Page 42 of The Alien in the Archive (Galactic Librarians #1)

42

THORNE

I see Page’s self-destruction happening in real time, and I hate that I can’t do anything about it.

As soon as I got back from Davina’s office, I felt Page’s tension ratchet up—saw the books hovering in her house through her eyes. Then I saw her friends come in, watched the fight with Lyn and Orin…felt her fear and anxiety when they left.

She’s walking to the library from the village, through the city. Her pack is slung over her shoulder, and she’s practically sprinting as she moves to catch a train. Any stranger must think she’s insane, because she’s muttering to herself, to me.

“You need to go to our reading nook right now ,” she’s saying, her voice rushed and quiet. “Security could be there any minute. I’ll meet you there.”

“You should stay away,” I tell her, pacing the length of my alcove. “If security is coming, you being here will only make it worse. Let them think I’m just another lost artifact. I’ll handle it.”

“No!” Her voice is firm, and I catch sight of a few people in the marketplace looking up with a suspicious glance. “You’re not handling this alone. This is my fault.”

“It’s not your fault,” I reply. “None of this is your fault.”

She ignores me, her mind racing as fast as her steps. The psychic connection between us hums with her frantic energy, a jumble of fear and self-recrimination. I want to reach through the bond, to still her panic, but I can’t.

Page isn’t someone who calms down when told to breathe. She’s someone who fights harder.

“I’m almost there,” she says, her breath hitching as she practically sprints through the entrance of the Grand Library. “Just…just do what I said. Please.”

I stop pacing. “I can’t stop you, can I?”

“No,” she says. “You can’t.”

I start grabbing everything that’s most important: my chronicle, more pens and paper, the book on Borean dissent. I even grab a few of the romance novels—because suddenly I’m wondering what I need to prioritize, and I find that these are part of my connection to Page. Ashlan sits on the table, tail flicking as he watches me, and it occurs to me that this creature is easily the most important thing in the room.

I gesture at my bag. “Get in,” I mutter, pointing.

He cocks his head.

“I’ll give you jerky,” I mutter.

He hops in.

As I step out of the alcove, the Obscuary’s Labyrinth stretches before me, dark and unyielding. The path to the reading nook is long and winding, but I know it well after too few perfect days spent there with Page. I hurry toward it, keeping track of Page’s location as well—seeing her walk through the gate, hurry through the Archive without paying any mind to the scant other researchers.

Our paths collide about twenty paces from the entrance to the reading nook. Page is flushed with exertion, breath heavy from running, and her grey eyes dart immediately to me. Relief floods through her and I feel it through the bond, a brief, dizzying wave.

She doesn’t slow, closing the distance between us and flinging her arms around me.

She’s changed her mind about coming clean to Davina; she wants to leave. It’s obvious from the way she feels, frantic and urgent. She doesn’t care about Riley, about Thalara…the threat to me is enough to leave it all behind.

But she doesn’t give me a chance to say anything. We keep going, slipping into the reading nook. Page turns around and flings her hand out, and one of the sofas slides in front of the exit, blocking the only way in from the Obscuary.

I look at her, mystified.

Her powers have intensified dramatically in the past few hours.

“Blocking the door?” I ask.

She whips around, nodding at me as if I’m an idiot. “Of course I am. There’s another exit to the Labyrinth here, right? We need to leave, we need time…just for a while.”

I step toward her, steadying my voice. It’s hard not to fly off the handle myself, when her emotions are so, so strong. “Page, we’re not leaving.”

“We don’t have a choice,” she says, her voice cracking. “We’ll go. And if we have to go for good…so be it.

“Think about this?—”

“I am thinking about it!” she shouts. Her hands clench at her sides, but even so, a few of the books we’ve stacked around the cushions in the middle of the room hover off the floor. “You didn’t see their faces, Thorne. Lyn and Orin are going to tell someone. It’s over. We don’t have time to wait?—”

“You don’t know that,” I argue. “What about Riley? Thalara? Are you willing to abandon them because of what might happen?”

