“Don’t worry—if she wanted to set us up, she would have done it at your execution.” Chase’s attempt at comfort isn’t quite as reassuring as he thinks. “It wouldn’t make sense for her to do itaftershe helped us escape.”
“I still don’t understand why a Red is helping us at all,” I mutter, just in time for the door to swing open and that Red to say, “Because you really seem to need it.” She’s nothing like what I expect. She’s young, for starters—eighteen or nineteen, at best—with skin as dark as mine and a thick braid that snakes down past her hip. But the most surprising thing about her is the eyes. Not their deep brown color, but the black spiked rim. This girl’s not a rogue, she’s a Council Shade. “And I prefer Saleen to ‘the Red’, if you don’t mind,” she continues. “Referring to a Shade by their color is a bit reductive.”
“Erm . . .”Saleen?That name rings a bell for some reason I can’t quite place. “Sorry, I—”
“Relax, I’m just messing with you.” Saleen winks, beckoning us inside. “He looks better, by the way,” she says to Chase. “I guess that means you found the Green?”
“Right where you said she’d be—I appreciate the tip.”
“Anytime. Oh, and we can phase back now if you want to drop your In-Betweens. The neighbors get a little twitchy when they see an unfamiliar face in the physical realm—we’ve had some problems lately with the Church trying to sneak iron into the district—but come in the Gray and they don’t so much as blink.”
“Then why not meet somewhere else?” I ask once the world has bloomed into color, draping the rooms in a soft palette of creams and yellows that warm like a flame.
“Because Cemmy’s message said you need information and this is where the illegal books live.”
The illegal books?I feel as though I’ve walked into a strangely lucid dream, where a Red in what has the feel of a family home is disclosing crimes and harboring Hues as though that’s an entirely normal thing.
“Judging by the look on your face, I’m going to go ahead and guess that you’re not completely up to speed, so let me give you the highlights,” Saleen says, ushering us through to the living room to sit. “Once upon a time, my parents were trackers—still are, actually, but before you freak out, they’re no longer playing for the Council’s team. Because ten years ago, during a raid, they came across a library filled with all manner of seditious materials and discovered that the Council lies, a lot. About Shades, about Hues, about our history, about our magics, about anything and everything, really. They’ve been working to sabotage the guild ever since.” She makes it sound so simple—so easy—as though countering a lifetime’s worth of hate only takes a moment of clarity and the right reading.
“So, you’re telling me they found some books and then they up and switched sides, just like that?”
“Ez, don’t—” Cemmy starts, only for Saleen to wave her off with an indifferent flick of her wrist.
“It’s okay; I don’t blame him for not trusting me.” She shrugs, then to me, she says, “Though I wouldn’t say there was anyjustabout it. It was more like . . . the lie that broke the camel’s back after years of questioning. But the point is, they kept the books, and they kept digging, and then once I was old enough tounderstand the gravity of the situation”—she lowers her voice in a way that, I assume, is supposed to mimic her father—“they brought me into the fold, as well. Though strictly speaking, I’m not meant to get involved. My parents want me to keep my nose clean while I’m still at the Academy.”
“Wait—you’re still at the Academy?” The more Saleen says, the less I understand. “Why? If you all hate the Council so much, why stay instead of going rogue?”
“Because going rogue changes nothing.” She absently picks at the tip of her braid. “It would only rob my parents of the access they already have as trackers and any opportunity to help. And besides, it’s kind of hard to get stuff done when you’re constantly being hunted. I imagine you know a little something about that.”
Yeah, I guess we do.
“So instead, you . . . what? Go around saving Hues from their executions?”
“Actually, you’re the first.” Saleen manages to sound both guilty and pleased in the same breath. “Most of what we do is preventative—getting Hues out of the city instead of caught—since, ninety percent of the time, they’re flat-out killed before they reach a cell, either by the trackers or by the Gray. If they do make it to the prison, freeing them is way too complicated to be an option; the best we can do is try to ease their stay there, slip them a few healing charms while they’re being interrogated or a numbing tonic to take the edge off on trial day. But since my parents are off on assignment, there was nothing they could do for you, and that didn’t sit right with me, so I tried to break in myself. That’s where I ran into your friends, and well, you probably know the rest.”
Most of it, yes—though Saleen’s side of the story lends the impossible escape they staged a whole new shape. It can’t have been easy, choosing to align themselves with a Shade, having to hope that she’d make good on her promise to get them in and out safely in lieu of leading them to their deaths. And yet they did it anyway.
“Thank you,” I say, since it’s somehow easier to thank her than it is them.
“You’re welcome, Ezzo. Now, maybe the three of you can tell me why you’re still here?” Saleen looks between us. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy to share whatever information you might need, but wouldn’t you be better off with some more Red and a safe route out of Sarotuza?”
“Probably,” Chase agrees, leaning forward in his chair. “And I’ll happily take the Red if you’re offering, but first, have you ever heard of a type of Shade or a type of magic called a void?”
“Can’t say that I have.” Saleen shakes her head. “But I’ve also never gone looking, so we might well find something in my parents’ collection. Follow me, they keep it in the study,” she says, springing back to her feet.
“Your parents keep a collection of illegal books in their study?” I ask as she leads us through the house. “That seems . . .”Reckless. Unwise. Downright dangerous. “Bold of them.”
“I mean, it would be—if the whole room wasn’t protected by a pretty powerful glamour.” She flashes me her teeth. “And besides, if you’ve got trackers rifling through your stuff, then you’re already made. At least this way, we could get the books out if we got the sense that they were coming. Here we go.” With one hand, she flicks on a set of hex lights and with the other, she brings down the spell, rippling the modest study back to its true form.
“Whoa.”In the blink of an eye, the room fills with oak and leather, deep stacks of floor-to-ceiling shelves materializing to cover every inch of wall space. “There’s got to be a thousand books in here.”
“Fifteen hundred, give or take.” Saleen’s pride could eclipse the moon. “All originals, from before the Council started altering records.”
“That’s a lot of texts, Saleen.” Cemmy, on the other hand, looks flat-out dismayed. “Unless you know where to start, this could take days.”
“These should help with that.” Saleen grabs a jar of purple crystals off the desk. “Indigo magic is tricky, but if you ask it simple questions like:in which book will we find the term ‘void’, it should work,” she says.
And since the future seems rather invested in my endeavors of late, there’s a good chance it will.
