Chapter 7 #2
She’s started doing that—acknowledging the Library in little ways that make it prickle with happiness.
“Thank you.” The words are reluctant, but he did save me time by getting rid of them all at once. “Let me deal with the line and then I can help with that.” I gesture at the pile of books Eddy is carrying.
I know she was hoping to spend the week before term starts studying. I taught her a little more conjuration over the holidays, but she’s woefully behind on alchemy and ensorcellment.
It’s not uncommon for liminals to start the year with less knowledge than their adept peers, but everyone else has had twelve weeks of tutoring already.
The next patron is marginally more civil. The one after him is banished for being worse than Goodberry. Not all of them are terrible. Several are simply nosy or in need of the usual assistance.
And through it all, North stands right there, like he’s daring them to make a scene. I don’t need a defender. I wouldn’t even say I want one.
I can only hope this doesn’t come across as my favouring Ackland.
By the time I’m finished, I’ve received several compliments on my outfit, and rumour seems to have spread that the closure of the Arcanaeum is related to parriarch business and not to be questioned. Either that, or all of the disgruntled patrons are busy drafting up letters of complaint for Josef.
“That was a lot,” Eddy says, as I send the last patron on her way with directions to the Kinetic Hall and a promise that several useful texts will be waiting in the reading room to help her with her paper.
I nod. “It’s good to be busy, but I promised to help you get started. Come, the Arcanaeum has reserved the normal booth.”
Ghosting through the desk, I pause as I meet North’s eyes. “You don’t need tutoring?”
“I’m just checking on you.”
What?
My first instinct is that he means both me and his sister, but his golden eyes don’t leave mine as he says it.
My hackles rise in suspicion, but…Eddy is smiling. Ordinarily, if he were doing something rude or annoying, she’d be the first to call him out on it, and I trust her.
This isn’t the first time I’ve noticed North behaving strangely since I embodied, either, though I assumed the book on alchemy he presented me with at Christmas was simply to stop me from feeling excluded as Eddy unwrapped half a dozen presents.
Either that, or perhaps he gave it to me to annoy his father.
After all, the tome still had ‘Property of the Ackland Collection’ stamped on the copyright page.
Not that the Arcanaeum had any quibbles about erasing the ink and adding the volume to its collection.
Was it really a peace offering? A…truce? Did something change?
His actions today, defending me, only confuse me further. For some reason Northcliff Ackland is moving from civility to downright…niceness. Thank goodness my cheeks can’t flush in this form.
My cough does little to disguise the way the shelves around us sigh a little.
“I’m perfectly content,” I promise, straightening my spine and looking away. “I had a wonderful New Year, and I’m much more used to…the new order of things.”
I keep my words vague as we pass a handful of patrons. I don’t want to bring up the incident where I fell apart in front of the heirs.
I’ve been given a gift. It would be foolish to waste time bemoaning what I can’t do when I’m so much better off than I was. My quality of life is much improved, and I no longer have to reenact my death every night.
“You can update the group chat now,” Eddy says, a wry grin stretching her cheeks. Before I can ask, she explains, “They’ve all been asking for updates on you—and that’s only in the chat I’m in. I’m almost sure they have a boys-only version.”
North rolls his eyes but doesn’t comment. “Someone had to check on her. It was either just me, or the whole lot of us. No one wanted to overwhelm her on the first day back at work. Well, Lambert did, but we managed to convince him out of it.”
Should I be concerned that they’re all in collusion with one another? Just who is in this ‘group chat’?
Before I can ask, we arrive at our destination. The booth is already set up for their use, and the tiny sign reading ‘reserved’ disappears the moment Eddy slides in.
This is the first time I’ve tutored any of them during opening hours, and despite the quietness of this particular corner of the Library, I summon a screen to give a little more privacy.
I plan to lurk in the walls anyway, keeping my visibility to a minimum while I pop in and out to deal with other patrons. To my surprise, North pulls out some books as well, taking over some of the tutoring since this is all material he learned last year.
As a result, I don’t think anyone notices the extra help I’m giving them.
But when I pop back a final time, just after closing, it’s only Eddy left at the table, and she’s no longer studying the alchemy text I gave her an hour ago.
“When did North leave?” I ask, surprised, as I slip into the booth opposite her.
