Ramsbottom’s hands fell to his sides, and he gave up all attempts to be helpful to stare at Silver in mute fascination. Vale didn’t seem to be affected. Irene was tempted to look behind her to see what Kai was doing, but as a dragon, he should surely be immune to anything that Silver could throw at him. At least, she hoped so.
Silver thought that the book was still here. There had to be some way that they could use that. At least Bradamant was playing along and keeping Silver occupied.
“But how did you know I was from the Library?” Bradamant asked, edging still farther to the left.
One of the thugs twitched forward as if to make a grab for her, but Silver shook his head. “No, my adversary deserves to know at least that much. How well you fooled me, my dear! I was quite distracted by your mousy little minion over there in her drab dress”—he gestured at Irene—“and by your cunning thefts. How could I have realized that you were the mastermind behind it all? It was only after I put it all together that I saw you in your true light.”
Irene was torn between relief that he wasn’t focusing on her and a certain amount of irritation that she was apparently a mousy little minion unworthy of his attention. Was she so utterly unnoticeable? Why wasn’t he pointing a finger at Irene and declaiming about her being an impressive mastermind? In fact, why was Silver claiming that there was a mastermind at all?
Part of her was aware that this was an incredibly stupid attitude to take, a reaction to his Fae charm or something. The same thing that was making her want to pout and preen at him. Maybe bare a shoulder or breathe deeply or somehow get him to notice her. To have him touch her with those beautiful long hands, his body pressing . . .
Right.
A thought at the back of her head was trying to get her attention. This is the problem with interacting with the Fae. An instructor’s voice from back at the Library, talking to half a dozen trainees while they made notes (or surreptitiously tried to plot out bestselling novels), droning away while rain spattered against the window that looked out onto a deserted grey stone square full of empty market stalls. They see everything in terms of their own personal drama. If you are not careful, they will drag you into it. This is in fact a problem and a risk with all chaos-infected alternates . . .
“I see.” Bradamant did a good job of drooping in response to Silver’s accusations. “Then you know everything.”
“Everything!” Silver declared. “I am not surprised that Aubrey should have called for reinforcements from the Library with such a prize at stake, but now he will have to admit that he has failed. Our long rivalry is at an end!”
Irene blinked in shock. No. No. That couldn’t be right. If Silver had known Dominic Aubrey and had learnt that he was a Library agent, then Dominic should have known about Silver being a threat. But Dominic hadn’t said a single word about Silver being an enemy of his, or warned them about him, or even told them that Silver existed . . .
And why was Bradamant nodding? What did she know? “Aubrey warned me about you,” she said, “but I believe he did not prepare me enough.”
No, surely this was impossible. There was no conceivable reason for Dominic to warn Bradamant but not her or Kai. They could well have come into contact, as the only door to the Library was in Aubrey’s office. But there had been no sign that they had exchanged this sort of intelligence. Of course, Dominic might have had his own patrons in the Library, who wanted Bradamant to find the book first. That was entirely plausible and wasn’t even an offence as such. But deliberately hiding the threat of Silver from her and Kai wasn’t just a casual slip; it was a betrayal. If she’d got back and told her superiors, then Dominic might well have been removed from his post.
Could Bradamant be lying? Her thoughts rattled in her head like computer keys. And the tension in the room escalated as Silver considered his next dramatic reply, as Vale and Kai shifted their positions behind her, and as the werewolves panted and waited to lunge.
No. It didn’t fit. Oh, all right, maybe Bradamant and Silver might be secret allies staging an argument to convince her. But that was taking paranoia too far. So if Dominic knew about Silver and considered him significant enough to warn Bradamant—but didn’t even bother mentioning him to Irene later, when he knew Irene was on a confirmed mission—then what did that imply? What had changed?
She thought back to her brief contact with Dominic Aubrey. His use of the Language was strangely old-fashioned. And then there was Dominic Aubrey’s disappearance and skinning, which left his Library tattoo intact but no sign of his body at all. And how did Alberich operate in this alternate world? Alberich, who had lived for long enough to be a legend even among the Librarians . . . but nobody knew how, and nobody even knew what he looked like.
An idea was forming, an idea that she mentally flinched from, but one that answered a lot of questions. Stealing someone’s skin and identity was covered in obscure folklore treatises, but it wasn’t something that she ever expected to be real. She didn’t want it to be real.
Silver had advanced on Vale and was flourishing his cane menacingly. “Wyndham only wanted the book because of information I gave him. Then he thought he could bargain for it. With me! Why, if the Iron Brotherhood hadn’t disposed of him, I might have been forced to do so myself . . . But all is not lost, my dear.”
So it
