We are officially one month out until the release of The Reanimator’s Remains (TRM #4), which you can preorder at all major retailers here. Since we are getting so close, I thought I would share with you the prologue to whet your appetite.
Prologue
The Cat Burglar
Mr. George Chadwick Livingston III’s home off Fifth Avenue contained many things: massive marble mantles imported from Italy, stained glass windows made in Tiffany’s workshop, enamel vases purchased from Faberge in the style of the Russian tsars, wardrobes filled with gowns from Worth and Doucet, antiquities looted from cultures around the globe, and the best display of good breeding and taste a first-generation steamer magnate could buy. What it didn’t contain was a bobcat, yet when the clock struck two, the wildcat slid out from under the sofa and regarded the man’s well-stocked library with a gleam in its eye. The creature purred as it silently padded to each door and confirmed that the room was locked and the halls beyond it were empty of people. The bobcat and Enoch Whitley, the man who shared a body with it, had waited nearly a month for this day, and they weren’t going to squander it by getting caught.
With a shove, Enoch forced the bobcat to relinquish its hold. Their body locked and convulsed like a machine in need of oil after weeks in bobcat form. They bit back a hiss as their skull split and the cat’s sharp canines retracted in favor of a row of square, crooked teeth. Across their body, their skin crawled as fur was replaced with flesh and greying brown hair, but the sensation was nothing compared to the pain of the breaking and remaking of bones and the tearing of muscle. Enoch clamped his mouth shut as the pain reached a crescendo that turned to nausea. He shouldn’t have waited so long to shift. He was too old, and at some point, waiting too long would be his undoing. Resting his head against the Indian rug, Enoch panted and shut his eyes until his heart quieted and the last echoes of the transformation passed.
If one of the maids had walked in, they would have found him as naked and vulnerable as a baby bird, but that was the price he paid for shifting. His lips twitched at the thought of being caught like that again as he forced himself upright, one spindly limb at a time. It had been a long time since he had been so careless. Touching his neck for his collar of clothes, Enoch found it bare and let out a disappointed hum. The damned cat forgot them. His spare clothes had been bundled around his neck when they snuck into the mansion weeks earlier, but somewhere along the way, they had been left behind. Enoch scratched at the stubble on his chin and tried to remember where his clothing might be. Clothes were too expensive to leave behind if he could help it. Unfortunately, when he was a passenger in the bobcat’s mind for too long, it was easy to forget inconsequential things like clothes or the days of the week. The bobcat cared only for sleeping, eating, and whatever quarry Enoch set its mind to. He and the bobcat were alike in that way; while the cat didn’t care a fig about books, it enjoyed the hunt.
Glancing up at the oculus high above his head, Enoch watched a flurry of snow twist and dance across the glass. It had been thoroughly autumnal when they snuck into the Livingstons’ manor, but he had barely noticed nature’s slow slide into winter while nestled in the bobcat’s mind. At least the rich man’s palace was warm even without a fire. No matter. If he couldn’t find his clothes, he would simply secure the book with a table cloth or rag and leave in furs again. He would just have to be careful that the book didn’t fall out or get wet. Enoch frowned but shrugged to himself as his not quite human eyes adjusted to the meager light. He would figure something out.
Drifting to the nearest shelf, Enoch ran his gaze over the rows of books and was relieved to find that the library had some semblance of organization. He couldn’t abide rich swells who couldn’t tell a folio from a grimoire and stored their books in the most asinine fashion. He sometimes stole more from people who organized their books by size or color on principle. Arranging books by their outward appearance showed their owners didn’t care about what was inside them, just how they looked. They were often the same people who ripped off the original covers and plastered on a generic piece of fancy dyed leather, so it matched their rug and couches. Enoch’s lip curled at the thought of the books he prized so dearly being pinned down and having their wings ripped off like a butterfly to satisfy some decorative fancy. It was sacrilegious.
As he moved to the next shelf, Enoch ran a loving hand over the spine of a book he already owned. He had taken his copy from a collection at a college in Poughkeepsie several years earlier, and while Mr. Livingston’s copy was in better condition, Enoch felt no need to take it. The knowledge inside was the same, even if the cover was crisper, but his esteem for Mr. Livingston and his book agent grew a fraction. The man may have known nothing of books, but it was obvious the person he hired as his agent did. His library wasn’t nearly as large or prestigious as that of the other robber barons who lived on Fifth Avenue, but the dearth of the collection along with the trophy pieces were well chosen to make him look sensible yet affluent. Giving his agent free rein to organize it as he wished had lent the library an air of discernment and forethought. So many people put books in alphabetical order to save time, and that was nearly as bad as grouping them by appearance. When Enoch had last been allowed in the Paranormal Society’s library, they had used the Dewey Decimal System, which Enoch disliked for his own reasons, but that had been a while ago. Resentment kindled like a coal in his breast, but he smothered it by focusing on his quarry. It didn’t matter if the society didn’t understand his mission; he didn’t need them or their books as long as he could still shift. With their hovering librarians, missing books were spotted so quickly, but in a library like this, a book could go missing and not be noticed for years, or so he hoped.
