“Can you allow my friends greater freedom of movement?”
“They have freedom of movement as it is,” was the not very encouraging reply. “Feel free to interrupt my lecture again if the Arbiters have information they wish to convey.”
Arbiters. Plural.
The plural was enough of a warning that Kaylin wasn’t particularly surprised when Arbiter Androsse came to a stop in front of a bookshelf. The book itself was placed on a higher shelf than his had been; Kaylin could reach it—with effort—if she stood on her toes. Or climbed the shelves, but she didn’t consider that smart.
This book, just as the first, bit her fingertips when she touched it. It also came easily to hand; she’d tucked the first book under her right arm to use the left, and was grateful that the book didn’t fall on her head as a result of her tenuous reach.
Hope’s squawk was soft, and as it didn’t contain words, wasn’t meant for her. If she’d had a free hand, she would have clamped his mouth shut; as it was, she froze, waiting for some sign that she’d been discovered.
In the distance, she heard a Dragon roar. Book in hand, she wheeled, breath held.
Arbiter Androsse smiled. “That is a very nostalgic sound,” he said—and appeared to mean it. The smile vanished into a much more pinched expression of frustration. “Well, what are you waiting for? You have said time is of the essence.”
Kaylin looked at the word that was emblazoned across the cover of this second book. She opened it. The figure that emerged was, as the first Arbiter, a thing of light. Of light and shadow—but not the type of shadow that meant imminent death. As the first Arbiter, the second started as a pillar, but the light here twined around darkness, like a braid. Like Larrantin’s hair.
The person that emerged had nothing else in common with Larrantin. Or with Arbiter Androsse. It was a thing of ghostly scales and ebon claws, and its eyes were the size of Kaylin’s head. She’d made as much room as she could while still carrying the book.
“Arbiter Kavallac,” Arbiter Androsse said—whether for Kaylin’s benefit or as a greeting, she wasn’t certain.
Arbiter Kavallac appeared to be a Dragon.
“I was sleeping,” the ghost said, its voice a Draconic rumble. “Is there areasonI have been disturbed?” Her gaze swept across Kaylin, pausing briefly to narrow in Hope’s direction before it settled firmly on Arbiter Androsse.
“Yes, actually. It appears that we have not been considered necessary for the functioning of the Academia in some long while.”
“Oh? The library does not appear to be on fire.”
“Not on fire, not precisely. But we are needed now. If we perform our duties well, it is possible the chancellor will allow you to eat a recalcitrant student or two.”
“The last one was not to my liking,” Kavallac replied. “Very well. This one does look more promising.” The Dragon’s pale head stopped directly in front of Kaylin. “She is Chosen?”
“Apparently so. Nor is that the strangest of the things I have heard since she chose to retrieve me.”
“I am uncertain that I wish to hear stranger.”
“It might be best if you choose a more compact form,” Arbiter Androsse replied. “There are apparently intruders in the library itself.”
“Impossible.”
“So I would have said—but what Starrante feared has come to pass.”
Silence then.“Ravellon?”It was a whisper of a word, a hollow, quiet sound that Kaylin would have sworn a Draconic throat wasn’t capable of uttering.
Androsse nodded, and the Dragon began to dwindle in shape, light and dark coalescing into the ghost of the form Kaylin considered mostly human.
“I suppose we are going to wake Starrante?”
“We are. The young Chosen has been tasked with the opening of the library.”
“Pardon? If this is one of your ill-considered attempts at humor—”
“It is not. The library is not, apparently, open.”
“How did you get in, then?” the Dragon ghost demanded of Kaylin.
“Through the wall.”
