by Jean Johnson
“If we work together to distract him, he won’t,” Foren said. He wrinkled his nose in disgust. “I don’t trust him, either. He seems happy with his punishments.”
“That’s because he’s a secret subservient at heart,” Gayn dismissed scathingly. “I’m not going to let others tell me what to do any longer. Are you, Brother?”
Foren stared at his sibling a long moment, a muscle working in his jaw. “ . . . It’s not right, how Domo Galen beats you. There is a line between punishment and torture, and he crosses it every night. Anything I can do to thwart him . . . I will do it, for you.”
Gayn looked back at Elcar and the others. “Family Day. It’s in just a few more days, or we can wait a week more. One of us can get our hands on the access brooch and the necklace, swap that out—I can get my hand on my mother’s access brooch, which is slightly different, close enough to not notice at a mere glance if we use that one to swap it out—and then we can distract Krais, keep him busy, while the other hurries you through the pertinent archives.”
“There are only a fraction of librarians on duty on a Family Day,” Foren added. “It’ll be easiest to bluff our way past the watchers. Especially since we’ll have the badge. He keeps it in his kilt pouch. It’s the viewing lens on that necklace that he’d notice most, if it were missing for long. But if we swap them out, then keep him busy and away from anywhere he’d use it, the one not keeping him busy can hurry to find what both of us need.”
“How will you swap it out without any magic?” Brother Alger asked.
“We’ll think of something,” Foren muttered, exchanging a worried look with his sibling. Without their magic, they’d have a hard time doing it.
“ . . . It’s been getting progressively hotter, the last few days,” Brother Fran pointed out, speaking up. “Several of us were talking about wading into the lakes on the Library grounds . . . or is that a blasphemy? Surely he’d have to take it off, maybe put it in his pouch and set that on the shore, in order to cool off with a bit of swimming? You could offer to take turns guarding each other’s things,” the lanky outlander added.
“Yeah, that sounds good,” Brother Alger agreed. “I’d trust my brothers to watch something important. Wouldn’t he?”
Foren nodded. “We’ll have to go to luncheon for Family Day, spend a few hours, but midafternoon, we could come back. And it’s not a blasphemy to swim in the waters. It’s just not done on the other days of the week because it’s not seen as very dignified.”
“We’ll make an afternoon picnic of it,” Brother Grell offered. “We can claim you’re becoming a part of our family, and invite you to dine with us.”
“Make it breakfast,” Gayn suggested. “That gives us more time to search and distract our brother. If it gets any hotter, the heat of afternoon will make no one want to move . . . and that heat will drive those whose cooling charms in their homes have failed into the various halls of the Great Library. Morning will be cooler and more suitable for a picnic.”
Fran nodded. “That would give us more opportunities to return the borrowed monocle, too, since if you come back in the late afternoon to do more research, we could go swimming again.”
“That’s assuming it turns hot enough to risk wading around so informally,” Brother Elcar said. “What if the weather cools, or it rains?”
Foren shrugged. “It’s summer, and it’ll be a Family Day. We’ll go swimming anyway.”
“You’ll need to do the swimming and the distracting,” Brother Alger told Foren. “Brother Gayn’s arm will make it hard for him to do any swimming or other activities for long.”
“Then we’re set,” Gayn stated, pleased with how things were turning out. “There are risks . . . but I think they can be managed. And as soon as I can loosen the bindings holding my magics back, I’ll be a lot happier.”
Brother Grell rose and cupped his shoulder. “We will do what we can to help you, Brother Gayn. You have already been punished more than enough by the others Gods, with your injury. Alshai’s compassion urges us not to let you suffer for much longer . . . and Nurem’s wisdom reminds us that sometimes just because something is lawful does not always make it right.”
Satisfied he would get the help he needed—and fairly certain they were not aware of his plans for vengeance, though he had only vague ideas for right now—Gayn nodded in gratitude. “Thank you. Unfortunately, my brother and I must go now, if we are not to be late and provoke more brutalities.”
