Paper and Fire

by Rachel Caine

  "Tell me about the day you were taken to the prison," Quest said. His voice was gentle, rising and falling in those faint, odd rhythms. "There is nothing to fear. You are only seeing, watching a play of light and shadow. You are an outside observer of what occurs. There is no pain. You feel no pain at all."

  The harsh breathing eased, just a little, but when Wolfe's voice came, it sounded rough and uneven and utterly unlike him. "I was . . . here," he said. "They came for me here."

  "Here, in this house?"

  "Yes."

  "And where did they take you?"

  "The Archivist's office at the Serapeum," Wolfe said. "He asked questions--"

  "Let that go. Where were you taken after he finished with you?"

  Wolfe didn't answer. Beside him, Jess felt Santi's muscles tensing, as if bracing for a blow.

  "Scholar? Where were you taken?"

  "Below."

  "Below where?"

  "Serapeum. To a cell."

  "Stop," Santi quickly said. "Skip over that. Ask him where he was taken after that."

  Quest gave Jess another questioning look, and he nodded. Santi was right. Asking Wolfe to recount whatever happened to him in the cells below the Serapeum in Alexandria wouldn't help them at all. Thomas wasn't there.

  Paris, Jess thought. They'll have taken him to Paris.

  But when Wolfe answered the question, he said, "The Basilica Julia."

  Rome. Jess swallowed hard as he remembered how passionately he'd argued for Paris with his friends; he'd nearly persuaded them it was the only logical choice and to go tearing off in pursuit of Thomas there. Thank you, Khalila. Thank you for holding out for more information. They wouldn't have more than one chance at this.

  And even this information, he cautioned himself, wasn't true proof. An indicator, certainly. But not proof.

  "How were you taken there?" Quest asked.

  "By Translation."

  Quest leaned back, frowning, and looked at Captain Santi. "There isn't a Translation Chamber inside the Basilica Julia proper, is there?"

  "No," Santi said. "It's in another building altogether, about a mile away. He can't be recalling it right."

  "Scholar Wolfe, when you came out of the Translation Chamber, where were you? Can you describe it?"

  "Hallway," Wolfe murmured. "Inside the Basilica Julia."

  "How do you know you were in the Basilica Julia?"

  "I saw the Forum from the windows. I know Rome." Of course he did. A traveling Scholar like Wolfe would recognize a great city like that from even the briefest glance. "A long, straight hallway. A door at the end."

  "Tell me what you could see from these windows," Quest said, and Jess grabbed a piece of paper and a pen that Wolfe had left on the table. He wrote as Wolfe described his view. Jess made a quick, rough sketch, marking exact things he'd seen. "All right. This door at the end of the hallway: was it guarded?"

  "Automaton," Wolfe said dully. "A Roman lion."

  "And was this door locked as well?" Quest asked. That was an excellent question Jess wouldn't have thought to ask. The Mesmer obviously had some experience at this sort of thing.

  "Yes."

  From there, Wolfe spoke of being led down steps, beside a long, sloping corridor of ancient stone, with cells built along one side. Turn after turn. Jess wrote it all down, and Quest continued his steady, passionless questions: how many soldiers did he see? How many Library automata? It was important, even critical, but Wolfe's distress grew ever more visible the further they delved into this particular piece of the past. He moved back and forth now, a constant rocking motion, and his arms had closed over his stomach. Protecting himself, Jess realized. He felt sick himself, watching. Next to him, Santi was as still as a statue.

  "Did anyone ever come to take you out of your cell while you were inside it?"

  "Yes."

  "And where did they take you?" Quest asked, which seemed an innocent enough question. He was only trying to map the rest of the prison, which was smart.

  Wolfe let out a sound that raised the hair on the back of Jess's neck, and Santi almost lunged forward, but Quest's gaze flicked to him and the Mesmer shook his head. "Breathe, Scholar Wolfe. Relax," Quest said. "You feel no pain, remember? There is no pain now; you are merely watching this from a distance. It isn't happening to you at all. Step back. Just step away and let it go."

