Page 7 of Dark Shaman: Eternal Hope (The Children Of The Gods #100)

AREANA

A reana held her breath as she gently separated two pages of a leather-bound volume, the paper making a soft whisper of protest before yielding.

No tearing, thank the merciful Fates. A small victory, many more to go.

Books and moisture didn't coexist in peace, and even though the library hadn't been flooded, the moisture that had traveled through the walls of their underground palace and permeated the air had done plenty of damage, especially to the older books, which naturally were more valuable and often irreplaceable.

Every recovered book felt like a triumph.

"This one's salvageable," she announced quietly, setting it in the growing pile of books that could be restored.

Sarah looked up from her own work, using a soft brush to clean mold from a gilt-edged tome. "We're making good progress."

"Better than I expected." Beulah lifted her head from her work. "It's just that there are so many. We will never be done."

Liliat snorted. "Don't say never when you have forever to do it. We have nothing but time on our hands."

Areana surveyed their restoration area with pride.

They'd started the project in the tent on the harem grounds, drying what they could, and then moved it inside, but Beulah was right about there being so many.

She hadn't realized that until they had returned to the library and saw that only a fraction of the books had been carted out by the staff.

Most were still on the shelves, still needing careful restoration.

Since returning to the harem, they had fallen into a rhythm. Sarah handled the most damaged texts, deciding what could be saved and what was beyond salvage, and Beulah sorted them into piles according to what needed to be done to them. The others did the actual cleaning and drying.

The work was meditative, almost healing after the chaos of recent weeks.

"Pass me that cloth, would you?" Liliat asked Raviki, who was working beside her.

"This binding is so beautiful, but it's falling apart.

" She turned to Areana. "We need better equipment for restoration and materials.

I could get into handmade book binding, embossing, and whatever else goes into making a beautiful new book. It would be fun."

Areana nodded. "I wish we had access to computers. I don't even know the names of the tools and materials needed for that. But perhaps we can order a book on the craft."

Raviki handed the soft fabric over to Liliat, then returned to her own task. "Remember when we first started collecting these books? Lord Navuh would bring them as gifts, and we'd argue about who got to read them first and then where to shelve them."

"You wanted them organized by color," Sarah reminded her with a small smile. "You said it would be more aesthetically pleasing."

"It would have been!" Raviki defended. "But you insisted on being practical and organizing them by subject and author."

Sarah chuckled and waved at the enormous library.

"Imagine what a nightmare it would have been finding anything if the books were organized by size and color like you wanted.

It's difficult enough to find anything in here as it is.

We need to create a catalogue and mark the shelves so we can notate the location.

I think this is a perfect opportunity to do that since we are taking all the books down anyway. "

The gentle teasing felt like slipping into a comfortable old garment.

Here in their library, surrounded by the accumulated knowledge of centuries, they could pretend that nothing had changed and almost forget the explosions that had rocked the mansion, the terror of their stay in the basement during the battle, the brief taste of different freedoms.

"Some of these will definitely need professional rebinding," Sarah said, examining a volume whose spine had partially separated. "The water damage weakened the glue."

"Put it over there.“ Areana waved her hand at the table where other books in similar condition were starting to form a pile. "If we can't get the proper equipment to rebind the books ourselves, we can ask Lord Navuh to send them off the island to be professionally restored."

The lights flickered and sputtered out, but before the emergency lighting could come online, the power returned.

"I prefer to get the tools and do it ourselves," Liliat said, ignoring the brief outage.

There were so many of them throughout the day that people barely noticed them anymore.

Tamira wiped the sweat off her forehead with the back of her hand. "The humidity is still too high in here. These books will develop mold if we don't address it."

The climate control was back online, but it was struggling to control the humidity. The entire island was still in a state of disrepair, but not for lack of effort. Areana knew that Navuh was doing everything to speed up the repairs.

"Lord Navuh ordered an additional dehumidifier." She smiled at Tamira, who had been strangely distant since their return to the harem. "The equipment will be delivered within the week."

