Chapter 9
Tap
Seir and I were discussing my shopping order when Phin wandered out into the hall, her clothing fresh and eyes bright.
“Good morning,” I greeted her. “Did you sleep well?”
She dipped her head. “I did. The bed is very comfortable.”
“I left breakfast on the table for you if you’re hungry.”
Her cheeks pinked. “I found it, thank you.”
“Good.”
Seir’s mouth dropped open, and he stared at her, then looked at me. “Tap?” We’d gotten straight to business, and I hadn’t had a chance to discuss the finer details regarding Phin’s employment yet.
“That hair color suits her far better than the black, don’t you think?” I teased him, keeping my voice level as I played ignorant to his clear concern.
“Sure, it’s nice.” He gestured to me that we should step off to the side while flashing her an awkwardly big smile, one where all his sharp teeth showed.
As much as I enjoyed watching him silently panic, I didn’t want to make Phin any more uncomfortable than she already seemed to be.
“Phin, it appears that my brother has recognized your true nature. I promise he’ll keep it to himself. Seir,” I drew my brother’s wide-eyed attention back from my new librarian, “nobody can know that Phin is here.”
“Oh. Yes, of course.” He swallowed thickly. “Though I did mention to Hailon that you had found a new assistant when I got home last night.”
“That’s fine.”
“And Merry happened to be dropping off some things, so she may have also heard, and she perhaps went home and told Coltor, I have no way to know for sure.”
I fought a twitch at the corner of my mouth.
Word may have spread quickly in the glade where they all lived, but knowledge of Phin was safe between my brother, his mate, and our friends.
There were no other residents there to find out.
Though … that likely would mean the rest of our family would know soon as well.
I sighed, realizing that I’d failed already.
“Understandable. The important part is that nobody outside of our circle knows she’s a Nephilim, alright? This is important. There are some angels trying to find her, and we don’t want that to happen.”
He straightened, panic ebbing away as I acknowledged the key piece of concern for him.
“Of course. She’ll be safe with us, you know that.
” He smirked. “Only you would find an angel to set order to your library full of demons’ deals, brother.
” He chuckled, but the sounds stopped the moment Phin’s gasp echoed around us.
“Sorry, sorry. Ignore me,” he stepped back, slowly making his way toward the portal that would carry him to Revalia, my shopping list in his hand.
“Let me see what I can do about all this, yeah? Sorry, Phin. I have a bad habit of speaking without thinking things through. It’s nice to see you again.
” At that, he disappeared into the portal and was gone.
I sighed, forcing my shoulders to relax. “You get used to him.”
“Deals?” she inquired, cheeks pink and violet eyes wide. “That whole library is deals?”
My heart sank, worried I might have lost her before she’d even had a chance to get started. “Yes. Will that be a problem?”
Her lips parted slightly, confusion wrinkling the space between her eyebrows. “No. I just … wasn’t expecting that, I guess. You took me in there yesterday, I saw what was on the shelves. I just didn’t think …” She trailed off, glancing around. “Are there other books here as well?”
Feeling returned to my fingertips as I relaxed the grip I had on them behind my back.
“Yes, I also have a small leisure library. Perhaps you could help there as well, if you’re so inclined.
It, like most things here, suffers from a lack of attention.
You’d be welcome to read from my collection, of course.
” Relief flooded my veins as she nodded and gestured vaguely toward the double doors that led to the libraries.
“Would you please show me where to start?”
“Of course.”
I allowed her to lead us through to the library and just stood aside while she gazed around in wonder. I envied her in that regard. The only thing I felt when I came into the room was a paralyzing sense of failure.
“I didn’t realize there was so much paperwork involved in making a deal,” she muttered, picking up several documents one at a time from the table before letting them fall again. “I thought it was some negotiation, a bit of blood, a handshake, that’s that.”
I chuckled. “Sometimes, yes. But most of them are meticulously written out so that every detail, every loophole is covered. No self-respecting demon would want to be caught out by an unexamined detail.” I thought of my brother Rylan, who had been the most dedicated to making deals out of us all.
