drifted in after Walter, looking every bit a ghost himself. Claire observed him out of the corner of her eye as she busied herself with finding clean thread and needles in the bottom of the drawer. He seemed unhurt, which allowed her to focus her anger at someone at least.
She shoved a bowl of water and a pot of salve in Rami’s hands with enough force to slosh his coat. “Wash the wound while I try to find something more delicate than bookbinding materials to sew flesh.”
Walter handled Hero with a tenderness that would have softened Claire’s heart if she had been in a better state of mind. As it was, the giant wisely retreated as she stormed past. Perhaps some surgical equipment was in the worktables. Enough artifacts in the wing were made of flesh and hide that there had to be something.
When she finally returned with a suture and a suitable needle, Rami had managed to get Hero’s damaged boot off and had cleaned the wound. It was a slice up the side of his foot, shallow but vivid. Rami held pressure with a clean towel and the weight of a hangdog expression. Claire sighed and carefully picked through Hero’s jacket.
“Explain,” she said into his breast pocket.
In turn, Rami appeared to address Hero’s foot with a hoarse voice. “We fell afoul of the bridge in Chinvat.”
“Chinvat?” Claire found what she was looking for, set his book to the side, and glanced up with a frown. “Why would you go there?”
“We didn’t start there. We started in Elysium,” Rami said, and Claire kept her peace until the whole story had been haltingly reported. Elysium, the Unsaid Wing, Hero’s grand idea to go poking at the muses as if they were an information desk. Claire pulled on a pair of clean gloves—no coming near an open wound with her inked hand, certainly—and resisted the urge to rub her temples.
“He twisted up his foot in the fall,” Rami concluded quietly.
Walter had been conducting a very thorough examination of his toes but finally cleared his throat. “Miss Claire, if everything’s ready, I left the office empty—”
Claire pulled herself together enough for a polite smile. “You can go, Walter. We’ve got it in hand. Thank you for your help.”
It was true. Hero would be fine. Hero’s book was fine, and that was the extent of her knowledge. Claire was not a surgeon, but the cut seemed worse than it actually was. Rami had cleaned the wound with the expertise of a combat medic. He should have been the one to stitch Hero up, but instead he hovered like a very guilty kind of storm cloud. Claire pursed her lips as she threaded a needle. “You should have taken him to Brevity, you know. She’s the librarian.”
Rami had the grace to look ashamed. “I know. But . . .”
“I’m not the librarian anymore, Rami.”
“No,” Rami said quietly. “But you are . . . to him . . .” His brow furrowed, as if digging for the word and coming up short. He reverted to watching Hero. “He’s yours.”
“Hardly. He’s Brevity’s assistant.”
“You know that’s not what I mean.”
The wound closed easily enough with one stitch, maybe two. Claire finished a stitch and held the tension in the thread long enough to meet Rami’s troubled gray eyes. “No, you sweet, stupid angel man. He is not.” Rami’s worry transformed into confusion. Claire hid her smile in an inspection of the stitches on Hero’s foot. The ink had already faded, and the skin was pulling together nicely. He’d be sore for a couple of days, but mobility wouldn’t be an issue. Even outside their books, characters were remarkably resilient. “Hero and I both have a particularly checkered history when it comes to romantic entanglements between unwritten books and authors. I’m not saying the attraction isn’t there. But the pull between an author and a book—even a character—is too messy. I care for him, I will continue to care for him, but I will lay no claim on him. That’s not what love is.”
Rami was quiet a stunned moment. “You’re saying—”
“I’m saying nothing but that Hero is not mine. At least, he is no more mine than you are. You should see to your own feelings. Ah! No, no use denying it. I see it there behind those atrociously serious brows. Hero has that effect on people.”
A groan like a rusted hinge forced Claire’s attention from Hero’s foot to his face. He’d regained some color but restrained his