Knowledge is all. It was the Library's motto, and they all murmured it in response, as they had from the earliest schooldays.
'Now. Everyone but Seif, Santiago, Wathen, and Brightwell, draw a tile from the pot. There are numbers in it ranging from one to six.'
The High Garda soldier was holding out a small clay pot filled with numbered tiles. He passed through the ranks of the students. Thomas stared at the tile he drew out in puzzlement, and silently asked Jess for hints; Jess didn't have any to give.
Then the High Garda man took out a set of ivory dice and tossed them to Wolfe. Wolfe rattled them and cast them on the flagstones. 'Anyone with two or five, step forward.'
Only two students did, holding up their tiles. One of them was redheaded Anna. The soldier collected the tiles and put them back in the pot.
'You can pack your things,' Wolfe said. 'Go home. You're done.'
'But--' Anna had gone bleach-pale. 'But we just got here! It's the first day! It isn't fair!'
'Eminently fair, and random. Only Seif and Wathen had fully formed and correct answers to my questions; only Brightwell noticed the Greek Fire, a threat that all librarians must always guard against at all times. I generously gave Santiago credit for helping clear the room. The rest of you were bystanders, and the fact that I did not dismiss you all is a mark of my generosity of spirit.'
'I'll-I'll appeal! You can't do this!'
'Certainly you can appeal. The Archivist Magister is always available to listen to whining, spoilt children who think they've been unfairly judged. However, if he finds I acted within my authority, you'll be fined for wasting his time, your placement fee will be forfeited, and you'll be paying your own way home. How confident do you feel?'
Jess felt a twinge of sympathy, and a larger bolt of fear, as he looked at the ashen faces of the two who would be leaving on the first day. There but for the grace of God, he thought. And my early acquaintance with the Burners.
Their walk back to the dormitory was all too silent, and Jess couldn't wait to get back to his room, take out his pen, and fill his journal with how much he genuinely was beginning to loathe Scholar Wolfe.
The first day set the tone. Wolfe was a merciless taskmaster, ruthless in dismissing those he thought were not worth his time. The first week was a brutal parade of failure. Of the thirty-two who'd moved their bags into Ptolemy House, twelve were gone within the first seven days. One left of his own accord, without a word to anyone. Jess understood that. He felt the pressure like a constant weapon pressed to his head, and he knew it would be easy to let it crush his spirit.
But he wasn't in the habit of failure.
Wolfe did not take them back to the ancient chamber again ... not that first week. Instead, he carried out his classes at Alexandria University in a conventional classroom, where he endlessly grilled them, one by one, on obscure points of Library history. After being caught out on the second day, and surviving the resulting dismissal lottery by sheer luck, Jess put himself to work.
So did all the rest of them. Even Dario.
'This is foolish,' Santiago complained the next night. It was direly late, and Jess's whole body ached from it. Apparently, the bells were set to clang every morning at dawn, and classes began before any of them were properly awake, but the amount of study that needed to be done left them with little chance of sleep. 'I thought he said we'd be learning real skills. He's doing nothing but stuffing nonsense in our heads. Who cares about the name of the forty-second Artifex Magnus?'
Khalila lifted her finger without looking up from the blank she studied. She had claimed a chair in the corner, while Jess had contented himself with sitting against the smooth white wall near the hearth, legs crossed. 'Sarenpet.'
'How do you do that?' Thomas asked. Even Thomas, usually sunny, seemed clouded over and tired. 'Can you name all the Archivists as well?'
'There was an emphasis on study in my household,' Khalila said. 'And I had little interest in more traditional things, like cooking. So yes. I can name them all. You should probably try.'
'Better history than distasteful conversations on smuggling,' Dario said. 'That is unnecessary information.'
'Scholars frequently investigate the black trades and markets, looking for rare books,' Izumi said. 'At least where I come from. Don't they have such in your country? Or are you so virtuous no one sells originals?'
'Well, it's like kissing one's sister,' Dario said 'If you have the bad taste to do it, you don't talk about it.'