“Just after you did. He said he had ‘errands’.” She hums under her breath, then cocks her head. “I thought you’d have noticed. Don’t you always know whenever anyone comes and goes from the Arcanaeum?”
I grimace, asking the Library for the explanation. In answer, something nudges my thigh. Oh dear. A small pile of books has been abandoned on the bench beside me, and on the top sits a familiar blue spellbook. With careful hands, I lift it up and place it on the table.
“The Arcanaeum primarily identifies patrons by their grimoires, so while it knows where everyone is at all times and would’ve noticed someone leaving, it wouldn’t have told me he was gone.”
Ordinarily, it’s a reliable and easy way for the Library to identify arcanists. Most would rather die than give their grimoire over to someone else. It’s like handing over a part of your soul.
The bonds between the books and their owners are so deep that writing in someone else’s is inefficient, not to mention one of our biggest taboos. Even I—who use the grimoires of the dead daily—would never cross that line.
Yet the Ackland heir just left his one behind without thought. I let out a deep, exasperated sigh at the reminder of just how far he still has to go.
“So it can’t tell who you are without a grimoire?”
“No. It can, it’s not blind.” I sigh, trying to think of a comparison.
“The Library connects with and perceives books in a way it can’t do with anything else.
Using them to identify arcanists is a kind of shortcut.
As North was leaving, the Arcanaeum probably didn’t see the point in checking who he was.
” I glower at his grimoire. “If it had told me, I would’ve made him take it with him. ”
“He’ll be back tomorrow,” Eddy says, as if that makes it better. “We can give it back to him then.”
“And during that time, he’ll be unable to cast anything more complicated than a scrap.” I shake my head. “But I suppose he’s brought that on himself. Now, more importantly, why are you reading about the history of the six families?”
She holds up the book so I can see the page she’s on, and I grimace as I realise it’s organised alphabetically. The first family is the Acklands, and given the photograph of a much younger Josef frowning in front of his desk, she’s reached the part about her father’s ascension to power.
“You said the best way I could help North was by learning everything about everyone.”
“Technically, Lambert said that,” I correct. “I suggested working hard at foundation magic.”
“Well, it seemed like the easier choice. The Arcanaeum gave me this book when I asked it for advice.”
The building chose well. That book is dry, but also probably the most unbiased written account of the last half-century, though it lacks a lot of the gossipier details.
I’m not sure that North would want his sister more involved in the politics of our world than she already is, and I suspect that’s why she waited until he was gone to start reading.
Eddy pauses, putting the book down. “Did Josef really kill the previous parriarch?”
“It was never proven.”
“But you think he did?”
“I don’t think there’s much that the parriarchs haven’t done to gain or keep power. There’s a reason I keep the Arcanaeum as far from their reach as I can.”
Unfortunately for North and Eddy, there’s no escaping destiny.
“Do you think he’d ever…” She trails off, looking at North’s grimoire, and I follow her train of thought.
I hum as I think about it. “The main threat to your brother is upstarts within your own family looking to usurp his position. Most of them will be too scared of Josef to try, given how hard he worked to find an heir who could get into the Arcanaeum.”
“So Josef is protecting North?”
“While it benefits him, yes. Having an heir who can access the Arcanaeum isn’t something that Ackland has been able to boast about for several hundred years.”
Eddy nods, returning to her reading. “He’s a trophy. Yeah. I remember.” Another long pause, then a groan. “God. This shit is so boring.”
I offer a sympathetic shrug. “I would help, but spending time around the heirs has taught me that I’m woefully out of touch.”
It still grates that I knew nothing about the ó Rinn curse until Leo told me when it was apparently common knowledge.
Her groan makes the books around her flutter, and a cart containing a half-dozen more rolls into place by her elbow. She stares at it in dismay as she says, “No. It’s okay. Save yourself. I’ll just be here…”
“Don’t forget to come and eat.” I glance down at the grimoire and groan. “I’m opening a door and chucking this at his head. There’s just no excuse.”
I’m still grumbling about North’s idiocy over an hour later when the meal delivery service delivers our food, and I take a plate down to his twin, only to find her asleep and drooling on the desk.
The Arcanaeum has summoned a granny square blanket to cover her, and I cup my face in one hand as I wait to see if she wakes.
Instead, she starts to snore.
“Falling asleep on the tables is against the rules,” I whisper as I carefully transport her up to bed.
Eddy’s lucky I’m developing a soft spot for benighted Acklands.