Chapter 11 #2
“Look at the world around us, darling,” Percival whispered.
He sounded haunted, distressed. “Has the Governor suffered for his crimes? Have the Droves? Everything, good and evil and right and wrong, died beside the Age of Scribes. ‘Now we are but shades, this world our haunt, these nights hereafter our long rest.’ ” Roy knew the quote.
It was the epigraph of the twenty-eighth chapter of Meha Torazkeer’s In Night’s Arms.
Percival cocked his head, his jaw tight, and looked out the window beside the desk, his features gone soft and tender yet pensive.
There was also a sort of restless energy to him, as if a million rushing thoughts were trapped within his stiff body.
Roy wondered if Percival preferred patching his wounds up to exposing them .
. . or perhaps he was waiting on the right person to show them to.
Percival didn’t want assistance, though; he wanted to avenge the near-death of academia by his own devices, to disassemble the violent society the Governor had established over years of oppression.
Roy was tired of being afraid, however. Tired of seeing Percival in a hall or a reading room and recoiling.
Not everyone wanted him dead. Not everyone was a new fear to conquer.
Besides, there was a world at war, and Roy couldn’t help wanting to assist those who needed it most. After weeks of little to no progress, he was once again sure he needed Percival to make that happen.
And that, perhaps, Percival needed him as well.
He rose to his feet, resolute, then searched through the piles of books and scrolls lying about the desk.
“I’m afraid it’ll take some time to find your wits, darling,” Percival said.
“Don’t make me regret this,” Roy muttered, then found a sheet of parchment. It was the grant he’d discovered a few days ago.
He felt a moment of apprehension, but he couldn’t turn back now.
What if this was the turning point? What if this game could coexist alongside his desire to share information with Percival?
Maybe it contradicted the proposition, but the relationship between The Ordnance and The Lost Records was too auspicious to ignore.
Roy placed the grant atop The Ordnance of Old Wynair, sat back at the desk, and recounted to Percival what he’d unearthed: the grant, the difference between the Tussyki weapons and the black chest plate, and the history of Wynair and Urswaelia.
Percival lifted his head from the grant. He looked to be in utter disbelief, his mouth parted. This isn’t how the game works, his perplexed expression seemed to say. These aren’t the rules I made.
“I know you don’t want me to do this,” Roy said, “but I had to say something, Percival. This must mean something.”
Percival picked up the grant carefully, as though applying any additional force might disintegrate the document. He whispered, “‘Black chest plate, country of origin unknown.’ ”
“It might not be referring to the Old Ones, but—”
“But it sounds like a damn good possibility.” Percival gulped, sighed, tapped his fingers on the desk. Roy had never seen him so frazzled. “Where did you find this?”
“Here. This room. I didn’t notice it at first; I didn’t think it would yield any valuable information, but I .
. .” He debated explaining what had compelled him to share this discovery, then decided that if he had come this far and shown Percival this much, then what was one more truth?
“I saw you reading something like The Ordnance last night. The Lost Records of Old Wynair, was it?”
Percival nodded, not at all upset at Roy’s surreptitious observations.
“Yes, that was it. There were a few accounts written by geographers who’d researched Wynair.
I didn’t come across anything terribly significant, but there was this sketch of a shipwreck that stuck with me.
A black chest plate was found in the wreckage, though whether the piece was salvaged wasn’t recorded—”
Roy stilled, ignoring Percival’s annoyed expression as he cut in, “Wait. A shipwreck? Was there any mention of its sails catching fire?”
Percival blinked. “Well, yes, but I didn’t think it was important . . .” He straightened, recognition sparking in his eyes. “Why? Did you find something?”
“The mural around the skylight,” Roy said, unable to hold back his smile. “One of the bas-reliefs depicts a ship sailing toward a land. A small island, maybe. Perhaps it contained the black armor and somehow crashed ashore.” His heart was racing.
“Perhaps it’s a coincidence,” Percival hedged.
“Does it feel like one, though? The details and the fact that these texts and sources are leading us here?” And maybe, Roy thought, something else is leading us here as well .
. . He shook that thought free. “I’d have to get a better look at the painting.
There might be an inscription underneath the scene that I missed when I first came here.
