by A J Hackwith
A flutter of unease intruded on Brevity’s happiness. “That’s why the corps sent you here, really.”
“In a way, yes.” Probity appeared able to read the alarm in Brevity’s face and shook her head. “I volunteered, though. I’ve missed you. Are you— How are you?” Brevity let out a shaky sigh and didn’t even have to put words to it. Probity made a tsking noise and guided her by the shoulder. “Enough work. Sit.”
“But I was going to make tea—”
“I’ll do it. Isn’t that what you have your assistant for?”
“Hero’s my assistant.”
“Hero is a character and a book.” A streak of awe shored up the pity in Probity’s voice. “He’s a treasure and a tragedy to be sure, but you can’t expect him to care for you as I could.”
“You haven’t exactly caught us at our best, you know.” Brevity allowed herself to be manhandled onto the couch with minimal argument.
“Then it is a good thing I’m here to care for both of you,” Probity said as she placed the pot on the warmer. “You took care of me enough when we were young—won’t you let me return the favor?”
“Oh. It’s just—you came at an awkward time. I’m thrilled to see you—” And, gods, she was. Probity had been like a little sister as a half-grown muse. Following Brevity around, her fierce shadow. Seeing her grown made a quiet ache form in her chest, a kind of homesickness. “But . . . the ink, Claire . . . the Library. I don’t know what to do.”
“That’s why I’m here.” Probity’s smile was firm with resolve. “To help you.”
A distant voice in her head—one that sounded posh and stern and Claire-like—advised caution at such a grand statement. But this was Probity, as close to family as Brevity had ever had. Probity didn’t lie—it wasn’t in her nature. If she was here to help her, then she was. “After the fire, all the peop—all the books we lost. I thought—I thought we failed. But now, this ink—” She wasn’t making much sense. Brevity sensed with relief that Probity didn’t care. “It can’t be just a coincidence. It is the books we lost, isn’t it? The stories, I mean. Can we get them back? The stories that we destroyed?” Brevity asked, leaning forward. “Is it possible?”
“Destroyed?” Probity blinked. She stilled a moment, gaze flicking up and down Brevity with a new assessment before her hands came up in an aborted comforting gesture. Instead she fetched the steeped tea and pressed a cup of it into Brevity’s hands. “Oh. Oh, sis. You didn’t destroy them.”
It was too much. It was all too much. The fear for the damsels, the ink, the argument with Claire, and now the appearance of her lost family, telling her the one thing she wished was true. Heat welled up and Brevity’s vision blurred. “What do you mean? The books—”
The memory clogged her throat. She’d seen them. Seen the pages curl in translucent flames, been the last one to catch a glimpse of their words, ash on black. Heard the crack of leather, the smell like burnt flesh. And then she’d held small cold hands, as so many damsels faded away, drifting to death on a shiver of ash. She’d seen them go. And afterward she’d sobbed herself empty as they gathered and interred what ashes they could. Breathing in the soot of lost stories. Leto had hugged her, though he wasn’t supposed to touch anyone by then. And then she lost him too.
Probity had wrapped an arm around her and didn’t say a word. Brevity got herself under control, even if her voice was thin as paper as she repeated, “What do you mean?”
“You didn’t destroy them,” Probity repeated gently. “What happened was a travesty. That, that woman”—Probity’s comforting pats turned a little more forceful as she mentioned Claire—“she was not fit to hold the title of a librarian. She barely is fit to hold the title of a human. The things she did, that she allowed to be done. But even she can’t destroy a story.”
It was true that Claire had sunk into a fierce, hurtful isolation when she’d taken the title of librarian. Hiding her own hurts, she’d become rigid with the rules and exacting in enforcing them. She’d been harsh and cold when Brevity had joined the Library. But hadn’t they all changed since then? Brevity barely knew where to start, but old loyalty rose first. “Claire worked harder than anyone. She was a—”
“She treated you horribly!” There was earnest anger there, and Probity’s voice was harder now than when she’d spoken of the books. “That’s why you were sent here, wasn’t it? For punishment. I can’t imagine how hard it was. Sis . . .” Probity searched her face with a deep, earnest kind of sympathy.
