The Invisible Library

by Cogman, Genevieve

  Kai’s shoulders slumped. ‘Sure,’ he said flatly. ‘As you say.’

  Irene resolved to apologize later – well, to some extent – and turned to slap the mission briefing against the door. The solid metal rang softly, like a distant bell, then reechoed again, chiming back until the room was full of distant harmonies.

  Kai edged closer, apparently willing to drop the sulks for a moment. ‘What would’ve happened if that had been faked?’

  ‘It wouldn’t have sounded half as nice,’ Irene replied. She tucked the briefing back into her pocket, then reached down to turn the door handle. It moved easily, swinging open to let her and Kai through into another room full of books, glass cases, and flaring gaslamps.

  The room had the indefinable air of all museum collections, somehow simultaneously fascinating yet forlorn. Manuscripts lay beneath glass cases, the gold leaf on their illuminations and illustrations gleaming in the gas-light. A single document was spread out on a desk in the centre of the room, next to a modern-looking notepad and pen. The high arched ceiling had cobwebs in the corners, and dust lurked in the crevices of the panelled walls. Next to the Library entrance was a rattletrap machine, all clockwork and gears and sparking wires, with a primitive-looking printer mechanism and vacuum tubes attached.

  Kai looked around the room. ‘Do we ring a bell or anything?’

  ‘We probably don’t need to,’ Irene said. She closed the door behind them, and heard it audibly lock itself. ‘I imagine Mr Aubrey has already been alerted. Librarians watching fixed Traverses like this one don’t leave them unguarded.’

  There was a ping. Several vacuum tubes on the mechanical contraption lit up and the printer juddered into motion, spitting out a long paper tape, letter by letter.

  Kai picked it up and looked at it. ‘Welcome,’ he read out. ‘Please make yourselves comfortable and I will be with you—’

  The printer came to a halt with a grinding, permanent sort of noise.

  ‘Shortly, I hope,’ Irene said.

  ‘This is cool.’ Kai began to wander round the manuscripts, peering at them. ‘Look, this one says it’s an original of Keats’s Lamia, though I’m not sure what it’s doing in Classical Manuscripts in that case—’

  ‘That would be because I’m cross-referencing it with the Plutarch material.’ The door at the far end of the room had swung open to reveal a middle-aged, dark-skinned man. ‘Good day. I’m Dominic Aubrey. The action of seeing you is a pleasure,’ he added in the Language.

  ‘The action of conversing with you is a pleasure,’ Irene replied. ‘I’m Irene. This is Kai. We’re here about the 1812 Grimm manuscript.’ She was conscious of Kai frowning, and remembered from her pre-initiation days how strange the Language could sound. Listeners who weren’t trained in it heard it in their native language, but with a certain unplaceable accent. Librarians, of course, heard it for what it was, which made it an ideal tool for cross-checks and passwords and countersigns. Like this.

  Dominic Aubrey nodded. ‘I’d invite you to take a seat, but there’s only one chair. Please lean wherever suits you.’ He fiddled nervously with his glasses, pushing them back up on the bridge of his nose, then brushed at his coat. He was in what looked like vaguely Victorian-period garb from the most common timelines. His regalia included the standard white shirt and stiff collar, with a black frock coat, waistcoat and trousers. His straight hair was tied back in a crisp tail, reaching halfway down between his shoulder-blades. ‘The situation has, um, developed a bit since I last sent in a report.’

  Irene leaned against the edge of the desk, making an effort not to look condemnatory, judgemental, or recriminatory. However much she might feel it. ‘I quite understand. This is a chaos-infested world, after all. Perhaps if you’d give us the briefing from the beginning?’ She glanced at Kai, and he nodded in acceptance, waiting for her to take the lead.

  ‘All right.’ Dominic sat down in his chair, folded his arms, and leaned forward. ‘I originally found out about the Grimm first edition after the death of Edward Bonhomme, when it came into circulation. He was a local property owner and bibliophile. Owned a nice selection of slums and made a very good profit out of them, and put the money into his books. Unfortunately, he was a hoarder of the worst sort. Never invited anyone round, never even let anyone look at his books, just kept them all locked away and gloated over them. You know the sort?’

