Obtaining an audience with Chief Librarian Sheratan was a frustratingly unsimple matter, fraught with small talk and dead ends, sideways glances and broken webbing. Eventually, she landed upon a workable portion of her network—a friend of a colleague-owing-favours who had some family connection to leverage.
“Well,” the friend-of-a-colleague said, eyeing her scribe’s garb. Rana memorised the shape of her face and the cut of her Higher Library uniform in turn, in case it would come in use later. “Aspiring academic, are you? Doubt you’ll get a place this way, even if Janan’s a dear.”
“I’d be grateful for a little of her time,” Rana said, as nondescriptly as possible. It was perhaps for the best that she assumed simpler intentions.
“Sure,” the Higher scribe said, in the manner of one indulging a precocious underling. “I’ll put in a word. No promises, though.”
Rana fished a pouch from her satchel and held it out, open-palmed.
The Higher scribe tilted her chin knowingly. “Courtling ways, eh?” she said with an affable grin. “Any friend of Basima’s a friend of mine. But since you’re offering…” She plucked the coins from Rana’s palm and winked. “Keep an eye for a letter.”
Rana shelved her words away, into a corner marked ‘near useless’. The thing about liars was that you never knew they were liars until they’d finished inconveniencing you.
+++
When the letter did come, Rana checked it over for the slightest hint of blue sigil before she allowed herself to open it.
Tonight, the Higher scribe had written. Official offices, eleventh hour. And with the letter, a spell-slip with runes for unlocking and access, all signed for in a looping hand.
No agonising over her outfit, this time: the plainest of dresses would do—it was the tell-tale blaze of apprenticeling-blue that mattered. The rest of her might as well not exist; when she wore the cloak, maidservants averted their eyes at her passing.
A group of late-shifters edged against the wall on her way to the Higher Library. She couldn’t help but search their faces in return; it was an increasingly distressing habit these days. Her gaze kept catching on profile lines, on swoops of hair, on hands wrapped around mops and the scroll of a sleeve pushed up to the elbow.
Living ghosts, she thought tiredly. Living ghosts, their skins stitched around still-moving flesh. Aliyah was alive; she was sure of it. Had to be. Healer Salai might be lost to the kingdom, rotting beneath a hundred layers of sand—but that didn’t mean his apprentice had to suffer the same fate. Farzaneh had relayed kiter reports: no bodies in the deserted boat, and no corpses in the gorge-tunnel, either. A scouting expedition had been sent in, though they’d stopped once the tunnel got too small to continue.
“I suppose someone could’ve kept going,” Farzaneh had said, tone wary. “I wasn’t there, so I don’t know—but the measurements looked plausible. Just not, ah…safe.”
“And no one tried to go further at all?” Rana asked archly. “Not even at Magician insistence?” She had a vague idea of how these things worked; the blue-bloods would have been itching to get their hands on the traitor.
Farzaneh shook her head. “Tariq’s a good leader. Argued back, wouldn’t risk his team. The Magicians agreed, thank the stars, and didn’t try to send one of us. There are all kinds of hazards out there, you know? Rock collapse, bad air…” Her voice scraped like gravel-over-gravel as she trailed off.
“I see,” Rana had replied, biting down on her frustration.
Part of her wanted to drag Farzaneh down to that damned gorge right there and then, to demand better answers. Why this traitor, and why now? The…timing…of the faery attack sat uneasily in the back of her mind, puddling there like bitter sludge: wasn’t it convenient that most of the Magicians had been busy and away while the greatest corrupting influence of the decade slipped free? What secrets had Aliyah been hiding from her, all these years?
The Library door loomed. Rana clenched her teeth as she pushed it open. Eyes turned, saw the blue adorning her shoulders, and slipped furtively back down to their books and papers and whatever else.
Nadim had been right; the Higher foyer greeted her with less hostility than when she’d indicated her place of employment. Silken blue lining rustled down her back, leaned in to brush against her chin like a friend whispering a secret: you’re better when you have me.
She presented her missive to the clerk on duty, who sat up straighter at her approach.
“Certainly looks in order,” the clerk said, dipping her chin. “I haven’t seen you around—new student are you? Please, enjoy your stay.”
An unfamiliar sensation uncurled in her chest—not satisfaction, exactly, and she wouldn’t go so far as to call it power, but…something not unlike it.
“Thank you,” she said, as pleasantly as she could manage.
