He filled Emma’s teacup. The stream of tea wavered as he poured, but Emma would have bitten out her tongue rather than say anything.
“Though you would have nothing to fear from the Boars here, in any case.”
Emma raised an inquiring eyebrow, her mouth too full of her third slice of toast to attempt speech.
“The Boars do not come to the Library,” the Librarian said. “It is not permitted.”
“That sounds very final,” she said.
“It is.” A frost hardened the Librarian’s eyes. “They are creatures of violence. They have shown they do not respect this place, or the knowledge it contains. The City may find them useful elsewhere, but it will not stand for that here.”
“Yes, Saskia said the Library was important to the Night City. But not why.”
“Why, child? This is its very heart.”
“Not the Court?”
“The Court is its golden bauble. But this is its holy place. Where knowledge lives, and where mortals come to seek it. One the Night City’s greatest gift, the other its greatest fascination.”
Emma wondered why she had once thought him vague. When his wits focused, as now, she almost shivered in their beam.
“At Court, the Night City rules. Here, it loves.” He waved at the stacks around him. “Think of the books, child. Books are dear to the City, for they contain knowledge, and knowledge is its power.”
The Night City loved books for the knowledge they contained. So even if a book contained secrets the City might not want shared—like how to flee its boundaries—what were the chances it might let that book survive anyway, from a pure love of knowledge? She knew that someone, at some time, must have found a path from the Night City back to the mortal world. And people wrote things down. All she had to do was find the right book.
“There are so many books here,” she said, pouring milk into the Librarian’s cup. “I remember you told me, once. Every work ever printed.”
“And many before the printed word. The collection here is like no other.”
Emma tried not to sound eager. She stirred his tea, then turned to her own. “So how might you find one? If you were looking for something in particular, I mean?”
The Librarian let out a louder wheeze than usual. Emma realized after a moment that it was a laugh.
“Might I but solve that.”
“What do you mean? Librarian?”
He seemed to pull himself back into the room with great effort. “Forgive me, child. It falls to the Librarian to find what is lost. The one book I cannot find. It fills my thoughts, my dreams…”
He trailed into silence. After a while, Emma leaned forward. “Librarian? One book lost isn’t so bad. I’m sure everyone has forgotten about it by now.”
“I cannot. All I am is bent toward it. Such were the terms of my return.”
“Return?”
He clasped her wrist, sending her teacup toppling to the floor. She felt the strange set of the bones in his lumpy hand, the splayed spokes grinding against her wrist.
“Librarian?”
He had been about to say something. About his book hunt, perhaps, and the “terms” that required it? That had sounded like a bargain, to Emma’s ears. And what had he meant, talking about his “return”? A return to where, or from where? Could he have meant the mortal world? Emma felt an electricity in her chest. An escape story, not hidden in an unknown book, but right before her.
“I am tired.” The Librarian looked smaller, suddenly. Tiny as a coin lost down the back of a sofa. He released her wrist. “So tired…”
He had sunk into vagueness, and Emma knew she would get no answer from him. But she still had the Library. She could approach it like her research project. Scientifically, methodically. Catalogue the areas to look, then survey in squares until the speciesshe wanted to observe appeared. She folded another slice of toast in four and put it whole into her mouth.
It was a good enough plan.
She stood. “Shall I leave you to rest?”
