The Lords' Scholars

They crept along narrower tunnels. “These passages are older,” Kellja said, almost to herself. She held a torch forward, half tilted toward the dark ahead of them. “There are more memories here than elsewhere. The Scholars say it is more conducive to thought, to be in the presence of it.”

“Have you often spoken with Scholars?” Belka asked.

Kellja shook her head. She looked back toward Belka with wide eyes, and Belka looked over her own shoulder, wary that Kellja had heard or seen something behind them. “Athalu did, once. Otherwise, our paths did not cross with those of the Scholars’. The Scholars kept here, while the rest of us kept near the barracks and the yard.”

“So we will find a Scholar here?” Belka asked. She did not want to tell Kellja that she was seeking a Scholar, as the word alone evoked a kind of shuddering in Kellja.

Kellja marched forward. She led them toward a forking path, and halted. “I think I’m lost,” Kellja cried softly. “I’m sorry, I do not know the way. As I said, we… the Lord never told us to patrol here.”

“It’s fine,” Belka said, stepping beside Kellja. “We last turned right when we came to a crossing like this. Perhaps we should go straight ahead. Do you know if that would be taking us closer to the yard? Or toward the courts?”

Kellja shook her head. “Straight ahead, I think that would be toward the libraries. We were going there, weren’t we?” She whined in a muted way. “But there could be another turn I do not know, and we might find ourself even nearing where the old dungeons were. Or the barracks.”

“Would a Scholar know the way?” Belka asked.

After frowning at Belka, Kellja pushed onward, straight through the intersecting hallways as Belka had suggested.

Perhaps I should have told Kellja to go back the way she’d come, Belka thought. If she is lost here, so would I have been? Kellja still slouched, her sword waving in her grip as though it were too heavy.

And after a few hundred paces, Kellja came to a stop. At an ajar wooden door. Air thick with dust waited beyond. Something has been here lately. “Wait here,” Belka said, stepping past Kellja to enter.

“I advance with you,” Kellja said, following.

Bookshelves lined the walls, and long tables occupied the center of the room. Books and scrolls lay open on the tables, the scrolls held down at their corners by books and iron paperweights made to look like span high lords and ladies in ceremonial armor. A few of the candles on the tables were melted nearly to their bottoms, wax pooling around the bases of each wick.

A man sat on the opposite side of the tables, closer to the far end. He looked up and across the candles toward Belka. Eyes glimmering as he glanced between Belka and Kellja. A heavy black cloak fringed with purple cloth hung from his shoulders. His graying hair was disheveled, and a thin line of drool hung from the side of his mouth. “I was asleep,” he said, in a thoughtful tone. “You two, cavaliers?”

Belka shook her head. All at once she felt she was no longer in control, as the man stared at her. He was neither young nor old, but pale and hunched forward.

“Intruders,” he muttered, pushing back his chair. He reached under his long coat and drew a silver mace not much longer than his forearm.