Daniel raised his head—and froze.
Little more than a handful of feet away, another row of floorboards cracked and splintered, vanishing into the Edge’s maw.
He scrambled back, adrenaline pumping through his veins. His legs burned, his injured limb unresponsive. He pushed off the ground, trying to rise, but it collapsed beneath him.
Move, that ancient voice repeated, building in intensity. Time is running out. Move, or-
Daniel shoved himself upright with a strangled yelp, overbalancing in the same instant. He tumbled again, fighting to get his footing, and-
Light filled his vision. The shapes from before. Dreamers—a pair of them. They coursed from the woodwork, from the abandoned husks of the bookshelves, and swept him up along with them. He could see their outlines, beneath the furious glow washing off their skin, but little else.
If they were offering help, he’d take it. Daniel latched on hard, grasping the arms that wrapped around him, and lurched back into motion. The scream of the Edge devouring the Library roared closer than ever, but ahead, the door to the sitting room was open. Madis strode through, Rickard at his heels, still scowling. Indira paused in the arch of the doorway, glancing back to him. When she hurried after Madis, the doors hung open behind her.
Hurry, the voice sang. Faster.
“Working on it,” Daniel muttered, trying to force his weary body to pick up the pace. The doorway was right there—so close—but his head felt like it might split open. A warm trickle across his face promised a nosebleed, and the gashes in both his arm and leg seared with every movement. He limped onward, grimacing.
Something waited inside, something that did not belong in the sitting room. A statue, poised in the center of a stone-lined well that gleamed from within with silvery-blue light.
“No,” Daniel whispered, stumbling faster. He was so close. “Can’t let him-”
The dreamers gave a final tug, hard enough he nearly toppled forward, and suddenly vanished.
The doorway slipped past.
And Daniel stumbled to a halt inside Alexandria’s heart.
- Chapter Thirty-Eight -
The sitting room.
Daniel could recognize it, but only just. The overstuffed chairs were gone, the carpet beneath their feet ripped up into shreds of fabric. The bookshelves on the walls that normally teemed with books were bare. The clock hung in its place over the mantle, but its orbs were devoid of sand. The other doors had vanished entirely.
And Alexandria’s statue stood in the center of the room.
“N-No,” Daniel whispered, stumbling forward another step.
Madis strode onward, seemingly unaware of his presence. “Yes,” he breathed. “Ah, there you are, my dear. It’s been some time, has it not?”
“So you do know this Library,” Rickard said. His voice was flat, leaden. “You knew from the start.”
“Is it not lovely?” Madis said. He shifted from foot to foot, circling the bottomless well around the statue’s feet. He reached out, almost touching her—almost—before drawing back, smiling. “This is a marvelous day indeed.”
As Daniel watched, frozen, Madis started patting the pockets of his coat. “Now, where did I-”
Leave her alone. Daniel hurled himself forward, straight into the side of their blue-glowing shield. Crackling bolts of energy erupted from where he struck it—and something pushed back against him. He gritted his teeth, shoving harder. Frost crackled from under his hands, ripping into the shield, but nothing happened. He shifted, bracing, and the blistering cold turned to gouts of fire that melted the frost to hazy mists.
Indira spun with a cry. Rickard was right there at her elbow, his face as fury-contorted as when he’d talked to Madis. His lip curling back, he stepped forward and-
“Leave him be,” Madis said, flipping through his book. “He cannot break through our defenses. Ignore him, and he’ll tire himself out from such tantrums. It will fade.”
Tantrums? Anger blossomed in Daniel’s chest, and he leaned in harder, digging his fingers into the shield.
“Use your head,” someone whispered in his ear. A woman, her voice rich with tolerant amusement. “The man’s right. I trained you better than this, didn’t I?” Something that might have been a footstep rang out, and then she continued, on his other side. “It isn’t about the size of the hammer. It’s about finding the right place to hit.”
Daniel’s arms shook. He was tired, so tired he thought he might collapse on the spot. But he couldn’t stand by and do nothing, either. “But-”
“Choose your moment. And then make it count.”
A breeze across the back of his neck, a gentle rustling of fabric, and she was gone. It killed him, but slowly, Daniel broke away from the shield, letting his fires die out.
“Let us see,” Madis said. A smile spread across his wrinkled, craggy face. He flipped through the pages of his book, finally cradling it closer to him. “This is most remarkable. Finally, I’ve found you again—and now, together, we might work to undo the damage done to this world. But how shall I-”
The room groaned, shuddering around them. Daniel twisted, his legs giving out beneath him. He hit the ground—and the walls around them crumpled, vanishing into dust.
The Edge was there to fill the suddenly-empty space. The wispy edges of its domain lapped at the scraps of wall remaining, at the ground underfoot. The ceiling overhead shattered into fragment that dissolved to blank white. Daniel huddled lower, throwing his arms over his head as splinters rained down. He heard Indira cry out, but the debris only bounced off their shield, clattering to the almost-bare concrete underfoot.
Madis didn’t even look up. He plunged a hand into his pocket, withdrawing a metal-tipped pen, and nodded. “Yes. Yes, between the two of us, a simple link should be sufficient. A bond, to make the two parts whole. Don’t you think, Rickard?”
Rickard didn’t say a word. His face was stony, one arm half-raised to shield Indira.
Madis crouched beside the well, stretching that pen toward the waters within. He was going to dip it in, Daniel realized. Right into her
