Inside it was a frozen mirror, the icicles so long that they had merged and formed a translucent pedestal. Frost crystals swirled around the mirror as though a blizzard howled behind the case’s glass.
“We are in the Hall of Forbidden Arts,” Mistress Wick explained. “Every artifact in this place was banned a hundred and fifty years ago by the Reforms. They are relics of an era past, preserved to remind us of what once was.” She moved toward the case, holding out her hand. She traced her fingers across the plaque. After a moment, Elisabeth realized she was reading the engraved letters by touch. “This is a scrying mirror,” she said, drawing her hand away, “created by the sorcerers of old, with which one can gaze through all the mirrors of this world. It is believed to be the last of its kind. The rest were confiscated and destroyed, and no one knows how to make them any longer.”
Elisabeth inched closer. “Is the mirror dangerous?”
“Knowledge always has the potential to be dangerous. It is a more powerful weapon than any sword or spell.”
“But the mirror is magical. Sorcery.” Elisabeth knew she shouldn’t say more, but she yearned for answers, not only about the mirror, but about the change taking place within her heart. “Shouldn’t that automatically make it evil?”
Mistress Wick sharply turned her head, and she immediately regretted asking. Yet the Deputy Director only placed her hand on Elisabeth’s shoulder and ushered her away, moving with such surety that it was obvious she could navigate the hall on her own. Elisabeth was the one being guided through this dangerous place, not the other way around.
“Some would say so,” Mistress Wick said. “But there is always more than one way to see the world. Those who claim otherwise would have you dwell forever in the dark.”
The armory lay at the far end of the Hall of Forbidden Arts, guarded by two statues who held their spears crossed in front of its ironbound doors. Mistress Wick flashed them her Collegium pin, and they lifted their spears away. The doors groaned open without a touch.
Elisabeth stared in amazement. Beams of sunlight fell from high upon cloaks and swords and canisters, and even upon archaic suits of armor that stood at attention along the pillars, their metal polished to a high shine. A line of statues arrayed along the back appeared to have been used for weapons practice; they had chunks missing here and there, and weary expressions frozen onto their faces. Only one person was in the room. A boy stood at a trestle table near the center, spooning piles of salt onto the centers of scraps of fabric. The completed product formed small round bundles, like coin purses, tied shut with twine. He looked up as they entered and offered Elisabeth a friendly smile.
“Good afternoon, Parsifal,” said Mistress Wick. “Elisabeth, Junior Librarian Parsifal will make sure you are outfitted for duty.”
“Hullo,” said Parsifal. Elisabeth liked him at once. He looked about nineteen, his pale blue robes belted over a plump stomach. He had a pleasant face, and a short thatch of blond hair that stuck up in places.
After Mistress Wick left, he bustled around the armory fetching items and laying them out for her on an empty section of the table: a leather belt, covered in loops and pouches, and a hooded white wool cloak, which was stamped on the back with a key and quill, and lined on the inside with a thin layer of chain mail.
“I had no idea I would be able to wear something like this,” she said, reverently touching the cloak.
“Even servants have their own uniforms here,” Parsifal replied proudly. “Though of course, it’s mostly out of necessity. If you’re going to work in the Royal Library, you need to be wearing iron—especially these days, with everything that’s going on. Now, these are called salt rounds,” he said, demonstrating how to hang the salt bundles on her belt, and how the thin fabric burst when flung against the flagstones, releasing an explosion of salt into the air. “If you ever run into trouble, using them should buy you enough time to run and alert a warden.”
“Do I get a greatkey as well?” she asked hopefully, glancing at the two keys on Parsifal’s key ring. Librarians earned the second when they graduated from apprentice to junior librarian.
He gave her an apologetic look. “Afraid not. Security reasons, and all that. You’ll have to knock on the staff door at the beginning of your shift, and someone will let you in. . . .” He frowned thoughtfully, looking past her. “Say, is that your cat?”
