The Palace of Glass (27 page)

Slowly, the tip of each tentacle began to fade, coming apart into black mist. The disintegration sped up as it went, racing along the limbs to the hulking main body of the thing, no longer even vaguely human. With a final blast of static, the Ouroborean came apart, exploding into a dark fog that quickly faded altogether.

Helga smiled, wheezing, one hand pressed to a dark stain on her stomach.

“Ha,” Helga said. “A good fight.”

Then she collapsed, and Erdrodr went back to screaming.

DECLARATION OF WAR

S
HE I
S A GOOD
girl, but over-inclined to worry,” Helga said. “It will take a great deal more than this to slay Helga the Ice Flower!”

“She wasn't the only one who was worried,” Alice said.

She was sitting cross-legged beside the makeshift bed they'd made for Helga in an alcove of the library, out of several sets of bed linens and pillows from the house. Erdrodr lay curled up and asleep by her mother's side. Helga's wounds, and everyone else's, had been sealed by the same numbing ice they'd once used to treat Alice. The stuff went on like a thick plaster, and it apparently worked wonders, since Helga was already sitting up in bed.

I'll have to get her to leave some of it here.
Having something better for first aid than a bandage would be welcome.

“I'll admit it was a hotter battle than I'd anticipated,” Helga said. “Had I the time, I'd have brought a few more of my warriors along.”

“We're just lucky you were in the fire-sprite village when Isaac got there,” Alice said.

She'd sent Isaac running for the portal-book, looking for anything that might help stop the Ouroborean. Since summoned creatures and magic were useless, she'd reasoned that regular spears and axes might help.
But if Helga hadn't been there . . .
Flicker and Actinia had defied their elder's order and come to her aid, but on their own, Alice wasn't sure they'd have been enough.

“Lucky for both of us. I got to repay my debt to you, for keeping my willful daughter safe.” Helga stroked Erdrodr's hair fondly. “She is a warrior after all.”

Looking at the two of them, mother and daughter, made something in Alice's chest ache. She did her best to smile. “She's a warrior
and
an artist.”

“True enough.”

“Thank you,” Alice said. “For everything. This was all my fault.”

“And you took responsibility for it.” Helga waved a hand. “I understood only a little of what your Isaac said, but this creature would have threatened our world too. Better to fight it here, with you at our side.”

“He's not really
my
Isaac,” Alice muttered.

“No? I hear his voice when he speaks of you, and I think . . .” Helga gave a crafty smile. “Well. You are young. You will learn, in time.”

Alice, blushing, wondered exactly how much Helga could know about it. She'd yet to work up the courage to ask if there
were
male ice giants and, if so, what role they played. Fortunately, she was saved from further discussion on the subject by a faint scrape of claws on stone. Alice looked around and found Ending's yellow eyes gleaming from the shadows of the nearest library aisle.

“Ah,” Helga said, her own eyes narrowing. “You had better go.”

Alice nodded and got to her feet. Ending's tail whipped back and forth, slashing the air like a metronome.

“Alice,” she rumbled. “Will you walk with me?”

Alice fell into step beside the huge cat. “Is everything all right?” she said. “With your siblings, I mean.”

“For now,” Ending said. “The other labyrinthine have retreated, and we can expect a breathing space. The old
Readers cannot be certain what happened, but fear of the Ouroborean will keep them away for a time.”

“How long do we have?”

“I cannot say with certainty. Weeks, perhaps a month. Even if they dare not use the portals, they can send creatures to spy on us across the physical world.”

A month.
Compared to the frantic pace of the last twenty-four hours, it seemed like an eternity, but also like no time at all.
How much can we possibly accomplish in a month?

Into the silence that followed, Ending said, “I am sorry.”

“For what?”

“I told you to find
The Infinite Prison
. I knew using it on Geryon would free whatever was inside, but I assumed it would be something I could easily deal with. I never expected the Ouroborean. Its very presence tore up the labyrinth and blinded me to what had happened. I was . . . too confident.” She paused. “I asked Ashes to tell you to run.”

“He did,” Alice said. “Did you really expect me to?”

“No,” the big cat said. “I expected you to die.”

Another pointed silence.

“I'm sorry to have disappointed you,” Alice said.

Ending turned her head toward Alice and gave
her a
toothy smile. “I should have known better. You have a habit of doing the impossible.” The labyrinthine stopped just ahead of another intersection. “What will you do now?”

“I thought about that, a little,” Alice said.

“And?”

Alice laid out her plan, trying hard not to stammer. When she was finished, Ending blinked slowly, and then gave a deep, rumbling chuckle.

“You don't think it will work?” Alice said.

“I'm not in a position to say,” Ending said. “I believe you are the one I have been looking for all these years.”

“Someone you can work with,” Alice said. “A partner, instead of a master.”

“A rare thing. A Reader who does not think like a Reader,” Ending said. “Who turns against abusing her power. Why?”

“Because it's wrong. It's cruel.”

“Rare indeed,” Ending murmured.

“You'll help?” Alice hesitated. “I don't think I can do it without you. I never would have gotten
this
far without you.”

“At this point, I have little choice,” Ending said. “My lot is cast. But for what it is worth, I think you are right. I will help as best I can.”

“Thank you.”

On impulse, Alice reached out to touch the fur on Ending's shoulder. Her hand sank into it, the downy black softer than the softest of pillows. Ending's tail lashed again.

