Brasley picked up speed.
She trembled beneath him, slightly at first, then went rigid, arching her back and pulling him tight against her.
“Now,” she whispered hoarsely. “Now.”
He thrust three more times then finished, gritting his teeth to keep from moaning loudly. He rolled off of her, panting, a sheen of sweat cooling his skin in the night air that came through the small porthole. Gray morning seeped in. The sun would be up soon.
Somewhere on the deck a bell rang. The prisoners working the capstan changed shifts.
“Docks ahead,” called the captain. ”Make ready with the lines.”
“We’re getting into Tul-Agnon early,” Talbun said.
“The way he works those prisoners, I’m surprised the paddle wheel doesn’t shoot us into the sky,” Brasley said.
“Suits me. The boat is so cramped. And I want a bath.”
Brasley cleared his throat. “Listen, about what we’ve . . . how we’ve been . . .”
“I used to have an entire tower of loyal men at my disposal when I guarded the Kashar Temple. I have needs, and it’s been a while.” She patted his cheek like someone might scratch a dog behind the ears. “You just helped me scratch an itch. Don’t worry. You did an adequate job. That should hold me for a while.”
“Ah. Well, that’s . . . good. It’s just that I’m married. So . . .”
“I know,” she said. “That’s why I decided it was safe. I like knowing you have a wife with a claim on you. Makes it less likely you’ll cling to me. Not really the sort of thing I’m looking for.”
“Of course.” Brasley felt it possible he’d been slightly insulted.
Mostly he just felt relieved.
“Let’s get dressed and pack as fast as we can,” Talbun suggested. “I want to be the first off when we tie up.”
They hastily dressed and shoved their few possessions into their packs and were on deck within five minutes.
The first thing Brasley noticed were the docks looming closer through the early morning fog, the grim silhouettes of men waiting to take the riverboat’s lines, stacks of cargo behind them waiting to be loaded.
A second later the fog cleared, and he noticed something else. A lone mountain looming extraordinarily close. Except it wasn’t a mountain.
It was a fortress.
He blinked at it, the fog closing in again, obscuring his view. He’d had a quick second to glimpse columns and high walls and towers, huge arched windows leading onto stone balconies. Surely such a place had been centuries in its construction, generations of builders raising their children to continue and finally complete the task. An undertaking from a lost age.
“Your first time seeing the library?” Talbun asked next to him.
“How can that be a library?”
“That’s what it is now,” Talbun said. “It was built by an ancient wizard of the Mage Wars to withstand the ending of the world.”
“But the world didn’t end.”
Talbun shrugged. “Some wizards figure better safe than sorry.”
He looked at her, saw the grin. “You’re messing with me.”
“Only a little,” she said. “He built it in anticipation for some cataclysm that never came. He was the mage responsible for the Scattered Isles, after all, so perhaps he feared some kind of retaliation.”
“Castle Klaar could fit inside of it ten times,” Brasley said.
“Twenty,” Talbun said.
The riverboat’s crewmen tossed lines to the men on the dock, and as soon as the vessel was secure and the gangplank slid into place, Talbun was the first to disembark as promised, Brasley right behind her.
The streets beyond the riverfront bustled with activity. The fog was clearing, and no matter which way Brasley turned his head, he could still see the enormous fortress from the corner of his eye. It loomed over everything, casting a shadow over the city. They maneuvered in and out of the crowd. Brasley hurried to catch up with the wizard. She knew where she was going and walked fast.
“Are we headed someplace in particular?” Brasley shouted after her.
“Town Square,” she called back over her shoulder. “We can find a good inn there, and it’s a short walk to the university. It’s been twenty years since my last visit, but I doubt much has changed.”
“Why are we going to the university?”
“Because the scholars control the library, and we have to ask their permission to enter,” Talbun explained. “You still have that letter Count Becham wrote for us, yes?”
Brasley patted his vest pocket. “Right here.”
