by Jim C. Hines
How many weeks had she spent preparing? How desperate must they have been to believe such precautions were necessary?
Words alone couldn’t create a complete mind. No author could. The amount of text it would take to capture a fraction of the complexities and memories of a human being would make Jordan’s Wheel of Time series look like a child’s board book. That was part of the reason intelligent characters went mad when they interacted with the real world. There simply wasn’t enough to them.
I thought about Smudge, remembering the damage he had done when I first created him. He was smart for a spider, but not intelligent or sentient enough to lose his mind. Not completely. Even so, he had been terrified, and nearly burned down my high school library before I managed to calm him enough to get him out of there. I had taken him to one of the old mine sites by Tamarack and let him scurry about in an empty cave for hours until he finally began to trust me.
From that standpoint, what Bi Wei had done should have been impossible. But maybe you didn’t have to perfectly transcribe the entirety of someone’s experiences. Nobody remembered every second of their life, right? I had a near-eidetic memory, but I couldn’t have said what shirt I wore two months ago, or what presents I got on my third birthday, or what color our first dog’s eyes had been.
Was it the total of all of our experiences that defined us, or was it the key moments and choices that truly mattered? How much of who I was today stemmed from the day I discovered magic? From my first kiss with Jenny Abrams in seventh grade? From the road trip I took out west after high school, and seeing mountains for the first time?
If I could capture those moments in text and somehow imbue them with magic as Bi Wei had done, would that be enough, not to create a new me, but to anchor myself to this world after my body was gone?
Bi Wei had preserved herself for centuries. How long could such magic last? How far into the future could you travel? Assuming someone was waiting to pull me back out, I could watch the evolution of mankind. I could see rocket cars, colonies in space, everything I ever dreamed of and so much more that I couldn’t possibly imagine.
“You know it’s a one-way trip, right?” Lena asked.
“Since when can dryads read minds?” I said grumpily. Mostly because she was right. I would lose my family and friends. I would almost certainly lose Lena as well. But the chance to glimpse the future, to see what we would learn and discover and become…I would pay an awful lot for that chance.
I set up my laptop, waited for our waiter to finish putting down our food, then logged into the Porter database. Magical Internet access: one more gift from Victor Harrison.
I began with the poem from the first page of Bi Wei’s book. The vagaries of translation complicated things, but by plugging different phrases into the search engine, I eventually identified it as a snippet from New Songs from a Jade Terrace, a collection of Chinese poetry published almost fifteen hundred years ago by Xú Líng. I e-mailed a copy of the text to myself to study later.
I had less luck finding information on Bi Sheng. The earliest reference to his work was a book written by Kuò, decades after Bi Sheng’s death. I did manage to dig up some basic biographical information. Bi Sheng was a commoner, born in 990 AD during the Song Dynasty. He died in 1051, only a few years after developing the first known system of movable type. I sent myself a copy of Dream Pool Essays, Kuò’s book, and kept reading.
“Did you know there was a crater on the moon named after this guy?” I had spent many nights examining the lunar landscape, but Bi Sheng’s crater was on the dark side. Much like the man himself, who seemed to be little more than a historical shadow. Johannes Gutenberg’s life had been endlessly detailed and distorted with a combination of historical records and random speculation, not to mention deliberate inaccuracies spread by the man himself, like his alleged burial site, which just happened to have been destroyed during the Napoleonic War. Bi Sheng, on the other hand, appeared to have been all but forgotten. For all I knew, it could have been Gutenberg himself who had erased Bi Sheng from the history books.
I shut the laptop and forced myself to eat a few bites, though my stomach grumbled in protest. Next, I turned my attention to Bi Wei’s book. I skimmed one page after another, searching for anything that would tell us more about how she had grown so powerful and what the limits of her power might be. I found nothing but a brief prayer that she would never have to use the book’s magic. I yanked off the glasses and rubbed my eyes. “This isn’t working.”
