Paper and Fire (The Great Library #2)(98)

That, for the first time, broke through Morgan’s mask, and she quickly looked up. “What about her?”

“She had a . . . misadventure,” Rosa said. “Perhaps you should visit her on the hospital floor.”

This time, Gregory stood up from one of the tables not far away, and though he said nothing, Rosa quickly ducked her head and went back to her seat without another word. Gregory sank down, too, but Jess could feel his gaze on them.

On Morgan.

“Well,” Khalila said as they took chairs at one of the few empty tables. “I can see how the charm of this place might wear very thin. Morgan? All right?”

“Yes,” Morgan said, but in a toneless way that made Jess think the opposite. “Fine.” She swallowed and forced a little cheer. “The food’s very good. The servers will bring what you want.”

Thomas, settling uneasily into a chair too small for him, said, “Is there a list of choices?”

“No. You just tell them what you’d like. Wolfe was right; Obscurists are pampered. The best food, prepared just the way we want it; that’s just one of many ways they try to make us forget we’re—”

“Prisoners,” Jess finished.

“No,” Morgan said, and didn’t look at him. “Prisoners eventually get out.”

A servant wearing a gold band—didn’t that go against the entire structure of the Library?—came to ask politely what they wanted for food and drink. With no slate of choices, Jess was too tired to think creatively; longing a bit for home, though he didn’t know why, he just ordered roast beef and mash. Thomas must have felt the same, since he ordered schnitzel. Morgan asked for chicken; Khalila for roasted mutton. It was all very normal. As soon as the servant walked away, Thomas said, “The servants are pledged here for life as well?”

Morgan nodded. “The difference is that they do get to leave the Tower from time to time. Obscurists can only leave under the strictest rules and controls.”

“What about the ones who operate the Translation Chambers?”

“Our lowest caste,” she said. “They have the least talent for writing scripts; they can only interpret what’s already been written and infuse it with the quintessence to make it work.”

Jess thought it must be a strange blessing here to be a disappointment; it held the chance to take the outside air, see the world, at least a bit. “Lucky devils,” he said, and got a look of agreement from her. Just a brief one, but it made him feel less cold. He’d lost his anger, he realized, and partly because it was becoming clearer and clearer to him that none of this had to do with a choice Morgan had made. She’d not chosen to be born with this talent; in fact, she’d done everything in her power to avoid coming here in the first place. She’d never sought out being an Obscurist.

Or children, he thought before he could stop himself. Rosa, with her self-satisfied glow and pointed jibes, made it clear just how Morgan was being taunted.

“Morgan,” he said quietly. “Who’s Sybilla?”

She froze for an instant in the act of reaching for her water glass, then completed the motion, drank, and set it down before she said, “A friend.”

“And she’s ill?”

Morgan said nothing, but Wolfe did. He looked angry. “Not ill. Leave it, Brightwell.”

Another awkward silence, one Thomas moved to fill with a patently false cheer.

“Do you know the Tower already?” Thomas asked Wolfe. “You lived here. Such wondrous inventions they have here, I’d love to hear about all—”

“My mother determined I was without significant talent as an Obscurist when I was five years old,” Wolfe broke in. “At ten, I was removed to the Library orphanage, where I received my training. I’ve never been back. So I know little about the inventions, Thomas.”

“A lot of time between visits from your mother,” Santi said. He was watching Wolfe closely, a cup of poured wine forgotten in his hand.

“Not long enough. I saw her the day they released me from the Basilica Julia prison,” Wolfe said. “She brought me home. To you. She left before you found me.”

Silence at the table. Santi opened his mouth and closed it again, as if he couldn’t decide what to ask or what to say; he finally just drank his wine. Wolfe followed suit.

The mood had fallen a little dark, and grew darker with the sudden approach of Gregory, who smiled at them as if they were old friends. “Obscurist Hault,” he said. “Your presence is requested. Dominic has missed you during your absences. Please come with me.”

Dominic, Jess realized, must be the red-haired young man who stood a few paces back. He was small, compact, and covered in a spray of freckles . . . and miserable. Jess had been prepared to hate him, but seeing how he avoided even so much as looking in Morgan’s direction, he understood with blinding speed it wasn’t the boy’s choice, either.

Just a duty to be done.

Jess was rising to his feet to do something violent—to Gregory, if not to Dominic—when Wolfe quickly stood, faced Gregory, and said, “I’d have thought you’d have learned some manners at your age, but you’re as bad as you were when I was a child. You’ll have her the rest of her life. Isn’t that enough?”

Gregory straightened to face Scholar Wolfe, and Jess realized there was real dislike between these two. It bordered on hate. For all Gregory’s droll observations, he wasn’t remotely friendly. There was something dark underneath his smile—more like a smirk now. Unpleasant and superior. “Keria’s always favored you,” he said. “Her precious little boy, born a disappointment. She fought to keep you long past the age when you should have been sent away, and when you finally were, she still never forgot you. All her love was reserved for you, and you can’t even give her a kind word in return.”