The Library, it seemed, did not shift its appearance as some rumours stated. It looked the same as it had last appeared, only much quieter—almost eerily so. Only a handful of figures dotted the tables, poring over yellowed parchments. Did Higher scribes get better hours, and fewer late-shifts? She marched up the closest curl of imperial staircase, up and up, all the way to the thirteenth floor. Bookshelves spiraled away on all sides on each level she passed, fading to an indigo haze in the distance; she tried not to look in those directions. Nadim had mentioned getting headaches from that sort of thing. She concentrated on the stairs instead: stairs and stairs and yet more stairs.
Finally, she paused at the thirteenth balustrade to catch her breath, and to cast begrudging admiration over the turn of the armillary sphere above. Stars spun over interlocking rings, glints of bronze and brass and gold waltzing in perfect harmony. It was a pity, she thought bitterly, that earthly things could not hope to be so straightforward.
The way to the Higher offices was through a deep corridor, a wedge of darkness cut into the far side of this level—there was a far side to this one, at least. A strange vertigo swooped over her as she stepped past that threshold—a blinking hiccup of nausea, there and gone again. She blinked her eyes clear as sparks of spell-light flickered to life, false-fire within glass globes. Flagstones merged into plush carpeting beneath her feet, so thick it silenced her footsteps.
Different paintings graced the walls now: portraits of Librarians long gone. Their eyes seemed to follow her as she walked, and her fingers tightened reflexively around her signed spell-paper. What would happen if she didn’t have it with her, she wondered. She spied no visible runes dancing over the walls, but that didn’t mean the enchantment wasn’t there—her senses twitched at the touch of invisible thresholds, secret lines demarcating bounds of permission between one footstep and the next. The half-seconds of dizziness could have been her imagination, but with magic involved, it was rarely as simple as that.
Offices graced the walls at various intervals, bearing nameplates that weren’t Sheratan’s. She supposed they went up in importance the further in she walked; it was only near the end of the corridor that she reached the doors she’d been looking for.
She squared her shoulders, took a deep breath, and knocked.
“Come in,” called a voice, threaded with power.
The doors parted in much the same manner as Magician Cardainne’s had, though with much less fanfare. Once opened, they framed a well-lit room—large enough, but almost modest in comparison to Cardainne’s—lined with full bookshelves. Many globes of false-fire hung from the ceiling in even rows. Chief Librarian Sheratan sat at her desk, stylograph in hand. A miniature armillary sphere turned beside her nameplate as she tipped her head expectantly.
Rana bowed hastily before making her way to the visitor’s chair. Sheratan was a plump woman, with angular spectacles and hair piled into a high bun. Golden embroidery cloaked her shoulders and traced down her arms, terminating in ink-flecked sleeve-cuffs. She stayed silent, expression calm and watchful as Rana produced the letter and spell-slip.
“Many thanks for your time,” Rana started. She’d had no experience with speaking to someone this highly-ranked, but politeness seemed as good a start as any.
“Thanks noted,” Sheratan replied dryly. “What is it you wanted to speak of—Miss Rana, was it?”
“Yes,” she said, swallowing tightly. “Forgive me for my forwardness, but—”
“Ah,” Sheratan said knowingly. “No need for all that. My niece has assured me you’re of a solid character, but if it’s a particular position you’re after, there is already an excellent system in place. One that I am not inclined to interfere with.”
Rana blinked. “Oh—of course. Though, I’m afraid that isn’t why I’m here.”
Sheratan sighed. “Is it about that, then?” She gestured at the apprenticeling cloak.
“Sort of.” Rana cleared her throat. “I wanted to ask you about…your kin-daughter. Seventhborn Alhena.”
Sheratan didn’t stiffen, or react visibly in any way, but her voice did take a harsher turn. “What about her?”
“About her traitor-associate, actually,” Rana said.
Sheratan looked her up and down. “I didn’t realise the Magicians sent their apprentices on such duties.”
“They don’t. This is a personal matter.”
Sheratan frowned and set down her stylograph. “Then I would advise you let sleeping daemons lie. There’s nothing worth investigating here that your masters don’t already know.”
“It’s not really about the traitor either,” Rana said. “Or at least, not that traitor.”
“Oh? Which, then?” Sheratan asked.
“The consort had an accomplice. When she escaped.”
“Yes?”
Her hands were in her lap, hidden from Sheratan’s view. She allowed herself to squeeze them into fists. “That accomplice was my friend.”
“Ah,” Sheratan said pityingly. “I see. Well, you seem like a bright young lady: you already know there isn’t anything you can do.”
