Paper and Fire (The Great Library #2)(70)

“No, it isn’t,” Khalila said, and took in a deep breath. “We’ve been thinking about this for a long time, Dario. I thought we’d already decided where our loyalty had to lie. Mine is with them. Is yours?”

“Sweet flower . . .”

“Don’t. If you want to go, just go. This isn’t the time for your charm.”

Dario studied her and then slowly nodded. “All right,” he said. “All right. Yes. We go.”

Santi looked grim, and never more in command. “We go. Now.”

The timing is terrible, Jess thought; he had everything he would carry for a duty patrol, but no extras. The rest of his kit was still back stowed beneath his bunk. It will have to stay there. He’d abandoned more things than he’d kept in his life, anyway.

“The hallway Wolfe talked about is on the other side of the far wall, the one with the statues,” Jess said. “Probably some access. I’d guess behind the statues, through one of the alcoves.”

“According to Wolfe, there will be guards and an Obscurist on duty in the Translation Chamber on the other side of the wall; Glain and I will take care of that. At the end of the hall, there’s an automaton and a door. I have Greek fire for the automaton . . .”

“No,” Jess said. “I can get us past it.” Santi looked at him and frowned. Jess met his gaze and held it. “I can, sir. We both know using Greek fire in a confined space is risky at best.”

“All right.” Santi didn’t sound convinced. “Jess will get us past the automaton. After that, the locked door.” Jess nodded at that, too. “And then we go down into the tunnel. There will be more automata. Three of them, according to Christopher. Two sphinxes and a Spartan. Can you disarm those as well?”

“I can get the sphinxes,” Jess said. “I don’t know about the Spartan, sir.”

“That’ll have to do. There are four High Garda on duty in the prison. If I know any of them, I’m going to try to save them, but if not . . . If not, we may have to fight. If it comes to that, let me, Glain, and Jess take the lead.” He turned to Jess. “You scouted the tunnel exit that Khalila and Dario discovered,” Santi said. “Is it clear?”

“How did you know I—”

“I know you. Is it clear?”

“Yes.”

Santi took in a breath. “Then we go.”

As simply as that, they were abandoning all they’d planned for their lives, all they’d worked toward. For Santi, it meant throwing away an entire career spent gathering honor and trust within the Library. For Glain, the destruction of a dream she’d held since childhood. For Khalila, a future so bright, Jess couldn’t bear to think of snuffing it out. Even Dario was giving up something priceless.

I’m the only one who has nothing much to lose, he thought. He’d already lost all the illusions that had brought him to this moment. What he had left now was just a hope that whatever came after this would prove to be better.

One by one, they nodded.

And they headed for the hallway that Jess and Glain had been assigned to patrol.

“What about Wolfe?” Jess asked. “He’s alone in Alexandria. Anything could happen to him there, especially once they know what we’ve done. He’ll be executed.”

“No,” Santi said. “It’s taken care of. Now spread out and find the entrance.” He stepped up to the nearest statue—the one of Minerva—and felt around behind her in the alcove. Jess held back, letting his gaze move over the gods in succession . . . and settling on one in particular. Pluto. Roman god of the underworld.

He stepped up and felt behind, along the smooth plaster of the alcove. Nothing. But as he did, he braced himself on Pluto’s marble arm, and it moved beneath the black toga the statue wore.

The alcove clicked open.

“Here,” Jess said. “Come on.”

“Dario, bring up the rear. Keep watch,” Santi said. He had his weapon ready, and, Jess realized, so did Glain. Jess quickly followed their lead and waited at the opening. “Jess, go right and see to the automaton. Glain and I go left. Dario, Khalila, stay here until we signal.”

Jess ducked through and immediately turned right. The hallway was just as Wolfe had described it in his Mesmeric trance—a long, straight run with windows that overlooked the Forum. Not glass, certainly, because that would make them easy targets for vandals or Burners. These would be made of something harder and unbreakable. No use giving a desperate captive the chance to throw himself out and escape, either.

Jess heard the lion’s rumbling growl before he’d taken three running steps in its direction and slowed to a fast walk. The lion wasn’t waiting for him; it was pacing toward him, the cabled length of its tail twitching side to side and slamming into walls and windows. It left gouges where it hit. The creature was a big thing, the same size as the one he’d faced down in the tunnels. Seeing it coming at him in harsh daylight was chilling indeed.

You know this. You can do this. The problem was that this lion was in motion, and very probably about to break into a run; it didn’t have the same confusion the one in the tunnel had shown, and it was not undecided about the situation. It had been built to respond to intruders, no matter what uniforms they wore.

Jess broke into a run again, closing the distance fast, and ten steps from it, he threw himself into a slide on the slick marble floor. The lion, confused, tried to slow, but momentum wouldn’t allow it to check so quickly. Jess slid right underneath its open jaws, which hit the floor with a heavy clang just as his head cleared the space, and grabbed one of the thick metal legs to stop his slide. At the same time, he reached up for the depression beneath the lion’s jaw, found it, and pressed as hard as he could.