Smoke and Iron (The Great Library #4)(51)

The silence in the carriage was profound after that quiet statement. Khalila felt a little sick. She thought herself an intelligent person, but he was right: none of them had fully considered the effects of what they’d set in motion. It had started as a means to save friends, and now . . . now it was larger than they’d ever imagined.

“King Ramón Alfonse,” she said. “Does Spain believe in the burning and destruction of the Great Archives? Of the wholesale loss of millions of original works?”

She’d struck him from an unexpected quarter, and she saw him blink. “No. Naturally, that is abhorrent to any person of any land.”

“But it will happen. It is inevitable. If we count politics above the preservation of knowledge, that is the outcome. We know, because it happened for a thousand years before the Great Library created the Archive system and the Blanks. Tens of thousands of precious, unique works, all gone because a king decreed that destroying them was useful. That denying knowledge to others was a tactic of war. Those are the days we fear, and they are coming. Unless we succeed, and you help us, then you will one day look on a world with no respect for knowledge and no tools to tell truth from a lie. Is that what you want?”

“Of course not. But the Library can’t survive on reputation alone. It needs strength, and it needs a leader who can mend all this damage. It’s been a long time coming, but the worst will happen quickly. You must be ready, Scholar Seif.” The king’s gaze swept across the rest of them. “You must not wait to find your new Archivist. When you present Spain with a name, you will receive our full support.”

It wasn’t Scholar Wolfe; she knew that. Wolfe didn’t have the temperament or, she thought, the desire.

Then who?

She didn’t know. And she had the sick, falling feeling that none of them did.

The carriage suddenly picked up speed with a lurch, and they all swayed from the change. The king turned to the guard beside him and said, “What’s happening?”

The guard slid open the compartment window that separated them from the driver, conversed, and slid it closed. “Your Highness, we’re informed that High Garda troops have arrived via Translation at the Cadiz Serapeum, and they are fortifying the building, along with the librarians. We believe the same is occurring in the Madrid library, and several others throughout the country.”

“Then Spain must choose,” King Ramón Alfonse said soberly. “We must take every single Serapeum. If they surrender, they will be given safe passage to Alexandria. If they resist, take the fight forward until resistance is done. Give the orders.”

“Wait,” Khalila blurted out, and instantly wished she hadn’t when all eyes turned to her. “Wait! If you start this war, it erupts everywhere! And at what cost?”

“To the Library? Everything. To us? We risk becoming the burning wasteland that was France, after their rebellion. Or, more recently, Philadelphia. But the Archivist cannot fight on so many fronts, and so we stand little risk of punishment. As king of Spain, I must do this.” The king stared at her with such intensity she felt an instinct to look away . . . but she did not. “This is the path you’ve paved for us.”

“Then let us try something else first,” she said. “Let us talk to them.”

“Talk?” He sat back, a frown forming now, and looked at Dario. “Talk?”

“She’s right,” Dario said. “There are doubts in the ranks. We had help getting away in America. And what loss to you if we can persuade at least one of the Serapeums to side with us?”

“I don’t like your chances, but it’s your funeral mass to schedule.” Ramón Alfonse tapped the barrier, and it slid open. “Counter that last order. Take me to the train. Then you may deliver our friends where they believe they need to go, and assign a full company of soldiers to guard them. I’ll expect them in Madrid in one piece. If they fail, or God forbid are murdered, then my original orders stand: take the Library properties with all speed.”

“Sire,” the driver said, and closed the window again.

“There.” The king arched an eyebrow at them. “I wish you luck, my friends. And if not luck . . . then I will exact vengeance.”





CHAPTER EIGHTEEN




Talking their way into the Serapeum had seemed like a reasonable idea in the heat of the moment.

Standing on the blocked road that led to the building, surrounded by grim, determined Spanish soldiers, it seemed a great deal more like suicide.

Khalila, to calm her nerves, walked away from the low, intense discussion between Santi and Dario and Thomas and found Glain, who was sitting on the back of a troop carrier. She had a rifle in her hands, efficiently loading it, then fine-tuning the optical scope. She’d put on Spanish armor, since it was all that was available, and she looked as at home in that as she did in High Garda gear.

“What are you doing?” Khalila asked.

Glain, without looking up, said, “I’m making sure that I’m ready for what happens when everything else fails.” She looked calm, but then, she usually did; the High Garda had done that for her, smoothed away her old flares of temper and given her purpose and direction. Glain had been born for soldiering, far more than anyone else Khalila had ever known. They had nothing in common, and yet, strangely, they had so much, too. “Did you finish your prayers?”