Khalila laughed and reached for the tea sitting on the table beside her. 'I'm not afraid to talk about it. There's a flourishing black trade near the docks, I hear. I've heard a few names.'
Jess deeply hoped that she was exaggerating. Khalila was mostly honest, but sometimes her stories stretched too far. 'You'd better stay well away from those people.' For my sake, he added silently. Those were his contacts, after all. He'd been given a list of names and addresses before his father had sent him off on the train, and he still recited them nightly before he went to sleep.
'I am a woman of many parts,' she said. 'And one of them is the ability to look to the future. Should I become a Scholar like Wolfe, I will need such resources, won't I?'
'Rough company,' Dario said. 'Unsuitable for an innocent flower like you.'
'You sound like my uncle. One can be innocent and not be ignorant, after all.' It was, Jess thought, nearly impossible to hate her, even when she sounded so smug. 'I'm warning you: at least try to memorise the Archivists. It's just the kind of thing Wolfe will keep asking.'
'We are trying,' Jess said. His eyes burnt, and he couldn't stop a yawn. It spread to the rest of them crowded in the common room, and he got muttered curses for it. 'We're just not as good at it as you, Khalila. You should probably get used to hearing that.'
'Did I give you permission to use my first name?' she asked, but it was a mild sort of tease, not offence.
'Forgive me, Postulant Seif,' Jess said, and bowed as low as he could without really putting an effort in. 'Your unworthy servant.'
'Finally,' Dario muttered. He'd claimed the most comfortable chair, and had a strong little group of followers fanned out around him. 'The scrubber knows his place at last.'
Jess looked up, and met his roommate's eyes. Dario's were challenging and bitter, and his smile matched. No jokes there. And no quarter.
'Oh, I do know my place, Dario,' he said. 'It's ahead of yours. What was your test score again?'
That woke hushed laughter from some of the others, and a smile from Khalila. Dario seemed to let it drop.
But of course, he didn't.
Jess slept like the dead, when he had the chance, and that proved to be a mistake. When he woke the next morning, after a bare three hours of rest, the bells were clanging in the dark, and Dario's bed was already empty. He'd missed his chance at the shower, again.
When he opened his chest to grab fresh clothes, it was empty.
The shock echoed up from his toes, hit the top of his skull, and shot back down again. He was no longer sleepy. You bastard. He thought about kicking in the bathroom door and dragging Dario wet and naked out to kick his arrogant arse, but that seemed too easy.
Dario had a lock on his chest, and clearly, he'd foreseen the need to fasten it, but Jess had come from a family of smugglers, with a dash of thieving thrown in. He knew how to pick locks, and this one wasn't even much of a challenge.
Dario's silken shirt felt good against his skin. Definitely a step up from his own wardrobe. He took the other boy's trousers, which were a bit long, and tucked them into his own boots. Dario hadn't bothered to steal those, at least.
Then he took his Codex and strolled down to grab a breakfast of fruit and thick, hot Egyptian coffee in the common room. He was early, but the room had filled with students by the time Dario burst in the door, hair still damp, face flushed. His bitter-black eyes fixed on Jess, and he advanced on him. Fast.
Jess sat at his ease, peeling an orange. 'Good morning,' he said. He
didn't try to defend himself, and didn't stand. Dario reached down and grabbed hold of the shirt, then froze and let go, probably because he remembered that he would be manhandling his own expensive garments.
'I should have known someone with your gutter manners would be a filthy little thief.'
Jess dropped a piece of peel into his bowl. 'When my clothes are in my chest, I'll give these back,' he said. 'Until then, I'll assume you mean to share.'
Dario cursed at him in fluent, liquid Spanish, and reached for a sharp knife on the breakfast table. Jess got there first and slapped it down with a clatter.
'Think,' he said, and leant forward. 'Which one of us knows how to use this better, little prince, you, or the one with gutter manners? And which one of us is more likely to be sent home packing after the crying's done?'
Khalila eased up and put a gentle hand on Dario's arm. 'Dario,' she said. 'Please. We have struggle enough to survive already. Fighting among ourselves is foolish.'