“You need sleep.” Lena licked the last of the ice cream from her spoon. “Magical healing fixed the cuts to your body, but your mind is exhausted.”
“I need better information.” I traced my fingers over the carefully brushed characters. Five centuries of readers had imbued these pages with magic, preserving Bi Wei’s life and experiences.
“The last time I saw that look, I ended up driving you to Chicago so Nicola Pallas could try to put your mind back in one piece.”
“This book anchored Bi Wei for all those years,” I said. “That connection wouldn’t just disappear when you restored her body, any more than your connection to your tree does. Which means I might be able to use the book to touch her thoughts.”
She was shaking her head before I finished talking. “Wei is terrified of you, and of Porters in general. If she catches you breaking into her thoughts and memories—”
“I’m not planning to go as deep as I did in Detroit. I don’t want to seize control of her body or climb into her mind. I just want to listen in.”
She sat back and folded her arms, her silence saying better than words what she thought of this plan.
“I promise I’ll be careful.”
“Tomorrow,” she said. “You’re not trying this until you’ve slept.”
“But the longer we wait—”
Her hand came down on the book, and I felt a stirring of magic from the wooden table as it responded to her anger.
“Right. Tomorrow it is.”
I held the cat carrier in one hand while an aging Siamese cat yowled in protest. Melinda Hill was strapping her one-year-old son into the car seat in the old minivan, while Hailey, the volunteer from the Dearborn domestic violence shelter, stuffed a hastily-packed bag of clothes, diapers, and formula into the back. Hailey and I had arrived ten minutes before, and Melinda hadn’t stopped shaking that entire time, but she didn’t let that stop her. She clicked the last buckle into place and stepped back.
By contrast, Hailey was completely calm. Her every movement was careful and deliberate. She took the cat carrier from me and set it into the back seat beside the boy.
Melinda jumped every time someone drove up the street. Thankfully, midmorning traffic had been relatively light. I heard another car approaching and offered her a reassuring smile.
Melinda stiffened, and then every muscle in her body seemed to turn to mud. I turned to see a red Jeep speeding down the block. Only a madman would do forty down a residential street. A madman or a pissed-off husband. He wasn’t slowing down, and I reached for Hailey, preparing to fling her onto the grass if the driver tried to ram us. He slammed on the brakes at the last minute, tires screeching against the pavement.
“Shit.” Hailey stepped in front of me. This was only the third time I had helped to escort a client. I was technically still a trainee and Hailey’s responsibility. “Get in the van with Melinda, lock the doors, and call 911.”
Melinda was whispering, “I’m sorry,” over and over. Her eyes were dry. It frightened me how quickly and thoroughly she had faded when her husband appeared, becoming a ghost of who she was.
I helped her into the van, then retrieved the oak cane I had tucked beneath the seat. “You’re going to be all right.”
I couldn’t tell if she heard me or not. By now, Hailey had pulled out a handheld radio and was holding it like a beacon. “Mister Hill, the PPO says you’re not allowed to be within one hundred yards of your wife. This conversation is being recorded. I know you’
re angry, but please get back in your car and contact Mrs. Hill’s lawyer to resolve this.”
Christopher Hill didn’t look like an evil man, nor was he particularly imposing. He was in his mid-twenties, dressed in a bland gray shirt and paisley tie. It was his shoes that caught my eye, black and polished like glass. Perfectly clean, just as the house had been.
This wasn’t how I had imagined the man who had broken three of his wife’s ribs and cracked her left eye socket.
He didn’t say a word, probably hoping that would prevent the recording from being used against him. He strode toward Hailey and reached for the radio. I stepped between them.
“Dammit, Lena,” said Hailey. “I told you—”
“I’m all right.” I rested both hands on the cane. “Mister Hill, you need to leave.”
His mouth opened, and then his eyes twitched toward the radio. With a grimace, he reached out to shove me aside.
I bent my knees, rooting myself to the pavement, and smiled. He pushed harder.