  ‘I’ve had to visit a few people like that,’ Irene agreed. ‘Anything suspicious about his death?’

  Dominic shrugged. ‘He fell downstairs, broke his neck and was found by the housekeeper in the morning. He was in his eighties, bought the cheapest candles on the market, and the stair carpet was threadbare. A lot of people did quite well out of his death, but none of them seem to have had a significant motive. The police treated it as an accident and it was left as such.’

  Irene nodded. ‘So, the book?’

  ‘It went up for auction after Bonhomme’s death, with some others of his collection. The money was to endow a scholarship in his name at Oxford. Typical post-death snobbery.’ He sighed. ‘Anyhow. Word got round fast and the bidding went up very quickly. It was bought by Lord Wyndham. He’s – he was, rather – more of a general collector of expensive trifles than an actual bibliophile, but the price on the book and the society interest made it something he wanted for his collection. And he got it.’

  ‘He was, you say.’ Irene had a growing feeling of doom.

  ‘Ah, yes. Precisely. Someone staked him a couple of days ago.’

  ‘Staked.’

  ‘He was a vampire. They used the traditional methods, you know. A stake through the heart, cutting off the head, inserting garlic in the mouth . . . though, to be fair, leaving his head impaled on the railings outside the front door, where all his party guests could see it, could be considered a little extreme.’

  ‘And the book then went missing, right?’

  ‘Yes!’ Dominic said brightly. ‘How did you guess?’

  Kai raised a hand. ‘Excuse me. Are vampires considered a normal part of society here?’

  ‘Mm, well.’ Dominic held up a finger. ‘Being a vampire or werewolf isn’t illegal in itself. Assaulting or murdering someone due to vampiric or werewolf urges is . . . As ever, having lots of money helps ease the rules. Lord Wyndham had a great deal of money.’

  Irene nodded. ‘So he was murdered – staked, that is – at his party, and someone stole the book?’

  ‘The plot thickens.’ Dominic raised his finger again. ‘A notorious cat burglar was observed escaping from the mansion that evening. Now while she’s never been known to kill anyone before, it seems a bit of a coincidence that she should just happen to be burgling the house on the same night Lord Wyndham was murdered.’

  Irene nodded. ‘She was seen escaping, you say?’

  ‘Dramatically. She leapt from the roof of the house to catch a ladder dangling from a passing zeppelin.’

  ‘Wait. Zeppelins?’

  ‘It’s part of the scientific ethos of this place. Zeppelins, death rays – they haven’t quite got those working properly yet, though – and other instruments of destruction. Also they have biomutations, clockwork technology, electrical healthcare spas . . .’

  Irene glanced at Kai. He was wearing an expression combining acute interest with admiring attention. ‘I told you I dislike chaos infestations?’ she asked. ‘This is why.’

  ‘But zeppelins are neat,’ Kai protested. ‘We couldn’t have any in my old alternate because of the pollution, but I guess they’d be kind of cool. Up there in the sky, tossed by the winds, driving across the curve of the world with the lands and seas spread out beneath you . . .’

  ‘Falling a very long way down,’ Irene added.

  He just looked at her.

  ‘I do apologize,’ she said hastily to Dominic. ‘Please go on. Tell us about this cat burglar.’

  ‘They call her Belphegor,’ Dominic said. He seemed more amused than annoyed by their interruptions. ‘She’s tall. Very
tall. Apparently she wears a black leather catsuit and a golden mask.’

  ‘Any details on the mask?’

  ‘I think people are usually too busy looking at the black leather catsuit.’

  Irene sighed. ‘So we have an incredibly glamorous female cat burglar who slinks around in a black leather catsuit, who kills vampires in her spare time?’

  ‘I’ll tackle her,’ Kai said enthusiastically.

  Irene raised an eyebrow. ‘How do you know that I don’t want to tackle her?’

  ‘Do you?’

  ‘Involvements with glamorous female cat burglars never end up well.’

  ‘And you’ve had some?’

  ‘One,’ Irene said, and hoped that she wasn’t blushing too badly.

  ‘Oh, you’re that Irene,’ Dominic said in tones of surprise. ‘I remember Coppelia telling me about it now. Didn’t you end up having some sort of showdown in the middle of a reception and—’

  Irene held up a hand. ‘Could we possibly concentrate on the current problem? Please?’

