by A J Hackwith
“Don’t even say it, Hero.”
Past the door, they stepped into a small, tidily appointed kind of foyer. Leto blinked for his eyes to adjust to the dim, while breathing a sigh of relief after escaping the heat. The thick walls served a purpose: the interior was much cooler than the sweltering street.
He’d just started to relax when an intimidating wall of muscle stepped forward. The bodyguard introduced himself as Murdock but made little effort to communicate exactly who McAllister was or how they had come to be chosen for the honor of a tour. He instead gestured to a cramped staircase and politely requested they follow, as if there were a choice.
The staircase was crooked and narrow, made for someone of a much smaller stature than anyone in their group. They spilled out onto a landing, where the floor was composed of the same stuff as the walls, pale sandstone and painted plaster.
“Ms. McAllister will see you.” Murdock stepped to the side at the wide double doors at the other end of the landing. The walls were smooth and windowless, leaving the doors in a smudge of a shadow. The air tasted a little stale, of paper and salt. The absence of sunlight, which had been a cool relief before, suddenly ticked an ominous feeling up Leto’s arms.
“Well, so glad this doesn’t feel at all like a trap.” Hero crossed his arms and his fingers played at the pocket where he’d stuffed his gun.
“Which part, the deserted mansion or the big goon?” Leto said.
“Be that as it may, the song does lead here,” Claire said, “trap or not. We’re going in for the codex.”
Hero snorted. “Well, as long as we have a plan, then.”
Claire straightened her shoulders and strode forward. Her hand rested on an antique doorknob just a moment before pushing one of the doors wide open and advancing through.
Leto followed close at her heels, not willing to be left behind with Murdock. Beyond the doors, the space opened onto an expansive, brightly lit study. Exactly the opposite of the landing. Sunlight pooled in from numerous tall windows and fell over walls of glass-covered bookcases holding what looked to be very old and very expensive leather-bound manuscripts. Oversized leather chairs were grouped in corners, and a desk much like Claire’s massive station in the Library was positioned at the center of the wall of windows. The air still carried traces of a recent pot of tea.
Leto released his held breath. It was a cheery kind of clutter, books and comfort. Perhaps this collector would be a friend. Things would work out.
The collector in question stood by a window, evidently absorbed with the book in her hands. She was as tall as Hero but rich and solid, where Hero was pale and light—walnut and oak rather than ivory and bronze. She was dressed in simple slacks and a button-up shirt, rolled up to reveal forearms speckled with faded ink. There was something familiar about her sharp face that Leto couldn’t place, but her narrow gaze was softened by what seemed like warm brown eyes.
Hero brushed past him, drawing Leto’s attention, and stopped just shy of Claire’s shoulder.
“Warden?” Hero’s question was barely a whisper, and Leto saw why. Tension snapped along her back, and the muscles in her jaw clenched into a snarl as she focused on the collector. It was a fury tinted with shock and fear, and suddenly Leto knew nothing would be okay.
The woman collector made no effort to move, but her soft smile tightened. “Hello, Librarian.”
The silence stretched, long enough for Leto’s nerves to sing in confusion. There didn’t seem to be any threat. A quick glance said Andras and Hero were as confused as he was. Claire drew a jagged breath, and Leto turned hopefully for an explanation, a rationale that would—
Then Claire yanked the pistol out of Hero’s coat pocket and pivoted to aim, and all hell broke loose.
The gunshot deafened everyone in the room. A flower bloomed on the stranger’s throat, not red but impossibly dark—blood was supposed to be bright, Leto thought distantly—and she made a single quivering entreaty with her hand before she hit the floor. Everything was suspended in the moment of that gunshot. It was thunder and silence. All Leto could hear was the wheeze of shock that got tangled somewhere in his throat.
