“You’re going to get mud all over the library,” she says.
He scans the room, then grunts. “I’ll wait in the hall.”
As soon as he’s gone, I take a seat next to the others. “Anything interesting?”
“Nothing yet,” Katherine says. “I can’t find anything about how to kill an immortal.”
I glare at Katherine, then speak through gritted teeth. “That’s not what we’re looking for.”
“Relax, Sabina,” Juliette says with a shrug. “She told me. It’s a win-win for me. If he’s gone, nobody can force me to marry that fossil.”
“What else did she tell you?” I ask.
“That’s it. That Caiden wants the throne,” she says.
I watch Katherine’s reaction out of the corner of my eye. It was a good lie. If Caiden was the one who wanted to attempt a coup, it wasn’t nearly as bad as the truth.
“It goes to show you how paranoid he is, doesn’t it?” Juliette says. “His own son doesn’t know how his immortality even works, and he didn’t bother to give him the same gift. Caiden’s going to die before he even gets to be emperor at this rate.”
“I thought the same thing,” I tell her.
She shoves a stack of books toward me. “These are the ones we pulled so far. Let us know if you find anything useful.”
I begin skimming the books, hoping to discover anything that might aid me in my task. How do you kill someone who is immortal? Someone the gods themselves protected when another tried to harm him.
We read until our eyes ache. Nothing.
“I don’t think we’re going to find it here,” I say. “He wouldn’t want anyone to know.”
“He’s practically a god,” Katherine says. “How do you kill a god?”
I straighten. “You’re right. He is like a god.” I jump from my seat and head to the shelves.
Scanning the titles, I move from one end to the other.
“I know I saw it in here somewhere,” I mumble.
“Saw what?” Katherine asks.
“A whole section about the gods.”
“It’s over there.” Juliette points.
The three of us pull every book about the gods and set them on the table. There are forty books in several towering stacks.
“It’s going to take forever to get through these,” I mutter.
“And I can’t read anymore today,” Katherine says, rubbing her eyes.
“We’ll divide them,” I suggest. “Each of us takes some, and we’ll read when we can. If we find anything, we’ll share with the others.”
We all have a pile of books in our arms when we leave the library. We left behind some volumes on the table, but we’ll come back for them later.
Brevan scans the books in my arms. “Need help?”
“No, you’re still covered in mud,” I say. “And you smell awful.”
He ignores the jab and starts walking. “Thinking of joining a temple? Is marrying Caiden that bad?”
