A dry and heady musk of vellum, parchment, ink and leather greeted Kaius as he entered the grand library of Baanswell. Dense mazes of stacks spilled through the open plan room that stretched across a full three quarters of the immense building's first floor. Warm yellow wardlights threw deep shadows as they spilled over overflowing shelves from the triple-vaulted ceiling. Combined, soft lighting and deep shadows muted the otherwise rich emeralds and deep ruby reds of the leather spines he could see in the shelves closest to him.

It was a daunting impression — a richness of history and tradition that extended far beyond the contents of the volumes the library held. The silence in the space was palpable and full of presence, like he’d stepped into a temple of the myriad gods. It weighed on him like a heavy blanket.

He found it surprisingly calming, in all honesty. Especially compared to the riot of noise and colour in the city outside.

Ahead of him, a woman with a shock of black hair tilted her head at him questioningly from behind her counter. Pale, yet saved from pallor by a lively warmth that shone from the half smile on her full lips. A librarian, by the looks of the gold broach in the shape of a quill and book that was pinned to her felted slate dress, the same colour as her eyes, glinting with honed insight.

She couldn’t have been more than a handful of years older than him — and she was very very pretty.

Her polite curiosity may as well have been a sharpened spear.

Mid step, he lurched forwards — catching his foot on something. It took him a bare moment to correct, swearing vengeance on the low step out of the doorway that he had somehow missed, but the damage was done.

A burning heat crept up the back of his neck as he felt the sheer weight of Porkchop’s amusement through their bond. Gods, even she was laughing at him. Politely behind her hand, but still.

Suppressing his desire to hurl himself out of the nearest window, Kaius quickly turned and clapped Ianmus on the shoulder.

“Ianmus, this is your domain, why don’t you talk to her — I wouldn’t have the faintest clue what to say,” he whispered as softly as he could, keeping his face perfectly straight — they could never know.

“I’m sure you wouldn’t,” Ianmus replied with a smirk, before he calmly stepped past him and walked towards the desk.

Oh gods. He spun, shooting Porkchop a glare. “You didn’t tell them, did you?!”

“Kaius, please take a look at your Dexterity for a moment, and then ask me again how we could possibly have missed you tripping over a bloody step. Also, I've seen cornered mice look less panicked."

A single glance confirmed that Kenva seemed to be doing her best not to laugh — and that the librarian was still looking at him with that half hidden smile on her face.

He was going to throw up. He couldn’t even leave — that would be so much worse.

“I have personally watched you impale yourself through the chest to kill a mantis three times your size without even flinching. You can’t be serious, Kaius,” Kenva whispered, leaning in.

“Shut it!” he hissed back — what if she heard!

For a moment, he seriously considered if he should use Compel Obsession to force everyone to stare at the ceiling while he ran away. Then, Ianmus reached the counter, and the siren call of those grey eyes vanished as she focused on his teammate. Her smile vanished in an instant, replaced by a prim professionalism. It was devastating.

“May I help you?” she asked. Though she didn’t whisper, her voice still had a feather touch.

Kaius decided that the bookshelves to their left were very interesting, though he took in absolutely none of it.

“You’re ridiculous," Porkchop said with amusement.

“Shut up.”

Ianmus, at least, seemed utterly at ease. “Hello, I was wondering if you’d be able to tell me if Archivist Kanmost was in — I'm an old acquaintance from Sunspire, and my team and I were hoping to meet with him. Otherwise, could you point us towards the pre-shattering history section?”

The librarian let out a contemplative hum. “Kanmost hasn’t been in today. A few days, really — but that’s not so strange for him. As for your other request, that’s easy. All ancient history is in the far left back corner of the library. Though, I'll warn you that most of the more substantive texts covering that period are in the restricted archives.”

“That’s more than fine,” Ianmus said warmly. “Do you know when the archivist might next be in?”

“Hard to say — he keeps an irregular schedule at the best of times, and he’s been deep in a research project for a few months now. Do you want me to take a message?”

“Just let him know Ianmus was hoping to speak with him — but we’ll likely be here quite frequently. We’ve got plenty to look through.”

“Will you now?”

Something about the way the librarian spoke forced him to look. Something about her inflection was just… captivating. They locked eyes — she’d been looking right at him, a half smile creeping up her face. The heat started to spread to his cheeks; her smile turned into a grin.

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When she looked back to Ianmus, the spell was broken. “I’ll let him know if I see him — did you need anything else?”

Ianmus shook his head. “No, no — you’ve been plenty helpful already.”

He led them deeper into the library immediately after — thank the gods. Kaius wasn’t even sure if he breathed until they were halfway to the back corner, some of his sense returning in the safety of the shadows of the stacks. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝔀𝓮𝒃𝙣𝓸𝒗𝒆𝒍.𝙘𝒐𝒎

Stopping mid-step, he planted his head on the edge of the nearest bookcase and let out a long, slow groan. Ianmus was there a moment later, leaning on his shoulder as he gave Kaius a wide grin.