“Good.”
“It’s early in the day,” Brasley said. “We could skip the inn and go directly to the university.”
“I want a new dress and a bath,” Talbun said. “I’m not going to an audience with university scholars smelling like a river barge and sex sweat. They’re rather big on cleanliness.”
“Good point.”
***
Talbun had said the scholars were big on cleanliness. Brasley took this to mean they were fussy little bureaucratic nebbishes bent on making his life miserable. The sole job of each squinting, sneering clerk seemed to be to keep him from getting to the next squinting, sneering clerk down some other hallway, hunched behind an identical small desk.
Brasley and Talbun arrived at the fifth such clerk at the fifth such desk. He wore a variation of the same outfit as the others, what Brasley had come to think of as the university uniform, a heavy velvet robe of deep green and a shapeless black hat leaning to one side or the other. Each of the clerks had a gold cord draped over his shoulders, some thinner, others thicker. Some were knotted at the end, and others had two or three knots. Brasley thought the knots might signify rank or experience, but he hadn’t asked, and nobody had volunteered to explain.
The man before him now had the most knots so far, three on one side and four on the other. Brasley hoped this meant they were finally getting somewhere.
“Yes?” the clerk said. He said yes in the same way someone might say, “Please don’t use my hat to wipe your arse.”
Brasley smiled. It hurt, but he did it. “My good man, we were told this was the desk where we might apply for library access in the sense of—”
“Downstairs. North Hall. Third door on the left,” the clerk said crisply.
Brasley’s smile wavered, but he heroically held on to it. “That line—where we started the afternoon, I might add—is for normal library access. We are seeking entry to the upper levels.”
“Ah.” The clerk looked pleased. “We do not allow access to the upper levels. Good day.”
“So we were informed by the previous two clerks,” Brasley said. “We went back and forth between them a few times for reasons that did not seem clear.”
“Then I’m sure they informed you an appropriate letter of introduction from a sufficiently high-ranking official must accompany any such request.”
“They did not,” Brasley said. “But the fourth clerk did.”
“Then you are well aware.”
“Yes.”
“And do you have such a letter?” he asked.
“Indeed we do,” Brasley said.
The clerk’s frown was so deep, it seemed to pull his whole face down. Apparently Brasley had delivered upsetting news. “Then why didn’t you say so?”
“I just did.”
The clerk held out his hand, snapping his fingers impatiently. “Fine. Fine. Let’s see the letter.”
Brasley handed it over. He cast a sideways glance at Talbun, who stood stoically and uncharacteristically silent.
What’s the matter? Don’t you have some kind of spell of obedience you could cast on this fool?
The clerk scanned the letter, lips moving as he read silently.
The clerk’s eyes flicked up to Brasley’s. “Count Becham?”
“Yes.”
Brasley could see the name worried the clerk. This wasn’t something he could pass off easily.
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“And your name?” the clerk asked.
“Brasley Hammish.”
“Lord Hammish, as I’m sure you understand, we can’t just let anyone—”
“Baron.”
The clerk blinked. “What?”
“It’s Baron Hammish.”
Now the clerk looked worried. “Ah. I see. Baron of . . . ?”
“Klaar.”
The clerk no longer looked worried. “Baron Hammish, as you might be able to guess, the upper levels of the Great Library represent not only a rich archeological chronicle of past centuries but also a potential treasure trove of magical—”
“I should also mention Count Becham is my father-in-law,” Brasley said.
The clerk looked worried again. “Excuse me.” He stood. “I must take this to a higher authority.”
The clerk crossed the room, knocked on a door, then entered after a muffled voice told him to come in.
“You could have helped,” Brasley said from the corner of his mouth.
Talbun smiled tightly. “You’re doing fine.”
“I’m just saying, I thought an all-powerful wizard would be more help.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Some heat in her voice.
