about it. The design, the people in it, the person who donated, none of it made sense until I saw the coat of arms that was on the shield by Marcus Aurelius, a rampant lynx on a black background. I’ve seen that crest before, numerous times during my… travels. I’m not sure what it represents, a person or a group, but it definitely points to someone that hoards knowledge and secrets. I’ve discovered that crest in tombs, ancient libraries leading all the way back during the Roman empire; it has been around a long time and always represents knowledge lost, hidden away. The tapestry being in the library, the book not being in Geoffrey's possession when he died, none of that is a coincidence."
"That's a bit of a leap don't you think?"
"If you had encountered as many remnants of this group as I have, you wouldn't think so," Hermione groaned. "So many times I've been on the verge of finding something that would be a significant find, only to come up empty with that infernal crest present, you would understand."
"Where did you encounter it before?"
"So many places, but one recently, I was on the trail of a journal that belonged to a crewman on the Erebus. The Erebus and the Terror were British ships attempting to find the Northwest passage through the Arctic early in the 19th century. Both ships and their crew mysteriously disappeared, never to be heard from again. They found both shipwrecks a few years ago, and that sparked interest in the mystery. There were rumors about a journal that told the tale of the missing crew, so I went looking for it. When I found where it was supposedly hidden, the place was empty, the only thing was a stamp with that crest: a black shield with a rampant lynx."
Fleur thought about Hermione's words and considered the implications as she took a bite of one of her chips. "If what you say is true, and there is a… what do you call them… a secret society that steals artifacts dealing with knowledge and secrets, does that mean that they took the book from Geoffrey and made it disappear?"
"It could be that the book was theirs to begin with and Geoffrey got his hands on it accidentally."
"How would they do that? And why would that tapestry be hanging up at the main library in Oxford for anyone to see?"
The brunette hummed as she took a sip of her beer. “That is a good question,” she murmured. “What was it doing here… Who did Hilda say donated it?”
“Er,” Fleur thought. “Ah, a plant… Cotton?”
“Yes!” Hermione snapped her fingers. “Sir Robert Cotton! If he had the tapestry in his possession, then it’s most likely he was a member of this… group, has to be a group.”
“Still doesn’t explain why the tapestry was in an Oxford library, your friend, didn’t she say he went to Cambridge, they are rivals oui?”
“Yes, why indeed…” The brunette mused, idly eating her food. "Let's start with what we know for sure, or at least partially know. There was a book that Geoffrey used to provide him information on the ‘King Arthur’ that he wrote about in his book, and since he was here at Oxford while he was writing, it is safe to assume that the book was part of the original Oxford collection before the university was officially founded. Geoffrey was found dead after finishing his manuscript, but the book was not found with him and has supposedly not been seen since. Then hundreds of years later, Sir Robert Cotton donates a tapestry to the Bodleian library with a crest that might belong to a secret… group that is known for secreting knowledge and artifacts, to what end I'm not sure."
"I never knew there were so many secret organizations in the non-magical world," Fleur mused. "First the Order of Mars and now this group, who next?"
Hermione rolled her eyes, "Don't remind me about the Order of Mars, if I see Cho Chang again, I'm going to punch her in the face. There are more secret organizations in the world, some less influential, some more, and some are just nonsense clubs for men pretending to be important." Her face twisted into a questioning look as she thought, "There's something about Sir Robert Cotton that sticks in my mind, something foggy that I should remember." She pulled out her phone and quickly searched for the man's name. The smartphone was a recent acquisition after her experience in Egypt and Italy. She had yet to find a way to protect it from magical surges that often rendered electronic devices as useless, but she had a working theory about magic operating through latent electrical energy, which would explain why devices always fried around magic… "Here we go, Sir Robert Cotton, 1st baronet of Connington, nothing significant as far as politics but…" Her voice trailed off as she continued reading, her mind connecting threads of information. "He was an antiquarian, founded the society of antiquarians…"
"Antiquarian?"
"People who love history, old manuscripts. If Cotton was part of this… group, what if he had access to their cache of books, might have even been given some to look after. Best place to hide books after all is with more books, what was that inscription on the tapestry again?"