Elisabeth turned, confused. A fluffy white cat sat on the floor behind her, staring up at them with yellow eyes. It was quite small for a fully grown cat; it could be a kitten, she thought, or perhaps it was just dainty. And strange . . . those yellow eyes looked terribly familiar. . . .
Her heart skipped a beat. “Yes,” she choked out, seeing no other option. “That is—my cat.”
“It’s all right,” Parsifal assured her. “Cats are always welcome in the Royal Library. They catch booklice, and they know to stay away from the grimoires. Having a cat with you might even help keep you safe, since they’re so talented at sensing magic.” To her horror, he went over to Silas and picked him up, holding him aloft at eye level. “What a lovely cat you are! Are you a boy, or a girl?”
“He’s a boy,” Elisabeth said hastily, when Parsifal appeared to be about to duck his head and check. “His name is—er—it’s”—she gulped—“Sir Fluffington.”
Dangling from Parsifal’s hands, Silas gave her a look of extreme reproach.
Parsifal beamed. “Lovely,” he repeated. “Well, you can have him back.” He passed Silas over. “I’ll show you around a bit, though don’t worry about learning your way just yet. You’ll have plenty of time to do that during training. First off, this is the Northeast Wing, where all the offices are. . . .”
Elisabeth hung back as Parsifal chattered away, staring aghast at the demon in her arms. His nose and the pads on his paws contrasted pinkly with his snowy fur. He was very fluffy. She felt an alarming urge to press her face against his belly, as though he were truly a cat and not an ancient, immortal being.
“Did Nathaniel send you to make sure I didn’t get into trouble?” she whispered. Silas gave her a slow blink, which seemed to mean “yes.” She scowled. “I’m not going to get caught by Ashcroft. I went sixteen years without seeing a sorcerer in Summershall—I’m not about to run into one here. And in any case, I’ll be wearing a hood.”
“Mew,” said Silas. Even his meow was adorable. Elisabeth shuddered and put him down. He trotted after them, swishing his plumy tail.
Parsifal led her through the remainder of the Northeast Wing, past the reading rooms, and into the central atrium, which could have fit the entire Great Library of Summershall inside. It was a colossal octagonal space from which the four wings branched off beneath arches embellished with bronze scrolls and angels. The domed roof was made of stained glass, deep blue and spangled with constellations. Gracefully sculpted marble stairways ascended to the upper levels, where the shelves rose higher and higher until they grew lost in the dome’s indigo-tinted haze. Librarians bustled across the checkered marble floor, their status differentiated not only by the number of keys on their key ring, but also by the shade of their robes, ranging from light to dark blue.
While Parsifal chattered on, she shut her eyes, letting the echoing, papery murmurings of the grimoires wash over her. She hadn’t realized how badly she’d missed being in a Great Library until now—like something deep inside her, misaligned since leaving Summershall, had shifted back into its proper place. She was home.
She clung to the sensation as Parsifal showed her the statues that moved ladders on command, the tiled map of the library set into the center of the atrium’s floor, and the pneumatic tubes hidden behind the bookshelves that carried messages across the building at lightning speed. While he did so, he explained what she could expect working alongside grimoires.
“You catch on awfully fast,” he said, impressed. “It’s too bad you aren’t an orphan. Oh, that came out wrong. What I mean is, you would’ve made an excellent apprentice.”
The compliment struck Elisabeth like a blow. For a moment she felt disoriented, as though she had been thrown outside her body. When people looked at her now, they didn’t see an apprentice librarian, and certainly not a future warden. Perhaps they were right. After using a forbidden magical artifact and conspiring to steal from the Royal Library, even stopping Ashcroft might not be enough to earn her apprenticeship back. Was this shadow of her former life all she had left?
“Thank you,” she said, gazing at the floor so Parsifal wouldn’t see her expression.