His contracts were truly artful, though he’d long since given up making them.
“My mother always said that those studying the law could learn a thing or two from demons.”
My smile was broad and genuine, the sensation a bit foreign to my cheeks.
“She wasn’t wrong.” I chose a handful from the table and flipped through them.
“You’ll be looking for markings in silver, those contracts have been fulfilled.
Anything red is still an active contract and needs to be retained here, same with the gold, though they are just awaiting payment collections.
We can work on the best way to organize them once some of the dead ones have been cleared out. ”
“Where will they go?”
“They’ll be archived.”
“In Hell?”
“Yes.”
She frowned. “Why not just destroy them? If they’re fulfilled, why do they need to be kept at all?”
Her excellent question gave me pause. “I honestly don’t know. Those in charge love their files, though. Always have.”
“What do they do with them in the archives?”
“Your guess is as good as mine. I can’t imagine that they are referenced all that often, but they must be of some value.
Otherwise, why bother?” The weight of the responsibility for keeping them was too heavy for it to be pointless.
If I found out I’d worried myself sick over a process that had no value, I might lose what remained of my mind.
“Maybe it really is similar to learning law, or a legal library. They keep all the old files in case they need previous contracts to justify later cases.”
“Perhaps.”
“You never asked?” There was no condemnation in her voice, only wonder.
“No.”
“Weren’t you curious?” Her eyebrows drew together, and her head tilted to one side just slightly.
“I’m sure there was a time I was.”
“Then why not ask?”
Her insistence amused me. “Because it doesn’t matter. Nothing about my job would change, regardless of the answer.”
Her fingertips pushed a few around, a frown creasing her face. “Are they fragile?”
It was my turn to be confused. “No. They’re just parchment and ink.
Some wrinkles or bending won’t ruin them.
As long as the marks and their color can be made out, the condition is irrelevant.
” I recalled Merry’s panic over some of the oldest disintegrating at the lightest touch.
“Some may fall apart due to their age. Don’t worry yourself if it happens.
Just put what you can of those in one place and we’ll send them back as well.
Any contracts that have been languishing here that long are either almost certainly already fulfilled or simply never will be. ”
Phin grew thoughtful as she pushed a pile of them out of her way, unearthing a bit of bare tabletop and then a chair as contracts spilled all over the floor.
After a glance at me to gauge my reaction, she continued down the table, arms extended wide as she cleared working space and unburied a second chair, then a third.
She shuffled her legs as she made her way back, gently carving a walking path through the piles.
The purposeful chaos of her actions unlocked something inside me, and some of the heaviness that pressed on my shoulders when I looked at the mess my negligence had wrought lifted.
I’d never considered doing such a thing, despite the fact that my disorderly piles often fell over on their own.
Once I put something down, that’s where it stayed, and I couldn’t quite get my mind or body to move things again unless I was going to take the time to complete the whole project.
Doing something like she had might have allowed me to get past being frozen in overwhelm—it might have allowed me to get started.
It was so simple, yet entirely foreign. I was awed.
“Sometimes, you have to make a bigger mess to get things cleaned up,” she said softly, but with great determination and a bright smile. My heart skipped a beat, then thudded an odd rhythm, trying to catch up again. “Would you mind bringing me some crates? I’d like to get started.”
“Of course.”
“Silver only,” she confirmed, sliding into one of the available chairs and pulling over a pile of contracts, immediately creating a space to stack them by color.
Her smile was sudden and bright, and it left me breathless.
My heart felt like it was being squeezed by a giant hand for several seconds, and I fought the wave of dizziness that swept over me as I rushed from the room.
I saw no need to burden her with my panic—I could surely manage that in private while her attention was elsewhere.
As I collected some crates, I worried I’d greatly underestimated the possibility that it would be more difficult having her near with the bond unfulfilled than at a distance.