Hailey’s composure was slipping. “Mister Hill, you’re committing an act of battery against Lena Greenwood. You need to return to your car.”
He scowled and tried again to shove past us. I moved with him, keeping my body interposed.
“This is my house,” he hissed in a low voice. “That’s my son. My wife.”
My smile grew. “Not for much longer, I think.”
His first punch was, frankly, disappointing. I don’t think he expected much from a heavyset Indian girl leaning on a cane. I shifted my stance and swung the cane with both hands to intercept his blow. Wood cracked against the bone of his forearm.
“Son of a bitch!” He jumped back, clutching his arm.
“Lena, don’t,” Hailey warned.
I was doing exactly what I had been trained not to do. We were supposed to deescalate conflict whenever possible, and to get away and call the police if we were in danger. But those rules had been written for human volunteers.
He rushed me again, and I struck his knee, dropping him to the road. I switched to a one-handed grip on the cane and reached down to twist my fingers into his shirt. I had never felt so strong, so powerful. I flung him onto the grass. He scrambled to his feet, but I rapped him on the side of the head with the end of the cane.
“Stop it!”
The shout had come from Melinda. She was crying. Hailey was holding her back, but she twisted free as I watched. She ran past me, interposing herself between me and her husband just as I had done seconds before when I tried to protect her.
I lowered the cane. “I don’t understand. He—”
“Get in the van, Lena.” Hailey’s face was red. She clipped the radio back to her belt. “Shut up and get in the goddamned van.”
I looked past her to Christopher Hill, silently daring him to get up. He groaned and sagged into the grass. Then I turned my attention to Melinda, who stood over her husband, ready to fight off anyone who tried to hurt him.
I hadn’t understood until then. Christopher Hill had bound his wife to him. He had twisted who she was, making himself the core of her being. She couldn’t leave him. Not without first freeing herself from his power.
She was like me.
Without another word, I retreated into the van.
BOTH MY PLACE AND Nidhi’s were on Harrison’s hit list. After a brief debate, I drove to the library instead. It was as secure a location as any to spend the night, and if Harrison did come after us, I’d have plenty of books on hand.
I parked around back, out of sight from the street. I checked through the windows, then unlocked the back door. The alarm system beeped at me until I punched in the six-digit code to deactivate it.
Lena walked through the darkened library, bokken in one hand, the branch from her oak in the other. I set my books down, then returned to the car to fetch an old blanket from the trunk. I re-armed the alarm as soon as I was back inside. It wouldn’t do much against a pack of wendigos or whatever constructs Harrison sent after us next, but maybe it would give us a few seconds’ warning.
She set the branch in a corner. “Do you have anything to drink here? I get dehydrated when I’m away from my tree.”
“There’s water in the break room, and we might have some juice boxes left from the picnic last week.”
By the time Lena returned, I had cleared floor space in the children’s section and dragged three battered beanbag chairs together to serve as pillows. The lights from the street filtered through the windows to silhouette the curves of her body. She stood there, sipping juice through a too-small straw and watching me.
“I never used to understand what you loved about libraries.” She crumpled the box and tossed it in the trash. She disappeared between the shelves, and I heard her fingers passing over the plastic dust jacket protectors. When she emerged again, she leaned against the shelves, clasped her hands over her head, and stretched, the movement slow and luxurious. Cats throughout the world could have taken lessons.
I settled into the beanbags. “And now?”
“The doors are locked, everything’s powered down for the night. This place should feel empty, but it doesn’t. That’s what you found here, isn’t it?” She spun on one foot like a ballerina. “Libraries kept you from being alone.”
“I wasn’t—”
“Don’t.” I could hear her smiling. “Books were your friends growing up. Your companions, your teachers.”
“I had friends.” I tried not to sound too defensive.
“How many of those friends understood you as well as the books did?” she teased. “Every book opened your mind, showed you the infinite paths that lay before you. Each one connected you to another soul.”