Fortunately, he didn’t notice anything wrong as he ushered her toward the entrance to the Northwest Wing. Foreboding prickled Elisabeth’s skin as they drew near. The angelic figures carved around the archway had skulls beneath their hoods, and the entrance was cordoned off with a velvet rope. Beyond the rope, shadows engulfed the wing. A thick mist spilled across the floor, and low mutterings and whispers chased down the corridor, reverberating from the stone. They seemed to be coming from behind an iron gate that reared from the darkness, over a dozen feet tall, mist swirling around its edges. She dimly heard Parsifal explain that this wing contained the entrance to the vault.
“But what is that gate?” she asked.
“That’s the entrance to the restricted archives. The grimoires inside there are almost dangerous enough for the vault, but not quite. Don’t worry—you won’t be assigned to the Northwest Wing. Now, if we hurry up the South Spire, we might be in time to see the wardens training on the grounds.”
As they turned to go, Silas stared bright-eyed into the wing’s shadows, and she wondered what he saw that she could not.
• • •
When Elisabeth got back to Nathaniel’s house that night, she was so exhausted that she ate supper and fell directly into bed. Then she woke early the next morning and began the fifteen minute walk to the Royal Library through Hemlock Park, Silas trailing after her in the predawn gloom like a cat-shaped ghost. It wasn’t likely that Ashcroft would happen to pass her in a carriage, but just in case, she stayed off the main street and took a circuitous route through hedged-in walking paths and a section of wooded park. She passed only servants plucking breakfast herbs from the backyard gardens, tossing out shovelfuls of soot, and emptying their households’ chamber pots. She felt a squirm of guilty embarrassment upon realizing Silas must normally be responsible for those tasks—though truly, she couldn’t picture him doing them.
The last leg of the walk took her past the Collegium’s grounds. Horses poked their noses out of the stone stables, smelling sweetly of hay and warm bodies. A low-hanging mist silvered the lawn where wardens practiced swordplay. She tried to ignore the ache in her chest at the sight of the dormitories, decorated with gargoyles and ornate gables, where wardens lived when they began their training. Now that she had come to scrub the floors, her dream of joining them seemed as though it belonged to someone else.
Once she reached the servants’ entrance of the Royal Library, she was instantly put to work by an old servant named Gertrude, who supervised her closely as she hauled a soapy bucket across the flagstone floor. Next she swept and dusted an unused reading room, and helped Gertrude carry out the rugs to be beaten. As the day stretched on, frustration simmered beneath her skin. She wouldn’t get any closer to locating the Codex with Gertrude watching her like a hawk. The elderly servant even insisted on taking lunch with her, which eliminated all hope of Elisabeth seizing a chance to sneak off and check the catalogue.
But an opportunity arrived after lunch, when Elisabeth moved an armchair to sweep underneath it, and in doing so disturbed a nest of booklice. The lice went skittering in every direction, gray and chitinous, the young ones no larger than chicken eggs. Elisabeth let out a ferocious cry and began smacking them with her broom. When several fled toward the door, she at last sensed the taste of freedom.
“Slow down, girl!” Gertrude shouted, but Elisabeth pretended not to hear as she dashed around the corner, chasing the lice with her broom lofted like a javelin. Gertrude soon fell behind, wheezing. From there, Elisabeth only had to make a few more turns before she was out of sight.
She checked herself as she entered the atrium, reducing her speed to what she hoped was a purposeful-looking stride. She cut a path through the librarians and ducked behind a pillar. The catalogue room was set into the facet of the octagon opposite the Royal Library’s front doors. All she had to do was sneak inside, go through the catalogue drawers, and find the card with the Codex’s location. But when she peered around the pillar, her spirits plummeted.
The room bustled with activity. Librarians of every rank climbed ladders and consulted each other over desks, overseen by a bespectacled archivist. No one would look at her twice if she were wearing an apprentice’s pale blue robes, but she was certain the archivist would notice her if she went up one of the ladders and started going through the tiny gilded drawers that covered every inch of the walls. And there weren’t many places to hide in there, aside from beneath the desks and behind a few display cases containing grimoires.