“Where are the books kept?” Phin asked quietly as she blew on her soup to cool it down. At my delay in response, she added, “May I borrow one to read?”
“Yes, of course. I’ll show you the workshops after we eat.”
I was rediscovering my talent for cooking in the short time since she’d arrived, making good use of the groceries Seir routinely delivered for the first time in months.
It brought an immense amount of satisfaction to prepare a meal and watch her enjoy it.
I knew that was partially the mate bond, but as I mostly lived off of anything I could eat with one hand while walking the great hall, my stomach was rather pleased with the change as well.
“You mentioned hobbies?”
“Yes, I’ve taken on many throughout the years. Painting, woodworking, writing. They all offer their own escape.”
“Do you have a favorite?” The spark in her eyes told me her interest was genuine.
“I’m not sure I could choose only one. Though perhaps it’s just that whatever I chose, my answer might change if you ask again another day.”
“Fair enough,” she said with a smile.
“Father Morton said you scribed for him?”
Her head snapped up. “Yes. I always enjoyed my time in the library.”
“Your room was right next to it. Did you not get to visit whenever you liked?” She shook her head, gaze back in her soup. I was left confused by the sudden shift in her mood.
“Most of the texts and practicing writing were off-limits unless Father could be there with me.”
I balked, heat filling my veins. “Why? Surely you sitting there reading did no harm. I saw the chairs, the lamps. Were you expected to just ignore the whole room as you passed through it? To sit in your little bed closet instead of using the larger space?”
Phin set her spoon down and blotted her mouth on a napkin.
I suddenly wished I’d waited until she was finished eating to inquire further.
“Not entirely, but in some ways, yes.” Anger, hot and vicious began to swirl in my chest. “He wasn’t cruel about it, but he knew that spending time in that room, reading, scribing, was my favorite reward. ”
“Reward.” I bit the word off, feeling all the time less and less charitable toward Father Morton.
“Yes. I sometimes needed the prospect of something pleasant to motivate me to complete my tasks.”
I breathed slowly in through my nose, desperate to settle the storm of fiery discomfort that had kicked up behind my ribs.
She’d already seen my temper, but I didn’t want her to fear me or worry I’d have an outburst every time she was honest about something.
However, the bond certainly seemed to think she’d been mistreated during her time at the church, and I was inclined to agree the more I learned.
“How … how many workshops are there?” she asked, redirecting the uncomfortable conversation.
I breathed in and out slowly before speaking.
“Many. And unfortunately, they’re all a bit neglected due to my lack of time to practice anything else with regularity.
You’re welcome in them whenever you like, you don’t need to ask permission.
We’ll make you your own space, and I can purchase anything you need that I don’t already have.
” I’d never made an offer even vaguely similar to anyone else, but it felt completely natural to invite her into every part of my life, despite the newness of our acquaintance.
Phin blinked at me, eyes wide. “That’s very generous.”
“I want you to feel at home, Phin. I know the circumstances are odd, but there’s no reason you can’t enjoy your time here.” I wanted nothing more than for her to be happy and to stay with me, even after organizing the library was completed.
Such an odd notion, but one I was at peace with. I’d been a solitary creature my whole life. I’d spent centuries alone, excepting infrequent visits from one of my brothers here or there, or very rare trips earthside. I wondered if I should be concerned over how easily I’d adapted to her presence.
I was pleased when she finally picked up her spoon again and continued eating, but tensed, remembering what she’d find behind the workshop doors.
I’d made a very conscious effort to keep the main living areas free of clutter, but the workshops …
they were a mess. Not that it would be a surprise to her, given what she’d already seen in the library, but the thought of revealing more half-completed projects and untidy rooms to her made me squeamish.
I was deeply ashamed of my inability to finish things.
Even Seir, who’d visited regularly and had for many years, never saw the other rooms.
Phin was more, though. She was my mate, whether she recognized it yet or not, and I couldn’t help but worry that my failings would keep her from accepting me once she figured it out.