“I know you,” I said in realisation. “You’ve been staying at The Burrows. You’re the High Buck, erm, thingy, right?”
“That’s right. High Buck of the Solarian Mischief of Tiberian Rats. It’s a pleasure to meet you properly, Princess.”
“And you. What are you doing here?” I asked.
“I’ve been staying at the library for a few weeks now to help find new ways of travel to replace stardust. Some of the old legends speak of something called vaporgation where you could turn yourself into gas form and have an air Elemental blast you away across the land at high speed,” Eugene squeaked.
“We love trying to prove old legends true,” Brittny said excitedly.
“Unfortunately, we think vaporgation might have had serious side effects like peeling a few layers of your skin off and making your fingernails rot,” Kandice said with a frown.
“Oh,” I said with a grimace.
“Are we quite done with the introductions?” Orion drawled.
“The princess saviour is looking at us,” Kandice breathed and Brittny honked nervously as the two of them blushed.
“Wait, if you like proving legends, there’s actually one we need some information on,” I said in realisation and Eugene squeaked, an exhilarated look in his eyes.
“What legend? We would be honoured to assist you,” he said, practically brimming with pride at the idea and I flicked up a silencing bubble around us.
“We’re looking for The Gems of Lariom,” I revealed, deciding to trust these people, though Orion glanced at me like he wasn’t sure if we should. I was pretty damn good at reading people though, and Gabriel would have said something if he’d seen anything shady about them.
“Oooh, that’s my favourite legend!” Brittny cried and Eugene scurried over to a bookshelf, grabbing a book from it which was twice the size of his head and wheezing as he carried it over, laying it down on a table with a heavy thud.
“We’ll get right on it, my lady,” Eugene squeaked. “This is a record of all the books on legends in the library.” He flicked fast through the worn pages then stopped on one and pointed to the title at the top above a seemingly endless list of books. Texts on The Gems of Lariom. “We’ll get looking through all of these, your highness, and if we get even a whiff of their locations, we’ll let you know immediately.”
“Not all of them,” Orion cut in, giving in to my desire to set them this task. “We need information on the gems for Libra, Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius and Pisces.”
“Okie cokie karaoke.” Eugene beamed and Orion nodded stiffly, turning to Laini.
“We’re here for an urgent matter. Take us to the section on dark magic, we can’t waste anymore time,” he said brusquely, his patience clearly at its limit.
“Please,” I added.
Laini nodded quickly, muttering an apology before jerking her head in an offer for us to follow. Kandice waved goodbye to us and I thanked her and her friends for their help as Orion caught my hand and towed me along after Laini.
“The dark magic section is in the labyrinths,” Laini said, leading us through a stone archway and into another section of the library.
This place was massive. Everywhere I looked there were more books, more shelves, more beauty. We passed over a small bridge above a trickling stream then approached a large door which was as black as iron and bolted shut. Laini pressed her hand to the centre of it and magic sparked out from beneath her palm, shimmering across the door and making the bolt slide back with a loud clunk.
The doors parted before us and a huge man stepped forward from the darkness. His head was transformed into that of a bull with huge horns curling up from it and his humanoid body was huge, towering over me with dark brown fur covering his skin. The Minotaur bowed to me and Laini gestured for us to join him.
“Arnold will take you to the dark magic section. Don’t ever leave his side or you’ll get lost down in here and we’ll never find you. Only the Minotaurs know the way around this section. It’s how we protect the most dangerous knowledge in this library.”
We moved forward to join Arnold and he released a deep moo before turning and leading us away into the dark. We hurried to keep pace with him as the sound of the door shutting behind us sent an echoing boom out around into the tunnels ahead of us.
My pulse flickered and I immediately cast a Faelight to guide away the shadows. Arnold apparently had no trouble seeing down here, but he made no objections to the Faelight I’d cast as he quickened his pace and turned down a narrow passage that pressed in on us on both sides.