Basil lifted his head and glanced between the two of them. “Are the two of you going to research the mate bond more?”
Benedict shot a look at her before he shook his head. “No. Not today. I might just take home a few of the more promising books to look over tonight.”
“I’ll do that too.” Beatrice nodded, even though the thought of walking back to the shelves to retrieve the books set her feet to throbbing.
“I can look over some of them with you tonight.” Basil slid the two pieces of paper across the desk toward them. “I have the roster of those who will be performing at the Faerie Market when it arrives next week. The two of you have been assigned to do readings together.”
“What?” Beatrice snatched one of the pieces of papers, her stomach sinking as she read. Their names appeared partway down. Together. “Who created this list?”
“Not me.” Basil grimaced and shook his head.
“What is with the Library pushing us together?” Beatrice flapped a hand at Benedict. Every time she turned around, she was being paired with him. Sure, the day hadn’t been all that bad. Almost pleasant, even. But that didn’t mean she wanted to spend the whole morning of the Faerie Market with him.
“Perhaps the Library knows something you don’t?” Benedict was back to giving her that smoldering smirk, his copy of the list in his hands. “It is the Great Library of the Court ofKnowledge, after all.”
Beatrice rolled her eyes. “Knowledgedoesn’t always meanwisdom.”
Not that she usually doubted the Great Library. But it had been making some puzzling choices lately. Perhaps the magic of Midsummer was addling it.
“I beg to differ in this case.” Benedict gave that insouciant shrug as he turned back to the paper. “It seems we have been assigned to spend the morning of the third day of the Market attempting to fill as many entertainment spots as possible with readings.”
Beatrice dropped her gaze back to the piece of paper, reading the instructions that started beneath the list and ran onto the back of the page.
At least their readings could be the same piece each time. As the audience in the Market would be ever changing, they wouldn’t need to come up with multiple pieces.
“You’ll want to pick out your piece and start practicing.” Basil gestured to the papers they held. “You can find the list of what is acceptable and how long the excerpt needs to be on the back.”
Beatrice flipped the paper and perused the instructions. The pieces couldn’t be risqué and needed to be a certain length. Other than that, there was no restriction on genre or type of performance. If they wanted to perform a play or read from a dry tome on the Laws of Bindings, that was up to them.
Benedict met Beatrice’s gaze, giving her the flirtatious grin that always made her blood boil. “I think we should do a romance.”
“Not a chance.” Beatrice stuffed the paper into a pocket of her coat. No way was she performing a romance with Benedict of the Smoldering Smirk.
“Come on. It would be a lot more fun than reading from one of the books we’ve been forging through lately.” Benedict might have been more convincing, if he hadn’t waggled his eyebrows. “Surely you don’t want to read one of the boring tomes we have been reading.”
Beatrice huffed a sigh that was more anger than resignation. Just when she thought she and Benedict were coming to some kind of understanding, he did something annoying. “We’ll see.”
That was about as good of an agreement as she was going to give him.
Chapter Eight
Beatrice shut the book, managing to keep herself from slamming it closed by sheer force of will.
This was hopeless. For the past week, she and Benedict had perused the various books on the Laws of Bindings. Maybe they’d missed something within all the dry, convoluted language. Maybe there was nothing to find. How were they to know?
Not that they’d had loads of time to search the books. The Library had remained just as busy for the whole week. All of them had been kept so occupied helping patrons that there had been very little time for in-depth book-searching of their own.
She slumped against the bookshelf behind her before she slid to the floor, her legs out in front of her. Two bookwyrms promptly slithered out of the nearby shelves and onto her lap, their scaly bodies a gentle weight. “This is hopeless.”
Benedict scrubbed a hand over his face before he shelved the book he’d been reading. He, too, had lost his arrogant edge over the past week, looking just as tired and worn as she felt. “Perhaps it’s time to take a break from law books and focus on the romance books instead.”
“Is that anI told you so?” Beatrice was too tired and defeated to even feel that much animosity.
“No, not yet.” Benedict’s smile flickered with a hint of his normal cockiness. “I’m saving that for when we find something.”
“Ifwe find something. The romance books might be just as much of a bust as the law books.” Beatrice flapped a hand in that general direction before she went back to running her hand down the back of one of the bookwyrms.
“At least they will be more pleasant to peruse.” Benedict shrugged, a hint of his grin curving his mouth and giving him the hint of dimples. “Perhaps we can find the piece for our reading while we’re at it.”
