The Archive of the Forgotten (Hell's Library #2) - A. J. Hackwith Page 0,47

of paper. “Seeing as we’re in Hell, I’d think—”

“‘Immortal’ is just a word for something you don’t understand the shape of, yet. The boundaries, the end.” Walter smoothed the paper with his calloused fingers. “No one would really want to be immortal. Forever is an awful long time.”

“I’m not following,” Claire admitted. “Are you talking about the ink?”

“I’m talking about bloody everything,” Walter grumbled, before looking stricken. He tapped his knuckles together nervously, as if he’d forgotten himself. “Look. Say this piece o’ paper is a bit of a life, yeah?”

“All right.” Claire attempted patience as Walter folded the paper up neatly and dropped it inside the jar. He screwed the lid on and snapped his fingers, and the paper caught fire and smoked.

By rights, the lack of oxygen in the jar should have snuffed out the flames, but instead the smoke began to sully up the inside of the glass. Claire shook her head at the flagrant disrespect for physics, but Walter was moving on. “So everything inside that jar, that’s a life, right? Whether it’s paper or smoke or ashes or heat, it’s all what we put in to begin with, yeah?”

“I’m with you so far.”

“But say we take away the container.” Walter moved with an uncharacteristic swiftness, flicking the jar off the counter with a finger. It slid and shattered on the floor with a crash. Claire flinched back, but the shattered glass evaporated before it could scatter. “Is what was inside gone?”

“. . . Well, logically, no,” Claire allowed. It was a peculiar thing to be schooled by Death.

“Then can ye point to where the life is? Or what it is?”

A single remaining shard of the jar rocked on the floor, turned dingy gray. The smoke had thinned and whispered away into the air almost immediately, and the remaining smudge of ashes was already getting lost in the floorboards. Claire didn’t bother answering the hypothetical. “You’re saying death is necessary.”

“Nah, ma’am. Death just is. It’s the container that gives it shape and makes what’s inside important.” Walter shrugged, suddenly seeming shy as he fetched a broom and began to sweep up the ash with surprisingly delicate movements. “Without a boundary that marks beginning and end, what matter would anything have? I reckon life inside a jar is special because of what it is under glass. Break the glass and nothing’s destroyed, but everything changes.”

“There’s no putting the smoke back inside the glass.” Claire frowned, folding her arms across her chest defensively. “I don’t understand how this applies to the ink. I rather liked it when you spoke plain truth to me, Walter.”

“I always stick to the truth, Miss Claire. Just sometimes . . . truth ain’t what people want to hear.”

“I’ve gotten rather a lot of that lately.” Claire folded the cloth carefully between her hands. It remained spotless, no matter how she rubbed her inked palm against it. “If we can’t restore the stories, then why does it linger? What could it possibly want?”

Walter returned to his place behind the counter, wiping his gnarled knuckles free of soot. He lifted his shoulders in a helpless gesture. “Can’t rightly say, ma’am. I only know life and death. You and your books are the story experts.”

Claire began to nod, and her mind snagged on the hook of that idea. She let out a soft oath. She’d been hunting ghosts, talking with Death, and staring at colors, when the reality was right there. The answers had been mocking her to begin with. She just needed a point of comparison.

Claire handed him back his rag and ducked toward the foyer before Walter could question it. “Thank you, Walter! I think I have a new hypothosis to test. You’ve been a brilliant help.”

13

RAMI

Myrrh. Not for the first time, I’ve wished I could talk to our fellows in other wings of the Library about this puzzle. We call ourselves brothers-in-arms, but in the end, it all comes down to secrets, secrets, secrets. I tried to explain my theories about the songs of books to Ibukun, but her interest ends precisely when I start talking of exploring other wings. “Hidebound”—now, there’s a word made for Ibukun. It’s only rules with her, yet she explains nothing. When I’m the librarian, I’ll do better.

Apprentice Librarian Bjorn the Bard, 990 CE

THE SHADOWS MARKED A cool threshold from the sun that had turned everything golden and baked outside. Rami had expected a restful interior of white marble, but while the walls appeared faced with stone,