why the library’s bell wasn’t ringing, why the halls were empty of people; it was too easy to imagine the librarians drawn into the Otherworld’s starry vastness, never to be seen again.
There. That was where the shelves had sprung open, revealing a secret passageway. Unsure whether there had been any specific action on her part that had triggered it, she flattened her palm across the grimoires and pressed her forehead to the spines.
“Please,” she gasped. “Let me in.”
Warmth pulsed through the leather touching her skin. A rustle ran through the grimoires, as though they were whispering to each other, carrying a message outward. She stepped back, and the panel swung open.
Nathaniel laughed in amazement. When she looked at him, she found him watching her, his eyes shining. It was the same way he had looked at her at the ball, when he had seen her in her gown for the first time.
“What is it?” she asked.
“I knew you talked to books. I didn’t realize they listened.”
“They do more than just listen.” The floorboards creaked as Elisabeth stepped inside. She breathed in and out, tasting the dust in the air, then closed her eyes, envisioning the Royal Library as though it were her own body, its lofty vaults, its secret rooms and countless mysteries, the magic flowing through its halls.
“We’re here to stop Ashcroft from summoning the Archon,” she declared to the walls around her, feeling far less foolish than she’d expected. She knew, somehow, that something was listening. “What he’s doing—it will destroy all of us. I know it’s already tearing you apart. Can you take us to him?”
She had never tried that before: speaking not to just one book but to all of them, petitioning the library itself for aid. She had no idea if it would work. A breeze wafted past, stirring a cobweb against her cheek like the caress of an insubstantial hand. And then—
A shiver ran through the floor. Her eyes flew open as the wood of the passageway creaked and groaned. Around them, the boards rippled like pressed-on piano keys, warping the shape of the walls. The transformation swept forward, dislodging clouds of dust, opening a path that hadn’t been there before. The passage was rearranging itself. Showing them the way.
She set off at a run. “Come on!”
Beside her, Nathaniel conjured a weak flame to light their steps. Worry lanced through her at the flame’s feeble appearance, but other than that, Nathaniel seemed fine. Whatever Silas was doing was working.
The passageway reconstructed its shape continuously before them, sending them careening around so many corners that Elisabeth couldn’t guess where they were headed. She wasn’t certain if it was her imagination making her feel as though the library’s magic coursed through her body, too, propelling her steps and expanding her lungs, an exhilarating sensation, as though she had become something more than human.
Finally, they reached what appeared to be a dead end—but she kept barreling forward, and sure enough, the wall swung outward before she collided with it, opening the way. It was the back of a bookcase; they had reached the passageway’s other side.
They stumbled out into mist and silence. Dimmed lanterns made hazy blobs around them, like dozens of moons glowing through a thick fog. It took Elisabeth a moment to figure out where they were. The bookcase that had opened for them groaned as it swung back shut, a deep, quavering, almost subterranean sound, ending in a click that echoed from the high ceiling. Whispers scattered after it, scurrying through the mist.
“We’re in the restricted archives,” she said, surprised. Though the mist pressed against her face like a veil, somehow she knew which direction to go. “This way.”
“Why would the”—she heard Nathaniel struggling to wrap his mind around what had just happened—“the library let us out here?”
“I’m not certain.” It would have been much faster to take them directly to the atrium instead of leading them through the Northwest Wing. She forced herself not to reach for Demonslayer’s hilt as she stepped forward. Despite the malevolence of this place, she was certain the library didn’t wish them any harm.
Toward the middle of the corridor, the vapor thinned. The bookcases became visible, towering around them, mist lapping against their lower shelves like fog breaking against seaside bluffs. They seemed to be far deeper in the archives than she had ventured last time.
Without warning, a huge, white shape reared into the lamplight high above her, and she lurched back in alarm—but it was only a