Meredith and the Magic Library
MEREDITH AND THE MAGIC LIBRARY
written by
BECKET
illustrations by
RAVEN QUINN
Copyright © 2015 by Becket
All rights reserved.
ISBN 1-941240-29-1
ISBN-13 978-1-941240-29-8
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the creators’ imagination or are used fictitiously.
Under copyright law, if you are not the copyright owner of this work, you are forbidden to reproduce, create derivative works based on this work, download, distribute copies of the work, decompile this work without Becket’s express written permission.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
Meredith Pocket
CHAPTER TWO
Magic Dust
CHAPTER THREE
Meredith’s Gift
CHAPTER FOUR
Magic Dust Harvesters
CHAPTER FIVE
The Magic Library
CHAPTER SIX
Uncle Glitch & Sir Copperpot
CHAPTER SEVEN
Old Librarians
CHAPTER EIGHT
Wormwood Operation’s Rotten Malware
CHAPTER NINE
The Little Miracle
CHAPTER TEN
New Librarians
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The First Magic Book
CHAPTER TWELVE
The Second Magic Book
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The Magic Spell
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The Third Magic Book
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The Scent of Magic
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The Mouse House
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Robert and the Robot Factory
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Megan Taradiddle
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Mr. Fuddlebee the Ghost
CHAPTER TWENTY
The Fourth Magic Book
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The Writography
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Reopening the Magic Library
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Dimensionally Intelligent Operating System
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The Perambubelt
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Opus’s Room
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Caretaking, Icktionaries, and Title Waves
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Waltz of the Robots
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
The Paper Airplane Airport
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
The Magical Machine Section
CHAPTER THIRTY
Mad Mumford’s Guides
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
The Cronumpet Corridor
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
The Metamorphosis Section & Caterpiggles
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Butterpiglets
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
The Magic Lantern
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Magic Light Show
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Meredith’s Old Bedroom
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Mr. & Mrs. Pocket
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Real Magic
CHAPTER ONE
Meredith Pocket
Meredith Pocket had short black hair that touched her chin, large beautifully blue eyes, and she was perhaps the tiniest nine-year-old you might ever meet. She looked up to everyone and everyone looked down to her, and looked down on her too, because she was not like most girls her age. Little Meredith Pocket did not have a house or a mom and dad. She lived on the street.
Yet even though she was homeless, she did not beg for money or clothes or food. She was always a quiet and kind girl, and she ate what most people threw away, not wanting to bother anyone. She had been living this way ever since she was a much littler little girl, not long after she lost her mom and dad.
In fact, she was so ignored by so many people for so much of her life that, if someone had taken the time to wash the dirt from her face and give her new clean clothes, they might have recognized her as the only daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Pocket, who had been very famous before their unexpected disappearance.
Meredith never knew what happened to her parents. She could barely remember them. She vaguely recalled her mom’s long black hair dangling down into her face when she taught Meredith to read. And she just barely remembered her dad’s scruffy chin and cheeks on those wonderful nights when he read books to her before bed. Whenever she was not thinking about trying to stay warm on cold winter nights, or trying to get a cup of hot soup and warm bread, she would sometimes think about her parents and wonder if they were still alive.
Maybe they were thinking about her too.
Yet even though Meredith lived on the street, she was not all alone. She had three very good friends.
The first two were robots. Their names were Uncle Glitch and Sir Copperpot. Sir Copperpot wore a tattered top hat, a red scarf, a long tailed coat, and a monocle. Uncle Glitch wore an aviator’s cap, a blue scarf, a thin jacket, and shoes that had once been fancy but were now scuffed and full of holes. Yet more raggedy than all that, Uncle Glitch and Sir Copperpot were two of the oldest robots you might ever meet. They had brittle bodies that shook a lot and often fell apart. Their batteries drained quicker the older they got. And their memory banks were failing more and more each day. They had to live on the street with Meredith too because everyone else had the latest and greatest inventions and they would not hire outdated models. Yet despite their failures, Uncle Glitch and Sir Copperpot never forgot about little Meredith Pocket. They took care of her as if she were their only daughter.
