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January 1 - January 9, 2021
By now you’re wondering what we actually decided about your apprentice. It was nearly sent back to committee for another discussion, with a due date of this time next year. However, I’m glad to say that we do have an answer. Or at least, a partial answer.
She’d bisected the table between them with a barricade composed of the teapot and cake-stand, an unofficial declaration that she wasn’t interested in conversation.
“What I want,” Catherine said quietly but emphatically, “is access to the Library. I want to get in among those books. If Irene can do that for me, for all I care, my uncle can fornicate until syphilis makes his private parts drop off.”
“Excuse me!” The waitress had raised her voice. As Kai and Catherine both turned to glare at her, she said, “There’s something you should know, sir, madam.” “And what is that?” Kai snapped. “You’ve both been poisoned.” She folded her hands primly in front of her. “But please don’t let me interrupt you. I can wait.”
“Did you know that it’s possible to extract a lethal poison from castor-oil plants?” Ricin. Kai maintained his ruthless smile, but inwardly he sighed in relief. Ricin was toxic in food, but it wasn’t as bad as if they’d inhaled it. Assuming they received proper medical treatment within six hours or so, they should be fine. “Oh, that,” he said. “Should I be worried? It’s not as if I’m suffering from anything that would require a dose of castor oil.”
“This is not the serene life of reading and study I expected,” Catherine muttered. She hunched her shoulders defensively, looking thoroughly miserable. “And I’ve been poisoned.”
“The Order of St. Anastasia. It’s one of those situations where an order of nuns become experts at treating poisons, everyone suspects they’re really poisoners, multiple cardinals die, they have to flee for their lives . . . then they save a king’s sister from dying and he builds them a secret nunnery. You know how it goes.” “Oh, that happens all the time,” Kai agreed.
“Does this mean we can sue the British Secret Service?” Catherine asked. “No,” Irene said. “They get very unhappy about people trying to sue them. The last person who tried was jailed for indecency with public transport—” “With or on?” “With. It was complicated
Lord Silver’s not too fond of rain—unless he’s bathing naked on the roof. In company.”
“With the utmost respect, anyone who knows you would expect you to investigate a potentially dangerous door while already facing a life-or-death situation.”
I’ll take a room at Claridge’s.
“Catherine . . . your uncle assured me that you were ‘of age’ and that you were experienced and reliable. That I shouldn’t make any judgements based on your appearance. In retrospect, he was trying to make me think you were older than you look, wasn’t he? Just how old are you?” “Twenty-five,” Catherine said brazenly. Irene met her gaze. “. . . next year.” Irene stayed silent. “Okay, I’m twenty-three.” Irene raised her eyebrows. “Twenty-one?” Catherine said hopefully. “Just tell me which side of eighteen you are,” Irene said wearily. “I’m eighteen in five months’ time,” Catherine muttered. “And
...more
“How do you know all this, sir?” Kai asked. “I know people,” Lord Zhang Yi said dismissively. “High-level people. I read their emails.” Kai wondered whether that meant I read emails from them or I have access to their email accounts—and they are blissfully ignorant of that fact.
You pay your taxes, Miss Winters, don’t you?” “Of course,” Irene said, leaving out on my legal earnings, at least. “Very well; think of this help as a state benefit.” Leaving Irene feeling rather as if she’d been stampeded by a previously helpful sheep,
This is the police talking.
The dragon—no, make that both dragons—may be useful political hostages. I don’t know where the second one came from. Do you go round collecting them?” “They’re like buses. You wait for one, and then half a dozen turn up at once.”
“I’m not sure you’re good for my moral development,” Catherine muttered. “I said I’d teach you to be a Librarian,” Irene replied. “Moral development is an optional extra—
“Why so horrified, Miss Winters? Have you never loved anyone so much that you’d break all laws, natural and supernatural, to get them back?”
“What will your lover say if you hand over his brother, so I can core out his personality like an apple and use his body?”
Irene raised her bandaged wrist. “I used my own blood—and the fact that we’re both Librarians, so metaphorically related.” A Kipling quote came to mind. “‘We be of one blood, thou and I.’” Alberich frowned. “That shouldn’t have worked.” “But it did,” Irene said, a little smugly. “No, really, it shouldn’t. My work was far more precise than that—metaphors shouldn’t have done the job.”
“I don’t like to go where I’m not invited.” “Isn’t that vampires?” Catherine asked. She set her jaw mutinously when Alberich turned to look at her with a vivisectionist’s eye. “Don’t tell me. You’re the origin of all vampire stories.” “Oh, it’s worse than that,” Alberich said. “Much worse.
“You’re the one with the closest relationship to the living mortals who work here. Why was it permitted?” She spread her hands. “I don’t know, my lords. I regularly curate the acquisition lists to check these risks are managed—but somehow it slipped past. As to why she was given the assignment, I don’t understand that either. I sometimes think . . .”
This is a librarian in the conspiracy talking. We don't know what conspiracy. We don't know who they are. Maybe fae?