She eyed the nearest display case. The grimoire inside looked familiar, and indeed, she recognized it from Summershall, where another copy was on display in the hall outside the reading room. It was an ostentatious-looking Class Four called Madame Bouchard’s Harmonic Cantrips, its cover bracketed in gold and stitched with peacock feathers. Elisabeth’s heart raced as a plan began to unfold within her mind. The only problem was that she couldn’t do it alone.
A throaty growl drew her attention to the nearest section of bookcases. A marmalade-colored cat crouched there, fur standing on end, its tail lashing back and forth. Opposite it sat Silas, looking supremely unconcerned. As the other cat continued to yowl, he raised one of his dainty paws and licked it.
“Silas,” Elisabeth hissed. She went over and scooped him up. The other cat bolted. “I need your help,” she whispered, ignoring the strange look sent to her by a passing apprentice.
Silas gazed at her levelly.
“It’s important,” she tried.
His tail flicked, in a fashion that suggested he was feeling inconvenienced. She suspected he still hadn’t gotten over the Sir Fluffington incident.
“If you leave me to my own devices,” she told him, “I’m likely to get into trouble, and I’m certain Nathaniel wouldn’t appreciate that.”
Silas’s yellow eyes narrowed. Slowly, he blinked.
Elisabeth sagged in relief. “Good. Now, here’s what I need you to do. . . .”
None of the librarians in the catalogue room paid any mind when, a few minutes later, a small white cat trotted inside. Not a soul reacted when he leaped onto one of the desks and minced across it. But they did pay attention when Silas launched himself at the glass display case, knocked it askew, and promptly streaked from the scene, looking for all the world like an ordinary cat that had gotten himself into unexpected trouble. Everyone froze as the case wobbled once—twice—then tumbled to the floor and shattered.
Madame Bouchard’s Harmonic Cantrips seemed to have been waiting its entire life for this moment. It rose gloriously from the wreckage, unfurling a set of paper wings, which were a good seven or eight feet across. As the librarians shielded their heads from its flapping pinions, it spread its pages wide and unleashed a shrill, operatic wail. Desks trembled. Drawers rattled. The archivist’s spectacles cracked. Librarians fled in every direction, covering their ears against the ear-splitting vibrato.
Elisabeth waited until the last librarian emptied out before she darted inside. She set her teeth against the noise—seeing that it possessed an audience, Madame Bouchard had launched into an aria—and glanced around at the drawers. The cataloguing system was different here than in Summershall, and there had to be thousands of drawers altogether. However, she swiftly determined that the drawers were divided into seven different columns, with bronze numerals fixed above them ranging from I to VII. Those had to represent grimoire classes, with classes Eight through Ten omitted from the public catalogue.<
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She had previously estimated that the Codex was either a Class Five or a Class Six. She clambered up the ladder belonging to the Class Five section first, and found the drawer marked “Pe—Pi.” After flipping through the cards and finding nothing, she checked the drawer labeled “Ci—Co,” in case the grimoires were catalogued by title instead of author. When that proved unsuccessful, she moved to the Class Six section with her nerves shrieking nearly as loudly as Madame Bouchard. During the brief intervals in which the grimoire paused for breath, she heard shouts ringing across the atrium, rapidly drawing closer.
She found the Codex’s card in the last drawer she checked, glanced at it, and slammed the drawer shut. As she leaped off the ladder, a warden came striding inside with a salt round at the ready and a length of iron chain. He stared at Elisabeth in bewilderment. She seized her broom and clutched it tightly.
“What are you doing in here?” he shouted over Madame Bouchard, who was now energetically practicing scales.
Elisabeth swept a bit of broken glass aside. “I’m cleaning up the mess, sir!” she shouted back.
A whirlwind of chaos ensued. The warden at last handed her off to an equally baffled librarian, who said, “Well, I must commend you for going above and beyond the call of duty, girl,” and brought her back to Gertrude, who gave her a thorough scolding. But Elisabeth wasn’t in any real trouble, for she could hardly be punished for sweeping a floor.
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