Page 33 of The Poisoned King (Impossible Creatures #2)
The Library, Unleashed
The low ceiling began to rise; slowly at first, and then faster and faster, until walls erupted out of the hole at breakneck speed, shooting upward with a shower of plaster.
They rose ten, fifteen, thirty, forty feet, and soon Anya was looking at a great tower room, wide as a ballroom and sixty feet high.
At last the walls stopped, still vibrating.
Ratwin sneezed at the dust. “I won’tses says I tolds you so’s,” she said. “But I will says, bravos and felicitationings to me.”
Together they stepped into the room. Anya craned her neck to look around at the walls lined, all the way to the almost invisible ceiling, with…
“Books,” breathed Irian Guinne.
There were huge tomes in brown leather, small books covered in blue silk and oxblood-red cotton, jewel-encrusted spines with gold lettering, paper in white and cream and silver and green. A dozen ladders stretched up alongside, wired to brass fixings to keep them in their place.
“So you have found the library,” said a voice above their heads.
Anya twisted to see: up at the top of the tower, a figure flew in slow, watchful circles.
“The previous woman never did, incurious money eater that she was.” The speaker swooped lower and came to land on a shelf above their heads.
“And you are?” said Irian.
“The librarian.” The voice was rough, sharp-edged. “I watch over the books.”
Anya knew, though, what she was. The creature had the face of a woman, with dark hair drawn tight back from her wrinkled face, sharp exacting eyes, and a wide red mouth. Her body was that of a bird, brown-feathered, sharp-taloned.
“A harpy,” she heard Christopher breathe, and Jacques, for once, seemed stunned into silence.
“You may enter,” said the harpy. “And you may read. But you may take no books without my permission.”
“How,” said Irian, “can this have been hidden—?”
“The library has been stored deep underground for more than a hundred years. The early Trevasse family was famous for infighting and profiteering and general idiocy. My books are extraordinarily valuable; there was talk of selling them off.” She flared her nostrils.
“One of the wiser Trevasses felt it was safer if it was hidden and spent an extraordinary amount of money on building a mechanism to do so. A library is a precious thing: it must be protected. Since then, the library, and I, have waited for somebody to release it.” The harpy flew upward and sniffed one of the books.
She had the look of a general inspecting her ranks of paper soldiers.
“I have done my best to keep it free from dust, but the shifting of plaster will have done damage. It will take me some time to restore it.”
“What is your name, madam?” asked Nighthand.
“Aellope. I know yours: Fidens Nighthand, Irian Guinne. I have been here, watching, since you arrived.” She looked them over, one by one. “I should ban the dragon from my library, but I understand he has no fire.”
Jacques glared. “I could still wreak havoc, madam, and I ask you to remember it.”
“Anyone who tries to wreak havoc in my library will have their liver plucked out. The same applies to anyone who folds the pages over or writes in the books.”
Anya left them to argue; she ran her hands along the shelves, pacing the room, her loquillan in her fist. The books began at the floor, packed tight and in every language she recognized and many she did not: Latin, Arabic, Sphinx, Old Lithian, Old French.
But none of the languages looked like the one she was seeking.
“May I assist you?”
There was a noise at her feet, and a face appeared. A mouse face, with an expression of courtly politeness and long whiskers.
It spoke. “I am Meridarpax, batrachomyomachian mouse and assistant librarian.”
“I call him Meri,” said the harpy. “He helps me with basic duties: cleaning, cataloguing. In exchange, I do not eat him.”
“It would be a great relief to me if you would allow me to assist you, given I am the assistant librarian?” said Meri.
He spoke at twice the speed of any human.
“I yearn to be out there, valiantly assisting, but there have been so few opportunities.” He sniffed at Anya’s feet, at Christopher’s boots, whiskers quivering, scurrying between the two of them.
“And now you! Ah, I have a plethora of scholarly magnificence that will interest you! Might you, for instance, care to know about the golden apples of the peridexion tree, which protect from dragon fire? Can I fetch you a book on the history of the separation of the Archipelago from the rest of the world, after the siege of Troy? Can I show you a book whose cover is encrusted in diamonds? Or perhaps a recipe for a tantalizing blue cheese?”
Koo, perched on Anya’s head, looked down at the mouse with small, sparkling eyes. “Mine,” he said.
“No,” said Anya. “Not yours.” She took a long tendril of her hair and wrapped it around Koo’s ankle so he couldn’t fly off. “We’re looking,” she said to the mouse, “for a dictionary.” She held out the loquillan to the tiny quivering nose. “Do you recognize this language?”
“We think the language is centaur,” said Christopher.
“It is a dialect of Kentavian,” said the mouse. “I have a translation dictionary. Wait here! I shall assist you with every inch of my soul.”
The mouse went scuttling off across the floor, climbed up a bookcase, and placed himself behind a huge blue-leather-bound book. He heaved with all his might and succeeded in pushing it three inches from the wall.
Christopher lifted it down. “Thank you,” he said. “That was great assisting.”
At the far end of the library there was a window seat, speckled with sunlight and fallen plaster. They carried the book to the reading nook.
“Could you get us some paper?” Anya asked Meri. “And a pen?”
“With the greatest pleasure! Wood paper? Pegasan-silk parchment, a papyrus scroll? And for ink—chestnut, black stone? Kappa spit?”
“Any kind. You choose.” The mouse scampered away, murmuring with delight, and returned with a glowing hercinia-feather quill and a leather-covered notebook.
It took time to work the translation of the letters around Anya’s loquillan. Jacques flew to help, beating the air with his wings in impatience. At last, Christopher read it aloud:
“Twelve pearls for the future,
Time torn open in its youth,
I offer man or creature
One version of the truth.”