Page 129 of Threadbound

Jamie sat down and opened up his laptop, half-watching Bran as the fae shifted in the old wooden chair across the table. “I dinna understand why they hide the books away from everyone, anyway,” he muttered.

“They’re fragile,” Jamie replied.

Bran waved a hand. “We have books a thousand years old.”

“You also have magic,” Jamie pointed out. Not that he knew anything about it, but he was fairly certain that they wouldn’t treat thousand-year-old books so casually if they didn’t have some sort of magical preservation.

Bran blinked. “Aye, that’s true,” he said after a pause.

The sour librarian appeared, then, with the book in question, and Jamie made space on the table for her to lay out the book on foam blocks to protect the binding. Bran and Jamie were then given a lecture about what they were and were not allowed to do—no flash photography or scanning, no marking the pages, and so on—before she left them alone with the volume and a final, disdainful sniff.

Jamie transcribed the text directly into a text file while Bran—who didn’t actually know how to use a computer, although Jamie had started to teach him—quickly and accurately copied the sketched plants, nuts, and other objects drawn in the recipes or margins.

Jamie found himself impressed with Bran’s artistic skill—Jamie wasn’t terrible, but Bran was much, much better.

Even though they’d gotten there early in the day, they worked straight through lunch, Jamie ignoring the hollow in his stomach so that they could keep going. He’d have ignored it a lot longer if it would ease the stress lines around Bran’s emerald eyes and full mouth.

And then they did it again the next day.

And the next.

Jamie was really starting to hate C.R.M. Breabadair, whoever they were. The hand was the same throughout the book, which was at least a blessing, since once they got used to C.R.M.’s scrawl-like penmanship, the transcription went a lot faster.

But by the end of the third day, they’d managed to copy down pretty much everything in the admittedly fairly slim volume. Jamie was fairly certain most of it was completely useless—not just relative to Cairn’s illness, but toanything—and another quarter to three-eighths probably unrelated, including one very bizarre love spell for cattle, although Jamie wasn’t certain if it was to make two cows fall in love with each other or… He didn’t really want to think too hard about it. There were a few other recipes—besides theDraught for the Breathing Dead—that had to do with illness or antidotes that Bran had drawn his attention to this ingredient or that one, although Jamie hadn’t recognized any of them.

Jamie filed the different recipes and prayers and spells in different places on his computer, depending on their ostensible category, and Bran had a stack of carefully labeled sketches, several of which he’d annotated with other sketches, even more impressive in that they were entirely from memory.

Exhausted and hungry, Jamie had insisted that Bran go back to the apartment while he stopped to grab curry for their dinner.

Bran had been asleep, curled on his side on the bed, when Jamie got home.

Jamie felt a surge of borderline panic as he watched Bran sleep—not because it looked like anything was wrong, but because he viscerally remembered being unable to wake Bran up after he had been attacked by thegeàrd soilleir.

He’s better, Jamie reminded himself.He’s not the one dying. It felt a little callous to be relieved by that, since Jamie did hopethey’d be able to help Cairn, but if he had to choose… There was no question that Jamie would put Bran first. Even if Bran didn’t.

That was a sobering thought.

Because Jamie had the feeling that Bran was absolutely willing to give his life for his father.

Jamie had no idea what that was like.

He didn’t even know who his biological father was—he’d asked his momma many times as a child, and she’d told him that his father was doing something very important and very secret, but that, someday, he would find Jamie and they could be a family.

And then she’d met Bill Eckel.

Jamie had never liked Bill, although he’d struggled to explain why at first. Bill Eckel had wooed Nell Weaver, bringing her flowers, taking her on evening drives, bringing little trinkets or treats for young Jamie. Jamie hadn’t ever trusted him. He’d hide the treats and neglect the toys, as though understanding on some instinctive level that they were bribes designed to control his momma by convincing her that she had to marry Bill Eckel for Jamie’s sake.

As an adult, Jamie could understand how it had happened. How Bill Eckel must have convinced her that he could provide for both her and her son, give them a better life—giveJamiea better life—than she could alone. That no one else would love or marry a single mother.

As a child, Jamie had resented the man his momma brought into their lives. The man who had taken them from their tiny home. Who had taught Jamie what it meant to be afraid. What it meant to face violence.

Jamie—the adult Jamie—shook his head, trying to clear away the shadows of memory as he looked down at Bran’s sleeping face, worry furrowing his brow even in sleep. Jamie wanted to smooth it away, to ease the stress and bring a smile to his lips.

Letting out a breath, Jamie sat on the edge of the bed and put a gentle hand on Bran’s shoulder. Green eyes immediately opened, bringing relief with them that Jamie tried to hide, feeling foolish. “Dinner,” he said softly.

Bran yawned, uncurling and turning his body so that he was lying on his other side, one hand resting on Jamie’s thigh, the frown settling deeper onto his features. “Verra well.”

They ate their curry in silence, Jamie worrying about Bran, and Bran clearly worrying about his father.

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