It’s Garrigan who squints at me, one hand in his hair.“Does that happen a lot with conduit-wielders?”
“I don’t know,” I say. “But I’ll get it under control.”
Dendera returns and dabs a wet cloth on Garrigan’s forehead, wiping some of the sheen that had formed. She hands a cloth to Nessa, who does the same for Conall, and under their tender care, Conall and Garrigan seem to relax a little.
“You two, rest,” I tell them, and turn for the door.
Dendera whips to me, her face instantly serious. “You aren’t going out alone.”
“Unless Henn is available.”
“He’s familiarizing himself with the grounds. He should be back in an hour.”
“I don’t have an hour.” Theron could already be searching for the key. Finding the Order or the two remaining keys before him are my last hopes for helping Winter without Cordell’s influence. Yakim is unresponsive. The possibility of forming an alliance with Ventralli still remains, and I’ll try with everything I have left, but . . . Theron is half Ventrallan. Anything he says, they’ll side with him.
I have to find the key or the Order.Now.
“I’ll be fine—I promise. I was fine in Summer, and that kingdom was far more dangerous.” Well, I wasbarelyfine in Summer, but that won’t help my argument.
My promises do nothing to ease Dendera’s glare. “Take Nessa, at least.”
And have her ask why I’m upset? Have her discover thingsthat might bring up her past?
“No.” It snaps out of me, breaking the excitement off Nessa’s face. Just when I thought I couldn’t possibly hate myself more . . . “I mean—I need you to stay and take care of them.”
Nessa slumps against Conall’s chair, her hand on his forearm. She won’t look at me, her lips set in a tight line. I hurt her.
What’s left of my heart crumbles.
Dendera’s lingering disapproval mars her words. “Tell me where you’re going. The moment Henn gets back, I’ll send him after you.”
“Yakim’s libraries. The ones in the palace, to start.”
She nods, hearing my words for the harmless request they are, but Nessa frowns at me. They both know about the magic chasm, about the truth of our journey, to find a way to open it. They know that’s what I’m doing—and doing it without Theron.
“I’ll fetch someone to show you the way,” Dendera says, and rises. “I won’t let you go wandering aimlessly. And here.” She tugs a small blade from Garrigan’s sheath.
I lift a brow. For someone so adamantly against me using weapons, she’s given me quite a few these past weeks.
“Hide it in your bodice,” she tells me. Her eyes narrow and she adds, “Don’t make me regret giving one to you again.”
I take the blade. “I won’t,” I say with more sincerity thanshe expected, because her tension evaporates into something like surprise.
She leaves and returns moments later with a servant who leads me into Langlais Castle.
“The libraries in the palace guard the oldest and most prestigious books,” the servant explains as we scurry down a staircase. “Putnam University houses the more functional tomes, meant for study and use. But for a Season’s purposes, I do expect the books here will suit you.”
A Season’s purposes? All I told him was that I wanted to see Yakim’s libraries. I frown at the back of his head, sorting through the meaning of his words, and roll my eyes when it hits me.
He doesn’t think I’m interested in the books forstudy and use. Which I believe is a lofty Yakimian way of calling me stupid.
“Oh, quite,” I return. “I just love looking at books. Sometimes I can even make out a word or two.”
The servant cuts a quick glance back at me, his eyes flitting across my overly serene stare. After a huff, he faces forward, and our journey through the palace falls silent.
Two halls later, we step into a behemoth of a room. Three stories high, with shelves of books that stretch in wrapping balconies, cloaking the bright, warm space in leather and parchment. No fireplaces or open flames of any kind sit in the room, the light coming from more of thoseunwavering orbs. Leather chairs cluster in rings on auburn rugs, in rows along balconies, at the end of bookshelves like soldiers standing guard. And at the end of every shelf hangs a mounted oval of mirrored metal with numbers etched on it, identifying the books within.
The servant stops in the center of a ring of chairs and pivots to face me, hands behind his back. “This is the Library of Evangeline the Second, queen of Yakim six hundred and thirty-two years prior.”
