Chapter 8 Riddles And Doubts
CHAPTER EIGHT
RIDDLES AND DOUBTS
ADELINE
I spend the night huddled against a standing rock, frozen to the bone and unable to sleep a wink, every little noise startling me and setting my teeth on edge.
Dawn breaks as I start my climb, the sky awash with colors, the mountain reflecting them in places.
It’s beautiful and terrifying, and the prospect of ascending it is daunting. I’ve never climbed rocks and sheer mountain sides before. Running is one thing. Scaling a cliff face is quite another.
No matter how strong my legs are, they will probably fail me. Climbing this steep mountain is likely to be my end, but a vague fear of Olm’s real intentions, if allowed to take over more people’s minds, keeps me going.
Having Olm hissing curses and commands in my ear isn’t helping. He seems torn between ordering me to climb back down and trying to help me not to fall.
“Shut up!” I wedge my foot into a crevasse and focus on reaching higher with my hand.
Thankfully, this isn’t a sheer cliff. There is a bit of a slope to it, which is the only reason I haven’t fallen to my death yet.
I can make out a ledge further up, and that’s now my immediate goal. “I’m trying not to die here.”
It’s not only my body that is struggling, though. My head is filled with the dark fae’s gleaming eyes, the panic of the flight and the concern for my family.
How didn’t I realize that Sedrig was such bad news? I may not have entirely trusted him, but I never imagined that dark fae were walking among us. I somehow thought I’d be able to tell. I thought I could figure someone out, know if they’re good or bad.
I was so wrong.
Naida was wrong, too. Knowing many stories isn’t a power after all, since I always see the pattern, the weave, way too late.
As for delivering the book to this library… I’m trying hard not to think about it just yet.
The satchel thumps against my back as I swing myself higher. This climb is never-ending. Draks swoop overhead like oversized, colorful birds. Here, so close to the rim, daylight is never too bright, and the Pillar supporting the Nine Worlds and brightening the sky seems far, too far away.
It’s like being close to the end of dreams, to the dark margin abutting on sleep or death.
“That’s a damn morose image,” Olm says. “You should think more positively if you want to make it to the top.”
“I thought,” I pant as I swing myself over a small ledge, “that you wanted me to go back.”
“Go back, not fall. If you drop and smash your skull on the rocks, I’ll rot together with your corpse.”
“Now who’s the one with the morose images?” I wheeze. “Really nice, Olm.”
“It’s meant to motivate you,” Olm says.
“Thanks a bunch. Shockingly, it’s not helping!”
The higher I climb, the easier the going gets—if you don’t look down and measure the height you’d fall from to your certain death.
And all the while, my mind is busy with thoughts of Olm.
Who is he? What is his story? Is it true that he can’t remember it, either?
My clues are few. A dragon. A name. Magic.
A desperate desire to go to the royal palace.
Finally reaching the small ledge, I rest for a while, allowing my breathing to return to normal.
I’m still resolutely not looking down, through my gaze is drawn to the landscape below, the plains, the towns, the sprawl of Siris in the distance, and even further away, the faint column of the colossal Pillar supporting the sky.
Olm’s name doesn’t ring any bells. I’ll investigate him later, I decide, once I’m done with this strange mission, once I’ve entered the library, delivered the book to its warrior guardian and returned home.
Keeping my thoughts positive, right? I’m doing my best here.
Huffing a frustrated breath, gathering my strength, I resume climbing. The muscles in my calves and arms burn. The satchel feels heavier the longer I climb, dragging me down.
“Throw me down, then,” Olm mutters. “Maybe a passing wildcat will grab me and carry me back to civilization, away from these bare rocks, savage animals and stupid women.”
“So that’s what’s bothering you now? My exhaustion?” I reach higher, find purchase with the toe of my shoe and lift myself up another few feet. “Not the fact I’m about to abandon you at the library?”
“The library. You speak of the Areon as if it’s an actual library,” he scoffs.
“It contains books. Therefore, it’s a library.”
“A library is a place of order and quiet, a safe place. The Areon is an entire world, a kingdom of violence and rogue magic extending into every book and every story.”
“That’s interesting. What else do you know about it?” I grit my teeth, struggling to pull myself higher. “Go on, entertain me while I climb this deadly mountain.”
“And distract you? No. Just… get up there.”
“I’m going in, you know,” I bite out. “You can’t stop me. If you don’t help me do what I came here to do, I’ll tear your book apart.”
