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  “With the right level of dedication, almost anything can be taught.”

  Again, that wasn’t exactly an answer. And he was now just repeating himself from earlier.

  “Is that a yes?”

  The man’s cloaked shoulders rose and fell in a shrug. “It is not a no.”

  Alex frowned at him. “Could you be less vague? The fate of the world kind of rests on your answer.”

  “Tenacious you might be, but I see you also tend towards the dramatic.”

  Closing her eyes and counting to ten, Alex waited until her urge to throw a burning log at his head passed before she spoke. When she did, her voice was hushed, serious. “You seem to know more about me than most, so don’t act like you’re ignorant of what’s happening out there and the role I have to play in it. Tell me right now—are you just wasting my time, or can you teach me what I need to know?”

  A shuffle of material as he shifted in the seat. A long moment of weighted quiet. And then, “I can teach you what you need to know. However,”—he pointed a gloved finger at her—“whether you will learn is something only you can decide.”

  “I’ll do whatever it takes,” Alex whispered her promise.

  “I know you will, Alexandra Jennings. You showed me that in ten hours, fifty-four minutes and thirty-two seconds. That dedication is the only reason I’m agreeing to help you. Because without it, you would fail before we even began. And I don’t need to tell you what that would mean for this world.”

  Alex drew her legs up and, ignoring the throbbing pain, wrapped her arms around her knees, staring into the fire while slowly nodding.

  “What happens now?” she asked, her voice hesitant.

  This time, he didn’t make her wait. “As you have likely guessed, we are currently confined within the walls of the Library. But before you interrupt with the questions I can see in your eyes, no, I am not Chosen, nor have I ever been a headmaster of Akarnae. I am also not Meyarin, thus I am not in any way related to Eanraka. The reason I can wander these halls and utilise the secrets within is not knowledge you have yet earned, so do not ask.”

  Alex hadn’t seen the man’s face, let alone learned his name, so while he clearly knew her secrets, she wasn’t surprised that he didn’t plan on sharing his own.

  “All you need to know is, while in here, my authority supersedes yours.”

  “Is that why I couldn’t open a door to leave the lake?” Alex asked.

  A dip of his cloaked head was all the confirmation she received. “The Library, as you know, is sentient. As such, it understands that there will be times when you will have to struggle through obstacles to learn the things you need to learn.”

  He leaned towards her, his posture demanding her full attention as he continued, “Make no mistake, Alexandra. There will be nothing easy about the tasks I set you.” He waved a gloved hand in her direction. “Consider your gift as a muscle. You cannot strengthen it without hard work, discipline and patience. It must be pushed to its limits—just as you will be.”

  Alex drew even tighter into herself, uneasy about what she might have to endure under his tutelage.

  “Now,” he said, sitting back again, “presuming you still wish to continue, I have one requirement and one rule. The requirement is that you tell no one about me. You may share that you are attempting to strengthen your gift, but you will give no other details about how that is being done or who is teaching you.” He hesitated before allowing, “The only exception is the Meyarin to whom you are mentally bound, though you must swear him to silence.”

  Alex didn’t like the idea of keeping such an important secret from her friends, but if that was the price she had to pay, then so be it.

  “As for the rule, there is just the one,” the man continued. “Break it once, and you’ll experience my displeasure. Break it twice, and you will no longer be my student.”

  From her huddled position on the ground, Alex raised her eyebrows. “And that rule is?”

  “Never question my training methods,” he told her. “Everything I do is for a reason, whether you comprehend that reason or not. I will suffer no demands for explanations. You either follow my instructions without comment, or we’re finished.”

  Well. That was about as black and white as he could make it. No room for ambiguity there.

  “So,” Alex said, “what you’re saying is, it’s your way or the highway?”

  Predictably, he didn’t respond. Until he did.

  “That, Alexandra, sounds very much like you questioning me.”

  Crap.

  “I—”

  “But since we have not officially begun your training, I’ll allow you a grace period—for today only.”