Her mouth went dry. “I want to find out why—”
Sheratan shook her head and pressed a hand lightly to her throat: a modest, sorrowful gesture. “There’s no use, Miss Rana. I told myself the same thing when they found out about dear Alhena. I knew her many years. She was such a sweet child, so happy with the harp—and yet, sometimes things turn out like this, and there is nothing us good folk can do.”
Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.
“I can do something,” Rana pressed. “I can find out why she…left.”
Sheratan shot her another pitying look from over the top of her spectacles. “And if you do discover why your friend became accomplice—what then? What good is that to you? As Librarians, we must learn to sort the important information from the unimportant. Powerful texts from useless ones. Good realia from bad. Surely you, even in the Lower Library, understand this.”
“I want an answer,” she replied helplessly. “Some simple closure, any at all. Surely you heard Alhena speak of…anything that would make sense as to why—”
“No,” Sheratan said, the faintest hint of hoarseness bleeding into her voice. “I did not. If that were the case, I would have steered her away from her dangerous notions. But as I said: sometimes, we discover the people we hold dear are not who they seem to be. And there is nothing you can do about that, Miss Rana—nothing you did wrong, that your friend hid her true self from you. It is not your duty to seek which dark star burned her mind from within, to dig into the wretched territories of her bygone soul. It is simply best, in my experience, to move on.” She offered a faint, tight smile. “For this too, shall pass.”
Would it? Aliyah was not Alhena, and Rana was not Sheratan.
“Your advice is wise,” she said carefully. “But I am not asking for counsel. I am only asking for information.”
“It will do you no good, Miss Rana. But if it is information you want, then your masters would be better to ask than I. What evidence there is to seek, I assume they have already sought.”
They are not my masters, she wanted to scream.
“Well,” she said instead. “It is a personal matter.”
Sheratan frowned. “If you are so determined to see this to its unsatisfying conclusion…well, I will not stop you, and the young do learn from their mistakes. Or so they say. I’m afraid I still can’t help you in that regard—Magician worries are not my concern, and if it is physical evidence you are looking for…again, your masters have investigated extensively, I am sure.”
“When you say physical evidence,” Rana began cautiously.
“Alhena’s possessions were bequeathed to the sixthborn, and not to I.”
Rana blinked. “To the princess Achernar?” For the first time since this awful meeting had started, she felt a flutter of hope in her chest. Or perhaps it was only a manic excitement, that she had not run out of cards to play. Well, not run out of all but the highest card.
“Just so,” said Sheratan, in a tone implying I doubt you can stretch your connections so far, little lowborn.
Rana managed to keep herself from laughing—but only just.
+++
“No,” Karim said. He worked his jaw and paced in front of her, arms crossed. “Rana, I’ve done everything you’ve asked for.”
“Yes,” she said. “You have.”
“Would you really?” he demanded. “After all that?”
Morning light spilled through his windows, washing over the neat stacks of notes upon his desk. She eyed the vase by his books: a plain carafe with pale roses frothing over its top.
“I would not like to,” she said.
The point wasn’t whether she would—it was the fact that she could. Perhaps not now, but if one day she ascended enough that such an outrageous reveal would benefit her…well, if he were a wise man, he’d stop at once. She knew he wouldn’t; he was so far gone that it was almost pitiful.
He must’ve sensed her line of thought, because he stopped stock still.
“Rana,” he said. “I have asked one thing, and that is you stay away from her.”
She shrugged. “It has nothing to do with her. It’s about access. That’s all.”
“And on whose neck does that fall on, if those above deem it inappropriate?”
“Mine, of course.”
He shot her a sour look. “Yes. And hers.”
She almost opened her mouth to say: no, it wouldn’t. But she recalled the seventhborn, the whole reason she was here in the first place. Alhena’s own Magician-siblings had contributed, one way or another, to her demise. There was no telling how far the courts might go—not anymore.
“They’re her rooms now,” she argued instead. “What would others have to say about how she chooses to use them? The Magicians would’ve already looked them over, right? There’s nothing dangerous in there. Only…clues.”
“Rana,” he said disgustedly. “All this, for that Library-thief? Don’t think I haven’t forgotten—”
“Even more,” she shot back, “for Achernar?”
He shook his head. “You don’t understand.”
“I understand,” she said. “You’re in love. It makes you a fool.”
A muscle twitched in his jaw. Those roses were still fresh; part of her was astonished they’d made it this long. She wondered what despair he’d fall into, when the time inevitably came for the sixthborn to be married off. It was tragic, really, like a storytale. If she were more of a romantic, she’d find it unbearably sad. As it was, it served for excellent leverage.
“Do you, now,” he replied. “Understand, that is.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Not like that.”
