Smoke and Iron (The Great Library #4)(30)

She concentrated on the one point of weakness: the symbol that relayed the information gathered by the scripts to the transcription automata. She reached out to stroke her fingers over the barely perceptible writing and thought about sending a surge of power through it to disable the connection . . . but no. If she did, that would alert him that she’d recovered her power. And they’d simply repair it.

Annis, she realized, was talking to her. “I’m sorry. What did you say?”

“I said that you’re also not my friend, girl. You’re my charge. I’m completely responsible for your behavior. That’s a neat trick, don’t you think? I’m his most vocal doubter. If either of us steps wrong, we’re both in it.”

“He can’t kill us.”

“He can’t kill you,” Annis corrected. “Me, I’m of little enough use to him. Too old to bear another child, and the least of all in this rusty prison. Killing me would be easy. So by all means, factor that into your thinking.”

It was the last thing Morgan wanted to do, honestly. Having another person depending on her choices made her feel claustrophobic. “You were friends with Keria Morning? Really?”

“Aye. When I came here, she was the first to make me welcome and the last to make me feel inferior. I knew she had a destiny, that one. I’m sorry it had to include dying for her son’s folly, but that was as she wished it.”

“You think it’s folly to fight for the heart of the Library?”

“I think the Library is too huge a beastie to turn with the poke of a few spears.”

Morgan almost laughed at that, dire as it was; the image of the Library as a lumbering beast the size of an ancient dinosaur, but composed entirely of books, was too strange. She liked Annis. That was going to make things much, much more difficult.

The headache pill was already starting to lift the throbbing fog from her brain, and without that to focus on, she began to notice other things: the cool, incense-scented air that tasted just a little bitter on the back of her tongue. The luxurious comfort of the bed on which she rested—only the finest for the Obscurists, of course. It was a fancy cage, indeed. Most accepted it without much protest, though from her previous confinement here, she could name only a few who were truly content.

Annis, though truly happy, was by no means content. She had a sharp mind, a sharp tongue, and a spirit that would never come to terms with this prison, however sweet it seemed.

“Annis,” she said. “Do you know what’s happened to . . . to my friends?”

The older woman stopped in the act of wrapping a colorful knitted scarf around her neck and turned to stare at her. “No. Why? Weren’t you captured alone?”

“I wasn’t captured,” she said. “I was—” She remembered the scripts in the walls and held up a finger, then slowly turned it to the wall. “Oh, my head is still making me sick. Do you have another of those pills?” As she said it, she shook her head. Annis looked mystified, but then nodded.

“Why, yes. Yes, I do.” Annis wasn’t much for deception; that sounded as artificial as a first-year actor in a play. “Let me get that for you.”

She stood up and then looked around uncertainly and mouthed, What are you doing?

Changing a script, Morgan mouthed back. Keep talking.

Annis looked completely thrown by the request, but she found something to chatter about—food, it sounded like, and her favorite dishes—while Morgan summoned up that tiny hoarded store of power from the dead rose and began to examine the complex formulae that surrounded the room. Clever, she thought. But not clever enough.

It took a single, focused burst of power to rewrite the variable to be switched on and off at will, with a simple voice command.

Morgan blinked, let the alchemical formulae fade, and said, “Silencio.”

“Did you just tell me to shut up in Spanish?” Annis asked. “Because I’ll have you know I’m excellent with Spanish—don’t you try to throw me off—”

“They can’t hear us now,” Morgan said. “I don’t dare leave it off for long, but whenever we want to talk without eavesdroppers, just say that.”

“Handy,” Annis said, and blinked. “You could honestly see the scripts? In here? Weren’t they hidden?”

“Very hidden. But I have a gift for that sort of thing.”

“Obviously.” Annis took in a breath and blew it out. “All right, then. What do you want to tell me?”

“That I came here because I wanted to,” Morgan said. “And I warn you, if you go to Gregory, it won’t stop me. I’ll just find another way.”

“I wouldn’t give Gregory the sweat off my back. He was a horrid, power-hungry bully all his life, and he’s turning into a monster as fast as he can. Your secrets are safe with me.” Annis considered her for a long moment before saying, “Why would you come back here of your own free will?”

“Because the best place to start taking away the Archivist’s power is here, where his power really rests. Without the Iron Tower, he’s got very little.”

“He has the High Garda,” Annis said. “Which is no inconsiderable threat in itself.”

“If he truly has them.”

“Hmmm. And he may have overstepped, you know. He’s called for a Feast of Greater Burning,” Annis said. “The public execution of his political enemies. And I’ve heard that many otherwise loyal High Garda soldiers aren’t well pleased to be doing his dirty work.”