“Nurem bless you both,” Brother Elcar replied.
Nodding, Gayn turned and left, cradling his arm. Touching his back briefly in silent comfort and support, Foren joined him. They might fight from time to time, but his middle brother was a solid kinsman. He just didn’t need to know everything Gayn intended to view with that special viewing lens.
* * *
* * *
Unlike the Elder Disciplinarian’s home, which had rooms for punishing people, extra garden space, extra room for guests, but which did not sit attached to that hierarchy’s administration buildings, the residence of the Guardian sat connected between the Mage Hall, with all of its offices, workrooms, craftrooms, and so forth, and the Temple proper. That ensured the Guardian never had to brave the worst of monsoon wind and rain just to get to the Fountain chamber.
Instead of a ground-floor atrium, a clever rooftop garden had been built, similar to the one above the residence floor of her parents’ bakery, scattered with potted herbs and hosting the family’s spirit trees. This garden stretched in table-styled bed after planting bed across the flat roof, with an arbor of flowering vines to serve as a sort of atrium wall around the edges. Pelai’s personal spirit tree sat in a matching trellis-covered gazebo in the center. That gazebo frame had broad, cushion-lined benches around the perimeter, benches on which Pelai and Krais had both decided to lounge.
While it was cooler inside than outside, the air just smelled better out here. That, and no one dared come here at night without permission, since this rooftop garden was considered personal, private space. Reserved solely for the Elder Mage and his or her family to use, save for just a few hours each morning for the building’s gardeners to come up and tend.
Which made the approach of footsteps and the clearing of a throat rather unusual.
“Elder Mage?” the white-clad young woman asked hesitantly, stopping just outside the gazebo so that she could peer inside without broaching the visual privacy of its trellis-edged walls. “I would not interrupt, but . . . there is an outlander gentleman down below. He is rather insistent on seeing Puhon Krais immediately.”
Pelai pushed up onto her elbows, and cast Krais a bemused look. He in turn sat up, his body sore and protesting from hauling around chests and bags and boxes of books over the last few hours, on top of a long day of walking around the Great Library’s halls. “An outlander?” he asked. “Curly brown hair?”
The apprentice mage nodded. “Yes. He says his name is Brother Fran. He gave me this . . . paper . . . to give to you. I cast spells on it to see if it is harmful, but . . . while it contains no magic I can tell, neither is it anything that makes sense.”
Rising, Krais crossed to her and held out his hand. She passed it to him, and he pulled his viewing lens out of his vest. Fitting it to his eye, he waited ten seconds for the magic to take hold . . . and blinked as red lettering swarmed up out of he swirling mess of black lines on the simple off-white page. The words hidden in the tangled overlay sent alternating waves of icy shock and hot anger washing through his frame. Breathing deep, Krais crossed to Pelai, and let her have a chance to study it, too.
When she finished, he gave her a significant look. Almost anyone else looking at it would have seen a tangled scribble of interwoven lines. She needed the tattoo the Elder Librarian had given her to read it. He needed his monocle. The viewing lens Anya’thia had threatened him with death if he lost.
The viewing lens his own b
rothers planned to steal from him in order to steal knowledge from the Restricted Archives. In specific, some of the very same spells the Elder Librarian had asked him if he would ever try to steal, after being given the ability to read the sort of carefully encrypted words that were not the kind that most people could see and speak aloud. An echo of his Goddess speaking to him from that moment during the Convocation wafted through his mind right now.
. . . The sight is different from the sound
Spoken words aren’t what scrolls show . . .
The young lady looked between the two of them, waiting for an answer. Finally, she said, “Well? Should I bring him up here, or take you down to where he waits?”
Pelai eyed Krais, and gestured at him, giving him permission to handle the matter.
“Please go back and tell him I will have a reply in the morning. Thank you,” he added politely.
“Of course. Anything else?” she asked.
