The part of me that isn’t absorbed by their conversation prickles at the use of the word ‘dull,’ and a book slides from a shelf without much prompting to slap Lambert over the head.
“Ouch! What the fu—? Sorry, boss!” Lambert calls, searching for me. When he can’t find me, he grumbles. “The walls have ears here, I swear.”
I know times have changed. The term is considered inoffensive now, just like so many profanities that would’ve been unutterable in my youth. Still, calling inepts ‘dulls’ does not sit right with me. It disrespects the wonderful hardworking people who raised me and the kind family I worked for before Edmund seduced me away with promises of magic.
The six families rarely bother with liminals anymore, although they cherry-pick those with the highest potential and bring them into the fold as a means to prevent too much inbreeding. It’s a stark contrast to when I was alive, when divinators were so desperate to bring our numbers back that they’d sometimes bring back liminals with barely enough magic to conjure a wisplight.
“Well, you shouldn’t use that word,” Galileo scolds mildly as he returns to his seat. “You know the Librarian doesn’t like it.”
As soon as the others follow him, the Arcanaeum reaches out and automatically tidies up my mess. Index cards fly back into the boxes, and the book which smacked Lambert shuffles back into place. It even polishes the brass finial shaped like an armillary sphere in the centre of the spiral staircase.
Lambert concedes with a wave of his hand. “Whatever. Anyway, North is looking for a book.”
“If the walls have ears,” North interjects, “then perhaps we should have this conversation elsewhere? What about lunch? Is there anywhere good nearby?”
Lambert snorts and rolls his eyes. “There’s nothing ‘nearby.’”
Thankfully, Galileo takes pity on him. “The Arcanaeum exists in its own little dimension. It has no physical location. We can leave through any door, and it will put us wherever we choose.”
“How about sushi?” Lambert starts towards a thin, wonky orange door in the corner, clears his throat, and raps on it with his knuckles. “Hachiko Square.”
He turns the handle, exposing the busiest meeting place in modern Tokyo, with the famous Akita statue easily visible beneath the city lights. It’s nighttime there, and without waiting for the others, he steps through.
I have never been more frustrated than when the door clicks shut behind the three of them. I’m tethered here, while they’re out there, plotting magic only knows what. Worse still, I’m nowso on edge that even if I were to go back to my book, I doubt I’d be able to focus enough to finish it.
I’m tempted to give Northcliff Ackland a second strike for that crime alone. Does he have any idea how long I’ve had to wait for the right mood to strike so I could start that series?
Instead, I drift back through the walls, heading up towards my clock tower with an aggravated groan.
The four semi-translucent clock faces permit a misty light into my cosy little bolt hole, illuminating the knickknacks I’ve collected across the years on their carefully dusted stands. My bed is crammed into the space as well, in a private nook created by more shelves and guarded by thick velvet hangings. I don’t sleep, but it felt weird to have a room of my own without a bed in it. Plus, the cushions and soft blankets look inviting, even if I can’t touch them.
Around me, the heavy tick, tick, tick of the mechanical clock echoes, sparing me from the uneasy silence that is all too common in this place. Right now, it’s not soothing me. Instead, every heavy clunk echoes like a countdown to battle. Without meaning to, I drift over to the table in one corner and flick open the music box there.
It was a gift from the Arcanaeum itself. Sometimes, when I’m sad or lonely, the building conjures something new or even something familiar.
It isn’t just sentient, but capable of empathy. Something Ackland and his cronies could never have predicted. Would they have cared, even if they knew? I doubt it. They simply wanted more power.
They were playing with magic they didn’t understand and couldn’t control, and centuries later, the building and I are still discovering the consequences.
A gentle waltz tinkles cheerfully in the empty space, and for just a second, I allow myself to believe that this morning neverhappened. When I go back down into the library, there won’t be a file labelled ‘Northcliff Ackland.’ My peaceful un-life is exactly as it’s always been.
It’s a lie.
Something has changed, and North’s arrival feels like just the start of it all.
Three
Kyrith
Galileo is the only one who returns before closing, settling back into his corner with a long, drawn-out sigh. For once, I don’t join him. Whatever peace I might’ve once felt in his presence has disintegrated.
He’s now in league withthem.
Somehow, in the space of a few hours, my peaceful Arcanaeum has become a battlefield. Lines have been drawn, and I have no allies.
“Librarian?”
I blink at Dakari, waiting patiently by my desk. Ordinarily, he’s the last person on earth I’d ever daydream around, but being dead has made me callous when it comes to the dangerous aura he exudes. Not for the first time, I find myself comparing him to some deadly shark. It’s not just the disconcerting stillness of his black-eyed gaze that brings to mind the comparison, either. It’s in the way he moves, the graceful ease with which he cuts through a space when he walks.
