by A J Hackwith
My apprentice will accuse me of being unkind. He is not wrong—I am too well trained to be a warm person. But that is not the source of my dislike. Gregor hasn’t grasped the basic truth of the realms yet. Hell and other realms are filled with a compelling cast of personalities. Demons, muses, jinni, spirits, and ancestral forces. Creatures that can feel, covet, love, hate. The truth is this: they are not human. Humanity isn’t defined by feeling, or the facsimile therein. Humanity is defined by fragility. We are a cherry blossom, and they are the frost.
Frost melts, but it is the blossom that dies.
Librarian Yoon Ji Han 1804, CE
PROBITY HADN’T HESITATED. ONCE Brevity finally agreed to her experiment, it had been a swift cascade of consequential actions. The only delay had been on agreeing to a time and location.
“Not in the Unwritten Wing,” Brevity said firmly.
“But, sis, it’s the simplest—”
“No.” And Brevity wouldn’t budge on this, even for Probity. “We can’t do this anywhere near the books.” It felt wrong. Even aside from all the logistic concerns, the idea of unlocking inspiration in a muse by using the ink, with all the unwritten books of humanity looking on, made Brevity uncomfortable. It felt disrespectful, like she was sullying the Library. But Probity wouldn’t understand that—there was no such thing as the Library, as a thing greater than its parts. The only concern Probity understood was concern for the books and for Brevity. So Brev stuck to logistics. “It’s too big a risk if something goes wrong.”
“No stories are in danger. Nothing is going to go wrong,” Probity insisted with certainty, but she relented. “I doubt you’re going to feel comfortable taking it outside of Hell, sis. Is there a room?”
Finding a room in Hell turned out to not be as difficult as one might imagine. Hell was a vast realm, and since souls sent themselves where they needed to be, one might say attendance had dropped over the centuries. Damnation was too constant an idea to ever die out entirely, but it could fall out of fashion.
An empty hall proved the best option, improved by its adjacent location to the transport office. Brevity had fabricated an especially urgent emergency for Walter, emphasizing the absolute need for privacy, and Hell’s gatekeeper had been sweetly agreeable about vacating his office for a spell. At least he had after Brevity had taken the time to explain the human concept of a “smoke break,” which seemed a redundant concept in Hell.
Brevity hesitated upon returning to her desk for her tools and the tiny vial of unwritten ink she’d hidden at the back of a drawer, shrouded beneath linen thread. The logbook lay open with heavy accusation. Brevity picked up the pen half a dozen times, precisely uncapping it and drifting the nib over a fresh page before putting it away again, untouched. A sense of duty found the seams inside her and tugged. As librarian, she should close the wing as a safety precaution, especially with Hero still gone. As Probity’s sister muse and co-conspirator, she should do as little to raise alarm as possible.
In the end, the wing stayed open. The books stayed quiet, the damsels stayed unaware, and Brevity stayed her hand, hovering over the handle of the great lobby doors. She left them half-open, creaking on the hinges of her own doubts. It wouldn’t matter. This wouldn’t take long.
The architecture of Hell was pasted together with lost things and tragedies, bits of buildings and spaces that have had the worst of existence visited upon them at one point or another. That meant a lot of Hell was an absolute drudge through muddy battlefields and concrete corridors that smelled like chemicals, but evil happened in beautiful places as well. The long room chosen for this experiment was splintered with cathedral windows. Through each piece of colored glass, Brevity could make out the light of a different scene. Sunlit squares fit for a hanging, shaded porticos to decide who was and was not human, cloistered confessionals that turned human love into sin. It made for a pretty kind of twilight in the hall, painting coins of color all over the stone floor. Brevity loved color; she might have enjoyed it under better circumstances.
As it was, she didn’t care for the way the multicolored light spilled rainbows like oil slicks off the vial of black ink in her hands. Probity had departed to fetch her muse co-conspirators, and Brevity was left to pace nervously. Electric ghosts of worry crept up her nerves, bunching her shoulders near her ears.
