As Kasira pulled aside a curtain, revealing the sight beyond, she felt, if only for a moment, as if she had been transported to that place.
The rush of the Seven Veils River solidified into a roar as the carriage crested a hill, the valley spreading out below in the early evening light. The river split into a series of waterfalls breaking over a tooth-shaped protrusion of rock that hung like a sheltering wing over a vastisland. At the overhang’s edge, a single leafless tree, larger than any she had ever seen, stretched yearning limbs to the sky. The path wound down the hill to one of six wooden drawbridges connected to the island, an entrance for each country, though only five were ever used. Avaria had closed its borders centuries ago.
Growing up, everyone around Kasira had looked at the Library and seen darkness, whereas she had seen a marvel beyond her comprehension. She had secretly longed after it for years, wondering over it the way a child peered over a steep drop and wondered,What if I could fly?Now that she was here, a little of that old wonder came creeping back.
The waters were a pure crystal blue, the size of the falls so massive, the pounding water nearly deafened her. One waterfall parted around the bridge connecting Kalthos, sprinkling the carriage with cool mist, and she drew in the scent of impossibly clear air.
Only years of training reined in her astonishment at what came next.
An enormous palace with stained-glass windows soared above them, towers becoming turrets becoming spires of brilliant gold, before melding into a slate-stone castle that appeared to have grown straight from the underside of the cliff. This was not the dark, dungeon-like palace she had been told of, forever capped by rain clouds and surrounded by dead vegetation. Rather, a field of verdant grass rich with wildflowers unfurled before it, the colors bold as if after a heavy rain.
The carriage rolled to a halt in the main courtyard, where paddocks dotted the grounds. Inside stood scaled horses the size of hounds and feathered canines the size of horses—beasts, grazing steadily at the long grass or else watching the arriving carriage with curious eyes.
“It’s true,” cried the younger maid. “The Library really keeps beasts like pets!”
“Not quite like pets,” said a deep, lilting voice in the Common Tongue.
All three of them craned for a look at whoever had spoken, butno one stood beyond the window. The driver made a small noise of alarm, before he appeared pale faced at the carriage door to open it.
“Lady Eirlana Corynth,” he announced with a stammer.
“I can’t possibly imagine whyyou’refrightened,” said the voice. “I’m the one with two thugs standing in my courtyard. Oh, don’t scowl at me like that.” The Malik the voice had spoken to only frowned more furtively, their fingers curving about their sword hilt.
Kasira descended from the carriage, one hand holding the folds of her dress as she sought the speaker. Sitting before her, its silver-white fur spotted in black, was a snow leopard. Easily eighty pounds, with a head that came up to her navel, the creature regarded her with round moonstone eyes.
“Um, nice kitty?” the younger maid said from behind her.
The leopard looked unimpressed. “I know the Kalish aren’t the brightest of brutes, but I do hope you possess a more eloquent means of expressing yourself than your companion, my lady.”
“Forgive her,” Kasira replied with an evenness she didn’t quite feel. “It’s not often one speaks to the manifestation of their sin.”
The leopard gave a beleaguered sigh. “This sin has been waiting for you for nearly an hour and would like to proceed. Your ladies and guards may go. I will escort you from here.”
“Lady Eirlana?” asked Tavlan in Kalish, but Kasira waved them away. She had known from the start she would be entering this place alone. Still, watching the women reenter the carriage and depart without a backward glance caused the magnitude of her situation to settle at last. She had reached the Library of Amorlin, and it was everything she had ever imagined and more.
And now began her task of bringing it to its knees.
The leopard regarded her with a tilt of his head, his thick tail thunking against the grass. “Well,” he said at last. “This ought to be entertaining, if nothing else. My name is Iylis, and I help manage the day-to-day of the Library. If you’ll follow me, I will take you to Lord Allaster.”
Kasira trailed after him along the gravel path, running through a final time how she planned to frame herself for her initial meetingwith the Librarian. Allaster had waited nearly a year since the death of the last Librarian to call his Assistant, only doing so under great pressure from the Kalish court to abide by the Library’s laws. He wouldn’t be pleased about her arrival, and he would be expecting someone who detested beasts, the Library, and everything he stood for. She would have to affect disinterest in it all and a resistance to learn, at least to start.
“My things should have been delivered ahead of me,” she said, a noble lady more concerned with her belongings than the opportunity before her. “Did they arrive safely?”
“Your possessions are fine, Lady Eirlana.” Iylis had the sort of voice she imagined Miravi professors possessed, sonorous and soothing. It didn’t stop her from resting her hand on the concealed blade at her hip, though.
At first glance, Iylis looked like a normal snow leopard, made strange only by the fact that few nonmagical animals were found outside of captivity, their numbers having dwindled in the face of their more powerful magical counterparts. Only his speech set him apart. She had never encountered a beast that could speak before, but the ability did not erase the fact that he could likely bite clean through her arm.
Iylis regarded her with a look of deep misgiving. “Lord Allaster will have his work cut out with you, won’t he? It just had to be the Kalish! Now of all times.”
At their approach, the intricately carved front doors of the Library swung open of their own accord, revealing a spacious foyer with a ceiling that arched high overhead and enough indoor plants to better classify the space a greenhouse. They hung from the rafters and gathered in corners, ran vines through trellises pinned to walls and sprouted flowers bigger than Kasira’s head. And behind their leaves and beneath their petals watched a hundred sets of eyes. Snake eyes and spider eyes and little ferrets with gemstone claws and even one crimson bird, whose crown of feathers shimmered like the air over a fire.
Kasira had the distinct impression that if she so much as touched a single leaf, the entire system would engulf her.
“This way, my lady.” Iylis led her through a sitting room wrapped in tall windows, then straight back through a small study, a spacious kitchen where a Riviairen woman didn’t look up from the dough she kneaded with swift efficiency, and at last into a cavernous room filled to the brim with books. Books on rows upon rows of shelves, books in built-in alcoves, books stacked on counters and on desks and on forgotten side tables beside teetering towers of teacups.
Then she lookedup. Level after level ringed the inside of the room like the ribs of a corset, culminating in a gold-framed stained-glass dome.
It shouldn’t have surprised her. From what she had read, the Library had begun as a place of study for magic that grew into something more. But she had never seen so many books in one place. Pages and pages of words; more than anyone could read in a lifetime, and yet some part of Kasira wanted to try. She’d always had a love for stories. Loraya used to steal her books from the orphanage’s library, and they would lie awake beneath the covers with a scavenged candle stub, reading late into the night.