“They are waiting for you, by Mr. Wurms' table,” Ending said. “The library creatures and the apprentices. I asked Ashes to bring them together. You had better speak to them.”

Alice nodded, then thought of something and swallowed hard. “What about . . . Ellen? Is she . . .”

“I have put her body somewhere safe,” Ending said gently. “When we are finished, I will show you a place where she can be buried.”

“Thank you.” Alice straightened up. “I guess it's time to face the crowd, then.”

“It is.”

She gave a weak chuckle. “I think the Ouroborean was less terrifying.”

“Was it?” Ending said.

Alice shook her head. “No.”

She took a deep breath and stepped around the corner, from
here
to
there
.

They were all gathered, all the creatures who'd come to her looking for reassurance after Geryon had disappeared—the clockwork spider, the sprites, the woman in bones, the bent-backed old man with his mushrooms. There was no sign of Mr. Black, but Mr. Wurms was there, having crawled out of who-knew-what hidey-hole. Helga was still in bed, of course, but Erdrodr stood at the edge of the crowd, her slate out, sketching frantically. Flicker and Actinia were in the front row, long black spears at their sides.

The other apprentices were there too. Isaac, Dex, Michael, and Jen stood together, a little separate from the rest. They were covered in patches of healing ice, and looked worried and exhausted.
And no wonder. I was fighting to defend
my
home. They may have lost theirs. They can't go back to their masters, not now.

Ashes walked back and forth on the now bench-less table, stepping lightly over the scattered books.

“Thank goodness,” he said, when Alice arrived. “This lot is getting fractious. I—
hey!”

Alice scooped the cat into her arms and planted a kiss on his fuzzy forehead.

“What was that for?” Ashes sputtered. “What have I ever done to deserve that?”

“I wanted to say thank you,” Alice said, putting him on the ground. “For everything.”

“Yes, well. Far be it from me to dispute my own heroism,” Ashes muttered. “But proper thanks should involve tuna.”

Alice laughed. “I'll keep that in mind.”

She clambered onto the table and raised her hands for silence. This time, the murmuring died away easily, and she felt every eye fixed on her. Alice looked out over the crowd and suddenly felt the weight of her exhaustion.
It's been a very long day.

“My name is Alice Creighton,” she said. “I am a Reader.”

Near the back, someone coughed. The clockwork spider hummed and clanked.

“Master Geryon took me as his apprentice when he found out I had the Reader talent. He didn't give me a choice, or”—Alice found Emma's blank face in the crowd, beside Mr. Wurms—“not
much
of a choice. The same is true of all the other apprentices I've met. I imagine it's not too different for most of you.” She nodded at Flicker. “The fire-sprites, say, didn't ask to be part of Geryon's . . .
empire, his domain, whatever you want to call it. But it was that, or be prey for one of the other Readers.”

“Everybody knows all of that,” the bone woman called out.

“I know.” Alice took another deep breath. “I went to Esau's fortress hoping to find out what happened to my father. I had thought he might be alive somewhere. I was wrong. He's dead, and Geryon and Esau killed him.”

She heard a gasp from Dex and pushed on in spite of the pain in her chest.

“I wanted revenge. I went looking for a way to get it, and I found one. I trapped Geryon in a place where he'll never be able to hurt anyone ever again.”

That
brought a mutter from the crowd. The clockwork spider raised a sign that said, QUERY: HOW? Others shouted or shook their fists, at her or at one another.

“What's important,” Alice said, raising her voice, “is that I didn't think about what would happen afterward. To me, and to all of you. I want to apologize for that.”

“Fat lot of good that does us,” the bone woman said. “It's too late!”

“It is too late,” Alice agreed over a number of similar shouts. “All I can tell you is what I'm going to do now.”

“You're going to take his place!” said one of the sprites.

“No. I won't. I won't because no one
should
have that kind of power. All of this”—she spread her hands to encompass the library with its millions of books, the estate, the whole world—“is a system the old Readers created for their own benefit. They'll do anything to defend it. When they realized that the Ouroborean was loose, they sent a spell here that would have walled off the library, leaving everyone in it to die. It would have killed their own apprentices, but that didn't stop them.

“If they were scared before, now they'll be terrified. We've
beaten
the Ouroborean. We're a threat to them. They may wait for a while, but they'll be back.”

Silence had returned. Even the spider had quieted herself. Alice hesitated, just for a moment.

“I'm going to fight them,” she said. “I'm going to tear it all down, the whole thing. The libraries, the prison-books, the tribute. Everything. I'm going to take away every bit of power they've ever used to hurt anyone, in any world. They've controlled us for long enough.

“I don't know if I'll win. But I do know I'm going to need help. Ending asked me to be a different kind of Reader, a partner instead of a master. So that's what I'm going to do. You're all welcome to join me.”

In the deepest recesses of her heart, she'd expected
cheers. Applause, at least.
Something
. But the crowd of strange creatures simply stood, silent, as though they'd all been hypnotized. Then the spider's sign clicked and whirred.

HYPOTHESIS:, she said. SUICIDAL INSANITY.

That broke the spell. Everyone was suddenly talking at once, arguments rising in a dozen places, a babble of voices that threatened to overwhelm her. Alice hopped down from the table and went to her fellow apprentices, who stood in a tight group off to one side.