The Binding Office

The Binding Office kept hours that suited no living person. Sefa stood at the counter for forty minutes before a clerk acknowledged she had a body. "Cooper Lane," she said. "It's gone dark. And I think there's — I think someone is in it." The clerk did not look up. "Lamps don't have someones in them. Lamps have spirits in them. Spirits are not someones. It's the first thing they teach you." "This one talked to me." That made the clerk look up. He had the face of a man who had spent his whole life hoping nothing interesting would ever happen to him, and was now watching that hope die. "Talked," he repeated. "Words?" "Words. A sentence. It told me I'd missed a lamp, and I hadn't, except I had." She leaned on the counter. "Whose spirit is in the Cooper Lane lamp? I want the name. I know you have a book with the names." The clerk closed the book very quietly, which told her everything.