“You’re acting quite the fool yourself, good cousin. Need I remind you of how you mangled your in with Cardainne?” His tone darkened. “I’ll wager he’s going to have the both of us coughing blood because of your overstepping.”
Rana ignored him. “I just want a quick look. It shouldn’t be difficult for you to arrange. You needn’t even mention my name, if it upsets you that much.”
“Very funny,” he said. “You don’t think she’s going to ask what I need it for? It’s suspicious as all hells, Rana, I can’t—”
“So tell her,” she said. “Tell her about how much of an evil courtling I am, how I need to be bought off with this one favour.”
“Achernar’s not an idiot,” he ground out. “And neither am I. You’re going to keep asking this of me, aren’t you? First it was ‘oh, search about town for a decent apothecary’, and now—”
“Please,” she said. “You know me. I wouldn’t for something so trivial.”
“If you think that Scionsong girl untrivial—”
“It’s not for her,” Rana snapped. “It’s for me. She’s already gone. Obviously. But I deserve to know, and she damn well isn’t here to tell me, so I’m going to find out myself.”
He blinked at her, in much the same way Sheratan had. “What? That’s—”
“Useless? Maybe to you.”
Aliyah had been her oldest friend, but it was not only that. It was not a matter of time; it was a condition of presence. Aliyah had indulged in all of her stupid, childhood ideas. Taught her how to fold paper scraps into many-winged birds. Sat with her beneath the shade of that old ironwood and spoken of pleasant, dreamlike things. They’d planned to become scribes together—none of it had worked out, of course.
Watching her deteriorate had been a wretched time, helplessness clawing at the inside of her chest. Fighting to seek a solution had been her one solace throughout the trials of early scribehood, of scrambling to learn, to adapt, to fit in—when it all became too much, she’d thrown herself into this one thing, this purpose. When she’d succeeded, it had been exulting. It had been you did something good with what little power you have. For some time, the world had finally felt just and right.
And now, it had all gone to hell. Why? She had to know why. It couldn’t all have been for nothing.
Karim’s gaze fixed on her face, looking perturbed. She schooled her expression back toward neutral.
“Fine,” he said heavily. “I’ll ask. She might say no.”
“Thank you. And I doubt she’ll refuse.”
He narrowed his eye at that. “What do you know—”
“She won’t refuse,” Rana said calmly. “After all, she loves you. Right?”
He was silent for several moments.
“Get out,” he said.
She did.
+++
The late Seventhborn’s rooms looked as if they hadn’t been touched since her last use of them.
The bed was huge and extensively canopied, but the sheets were unmade. Clothing lay bunched up on the backs of settees in haphazard piles. Were it not for the dust sheening the dark surfaces of the desk and dresser, Rana would have suspected Alhena had just left for the day. Achernar had, according to Karim, no reason to touch the place for now. One could draw easy conclusions as to why.
Lines of sunlight blazed around the edges of heavy curtains, drawn shut. Rana whispered words for spell-light rather than open them and cupped the glow in her hand as she ventured through this shadowed ghost-place.
Alhena’s quarters boasted wall shelves full of books—upon closer inspection, they were not spell tomes or study texts, but rather literary novels, and a selection of illuminated stories. She flipped through them for hidden hollows or messages tucked between the pages, but found none. The rest of the rooms were predictable in their magnificence; the gilt-edged mirror concealed no compartments, and table drawers held nothing more than loose papers, broken cosmetics and the occasional shiny trinket.
All in all, it was very disappointing: the place painted a portrait of a rather pampered individual, one who liked to take baths using—Rana had frowned down at the label—gold-flecked soaps. Perhaps Alhena’s softness had been her undoing, in the end. For what was there to find? There were no vials of poison, no journals detailing murder plots. She supposed the Magicians might have removed any overt pieces of evidence, but she’d hoped that they would’ve missed something: traitorship was, after all, often gleaned by word of mouth.
Rana sighed, and did another sweep of the room. Of the traitor-consort, there were few signs. A pair of shoes in a slightly different size, a box of eye-contacts shoved into the back of the wardrobe, two plain throwing knives tucked behind a stack of papers—that was about as interesting as it got.
She frowned down at a pair of settees, facing one another. In truth, she couldn’t picture Aliyah here, speaking in confidence with a princess and her spymaster—but then, she hadn’t pictured quiet, meek Aliyah breaking into the Higher Library before it had happened. Sighing, she straightened up and chewed at the inside of her cheek.
“Find anything?” someone said at her back. A smooth voice. Elegant intonation. For a moment, her mind alighted on the thought of a royal ghost, head cradled in see-through hands.
