by Zara Stark
Nevada wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and cursed under his breath.
"That is the most violating feeling on the planet," Nevada whispered.
"You're telling me," I whispered back, "I think we have a more pressing problem though.
I pointed at the Kyōrinrin and Nevada sighed in defeat.
The fluttering of the scrolls that composed it made loud flapping and ripping sounds and its jaw fell open and flashed sharp white teeth at the damaged shelf but it didn't roar.
As if he had read my mind Nevada explained. "It can only make noise through its scrolls, it knows we're here and it's smart enough to know we're hiding ourselves."
"Fuck," I cursed.
"Not now Octavia, control yourself," Nevada sighed and ran his hands through his hair. He gave me a smirk far too devious for his handsome face.
"Ha-ha, very funny," I sneered at him. "How are we getting out of this one, we aren't even close to where we need to be."
"Most of your cards are too destructive and loud, we need to incapacitate it until we leave," Nevada narrowed his eyes at the large paper dragon. The Kyōrinrin was clearly confused, looking around for the culprit who dared to harm the books it was protecting.
"Fuck," Nevada cursed making me almost jolt out of my skin. All of the other guys cussed but Nevada didn't very often. The word fuck out of his mouth was as shocking as it was titillating. It sent pleasurable chills up and down my spine.
"I didn't want to use this power, I wanted to store it up for later," He sighed, running his fingers through his dark curls.
The Kyōrinrin lumbered towards us again, about to pass through our intangible forms again. I grabbed onto Nevada's forearm, ready to tug him out of the Kyōrinrin's path so he wouldn't throw up again.
But Nevada threw his hands up and a chill filled the air once more, his pale hands turned an icy shade of cyan and nails turned blackened. The Kyōrinrin froze in place before the pale off-white and yellowed scrolls turn the same pale hue of blue as his hands.
"Crap, that was fast thinking," I nodded. "So what happens if someone comes along to see that it is frozen in place?"
"They won't, they don't patrol down here," Nevada shrugged. "Arrogance really, they don't think anyone can get past the wards they have and they don't think anyone--let alone a dragon is smart or stealthy enough to make it this far."
"Oh," I sighed. It made sense, after all, I had dealt with the Concilium enough to know they were a bunch of arrogant pricks.
"Kyōrinrin, that doesn't sound Latin," I pointed out. He was so very tense, his face still a tab bit green from nausea. I knew focusing on explaining something would help to ease him.
"I believe they were first noted by Japanese scholars as a type of Tsukumogami and were thusly named by them but they occur all over the world," Nevada explained, if he knew what I was trying to get him to do, he didn't mention it. The tension seemed to drain from his shoulders and the pallor in his face returned. The clarity returned to his dark blue eyes, in the pale green light they looked almost black. It should make him look monotone, blending with his dark hair, heavy brows and the thick fringe of eyelashes but it just added to his allure.
"Interesting, ready to continue on?" I asked, in a soft voice. I rose on my tippy toes and pressed my palm to his cheek. He felt ice cold but that was his norm. "Feeling better?"
He quirked an eyebrow up at me and covered my hand in his much larger one, he leaned into my touch and place a soft his to my hand. His eyes went half-lidded for a moment in a facial expression of pure content before it drained from his face and he glared at me.
"If you tell the other three about me throwing up, I will punish you," Nevada growled with a snarky grin.
"You promise?" I winked at him. I loved the devious, playful side of Nevada that he only seemed to show to me. "A spanking?"
"Worse," Nevada whispered, still grinning.
"Should I be scared?" I asked.
"Not if you like handcuffs," Nevada flashed white teeth at me in a bigger grin.
"Oh boy, it's true what they say about the nerdy types, secret kinky freaks," I giggled, feeling my cheeks heat up red and my heart pounding in my chest. "I like it."
"You're not supposed to, it's a punishment," Nevada growled again.
I burst into laughter again and Nevada reached down to clamp a hand over my mouth.
Oops, I had almost forgotten where we were for a moment. I had been so caught up in Nevada's banter.
"Sorry," I mumbled into his hand and he let me go.
"Don't apologize, I started it," Nevada gave me a soft smile full of affection.
"Okay, how much longer until we get to the section we need?" I asked.
Nevada threaded his finger through mine again and pulled me along.
He stepped over the Kyōrinrin's frozen midbody and turned around to help me over it as well.
"What a gentleman," I commented with a smile.
"Milady," He gave a mock little salute and I did a curtsy.
"Worst curtsy I have ever seen in my life," Nevada shook his head and tsk-tsk-ed me.
"Oh? You think you can do better?" I challenged.
Nevada raised an eyebrow at me and sank into a perfect curtsy.
"Damn, that was a perfect curtsy, I'll give you that much at least," I laughed.
"Obviously," Nevada stood back up and shrugged.
"So how many times have you practiced that in front of the mirror?" I asked.