  The terrible keening sound went on and grew sharper, and even the Mesmer seemed taken aback by it now. He reached out and put his hand on Wolfe's shoulder. "Scholar," he said. "Scholar. You are now outside of the cell, do you hear me? You are standing outside the cell. There is no pain at all. You feel peaceful. Calm."

  It was no good. Wolfe's buried scream was growing louder and he wasn't listening.

  "That's enough," Santi shouted, and lunged forward. "Bring him out! Now!" He sounded as shaken as Jess felt.

  "All right," Quest said. "Scholar Wolfe! Scholar!" He briskly tapped Wolfe's forehead, then his shoulder, then the back of his hand. "Exeunt!"

  Wolfe's cry stopped cleanly, and he slumped back in his chair, utterly limp. Santi shoved Quest out of the way and sank down to a crouch beside Wolfe to take his hand. He was checking the other man's pulse, Jess realized, as much as holding his hand.

  Wolfe slowly raised his head. His color was terrible and his eyes looked dull and strange, but they were open, and after a blank moment that seemed to stretch forever, he looked directly at Santi and said, "It must have been terrible if you look so worried."

  Jess saw the intense relief flash over the captain's face before his expression closed again. "Not so bad," Santi lied. "And now you're back."

  Wolfe put his hand over Santi's, and there it was again: a little flash of gentleness, sorrow, love. Jess looked away, and when he turned back, Santi was rising to his feet and turning to Quest. "You, Mesmer," Santi said. "Get out. If there's any whisper about any of this, I'll kill you."

  "Sir," Quest said, "I am a professional. There is no need to threaten." He hesitated for a moment and then said, "And as a professional, I would be wrong not to tell you that something terrible was done to your friend, and that will fester inside if the wound isn't lanced. I am willing to offer my continued services at a reasonable--"

  "It's none of your business," Santi said. "Jess. Get rid of him. Now."

  Jess nodded and grabbed Quest's arm to tow him to the door. He handed over the second, heavier sack of geneih coins--the half Quest was due, plus a hefty bonus. "Leave," he said. "Forget about this. He's quite serious about killing you if you don't."

  "Risk of the trade," Quest sighed. "But take my advice for your poor Scholar. Find someone who can guide him through that pain. He needs help. I've seen it kill stronger men." He seemed earnest in that moment and not at all trying to make another fee. As if he was actually, genuinely worried.

  "Thanks," Jess said, and meant it. He hailed the little man a carriage. "Don't make me find you again."

  Quest grinned suddenly. His teeth were surprisingly white. "If I didn't want to be found, you'd never manage it. One street rat to another, you know that's truth."

  Then he was gone.

  Jess went back inside. "Is he all right?"

  "Still here, Brightwell. Thanks for your concern," Wolfe said. His voice sounded unnaturally low and hoarse as he cradled his head in both hands. "Did you find out what you needed?"

  "Yes," Jess said. "I think so."

  "Then get out."

  "I'm sorry you had to do this--"

  "For the love of all the gods, get out!" Wolfe raised his head, and his eyes were wet and streaming with blinding tears of pain and fury. He grabbed for a book and hurled it at Jess with great force. It was only a Blank, but Jess understood just how out of control the man was to fling it.

  "Jess," Santi said. "Go. You have what you wanted. Now I have to help him live through the consequences."

  Jess swallowed hard, nodded, and rolled up the notes he'd made. He closed the door at his back and leaned against
it for a long moment with his eyes shut. He tried to forget the awful, tortured sound of Wolfe's keening.

  On the way back to the barracks, he sent coded messages using people he trusted to alert Khalila and Dario to what he'd found out. It was only fair to tell everyone at once. Everyone but Glain, who'd probably deck him hard for what he'd done to Wolfe. Her, he could leave for last.

  He was halfway to the barracks when he turned a corner and saw a person lurking ahead, wearing a coat too warm for the weather with the hood raised. His instincts pricked him hard as needles, and he slowed his steps. The shadowy figure melted into an alcove halfway down the block; there weren't many people out in these dark hours, and the moon was half-hidden behind high, thin clouds. Perfect conditions, he realized, for an assassination, if the Archivist meant to launch one.

