Page 14

“ Please .” Nikoly had said, unless Tiiran had heard wrong. But Tiiran wasn’t thinking about that. It hurt and was confusing, and there were requests to answer and letters to Toak—and the other Master Keepers—to write, and Niksa was shaking and sniffling without end, his eyes watering in even candlelight though he kept insisting he could stay to finish his day’s assignment.

Tiiran set him up apart from the others, but with orders to leave when he felt he was done. He suspected Niksa would waste the time feeling too poorly to do anything when he could have gone to his room to sleep, but didn’t feel like ordering him to go if this was where he wanted to be, snuffles or not.

He also didn’t feel like dealing with demanding scholars or really, anyone. He left the desk near the entrance unoccupied and temporarily took over one of the absent Master Keeper’s desks to compose responses. Mattin hadn’t advised him to be cautious even though Mattin was clearly anxious over the matter. It could bring trouble down on Tiiran, he had said, despite admitting that there was no one for the chastised Master Keepers to complain to except the king, who they were unlikely to approach. Fear of royal attention was what they were avoiding by staying away from the library, after all.

In the end, Mattin said he would sign the letters alongside Tiiran if Tiiran wanted him to, and chewed his bottom lip while perched on the window seat in Keeper—in former Keeper Aize’s office, and said nothing when Po had eventually come in to watch Tiiran write. Like Mattin, Po had a small furrow in her brow.

“Did Orin leave?” She was visibly bewildered when Mattin shook his head and Tiiran scoffed to himself over his papers.

Tiiran signed the last letter with a flourish and a cramping hand, then stood up. “Read them over if you like. But I won’t make you sign. I can always go back to sweeping floors. You can’t.” Mattin was noble and wouldn’t need to earn a living, but Tiiran didn’t bother to correct himself.

Mattin darted over to read each letter.

Po continued to frown at Tiiran. “Sweeping floors? What’s going on? Orin usually calms you down.”

Tiiran scoffed again. Po had better not suggest he go back up there.

He’d already tried, making it as far as the second level landing, and then fear of what he might overhear had sent him back downstairs to make absolutely sure Niksa was all right—and finally send Niksa to his rooms to sleep, a cup of tea in his hands. Orin and Nikoly might not have even been in the nook. For all Tiiran knew, they’d left while Tiiran had been banging around downstairs trying to find the good paper for letters to tell the Master Keepers to fuck off.

If Orin had put Nikoly over his knee, Tiiran would have been able to hear it, surely. Tiiran had heard plenty of vigorous tupping in his time. …And walked in on more, even after clearing his throat to announce himself. Lovers seemed to get caught up in sensation and not hear the slap of skin on skin. Or perhaps some did and wanted others to hear.

Nikoly was shameless, when it came down to it. Maybe that pleased Orin. So much less work than Tiiran, and for someone much prettier.

Tiiran reached up to rub at the ache behind his eyes.

“Tiiran?” Po pressed, trying to peer down at what Mattin was reading at the same time.

“It’s not your mess,” Tiiran informed her in a crackling voice, his heart beating too fast again when she flinched. He relented enough to say, “I’m not tolerating Master Keeper bullshit anymore. That’s all.”

Orin and Nikoly had so many interests. Tiiran had the library. Well, he would run it as well as he could. No more wasting time expecting help that wouldn’t come.

They were probably finished by now anyway, whispering to each other whatever people whispered in their situation.

Meanwhile, Tiiran had other things to worry about, like Mattin toying anxiously with his hair and muttering about how the Arlylian were without scandal.

“You don’t need to,” Tiiran assured him again, and got a vexed, perhaps even annoyed, glance from Mattin, so Tiiran went silent.

When Mattin was finished reading, Tiiran began neatly folding each letter. As assistants, they had no seal to press into wax on their messages, but Mattin dug around to find wax so the letters at least looked official. Then he heaved a breath. “Now, to deliver them.”

“Tiiran,” Po was cautious, “are you sure you’re all right? Do you need—I was going to say a late lunch, but an early dinner? Where is Nikoly, anyway?”

“He’s not always with me.” Tiiran stacked the letters, then stuffed them under his arm, distantly surprised at how light they were. “And Orin doesn’t always calm me down.”

He’d told Orin they’d eat dinner together. He doubted that was happening now. In any case, Tiiran was busy.

“I’ll hand these to messengers myself.” Letters and packages going outside the palace were usually given to palace runners, if the letter writer didn’t have staff of their own to make deliveries for them. With no Head of House, runners had to be tracked down, and were often found near the kitchens or in the stables where gambling went on during slow hours.

“You’re leaving?” Po was frowning again. “With Orin still here?”

He rearranged the letters, trying under his other arm. “Nikoly’s with him. They’ll take care of each other.”