This was the right move. Or, rather, it was the necessary move. Claire had made this necessary, refusing to collaborate on the nature of the ink. It was Brevity’s responsibility as librarian to fix this. She thought Claire would want to fix it, but Probity had been the only one to suggest a solution. Brev felt a little guilty about blaming Claire, though. She’d been absent since the accident, but that would be expected. Claire would rather die than have anyone see her injured or suffering.
If this worked, they could figure out an equilibrium with the ink and stop the stain on Claire. In a way, Brevity needed to save Claire just as much as she needed to save the books.
Brevity had a lot to make up for.
The carving-crusted doors at the end of the hall creaked, and Probity came in, leading a pair of wide-eyed younger muses in her wake. They had matching heads of scarlet curls, one tanned pink and the other orange. Brevity squinted, trying to place them, but Probity warmly started through introductions. She had her elbow crooked around either muse’s arm familiarly. “Gaiety, Verve, you know of Brevity.”
“The exiled muse of Brevity,” one breathed, while the other held a hand to her mouth. “It’s an honor to meet you, ma’am.”
“Oh, really? I don’t . . .” Doubts, formerly niggling, swarmed up as the two younger muses stared at her with something approaching awe. Brevity struggled not to fidget. “You heard about me?”
“I took them under my wing . . . same way you did for me,” Probity said, eyes diverting and voice dropping off at the last part. “I try, at least.”
“Probity is the best,” the one with orange skin announced. Probity had called her Verve. She bounced on her toes eagerly. “She’s told us all about your rebellion. How we can save stories. Is that the ink?”
“It’s so beautiful,” the pink-skinned boy named Gaiety whispered.
“Oh . . . well, it is . . .” Doubt swamped Brevity out of nowhere.
Probity’s eyes sharpened, as if she could sense the waver in Brevity’s tone. She extracted herself from her sibling muses and put a hand on Brevity’s shoulder. “Gaiety and Verve are here to help us.”
“You volunteered, right? To test this ink?” Brevity didn’t precisely think of the question before she asked it, but she felt better as the two younger muses nodded with confusion. “And you understand we aren’t sure what will happen?”
“Of course they volunteered.” Probity’s hurt was evident.
“We’ll be the first muses to create our own stories.” The one named Verve was appropriately ambitious, with a glint in her eyes.
“We aren’t certain of that, actually.”
“We understand the risks. If we can create the stories ourselves, we won’t need to entrust them to humans who burn books,” Verve said. “It’s worth it.”
If Probity had been an enthusiastic activist for this cause, these two were true believers. It was tempting to be swept up in the wake of their certainty. “I’m not sure—”
“Anything is worth it for the sake of the stories,” Probity said. “We’re not weak human souls to be overwhelmed like the librarian. Muses are connected to the Library by nature. I’m certain we’ll be fine.”
“I am certain you’re certain,” Brevity said weakly. But it made sense, and again the thought of the black creeping up Claire’s arm strengthened Brevity’s resolve. “As long as we have precautions in place.”
“Of course. No one wants to protect the stories more than us. We’re well away from the books of the Library.” Probity tossed an expansive gesture around the silent hall before directing th
e red-haired muses to the center. “There and there. Are you ready to go? Let’s change history.”
“Will it hurt?” Gaiety fidgeted as he took his place. Evidently Brevity’s unease hadn’t gone entirely unheard. “You said this could end humanity’s book burnings.”
“It will. I’ve seen the power of this ink,” Probity soothed, and touched each of their cheeks with a motherly fondness. Brevity marveled at how neatly she avoided answering the first question—or perhaps not. Either way, the younger muses appeared calmed, then awed as Probity took the vial. Brevity’s anxiety crept up again as Probity uncorked it, holding the glass up to the light. “But we’ll be cautious anyway. Just a drop to start. One drop, and we’ll create the first story born of a muse. We won’t need humans. We’ll save the future of every story ever written.”
And unwritten, Brevity wanted to remind her, but Probity was already gesturing. Gaiety and Verve held out their hands. Probity didn’t hesitate. She precisely tipped the vial to flick a droplet of ink into each palm.
The ink didn’t sink immediately into the skin, like it had with Claire. In fact, it seemed repelled at first. Tiny amounts of the dark liquid beaded, then skittered over their palms like oil on a hot skillet. It raced over their knuckles, black lines starting to coalesce and swirl against their sunny-colored skin.