“Just thank him for this message, let him know I understand what it means, and reassure the outlander that I will have a reply for him in the morning,” Krais repeated.
“Of course. Goodnight, Pelai’thia. Goodnight . . . Krais.” She flashed him a tiny smile, bowed, and left.
Rather than return to his own side of the air-cooled gazebo, surrounded by the pleasant scents of a dozen different flowering plants, Krais crossed to where Pelai still lounged. Ever since her official investiture, she had taken to wearing a comfortable cotton taga most of the time. White, of course, belted in gilded black with her matching bracers still firmly laced in place. She had removed her boots earlier, letting Purrsus nuzzle and rub his face all over them, and had donned simple toe-strapped salaps for the walk to the roof garden.
So had Krais, donning an old pair of salaps since neither of them had expected to go anywhere this late at night. One of the reed-woven sandals accidentally fell off when he sat down by her thighs and crossed his ankles. He debated toeing after it, but left it on the wooden slats of the gazebo floor for the time being.
After a while, he finally said, “So. It begins.”
Pelai snorted at that, and smacked him in a light thwap of the backs of her knuckles against the back of his arm, the closest part she could reach. “It began when that first idiot, the Aian mage Torven or whatever, decided he was going to try to take over the Tower’s source of power. It began when those idiots in Mekhana chose to seek out a stupid source of power that would end with the world invaded and ruined.
“It began when . . . well, when you and your brothers stupidly decided it would be okay to commit crimes against other nations,” she added, softening her tone. Pushing upright, she cupped his shoulder in sympathy. “It began when you decided you were wrong, and each time you decided you would oppose them. Krais . . . whatever we are handed is our fate, yes, but what we choose to do with it is our destiny. And you have been making good choices. Your brothers . . . well, they have the right to make their own choices, good or bad. But we need to consult with Master Kerric about whether or not this is something that will disrupt the future, based on each possibility for whatever we might consider doing about it.”
He nodded, forced to concede her point. “I know. I know. I have to let them . . . make their mistakes. Accept the consequences for their acts. Send them . . . send them into exile. Father . . . is going to shit whole books over this,” he added crudely, scrubbing at his face with both palms. “Pardon my language . . .”
“Shit books?” Pelai asked, amused by the vulgarity. “How big of books, do you think? Little paper novels of fanciful, fictional tales? Or much bigger tomes, like exchequery-sized ledgers?”
Dragging his hands off his face, he parted his arms, his palms sketching a space nearly a yard wide, then half again as long. “The Registry sized ones.”
That made her chuckle. Leaning forward against him, Pelai hugged Krais. “This is a real mess, isn’t it . . . But what was that your prophecy poem said?”
Drawing in a deep breath, Krais ordered his thoughts, then recited from memory.
“Hush, little Guardian; stand your ground.
Wisdom faked will try to know.
The sight is different from the sound.
Spoken words aren’t what scrolls show.”
“No, no, not that part,” Pelai dismissed. “I mean, that part is important, but . . . umm.. Love, not hate, is what must grow. That’s the part I’m thinking about.”
“If they do this, they’re breaking the law, Pelai. Do I show them love by trying to get them locked up? Or do I try to help them escape . . . and get punished for it, or sent into exile, too?” he asked, turning to look at her. “I don’t want to leave you.”
“Pff,” she scoffed. “You’re a part of the Guardians of Destiny poem, and we’re three for three so far on it being a love prophecy . . . as well as a warning against a dire global fate.” At his arched brow, she said, “Kerric fell in love with Myal, the Painted Lady to his Master of the Tower. Saleria was the Keeper of the Grove, and Aradin Teral the Witch helping her. They’re happily married, now. Alonnen clearly has his Rexei, and they make such a cute boyish couple together . . . And I? I have you. My Painted Lord, standing by my side.”
He grunted at that. “Some bargain. I—ow!” he hissed, quickly cupping his hand over the nipple she had pinched through his vest. “Dammit! . . . Was that a punishment, or an attempt at arousal?