The black blood began to seep from beneath the collector’s ear, reaching into the dusty carpet like pitch fingers. Grasping for his feet, rooting him to the floor. The book that the woman had been reading had landed near her feet. Its pages were twisted and bent underneath its spine, like broken legs. It felt indecent, to Leto. He wanted to fix it. His feet wouldn’t move.
Claire tossed the gun back to Hero and turned away. “The pages are here. Lock the door and search.”
22
RAMIEL
You’ll miss the world. That’s fair; it used to be yours. But there’s a reason we don’t get to travel freely among the living, even as librarians. The Earth is not meant for someone who can’t treasure it. Time makes us clumsy, dulls our senses. Live too far past your tombstone, and you turn a bit stone yourself.
Nothing burns up humanity as thoroughly as eternity.
One supposes that’s why librarian is not a permanent position. We need to retain ourselves, retain our souls, if we’re going to be any good to the books. My apprentice has an abundance of soul. That’ll make her a good librarian. That will also make her an unhappy one.
Librarian Gregor Henry, 1986 CE
THE TIDES OF THE lake sloshed and shoved against the shore. The grinding churn in the air might have been the wear of water against gravel, or Uriel’s teeth. “You can track them,” Uriel gritted out. It was an order, not a question.
Rami nodded. “I can. I got a measure of her soul in Valhalla. If she’s lost anywhere on Earth, I can find her.” It wasn’t hard to judge where the librarian and her hellspawn would have gone. They’d taken the mists, the burial roads, and there was only one place those went—though usually in the opposite direction.
“Do it,” Uriel had said, already turning away from the shore. “I have business to attend to.”
“Business?” Rami blinked. “What business could be more important than the codex?”
The Valhalla sun was setting. Soon the realm would resurrect its dead, beginning the whole dreadful cycle again. The light hit Uriel askew as she turned, brightening her cap of white hair but turning the rest of her features into jagged relief. Her smile was slivered with shadow. “An opportunity for the bigger picture. You think too small, Ramiel.”
* * *
◆ ◆ ◆
IT TOOK TIME AND cost to trace a soul: a sacrifice of cold stars and the ashes from his own flight feathers. But in the end, when the knowledge surged through him, it felt familiar, like slipping into well-worn shoes, tracing the weave of lifelines to find the one dropped thread. As he took on the role he had been cast away from, it felt comfortable, and right, so right that it hurt when he released the power. Its departure left empty rivers in Rami, like indents on a violinist’s fingertips, useless when away from the strings.
But he had a location. He sent word and when he arrived in Malta, Uriel was already perched on a tumbled pile of sandstone outside the city. She paid no mind to the humans that occasionally filtered by below her, and though she was invisible to them, Rami was relieved she had moderated her appearance somewhat: a sparse cream-colored coat with a military cut instead of a robe, and her shining white hair dulled to a mortal blond. She’d shrunk a bit so she towered only a few spare inches over most humans. But the passing crowds still veered a wide berth around her. Nothing could hide her presence: she was the Face of God no matter what skin she wore, and right now that face was an intense, grit-teethed snarl.
Fists clenched at her sides as she stared at the entrance, as if she could bring the walls down with simply the force of her gaze. “They’re here?” she said as Rami stepped up and followed her eyes.
“Yes. The librarian’s soul is in Mdina.”
“With the demons,” Uriel bit
out. Rami assumed she meant the librarian and her companions. The way she growled it made cold form in his stomach.
He picked a careful reply as he tried to suss out what plan Uriel had in mind. “Well, I’m surprised you waited for me, then.”
“Not as if I had much of a choice.” Uriel finally dropped her gaze away from the walls and sighed. “It’s warded against us.”
Rami blinked. “What, the whole city?”
Uriel nodded. “I’d heard tell of it, but never had need to see it for myself. The entire city, warded. Something left over from one of the humans’ petty wars. Nothing not born of humankind—not angel or demon or claimed by another realm—gets in without invitation from its residents.”
Rami glanced at the thick sandstone walls with new interest. “Then how did the librarians get in?”