The man Mr. Livingston had hired to stock his library—Ramsey, Ransom, something like that—had sought out titles that were not fought over by the men of the Grolier Club, yet the books he had purchased were still fairly rare and in good shape with the occasional treasure. If Enoch had been a cat burglar with less scruples, he might have grabbed a few of the nicer boring books and lived off the proceeds for years. But that wasn’t what he came for. Silently padding up the curling iron staircase in the corner, Enoch’s eyes glowed in the meager starlight like a cat’s. The book he wanted had to be up there somewhere. On the first floor, the higher shelves had been used for flaunting the more expensive treasures, visible but not easily touched. If this were his library, he would put the more controversial books on the second floor, out of reach and out of the way of prying eyes. The bobcat purred in his head as they reached a corner that couldn’t be glimpsed from the floor below. There were saucy books that probably contained some interesting etchings or turns of phrase, things that could no longer be sold through the mail legally, but Enoch didn’t care about those. He needed a book for his research library, and for once, he knew exactly who purchased it. The only question was if Livingston or his agent truly knew what it was; that would change where they put it.
Enoch squinted and blinked, his eyes and brain struggling over the titles as he skimmed row after row of spines. When he set off to steal this book, he hadn’t expected to get stuck in the cat’s head for weeks, but fate had smiled upon him that day. He had been perusing the shelves of his favorite bookshop when Mr. Livingston’s agent came in to check on whether an order of books had come in. As soon as the proprietor mentioned The Corpus Arcanum, Enoch had been unable to rip his attention away. The book had been on his desiderata for years, and he needed it. The next night he broke into the bookshop and went through the man’s papers to find the buyer. What he hadn’t realized was that Mr. Livingston had purchased it along with several dozen others.
The rest of the books were mundane or illicit in far less interesting ways, and Enoch couldn’t help but wonder why he had purchased a book on magic. He thought maybe Livingston was a collector of esoteric books, not for what they contained but for their age or strangeness. The library so far hadn’t contained anything particularly interesting or useful to him. Perhaps, the agent had merely gotten a feeling that he should buy it. That happened to non-magical people sometimes. If their blood contained the dregs of magic from some long-dead ancestor, they were drawn to magical objects like moths to a flame even if they couldn’t use them.
Enoch had expected to stake out the house for a few days before stealing the book. What he hadn’t expected was the book agent to quibble with Mr. Livingston about the organization of his library. For days, the bobcat had sat under the sofa as books were taken down, reorganized, cataloged, and the new books unpacked. Eventually, the bobcat refused to stay still for so long, so they took to learning the routines of the household staff and family, which halls were safe to traverse in daylight, and when the master of the house would next be away on business. He had decided to wait until Mr. Livingston left for England to take the book. The man spent a great deal of time in his library, and Enoch feared that if he didn’t wait until the new books lost their shine, their absence would be noticed. A life of bibliomania had taught him that book lovers always came in from time to time to marvel at their latest purchases, turning them over in their hands, and feeling that swell of satisfaction that it was theirs. Enoch knew the feeling well. Every book he stole for his research library was a treasure to be stroked and admired until he went after his next quarry. It was only when a new book took its place that it became one of many.
Waiting to take the book while Mr. Livingston was away was the smart thing to do. He and the book man were the only ones who came into the library with any regularity, and by the time he returned, his latest purchases and their locations on the shelf would have dulled in his memory. After a month of lurking in the shadows, Enoch would leave the mansion with far less mice than when he arrived in exchange for the book he needed. All things considered, it seemed a fair trade, and it wasn’t as if Mr. Livingston could use the book anyway.
As Enoch reached the second to last shelf, his breath hitched at the sudden kick of adrenaline coursing through his veins. There it was: The Corpus Arcanum. After years of trying to get his hands on it, it was finally his. The title had been written on the ribbed spine in a bold, golden script by some enterprising librarian over a century ago, but it was still in its original binding. Wiping his sweaty palms across his leg, Enoch steadied his shaking hands before carefully pulling it out. It had been stuck between two mundane volumes from the Renaissance, so he quickly shuffled the other books around it to obscure the space where the tome had been. Sinking to the floor of the catwalk, Enoch stared down at his prize and ran a reverent hand over the black, goatskin cover. No wonder the book agent had bought it for Mr. Livingston’s collection; it was beautiful. He had expected it to be plain and ugly like so many magical books were, but it was covered in gilded arabesques and stars that reflected the intricacies of the work within.
The collected knowledge of magic in one thick volume, and now it was his. He had begged the librarians at the Paranormal Society to let him into the special collections to read it, but that cantankerous old prune wouldn’t let him. His research was never worthy enough to gain him entry, though he was certain old Turpin kept him out to keep him from gaining too much knowledge. Enoch ran his fingers hungrily down the book’s spine as the bobcat purred loudly in his head. He didn’t need the Paranormal Society anymore. He had a library of his own. One that would soon rival them if he could find a few more books on his desiderata. He would make them regret dismissing him.