“Yes. Would you like to retaliate?” she purred, leaning into him and nipping at his bottom lip with her own.
As much as Krais wanted to make love to her—and planned to make love to her, here in the gazebo of her rooftop atrium—he pulled back and pressed his finger to her lips. “Bookmark that,” he ordered. “We need to go see Anya’thia. I am not about to let the viewing lens be ‘borrowed’ by my brothers without her permission.”
Sighing, Pelai sat back, giving him the freedom to rise so that she could follow. “I’ll bet she’s getting sick of us. Maybe at the end of each day of late, she soothes herself with dire mutterings about how we should be bothering Nalai’thia, or Hala’thia, or Sandu’thio . . .”
“Outlanders do not typically come to Mendham to talk with the Elder Citizen or the Elder Craftsman,” Krais reminded her. “They come for the Great Library, and that means Anya’thia has to deal with all the headaches of it.” Removing his finger, he added, “At least we are helping her to manage some of it . . . even as we deliver some of it.”
“Well, we’d better go now. I know she stays up to read, but I’m not sure how late, each night,” Pelai said. “Her residence is on the far side of the Temple—“
He booped her on the nose, a light tap that made her blink. “Or we could just use your ability to tap into the scrying mirrors of the Tower, and link to her and to Guardian Kerric. The one with the mirror where he can tell if what decisions we’re discussing will have a positive or a negative impact on the world a year from now?”
She groaned at that, and dropped her forehead against his shoulder. “I’m tired of floating faces . . . ! If we do that, then I want to go down to the Fountain Hall. It’s also more private down there, since no one can eavesdrop.”
“Then we’ll go down to the Fountain Hall,” he agreed. He waited for her to move away from his shoulder first. She felt too good, leaning on him for comfort, for Krais to want to move. She felt too right, leaning on him.
“And we’ll need to bring Anya’thia, too,” she muttered, not yet moving.
“I know . . . and we really do have to move, in case she’s headed for bed as we speak.”
“Ugh! I swear, if I’m anywhere near these demon-cuddling idiots when they start their next round of summonings, I will pick up said demon and flog them with it!” she muttered with dire vindictiveness. “I just wanted to have a nice, peaceful transition to being the next Elder Mage, not this mess!”
Chuckling, he wrapped his arm around her
, hugged her to him, kissed her beautiful tattooed brow, and shook his head. “Too late. You’ll just have to deal with it. But I promise I will help you.”
“Good. You’re mine, now. I’m keeping you after your two months are up.” Kissing his cheek, she finally moved away, just enough to rise and brush down the folds of her taga. “I miss my black leathers. It’s too hot for leather, even white leather with cooling charms, but I miss them. Do you think she’ll be offended if we arrive wearing cheap salaps instead of nicer sandals?”
“How would I know?” Krais reminded her, taking her hand and twining their fingers together, an act they could only do up here in privacy. “I haven’t been around her for most of the last year.”
“You’re right. It’s late, it’s hot, I’m cranky, and she will just have to put up with it. Let’s go,” she added, pointing at the Temple wall rising on the east side of the rooftop garden. “There’s a doorway that serves as a shortcut to the main floor of the Temple through there, in the middle of the arbor walkway. I saw it my first summer apprenticing under Tipa’thia, and I know its rune-lock has been enchanted to accept my hand, same as all the others . . .”
* * *
* * *
Family Day donned hot and humid, the sticky, sweaty feel to the air just perfect for lounging around in comfortable, cool water for as long as possible. The initial theft of the necklace and the brooch passed without a problem, and Gayn had an excellent excuse about needing to go see one of the Healers to check on whether or not a spell had been researched that could cure his arm . . . but Gayn did not return right away. Neither did Brother Fran, who had offered to escort Gayn in case he felt faint—the perfect excuse on several levels, since he was the only youth in the group who could write in the special code the older priests used.