  Jess moved with deliberate, casual confidence, and eased his knife free of the sheath at his belt as he walked on. He had to use his left hand to keep the knife from view of his would-be killer, who lurked on the right. He wondered whether he should whistle. Might seem too much.

  He kept his speed calm and steady as he drew near the alcove, then past it, and when he felt movement behind him, he turned, grabbed hold of the person rushing at him, and jabbed the point of his dagger up under a soft chin.

  The hood fell away. The moon whispered out of the clouds overhead and threw a soft, pale light over both of them.

  Jess's lips parted and he let go, because the girl facing him, the girl he'd almost killed, was Morgan Hault.

  EPHEMERA

  From On Further Nature of the Elements, a late work of the great Archimedes, collected from that master Scholar in the first years of the Great Library. Available on the Codex.

  I have many times been asked to explain the nature of the divine fluid of quintessence, the unseen barrier through which all things must pass to change form. I direct your study to the minerals of the earth. The baser metals are found below the surface, in the darkness and silence, and are lumpen and unformed. The finer metals and minerals--silver, gold, all precious ores and gems--are found in an organic structure of life. They grow, treelike, slowly through many years, rising up through the invisible richness of quintessence, and are transmuted from the base to the precious as they rise toward heaven.

  All things live. That which begins as inorganic becomes organic through the divine power of quintessence. And so we must learn to control this unknowable element, to discover how to make metals, minerals, the organic and inorganic alike transmute and transfigure, above and below the earth.

  This knowledge is obscure, but it must be sought. It must be codified, taught, and revered, for only through this great work will the secrets of the world be revealed.

  And those who seek it, I call Obscurists, who will cast the light of quintessence upon the darkness.

  Let us now discuss how the principle of First Matter may be used to create new forms, with the help and guidance of the gods.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Morgan seemed too pale, he thought, and at the same time she seemed ethereally beautiful. Her unpinned hair cascaded down over her shoulders in messy, springy curls, and she was dressed in a plain dark dress that reached down to the tops of leather boots. The only jewelry she wore glittered in the moonlight: the gaudy, engraved collar that circled her throat. The golden collar of an Obscurist.

  He dropped his knife to his side and wanted badly to put his arms around her; everything in him said it was the right thing to do.

  But he knew it was wrong from the tension in her body, the flash in her eyes. Still, for one dizzying instant he imagined holding her and kissing her, and the feeling of her lips under his seemed as real as breath. The smell of her, roses and spices, washed over him in a flood.

  Jess took an indrawn breath that seemed to fill him with her presence, her reality.

  "You're here," he said. "You're really . . . here." It seemed impossible. No, it was impossible, by any imagining; she couldn't leave the Iron Tower. If she could have, surely she'd have run away, not come here.

  But then her hand brushed his, and he knew it wasn't a dream or a trance or anything but real. She was here. Alive. Morgan smiled, and his heart shattered into pieces, because it was a guarded smile, not a happy one. "I won't be here long," she said. "I've managed to stay out for almost a full day, trying to find you. You do hide yourself well."

  "Then you can stay out longer? Get far from here?"

  She was already shaking her head. "No, I'll never make it out of Alexandria. They'll find me soon. I haven't found a way to take this off yet, and until I do, they can track me." She withdrew her hand and traced fingers over her collar, the symbol of her enslavement to the Library. Some sanity came back to him, and with it, doubt. Maybe they'd turned Morgan. Maybe she was a lure meant to distract him from another, more serious threat. He didn't see anyone or feel anything, but she was a stunning distraction. He couldn't take his gaze away from her for long enough to keep a good watch.

  So many things he wanted to ask her, but he settled for, "You must have had some great reason to come now. What's wrong?"

  Something clouded her face for a moment, and it almost looked like . . . fear. "There were other reasons, but mostly . . . mostly, it's about Thomas. Jess, I think he could be held in Rome! I found reference to an ancient, very secret prison--"

  "Below the Basilica Julia. I know," Jess finished. "I'm sorry. I just found that out. But . . . do you have proof that Thomas is actually there?"