Brasley held up a hand, placating. “Nothing. Never mind. I just thought—”
The clerk returned, gestured to the door behind him. “Lord Minn will see you now.” His nod was like a reluctant bow, as if he hated himself for doing it. “Please go in.”
Brasley and Talbun walked past him into the room beyond. The door clicked shut behind them.
A much bigger desk. The man behind it looked far more important that the previous clerks. He stood. His robes were soft and beige, but he wore a sash of the deep green that Brasley associated with the university. A gold cord around one shoulder with multiple knots. Brasley didn’t bother to count. Minn was bald, a smudge of gray moustache under his nose, short, and approaching chubby.
“Welcome, Baron Hammish,” he said. “I’m Lord Minn. Let’s discuss your situation.”
Minn gestured to two chairs. Brasley and Talbun sat.
“I understand you wish to go to the upper levels of the Great Library,” Minn said.
“Yes,” Brasley replied.
Minn looked down at the piece of paper in his hands. Brasley realized it was the letter from Becham he’d given the clerk.
“Naturally, we respect Count Becham’s position in Pemrod’s court,” Minn said. “I understand he’s your father-in-law.”
“Indeed.”
Minn held up a finger. “A moment.”
He turned to a wall of shelves behind his desk. Piles of parchment. Scrolls rolled and stacked in cubbyholes. Thick leather books. He picked a large scroll and unrolled it on the desk. It was well worn and old. Brasley and Talbun leaned forward to look at it.
It was a detailed sketch of the Great Library.
A narrow road led through a gate in the fifty-foot-high stone wall. Someone had drawn a tiny wagon and team of horses to give the drawing scale. Brasley had to squint to see them. The structure was roughly pyramid shaped, flat on top, occasional towers, spires, or landings breaking the symmetry. Numbered lines written in tight neat printing out to the side indicated each level of the massive fortress.
Minn gestured at the diagram. “As you can see, there are eighty-one levels to the Great Library. The first two floors make up the library proper, where university students may study the histories and the ancient arts. High-level scholars act as curators.”
“So I’ve been informed,” Brasley said, trying not to sound bored.
“In recent centuries, scholar-explorers have mapped and cleared the next five levels,” Minn said.
“I’m sorry,” Brasley said. “Cleared?”
“Some believe the master wizard who built the fortress meant for it to be a city unto itself, sealed from the rest of the world,” Minn explained. “This is just a theory, of course, but dangerous and multiple wards had to be removed level by level by our best mages. This is one of the reasons for the seemingly slow process. Exploration must progress slowly and methodically. Since the university was founded nearly five hundred years ago, we’ve lost three hundred ninety-one scholar-explorers. You’ll notice I have the exact number memorized. Safety for our people is a constant concern.”
“Commendable and understandable,” Brasley said. “May I ask—not that I don’t find it fascinating—why we are being treated to this history lesson?”
“Undertaking an expedition into the Great Library’s upper levels is one of the most dangerous things anyone can do,” Minn said. “And yet all exploration would come to a halt if not for the intrepid curious who wish to take the risk.”
“I’m not sure I understand,” Brasley said. “You discourage people from exploring the upper levels, but you need them?”
“We don’t want people risking themselves frivolously,” Minn said. “But we’re even less keen to risk our own people. It’s rather silly for a man to spend a decade training himself to be a bona fide scholar only to fall down a hole while exploring the upper levels. Making arrangements with outside parties has proven profitable and less perilous for university personnel.”
“I presume there is some sort of nominal fee for entering the library,” Brasley said.
“There is no fee for taking an expedition into the Great Library.”
Brasley narrowed his eyes. “I am pleased and suspicious.”
Minn smiled. “There are other ways the university is compensated. Should you venture into a new area, we require that you map it. This will aid future exploration. Additionally, all artifacts of a magical or historical nature are automatically property of the university. An appropriate finder’s fee is awarded to the expedition, depending on the value of the find. These awards range from nominal to generous. May I ask the nature of your expedition?”
