A Hackwith - The Library of the Unwritten

If Hero had a reply, she didn’t hear it as she strode away to face her own test.

THE RING WAS LARGE enough to separate the duels by several yards—far enough that she would not be swept up in the first swing of Uther’s grand maul.

Claire positioned her back to Hero’s match. She would have to keep moving. This was not the stand-and-deliver type of duel that she was familiar with from the Library. But as she wrapped her fingers over the soft grip of her staff, she settled on a grim certainty. Whatever the outcome, she was not leaving the realm until she had her answers.

“Seeing as you’re our guests”—Bjorn raised his voice so it carried over the watching crowds—“we’ll allow you the first attack.”

“Grand.” Claire heard Hero’s dripping sarcasm behind her.

There was a shuffle and a thundering step as Hero initiated the attack, and Claire could not stop from twisting around as the crowd began to roar. Hero had opened with a testing swing, darting forward and aiming for Uther’s unprotected side. But the giant easily avoided it, batting aside Hero’s sword as if it were a gnat. Hero grunted and recovered, cautiously maintaining his distance.

“Well, Librarian?” Bjorn’s voice brought her around.

She would have to stop worrying about Hero’s fight if she was going to survive her own. A duel between librarians was a duel of words. Not just any quotation from a poem or other passage would do; it had to hold meaning for the audience. It was the meaning that carried the weight. The opposing librarian would have to identify it, take away the audience’s meaning, and redirect it to defuse the attack. Claire tightened her grip on the staff and considered her audience. This was Bjorn’s audience, not hers. She would be operating at a disadvantage. The encounter with the ravens at the steps came to mind. “‘Cowards die many times before their deaths; the valiant never taste of death but once.’”

Her voice rang out, and she felt the silky shudder on her lips as the magic took hold. Fine silver script flowed through the air, etching the words in a glowing ribbon. A flare of figures formed around it, tiny points of light in the shape of faeries, fine ladies, jesters and daggers, moons and men. It whispered as it flew sharply at Bjorn’s face, and the crowd murmured approval.

The old man grunted and whipped his staff to the side, catching the words from the air. The silver script tangled and scraped at the wood, tendrils whipping like a lash toward his face. He spoke just one word to make them disappear into nothing. “Shakespeare.” Bjorn snorted as he named the author. “Starting with the Bard, Librarian? A beginner’s move. I hope you have more than that.”

“It seemed fitting, considering.” Claire began to circle as Bjorn moved. The tumult from the crowd was growing. Out of the corner of her eye, she registered swirls of movement as Hero and Uther began to trade blows in earnest. Claire forced herself to stay focused on the bard in front of her.

“‘It’s much better to do good in a way that no one knows anything about it.’” Bjorn’s words were gold and old stone runes, tiny marching men and snowflakes, all sharp edges as they snapped toward her. Claire’s mind spun along with her staff, and she stumbled back a step as she barely avoided being sliced by the tail end.

“Tolstoy.” The words disappeared, and she stifled a sigh of relief before she began to circle again. Bjorn was faster than an old man had a right to be, his words too sharp. She needed the space to react.

“Out of practice, Librarian?” Bjorn took easy strides around the ring.

“‘The sun himself is weak when he first rises, and gathers strength and courage as the day gets on.’”

She aimed the words lower this time, forcing Bjorn to dance away lest the gossamer script tangle his boots. “Dickens. Wasn’t he a contemporary of yours? Or would have been if you’d written.”

“Low blow.”

“Not low enough, it seems.” The old man narrowed his eyes at her before forming a return volley. “‘He knew everything there was to know about literature, except how to enjoy it.’”

Claire caught the gold words at the center of her staff. She found the quotation but took a fraction too long. The gold script managed to slice at the back of her arm before she could dispel it. “Joseph Heller,” she gasped. Blood welled up in thin lashes up to her elbow.

So they went, back and forth, trading blows up and down the written words of history. Bjorn staggered when an Austen escaped his guard and landed a blow to his knee. Claire found herself diving to the ground to avoid an Eliot as it lashed for her head. It was when she was rolling to her feet that she first noticed the blood staining the other side of the ring.

Hero moved like a dervish, darting into the larger man’s reach only as long as it took to aim the edge of his blade along Uther’s flank. Striking a blow, then flinging himself out of the way of the maul again. Both men were bloodied, though Hero bled black, pitiless ink. They both breathed heavily; Uther favored his side, while Hero held one injured wrist away from his opponent.

Claire took a deep breath and faced Bjorn again with a long attack. “‘Be men, or be more than men. Be steady to your purposes and firm as a rock. This ice is not made of such stuff as your hearts may be; it is mutable and cannot withstand you if you say that it shall not.’”

A boisterous approval came from the sidelines. “What soldier wrote that?” came a call from the crowd.

“Mary Shelley,” Bjorn said grudgingly. With more bravado than she felt, Claire bowed, and the gathered crowd laughed.

Bjorn shook his head. “‘And the rest is rust and stardust.’”

“Nabokov,” Claire said with a grunt as she spun and dispelled a marching line of script and meteors. “God, Russians.”

Bjorn chuckled but did not dispute her sentiment on the literature. Claire paced a few more steps to catch her breath. This needed to end soon. “‘We lived in the gaps between the stories.’”

“Atwood.” Bjorn returned with a line from Tolkien, which Claire dispelled before he commented, “Your soldier looks tired, Librarian. Blows like that… he’s not standing much longer.”

Claire allowed her eyes to stray to Hero. Uther had gotten lucky. She’d missed the blow that had sent Hero sprawling, but its impact must have been tremendous. He’d risen from his knee but held heavily to his sword with his one good hand, ink dribbling down one cheek. He reserved all his energy for a glare at the moving mountain in front of him.

Claire swallowed hard and forced her attention back to Bjorn. “‘Logic may indeed be unshakable, but it cannot withstand a man who is determined to live.’”

“Kafka.” Bjorn dismissed it with a wave of his staff before returning a volley toward Claire. “‘The weak man becomes strong when he has nothing, for then only can he feel the wild, mad thrill of despair.’” He aimed the volley for Claire but was grinning at the other combatants in the ring.

“Arthur. Conan. Doyle.” Claire gritted her teeth, searching for a line that would wipe that smug, blood-mad grin off the Viking’s face.

But it was then that Hero made his move. He regained his feet and swung, lithe bronze figure glinting as the sword arrowed toward Uther’s ribs. The giant turned, fast, too fast, and a crack reverberated throughout the hall as maul met blade, and both sword and swordsman were flung away.

Hero sprawled on the dirt, groaning. Black liquid flowed freely from the cut on his temple now, and his movements were slow. His sword came to rest several yards away. Weaponless, Hero clenched his teeth in a death’s-head grin as he gained a knee and turned toward Uther. The Norse warrior inclined his head and brought his arms back to deliver the winning blow.