Page 150 of Librarian

While there would be some merit to having martially trained arcanists willing to defend the Library, I still can’t bear the idea of it becoming a battleground.

Historically, peaceful campaigns of resistance are twice as successful as violent ones. I don’t want to start a war. I want to create change, to avert Mathias’s takeover of arcandom, and excise the rot that allowed him to mount it with so little resistance.

Above all, I want to protect my family, the Library, and our patrons.

“What are you planning to do?” I ask the officers at the desk.

Blanche offers me an apologetic shrug. “I suppose I hadn’t gotten any further than going to the Library for answers.”

I start to pace behind my desk, thinking.

While the lich almost certainly won’t slink away peacefully, Mathias isn’t the only problem here. Not anymore. He and Isidora have spent years corrupting and warping systems that were supposed to serve and protect people, turning them into instruments of oppression and surveillance.

We’ve already dissented by opening the Arcanaeum to liminals in need of a magical education. We could continue that vein of peaceful resistance with all of these people on our side.

“How do you feel about subversion?” I ask carefully, meeting Blanche’s eyes.

She tilts her head. “Normally, not a fan. But for this…I’ll make an exception.”

Forty-Two

Galileo

The Arcanaeum is bustling with patrons. Half of them are students; the other half are nosy bastards. We’ve been open for four days now, and their curiosity hasn’t waned.

North, Eddy, Lambert, Pierce, and Jasper are all enduring their last lecture of the day. I almost joined them this morning before I remembered that, technically, I’ve graduated.

I only really joined the class in the first place because I knew that Lambert would fail the yearagainwithout someone there to keep him on track.

It’s probably a good thing he has North, Jasper, and Eddy for that now.

Helping in the Arcanaeum is keeping me busy. Ever since patrons were allowed back in, they’ve been testing the rules. Word has spread that the Library was damaged by whatever Mathias did to it, and now everyone is pushing boundaries.

Kyrith told us to restrict ourselves to just bashing rule-breakers with books until they cut it out, but I swear, if I catch one more eejit lighting up in the bathroom…

Urgh. I can’t wait for closing time. There are only a few minutes left, but it feels like a lifetime.

“You need to wake up,” I tell the shelves, talking out loud to the slumbering Library for the dozenth time. “We can’t keep doing this without you.”

Probably stupid to be talking to a building that’s as good as dead, but at this point I’ll try anything. I know the plan is to let people get away with some stuff, to slowly reintroduce the cracks to Kyrith’s ghostly illusion and play up the tales of weakness. But some things—like fire—are too dangerous to let slide.

One of the magisters was smoking a stars-damned pipe for feck’s sake.

Kyrith had to banish someone for trying to steal a stack of books earlier. At least it proved that she can if she needs to, but it’s a stress she doesn’t want to put on the dagger. None of us want her using it if she doesn’t have to, given that the damned thing has started burning her whenever it needs more power to open the damned doors.

She doesn’t complain. That makes it worse. Every night, I watch her lower herself onto the sofa and examine the damage to her thigh. Jasper is always there to patch her up, but the look on his face when he does tells me exactly how fecking bad it is.

I check my phone. One minute until closing.

Close enough.

Opening my grimoire, I use a manipulation spell to flip shut the books on the table on my left, and then another to dim the lights in the booth opposite. The students studying there grumble but start packing away. It’s weird to mimic the Arcanaeum, having been on the receiving end of its nudges so many times before.

“Done?” North asks, dropping his invisibility spell as we meet in the middle of the corridor a few minutes later.

“Done.” I slump into the nearest chair with a groan, waiting for the now-familiar wave of pink light to appear.

It’s a spell Kyrith designed. It works by detecting the bacteria that live exclusively on our skin.