"Never," Nevada sighed, giving me a scathing look of dismissal. He looked like a noble lord of old looking down upon a peasant. Some women had resting bitch face, Nevada had resting lordly face.
"I'm a natural talent," He turned away from me and grabbed my hand again leading me along with him.
"What a natural talent for you to have," I chuckled. "How many more floors?"
"We have one more floor to clear and then I think the information we need is on the deepest floor of the library.
We came to another darkened staircase, no light lining the wall of the narrow passageway and steep set of stone steps. I could feel Nevada pulling the cold from the air, the air smelled of dusty old books and ink. It didn't matter the century or even the medium of paper or ink, the smell of old books was just as enthralling and comforting to me. The passageway smelled of stale stone. I trailed the fingers of my broken hand along the wall. I wondered if it was limestone they pulled from the nearby sea. It still smelled of the coral and sea creatures it had been formed from.
The staircase was just as long as the first, the backs of my thighs were starting to ache and so were the soles of my feet. The ancient gladiator sandals didn't have the best arch support.
We came to another library floor. Nevada weaved us through the oddly placed shelves and we got through the floor quickly. I didn't get to see what the floor was labeled and I was dying to know.
Nevada led me down another staircase and we began a long trudge down another impossibly long flight of stairs. Just how far were we underneath the city of Rome? I could hear the vague sounds of rushing water and tried to remember at this point if the Romans had running water.
I knew they did have an aqueduct and pipes for water that were made out of the poisonous metal lead. That was where the word for plumbing came from Plumbum, the Latin word for Lead. But I couldn't recall if it was this early that they had plumbing and if what I was hearing was piping. The roar of the water was loud, it would have to be a gigantic pipe.
Nevada didn't seem to care and he kept walking. We finally came to the deepest level, another rush of cold air coming towards us as we stepped out of the narrow stairwell into the open low-ceiling chamber. The cold was gone as quick as it came as Nevada siphoned it right out of the air.
There was a large empty space where the stairwell ended, gigantic shelves were packed closely together around the rest of the room, each shelf touched the ceiling and they were at least three feet wide and brimming from being overstocked with scrolls. Though cluttered
, the shelves were tightly packed and lined and seemed to have some sort of organization. Each shelf had strange symbols I didn't recognize, only one or two appeared to be ancient Latin. Some appeared to be in some sort of Arabic text, others in Cyrillic and others in some form of Oracle Bone Script, the mother system of all Asian scripts. There were even more that looked completely different than anything I had ever seen. They looked completely alien.
"Is this it?" I asked, looking up at him. I had expected something more ornate. More mystical. It appeared to be more like the ancient version of a used bookstore.
"Yes, the deepest chamber, contains anything and everything on the most arcane versions of magic and alchemy," Nevada explained, his eyes full of curiosity as he scanned the tall shelves stuffed full of scrolls. "It's larger than I expected. I don't even know where to begin."
"Well I'm going to take a shot in the dark and guess that they don't use the Dewey Decimal system here," I tapped my chin.
"I wouldn't bet against you on that observation," Nevada looked around. "We're looking for your magic. What do you think we should look for?"
"What were you guys calling me before? A card conduit? Would it be smart to start there?" I asked.
"I'm not sure, I thought I made that up, to be honest," Nevada shrugged. "Maybe I read it somewhere who knows?"
"Well damn, I don't know where to search either, we got a clue with the dice though," I shrugged. "I use objects from games of chance."
A light bulb seemed to go in Nevada's head. "Dice and cards."
"I wonder what I can do with a roulette table," I laughed. "Or the flip of a coin."
Nevada didn't laugh with me though. Instead, he looked deep in thought.
"What's wrong?" I asked.
"Just connecting the dots in my head," Nevada explained.
"Don't strain yourself," A loud feminine voice rang out through the room and we both froze. The voice was female but sounded deep, magically enhanced almost.
Neither of us spoke again, we simply froze in shock.
"Don't stop speaking on my account, it was quite entertaining," It--she said again. "Truly freezing won't help you, I can see the unseen, your little card tricks can't work on a creature that sees how the cards have been dealt."
Nevada scoffed in contempt, his eyes rolling. "Speaking in riddles and trying to confuse those you talk too is a sign of arrogance and a fragile ego."
"You would know, Crustallos Drakon," The voice said again. I narrowed my eyes, it sounded like she was speaking Russian or another Slavic language. I recognized the word dragon. What else could Drakon mean? Nevada's eyes met mine in shock, his eyes mouthed ice dragon.
Whoever this was, they were very observant or psychic.
"Can you stop getting into arguments, especially with disembodied voices that can see through my magic," I snapped at Nevada, fixing him with a pointed glare. I turned my head in the direction of the voice. "Show yourself."
"Are you sure? What is asked cannot be unasked, if you want my help, you have to be ready for it," The voice said again.
"I'm getting tired of the riddle talk too," I sighed.
Nevada nodded, placing a hand on my shoulder. "This is how the others must feel when we have our little contests."