  ‘It’s a pleasure to see that you’re taking to this so cheerfully,’ Dominic remarked. ‘Now some junior Librarians would be running for the Traverse at this point and trying to ditch the job. But not you. No, I can see you’re up for the task and all eager to go.’ He smiled toothily.

  Irene took a deep breath. ‘I’m looking on it as a challenge,’ she said blandly. And I’m damned if I’m going to let Bradamant manage this instead of me.

  Kai raised a hand. ‘May I ask a question?’

  ‘Please do,’ Dominic said.

  ‘Do you have any sort of dossiers about this place that we can read up on?’

  Dominic nodded. ‘I’ve a rough set of notes on current affairs, history, geography, all of that. I’ve also set up some spare identities, both male and female, for when I have Librarians visiting. I’ll sign over a couple of these to you, together with funding and so on. Don’t worry, I’m not going to hang you out to dry. I just wanted to see how you’d react to the situation.’

  ‘Frankly,’ Irene said, ‘it sounds like a penny dreadful.’

  ‘Frankly,’ Dominic said, ‘it is.’

  Irene sighed. ‘Well. So Lord Wyndham is dead, and not even undead any longer. The book is presumed stolen by the cat burglar Belphegor, and – there is more, I take it?’

  ‘Not much,’ Dominic said apologetically. ‘All this was only a couple of days ago, you understand. The newspapers are still buzzing about it. In fact, if you want to be researching the story for your cover . . .’

  ‘Good point,’ Irene agreed. ‘What’s the gender situation here?’

  ‘Women are generally accepted in most trades, except as serving soldiers in the army. They often end up in engineering divisions there. Nothing unusual about a female reporter, though they often end up with the high society and scandal pages. So that’ll be entirely appropriate.’

  ‘So is there magic?’

  ‘Not per se,’ Dominic said slowly, ‘though we have vampires, werewolves, and other supernatural creatures and so on. I’ve got a theory that the weird technology of this place is actually a structural evolution of what would elsewhere have manifested as directed magic, but I can’t prove it.’

  Irene nodded. ‘Do you have any theories about the lack of draconic interference?’

  Dominic snorted. ‘Typical bureaucratic miscomprehension in summarizing my reports. The dragons don’t intervene here because they don’t need to. There may be a high level of chaos infestation, but there are also a lot of natural spirits inherent to the local order buzzing around the place – metaphorically speaking, that is – and they seem to be acting as a counterweight. In fact,’ he said enthusiastically, ‘I think we have grounds here for an entire study on how a high level of magic in a world responds to a chaos infestation by working in non-chaotic ways. So, the natural order is reinforced via technology with weird science, and also strengthened supernaturally. The latter happens via a hierarchical structure of guardian spirits and fundamental reinforcement—’

  ‘But you can’t get the funding for it?’ Irene said sympathetically, before he could get any further.

  Dominic slumped. ‘Philistines,’ he muttered.

  Kai raised his hand again. ‘So, theoretically, would these local spirits be a useful source of information? I mean, I’ve been stuck in the Library for the last five years, I know the theory, but not how you go about it in practice . . .’

  ‘Good thinking,’ Irene said, but then she saw Dominic frowning. ‘Why, is there a problem?’

  ‘They can be dangerous,’ Dominic said. He fussed with his glasses again. ‘I wouldn’t recommend it as a primary option. To be frank, I haven’t had much chance to investigate things myself – my cover, you know. There’s only so much that I can get away with as Head of Classical Manuscripts. You’ll probably be able to find out more at ground level.’

  Irene nodded. ‘We’ll keep it as a fall-back option, then. Do you have any local Language updates that I should be aware of?’

  ‘I’ve put them in the briefing,’ Dominic promised. ‘There aren’t many, though. The vocab is all fairly generic. A vampire’s a vampire as you’d expect, fangs and all etc. Actually, if you want to wait here, I’ll go and fetch the documentation, and then the two of you can slip out and get to work.’

  Kai looked down at his clothing. ‘Like this?’ he asked.

