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In my research fervor, I’ve been letting the good scholarly habits I learned in school and under my former mentor slide. I can almost hear one of the professors at Sovereign College chiding me. A healthy sitting position is essential to keep the body sound for long hours of reading in future years.
Maybe if my current line of inquiry didn’t feel so urgent, I’d find that maxim easier to remember.
The footsteps come to a stop at the doorway of the inner library room. Ivy peers inside with Casimir gazing over her shoulder. Ivy looks a little pensive, but the courtesan offers a smile sunny enough that I don’t think there’s any reason to worry.
At least, not any more than we already had.
“Can you put the books aside for a little while?” Ivy asks, a softer smile touching her own lips. “We figured it was about time you got some lunch into you.”
“And that you might appreciate some company for that lunch after all the time you’ve spent tucked away down here,” Casimir adds.
Before I can answer in words, my stomach rumbles, which I suppose is answer enough. With a bashful laugh, I get to my feet. “Thank you. My body is reminding me that I shouldn’t neglect it while I’m filling my head.”
Out of consideration for the many fragile documents in the library, my companions have set up their sort-of picnic on a low folding table in the fore-room at the bottom of the basement stairs. None of the books are kept there, only a small hearth and a few armchairs set along the walls for casual readers.
Stavros and Rheave are waiting for us, Stavros pouring out a ruddy juice into the glasses. He offers me a crooked grin. “I’d have brought wine, but I suspected you’d want to keep your thoughts as unmuddled as possible.”
Warmth forms in my chest at his recognition of and respect for my priorities. “That I do. Thank you.”
As I sit at one end of the table with Ivy and Casimir sinking down to complete the group, the warmth expands into a sense of total contentment. It’s a strange emotion to be feeling when we’re up against a country-wide conspiracy of sadistic sorcerers, but I can’t bear to dismiss it.
I’ve never had anything like this before—the kind of connection where you know you can count on each other no matter what you’re facing. Where you know you’re appreciated for who you are, not some task or favor that’s going to be asked of you.
My lover and my friends wanted to have lunch with me and make sure I knew they cared. I don’t know what kind of thanks could possibly express how much that means to me.
As is typical in the temple, the meal is simple fare but fresh: a salad of local greens, bread still warm from the oven, butter and cheese from the temple sheep—one of Elox’s symbolic animals. Every bite is deliciously tart or creamy.
As Rheave devours his own portion gleefully, he studies me from across the table. He pauses in between bites. “Have you found out anything interesting in all these books?”
I glance toward the stack I left behind with a regretful grimace. “Nothing in much detail so far, but I have a lot more to get through. And I suppose we don’t really know that Lothar will draw on actual historic rites with his new festival.”
Stavros hums. “It would make sense if he did at least a little, to give his ‘celebration’ an air of legitimacy. He might be a treacherous prick, but he’s a clever one.”
Ivy makes a face of disgust. “Yes, why invent a tribute to murder from scratch if you can simply borrow traditions from centuries ago?”
“Not just that.” Casimir’s voice is gentle but steady. “He may very well believe in his ideals of getting back to the ‘old ways’ and restoring the All-Giver, as awful as his methods are. In that case, it would make sense for him to incorporate as many of those old ways as he can.”
And that’s exactly why I’ve spent the past two days digging through every record from before the Darium invasion that I can find. The more we can anticipate what Lothar might enact with his soon-approaching festival, the more ideas we’ll have of how we can disrupt or make use of it to our own ends.
“I’ve found a few references that might point me in the right direction,” I say. “As soon as I find anything I think we should take into account, I’ll let you know.”
Ivy rests her hand on my arm. “We still have time. And if we can’t find anything that could help prepare us, we’ll just have to go and see it all with our own eyes. We’ve come up with pretty good plans in the moment before.”
We have, but I’d rather we went in prepared.
Once the meal is done and the remnants gathered, Ivy tugs me close for a quick kiss before following the other men upstairs. I return to my work with both my heart and my stomach full.
One avenue of research that’s been somewhat fruitful has been the oldest treatment records I’ve been able to unearth. I’ve come across an account of a patient treated by the temple devouts for a chemical burn it was hinted had something to do with a local celebration and another of a broken ankle sustained during a large-scale rumpus.
If any of those long-ago devouts were wordier in their accounts, I might get more details about exactly what those festivities and games entailed.
I finish paging through the book I was in the middle of and pick up another journal with handwriting so faded I find myself squinting even with the lantern near my shoulder. That volume does turn up another account of a similar burn, which the writer notes comes from a dye that’s apparently splashed around for reasons he doesn’t mention.
As I read, I jot down a few notes that I’m gradually assembling into a somewhat coherent picture.
The next book proves to be both incredibly brief in its notes and half-written in some private notation I can’t interpret. The volume I reach for after that I handle especially gingerly, careful of the flaking leather cover that drew me to it where it was buried at the back of a shelf.
It’s old enough that even the periodic waves of preservation magic cast through the library couldn’t totally protect it from the passage of time.