Brevity started to shake her head. “But it wasn’t—”
“But even a bad librarian can’t destroy stories. They’re made of stronger stuff than that.” The smile on Probity’s lips was brief before dropping into a darker expression. “Only the living can kill a story. Humans do it every day.”
The animosity in Probity’s soft voice was a velvet razor, the threat of which was impossible to miss. A cutting change, swift and harsh as a rockfall, came across her expression. But Brevity was distracted by what else she was saying. “You’re saying the damsels—the unwritten books—are still alive.”
Probity shook her head. “‘Alive’ is . . . a funny way to put it. No, the books are destroyed and gone, but the stories . . . the potential . . . that’s preserved in the ink. And that’s the powerful part.”
Claire had said something similar, and the way the ink had swarmed and fluxed on the log page certainly seemed like a living thing. Brevity’s gaze strayed to where the logbook rested, closed and inert on the massive librarian’s desk. Brevity still thought of it as Claire’s desk. “We could bring them back?”
“I thought that small, too, at first,” Probity whispered, drawing Brevity’s attention back. She was shaking her head with some kind of deep empathy. “We’re taught to think that small. But seeing the ink work the wonders it did . . . that it exists is a miracle. It’s a sign. You have the Library now—and the support of the Muse Corps. Think about it, sis! We can do more than just restore the way things were.”
We. Being a “we” with the muses again; longing for that warred with the caution still echoing in Brevity’s head. “Like what?”
Probity’s bottom lip worried and caught between her teeth, seeming to hesitate over her words. She took a breath. “New books, fresh books. We would replace what the Library lost and more.” There was a hopeful, sunrise kind of light in Probity’s gray eyes, like her entire face was blooming. It brightened her, brought to mind old games and pranks they’d played, and made Brevity smile.
“Like, new stories? Brand-new? How could that be possible? Which humans—”
“It’s possible.” Probity clutched her hands in front of her, almost as if she were still that little sister. Sisters, sharing a secret daydream. “New stories, recovered stories. Who knows what else? But first we need a sample of the ink to experiment.”
That snapped over Brevity like a flinch of frost. She straightened. “No more experiments. Claire and I already tried. You saw what happened. It rejected the paper straight out.”
Probity thought about that for a moment, growing solemn and certain. “Then next time we don’t try paper.”
There were so many options, Brevity had trouble deciding which part of that sentence alarmed her more. As she passed Probity’s shoulder, she caught a glancing wisp of emerald and periwinkle near the Library doors. That was a color combination she’d recognize anywhere. “Oh, Hero! Over here.”
A moment later, the man himself appeared in the doorway. His step hesitated as he noticed Probity, but he continued over to them with a shake of his head. “I don’t know how you always hear me coming.”
His book might have rejected him, but he still streamed colors like any unwritten book in her eyes. Brevity chewed on the grin that threatened. “Just a muse thing, I guess.” She turned her head to share her amusement with Probity, but a change had come over the younger muse. The excited look sh
e’d had while explaining her dream to Brevity, the soft way she’d talked about the plight of stories, had turned pitying with the presence of one. Probity’s eyes lingered on Hero as he approached, and she tensed from what Brevity could only guess were nerves.
“Everything all right downstairs?” Brevity asked lightly.
“Claire has the Watcher locking up artifacts,” Hero said with a brief disapproving purse of his lips.
“Don’t be afraid. She can’t touch you anymore,” Probity reassured him a little too intensely. Hero gave her an odd look.
“Ah . . . yes. The monster is dead. I can finally sleep soundly.” Probity didn’t appear to catch the droll twist of Hero’s reply. She’d never been adept at sarcasm. Brevity quietly winced inside. Hero shrugged. “I suppose locking things up is what a librarian is best at.”
“She is not the librarian,” Probity said before Brevity could answer. She pinned Hero with a pitying look. “As a book you know that.”