  Alex swallowed. “Uh. Thanks. And, um, sorry. Habit, and all that.”

  “A habit that you’ll want to break swiftly if you plan on spending any time with me.”

  Nodding, she muttered, “Duly noted.”

  The man stood. “You’ve had enough for now.”

  With his words, the armchair disappeared, as did the fireplace and the rug, along with the nothingness of the rest of the space around them. Instead, Alex found herself still curled in a ball but now sitting on the rocky ground in a familiar underground cavern divided by a narrow river—the place where she’d first discovered she could step back through to Freya.

  “Your curfew is ten pm,” the man said. “You will therefore meet me here every evening promptly at nine. How long we train each night will depend on how quickly you complete the tasks I set you, but the Library will ensure that, while you are with me, time will not pass for the rest of the world.”

  Alex opened her mouth to point out a problem, but he beat her to it.

  “On Tuesdays and Thursdays when you have your Stealth and Subterfuge class until nine-thirty, you will come here directly from there. Tardiness on any other day will be considered unacceptable.”

  This guy was something else.

  “Do we have an agreement?”

  Like I have much of a choice, Alex thought. Either she put up with a grumpy, monotonous taskmaster, or she didn’t. But since the latter would doom the entire world, her answer required little consideration.

  “Yes, we have an agreement,” Alex said, uncurling from her ball and rising to her feet. “Do you have a name? Or should I just keep calling you Mr. Mystery Man?”

  “If you do turn up for your first lesson tomorrow night, I shall give you a name. In the meantime, I suggest you get some rest—and some medical attention. You must be prepared to work tomorrow, and work hard.”

  With those sombre words of warning, he disappeared, leaving Alex alone in the cavern with a thousand questions and the knowledge that, thanks to his rules, she couldn’t ask any of them.

  Nine

  When Alex finally hobbled her way out of the Library, it was well past dinnertime and fast approaching curfew. This, however, was not a result of her nearly eleven-hour trek across the lake, since time had indeed paused while she’d laboured through her tasks. Instead it was because, after returning to the foyer of the Library with the intention of heading straight to Fletcher, hunting down some food and sleeping for the next twelve hours, Alex’s plans were derailed—all thanks to the prickly librarian.

  The moment his owlish eyes had spotted her through his comically thick glasses, he’d wagged a finger until she’d limped her weary, injured body to his desk.

  Barely peering up from the mess of papers in front of him, the librarian had made the obnoxious assumption that she’d had nothing better to do, and he’d insisted she help him clean the frames of the paintings that hung on the walls.

  Glancing apprehensively around the sizable foyer, Alex had known the task would be much more involved than it seemed, since the entire history of Medora was revealed through the paintings. As such, they were constantly self-updating, appearing and disappearing through the walls as they were swapped out and shuffled around by some invisible Library power. It could take years for them all to be clea
ned—if not longer.

  Stammering out an excuse hadn’t helped Alex, not even when she’d pointed to her blood-soaked jeans and said she needed to visit the Medical Ward. The librarian had simply flicked his goggling eyes to her bandaged leg for the briefest of seconds before turning back to his papers and saying, “It’s still attached. I’ll consider allowing you to leave if that changes.”

  Gaping at him, Alex had squeaked out, “Are you… Is that a joke?”

  His only response had been to sniff and turn his nose up while answering, “Dismemberment is no laughing matter. Really, Alexandra. Your sense of humour is sickening.”

  Alex hadn’t had any spare energy left to argue with him. She’d been cognisant enough to recognise he was lashing out irrationally, pinning his frustrations about the Meyarin situation and all it might lead to on her. So instead of fighting back, she’d taken the cleaning supplies he’d shoved towards her and dragged her failing body to the nearest wall.

  Her only break had come when the librarian had left his desk to assist a younger student who couldn’t remember the name of the book she was after. In the scant minutes he was gone, Alex had remembered to pull out her ComTCD—belatedly grateful that it was waterproof—and called Jordan. All she’d been able to offer was a quick assurance that she was back safe but stuck in the clutches of the unrelenting librarian—to which he’d been sympathetic but also amused—and promised she’d catch up with him and the others later.

