Chapter Twenty-One
Tyrael sat at a desk in the Askari archive, surrounded by stacks of books, ledgers, and scrolls.
A tremendous rainstorm lashed the tower, pelting the roof and slapping the windows with heavy droplets, but the library within remained dry and warm.
He had been poring through the official court records for nearly a week, searching for evidence of the first Horadrim and their activities in the Skovos Isles, but he had found no sign nor clue, not even indirect.
Neither could he find any mention of the lost expedition.
He wondered if he should even bother continuing, but he could think of no other way to be useful while confined to Temis.
He hoped only that Donan had been more successful.
Hours passed, as they had every day he had spent in the archive, and as the rain eased, Maziel came down from his work on one of the floors above.
“Are you hungry?” he asked. “They’ll be serving the midday meal.”
Tyrael looked at the stack of parchment in front of him and rubbed his eyes, realizing that his body did need some nourishment. “Yes, I think I should probably eat something.”
He rose and followed the librarian out into the cloister, where runoff from the rainstorm dripped down from the roof tiles and splashed against the cobblestones.
The cloister had become Tyrael’s world these past several days, containing both his sleeping quarters and the refectory where he took his meals.
Maziel also lived there, alone but for Tyrael.
In the past, that wing of the palace had apparently housed many scholars, but most of them had died during Malthael’s Reaping, and now only Maziel lived there, the last librarian remaining.
The two of them entered the refectory and sat down at a dining table large enough to host a dozen or more.
They ate well in the palace, better than the commoners Tyrael had seen receiving rations in the city below.
Today, they dined on grilled fish and root vegetables, all drizzled with lemon juice and olive oil.
“Do you ever get lonely here?” Tyrael asked.
“Lonely?” Maziel cocked his head, eyes turned upward as if he were trying to remember the definition of the word.
“I suppose I do enjoy the camaraderie of fellow scholars—it has been a pleasure to have you here. But if I am being honest, no, I do not miss the company of more common folk. Too few of them care about history and other subjects that matter.”
“Do you ever leave the cloister?”
“I can, if I wish. There is a passage.” He leaned closer. “This whole island is an anthill of tunnels and chambers.” Then he shrugged. “Did you find anything of interest in your studies this morning?”
Tyrael sighed. “I read a transcript of a meeting between the Oracle Queen and yet another Zakarum missionary from Travincal.”
“The followers of Akarat were quite persistent in their proselytizing. Was this transcript from before or after their corruption by Mephisto?”
“Before,” Tyrael said, although that was a more difficult question to answer than the librarian assumed.
The downfall of the Zakarum church had in some ways begun the moment the Horadrim first entrusted its priests with Mephisto’s Soulstone prison, even though the demon’s influence took many years to manifest.
“I’m still not exactly clear on what it is you’re looking for.” Maziel put a bite of fish into his mouth.
Until now, Tyrael had resisted disclosing anything specific to the librarian, but his patience with the confines of the library had reached its limit. “I suppose I am a bit surprised that I haven’t encountered any mention of the Horadrim. They were active during the period I have been studying.”
“Hmm.” Maziel put his fork down. “The Horadrim are a slippery topic to research, aren’t they? Much of what we have is rumor and hearsay. Perhaps that is because they kept their own repositories. If you believe the legends.”
Tyrael moved the conversation away from the idea of repositories. “According to those same legends, the Horadrim traveled widely. I thought perhaps there would be records of their visits to Skovos in the court chronicles. But perhaps they did not always make their presence known.”
Maziel nodded, stroking his chin. “It may be time to move up one floor, to the unofficial records.”
“Do you think I would find something up there?”
“Oh, certainly.” He resumed eating, munching on a charred carrot. “The Horadrim are not a common topic of interest to the Askari, but a few historians have written about them.”
After they had finished their meal, they returned to the library and climbed to the third floor, where Maziel pointed out the volumes that he knew mentioned the Horadrim.
Tyrael began to read them, and they did indeed describe the activities of the order, though not with great accuracy, according to Tyrael’s memories—although, in fairness, he had not been with the Horadrim at all times and in all places, and the gaps in his memory caused him further doubt.