Meredith’s other friend was an orphan like her. No one wanted him around either because he was so strange. His name was Peter Butterpig. And he was a bright pink pig with large colorful butterfly wings. He had tried to fit in with other pigs in other pigsties, but they did not want him around since he was not like them, neither pig nor butterfly. And anything they did not think was normal like them (pigs in pigsties) they cast away out into the cold. Peter Butterpig came fluttering to town one day all alone and weeping because he was so friendless and lonely. Meredith immediately befriended him and the two were instantly inseparable, especially when other children made fun of Meredith for being homeless. Peter Butterpig would chase them off by grunting and ruffling his bright beautiful butterfly wings.
In total contrast to their poverty, Uncle Glitch, Sir Copperpot, Peter Butterpig, and little Meredith Pocket lived in a town that had one of the greatest treasures in the world. This treasure was not made of silver or gold. It was not money or credit. No, this treasure was even rarer than all those things combined. This treasure was MAGIC DUST!
CHAPTER TWO
Magic Dust
Most towns traded with gold or gems. But the economy of the town where Meredith lived thrived on the sale and trade of magic dust.
Responsible grownups worked for it every day. They bought food with it, they bought clothes with it, they bought furniture with it. And sometimes, when they stopped thinking they knew anything about everything, they had fun with magic dust by using it to weave enchantments and spells.
Other boys and girls Meredith’s age used magic dust all the time to weave the most amazing magic spells she had ever seen. Some children wove spells that changed them into dragons. Other children wove spells that made them invisible. And a few other children wove spells that made them glow in the dark. One girl with pigtails used magic dust to weave a spell that made her hair change colors once a minute. And one boy with a propeller hat wov
e a spell that helped him fly safely over the moon, although he got a little lost on reentry.
But those magic spells lasted very briefly. So the children had to get more magic dust to weave more magic spells, which meant that they had to beg their parents for a few pinches.
Parents who had bags full of magic dust gave their children whole cups to do with as they liked. Those children were often the most popular. They were also the ones who were usually the most unkind to everyone else, especially to people living on the street. Cruelly, they wasted their magic dust on silly spells right in front of little Meredith Pocket, just to show her what she was missing.
Then there were the moms and dads who had mere smidgens of magic dust. Hardly anything at all. They had to scrimp and save every pinch. They were the ones who always taught their children to use every little bit wisely. But stingy parents often made stingy children. They would hoard their magic dust and look at it and never use it, and never ever give it to anyone else either, especially to a street person like Meredith, who could have used just the tiniest dash of magic dust to weave the teeniest magic spell just to keep herself warm on the cold nights of her even colder town.
But even though she could have used some magic dust to give herself the things she needed, things like food and warmth and shelter, she also wanted to use magic dust the way other kids used it, kids who were always laughing and having fun. She wanted to turn into a dragon too, or become invisible, or fly over the moon. But she did not have any magic dust whatsoever, so she could not do any of those things. And so she spent many cold and hungry nights looking up at the stars and imagining what she might do if she had the tiniest sprinkling of that stupendously extraordinary, super-dazzlingly wonderful magic dust.
CHAPTER THREE
Meredith’s Gift
Magic dust was everywhere. It could be found on cars and carriages, on walls and walkways and windows. But it was very difficult to find because it was not in bags or pinches, but in motes, which is even smaller than a grain of sand. And the teeny-tiny, itty-bitty motes of magic dust got mixed up with all the other little motes of common dust that gathered every day on shelves and unread books. So finding a mote of magic dust was like uncovering a chip of a diamond on the shore of the sea.
When Meredith Pocket’s three friends saw tears of longing welling up in her big blue eyes, Uncle Glitch, Sir Copperpot, and Peter Butterpig decided to do something about it. They would gather up as much magic dust as they could find (despite the odds of finding even a single one) and then they would give it to little Meredith Pocket as a gift.
Since none of the townsfolk would give even so much as a mote of magic dust to two old robots and a butterpig, Meredith’s three friends spent months searching in streets, hunting through haunted houses, and combing through vast fields of jack-o-lanterns just to gather enough magic dust to fill the bottom of a small thimble. And when they had finally gathered enough dust to weave a few very basic magic spells, they gave the thimble to Meredith, not because it was her birthday, and not because it was Christmas or Hanukkah either, or any other gift-giving time of the year, but because they loved her, and they wanted to give her everything in the whole world.
Receiving that gift from her friends was the happiest day of her young life.
With tears of gratitude, she took the magic dust from the two old robots and the butterpig.