Tiiran must have layered his words without meaning to. Po was suddenly right in front of him, watching him with wounded eyes.

“Oh, bee . I know you aren’t like me and Amie. Maybe they thought you were and this is all a misunderstanding.”

Mattin made a strangled sound.

“I’m don’t want to talk about it.” People didn’t like it when Tiiran snapped and snarled, so they should be happy he wasn’t doing that now. Not stare at him as if they’d done something wrong. No one had. Except for Tiiran being foolish, but it wasn’t wrong to be a fool, only humiliating.

And painful. But he’d deal with that later.

“Maybe you should wait to do this, bee,” Po said next, trying to smooth his hair now. “At least eat first. Never make big decisions on an empty stomach.”

Mattin looked at her incredulously. “Then I’d never get anything done.”

Po swung a hand toward him without looking away from Tiiran, one finger raised. “We’ll get to you, daisy.” She didn’t force Tiiran to meet her stare, but she didn’t move away. “Will you talk to me later? If you need to? I’m sorry for not getting involved before.”

“You shouldn’t have to.” Tiiran was firm. “It’s all perfectly obvious. Now, I need to go. Before they come back downstairs if they haven’t already,” he added, quieter, although Mattin likely heard it anyway.

“Oh, bee,” Po said again as Tiiran walked away, “it’s actually worse when you’re composed and proper about it.”

Tiiran succeeding in getting runners to deliver the messages within the capital, and one who would see the rest posted with the next boats going up or down river. Then he found himself standing by one of the palace gardens, unsure of where to go next.

The kitchens should have been his destination, though it was early to eat by his usual standards, which were probably much too late by the standards of sensible people. He could go to his room to finish some of his reading. There was nowhere else. Tiiran had no interests outside the library, and no friends, and no family anywhere, unless he counted whatever fae lurked around the garden behind him.

He stood indecisively in front of the entrance until the sun began to go down in earnest and several palace guards had taken the path past the garden only to circle back to regard Tiiran suspiciously.

Orin had instructed him to eat better, to rest more, to spend time in places outside the library. That game only continued if Tiiran wanted it to. Orin might still care, but it mattered that he would care about Nikoly in the same way. It shouldn’t matter, and wouldn’t have to Po or Amie or others like them; Po had been right about that. But it did matter, if only to Tiiran, although Orin’s other ducklings didn’t bother him nearly as much as the idea of Orin with Nikoly .

The other ducklings were far away, and Orin had claimed Tiiran was different. That might be all it was, Tiiran hoping to be special to Orin, to Nikoly.

He had hoped to be special, but didn’t need fae giggling at him from wherever they hid.

“You can fuck off,” he shouted to the garden walls, startling and then angering one guard. Tiiran dashed beyond the walls, hoping the guard wouldn’t follow and smug when he didn’t—although it was likely Tiiran’s wild hair and small stature that had convinced him not to, and not Tiiran himself. That, and Tiiran heading into a garden where an altar for fae offerings meant the fae might be near.

That was the only interesting thing about Tiiran: fae blood. Eyes that went black, hair of too many colors, no height to speak of. Then he had gone and wished, deep down in his heart he had carried dreams despite knowing better. Dreams that he was special to Orin, and special to Nikoly, and that was what hurt. He could have accepted Orin’s others or Nikoly’s visits to the capital.

He could have , he thought forcefully, glaring into the darkening paths of the garden. Tiiran had never had anything of his own and he certainly hadn’t expected to have either of them solely to himself. But he’d wanted . He’d wanted something so stupidly impossible that he hadn’t even let himself admit that he wanted it. He’d wished to be loved , and by two people so remarkable that of course they’d been drawn to each other.

“Jackass,” Tiiran named himself so the fae wouldn’t bother. He looked over blooming trees and budding shrubs he didn’t know the names of. Maybe he should learn plants in the spare time he didn’t have. It might help him find work in an apothecary or helping tend a noble’s garden if the library ceased to be or Piya threw him out on his ass. A noble might like to look at Tiiran and pretend a real fae was caring for their roses.

Tiiran stopped to stare at a vine on a trellis that seemed to be dead, but he doubted it was. Even in the current palace with no proper staff or care, the fae wouldn’t let just the vine die.

Or maybe they would. They abandoned children.

He moved on, giving up on the idea of caring for plants. They seemed the sort of thing to need hands-on training, not some noble’s poor attempt at sketching in a dusty book. Focusing only on the library wasn’t such a terrible crime anyway. Lanth had done it, if Tiiran ignored her life of capital visits and friends and lovers and more friends.

Maybe that was what she’d seen in Tiiran; someone who would appreciate the Great Library for what it was and for what it could be. And perhaps his strength and commitment.

