A Hackwith - The Library of the Unwritten

“No.” Rami was firm on that point. “However, after Leto’s processed… I would like permission to return.”

Surprise startled the grief from Claire’s face momentarily. “Return?”

“To the Library. I should… I would like…” Rami was confounded by his own words. To like , to want anything. To seek anything beyond forgiveness was something he hadn’t been faced with in many, many years. It felt weightless, and terrifying. There had been a time when he’d still had the right to wings; he hadn’t always been earthbound. The memory came to him unbidden, that breath in flight, when you’ve stepped off solid ground and your mind hasn’t quite made up whether you want to fly or follow your shadow to the ground. He abruptly wanted to cry, but he grunted instead. “I would like to return to… discuss. How I can help.”

Claire’s brows remained a few inches too high, but some humor gleamed in her dark eyes as she considered. “Return, and we’ll see what happens.

“Brevity,” she called over her shoulder as she drew herself up from the couch. “Come say your good-byes to Leto.”

“Don’t I get a say in this?” Leto sulked, his eyes on his feet as Brevity approached him. His cheeks were pink as he glanced at her teary face. “Ah, c’mon. It’s not like I’m dying… again.”

“That place better treat you good.” Brevity sniffed, and it was obvious it took great effort not to swing her arms around his neck in a hug. “If not, you just go ahead and damn yourself all over again.”

“That’s… that’s not how it works,” Rami muttered, mostly to remove the pained grimace from Claire’s face.

Leto just flushed. “You’re going to be a great librarian someday, Brev. The best.”

“You bet.” Brevity rubbed a tear off her cheek. “The Library will always have a place for you.”

“Only if he remembers how to brew a proper pot of tea.” Claire made a face as she hobbled over. Injury or not, her limp was more pronounced as her energy flagged.

“I’ll practice in Heaven,” Leto said. “You’ll tell Hero I said… bye?”

“I’ll improvise on that with a little more eloquence, but sure.”

Leto drifted for a hug, but caught himself when Rami shook his head. Leto let out a long sigh and rubbed his neck. “Thank you, ma’am.”

“Still calling me ma’am.” Claire drew herself up, voice aloof and eyes wet. “I give up. Rami, get the kid out of here before I decide to keep him.”

“You heard the lady.” Rami squeezed Leto’s shoulder.

“I mean it. Thank you. I was… The Library saved—”

“You saved yourself. You write your own story here.” Something crumbled, just enough for Claire to wrap her arms around herself, as if making sure they didn’t do anything they weren’t supposed to do. She smiled. “I’m… I’m glad I got to meet you, Leto. Go. Be good. No—be better than good: be happy.”

FOR THE SECOND TIME in as many days, Claire sat down and began to repair the binding of Hero’s book.

His was not the only book to be repaired. Claire kept her eyes pinned on the tattered binding in front of her, but she could nearly hear the hurts of the hundreds of torn, crushed, burned unwritten works around her. The books trodden underfoot by Horrors, the carpets with holes eaten by acid, the paintings torn by raven blades.

Claire didn’t see books; she saw graves.

She saw a thousand lives on each cindered page. Here, a band of adventurers, suffocating in a forest. There, a pair of lovers, entombed in the moment before a kiss. There, torn beneath the edge of a fallen chair, the teenage outcast that never learns they are something more.

A thousand stories, caught middream, eviscerated from the possibility of being real. Some, granted, were never to be written—their authors were long dead—but others had authors just beginning to dream them. Each book was magic, a potential never to be duplicated. With a book destroyed, they faded all the same. Worlds trapped, suffocating on the page.

One thought suffocated more than most. Not long ago, it wouldn’t have bothered her at all. She’d called them things. Pressed a scalpel against their hurts and called them unreal. When books were merely as enchanted objects, annoying simulacra. But now… now their deaths smelled of ash and acid and ink turned sour.

And as little as she cared to admit it, overriding it all was the concern for the still body on the couch next to her.

Hero had drifted in and out of consciousness during the confrontation, but once the ravens left and the danger passed, he’d succumbed to a deep sleep. Most of the fresh pages she’d stitched into his book just days ago had been clawed and torn. The front cover was blackened with char, and the edges were sodden with ink and soot. If possible, he’d done even worse injury to himself than before. She hadn’t been able to get a proper conversation to assess the origin of his injuries, but Brevity had told her an absolutely ridiculous tale of Hero’s… heroics.

She would have to be careful not to use that phrase in front of the vain creature. There would be no living with him.

Claire found herself hoping there would be some living with him.

She glanced to the couch and gave another grunt, pushing it all out of her head. She focused on rebinding Hero’s pages. Again. Slice the strands of old thread, divide the signatures. Trim the papers. Mark the new spine. Cut the groove. Fit the cord. Reconnect the signatures. Adjust the press. Thread and stitch. Thread and stitch. So much threading and stitching.

She worked the finishing chain stitch up the spine, tied it off, and leaned back to rub the numbness out of her fingers. She let her gaze wander to give her eyes a moment of rest. The Library sank into a sepulchre of quiet.

Rami had departed with Leto, promising to return when he was able. She worried he would encounter questions that were best left unanswered, but the Watcher seemed confident in his ability to maneuver Heavenly bureaucracy. She hoped he was right to be so confident; she’d had enough of war.

Brevity, after orchestrating a cleanup of the worst of the mess, expressed a preference for hovering over Claire like a rather concerned sparrow. After Brevity checked her tea needs for the third time, Claire had sent her off to the depths of the stacks to inspect the ashes of her burned books.

The memory of flames igniting under a black blade unsettled her focus again. Claire took a long sip of tea. Her books. Her arrogance. Beatrice. Her longing for Earth. Andras had only played on the foolish secrets and tender fears that Claire had kept. He’d set the fire, but she’d provided the tinder to burn it all down.

Andras had always said the game was just children playing in the dirt, exposing wiggling things to the light of day.

And she was exposed now. Brevity had gasped when Claire instructed her to assess and repair her books.

“Yours, boss? Are you sure you don’t want me to bring them up for you, and—”

“No.” Claire shook her head. “Things got… stirred up when I confronted the Arcanist. It’s best if you repair them. I trust you.”

The surprise that sparked across her assistant’s face, blooming into starry joy, made Claire deeply sorry for the diet of harsh words she’d fallen into over the years. A habit she’d never given thought to before. She sent Brevity off with supplies, drowning that introspection under a swig of tea as she focused on Hero’s repairs.