  Later ended up being much, much later than anticipated. But finally the librarian was now satisfied with her cleaning enough to release her, saying that if she was ever bored again, there was always plenty of work he could find for her.

  Dead on her feet, Alex had neither the mental nor physical strength to respond. Instead, she stumbled out into the night, gritting her teeth through the pain she’d endured for the last seemingly endless hours.

  Just when she thought her unnaturally lengthened day couldn’t get any worse, she finally staggered into the Med Ward—only to find it empty.

  “Seriously?” Alex groaned as she looked around.

  Having no idea where Fletcher was or when he would return, Alex decided that if she wasn’t going to receive pain relief anytime soon, then she needed to at least be in the comfort of her own bed. So she called upon the last reserves of her Meyarin blood—since she was way past the limits of her mortal body—and hobbled back out of the Gen-Sec building, painstakingly making her way to her dorm.

  By the time she arrived in her darkened room, D.C. was already fast asleep. Not wanting to wake her, Alex didn’t turn the light on, she just blindly stumbled her way forward.

  With her eyes still adjusting to the darkness, Alex let out a startled yelp when she collapsed onto her bed only to discover it wasn’t cushiony like it should have been.

  … Because someone else was lying on it.

  Scrambling off the unknown figure, Alex was ready to scream bloody murder until a familiar voice broke through the haze of her alarm.

  “You’re not my favourite person right now, kitten.”

  Heart pounding, Alex gasped out, “Niyx?”

  Half a second later, the room flooded with light as Niyx turned on the power and returned to Alex’s side in record time. If she hadn’t tracked the movement, she would have wondered if he’d activated the Valispath for the quick manoeuvre.

  Taking stock of yet another surprise for the day, Alex’s concerned eyes swung over to where D.C. lay, but she was shocked to find her still fast asleep.

  “Don’t worry about her,” Niyx said, following Alex’s gaze. “She’ll be out of it until morning. You could set her hair on fire and she’d never know.”

  Alex turned back to him with a glare of suspicion. “What did you do to her?”

  Niyx grinned unrepentantly and flicked Alex’s nose with a playful finger. “Nothing you need to worry about. Plausible deniability, and all that.”

  Sighing loudly as she rubbed a weary hand across her eyes, Alex closed the distance between her and Niyx, collapsing forward and planting her face in his chest.

  He hesitated only a fraction of a second before wrapping his arms around her, supporting most of her weight as she leaned into him.

  “Today has been awful,” she mumbled into the material of his wintery cloak—something he hardly needed considering he barely felt the cold. “But I’m so happy to see you’re okay. You have no idea how worried I’ve been.”

  “‘Okay’ is a relative term,” Niyx said, pushing her from his body and gently onto the bed. “I meant what I said about you not being my favourite person at the moment.”

  Alex furrowed her brow. “What’d I do?”

  “That.” He pointed a finger towards her blood-soaked jeans.

  “And therefore, this.” His finger turned to his own leg, where silver blood stained his dark pants.

  “I’m so sorry,” Alex said, wincing. “I didn’t think—”

  “For light’s sake, eat this before you waste time apologising,” he interrupted, reaching into his cloak and shoving a handful of laendra into her open palm.

  Alex smiled tiredly at him. “My hero.”

  Scarcely chewing before she swallowed, Alex closed her eyes as she practically inhaled the glowing flower and felt the effect of its healing. Her relief was so acute that she could have wept.

  “Truly, Niyx,” she whispered as the pain disappeared entirely, along with her hunger and bone-weary exhaustion. “Thank you.”