“Focus,” Probity soothed when Gaiety and Verve began to shift nervously.
“It might be working,” Brevity said quietly. The ink appeared to be stretching, thinning out into long lines. Perhaps it would take shape and simply mark their skin like the inspiration Brevity had stolen. She clutched one bare forearm at the thought, but the ink showed no sign of settling down. It raced across the back of Verve’s hand, and Brevity frowned.
“Did you see . . . ?”
Probity’s gaze snapped to her. “See what?”
“Light,” Brevity muttered. “We need more light.” She grabbed the edge of Verve’s tunic and dragged her over closer to one of the windows. The stained glass depicted some long-forgotten saint, looking forlorn and wearing a mostly white robe, which cast the clearest amount of stolen light. “There. It’s leaving a trail.”
She pointed as the droplet of ink wove its way around the orange skin of Verve’s knuckles. The skin it passed felt lightened, pulled to a paler shade of tangerine. The ink moved quicker over the back of her hand, appearing to pull color with it. The ink stayed bleak and black, even in brighter light.
“It’s cold,” Gaiety said softly. The ink was doing the same to his rose-colored skin. Pastel tracks stood out where the ink had slid over the surface and up his wrist. A glassy tone in his voice made Brevity uneasy.
“I brought a blotter.” She began to reach for her bag. “Maybe we should—”
“No.” Probity’s hand was on her wrist. “I suspected this would happen. It’s a good sign, see? The ink isn’t sinking in like with Claire. It’ll work. It’ll work,” Probity repeated, quieter. “Just a moment longer.”
Brevity hesitated, for just precisely that moment, and a small sigh of air brought her attention back. The ink had sailed its way up Gaiety’s forearm, and its pale track disappeared under the hem of his sleeve at his elbow.
Gaiety struggled for breath.
A streak of alarm shot up Brevity’s neck. “Are you—”
“Cold,” he mumbled between clenched teeth.
“Look,” Probity said, with a distant kind of awe.
Brevity followed the line of Probity’s attention to the neck of Gaiety’s tunic. His skin was naturally darker there, a sweeter rose than pink. But as she watched, it paled before her eyes, fading from almost red to pink to a pastel kind of coral, until it started to turn white.
“Shirt off!” Brevity batted at the muse’s shirt, alarm rising. When she managed to pull the shirt over his head, the dot of black ink had not grown but was racing in increasingly more frantic patterns over his chest. “What’s it doing?”
“Absorbing,” Probity breathed, sounding almost faint with disbelief. She lifted a hand, hovering over the small liquid bead as it swept and swooped over Gaiety’s fading collarbone. “It’s absorbing bits of him.”
“We need to stop this!” Brevity turned and ran for the bag she’d left in the corner. She came up with the pad of blotter sheets, but Probity was already stripping Verve to see the same thing there.
“They aren’t absorbing the ink, like the humans; the ink is absorbing them.” Probity’s voice was full of awe. “But absorbing what parts? I wonder. Where does it end? What does it take and what does it leave behind?”
“Probably not healthy parts,” Brevity said. She ran back over and attempted to smack the blotter down on the ink, but the droplet beaded and darted away every time she got near. Gaiety was nearly white by now, and Verve had turned a sickly shade of yellow. “We’ve got to stop this now.”
The ink fluted up Gaiety’s neck, creeping like a gnat beneath his skin. Brevity brought the blotter sheet up again but hesitated. Gaiety opened his mouth and a strangled creak slipped out. Past his lips, his teeth were white. And so was his tongue, and the long white nothingness of his throat. Brevity couldn’t stand to see any more; she pressed the blotter page against his face as the ink darted out of his mouth and toward his hairline.
The sheet fluttered as Gaiety sucked in rapid breaths, and Brevity held it there, uncertain how long was needed to capture the ink. His hair was draining of its normal pigmentation, fading swiftly from scarlet to something weak, like blood-tainted water. Abruptly, the breath rustling beneath the sheet stuttered, then stopped. Brevity exchanged a worried glance with Probity, who looked uneasy despite her earlier confidence.
