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Remember, I went to Harvard.
Mevela 26th, 1125 Dom.
Vincent had asked me not to help, so naturally, I wanted to help. And I thought the best way at least would be to read. It’s all I’ve been doing for months, after all.
“What in the god damn have you been drinking?” I waved my hand in front of Justinian and they followed on one side, then went passive for seconds before trailing the next side.
“Jus’ a lil’ heavenberry w-w-wine.” He said. “I jus’ wanted to know what you loved so much about this - this stuff.”
Each word he risked vomiting and each word, I went a little further back away from him in the expectation he would vomit.
“You need to go back to the inn and rest.” I said.
“I jus’ wan help.” Justinian said and knocked over a stack of books. Scrolls, candles that struck the floor and almost ignited. I stomped out the fire. The book keeper looked at me from the corner of his eyes. He raised his head, the giant corset around his waist raising his neck just a bit.
“Why don’t you two take care of him?” I asked.
The Silverfangs looked at each other.
“Why’a we gotta take care of him?” Edwin said.
“Because I said so.”
“You’re not the captain.” He said.
“I am now.” I narrowed the eyes the same way I remembered it from Vincent, with a cold, dispassionate sideways glare and my own face blank of all expression. Because the eyes were all I needed and to be fair; I knew my eyes weren’t red but they were mighty scary. Scary enough to get the Silverfangs moving.
“I already don’t like him.” Lowerll said with a sniff. He grabbed Justinian by the shoulders, who kept stomping on the floor, and carried him out. Not quite to his room, but outside where they set him down after he’d gone and fought his way through the grip. So there I was, with Obrick and Kal, looking out the window to the three wrestling each other on the floor and Justinian honest to God winning.
“This is what we’re working with.” I said.
“I told you from the beginning not to let them in and if you weren’t so desperate we could have spared ourselves their trouble.” Obrick ate from a little pouch of seeds and dropped the shells beneath his feet. Amongst us the towers of books stood, long lines of them that ran up halfway to the ceiling and whose underneath-cloths almost ripped from the tension of the giant stacks. Books on top of books, of all sizes and with giant lettering and small letterings, with book mark rope like colored rope to the floor.
“What’re we here for again?” Kal asked, shifting through pages and each page contorting his face harder and harder. He squinted his eyes and leaned into a small brown book.
Behind us, rows of books and a few shaking chandeliers.
“Learning about the Nightstalkers, it’s about all we can do.” I said.
“Why don’t we just listen to the Commander and stay put.” He said.
“Where I come from, you don’t really get to the top by standing still, alright?” I said. “You show strength of will, character, ambition…”
“That’s great. But why are we here, we could be at the inn. Enjoying food. Sleep. Wine.” Obrick bit into a shell and spat it out. “I don’t like reading.”
“But you two know how to read, which is more than what ninety percent of the people here know.” I said. “So you’re going to help me read.”
“That isn’t answering my question, why should we help?” He asked.
“Because it’ll help the hunt.”
“So?”
“Because it’ll make us look good.” I said.
“So?”
“Because we’ll stop the murders from nightstalkers.” I flipped through the pages, dust came up to my face and wet my eyes.
Obrick chewed. Kal sighed.
He nibbled, he spat, he looked with deadpan expression at me and the dust in the air.
“I guess.” He said.
From the middle of the stack, like a fool unafraid of a jenga stack, Obrick ripped a book out. He plopped it right in front of it and all the bits of dust from the table and the book pushed to the side. He opened it, midway, and flipped through the pages.
“I didn’t learn much.” Obrick said.
I snapped my pen down on the paper.
“Ceventrius Nogales. That’s their science-y name.” I said. “They like cold, dry environments. Which is here in Sonhelm. They hate fire which is nice to know. And they have hives.”
“But if they have hives.” Kal said, in that same monotone deep-voice that made it hard to tell if his heart had stopped halfway or if he was just getting in another years worth of air. “How are they moving around so often? And how haven’t they been found?”
“Maybe they’re nested somewhere outside, a cave maybe?” Obrick said.
“Maybe they’re in the sewer?” I asked.
“They hate wet places.” Kal said. “And the guards have already debunked that. They do travel in the sewer from time to time, though.”
“I mean, they don’t travel far which is where they nest. Far from people. So how far could they have settled outside and where?”
Obrick closed to be book.
“Looks like we’ll just have to let Vicentius investigate, right?” He stood from his chair so fast that it pushed back and screeched against the floor. “I’m going back to the inn. You coming, Kal?”
“Yes.” He took a breath and stood. “I’m hungry.”
“We haven’t found anything out yet, though.” I said.
“We eliminated possibilities.” Obrick said. “Things everyone else probably knew, but we did it anyway.”
“We’re going to go home like this? Empty handed?” I asked.
“Virgil.” Obrick said. “All we did was light a barrel on fire. We’re not special. We just got lucky.”
“Then let’s get lucky again.” I said. “Don’t you want more than this?”
“No. I really don’t. Glory, fame. I never wanted that in my life.” Obrick said. “Give it a rest, these books and you.”
They stood and walked out and the door hit the frame behind them but it wasn’t a sound I was exactly unused to and this wasn’t a strange feeling, to be alone in this room with this book keeper with magnified eyes behind the counter looking at me and all these books in front of me. As if I wasn’t like this months ago, alone in the wagon reading day in day out just to get a handle of the place. Or as if I wasn’t used to the loneliness, the months of it.
“We’re closing soon.” The book keeper came up, his hands behind his back.
“Keep it open another hour.” I said.
It was obvious he wanted to say no, his crooked smile couldn’t maintain its shape and he broke into a frown now and then. The sweat came down his face and from his pockets (he had so many on his green vest) he grabbed one giant handkerchief and dried his bald head.
“Okay. Okay.” He said, walking back.
I looked down at the book, it had a picture of a Nightstalker. Or at least, the artists recreation of one in cross-hatch, enlarged on the page.
It looked disgusting.