  “Now that we’re not both bleeding to death, let me set the scene for you,” he said, standing in front of her with his arms crossed. “There I was in the middle of the throne room with not only Aven and his closest Garseth, but also his strongest mind reader, Signa Zu, the telekinetic Calista Maine, and half a dozen Claimed Zeltora, when suddenly I felt a stabbing pain and found my leg covered in blood.” His voice was pleasant, as if he was reciting events that happened to someone else. “Naturally, all eyes swung my way as I clutched at my wound. So, to cover, do you know what I did?”

  Alex bit her lip and shook her head.

  “I am Niyx Raedon, firstborn son to Cykor and Kosett, and heir to House Raedon of the Meyarin High Court,” Niyx said, most of which Alex already knew. “I’m also a Zeltora-ranked warrior, and the only reason I wasn’t actively serving in the elite guard before my imprisonment was due to the obligations required of me as heir to my House.”

  That Alex hadn’t known, but she didn’t attempt to say as much since his blazing amethyst eyes warned her to keep silent.

  “Given all that, I’m sure you can appreciate that I wasn’t pleased when, in order to come up with an excuse for your unexpected wound, I knew I had only one choice.”

  Hesitant, Alex asked, “What did you do?”

  Niyx speared her with a look. “I told them all that I’d accidentally stabbed myself in the leg.”

  Alex bit her lip again—but this time to keep from bursting into laughter. “You did what?”

  “By the stars!” Niyx ran agitated fingers through his hair. “I’ve never felt more humiliated in my life!” He slumped onto the bed beside her with a belligerent scowl. “I don’t know what’s worse—having to admit to doing something so foolish, or the fact that they believed me.”

  Alex didn’t say anything. She couldn’t, in fact, because she was shaking with laughter and wasn’t willing to risk opening her mouth and inciting his wrath.

  “Ergo,” he finished, his narrowed eyes showing he hadn’t failed to notice her humour, “you are not my favourite person today.”

  Alex hoped he couldn’t see the amused tears welling in her eyes. When she finally had a handle on herself again, she said, “I can see how that might have been unpleasant.”

  Niyx made a growling sound from the back of his throat. But then he sighed and peered at her with concern. “Not unpleasant enough that I didn’t spend all day worrying about you, kitten.”

  His words filled Alex with warmth. “I’m okay, Niyx.” At his disbeliev
ing look, she amended, “Or, I am now, thanks to you and your laendra.”

  “What happened, Aeylia?” he asked, using the name he was most familiar with. “And why didn’t you seek medical attention sooner?”

  Shuffling into a more comfortable position, Alex told him of her day, from her time in Tryllin to Gaiel’s attack in Draekora, including the settlement’s depleted laendra supplies. She then shared her entire Mr. Mystery Man lake experience, before finishing with her grumpy-librarian encounter and her absentee doctor.

  “And I thought my day was rough,” Niyx said.

  “Told you it was awful,” Alex said around a yawn. The laendra had taken the edge off her exhaustion, but she’d essentially lived almost half a day more than everyone else.

  “It’s interesting—I’m curious what would have happened if you’d been injured while inside the Library,” Niyx mused. “I’m not sure I would have known, not until you’d left the time-space vacuum and stepped out into the real world again.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because if that lake was as icy as you say, then I should have at least felt the phantom cold of your physical distress. Plus, time had paused for me, remember? The world didn’t start again until you stepped back into it.”

  Alex realised he was right. “Note to self: injuries in the Library, okay. Injuries outside the Library, not good for Niyx’s street cred.”

  Rolling his eyes at her, Niyx said, “There’s at least one good thing we’ve learned today.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You know how I wasn’t sure if my link to you would protect me from mental gifts in Aven’s army?”

  “Uh-huh,” Alex said.

  “Well, like I mentioned before, Signa was in the room when Gaiel daggered you,” Niyx said. “Knowing you must have been hurt, my thoughts naturally jumped to you before I could get a lock on them.”

  Alex turned rigid.

  “Do they know?” she gasped out. “Are you in danger?”

  “That’s the thing,” Niyx said. “Signa didn’t blink. Not even when I risked double checking by mentally yelling creative instructions for where Aven should shove his new throne.”