Page 112 of Keldori By Daybreak

I chalked it up to Willow’s Grave being an uncommonly welcoming city, but when an older gentleman handed me a flower from his cart, he leaned in close.

“You’ll want to avoid the next street. The Barony guards like to get drinks there when they finish their shifts.”

I recoiled, and the man winked before pushing his cart down the street.

“He recognized me,” I said to Orla.

“You’re a wanted criminal,” she laughed nervously. “But we’ve eaten for free all day, and that nice lady did give me this bracelet.”

She held her hand out and the opal beads around her wrist glinted in the sunlight that filtered through the willow’s vines overhead.

“We don’t need bracelets,” I said, pulling Orla back towards the inn. “We need the library!”

The next morning, Tiernan waited for us in the tavern, his face heavy with fatigue but a satisfied smile playing across his face.

“I asked around about the library all night,” he said.

“And?” Ciarán pressed.

“And it’s real,” Tiernan continued, “but I wasn’t able to get much more out of the woman, because she told me Lysanor's library doesn’t allow men.”

“Lysanor?” Iseult gasped. “She said Lysanor?”

Tiernan nodded and bit into his poached eggs, still grinning.

“Your aunt?” Orla pressed.

“Yes.” Iseult dropped into a chair. “She’s alive. She’s here.”

“Then we leave now,” Ciarán said. “We have a lead. We can find the library today. Tiernan, where was this woman you spoke with?”

“You are going to bed,” I said. “You’ve been up all night.”

“But the library—”

“Doesn’t allow men,” I reminded him. “I’ll go with Orla and Iseult. You stay here and sleep. If we do find the library, we’ll be on the road again by tonight. I need you rested.”

Ciarán crossed his arms, his thoughts swarming against mine.

“Fine,” he conceded. “Get the journal and get out so we can leave.”

“Get the journal if it’s there,” Iseult said.

Ciarán scowled in reply and stood up.

“Wear a cloak,” he said in my head. “Keep your face hidden. We leave as soon as we have that book.”

Iseult took the lead through Willow’s Grave, weaving through markets and plazas. The snatches of sun that broke through the canopy of vines overhead warmed the stone walkways, but the shade of the petrified willow tree and its host of foliage kept us cool.

Tiernan had described the shopkeeper who had told him about the Library’s women only policy, and Iseult did most the talking when we found her sweeping the cobblestones outside her shop.

“Are you with that man from yesterday?” The woman clutched her broom and scanned our faces with a careful scowl. “He sent you, didn’t he? He’s not allowed in.”

“We are looking for the library for us,” Iseult insisted. “Lysanor's library, right?”

“I don’t know anyone by that name,” the woman said, but then her mouth dropped open as Iseult pulled her headscarf back to reveal her white hair. “It’s you! The woman with white hair who was seen entering Willow’s Grave with the new Saergrim.”

Iseult swore and hurried to pull her headscarf up, and Orla instinctively stepped in front of me to hide my face.