“I’d bet,” Lore said softly.
He caught the gleam of interest in her eye, smiled to see it. “You’re welcome to come look at them sometime. Just let me know beforehand, so I can make sure Anton isn’t going to be around. He’s picky about the Church library.”
A scowl flickered at the corner of Gabe’s mouth, but he didn’t say anything.
“I’ll take you up on that.” Lore turned in the direction she thought would take them toward the southeast turret. “Assuming I can find the time to un-sew myself from Bastian’s ass.”
Malcolm snorted. “Let me know if you need a seam ripper.”
The sun was low in the sky by the time they made their circuitous way back through the shining halls of the Citadel to their suite. Gabe was quiet the whole time, his face drawn into pensive lines. Any attempt Lore made at a joke was rebuffed with silence.
The silence did not alleviate when they got to their apartments. Gabe sighed when he entered the sitting room, hands hung on his hips, before turning right and entering the smaller study off the dining area. She heard a chair creak as he lowered himself into it.
Lore went to the sidebar, found a bottle of wine, poured herself a glass. Still vinegary, but passable. She couldn’t find another wineglass, so she poured Gabe’s helping into a small mug clearly not meant for the purpose.
A large oak desk dominated the study, empty except for a cut-glass paperweight housing a blood-red rose in its center. Bookshelves lined the walls, but they were mostly empty, too, holding only a dusty copy of the Compendium and a potted fern in desperate need of a good watering.
The study was small enough that Lore didn’t have to enter all the way to hand him the cup. For a moment, he just looked at it, but then he took it from her.
She leaned her shoulder against the jamb. “Your mood has taken a drastic turn for the dour.”
He huffed, sipped the wine. “Being reminded of the excess in this place will do that.”
Understandable. It had itched at her, too, wandering through the museum-like halls, seeing all the accumulated wealth while knowing firsthand the lack felt outside the Citadel. Lore had never worried about starving—Mari and Val made sure of that—but hunger was a sleeping wolf crouched at the door, a continuous threat that you learned to live with and did your best not to wake.
Lore stared into the depths of her glass. “Our guilt isn’t helping anyone, Gabe.”
He stiffened.
Her foot tapped against the floor, a nervous rhythm to order her thoughts around. “I mean, part of me feels guilty for enjoying it, too. For wanting all this for myself, when I know how little most people have. But we don’t have time for the luxury of guilt. Not if there’s an actual war coming, and not while we’re stuck here either way.”
Gabe still didn’t look at her. He slumped back in his chair, an inelegant pile of monk. “I didn’t think I missed it. But here, in a place where I was… was happy, once…” He trailed off. Sighed. “I remember when it was like a home, before I knew it was rotten. The Citadel was easy to love, then. And hating it was just as easy, once I learned how corrupt it was. But hating it is only easy from far away.”
He wanted that ease back. Wanted simple answers, clear delineations. And if it weren’t for Lore, he’d have them.
“It’s shameful,” he murmured. “It’s shameful, how much they have, how much they steal.”
“It is,” Lore said. “I want to do something about it. To fix it, somehow. But I…” She trailed off, shrugged. This was something she’d thought about so often, and never quite been able to translate. “I don’t know how, I guess? I’m one person. One fairly insignificant person, and against so many years of so much power, I feel completely useless. Like… like trying to dam up a river with a pebble.”
“It would take a lot of pebbles,” Gabe agreed. He picked up the glass paperweight and twisted it in his hands, making the rose inside stretch and refract into odd shapes.
Lore crossed to him. Took the paperweight and placed it gently back on the desk. “Give yourself some of that grace you were prattling on about, Mort,” she said softly.
And with that, Lore went into her room, still carrying her book of erotic poetry, and left the one-eyed monk staring into the dark.
She tried reading for maybe an hour or so, lighting the candle by her bedside when the sun completely slipped past the horizon. But the poetry was too flowery to really be titillating, and instead Lore found herself staring into the embroidered canopy over her head and thinking of the vaults.