Cradling the book close, Enoch returned to the first floor and swept his glowing gaze for anything he might use to tie the book to the cat. The covers on the tables would be missed, and when he rifled through Mr. Livingston’s desk, he didn’t find so much as a handkerchief. Why would he keep one on hand when he could merely order a servant to bring him one? Enoch shoved the draw shut with a grunt and closed his eyes. He tried to picture the house from the bobcat’s perspective; there was a linen closet a few hallways over near the dining room where there were plenty of napkins that wouldn’t be missed. To get there, he would have to take to furs again and leave The Corpus Arcanum behind. Cold sweat broke on Enoch’s back at the thought of putting the book back or not being able to return to take it. If a maid heard him rummaging around, she might chase the cat off or realize there had been a robbery. The binding creaked beneath his fingers. He couldn’t risk going into the bobcat’s head for weeks again to get another chance. He had to leave with the book tonight. He needed this book for his research.
Enoch’s gaze sharpened. That was it. He needed the knowledge within the pages for his research, not the book itself. He had at least two hours before the staff began to wake. That was plenty of time to confirm a theory or two and satisfy his curiosity in case he had to wait to come back for the book. Settling at Mr. Livingston’s massive desk, Enoch suppressed a chuckle at how ridiculous he must look. He much preferred his usual ritual of showing off his latest find at the Guttenberg Club and then reading it in their parlor with a glass of port. Then again, Benjamin Franklin supposedly did his best work in the nude, so at least there was precedent. Cracking the cover, Enoch’s heart fluttered in anticipation. He skimmed over the front page of The Corpus Arcanum, his eyes lingering on the book curse written in gilded ink.
He who steals this paper and ink
Into death he shall sink.
May he enjoy these words today
For he shall not live to see another day.
Such charming things, book curses. Too bad they didn’t work. If they did, he would have been dead long ago. Flicking through the pages, Enoch skimmed the headings for the information he needed most. His head swam with a heady euphoria he rarely felt outside his library. The Corpus Arcanum was perfect. It had everything he needed. It probably held the secrets that would unlock everything if he had more than one lifetime to study it. He kept catching himself stopping to read random passages, but he needed to keep moving if he wanted to get out before dawn. He would read it all in due time, he reminded himself. When the next two pages stuck, Enoch went to lick his thumb but froze. The cat growled in his head as he stared down at this hand. His fingertips, nails and all, were black with ink. He wiped his hand against his bare leg, but the color held fast. He distantly knew this development was alarming, but as long as the paper was free of smudges, he didn’t care. Wiping his finger against the page, the words beneath it bubbled to the surface. They shimmered with wetness before soaking into his skin, their meaning sinking into him like a knife. Enoch stared at it with equal parts reverence and horror. The bobcat released a low rumble, but Enoch ignored it. The book wanted to become one with him. It had chosen him. He had heard of it happening, but he needed to read it first before he could take on all of its knowledge. He would take care now and wear gloves when he brought it to his library. Yes, gloves…
He nearly set the book down on the desk when a shuddering chill passed through him and a cold sweat broke on his back. His fingers tightened on the cover of their own accord. He stared transfixed as the words at the top of the page glowed and rearranged themselves. The letters danced and swayed to an unseen metronome until the world around him faded away. They flickered into new phrases, new connections, new information no human had ever gleaned before. Enoch gasped. It was exactly what he had always wanted to know. The Corpus Arcanum drew him in and held him tight until he could see nothing but the threads of the hidden world that had become his life’s work. It was connected. It was all connected. Tears stung his eyes as they trailed down his cheeks in oily, black streaks. He had been right. He had been right about so many things.
His teeth chattered and his heart thudded in his ears, but it didn’t matter because he had been right. He needed to gather disciples. Yes, he would start a school. The knowledge was in his eyes, his mouth, his ears. The words swam in his vision and pulsed in time with his blood. He would teach others. He would pass— Bitter, metallic saliva pooled in his mouth, but when he tried to swallow it, he choked. Ink surged up Enoch’s throat, spilling from his lips in a torrent. He gagged as it poured down his chin and out his nose. The ink flowed from every orifice, but he wouldn’t stop it even if he could. The Corpus Arcanum was in him. They were one. Blood spilled onto the page and wicked the words away in a tide of black as whispers filled his ears and letter after letter flickered across his vision like a zoetrope. Meaning pulsed through his veins in time with the pump of his faltering heart. The bobcat tried to mewl a warning, but the sound died beneath the rising black tide. Enoch couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t think. He didn’t have to. He knew everything. He finally knew everything. A beatific grin crossed his lips as his eyes rolled back in his skull, and he glimpsed the world he had longed to see.
Kara Jorgensen 