"That's good," Tamira said, and though the words were neutral, something in her tone made Areana look at her more closely.

Tamira was troubled by something, and Areana resolved to catch her alone and ask if she could help in any way.

Beside her, Tula stood and stretched. "I need to go on a walk. My back is protesting all this hunching over books, and frankly, I'm bored and tired."

"Why don't we take a break in the indoor garden?" Areana suggested. "I'll come with you. We can check on Tony and Elias's progress."

The indoor garden hadn't suffered a lot of damage, but it had been enough to need some tender loving care from someone who knew his way around plants.

They left the others to their work, taking the stairs to the second level instead of the elevator, even though it was safe to do so.

Something about getting inside the small box was still frightening, but Areana knew she had to get over it sooner rather than later.

It was okay to use the stairs while moving between the first three floors of the underground pyramid, but she needed to visit the servants on the lower levels, and she had delayed doing so for too long already.

When they reached the second floor and walked through the familiar corridors, Areana couldn't shake the feeling that the harem felt different now. The walls were the same, the paintings hanging on them perfectly restored, but something indefinable had shifted.

Perhaps it was they who had changed, not the place.

The indoor garden occupied a large atrium on the second level, with the ladies' quarters surrounding it on all four sides.

Each section had a set of doors leading outside, and as they stepped out through them, the sound of soil being turned and quiet masculine conversation drifted from a far corner.

"These should go here," Tony was saying. "These peace lilies will look good with the ferns and dracaena."

"I'm impressed," Elias said. "You remembered their names."

"I wrote them down." Tony patted his back pocket.

Both men were covered in dirt, their shirts abandoned in the heat of their work, soil streaking their arms and faces.

The garden showed signs of their efforts, with pieces of broken irrigation lines and cracked planters tossed into a large pile, and new plants carefully positioned to replace those that didn't look good after the trauma.

"You've made a lot of progress," Areana announced their presence.

Both men looked up, and Tony's face immediately brightened at the sight of Tula. The emotion was so naked, so obvious, that Areana felt a pang of pity for the man.

Tula didn't love him back. She liked him, enjoyed his company, but she didn't love him. It was smart on her part, but sad for him.

"Lady Areana." Elias straightened, brushing soil from his hands. "Most of the plants are recovering, and the root systems are largely undamaged."

"Some of the irrigation lines broke during the earthquakes," Tony added, his eyes still on Tula. "We fixed most of them, and we are adding new plants to fill in the gaps."

Areana walked further into the garden, impressed by the change their work had produced. "It looks better than before. What are these?" She gestured to a collection of flowering plants she didn't recognize.

"Kalanchoe," Elias said. "They're succulents, very hardy. They'll bloom for months with minimal care, and they do well indoors under artificial lighting."

"The colors are lovely." Tula got closer to examine the small clusters of flowers in pink, orange, and yellow.

"We thought bright colors would help." Tony looked at Tula with smiling eyes. "Make the space more cheerful."

"It's so pretty." Tula's gaze was still on the flowers.

"Like you," Tony said.

"Like us," Tula murmured. "I mean, this garden is like us. Nice to look at, but more hardy than it seems. It held up much better than we'd expected."

An uncomfortable silence settled over the group. They all knew what she meant.

"Well," Areana said briskly, breaking the moment. "The garden will be beautiful again. Thank you both for your hard work." She turned to Tula. "Shall we check on the servants? I want to see how they're settling back in."

Tula nodded, though Areana caught the look she cast at Tony as they left.

Perhaps she was wrong, and Tula loved Tony but was only pretending not to because she saw falling for a human as a failing.

As they entered the elevator, Areana felt her chest constrict. "Are you also afraid of getting into this little box?" she asked Tula.

"No." Tula looked up at the camera that hadn't been there before the flood, smiled, and waved. "Our fishbowl has gotten another viewing port. I wonder why? Additional cameras are not going to safeguard us from earthquakes and water breaches."