He was doomed.

“Kill me and bury me in a shallow grave. Please,” he muttered.

Ianmus ignored his plea. “So. Librarians, eh?”

“I will let the next monster eat you.”

“Kaius! My friend! I am a mage of Mystral, believe me when I say I understand the allure! I’ve just never seen you quite so…spellbound. You didn’t hit yourself with a Compel Obsession by mistake, did you?”

“I’m letting the next monster eat you,” Kaius groaned. “Gods, that was embarrassing.”

“Chin up, she seemed to find it endearing," Porkchop chuffed.

Kaius shot up straight and spun around to face his team. Bastards looked delighted to the last. Still — endearing? He’d made an utter cock of himself.

“She did?”

Kenva sighed, shaking her head in faux-disapointment. “She did — I blame the fact that you’re a six and a half stride tall meatbrick and human women have terrible taste.”

He froze, entirely unsure what to do with that information.

“How. Please explain how you can face down monsters a dozen times your size, and this is what makes you flinch. She thinks you're pretty, you think she’s pretty — what’s scary about that?”

Everything!

“Monsters are easy! They just want to eat you alive—”

Kenva snorted, interrupting him. “She might have more in common with them than you might think.”

That was it — he couldn’t deal with this.

Kaius stormed off, heading towards the back corner of the library as he did his best to ignore the hushed giggles he left behind him. This was a betrayal of the highest order. They were here to research, not gossip like children! If the librarian had already left by the time they had to leave, all the better!

….

Running his hand over the spines of a row of books, Kaius felt the dust start to wad on his finger tips. The scent of old tomes was stronger here, verging on musty. Though that might have been the spotting — ‘foxing’, Ianmus had insisted — on the edges of the pages.

Just as the librarian had said, finding the ancient history section had been easy — but said section still easily held a hundred or more massive bookshelves, each packed to bursting with titles.

Nor was ancient history limited to works on the empire, either — by the library's definition, it covered everything from the Age of Dawn that followed the post-Shattering dark age, all the way through to a few limited texts on pre-System history.

In short, they had a lot of work to do to even find the relevant titles, let alone read through the books. That was without considering the restricted sections of the building, which supposedly numbered double the total volume of books, but were over represented by more ‘valuable’ knowledge than what they were looking through. Good thing he’d already resigned himself to this taking time.

At least it might mean he got to see more of that girl. She’d seemed so… sophisticated. Or something.

He shook his head, focusing on the brown leather spines he’d wiped cleared off, and read through the titles. ‘A History of Ancient Xentar’ — ten full volumes. That was not what he was looking for. Most of the others on the shelf weren’t much better, though he did recognise the country Yerlend from one of the titles. He couldn’t remember where from, but he was pretty sure that it was one of the larger nations on the continent at some point in the dark age.

He was getting closer.

Before he could move to the next shelf, a soft cough drew his attention. Kenva was leaning against a bookcase at the start of the aisle, a stack of tomes tucked under her arm.

“Hey,” she said, smiling at him.

“Hey.”

“Just thought I'd come check on you. You know we’re just teasing, right?”

Kaius sighed, crouching down as he kept searching through titles. “I know — and I don’t mind, not really. The gods know I'd do the same. Just wasn’t exactly my best performance, y’know.”

Snorting softly, she walked over and crouched down next to him, and made a perfunctory effort at pretending to read titles.

“Have you… had much experience? With women?”

Rotten roots, he’d made such an ass out of himself that Kenva was trying to help. He loved her for that, but gods.

“Well, growing up in the forest with only your father for company wasn’t the most conducive lifestyle for meeting girls,” he said, drawing another soft laugh from his friend. “But I've made my grand escape under the cover of night from a handful of barns in my time. We rarely left the Sea — but we did visit the nearby villages for supplies every now and then.”

“Evocative. What was with the shrinking violet impression, then?”

Kaius gave her a flat look. “I wonder why a forest boy who went a full year without human contact might be a little intimidated by a well-dressed, educated woman who looked that good.”

“You’ve got me there — you really should try talk to her though. She was definitely interested.”

Kaius hesitated — did he even have the time? “Maybe, and that’s not just my nerves talking. I’ve sort of got a lot on my plate with the whole blood-debt and end of the world thing.”

To his surprise, Kenva rolled her eyes. “You don’t need to marry her Kaius. A little fun would be good for you, and we’re likely going to be in Baanswell for at least a few months. Besides, she was salivating, not swooning.”

“Kenva!” he hissed, swatting her on the arm. It only made her cackle.

She stood, grabbing her stack of books. “Come on, we’ve set up a table, and these look promising,” she said, patting the stack.

“Oh?” Kaius questioned, eying them as he followed her.

“Lost Heraldries, volumes one to five.”

That did sound promising.