A Hackwith - The Library of the Unwritten

Or you can choose to rebel.

RAMI WAS LEARNING MANY things today.

Hell had a pet gargoyle. Ravens fought like warriors. Books bled ink. And dead bodies stank, even in Hell.

The last lesson was the most pressing on his mind as he covered his nose with his sleeve, clearing a spot on the floor of debris before the gargoyle deposited the final body on the pile. The Library had become a graveyard.

The Horrors, when slain, decomposed at an accelerated rate and had turned putrid before the fighting was even over. The young ladies—Leto had referred to them as damsels before Brevity staunchly corrected that they were their own goddamn heroes now—were fading and so fragile, their forms were like spiderweb and ash where they’d fallen. Rami had made one attempt, just one, to right a dying damsel, but the body had folded into dust. Brevity had made a wounded sound, and Rami couldn’t even bring himself to wipe the ash from his face.

Arlid and her raven folk made little effort to help, of course. The warriors were more inclined to scour the stacks, finishing off with judicial glee any Horror they found, but Arlid delegated a young leather-clad boy to tend to the injured book they called Hero.

The boy had bandaged the unwritten man’s wounds as best as possible. Brevity directed him to prop Hero on the couch near the front desk. She gathered his mangled book where it lay, but that was as much as could be done until a librarian could repair the damage. Hero lay on the couch unmoving, fading in and out of awareness, though every time he woke, his face turned toward the entrance to the stacks.

Finally, against Rami’s advice, Brevity took a few of Arlid’s folk and plunged into the stacks after Claire. Fool girl. It wasn’t safe, but the muse was frantic to find the librarian. She’d only grown more so after a discomfiting breeze had whipped through the stacks before dying down again.

The minutes had ticked by, but neither raven nor librarians emerged.

“How much more?” Leto asked, hovering by the desk. The boy had kept out of the fighting, but helplessness drained his features. The boy looked tired, scanning the death and destruction at the front of the Library. Several of the Library’s tall shelves had been damaged in the fighting, upended as much by the gargoyle’s own maneuvering as by Andras’s forces. The stacks cracked and groaned, leaning against one another like broken old men. Books, paintings, and other unwritten artifacts were scattered on the floor. Rami hadn’t allowed Leto even to help with pickup.

“That’s the last of them,” Rami said. He stepped back as Arlid approached with a blue-flamed torch. The smell drew a wince as she placed it to the bodies, but the magical fire sputtered and burned cleanly, smoke neatly drifting out the hallway to mingle with Hell’s usual ash- and anise-heavy air. Damsel and demon alike were ascribed to the elements. Rami said a silent prayer. To whom, he found he wasn’t quite sure.

“Was it worth it?” Rami muttered.

Arlid heard and arched one thick brow. “Beats me, Watcher. My kind slaughter each other, everyone gets up for sunrise again the next morning. Ask your librarians.”

“If they return.” Rami cast a look toward the still shadows of the stacks.

“They better. The little one took some of the flock in with her.” Arlid made it sound as if she would take it as a personal offense if the search party failed.

The fire did quick work, burning blue and clean, never straying toward the shelves of tempting paper nearby. They were just watching the embers when there was a pop and a familiar teenage yelp of surprise behind him. Rami sighed and turned to remind Leto not to touch anything.

The air left his chest in a rush.

A shattered star stood just beneath the arch of the Library doors. Uriel, archangel of the Heavenly Host, Face of God, proud, holy, eternal, stood straight as a blade in the chaos of the Library. Her fractal wings were fully unfurled, and razor blades of light scissored and lashed gouges into the door molding. By her side, Leto stood stock-still.

Perhaps due to the angelic fist clenched around his throat.

“Uriel!” Rami’s legs decided to work again and he jolted forward. “What are you doing?”

“What you should have done, the moment you entered this unholy place.” Her voice was silk over frozen stone. Uriel didn’t have a weapon, didn’t need one. Her pale fingers curled around Leto’s neck like a collar. It was threat enough. The whites of Leto’s eyes were wide, and his cheek twitched from the effort to breathe around Uriel’s grip.

Her hand tightened as Rami advanced. He frowned in confusion at the archangel. “How did you—”

“I followed you. Your fallen path was not so hard to find once you made me aware of it.”

“That’s— The threat is over now.” Rami raised his hand. It was difficult to keep the tremble out of his voice. “Leto is an innocent human soul. He’s not even damned—he’s Heaven’s now. We saved him. That means—”

“That means nothing ,” Uriel snarled. Her arm shook for good measure, drawing a stuttering yelp from Leto. The light at her back splintered and doubled, growing from wings into a lashing scorpion tail. She was losing control. “Not when a Watcher, one of Heaven’s first creations, dear to the Creator’s heart, would turn traitor and help these things .”

“No one here is a thing . They’re human, or harmless spirits, or…” He trailed off, not quite sure how to describe Arlid’s ravens or the gargoyle. He caught leather-clad movement at the edge of his vision. Arlid stepped up behind him, hand dancing over her weapon, calculating the space between them and the angel.

His heart ached, already drowned in too much bloodshed today. He had to stop this before it turned foolish. “I haven’t betrayed anyone, Uriel. And I can’t condone harm to a human soul by our hands.”

“You have no standing to judge me. A failed Watcher, the sad, pathetic beggar at Heaven’s Gates.” Uriel’s grip tightened, sending a flush of strangled blue frost to Leto’s cheeks. The teenager’s hands flew up and clawed weakly at her wrist. Rami didn’t realize he’d moved until the lightning crackled up and down the blade in his hands.

Uriel’s eyes ignited and leaked flame. “ You would dare draw a blade against me ?”

Rami opened his mouth before he realized he couldn’t deny it. But Uriel began to bleed pale wildfire, and panic leapt into his mouth instead. “Leto! Close your eyes!”

The room flared as Uriel shed her skin. Behind him, he heard a strangled cry and a flutter of raven wings. Only Rami could stand his ground as shards of light spit from the angel’s back like needles, and her face became a mask of fire. Leto was a dark, cringing blot against Uriel’s wrath, and Rami could only hope he’d followed orders. A human mind was not equipped to see the face of god.

When Uriel’s transformation completed, her voice was splintered crystal in his ears. “You dare?”

Rami swallowed, calling lightning to his blade, which he kept pointed low. “It seems I do. Let the boy go, Uriel.” Leto whimpered, and Rami was ashamed that he was uncertain whether he could really strike the Face of God.

He didn’t have to find out.

“Rule number twenty-three. No fighting in the Library.”

A voice, infinitely weary, rang out from the front of the stacks. Rami turned. Claire’s arm was looped over Brevity’s shoulder. The muse had her eyes screwed shut against the light, but Claire leaned heavily on her assistant. It took Rami an unbelieving moment to realize she stared directly into the blinding face of god with a dull, distant stare.