  ‘You’ll have to claim to be barbarian visitors from Canada,’ Dominic said cheerfully. ‘I do have some clothing for emergencies, but under the circumstances you can pass for students until you can buy some clothing that fits you better. You’ll just need some overcoats until you can get to a shop.’ He stood up, brushing his hands together again. ‘I’ll be back in a moment. Don’t fret.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Irene said, suppressing a sigh of relief, but he was already out of the door. Perhaps his quick exit was due to embarrassment. Helping visiting Librarians maintain a low profile was supposed to be part of the Librarian-in-Residence’s job, after all. It usually involved a little more than ‘here’s an overcoat and there’s the nearest shop’. She considered prospective excuses for the shopkeeper. I’m terribly sorry, but we just had all our luggage stolen while disembarking from the ocean liner . . .

  Kai stretched and looked around restlessly. ‘Do you suppose barbarian Canadians wear jeans?’

  ‘I hope female Canadian barbarians wear trousers,’ Irene said drily. ‘They’re easier to run in.’

  Kai turned to face her. ‘Have you ever seen a really bad chaos infestation?’ he asked.

  ‘No,’ she said quietly. ‘Only mild ones. But I’ve heard things. I knew someone who went into one, once. I saw some of his reports.’

  There’s something addictive about it, he’d written. The world itself seems so much more logical and plausible. There’s a feeling that everything makes sense, and I know this is only because the world itself is shaping to fit the gestalt, but you wouldn’t believe how comfortable it makes me feel.

  Kai snapped his fingers in front of her face, and she blinked at him. ‘Ahem. You could at least share with me, rather than sit there and brood about it and figure that you’re protecting me or something.’

  ‘You do rate yourself highly,’ Irene said, trying not to feel irritated. ‘All right. You remember the stages of infestation? Affective, intuitive, assumptive and conglomerative?’

  Kai nodded. ‘From what you and Dominic were saying, this world is affective going on intuitive, right? So the theory suggests it’s being warped, and it would then reach the stage where things tend to fall into narrative patterns. So instead of natural order prevailing, events start taking on the kind of rhythm or logic you might find in fiction or fairy tales. Which could be terrifying. But it must be hard to spot, surely, as even in order-based worlds fact can prove stranger than fiction . . . It isn’t fully there yet, is it?’

  ‘No. And that’s interesting. It makes me think that Dominic’s got a point with his theory that order
is being asserted. I wish I understood more of it.’ Irene pushed away from the desk, and began to wander round the room, staring absently at the various glass display cases. ‘Now if a world could be stalled at this point, so it didn’t head further into chaos, it’d be useful to know how it’s done. We don’t know how many worlds there are, so we don’t know how many we lose to chaos. But we lose enough that we do know about. And the dragons aren’t interested in talking to us about how they do whatever it is that they do.’

  Kai coughed. ‘Just like we aren’t interested in talking to them about how we do what we do?’

  Irene turned to look at him. Witheringly, she hoped. ‘Do you think you’re the first person to have made that argument?’

  ‘Course not.’ He shrugged. ‘Fact remains, though. We don’t talk.’

  ‘I met one once,’ Irene said.

  ‘What did you talk about?’

  ‘He complimented me on my literary taste.’

  Kai blinked. ‘Doesn’t sound like a life-threatening sort of conversation.’

  Irene shrugged. ‘Well, he was the one who got the scroll we were both after. You see, there was this—’ She saw him glance away. ‘Oh, never mind.’

  There was this room full of fabulous woods and bone, and I’d been escorted there by a couple of servants, and I was honestly afraid that I was going to be killed. I’d trespassed on his private property. I’d negotiated with one of his barons for that scroll without realizing it. I’d been dropped in the deep end and I was sinking fast.

  ‘I don’t mean to pry,’ Kai said unconvincingly.

  He looked almost human. He had scales in the hollows of his cheeks and on the backs of his hands, as fine as feathers or hair. He had claws, manicured to a mother-of-pearl sheen. He had horns. His eyes were like gems in his face. His skin was the colour of fire, and yet it seemed natural; my own skin was blotchy and dull in comparison.

  ‘There isn’t much to tell,’ Irene said. ‘He let me go.’

  He discussed the poems in the scroll. He complimented me on my taste. He explained that he did not expect to see me or any other representative of the Library in that area again. I nodded and bowed and thanked him for his kindness.