Brevity could only see the black licking up the inside of Claire’s elbow. She nodded her assent, Probity’s grip tightened into a vise, and something set fire to her arm.
The world narrowed to a single glimpse of familiar inspiration gilt, peeling away from Brevity’s raw skin like viscera, before everything swam to ink black.
3
HERO
I have confirmed my suspicion that the first skill a librarian must require is complete and utter boredom. Brevity has set me to reading through the Librarian’s Log at random, as if reading the whining and philosophical angst of my predecessors will teach me something about book curation.
(Teach me! Me! I am already intimately familiar with books, thank you.)
I had thought, at least, that I would be entertained by learning more about the warden. But the log, according to Brevity, has a sense of requirement to its indexing. There is no simply reading the log. The personal notes and errata are not reliably listed in chronological order; the best approach seems to be flipping open the book with a question in mind. Let the log show you what you need, the librarian says.
No Claire details yet. Plenty of Yoon Ji Han essays on bookbinding, though. I think the log is broken.
Apprentice Librarian Hero, 2020 CE
HERO WAS OF THE opinion that once decent folks began pulling things out of one another’s bodies, one should take a second look at the decisions that led them to that point. So Hero considered all the (many) errors that had occurred. Questioned his choice of life philosophy that had a raven screaming its curses at all of them from overhead. He wrenched his knee terribly as he half shielded Brevity with his shoulder, putting himself in between her and her supposed friend, who had just ripped her tattoo from her skin. It wasn’t just a tattoo—it was shimmering, gilded lines of pure inspiration; even Hero knew that. It was the inspiration she’d been trusted with, as a muse, and tried to keep rather than surrender to a human. It was her reason for exile, her most treasured mistake, and Hero knew plenty about how important those were.
Claire had not made a sound through the entire exchange. The silence was a prick between Hero’s ribs. He wanted to see—needed to see—but Probity was in the way. He could only glimpse the scuffed toe of one sneaker, peeking out beneath a mess of skirts that lay still, too still.
Steel licked against steel next to his ear. Ramiel stood over them with his broadsword leveled at Probity. The muse looked flatly unimpressed even as the tip of the blade began to waft blue flames. Rather calm, Hero thought, since Ramiel was absolutely terrifying when he went full Wrath of God.
Well, Wrath of Hell now. Wrath of Books? No, that didn’t have quite the right ring to it.
“Step back, muse.” Ramiel’s voice had gone cold and deadly as black ice.
Probity did not step back, though she had enough sense to hold very, very still. The inspiration gilt writhed violently in her grip, glowing and slick with things Hero preferred not to think about. Her eyes seemed wide and bright as the moon. “If I step back, the human woman dies, and my sister begged me not to let that happen. I can do so because I am very, very good at what I do.” The inspiration twined, blood slick, to grasp at the air. “And I will do anything for Brevity.”
Brevity slumped against his shoulder, unconscious, though Hero could detect shallow breathing. He risked a glance at what he could see of Claire. Probity had shifted; he could see Claire’s arm now. Black licked up her forearm like serpents. He couldn’t see if she was breathing. Her fisted hands weakly fell open. They seemed smaller, frailer, but perhaps that was a trick of the ink. It had to be.
“Ramiel,” Hero said quietly.
The Watcher reined in some of his holy terror, but indecision froze him. The tip of his blade wavered. (Hero didn’t have his sword. Why didn’t he have his sword? People were always taking away his sword.) Then Rami dropped his arm into a wary guard.
“Save her.” His voice was human again and rough as gravel.
Probity was a blur of movement. She propped Claire’s shoulder up—taking caution not to touch the infected parts of her arm. With swift efficiency, she looped the band of inspiration around the leading edge of black. The ink appeared to react, surging under the edge.
“No, you don’t.” Probity muttered an incomprehensible word and executed a flourish that was too fast to follow, lassoing the ink back behind the line. She cinched it, muttered another incomprehensible word. The scent of cardamom and something else filled the air, making Hero’s head go fuzzy for a moment. He blinked, and the inspiration encircled Claire’s arm, just below the elbow, as if it had always been there.
No one spoke as the tendrils of ink collided with the band of blue, racing along it as if looking for a weak point. Every inch of skin below the band turned starless black. The neon inspiration shivered and then pulsed once. A skin of frost swept down the stained skin, as if the liquid was drying. Then the frost appeared to evaporate.
Claire’s arm stayed black.
And Ramiel’s sword was back up, advancing on Probity. “What did you do?”
Probity had reverted from awe-striking competence to innocence and lace. Claire was still a limp weight in her arms, and Probity held her like a sack of grain. Hero distantly thought how she would never, never have allowed herself to be manhandled so crudely. The wrongness made his lip curl.
“I stopped the advance of the ink. Rather, the inspiration did,” Probity said with a certainty in her smile. She tapped her fingers on top of Claire’s blackened wrist. “It’s safe and held in stasis for the moment, though I’m not sure how we’ll be able to extract it intact.”
The violent impulse that bloomed in his head surprised even Hero himself. It was a cold kind of rage, the kind that must have been simmering under pressure for some time, but he hadn’t seen it form. His hands were full of an unconscious librarian, or he might have done something worse than snarl, “Who cares about the ink?! How is Claire?”
“Oh.” Probity startled, appearing earnest as she blinked at Hero, then glanced briefly at Claire. “I think the band should slow down any damage the ink was causing?”
The muscles in Ramiel’s shoulders bunched, causing the feathers sticking out from beneath the coat epaulets to twitch. With some great effort, he lowered the sword again and sheathed it. Hero saw him glance cautiously at the pool of ink. The surface was deceptively still and patient just a few feet away. “Can we move them?”
Probity shrugged. “Sure. This one will be out for a while. Brevity probably passed out from the shock. She should be fine when she wakes up.” She betrayed her concern with the way she chewed on her bottom lip as she studied Brevity. But then she shrugged Claire out of her lap and might have damn well let her fall had Rami not jumped in to take her.