Dario turned his head and glared at her. 'Are you calling me a fool?'
'Yes,' she said, very calmly. 'Now stop.'
He blinked, and there was a twitch of a frown on his high, smooth forehead, and then the smooth noble facade came down. He gave her an elaborate bow. 'For you, desert flower, anything.'
Khalila gave him an unreadable look, picked up a bread roll, and carried it to the farthest corner of the room, where she pointedly opened her blank to read.
Jess took his hand off the knife and went back to freeing his orange from its thick prison. He wanted to goad Dario, but he knew it wouldn't be wise; he could see Thomas silently beseeching him not to push his luck, and of course, Thomas was right.
The day's session with Wolfe was in the classroom - a normal enough place, with narrow windows, desks, chairs, and a large, flat, blank sheet mounted on the wall for Wolfe's use, should he need it. He didn't. It was five hours of relentless questioning, which ranged from history to geography (Jess had failed to memorise the locations of all of the daughter libraries, but the weight of that question had crushed three other students) and on to the proper usage of a Codex to conduct advanced research.
They were all exhausted and fearing the reappearance of the lottery tiles when Khalila suddenly said, 'Are you going to teach us about the Iron Tower, Scholar Wolfe?'
It put a stop to everything for a few seconds, and then Wolfe slowly turned towards her. His expression put chills through Jess; he couldn't imagine how it felt to be on the direct receiving end of it. 'Excuse me?'
'The Iron Tower?' She said it with slightly less confidence this time. There was a darkness in the way Wolfe was looking at her, and a calculation, as if he was trying to decide what she meant by the question.
'If you wish to learn about the Iron Tower, so be it. Tell me what you know about it, Postulant Schreiber.'
It was an unexpected lash of a question, but it didn't seem to bother Thomas at all. In fact, he seemed delighted to answer. 'It was built by engineers from Artifex in the year 1789, to the specifications of the Obscurist Magnus at that time. It was made from a rare type of iron which, quite remarkably, does not rust - the Iron Pillar in Delhi is made from the same, and the process has been under study for--'
'Fascinating, I am certain.' Wolfe cut him off, in an utterly bored voice. 'I was referring to those who reside inside the tower, however extraordinary the exterior might be.'
Thomas was on firm ground when speaking of the accomplishments of engineers, but less so now, and Jess saw him hesitate before he said, 'You mean the Obscurists?'
'The Obscurists would be a correct answer, if woefully inadequate,' Wolfe agreed. 'Expound.'
'They ... maintain the Library's Codex system.'
'How?'
'Sir?'
'Postulant Seif wishes to discuss the Obscurists, and so we shall discuss them. Can you explain to me exactly how they accomplish the mirroring of the Library's information across so much distance? The exact mechanism they use to perform this miraculous feat?'
'I--' Thomas swallowed. 'No, Scholar.'
'Then what else do they provide to the Library?'
'They ... provide the spark to power the automata that guard the Serapeum?'
Wolfe let him dangle in silence for a moment, then crossed to stare out the window at the Iron Tower with his hands clasped behind his back.
'The burning of the Serapeum at Rayy, as we discussed on the first day, changed everything,' he said. 'Prior to that loss, alchemists worked in secret; after, they began to work together. Their discoveries led to the Doctrine of Mirroring, but they also found something curious: alchemical successes were not a simple matter of chemicals and potions and the time at which they were combined, as everyone had thought. The formulae worked for some earnest masters and not others, because there was a spark in only some, a talent that could imbue formulae with real power.'
'And those people became the Obscurists,' Khalila said.
'The most valuable resource in the world.' Wolfe suddenly rounded on Khalila, stalked directly to her, and Jess saw the fine tremble that went through her that marked a desperate desire to retreat. It was a significant achievement that she held her ground; Jess wasn't sure he could have done the same. 'Do not ever bring up the Obscurists again, Postulant Seif. Your idle curiosity will not be so well rewarded.'