“We seek information pertaining to ink mages,” Brasley told him.
“Ah. That’s not a subject much in vogue anymore at the university,” Minn said, “but I’m sure we’ll be able to dig up a junior scholar who might serve as your guide.”
“Guide?”
“All expeditions are required to take a guide through the explored levels,” Minn said. “These keep you from retrodding ground that’s already been picked over. The guide will turn back as soon as you reach unexplored territory.”
“This guide is to be paid by the expedition, I imagine.”
“Yes. Negotiate whatever fee is mutually acceptable to both parties,” Minn said. “May I ask why ink magic is the particular field that has caught your attention?”
Brasley gestured to Talbun. “My associate might be able to answer that better than I. She’s—”
“Baron Hammish’s assistant,” Talbun interjected quickly. “My name is Esthar.”
Minn nodded to her. “A pleasure.”
“You may have been told that the baron hails from Klaar,” she said.
“Yes, so I was told.” Understanding lit Minn’s eyes. “Oh. The duchess.”
“Just so.”
“I had thought the stories . . . exaggerated,” Minn said.
Talbun shook her head. “No. As you can imagine, Duchess Veraiin is anxious to unearth any lore about the tattoos and their history. Baron Hammish is here to lend his authority to the enterprise, but I’ll actually be cataloging any information we’d be able to gather.”
Minn nodded, drummed his fingers on his desk. “Well, in light of our discussion and your excellent credentials, I feel it is appropriate to grant your request to send an expedition to the upper levels.”
Brasley beamed. “Excellent!”
“We should have an opening in eleven weeks.”
Brasley’s smile fell. Hit the ground. Shattered into little pieces.
“Eleven weeks?”
Minn looked pained. “Alas, we must space the expeditions in a way that they are not tripping over one another in their explorations.”
&nbs
p; “This is most disappointing,” Brasley said.
Minn took a leather-bound ledger from the shelf behind him, opened it, and slid it across the desk to show Brasley. “As you can see, we’re totally booked for the foreseeable future. Really, my hands are tied.”
Brasley leaned in, squinted at the ledger, and memorized the first three names on the list.
He sighed dramatically. “Count Becham will be most displeased. Those at court who’ve taken an interest in this project won’t like hearing about the delay.”
Brasley had hoped Minn would infer he was talking about the king. As lies went, it was fairly brazen. Well, really, what’s the point in lying if one can’t be brazen once in a while?
Minn held up his hands, palms out. “Well, now let’s not be hasty, Baron Hammish. Here’s what I can do for you. Okay? How about this? If one of the other expeditions cancels for any reason, I can slot you in their place. That’s within my authority, and I’m happy to do it for you. And for Count Becham, of course.”
Brasley rose slowly, chin up, and looked down on Minn with all of the haughty bearing he could muster. “I suppose it will just have to do.”
***
“You did what?”
“Keep your voice down.” Talbun looked around the inn’s common room, but even though it was crowded, nobody took notice of them. “Why do you think I didn’t want to give my name at the university? Scholars have long memories.”
“I don’t know. I thought you were just being mysterious,” Brasley said. “I didn’t know you’d stolen something from the Great Library.”
“Will you keep your voice down?” She glared.
“Okay, okay.”
A serving woman arrived with two tankards of dark beer and a quill and an inkwell, which she set in front of Brasley.
“What’s that for?” the wizard asked.
“I want to write down these three names before I forget them.” Brasley dipped the quill into the ink then scribbled on a scrap of parchment.
“What names?”
“The first three names in the ledger Minn showed us,” he said. “What did you steal, anyway?”
“A spell,” she said. “It is said that the master wizard had over five hundred acolytes, each a powerful mage in their own right. There’s a lot of powerful magic to be discovered in that place. I figured they wouldn’t miss one little spell.”
The Tattooed Duchess (A Fire Beneath the Skin Book 2) Page 28