Page 16 of The Book That Wouldn't Burn

“Little fucker...”

A man had been sitting on the steps between the third and fourth door, up near the top, the only person seated. Livira hadn’t seen him until he stood, for his robe was the same dark grey as the stone, and although he didn’t look old, his hair was white as bone. Now he was descending in her direction.

She kept going, angling across the steps rather than up them, stopping only when level with the fifth door. The golden-haired boy was already at the entrance, being spoken to by the white-robe on duty there. Back at the base of the pillars, brows were elevating among the lords and ladies preparing to send forth their progeny. Livira, about halfway up the fifty-yard flight of steps, scowled back at them. She’d heard about kings and emperors in the dark-time stories of course. The bit she never understood was why anyone did what they said. Soldiers, her aunt would say. The king has soldiers. But why, Livira asked, did the soldiers do what he said? None of it made sense to her. Her aunt would tell her not to spoil the story with all her questions. Malar was the only soldier here, and it didn’t seem as if he was going to stop her.

Livira looked down on the princess in green and gold emerging from the velvet ranks at the foot of the steps. The city had thrust a sense of smallness and dirtiness upon Livira as she entered it, but the anger she’d carried with her from the Dust had started to burn through. The girl now climbing towards her might look like a king’s daughter plucked from the tales, and perhaps her garden did have silver trees with golden fruit. But none of that made Livira think she should get out of her way. Instead Livira turned resolutely towards the fifth door, ignoring Malar’s wide-eyed silent entreaties, and climbed towards it, increasing her pace slightly to prevent the man in grey from catching up.

The boy had already gone in by the time Livira presented herself at the door. The guardian in the white robe was tall, hunched, and old—older than anyone Livira knew. His hair was as white as his garment, his face as crumpled as the triangle of parchment Livira kept in her pocket. He squinted down at her with faded blue eyes and a puzzled frown.

“And what can I do for you, young lady?” Like Malar he spoke his words with strange edges on them that tried to hide the meaning, though they were not the same edges.

Livira had been planning to say that she wanted to be allocated. Now she realised that even if the ancient’s eyesight wasn’t sharp enough for him to be entirely certain that she didn’t fit, his ears would tell him so as soon as she spoke. She could say whatever she liked: what he would hear was “dust-rat.”

The old man cocked his head to the side, inviting her answer.

Livira drew a deep breath, her heart pounding. She would rather dive into another dust-bear than be turned away with the princess behind her watching, and to have to trudge shame-footed past the sneering girl in red to face Malar’s wrath. She’d done it to herself. Everything else since the sabbers came had been done to her—but this, this she had done to herself. She growled.

“Your pardon?” The white-robe frowned, adding more wrinkles to his already impressive array.

Livira snarled, growled deep in her throat and released it. “T’loth criis’tyla loddotis.”

Two white eyebrows shot up and a strange delight lit the ancient’s face. He clapped his hands together gently. “Have you indeed?” He glanced away towards the approaching man in grey, decades his junior but with hair even whiter. He frowned and pressed his lips into a flat line. “I’m afraid, young lady, that I must respectfully—”

“Wait.” The man in grey reached them. His skin was as pale as milk and he watched Livira unsmiling, from beneath white eyebrows. He carried a peculiar, bulky walking cane, though he didn’t use it for support. “Why not let her in, Hendron? I want to see what they make of her.”

Hendron’s own smile returned. He turned and reached for the black iron knocker at the centre of the door, banging it three times.

“Good luck, child,” the man in grey said seriously. “You’ll need it.” He inclined his head towards Livira. She saw now that even his eyelashes were white, guarding pink eyes that studied her with a consuming intensity. Nobody had ever shown even a fraction of the interest in Livira that this stranger did right now. Except perhaps Ella, on the rare occasions when the old woman wasn’t busy with her wind-weed or the necessities of scratching a life from the Dust. With his unworldly eyes, the man seemed somehow stranger to her than the sabbers had. And almost as unnerving.

As the door swung open the princess in green and gold arrived. Livira was pleased to see that close up the girl’s face was less perfect than she had imagined and a sheen of sweat glistened on her brow.

“You may go through too, Serra Leetar.” The white-robe made the smallest of bows in the girl’s direction and held the door for both of them. As Livira passed him he offered a small smile. “Those were big words for a young girl. I hope you can live up to them.”

The guard who had opened the door from the inside gestured with his large-knuckled hand, indicating Livira and the princess should move on. A corridor stretched before them, lit by lanterns, with no side doors to worry about. Livira strode down it, her overlong cloak swishing behind her, the stone cold beneath bare feet. Serra Leetar followed. Livira could almost hear the girl’s curiosity battling her distaste.

Finally, halfway down the corridor, the girl snapped, “What did you say to him?”

Rather than admit that she had no idea what the words meant, and that she had just repeated the sounds the sabber made, Livira gave her own translation.

“I declared war.”

... debate of carrot or stick. And for many children these are valid considerations. Marquart, however, reminds us that for some few, a stick would be required to keep them from such knowledge rather than drive them to it. It is important to investigate the origin and breeding of these outliers. Such a child is a spark, and only a fool invites fire into their library.

On the Education of the Lower Classes, by Einald, Duke of Ferra

CHAPTER 7

Livira

Livira emerged from the corridor into a large chamber taller than it was wide. Sunlight decorated the wall to her left and half the black floor, streaming down through the perforated ceiling far above them. Livira looked up to see the blue sky divided into a thousand shapes and when she returned her gaze to the room she saw only after-images.

For a long moment she stood swaying, dizzy with more than just hunger now, teetering on the edge of a faint. Too little sleep, too much stress, and plenty of exhaustion all chose this moment to catch up with her.

“You’re first.” Serra Leetar pushed her shoulder. “Gods know what they’ll do with you! I’m to be allocated to the university. Embassy service wouldn’t suit me, and the laboratory is right out.” She said this last one with a shiver.

Blinking, Livira noted that the girl’s sleeve of green slashed with gold was further decorated with minute embroidery picking out the same kind of geometric patterns that pierced the roof. Malar’s cloak, which was by far the finest garment she had ever owned or even touched, seemed suddenly shabby. She shook the fuzziness from her head and looked to see what the princess was pushing her towards.

Four tables stood by the light-dappled wall. A figure seated at each. And behind them three corridors led off. The golden-haired boy was leaving the first table and walking towards the second, a tall, raven-haired girl was at the fourth. A small group of children had collected by the leftmost of the three exits, two others stood at the exit to the right, none at the middle one. Livira had no idea what a laboratory was, but it sounded bad.

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