Bookshops & Bonedust (Legends & Lattes, #0)(55)

Viv reluctantly admitted, “There’s really only one thing that make sense.”



* * *



“It’s Varine’s?” asked Iridia, examining the book with narrowed eyes. She ran her finely scaled hand across the surface, feeling the tracery of glyphs at the edges.

“Our mysterious stranger hid it in the bookshop. I think he stole it from her.”

“And you know this how?”

Viv flipped back the cover. Iridia calmly regarded the exposed black page.

“They’re portals to an underspace,” she said. “Like a treasure vault, or something.”

Viv dipped a hand into the blackness and immediately pulled it back out.

The tapenti hissed an indrawn breath and glanced sharply at the orc. “An underspace?”

“That’s what Fern called it. She, uh, reads about this sort of thing. There are hundreds of them.” Viv turned the pages. “They contain, um … various things.”

“A fascinating object. Undoubtedly valuable. And yet I don’t see how you can be sure it’s hers.”

“No chance I can convince you that I can tell by the smell?”

Iridia chuckled throatily.

Viv didn’t take that as an affirmative. She scratched the back of her neck. “Look, I might have pulled something out, and then … well, I think there’s a sort of alarm? It’s possible Varine may know I took something, and, uh, maybe even where it is right now. Potentially. Maybe.”

“And what did you take from it?”

“Nothing she needs.” She hurried onward. “Anyway, I figured the best thing for it was to keep the book someplace protected.” She met Iridia’s gaze steadily. “Maybe locked up here.”

“So what you’re saying is that you’d like to store a potentially dangerous object, which is of immense value to an even more dangerous necromancer, here. In my offices.”

Viv shrugged uncomfortably. “Yeah. Yeah, I guess so.”

Iridia smiled thinly. She slid the book off the desk and weighed it in both hands. “I do so look forward to your eventual departure.”



* * *



The greatsword was impossible to hide when Viv pushed her way into The Perch that evening. With no way to sling it over her back, she held all six feet of it point down before her, hoping to make her way swiftly up the stairs.

“Holy hells!” cried Gallina, immediately scuppering those plans. “Where’d that come from?”

“It’s, uh …” Viv realized she should have come up with an explanation for the sword’s provenance ahead of time. “I … bought … it?” she finished lamely. And entirely unconvincingly.

Brand watched her with interest as well. “Hm. Greatsword, eh? Feeling underarmed?” he asked.

Viv tried to smile, but it felt like a grimace and probably looked about the same. “Really done in for the day. Just going to head up to my room.”

She limped up the stairs, tucking the blade under her arm, and hurried to her room, where she closed the door firmly behind her. A damp sea breeze filtered through the narrow window, laced with the sulfurous smell of seaweed.

She laid the greatsword atop the leather straps of the empty bedframe, lit the lantern, and stepped back to examine the blade.

The steel glimmered along its flawless length, clean and perfect, not so much as a nick or notch to mar the edges. The leather wrapping on the hilt might have been bound and shrunk yesterday, and a beautiful but substantial silver ring formed the pommel.

Viv immediately wanted it in her hands again.

She probed her thigh, testing the receding ache there. Had Rackam cornered Varine the Pale yet? Was he still alive? Was she? The signal from the book strongly implied she was.

Impatience swelled in her breast. She’d been reading and idling away her days, with nothing but a little indifferent training to keep her reflexes afloat.

Murk seemed to have a sleepy power over her, a seductive song of indolence.

She’d almost let it claim her. Sure, she had to bide her time and heal. And there was no harm in wringing a little enjoyment out of her forced recovery. She thought guiltily of Maylee. Or a little companionship, she added mentally.

But her time in Murk must draw to an end. And she needed to be ready when it did.





27





The sky threatened rain all the following day. Viv made a perfunctory visit to Thistleburr but didn’t stay. Fern was busy shelving the last of the remaining books and fussing over the wrapped packages, and there wasn’t much that Viv could help with anyway. She relayed what she’d done with Varine’s book, and Fern seemed caught between anxiety and relief, but the tasks of the day outweighed either in the end.

Viv and Maylee had planned an outing, which had been a pleasant prospect until she’d drawn forth the greatsword. She tried to recapture her anticipation as she knocked on the door of Sea-Song.

They shared a leisurely walk along the beach. Maylee traced a finger up and down Viv’s forearm in a very distracting way, and Viv described the plan she and Fern had hatched to find homes for the surplus books.

“Thanks to your baking,” she said. Viv gave Maylee’s hand a squeeze.

“Everythin’ good is thanks to bakin’,” Maylee replied with conviction.