He'd survived well enough before Orin or Nikoly’s interference. Even Po at her most concerned had never stepped in to stop Tiiran, knowing that a few skipped meals didn’t matter in the long term. Orin and Nikoly would see that in time, if they still cared to.

Tiiran took a deep breath, then sank into the bench that appeared behind him, nearly hidden from view by overgrown ferns.

The game, or whatever it was, with Nikoly where Tiiran allowed Nikoly to fuss over him so he could praise Nikoly for it didn’t need to continue. Likewise, the game with Orin. It would probably be a relief for both of them to be with someone who didn’t need to be reminded of things like manners or meal times. Nikoly in particular would be happy to spend his evenings having fun again instead of needing to return to the library to ensure Tiiran slept in a bed.

Tiiran didn’t even need a bed. He could sleep anywhere: before a hearth to keep warm, sharing a mattress with two other workers and pushed to the edge because he’d been too young and small to fight for space, alone in his large, cold room whenever he felt like returning to it.

He could sleep in the library on the floor. It truly didn’t matter to him. He might even save time not having to walk back and forth every day. Po wouldn’t like it, but she wouldn’t get in his way. Anyway, Mattin dozed off in the cubbies all the time. Tiiran could wake up and get right back to organizing the library in a way that was actually useful and not slapped-together “traditions” that had long since stopped serving any purpose.

Information should be easier to access, for the assistants but also for anyone who asked for it. Just because the library’s primary purpose was records for the ruler didn’t mean that couldn’t change. Mattin liked to write down song lyrics when he listened to bards play. Amie could compare historical maps for hours, not for the land divisions, but for the skill of the artists drawing them. Countless nobles had filled their journals with their hobbies and interests, from herbs, to mixing paints, to tapestry weaving, the “known” history of the fae. There should be ways for those in the future to easily find that information or research into a famous ruler or general.

Not for Nikoly or for Orin, specifically, but for people like them.

Library work was all Tiiran was good for, which he’d told them. And they had argued back that he had friends.

Friends.

Something he might have been excited to hear, once. He’d probably be excited about it in a few days, which was surely long enough for him to calm down and see reason, or if not, to work hard to forget today had ever happened. He’d be glad to have friends who didn’t seem to mind that he didn’t know how to be one in return.

Look at today. Tiiran had read things so terribly wrong. Orin might have been interested in him. Nikoly might have too. Just not how Tiiran had imagined.

Embarrassing. And not the fault of either of them, no matter how hot inside Tiiran was to think on how obvious he’d been.

The fact was, he had no right to feel whatever it was he was feeling. The temper that was not temper. The lurch of his heart in his chest. The sickness in his stomach. It was wrong of him. Either he had failed to see something or he had interpreted something badly. Or he had read most of it correctly, but what he had been offered, friendship with perhaps a fuck, was not what he’d wanted, or was no longer an option now that Orin and Nikoly had met and might decide to continue on. Maybe, for each other, they would be the devoted kind who sought no others. Maybe Nikoly was Orin’s one-and-only, the perfect partner for him.

Tiiran went dead still, scarcely breathing enough to disturb the ferns. The pain was a wish disappearing before his eyes, another mortifying dream gone.

Orin had said he liked the idea of returning to something, to someone. Nikoly would be excellent to return to. Hadn’t Tiiran thought something similar every time Nikoly came to stand at the desk with him, or brought him tea? How good he was. How kind. He had money to buy Orin anything he wanted, and he had the time to care for him, and the knowledge to tend to wounds properly. He would work so hard to be good for Orin, to do exactly as he was told without arguing.

A minor noble could live somewhere in the nicer parts of the palace, or possibly afford a place in the capital. Nikoly would care for a home as well as he cared for people. He could fill it with books for Orin and probably wouldn’t mind Orin’s road ducklings, if Orin continued to visit those. If he did mind, they would could have a talk about it without having to stop to explain ideas every few moments as they would have to do with Tiiran. But Nikoly didn’t have to worry about equaling unnamed, faceless bed partners. Maybe he had a steady lover of his own in the capital, and he hadn’t mentioned it to Tiiran because why would he?

Tiiran was the strange-looking fae boy with the muck-spout mouth and no tact. The angry librarian with more or less boring features, if one discounted the colors of his awful hair. Someone to laugh at for believing they could be loved, or at least liked.

Tiiran glared ahead of him at the stone sculpture set in a bed of greenery that would likely be a riot of color by summertime. A gently curved figure, human in appearance except for the ears like a rabbit and the claws on the ends of its toes. It held a large pearlescent shell, open to accept offerings, although there were currently none in the shell or at the creature’s feet.

“I suppose everyone wishes sooner or later,” he growled at it, “even those who swear they never will. But at least I never expected you to really answer.”

The fae, for what else could the statue be meant to represent, stared back with stone eyes and said not a word. Neither did any other fae who might have been around.