She pulled the blotter sheet back, ready to slap it down again if the ink moved.
No ink moved. Instead, Probity let out a short scream.
Gaiety’s formerly rosy complexion was entirely an off shade of ivory. And the skin was an unblemished expanse. It was as if the blotter sheet had taken the features of his face as well. There was naught but smooth skin where the valleys of his eyes had been, and his mouth was no more than a divot in the pale clay of his skin.
Probity leapt back, horror taking over her face. When her eyes met Brevity’s, they were wet, and she shook her head rapidly. “I didn’t—this isn’t possible. I didn’t mean—”
Brevity stepped back as Gaiety lunged forward, pale hands already swimming into translucent claws. It was as if all of the muse was being absorbed by the ink, turning to paper and ice.
“We need to fix this! There’s got to be a fix.” Probity sounded pleading now. She held up her hands, and the abundance of lace at her wrists gave away her tremors.
Brevity shook her head. “I think we can call this experiment a f—”
They had forgotten about Verve. A white shadow streaked past her head, launching itself at Probity. They went down in a tumble, but the ink-blotted muse was fast, and rabid with movement. She smashed Probity’s face into the floorboards and leapt toward the end of the hall before Brevity could even act.
Gaiety made a creaking, breathless kind of sound, as if protesting his sibling leaving him behind. Brevity was already running. “Stay with Gaiety and keep him calm. I’ll go after her!”
“Sis!” Probity called, but Brevity didn’t look back. She had to keep her eyes peeled on the retreating ghost, a flutter of pale skin in the gloom of the hallway.
It canted through the door of Walter’s office, and Brevity groaned as she heard the clatter of shattered glass. She burst through the archway just in time to see billowing red and purple smoke—which travel jar had been shattered was difficult to tell, but she would have so much apologizing to do when Walter got back—and, just beyond, the retreating shape of Verve disappearing through the main door. Brevity skirted the smoke, saying a silent apology to Walter, and ran after her. They were in familiar hallways now, and Brevity gained on the maddened mu
se, but as they vaulted the stairs up a level, Brevity’s heart stopped.
She knew this path, and knew exactly where the feral muse was going.
The Library.
Brevity struggled to catch up, but the muse was fleet on pale white feet. It shrieked a hunger-pang sound that made Brevity’s teeth hurt and hurtled itself down the hallway. It made it past the gargoyle, who just blinked sleepiness in several dimensions. Some guard dog he was, but then again Brevity supposed there was no reason to ever bar muses from an open library. Verve scrabbled at the doors, leaving deep scratches in the wood as she rushed into the lobby.
“Verve, stop!” Desperation gave Brevity a burst of speed. She hurtled past the entry and flung herself at Verve with just enough momentum to snag her by the ankle. The washed-out muse went down, hissing and snarling. Brevity clamped down and tried to drag her back, but Verve’s claws shredded at the rug as she went. She couldn’t allow her to reach the books; above all else, Brevity knew with entire certainty that she could not allow anything with that kind of hunger to reach the books.
Brevity dragged Verve back at the cost of the rug. The younger muse was almost completely white now. Washed out and almost translucent in the weird light of her eyes. The only color remaining was the faintest wash of pink still clinging to the tips of her long hair. Unlike Gaiety, she’d retained her facial features, but the bead of black ink swirled hazily from eye to eye, occasionally making a detour down to slash black across her lips. It was the only sign of life in the face that had been so hopeful and eager to help moments ago.
Brevity’s heart clenched but she didn’t let go. “Verve, you gotta snap out of it.”
She didn’t appear to hear. Verve lunged across the carpet again, hands straining toward the shelves of books as if she were a dying man reaching for a mirage. She croaked again, hungry and keening. It was all Brevity could do to sit on her back until Probity arrived.
Probity had managed to procure a strap from somewhere and had belted Gaiety’s thin arms to his sides. The faceless muse twisted and writhed, as if suffocating in his own skin. It hurt to watch. Brevity looked away to twist around and begin to roll the shredded rug around Verve’s sides. “What happened to them?”