Before I could answer, the voice rang out again, a little higher pitched in their clear excitement. "A contest? Of riddles, you say?"
That voice could only be described as cat-that-got-the-canary, it was far too pleased.
"What of it?" Nevada snapped, even though he sounded angry, his eyes were alight with curiosity. I sighed in defeat, all was lost now. If Nevada's interest was piqued there was no turning back now. We were in trouble.
"Three riddles, you answer them correctly and I'll give you the books you need and won't alert the Concilium to your presence," The female offered. Anxiety boiled through me, as a frequent watcher of scary movies, my usual response to situations like this was "don't trust them! run girl run, he's gonna kill you!"
My eyes scanned the library, there was no way we could sift through all of this. One, we didn't have the time. Two, I didn't know any of the languages shown, I might be able to stumble my way through Ancient Greek or Latin but the rest were a lost cause unless Nevada knew them.
"You want to know the young lady's origin of power, don't you? Such a fascinating ability, only seen a time or two before, seen enough to be documented in writing, wouldn't you like to read that scroll?" The voice offered.
"We could torture you for information," Nevada growled.
"You could try but why would you? You're a smart one Aurelius," I gasped at this woman--this whoever, knowing Nevada's last night. "Why risk it? If you tried to torture me, you might not succeed. I might mislead you, give the wrong book. Or I might summon a few of those idiotic Concilium warlocks. Useless most of the time but much practiced in painful curses. Three little riddles for two young riddle masters should be a breeze," They explained and I couldn't fault their logic. I knew Nevada would agree, logic was his number one, what they were saying made sense on paper.
"Why would you help us?" Nevada asked.
The feminine voice sighed. "Long-suffering boredom."
"Aren't you worried about betraying the Concilium?" I asked.
"Really? I am part of the library just as much of the Concilium. My station is older than the Concilium, I predate them. They betray me by not letting anyone into the library, no questers searching for information. Sitting down here is so boring, so lonely. I do so miss the sunlight. Is it still pure white?"
"It's yellow. The sun is a yellow dwarf star," Nevada explained and I rolled my eyes and shook my head.
Of course, Nevada would try to correct anyone if he thought they said something wrong.
Forget a scientist, Nevada needed to become a professor when we got back to modern times. Or perhaps a tenured professor. Doing his own research but also taught classes at the university he researched at. I thought of him in business casual attire. Reading glasses perched on his perfect nose, dark curls spilling down over his forehead, framing his face as he looked down at a textbook deep in concentration, maybe biting his pouty bottom lip in deep thought. Or maybe he would be grading papers as I came to visit him at his personal office. I would lock the door behind me and sit on his lap. He would sigh in pretend irritation, claiming he needed to get his grading done but ultimately he would be unable to resist me. Maybe we would knock the clutter off of his desk or maybe he would take me right on top of all of the papers on his desk. I would wear a skirt so it would that much easier for him. I would keep the glasses on so he would have to look down at me through the glass as we made love on his desk. And I was letting my mind wander to a dirty place in the middle of a life or death situation. It was becoming a terrible habit. I mentally filed those thoughts away to bring up at a later time. I didn't even know I had a thing for professors! I was hanging out with Nevada too much.
"Maybe not now," The voice whispered, sounding pensive, almost as if speaking to herself rather than us. Welcome to the club.
A chill ran through my body, just how ancient was this creature whatever it was.
"If we agree, we won't be deactivating her card," Nevada warned.
"I wouldn't expect you to do so," The voice agreed. "Do we have a deal?"
My immediate thought was NO!
Deals with the devil were a double-edged sword.
"What happens if we don't answer all three riddle correctly," I asked.
"Well I eat you of course, not the ice dragon, dragon meat is rather tough but I haven't one of you in many years," The voice went loud at the end, warbling toward me in a loud croon full of longing. "Delicious."
"Deliciousness aside, if we answer them correctly, you'll give us the correct scrolls and or documents pertaining to my origins or powers and let us leave without alerting to Concilium of our presence?" I asked.
"Yes, this is bordering on tedious and redundant now," The voice said.
"I want the terms
laid out clearly," I explained, not deterred in the slightest.
"Not a bad idea, three correctly answered riddles for three correct scrolls, three wrong answers and you become a tasty long-awaited snack," The voice laid out. "I won't even try to sabotage you, I do so enjoy when my playthings sabotage themselves."
"You don't have a problem with any of that?" I asked Nevada gesturing my hand towards the voice.
"No, we are obviously going to get them right, I mean it's you and I," Nevada grinned. "How could we go wrong?"
My heart warmed at his words. Nevada wasn't the kind of guy who gave you false words of affection and compliments just because. He wasn't a false flatterer who just complimented to get something he wanted or out of habit. When he said something like that it was a true compliment. His terms of affection were few and far between and that just made them mean all the more. In stilted apathetic Nevada-speak, he had just told me he loved me.