She freezes. I feel the words hit her through the bond, like a sudden drop in temperature.

“I don’t want to leave them,” she says, her voice breaking. “But you…Thorne, I cannot lose you.”

“You’re not going to lose me,” I murmur, putting my hands on her shoulders.

Her breathing stutters as she looks up at me, grey eyes wide and filled with tears she’s fighting to hold back. I feel every tremor of her fear through the bond, raw and sharp.

“We don’t know what Lyn and Orin are going to do,” I say, keeping my grip on her. “Running now won’t solve anything. We decided we weren’t going to hide anymore.”

She swallows hard, her pulse racing. “But?—”

“This was the only place in the galaxy where I could hide,” I stop her. “Where else could we go?”

Her hands are trembling now, the books around us wobbling…then falling to the ground. She steps back, her energy spent. “You don’t understand. I can’t lose you. Not after everything.”

Something in me cracks. I release her shoulders and cup her face gently, my thumbs brushing her cheekbones. “Page,” I say carefully. “I’m right here . I’m not going anywhere.”

The tears spill now, and she squeezes her eyes shut as her face crumples. “I screwed up,” she chokes out. “I screwed everything up, Thorne. They saw my powers and I didn’t need to tell them about you, but I…God, I wanted them to know. I wanted them to believe me and help me and be happy for us. And they just…”

I pull her to my chest, stroking her hair. She cries quietly, fingers curling in my shirt.

“Riley and Thalara seemed receptive,” I murmur. “And Davina… ”

I pause, wondering if I should tell her what I did.

No harm now, right?

“I wrote Davina a letter,” I say, “explaining everything. Put it in her mailbox a couple hours ago.”

Page looks up at me, eyes wide. “Oh my God…Thorne, she’s going to be so pissed?—”

“No, I don’t think she will,” I reply. “She’s a scholar; she’ll see reason. And I trust that she’ll protect you.”

Page’s tears stop as she processes what I’ve said. I can feel her doubt through the bond, like a faint, rippling current beneath her surface emotions. But there’s something else there too—a flicker of hope.

She sniffles and nods, wiping her eyes and stepping away to think. “Okay,” she says. “We have people on our side. Riley will back us up, I think Thalara will, and Davina…”

“Exactly.”

“And you haven’t done anything wrong.” She starts pacing, chewing on her lip. “So, even if Lyn and Orin go to someone, what can they actually say? You’ve been…what, hanging out and reading? You didn’t have anything to do with the Convergence.”

I watch her as she paces, her energy shifting from frantic to determined. “Nothing really changes,” I tell her. “We’ve just moved up our timeline.”

She exhales slowly, her shoulders slumping as the weight of the last few days seems to settle over her. “I feel like I’m on the edge of losing everything,” she admits. “I don’t know how to stop it.”

I force her to stop walking again, taking her hands in mine. “Change is coming,” I tell her. “We can stay here tonight…but this was inevitable.”

Page lets out a shaky breath, squeezing my hands. “Okay,” she whispers. “We’ll stay for tonight. And then tomorrow…maybe Davina helps. ”

I nod. “Exactly.”

She looks at me for a moment, then she’s stepping into my embrace, sliding her arms around my waist. She breathes me in and I close my eyes to enjoy her mere presence. When I open them again, I see the couch she flung into the entryway, and I’m reminded that this is very, very new.

“That trick you did with the couch was impressive,” I remark, gesturing to the sofa. “Maybe you should start teaching me.”

She gives me a weak smile. “Let’s focus on not getting arrested first.”

“Fair enough.”

Ashlan pokes his head out of the bag, chirping softly. Page reaches out to scratch his chin, her movements slower, less frantic now. “At least someone in this room doesn’t think I’m crazy,” she says, gesturing at Ashlan.

“He’s probably just hoping for a snack,” I point out. “Speaking of which…did you happen to bring any food?”

Her laugh this time is fuller, brighter. For the first time in hours, the tension between us dissipates.

We’re not out of the woods yet. But at least we have hope.