She was silent for a second, and then - remarkably, to Jess's eyes - she drew herself up and held Wolfe's gaze quite steadily. Then she said, with only a tiny hint of a tremor in her voice, 'With the greatest respect, Scholar Wolfe, I do not ask from idle curiosity, but from a desire to more fully understand the duties of a librarian. Librarians instruct, assist, research, develop, create ... and protect, do they not?'
'Yes. Your point?'
'You said they are our greatest resource. Does that not also make the Obscurists our greatest weakness?'
That sparked a sudden, common intake of breath, because it seemed more than daring, that question.
It seemed seditious.
Wolfe stepped back without blinking, and clasped his hands behind his back. Smiled. It was a strange expression on him, unnatural, almost brittle. 'Explain,' he said.
'All of the other specialities of the Library - Medica, Artifex, Historia, Lingua - are positions to which we can aspire. But alchemy cannot be taught in the same way. None of us can become Obscurists, because they are born with a special gift. That makes them rare,' Khalila continued. The tremor in her voice was more obvious now, and she stopped to swallow. 'We must know if we are to help protect them.'
'And when you rise to the rank of a Senior Scholar, you might be granted that knowledge,' he told her. 'Until then, the question is a waste of your time. Obscurists do their work in seclusion and protection within the Iron Tower. That is all you need know.'
'But without them, documents can't be added to the Archive, isn't that true? Without them, the automata that guard our daughter libraries cannot have the spark of life. Without them--'
She seemed to run out of courage, suddenly, and her voice fell silent.
Jess finished the thought. 'Without them, the Codex doesn't work,' he said. 'And if the Codex doesn't work, the Library falls.'
That got Wolfe's attention. He instantly regretted opening his mouth. The room was hot and still, and when he gritted his teeth in order not to flinch under that stare, his jaw ached tightly in the corners.
But he didn't look away.
'Remember,' Wolfe said. The word was silky soft, almost gentle. 'Even here, you can ask the wrong questions and speak the wrong truths, postulants. Here ends today's lesson. Tota est scientia.'
Their murmured response followed him as he turned and walked from the room, blending with the whisper of his black robes on stone. Finally, after the doors closed, Jess let out his breath in a rush.
'Scheisse, Jess,' Thomas said. 'Did he just threaten you?'
Khalila was looking at him in concern, and her face was several shades too pale. 'I'm sorry,' she said. 'I didn't mean--'
'Never mind,' Jess replied, and picked up his Codex from the desk. 'It was a good question.'
Outside, Wolfe's High Garda friend was waiting with the pot of tiles. Jess automatically reached for one.
The man pulled it back and gave him an unexpectedly friendly grin. 'Not you,' he said. 'Pass.'
Somehow, Jess thought, that only made it seem more ominous.
The day's lottery yielded no losers, by some miracle. By the time they made it back to Ptolemy House, the sun was down, they were all soaked with exhausted sweat, and Jess stood in the shower for well on an hour, wondering if he could survive this gruelling process, and more, if he should.
When he came out of the shower, his missing clothes were back in his trunk. Stained, muddy, and filthy, but returned, and fair point, he hadn't told Dario they had to be in the same condition as they'd left. Jess silently scrubbed the worst of the mud out of a shirt and trousers, donned them, and then pondered taking revenge to the next level. His brother would have, until it came to knives and someone dead on the floor.
He wasn't his brother. For that reason, he decided to just let it go. Dario had kept his end of the bargain ... exacted some petty revenge, but a little mud didn't bother Jess much. Benefits of an urchin childhood. Jess even wrote something that was almost civil about his roommate in his personal journal that night, simply because he believed they might have reached an understanding.
It was premature, as he found out the next morning when Dario roughly shook him awake.
'Where is it?' Dario growled. Jess blinked spots from his eyes and tried to sit up. Dario pushed him back down. 'Now, scrubber!'
'Where's what?'
Dario lunged for him, and Jess on his side, delivered a quick elbow to Dario's face, and was on his feet and balanced for a fight in seconds as the other boy staggered away. Dario, however, went down hard on his arse, and stayed there, breathing hard and holding his nose. It wasn't broken. It wasn't even bleeding.