“That is a very good question,” Uriel said. “If the Creator were receptive, we could have found a way in through the churches.”
That startled Rami. “The Creator is removed from the faithful as well?” A stroke of unease stirred at the back of his thoughts. The state of a realm was tied—to belief, but also to the godhead that ruled it. If those two become disconnected . . . well, Rami wasn’t certain of the repercussions.
Uriel waved a hand as if to flick the irritation away. “It’s no matter. I’ve made arrangements. They will come to us.”
Rami frowned. “I very much doubt that. Why would they—”
“I have made arrangements. Second rule of demons: they always want something.” Uriel, smug and almost smiling, raised a brow at him. “They’ll come to us. I have it on good authority that they’ll have no other choice.”
23
CLAIRE
My dear apprentice, you learn so quickly. Though it will be years yet before you learn all that is necessary to serve the Library, I see the librarian you will become. Fierce, strong, and yet with enough feeling heart to treat the books under your care kindly. Perhaps even to bring much-needed change to the Library, and the secrets it holds. The Library needs you, Claire.
So I can only beg your forgiveness for what I must do.
Librarian Gregor Henry, 1989 CE
SOMEWHERE, SOMEONE HAD A pot of Earl Grey on. Earl Grey with citrus, Claire corrected, detecting the lemon drifting through the air. Her favorite, when not mixed with the smell of death.
It soured her stomach. An old clock on the desk ticked, but otherwise there was no movement behind her, near the body. Claire clenched her fingers, which were absolutely not trembling, and pretended to sort through the stack of books by the window.
“May I ask why we just shot our only source of information for the pages of the codex?” Andras broke the silence, his voice mild.
“Come to think of it, why isn’t the well-armed guard outside rushing in at the sound of a gunshot?” Hero said.
“You need a body to need a bodyguard,” Claire mumbled under her breath. The help around here probably had strict instructions not to enter no matter what was heard.
“Is she dead?”
Leto’s panic finally brought Claire’s head around. The teenager looked even more pale than usual, if that was possible. He crouched over where the book collector lay, eyes wide as saucers as he extended a finger.
“Don’t touch, Leto. She’s . . . fine.” Claire scooped up a few books at random and gave them an underhand lob. “Flip through these. We’re looking for loose sheaves of very old paper.”
The books fell to the floor with a clatter—Leto had made no move to catch them. He turned a look of horror on Claire. It was earnest with a cutting edge. “Fine? You killed someone!”
“No, I didn’t. I—” Claire forced her jaw not to lock with tension. “Just start looking. Gentlemen, please. We don’t have much—”
She was cut off by a cry. Leto stumbled back, flinging himself away from the empty rug. An empty rug where, but a moment before, the prone body of the book collector had lain. A tacky pool of black blood and a slight impression in the crumpled carpet were the only indications left.
“. . . much time,” Claire finished.
“She disappeared.” Leto stumbled to his feet. “She just disappeared.”
“Disappeared rather like a character from an unwritten book.” Hero held an increasingly suspicious glint in his eye as he turned toward Claire. “Now, why would a body do that, warden?”
“As I said, we don’t have much time.” Claire moved toward the desk and studied the drawers. Locked, of course. She began rifling through the detritus for a key.
“Perhaps a very succinct explanation would speed things up,” Andras said.
She found the key resting in the bottom of a cup of pens. Exactly where she would have hidden it.
“Pup. Claire,” Andras prompted softly.
Claire’s lips thinned, and she let out a hard breath, staring at the key rather than at the others. It was dented; tarnish discolored the grooves between the teeth. “Because she is a character. That’s why I shot her. Characters retreat to their books when damaged—assuming they aren’t unable to do so like Hero here. It buys us time to find the codex pages while it’s busy recomposing itself.”
“So you didn’t kill her.” The relief was evident in Leto’s sigh. Claire looked up and wished she hadn’t. Color had drained from Leto’s face. He was trembling, given away by the twitch of the coils of hair shadowing his eyes. He had the unsteady look of someone desperate to believe the best of people.