“Remember the dragon,” he says and heat seeps through the satchel and into my back. “If you leave me, I’ll roast you until your flesh is tender and falling off the bone.”
I shiver. Olm seems harmless most of the time, all protests and indignant replies, but if he can indeed unleash a dragon…
The only reason I’m alive is that he needs me as his pack animal, to transport his book where he wants it to go, but if I attempt to leave it at the library or destroy it as I have threatened, will he kill me?
How fast can he be? Could he destroy me before I destroy him?
Hopefully it won’t come to that.
“The law decrees that magical books are precious and shouldn’t be tampered with,” Olm snaps at my thoughts. “That includes destruction.”
“Is there such a law? It doesn’t matter, Olm. I’m a thief, do you think I care? And out here, who will see me?”
“You are unbearable,” Olm declares, the heat dissipating at my back. “I wonder if the trouble of unleashing the dragon on you is even worth it.”
“Stop doubting. It’s not.” I huff and puff as I climb and climb. “Like you said before, you need me alive if I am to take you where you want to go.”
“Does that mean I’ve managed to persuade you to take me to the palace?”
“No.”
A screech of frustration almost throws me off the mountain and makes my ears bleed, but I keep a feral smile on my face as I keep going, my palms and shins cut up and bleeding on the rock, my dress torn and tangled around my legs.
Every part of my body feels bruised and heavy. I’m hungry, desperately thirsty and so exhausted I want to cry.
Almost there.
Gritting my teeth, I pull myself over the last few yards of rock, leaving some more skin behind, and finally reach a wide rock shelf.
Grateful to have reached a flat surface, I crawl further until I’m not dangling over the drop anymore and sit back on my heels. Look at that. It’s as large as the square where I encountered this accursed book. And…
“Seriously?” I say, aggravated. “Is this it?”
It looks like I’ve reached the entrance to the Library of Areon, only it’s not what I’d expected. I had imagined a huge, engraved gate to the realm beyond, magic shimmering at its edges. I expected statues and pillars carved on either side, something impressive and breathtaking.
Well, it is a gate, most definitely. A door, at the very least, and it’s not open. Oh, no, that would be too easy. It’s a simple outline in the black, basaltic rock, its surface craggy and patched with lichen and flowers.
An epigraph is etched over it, the letters jagged and barely visible.
“A riddle,” I whisper. “Naida didn’t know about it, but it makes sense. It’s a library. Books are tales, and tales like riddles.”
The riddle reads: ‘I am a world without end, my inhabitants dangerous, my doors locked. Enter at your own peril. To unlock the door, speak my warden’s name.’
“Ersil,” I whisper. “Ersil is the warden. It’s Ersil!”
I wait, heart pounding frantically, for the gate to open and let me inside.
Nothing happens.
“But it’s the correct answer!” I glare at the outlined door. “Ersil is your warrior librarian. Your guardian and protector.”
A story riddle, in the very best fae tradition of hidden doors, and if I can’t crack it, I’m going back home, having failed in my mission.
“The word warden,” Olm says in the thundering silence that follows, “can also mean master.”
“Master? Who is the master of the library? If it’s not Ersil, its librarian, then who…?” I slap my forehead. “Of course.”
“Of course, what?”
“Areon. This is the Library of Areon. For some reason, Areon gave his name to the library, so it is his library.”
“Areon never existed,” Olm says shrilly, “or if he did, he died long ago. He’s ancient history.”
“Areon!” I shout, ignoring Olm, cupping my hands around my mouth. “It’s Areon!”
A grinding sound comes from deep inside the rock.
Then the ground shakes, throwing me a step back.
I struggle to keep my balance as the craggy surface of the rock face ripples and then shimmers, turning into a tall, shiny black door.
Symbols in white decorate it in clusters, heraldic in form although they don’t look familiar, but also letters in a script I can’t read.
The door creaks, slowly swinging inward.
“It’s opening! The door is opening!” Despite my weariness, I do a little dance on the spot, giddy with excitement. “We did it, Olm! We opened the library!”
He harrumphs. “Why did I help you? I must be crazy. But leaving you to perish out here wouldn’t help my cause, would it?”
“Keep telling yourself that. The truth is, you’re not that bad after all.” Adjusting the straps of the satchel on my shoulders, I step toward the open door. “Here we go.”
May the Sleeping Gods help us, I think as I step into the dreadful Library of Areon.