Rana whirled round, a clumsy shield cresting at her fingertips.
“No need,” said the sixthborn Achernar. “It is only I.”
Level eyes stared her down. Her first impression was of a furrowed brow and frowning lips and a beaded shawl cascading over narrow shoulders. A ribbon laced the shawl closed at the throat, bleached mourning-white.
“You’re Karim’s cousin,” Achernar said. “Aren’t you.”
It wasn’t a question. “Yes,” Rana replied anyway.
She looked the princess up and down. Achernar wore relatively simple clothing, for a royal, and her hands were held loose by her sides, free of any instruments or weapons. Of course, that meant nothing: if Achernar wanted to kill her, she could probably do it without much struggle. Rana didn’t tense just yet; there was none of that ice-spined chill that had been there when Cardainne had spoken to her on the battlements.
“Why are you here?” Rana asked.
“These rooms belong to me now,” Achernar said with a wry shrug. “And you are in them. I thought it wise that I supervise.”
“Right,” Rana said. “Well, I’m done looking. Would you like me to turn out my pockets?”
Achernar’s lips twitched into a faint smile. “No need. If you were to rob a dead woman, then I think that is punishment on you enough.”
Rana shrugged. “There’s nothing to steal. Nothing to find.”
“No?” Achernar asked. “One would think the Magicians overlooked something.”
Rana blinked, startled. “I’m sorry?”
“I suspect you thought the same,” Achernar said, stepping closer. “Why else would you be here?” She cleared her throat and traced a hand absently over the back of the settee. “I was present when they dragged Alhena out and threw me the keys. Was it not an unreasonable assumption, that they did not have the time to scour for true evidence? Coward was I, I did not look for myself. So I ask you, cousin Khan—are you certain you found nothing?”
“Quite certain,” Rana said, and hesitated. “Did you ever see the seventhborn with others?”
“You mean with her foreign companion?” Achernar wrinkled her nose delicately. “The…spymaster…slept in there, yes. I suppose it was part of their farce.”
“I meant others,” Rana said falteringly. “Like, any meetings with a lowborn, or—”
“No,” Achernar said. “No, I did not. You should know how unusual it is for a lowborn to cavort with royals. Certainly not in here, past guards if the liaison were to occur under cover of night.”
“I see,” Rana said.
They’d been on some terrace when she’d stumbled across them—she could still picture the two of them gazing into each other’s eyes, the closeness of their faces indefensible. It was, she thought wincingly, so tragic that it was insufferable.
“If I tell you all I know,” Achernar said, breaking into her gloomy musings. “Will you leave us alone?”
She blinked. “I already wish to leave you be.” Let them have what bitter scraps of happiness they could, for the time being. Who was she to interfere, leverage aside?
Achernar shrugged. “Well, I can assure you—your friend has no connection to my former sister.”
“Oh,” Rana said. And then: “What?”
“Karim informed me of your concerns,” Achernar stated matter-of-factly. “I have a little insight from the Magician investigation: the foreign traitor acted alone, and on Alhena’s request no less. She was recruited…specifically for such a purpose, I believe. A rare diplomatic visit, unaffiliated eyes and ears—none of us could have foreseen this. Your friend is an anomaly, a last-minute addition, I suspect. Are you hoping to find a version of events which absolves her of all guilt?”
That last sentence was spoken with the same casualness as the rest of her words, but Rana froze.
“I was just looking for an answer.”
Achernar gave her a knowing look. “An answer that you would make you happy? She fought a Magician’s apprentice of her own accord. I suggest you come to terms with it.”
“But, why—”
“Perhaps she simply wanted to leave,” Achernar said with a shrug. “Traitorous minds whisper it is not so good here, not for the likes of her. She could have been offered money, or power, or perhaps most invitingly of all, a new life. Karim tells me she was an apprenticeling. Well, it is much the same sort of reasoning, is it not? To step into the shelter of a Healer or traitor or both, depending on if they ever unearth that Salai fellow.” She paused. “Perhaps your friend weighed sentiment against reason, and chose reason. It is a difficult choice, or so I have heard.”
Rana swallowed. She thought of blood draining from bodies, of red blooming across the skies, of adulterated tea and too-sweet vanillin.
“It is not a difficult concept to understand,” said Achernar. “It is more a matter of willingness to.”
The silence stretched for much too long.
“Yes,” Rana choked out. Her tongue tripped over phantom sweetness, at vanillin that wasn’t there. “Yes. I think I understand, now.”
Achernar laid a pitying hand onto her shoulder, and Rana couldn’t bring herself to shrug it off.