“Do I? Thank you for the reminder. But as assistant librarian,” Hero said through a sharp-toothed smile, “I know how closely the Unwritten Wing and the Arcane Wing collaborate.”
“Tea, Hero?” Brevity interrupted, before Hero could further sharpen his tongue on Probity’s misplaced pity. She snatched the pot Probity had brewed off the stand. “Have some tea, Prob.”
“No, thank you,” Hero said while Probity accepted a cup. He gave Brevity a cautious glance. “I thought I’d spend some time in the stacks. Inventory, see if there’s anything the damsels need.”
Brevity wasn’t sure which was more suspect: Hero volunteering for inventory or Hero concerned for the damsels. She was not stupid, but it was obvious Hero wanted an excuse to avoid Brevity and her guest for a while.
She nodded assent and pointed to the cart loaded with books. “Those go back to the children’s fantasy section, please.”
Hero approached the cart, glanced at a title, and made a face. “Imaginary-friend stories. Why are these even books? I hate it when they wake up.”
“That’s why we shelve them quietly.”
Hero sniffed and kicked the cart ahead of him, in the direction of the stacks. “As you say. You’re the boss.” It never sounded the same when he said it. Less like a title and more like a reminder of what she wasn’t and never would be. Had it been the same for Claire?
“He’s forgotten his book,” Probity said contemplatively into the silence Hero’s departure left behind. “It’s a terrible tragedy for one to carry.”
“Hero’s making the best of it.” Probity hadn’t precisely said anything malicious, but Brevity felt a surge of protective instinct. “He’s learning fast.”
“And moving farther and farther away from his story.” Probity shook her head with a distant look in her eyes. “It’d almost have been kinder if he’d burned.”
Brevity’s stomach recoiled and brought her out of her chair. “Don’t say that.”
“I’m sorry. I know it’s not what anyone wants to hear, but the truth rarely is,” Probity reminded her, a pitying look in her eyes. “Think of it, sis. He’ll never be written, and now he doesn’t even have the company of his own kind in his story. He exists simply as a reminder of the Library’s failure to protect him.”
That pierced a little too close to the darker spots in Brevity’s heart. “I’m trying to take care of everyone,” she said softly.
“Oh, sis, not you.” Probity looked far more abashed than she had when talking about Hero. She stood and touched Brevity’s arm apologetically. “You are doing everything right. You are setting so much right. You shouldn’t even be here. I simply meant he’ll never have his story, a character without an ending. What kind of life is that? At least loss is decisive.”
The oily feeling in Brevity’s gut was a mix of horror and old wounds. There was some truth in what Probity said—there was always some truth, but Brevity had learned long ago that some truth was not all truth. “Stop it. You weren’t there. The fire, when it took the books . . .” She gulped down the bile that threatened to rise and squeezed her eyes closed until her stomach behaved itself.
“You saw one fire,” Probity said quietly. “I’ve seen them all.”
Brevity opened her eyes to question that but stopped. Probity was already lost in thought, looking into the shadows of the Library but seeing something else.
“They burn them first, the stories. Humans always come for the stories first. It’s their warm-up, before they start burning other humans. It’s their first form of control, to burn the libraries, to burn the books, to burn the archives of a culture. Humans are the stories they tell. If you want to destroy your enemy, destroy their stories. Even if the people survive, it will be as if they never existed at all.”
Brevity chewed on her lip. “Humans do a lotta terrible things during war—”
“War,” Probity said, and it was caught somewhere between amusement and agony. “Shall we revisit the peacetime burning, then? Libraries censored and burned, the stories that died and were forgotten by accident, by neglect, by ignorance, by—and here, the most notorious peacetime murderer of all—by piety. Books burned because they threatened Bronze Age beliefs and scared old men in long robes. I’m not sure if humans have sacrificed more ink than blood to their gods over the years, but if not, it has to be a near thing.”