  Morgan seemed shocked and then a little angry. He didn't blame her. "Proof? No. But I thought-- I thought you'd want to know, that it would give you something more to investigate. And instead I risked my neck to come here to give you information you already had?"

  She really does seem pale, he thought. Even in the Iron Tower, there must be sun somewhere for them to enjoy, and she hadn't gotten enough. She seemed thinner, too. And even discounting the deceptive shadows of the night, he read the weariness on her face. The frustration.

  "Did you find records about him? Is he all right?" Jess asked, when all he really wanted to ask about in that moment was her. What she was enduring in the Iron Tower. Whatever it was, he knew it was his fault she was there. They both knew it, and it stood between them like a dark, brooding shadow.

  "I know he's still alive," she said. "The Artifex seems to believe he has a use for him. Something about the design of the Library automata. From the reports, Thomas had notes in his Codex that might help improve the automata against the Burner attacks. They'll want to get that from him, at least. If he proves useful, they'll keep him alive. And if they think they can trust him, they might even . . ."

  "Let him go?"

  "No. But move him somewhere not as terrible. It must be terrible, Jess. From what I've read . . ." Her voice faltered, and it took a heartbeat for it to return. "Wolfe suffered horribly there. They were going to kill him before his mother finally intervened. I didn't know human beings could be so . . . cold. So cruel. And especially not . . . not in service to the Library."

  Jess did, unfortunately, though it seemed to him there were always more terrible surprises left in the world. "How long before they find you?"

  "I'm not sure. They'll have searched for me inside the Tower first, probably most of the day. If the Obscurist is involved, it won't be long now."

  "Then we don't have much time." His body felt hot and cold at once, and the feeling in his stomach was like that of standing in a very high spot, looking down at the drop. He took her hand and held it. "Morgan, please. I need to know if you can ever forgive me."

  "For sending me to the Tower?" she asked, which was blunt and painful, but he nodded. "Most days I don't blame you. Some days I do. I tell myself they would have caught me eventually, that you just spared me pain and injury and maybe even death fighting the inevitable. But it still hurts. As long as it does, I can't . . ."

  "Can't feel the way you used to," he finished for her, and she slowly nodded. And there it was, the dr
op he was falling off of, a long spiral down to an inevitable painful impact. "All right. That's fair enough." All the nerves in his fingers seemed uncomfortably aware of the feel of her skin, the softness, the warmth. The way her hand curled around his and held on.

  "No, it isn't fair at all," she said. "I'm sorry, Jess. It isn't that I don't care for you--I do. I just--"

  "Let me make it up to you. Come with me," he said. It was an impulse, a wild thing he couldn't quite control. "I'll take you away somewhere."

  "Where?"

  "Away. Anywhere."

  "Jess, they'll find me."

  "Then we'll run."

  "They'll find me. Until I can get this collar loose, it's no use even trying!"

  "And if you do get it off?"

  "Then maybe things will be different," she said. There were tears glittering sharply in her eyes. "This isn't easy. I'm sorry."

  Jess stepped closer, and she didn't back away. He eased hair back from her face and let his fingertips linger. After imagining her for so long, having her here seemed more like a dream, except for the velvet evidence of her skin. Easy. Nothing about how he felt for her was that. He knew he loved her, but it was shot through with dangerous thorns: guilt, jealousy, fear.

  It occurred to him in that moment that for all his missing Morgan before, he'd missed nothing but a fantasy. As Glain had said: a challenge, distant and safe. But this girl, standing in front of him now, was far more real, honest, and complicated.

  And he wanted her more than he ever had.

  They were so close, too close, and Morgan's eyes widened. She stepped back and brought their conversation back to the practical. "I almost forgot. There's a Translation Chamber in the Basilica Julia; it's private, only used for access to the prison, and only to and from the Alexandrian Serapeum."

  "Wolfe remembered a Translation Chamber," Jess said. "Nic didn't believe him."

  "It's very secret. But I think I might be able to change the destination and take us somewhere besides Alexandria. If I can get free of the Iron Tower again and join you."

  "You're free now."