It now felt odd to contemplate that era of his existence, back when he was still an archangel.
He had founded the Horadrim nearly three hundred years ago, and to the mortal he had since become, such a span exceeded several lifetimes and generations.
But he still retained a glimmer of his former eternal sense of time, back when he counted years as hours, and centuries as mere seasons.
There were moments when it seemed he had just recruited Tal Rasha and Jered Cain, and there were other moments when he had trouble recalling their faces and the timbre of their voices.
He spent the next several days combing through the books on the library’s third floor until he eventually stumbled upon a history that mentioned a group of visiting mages.
It did not name them as Horadrim, but the way they were described put Tyrael in mind of the order.
These travelers had apparently assisted an Askari scholar named Ambrose with the excavation of a Firstborn tomb, and the text referenced a field journal as its source.
Tyrael remembered Maziel saying the fourth level of the library contained journals and other such materials, so he went looking there for the text in question, but he was unable to locate it.
He considered asking for the librarian’s help but decided against it, having already revealed more than he would have preferred by mentioning the Horadrim at all.
Instead, Tyrael spent several more days conducting his own search.
Eventually, he located the field journal of Ambrose.
It had been shelved in the wrong place at some point in the past, and its binding was rather plain and inconspicuous, allowing the error to go unnoticed.
He scanned through its pages until he came to an entry mentioning the Horadrim by name.
It seemed that members of the order had been assisting with the study of a Firstborn location the writer referred to as the Crypts.
The field journal mentioned beasts called titans and described a theory that the Firstborn had created these monsters for blood sport in their arenas.
The journal also recorded the discovery of a magical scepter, which was believed to have once offered a method of control over the titans.
After that, the Horadrim vanished from the pages of the journal, but their mention in association with the Crypts gave Tyrael the desire to seek out the ruin. He remembered that the archive’s fifth floor contained more formal, scholarly studies of Firstborn history, so he went up the staircase.
On the next floor, he encountered Maziel replacing books on a shelf, having dusted and polished the wood behind them.
“Is there something with which I can assist you?” the librarian asked.
“Perhaps,” said Tyrael, thinking an interest in Firstborn history might serve to disguise his true purpose. “Have you ever read about titans?”
The librarian’s mouth opened in a miniscule gasp that he immediately hid by looking away. “Hmm. Titans, you say?”
“Yes. I came across a reference to Firstborn Crypts that once housed titans, and now I am curious to read more.”
“I see.” Maziel worked hard to appear disinterested, but it was a poor charade. “Where did you come across this reference?”
Tyrael did not understand why the subject had so agitated the librarian, but he decided that circumspection would be wise. “I don’t remember, exactly. I’ve been reading so many books, and it was only a passing comment. If you are busy, I’m happy to explore on my own—”
“No, no. I’m happy to help. Let’s go up together.” Maziel left what he had been doing, and they went up the stairs to the next floor. “Now, let me think,” he said. “Titans.”
“I recall the name of a scholar. Ambrose?”
“Ambrose, you say? I do know of an Ambrose from a few centuries ago.” He lumbered over to a section of shelves and ran a finger along the spines of the books; Tyrael noticed his hand trembling. “I don’t see any of his work at the moment, however.”
Tyrael stepped toward the librarian. “Maziel, is everything all right?”
“Yes, of course, why do you ask?”
“The mention of titans seems to have…upset you.”
“You think so?” He laughed; sweat had formed on his forehead. “I can’t imagine why—”
“Maziel. You can speak freely. I would do nothing to betray your trust.”
The librarian paled, and he bit his lip for a moment. “I don’t know what I would do if I lost my position here,” he whispered, almost breathless. “I am not suited for any other work.”
“Has someone threatened your position?”
“Captain Myrina.” He let out a long sigh, as if releasing a pressure he had held inside himself for a great while.
“Some years ago, she came to me and asked about titans. I had never heard of them before, but I conducted a search of the library for her, and after that, she confiscated all the volumes that mentioned them. I haven’t thought about it much until today. ”
“Not all of the volumes,” Tyrael said.