Chimes at Midnight

I walked over to the nearest couch and sat, piling the books around me. They looked dusty, but the dust didn’t come away on my fingers, and I had to wonder how much of it had been generated by the Librarian herself. Maybe it was connected to her admittedly eccentric filing system. Navigation via dust.

Reaching into the pile, I picked up the first book my fingers hit, a fat red volume with a redwood tree embossed in gold across the front. I flipped it open to the front page, where the title The Life and Times of King Gilad Windermere in the Mists, Duke of Golden Gate, Protector of the Western Coast was written in florid calligraphy.

“I wish I’d packed some of Marcia’s sandwiches to go,” I muttered, and started reading.

The text was dry, which I expected. It was also dense. By the end of the first chapter, I knew Crown Prince Gilad was an only child; that his parents had been married for more than six hundred years before he was born; that he was a prodigy in every possible way, as befitted a King; and that he really liked climbing trees. Like, really liked climbing trees. Once he was old enough to walk and control his natural teleportation magic, he was continually being fished out of trees all over the Kingdom. Mostly in Muir Woods, where the redwoods presented an irresistible challenge.

At the end of the chapter, Gilad was approaching his teens and had adopted the redwood tree as his personal banner, and I was developing the worst headache I’d had in a long time. I groaned, dropping my head into my hands. “Oh, oak and ash, I hate history,” I moaned.

“History hates you as well,” said Tybalt, whisking the book out of my lap as he sat next to me. “It goes out of its way to be complicated and inscrutable for just that reason.”

“Right now, I’m inclined to believe you.” I eyed the stack of books that he’d brought with him. Quentin was staggering toward us with even more books in his arms. Mags walked behind him, clutching a single massive volume to her chest. “How much history is there?”

“Years and years,” said Mags, and giggled, like that was the funniest joke she’d ever heard. Sobering, she explained, “Much of what you’ll find here is the same information from slightly different points of view. There’s little that’s unique. Historians are magpies, in their way, and they share things back and forth. Still, if you can find a footnote that points you to an index that leads you to a bit of knowledge you didn’t have before . . . librarianship is a form of heroism. It’s just not as flashy as swords and dragons.”

“Any tips on slaying this particular beast?”

“If you could tell me exactly what it was you were looking for . . .” Mags looked from face to face, catching the sudden guardedness in our expressions. “No, I rather thought not. Well, then, I suppose it’s time we reviewed the rules of the Library. Nothing’s quite free, you know.”

“I figured,” I said, and sat up a little straighter. “What’s the fee?”

“The fee comes, in part, with obedience. There is no running in the Library unless you’re being pursued by something that didn’t enter with you. There is no fighting in the Library.”

“What about fighting back?” asked Quentin.

“Self-defense is allowed,” said Mags. “But aggressors will be evicted, and their privilege of passage revoked. Do not taunt someone simply because you think they can’t hit you here.”

I frowned. “You sound like you’re expecting trouble.”

To my surprise, she laughed. “Amandine’s daughter comes here from the Queen’s Court, if the dress you’re wearing is any indication, and starts asking for books about a long-dead King? It doesn’t take a genius to know that you are trouble, and you’re likely to cause even more.”

“Fair,” I admitted.

“Next, I’ll need you to tell me about your mum. We can do that part later, once you have the information you need, but it’s clear you know something that’s not in her official biography, and that could help me quite a bit.” Mags looked almost abashed. “The Libraries work on a system of information for information, you see. If I have verified information that no one else does, I can use it to trade for some volumes we’ve needed here. Undersea histories and the like.”

“Done,” I said. Mom gave up the right to pretend she was Daoine Sidhe when she lied to me about my heritage, then left me with powers I didn’t fully understand. I paused as a thought occurred to me, and asked, “While we’re here, do you have any books about hope chests?” They were a manufactured method of doing what my mother—and I—could do naturally. Maybe reading about the hope chests could give me a better idea of how my own magic worked.

And how to hurt people less when I had to use it on them.

“I do,” Mags said. “I’ll get it for you.”

I looked at the heap already building around me, and sighed. “Right. We’re going to need to make a coffee run.”

Mags smiled. “I like my mochas with extra whipped cream.”

SEVEN