“When did you get so poetic?”
“Tell me I’m wrong.” She stepped closer. “I dare you.”
“You’re not wrong.” I breathed in the familiar smells of the library. Paper and ink, cloth-bound books and binding glue, magazines and old newspapers. A faint scent of coffee. Even steam cleaning had failed to completely remove that stain after Jenn accidentally knocked her travel mug off of the desk. Then there was the underlying smell of the hundreds of people who passed through the library every month.
“Thank you for sharing this with me, Isaac.” She leaned down, and her lips brushed mine. Then, with a mischievous smile, she straightened and backed away until the soft light from the exit sign painted her a deep red.
Moving with exquisite slowness, she peeled off her shirt and tossed it onto a nearby table. She pulled off her shoes and socks next, then slid her jeans down over her hips and kicked them aside.
The lines of her body flowed so beautifully, one curve leading to the next. My eyes traced her neck and shoulders, then moved inward to the swell of her breasts, straining slightly against the confines of her bra. From there to her stomach, where softness concealed the steel beneath, and down to the muscular curves of her hips and thighs.
She stood there a moment longer, then picked up her bokken and grinned. “All right, now that I’m comfortable, why don’t you go ahead and get some sleep while I keep guard?”
I groaned and thumped my head into the beanbag. “The alarm is on. I think we’re safe.”
“Are you sure? I wouldn’t want to take any chances.” She twirled her bokken, then settled into a low stance, weapon ready.
“If you’re trying to get comfortable, why not go all the way?” I said. “Or are you afraid to fight evil naked?”
“When you’re built like me, a good-fitting sports bra is non-optional for battling wendigos and other nasties.” She tilted her head, and her tone turned serious. “What is it? What’s that look for?”
“You.” I couldn’t stop staring. She shifted her weight and rested the sword on her shoulder, simultaneously strong and sexy and dangerous and so damned beautiful it hurt. I imagined my fingers stroking the outer curve of her leg, then tracing up the softer skin of her inner thigh. Her toes curled, as if even the feel of the old carpet beneath her bare
feet was a source of pleasure.
She laughed. “That’s all you have to say? Are you just going to lie there and stare at me all night?”
“Works for me.”
“Mm. But then you wouldn’t get any sleep,” she teased.
“I’m willing to accept the consequences of my choice.”
“Are you, now?” she whispered. Placing her hands on her hips, she surveyed me and made a disapproving tsk sound. “My dear Isaac, I do believe you’re overdressed.”
By the time I tugged off my T-shirt, Lena had set her bokken on the floor and joined me in the beanbags. She brushed her fingernails down my chest and stomach, then lower.
I slid a hand through her hair. The other cupped her breast, my thumb teasing her nipple through the spandex. Her hips pressed into me as I slipped my fingers beneath the elastic and slowly pulled off her bra.
“What is it about libraries?” she whispered, her breath tickling my ear. She took the lobe gently in her teeth. “You used to work at the MSU library. Did you have many students sneaking into the stacks to study biology?”
“A few. I think it was the excitement. The fear of getting caught.”
“I can understand that.” She grinned and rolled on top of me, and I pulled her mouth to mine. Lena might be a dryad, but tonight my hunger matched hers. We rolled across the floor until we bumped into a shelf.
She broke away, laughing. Before I could draw her back, she jumped to her feet and stripped off her underwear. Then she walked toward the front of the library. At first, I was content to simply watch, but she wasn’t stopping.
I followed her into the front room. “What are you doing?”
“Do you ever get tired of hiding, Isaac?” She stood three feet from the main window, hands on her hips, looking out at the street. Gods, she was gorgeous.
I hurried and grabbed her hand, trying to pull her back to the relative seclusion of the children’s section. Instead, she spun around and kissed me. Her fingers clamped my head like iron, and her tongue danced with mine. One of her hands undid the button of my jeans, then tugged the zipper down.