She imagined weaving a magic spell that would make her skin like a chameleon, so she could blend in wherever she went. She imagined turning herself into a hawk so she could soar high above the city. She even imagined making herself grow into a giant so she could stride off to a far away kingdom. She imagined all sorts of wonderful spells she might weave with this dash of magic dust, which was much smaller than the amount many other children got every day.
But in the end, and after much thought, little Meredith Pocket decided not to weave any grand spells that would use up all her dust at once. Instead, she decided to weave several small and simple spells, ones that would use only a little bit of magic dust at a time, perhaps a few motes that might coat her fingertip like glitter, nothing more.
First, she used a sprinkle to make herself float just above the ground. She loved floating and she wished it would last forever. But the spell was so small and simple that it lasted for only one precious minute, yet it was the most wonderful minute of her life. When she gently floated back down to the ground, she hoped with all her heart that everyone could feel that way at least once in their life. She did not know if she would ever float again, but the memory of floating helped her float enough, at least on the inside. And even though other children her age were weaving spells every day to make themselves fly, she knew she would always treasure that one amazing minute for as long as she lived.
After that little floating spell, she wove a few more small and simple spells, using only a single pinch of magic dust. But this time, she did not use those pinches for herself. Instead, she used the rest of the magic dust for her three friends.
“Please, do not use it on us,” Sir Copperpot politely insisted.
“We got that magic dust for you,” Uncle Glitch declared in a gruffer tone.
Peter Butterpig snorted in agreement with them.
But Meredith Pocket told them in a confident yet kind tone, “It is my magic dust and I can do with it as I like.”
So she used a pinch to fix a squeak in Sir Copperpot’s knee. Then she used another sprinkle to help Uncle Glitch’s memory processors remember his right shoe from his left. And she used the final dash of magic dust on Peter Butterpig to give him what all butterpigs loved most in the world, which was mashed potatoes covered in ketchup.
All four of them—Sir Copperpot, Uncle Glitch, Peter Butterpig, and little Meredith Pocket—were more than just the best of friends. They were a real family.
CHAPTER FOUR
Magic Dust Harvesters
Magic dust came from several places.
Much of it came down from the moon and stars like gently falling snow. But that kind was legally gathered by major magic companies, like the Wicked Wizard & Warlock Group, or the Ted Zombie & Sons Organization, or even The Bad Banshee, Basilisk, & Boggart Club. Anyone caught gathering stardust or moondust without a license would be arrested and sentenced to several hopeless years in the Dungeon of Despair.
More magic dust grew on a variety of trees too, like the lean fay trees, or the small pixie trees, or the chocolaty trees of the brownie folk. But they were in far away lands and were difficult to find. And their magic dust was harvested by Mystical Creatures like the Gory Gremlins Guild, or the Forgotten Prairie Pucks, or the Dark Elves of the Dire Woodlands, none of whom liked outsiders and would cast nasty curses on trespassers trying to gather even so much as a mote of magic dust without the proper papers.
Magic dust could also be gathered from under the beds of children having very vivid dreams or horrible nightmares. That dust was usually harvested by the Nomadic Gnomes, the Desperate Dwarves, or the Grave Goblins, who worked quickly and were gone before anyone woke up. But if you happened to awaken quickly enough, and if you happened to catch them, then they might give you just a pinch to keep you quiet, or they might blow it in your face to make your nose trumpet with violently magic sneezes.
The easiest place to gather magic dust was from off the tops of magic books, especially the really old kinds scented of age and glue and ink. If you had one really old magic book, you could probably gather a thimbleful of magic dust in a month. Amounts like that could last a spendthrift several minutes or a penny-pincher maybe a few weeks. Or if you had a whole bookcase full of old magic books, and if you knew how to spend wisely, then that amount of magic dust might last you many long years.
Some grownups saved their magic books in very special places so that they could gather the most amount of magic dust naturally. But that was a very long term investment because great fortunes of dust took a really long time to gather. At the same time, other grownups would spend great fortunes just
to buy one magic book that had already gathered magic dust, but that was a dangerous business because it was very easy to get hoodwinked by swindlers.
There was one place in town that had many magic books covered in mounds and mounds of marvelous magic dust. It was the greatest collection of magic books and dust in the world. It had piles and hills of books. It had mountains of magic dust. It was the most magical building in town, and little Meredith Pocket lived in a little box right across the street from it.
This place was…
THE MAGIC LIBRARY!
CHAPTER FIVE
The Magic Library
The Magic Library was the most magical building in town.