No one liked to speak about the books that were lost, especially muses. Brevity knew it, had mourned along with the others as each precious story they’d ushered to the page was destroyed. Each story that’d managed to get out of the Unwritten Wing only to fall to nothing. It was like a midwife losing entire villages of children to war and ignorance. At least while they’d remained in the Unwritten Wing, they’d been possible. After a story was written and burned . . . there was only one fate for that. Each one hurt. And then each one had raged, and then . . . somewhere along the way . . .
“It’s why you did what you did, wasn’t it?” Probity glanced up, and it wasn’t accusation in her eyes now; it was understanding.
To her credit, Probity’s gaze didn’t waver, didn’t drop to Brevity’s folded arms. The ghostly scars of gilt twitched, as if knowing it had been summoned. Brevity still remembered it, remembered when the loops and curls of magic hadn’t been on her skin but in her hands, strands of pure inspiration, a human’s inspiration. The giddy feeling of holding the seeds of a story. She had delivered it to unknowing humans a thousand times before, but that time . . .
That time she hadn’t.
The betrayal had taken only an instant. Hands clutching, feeling the cool-warm flutter under her palms as she pressed the inspiration close to her chest. It’d fluxed, a bare moment of protest before finding her skin and flowing. No flash of brilliance hit her, no genius inspiration of her own—of course not; it wasn’t hers—but the strands of inspiration had wrapped seamlessly over the skin of her arm and stayed.
There wasn’t a law against stealing inspiration from a human, but then again, there wasn’t a law only because it was unthinkable. Not just a crime; a moral travesty. Brevity had been expelled, the first muse to ever have her duty revoked. She’d been cast out and sent to the Unwritten Wing, where she could perhaps do no more harm and, the muses had likely thought, be tortured by the presence of stillborn stories she couldn’t touch.
“So, you know,” Probity was saying at barely a whisper, as if knowing she was intruding on Brevity’s worst memories. “You have to know. We should serve the stories, not the humans. They’ve been a necessity for a long time, but they’re flawed. Humans aren’t worthy of the stories we bring them.”
“What?” Brevity shook her head. “That’s not—”
“You can’t think of a different way it could be, but look at it, at least! The whole system is wrong. Why do we expend realms’ worth of effort—the Library, the books, the muses, all of us—to try to entrust our most precious gifts to the most callous, plod
ding, destructive mortal creatures? Tell me how that makes sense!”
Brevity hesitated. “Humans are special; they can create stories—”
“And destroy them.”
“But humanity, creation, takes a human soul.”
“Does it?” Probity asked, and the question had such a fine razor point that Brevity stopped.
“What do you mean, ‘Does it?’”
“Does it really take humans to make a story? Yes, they spin up the pieces, but they seem to need an awful lot of help from us.” Probity paused and leaned closer, hesitant, as if there were a bubble between them that might break with the slightest wrong word. “What if we took them back? We could skip the middleman. What if the stories were ours?”
Brevity’s world flipped. She took a shaky breath and shook her head. “No, when I stole the inspiration I didn’t get any of the story. It’s not possible.”
“Maybe not from the inspiration. It’s too distilled, the wrong form to work with. We’d need something closer to the end goal,” Probity said thoughtfully.
Brevity stared at her. “The ink. That’s why you were so excited about the ink. I already told you, it’s impossible.” When Probity said nothing, Brevity’s brow furrowed. “But how would that even work?”
Not could but would. Brevity realized the mistake after she said it. Probity met her gaze cautiously, hopefully. “It would just take a small sample to try. I have some ideas, if you’d help me. You and me, Brev. Don’t you remember how that used to be?”
That was the difficult part: of course Brevity remembered. She’d always felt better working with someone rather than alone. And helping train Probity had been the best of her memories as a muse. Working together, struggling together, wondering together. Probity had been so studious and good at anchoring down Brevity’s wild leaps of ideas, the same way—oh, and there it was. Memories blurred from working with Probity to working with Claire in the Library.
“No,” Brevity said, more to herself than anyone else. Even her own ears didn’t believe it. “That’s not what the Library is for.”