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It created a mess of tunnels that wound about like worms in soil. The library at Imenborg was nothing impressive, but it contained some of the most dangerous books ever penned by goblin hands: even some that had been penned by elf hands. Jael didn’t know how his people came into possession of those volumes—he was sure the dune elves would prefer them back. However they came into possession of them, the goblins had an entire shelf in the Forbidden Section where they kept a series of elvish books.
He hadn’t told anyone where he was going, not even Math. He would have tried to stop him and would have been right. They didn’t refer to the deepest corner of the library as the Forbidden Section for no reason.
But his orders had come from the king. He knew his father would not send him on this errand unless it was necessary.
And he knew better than anyone that it was necessary. His skin still bore the stinging lash of the shadow’s attack, the cuts on his face and arms still raw. The one on his brow stung with particular ferocity. Fresh blood seeped over the older scabs encrusted over his eyebrow and down his cheek.
He lifted the bloody cloth to staunch the flow. The wound might need stitching, but he didn’t have time for that yet. He needed to finish this task before he lost his nerve.
The tunnel he followed angled downward toward the forbidden vault. He had to remove a runestone from his pocket to light his way now because this section of the library wasn’t lit, for obvious reasons.
No one should be down here, so no one should need any light.
The air grew staler and much dryer. He paused at the doorway to the vault and stretched out fingers coated in dried blood to stroke the stone. The blood-red gemstone contained a more potent layer of runes, to protect, to ward off, to keep in...
His fingers knew the shape of the necessary rune, the diamond with the long vertical slash down the middle. The stone recognized his command, his rune, the sign of the Runemaster. The protection stone thrummed as if accepting his presence.
It wouldn’t hurl him from the chamber, at least.
Apprehension kept him frozen in the doorway all the same. The purplish-blue light from his runestone cast odd shadows and angles of light through the chamber beyond. Was it his imagination, or did the runestone struggle to pierce the heavy darkness within the vault?
It had been years since he entered this chamber, and he had only entered once with his father by his side. The day Jael accepted the post of Runemaster, King Ereb had led him down these very tunnels to this exact vault; showed him the dusty shelves, the horrible books, the tattered volumes, the monstrous grimoires. Books so vile they should never see the light of day.
“Protecting these books is one of your biggest tasks, my son,” King Ereb had told him. “Very few even know this vault exists. And you need to keep it that way. Be sure you trust your staff implicitly before entrusting them with the knowledge of this chamber.”
Jael had taken the warning to heart. He’d only told Math, although his apprentice had ferreted out the secret on his own from something he’d read in one of his books. Jael had seen to it the volume in question was removed from the General Shelves and put under lock and key.
He shook himself. There was nothing for it; he couldn’t procrastinate all day. His limbs felt wooden and awkward as he stepped into the forbidden vault carved from stone.
The protection stone at the entrance wasn’t the only one. Every shelf within the vault had its own protection stone. These weren’t normal runestones that needed to be replaced at intervals.
Carved from rare precious rock, these stones glowed as bright as gold glittering beneath the light of dragon fire and could hold for decades, perhaps centuries. As far as he knew, the stones in this room were the only ones in existence.
A crying shame, because he could use them for the Bifrost right now.
The air in the vault pressed down on him, tasting of decay and dust. He drew shallow breaths and tried to ignore the unpleasant smell, the taste, as he scanned the stone shelves for the book his father had sent him to fetch. The Nameless Volumes were somewhere in the back, he remembered that much.
He found them around a jutting boulder of rock, in a crevice. Six narrow cubbies carved inside the boulder held a dozen tomes, their spines coated in dust and mildew. Jael scanned them, noting the different colors and sizes and shapes, but not one word had been stamped onto the leather covers.
They were nameless.
He had no choice but to remove them one by one and search for his father’s seal, the seal of the King, of the Daemon.
The first book on the top shelf felt cold and grimy to the touch, its leather cover a puke shade of amber that had been vibrant before years of neglect in the vault. The next book was dull brown, locked with an iron clasp that had no key, the third a light shade of tan wound with straps that burned when his fingers grazed them.
Jael found the one he wanted on the third shelf. The leather book felt icy cold against his fingers as he held it up to the light of his runestone. It was a light brown tome splattered with darker browns. The seal of his father clasped the flap shut.
A sense of dread stole over him. The inclination to toss the book back onto its forbidden shelf and race from the vault almost overcame him. Perhaps it was the protection stone warning him away, but more likely it was his own feelings of foreboding.
Jael took a stabilizing breath and hid the book in an inner pocket of his robe, where no one would ever know it was hiding. The protective runes in the Forbidden Section kept anyone from using magic within its walls. He would have to remove the book from its safe place in order to open it. Perhaps he could find a secluded section of the library that would shield him from prying eyes.
This time, when the whisper to run flooded his senses, Jael bolted for the door and left the forbidden chamber with its nameless books behind.
He could almost imagine they snarled at his escaping heels.
Chapter 17
The runestones cast mauve lights against the walls and ceiling of the tunnel Anrid wandered down. Twice now she had heard giggles close by, but she was yet to capture a single goblin child. They flitted just out of her reach, in the shadows, knowing where to hide so that her human eyes could not find them.