Claire wished she wasn’t going to disappoint him.
“How’d you know she was a character?” Hero asked, mercifully drawing her attention away. “Not that I don’t respect a display of gratuitous violence.”
Claire straightened. “Why wouldn’t I? I’m a librarian.”
“And I’m a character and a book. I know how these things work.”
Andras made a noise of agreement. Claire didn’t dare look at him. She could take anything but pity from Andras. Instead, she picked up the key and worried at it. The teeth were dull, but made a pleasant sting as she rasped the pad of her thumb against them. There had to be a way out of the story she didn’t want to tell, a twist that would send them on to a happier story. She came up empty.
“Because she’s mine.” Her voice came out a whisper. She grimaced and cleared her throat. “She’s—she’s a hero from one of my books.”
The book in Leto’s hands slipped to the floor with a thud and a likely crack of the spine. Claire didn’t chide him to be careful.
“I wasn’t aware there was an outstanding book missing from the Library, present company excluded.” Andras gave a nod at Hero.
Claire felt it when the careful, bleak part inside her unlocked and the familiar guilt tumbled out. She studied the key in her hand. It was tarnished, impossibly dull. Claire rubbed at it with her thumb, but it didn’t come clean. “There isn’t. I removed her from the Library inventory. After I helped her escape.”
The words fell on the ensuing silence like lead.
“Well. Finally, the warden gets interesting,” Hero muttered.
“You helped a character, but when would you . . .” Understanding glanced into Andras’s voice like a spark of fire. “Gregor.”
A single word that Claire had avoided for three decades. It called up Claire’s best memory of her mentor, tinged by fondness and guilt. He’d been somewhat young when he’d died the first time—much older when he died the second, but then, years in the Library never showed. Not on the outside. A paunchy, scholarly man, American, and, god, had Claire resented him at first. Acid slaked her throat. “It wasn’t planned.”
“But it did occur.”
The accusation in Andras’s tone was obvious. Claire squeezed her eyes closed. “Gregor was—”
The world tilted and swallowed Claire’s words. She nearly fell over the desk as the floorboards bucked beneath her feet
. A long, echoing groan shuddered through the air, as if the earth had torn itself open, followed quickly by a distant, deep howl.
Claire’s eyes flew wide, all explanations forgotten. It wasn’t the howl of a dog, or even a wolf, of wild things and forests. No, it was a howl of deeper places. Dark pits and tears that tasted of anise. “No—”
“What was that sound?” Leto was the only other one to sway as the room bucked again. He dug into his pocket at the same time Claire fished out her lighter. She muttered a useless prayer before opening her palm.
The lighter sat cold and dark. No flame bobbed in the liquid; no glow warmed her skin. An unnatural cold settled over the little lighter. A quick glance said Leto’s lighter was the same. Claire’s voice was weak as all the air seemed to have left the room. “Not— I thought we had more time.”
“Warden?” Something about Claire’s expression must have made Hero’s hand stray to the gun in his coat pocket. He and Andras showed no sign of feeling the shuddering of the floor, though Claire and Leto could barely stay on their feet.
Claire wheeled in place once before deciding on what to do and snatching Leto by the shoulder. He made a startled sound as she forced him into the gap between the bookcases in a corner and backed up in front of it. It was pointless. It was doomed. She did it anyway. Leto’s breath wheezed past her ear as he caught on to her panic.
“Claire, what’s going on?”
It took a moment to realize Hero had been repeating her name. Not “warden,” but her actual name. She closed her eyes and tried to shove her drumming heartbeat back into her chest. It took another try to wet her mouth enough to speak. “Andras . . . I don’t suppose you brought anything that—”
“Nothing that would stop them, pup.” Andras’s face was not made for compassion. The pitying look was disturbing on his sharp features. Her ears thundered again with howls.