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I headed to the east hall where it was usually empty. Today did not disappoint. I stumbled, staggered past the ancient paintings, feeling like the creature that had forty spears stuck out of it. Was it surprised? I was surprised. I touched a pillar and then recoiled at the pain. I wasn’t sure if it hurt or me, but either way, there was way too much pain to deal with. The library didn’t want to be cut off from me any more than I wanted to be cut off from it.
Somehow, that was comforting enough for me to shake my head and gather my thoughts. I needed to take care of my things I’d left in the various departments, but most importantly, I needed to get my book before its unstable magic started bleeding all over the place and messing with the other books in the library.
I headed up the back stairs and stopped in the preservation rooms first. Don and Jade were working as they always did, unsurprised to see me.
“Oh, good, you’re here. We were going to get started on?—”
“I’m just here to get my things.” I gathered up my supplies and handbooks on various preservation formulas while they watched me in confusion.
“Are you visiting another library?” Jade asked.
I licked my lips while a pulse of disorienting pain went through my chest. “They fired me. Jessica is now on the board.”
Jade hissed, and Don cursed more creatively than I’d expected from a preservationist. “That’s just wrong. You’re much more competent than she is, at everything,” Jade said, rubbing my shoulder, the one Horace had mangled.
I winced and tried to smile, but I’m sure I just looked sick. “It’s not that they picked her over me, but that I didn’t tell them about Horace. I knew that the Scholar was turning him and didn’t notify the board.”
“That’s still idiocy,” Don said, scowling. “Is it your job to tell them what’s going on here? Maybe if they made you a member of the board instead of keeping you hanging, you’d make sure they knew what was going on. Just because no one is here more than you doesn’t mean that they own you.”
I shook my head and put everything into a box. “Thanks, but it’s done. They stripped me of my title.” My bottom lip trembled before I turned and walked out before I burst into tears. I’d save that for when I was all alone eating sushi, although not even sushi sounded good.
After that, I got my translation notes on various junk texts out of the desk drawer of my favorite study room, then went to the lift that led to the floor with rare and dangerous texts, but I couldn’t use the elevator, because the blue orb wouldn’t take my finger scan. For a moment I stood there on the brink of self-destructing, when the doors opened and out stepped Felix, the guy who spent most of his time watching book wards.
He smiled cheerfully. “Hey, Libby. Your book is getting volatile. I wondered when you’d be in to reset its wards.”
“I actually came to get it,” I said, sniffing. “I got fired and Jessica is on the board.”
His brows rose. “You’re kidding.”
I shook my head and my chin quivered.
He ushered me into the elevator. “How am I going to manage all the books without you? You have a knack for knowing exactly how dangerous books will interact and how to keep them playing nice. And where will you keep your book? It’s old enough that you could probably sell it for something, but how much money would be enough to lose the only thing you have from your father? You can’t have it in an apartment, or who knows what it will do? It could transmorph the pillars that hold up the roof into flowers.”
I sighed. “I don’t know, but that was part of my job, keeping my book, so if I don’t have my job, I can’t keep my book here.”
“Downstairs in the lab they have a lock room filled with even more dangerous books than the ones up here. I got a tour once, you know, to get ideas, not that you aren’t on top of your game, but it’s always good to see new ways of doing things. I never mentioned it to you, because we all know how much you hate vampires.” Apparently not enough.
The elevator reached the secure vault floor where he opened the gate, then followed me out.
“I’m serious about you asking for the use of the Scholar’s vault. They might find your book interesting enough to do it for a small fee, maybe in exchange for a few of your methods of containment. I know that you can’t stand any of them, but they’re not all bad. They’re serious about their work and don’t take any shortcuts. What else will you do with her?” he asked, opening the door that led into the inner vault where my book hung in chains from the ceiling, touching nothing that could bleed into the other books or the building.
My inheritance was all kinds of hassle, but I loved that book, even if it wasn’t rare enough to be priceless. It was a morality treatise in English and ten dead languages, word for word, a key to unlocking all the mysteries of ages past. It was my languages key, and while it wasn’t entirely consistent, as no such things are when we talk about variety of dialects and the changes of a language in an area over a period of time, it had begun my fascination at an early age. I’d used that book as a key while I translated the other ancient texts in the House of Mercy, but my experiments had mixed with the book’s own magic over the years. If the old librarian at the House of Mercy hadn’t known so much about containing dangerous sacred texts, I would have had to destroy it a long time ago.
What was I going to do with it? What were my options? Truly, asking the Scholar if I could keep my book in his vault wouldn’t be too big a favor since I hadn’t reported that he was turning Horace in time to stop it. What a waste, since he had no valuable information on anything about his death.
“Have you heard of the Book of Fates?” I asked, because I should care about something else, even when my library had been taken from me.
“Which one? The Celtic is the most popular, but I think it lacks the pomp of the Norse. Then there are all the smaller ones, less popular, but if you wanted to make a study of it…” He rubbed his chin and started drawing out the release runes on my book. “There’s a scholar whose specialty is all about the Books of Fates. Stead, I believe his name is, something boring, Matthew, Markus…”
“Michael,” I said while my stomach twisted. The Scholar hadn’t mentioned knowing anything about the book when Horace said the name to me.
“That’s right. You should contact him while you’re between jobs, help with translation. You really are a treasure, Libby. I don’t know what we’re going to do without you.”
He walked with me, carrying my box of supplies with my book on top wrapped in special bandages soaked in oils to keep it stable while I transported it. “Why don’t I come with you?” he asked as he juggled the box and put his finger in the blue sphere. “I’ll introduce you to the people who run their vault and you can decide what you want to do. We can take the stairs off the east hall so no one asks questions. Jessica’s a fine librarian, but she lacks your training and your instincts. I don’t care how many degrees she has from her prestigious school. I went to a local college and then worked with a great book speller at a book shop in New York, and let me tell you how valuable it is to not have those huge student loans hanging over your head. Most of my contemporaries who wanted to follow the path of the books had to quit and take security jobs with business firms just to pay off their debts.”
I nodded and followed him into the elevator. He kept up a cheerful chatter while we descended, then kept talking while he carried my box towards the stairs where I’d run, quite literally, into the Scholar, the moment that had really started this whole mess.
It would be so humiliating to see him again with nothing but my mediocre skills to fall back on. Felix was too kind, but I didn’t have the background necessary to seriously work in his field. The Scholar had offered me other translators to work with. Maybe after some time, I could reestablish myself at another library, but would all of that depend on whether or not I cultivated his personal interest?