"Ah," Fleur's face twisted as she tried to remember. "Something about wisdom and answers… answers are found in the collection of the wise, something like that."
"Sounds like a clue to me," Hermione replied. "A riddle to challenge those in the know to find their collection. Sir Robert Cotton left his entire collection to the British Museum Library on his death, it could be that there were some… secrets hidden in that collection as well."
"Do you not think that the British Museum would have found them by now? They are very good at finding things that are not theirs from what I gather."
Hermione snorted a bit into her beer, "Ah, well, that's beside the point. The only way secret societies like this stay hidden is if they have people strategically placed to ensure their secrets are kept. And besides, the manuscripts are not at the British Museum any more."
"How do you know that?"
"The British Library act of 1972. All of the manuscripts and such once held by the British museum are now in the British Library, that is where we need to look.”
“Do we not have the same problem that we did here?” Fleur asked. “How do we know that there is something to find that hasn’t already been found?”
“That is a good point,” Hermione murmured. “It would be the height of arrogance to assume that your secrets would never be found… on the other hand though, we are dealing with a group that specializes in secrets. And again, in my experience, items, people, they leave imprints of themselves, so there might be something there in the library that can help us find this book.”
A thoughtful look crossed Hermione’s face, and she fell silent for a few minutes as she allowed her mind to follow the train of thought. It was unusual for this group to leave clues concerning things they had spirited away to destinations unknown. Her previous experience with them gave her the impression that they thought they knew what was best and went about their business with that assumption. It gave her an uncomfortable feeling, wondering at the type of people needed to run a secret organization that felt they deserved to make decisions regarding information like old gods or dragons sitting on their hoard.
Fleur studied the other woman as she was lost in her thoughts. She had to resist the urge to set her head on her palm and sigh while gazing lovingly at the younger woman. It was fascinating to watch her mind work, twisting and pulling apart puzzles, languages, problems, anything in front of her until she had it laid out in front of her. “I would love to be laid out in front of you,” Fleur muttered absentmindedly and instantly froze when she realized she spoke out-loud.
“What?”
“What? Ah, um.” The blonde struggled to come up with something, anything to take the focus away from words spoken from the lusty part of her brain. “Uh, what do we do now?”
Hermione’s eyes narrowed and Fleur was briefly afraid that the other woman would address misspoken words, but she just glanced down at the watch strapped to her wrist. “I have a friend who works in the British Library. If we hurry, we might be able to make it there before it closes.”
“A friend?”
“Non-magical, we grew up together. She lived down the street from where I lived with my parents. We stayed in touch after I went to Hogwarts and after… well, she’s a librarian now, works as a collections specialist for the British Library. I’ll have to make a quick stop at home to grab something that might convince her to let us stay after closing. I can write down the directions from the apparition point near King’s Cross and I will meet you at the library.”
“Bon,” Fleur agreed, and Hermione quickly scribbled out the address and directions on a napkin. “What do you need to pick up from the manor?”
“Cookies,” the brunette replied, rolling her eyes. “Lots of cookies.”
"What do you think you're doing Aristotle?" A low voice growled, causing the figure to turn and look at their counterpart.
"Drinking my tea," Aristotle replied. "Out of a paper cup I might add, something that wouldn't be necessary if you agreed to meet somewhere other than a dark alley Brutus."
The other figure scoffed, "If you forget, security is my job, which is why I want to know why you got those women involved in tracking one of our secrets."
"It's long past time this particular secret was dealt with," Aristotle countered. "I believe those two women have the ability to deal with it."
"And who gave you the authority to decide this?"
"I have the complete agreement of Plato and Marcus Aurelius."
Brutus scowled, "They do not know what it takes to protect all that the Archive has acquired, these two women could put our organization in danger."
"You'll have to trust me Brutus," Aristotle responded. "I know the importance of what we do, I would not put it in jeopardy."
The figure sniffed, "Very well, I will be keeping an eye on them though. They step out of line, I will know how to act."
"I would expect nothing less."