” A small grin was forming on his face. “This is earth-shattering, Percival. Everything could be connected to the Old Ones, even this library. I mean, why else would that artwork be shown here?”
Again, Percival nodded with satisfaction, silently considering their breakthrough and, almost certainly, the fact that although he had set the game board and put down the pieces . . . it had been Roy who made the first move.
“It appears the Old Ones are associated with forgotten lands,” Percival said. “The specific date of that shipwreck isn’t certain, though as it’s ostensibly related to the grant, perhaps you were right, in that the current Old Ones’ ancestors existed before the Age of Scribes.”
“If they provided Randyll with a set of their armor, as he requested, they must have been in league with Urswaelia,” Roy assumed.
“Councillor Randyll was a traitor, though. King Archibald ordered his execution. The alliance between Urswaelia and Wynair persevered, and yet there’s nothing in this grant, nor in The Ordnance of Old Wynair, about the Old Ones other than this reference to armor.
I doubt what we know of them might be useful. ”
It was true . . . to a point. They knew enough for speculations to germinate, but they had nothing with which to ascertain a firm correlation. But Roy had faith in what he’d claimed: everything was connected.
He hoped, then, Percival would forgo this whole game right now, right as they’d made this discovery together.
He could stand Percival’s self-absorption in mild doses, but Roy was loath to bear Percival’s inexcusable caginess.
It was clear he’d only discussed what he had unearthed in The Lost Records of Old Wynair because Roy had brought it up, but now that he had . . .
Roy straightened in his chair, then snatched the grant out of Percival’s hands and stared at it.
He looked up at Percival, excitement stirring through him.
“Percival, the armor. I think it’s what separates the Old Ones from any regular soldier.
Why else would Randyll request a chest plate?
Why else would this warrant his execution?
Maybe the Old Ones were a rival to Urswaelia and Wynair.
Randyll’s treachery might have been the breaking point for the alliance, but there must be something about the chest plate that created such a debacle. ”
“As in, the properties? The metal used to forge it?”
“Or its specific placement on the body. Either way, it’s unusual for this grant to include a single piece of armor without requesting the rest. Perhaps Randyll had intended to study it, to learn of its construction? I’m not sure.”
“I haven’t seen anything else on it in the Basilica, either,” Percival said.
His tone became grim and cold as a frostbitten corpse.
“But back home, there were rumors of the Old Ones’ strength.
I got a letter from one of my cousins one night, long before the Governor sent his missive.
A division of the Old Ones had passed through her village.
She watched from her kitchen window as a soldier shattered two of her neighbor’s children with their fists, then burned their manor to a crisp.
The smoke hung heavy for another week.” He shook his head, a grimace twisting his lips.
“The Droves could do nothing against them.”
“I know.”
“But think: What else could the Droves do nothing against?”
Roy shook his head, not seeing where Percival was trying to lead him.
“What about the Basilica? This library has stood for years, untouched by time.” His eyes widened. “Darling, don’t you see?”
Roy cocked his head, a lock of black-silver hair draping down his face. He watched as Percival’s eyes followed it, then darted back to Roy’s face. Roy kneaded the left column of his neck, gulping at the splotches of heat he could feel marking his throat.
As Percival studied him, Roy froze, his breath caught as if on a hook. He’d once thought Percival wielded his beauty like a blade, but whatever the warmth in the pit of Roy’s gut was, he was not pained by it. He almost thought he might be in more pain without it.
“Tell me, Percival,” Roy said, and this time, he found it impossible to hide the hoarse edge to his voice.
Then, as he reviewed the direction their conversation was taking, he chose a new course of action, a way to—hopefully—convey that the game, as evidenced by their exchange of research material, was over.
He hesitated, then took the leap. “But if you tell me what I’m missing, then it’s as much as acknowledging that this competition between us, this race for answers, has no place in our investigation. ”
After a moment, Percival surrendered. “All right, darling. The game is done. Maybe together, we can finally make some progress.”
Roy let out a relieved sigh, grateful that Percival had at last given up his decidedly useless choice to drive a wedge between them, and moreover, that he had actually admitted to the effectiveness of their collaboration.