Page 81 of Librarian

“I’d like to see you try.”Artemius has always been apathetic, but his bored tone cuts through the threat of Mathias’s words like a blunt knife.

My stomach lurches, and suddenly I’m back at hip height, watching a magical battle between two old men, completely powerless to stop the one that’s begun back in Orkney.

Twenty-Three

Northcliff

“You might as well go back inside,” Pierce says. “I’d do a better job of keeping watch with my eyes closed.”

I give him the finger. “If only you could manage it with your mouth shut as well.”

“Boys, boys,” Benny chides. “You’re allies.”

Pierce and I let out identical huffs of displeasure, and I lean a little heavier against the stone wall as his grandfather gives us an indulgent look.

Sure, keeping watch on the wall is boring, but it doesn’t have to be this bad. When Dakari and I are up here, he usually takes the opportunity to teach me shit. I’m nowhere near as useless as I was.

I’d give anything to have the quiet man here now. Instead, I’m stuck with Pierce. He’d rather spend the time trading insults.

It’s a shame, because apparently, he’s decent at the school of magic I need to master to become parriarch. If he weren’t a prickly asshole, he might actually be able to show me something.Or at least explain what the runeforms glowing on either side of his eyes do.

Is it a spell to give him super vision? Benny hasn’t questioned it, so I’m betting it’s one of those things that’s common knowledge to everyone except me.

“They’re not here yet,” Pierce grumbles, resting his elbows on the stone to my right. “Enforcement isn’t usually this incompetent.”

“I can’t imagine anyone was rushing for corpse duty,” I say.

“It’s disrespectful,” Benny agrees sombrely. “But not unexpected, given the state of their ranks at the moment.”

The remains of the men and women Isidora killed are lined up a fair distance from the wall, shrouded in white sheets. Halinor reached out, offering to hand over the dead days ago, and it wasn’t until this morning that enforcement actually replied.

“You know something.” Pierce’s tone turns mildly accusing.

Benny rubs the back of his neck. “Not much. It appears I may have miscalculated. Your mother had more of their leadership under her thumb than I anticipated. Now most of my sources have gone dark. The original evidence I sent has been wiped from their servers…and those who talk about it are being fired or incarcerated.” He sighs. “And her lackeys have done a brilliant job of scaring the McKinley girl off the internet, which gives more credence to the claims that she faked the attack.”

True. I bet Jasper is regretting ever letting Hazel get involved.

Pierce turns away, shifting to watch Owen and Helen, the two McKinleys stationed a little farther down the wall. “Should’ve just cremated them and returned the ashes to stop my mother turning them into puppets.”

I give him a healthy dose of side eye. “Does she do that often?”

Pierce’s shoulders inch higher, but his tone is lazy and dismissive as he replies, “We have some regular maids, and the butler was too useful to kill, but you try explaining away the number of bloodstains on the carpet to a living employee. The dead also don’t spill secrets.”

Benny shivers. “I should’ve forced you out of that house a lot sooner.”

“It was necessary.” The flatness in Pierce’s tone makes his grandfather’s lips thin.

Great. Stuck in the middle while they rehash this old argument. I glance over my shoulder towards the keep, frowning. Either Jasper and Lambert are working their magic on the Librarian, or she’s still asleep.

“What?” Pierce asks; then, when I don’t reply, he elbows me.“What?”

“I figured Kyrith would be awake and setting the place on fire by now.”

I may hate being stuck on a wall in the freezing cold with Pierce and Benny, but anything’s better than waking up a hungover Kyrith. I push off the wall. I need to move. Maybe walking will warm me up.

“I doubt the Librarian would do anything so uncouth,” Benny protests. “And what are you smiling about?”

The corner of Pierce’s lip quirks, like he’s in on some secret joke, and I raise my brow. He took Kyrith back to her room last night…while she was hammered…