Reive decided that he liked whoever had put those displays together.
"Can I help you?" inquired another little-old-lady voice. The woman behind the counter was tiny, five feet if she was an inch, with her hair done up in a perfectly neat little bun. Her name tag said MARION.
Reive turned on the charm again, or at least he tried to. He was tired to the bone; just the walk from the bus station had exhausted him.
"I hope so, ma'am. I understand you have a collection of books on gargoyles here."
"We do, but we're closing soon," she said, checking her watch. "We're only open for a few more minutes."
He hadn't realized how much hope he'd pinned on this until panic clutched at his chest and tightened its claws around his throat. Every day mattered. He couldn't wait until Monday. "Couldn't I just take a look at it? A quick look?"
"Well ..." She looked around, tapping the end of a ballpoint pen against her chin. There was no one else in the library except an old man one-finger-typing on one of the library computers. "All right. Just for a few minutes. Are you looking for something in particular?"
"I—uh—it's complicated," he said awkwardly, following her as she left the desk. "I'm doing some research. I think I just need to look and see what you have."
"You know, you're the second person in two days who's come here wanting to see these," the librarian remarked brightly. "But you're so much nicer than the other one."
"Who was the other one?" Reive asked, a thread of ice crawling down his back. No one else knew about his personal mission. No one had a reason to know. Was someone from his clan checking up on him? No, that made no sense.
"A young man writing a book. He wouldn't talk much about it. Very rude young man, if you want my opinion. Always in such a hurry, people that age. No one has any time to stop and talk anymore."
For a person Marion's age, "young" could mean anywhere from a teenager to someone in their 60s.
"Did he tell you his name?" Reive asked. Could it be the gargoyles themselves? He couldn't see how; they didn't know what he was looking for, so they had no reason to interfere.
"I don't believe so. Neither have you," she added, giving him a sharp glance.
"I'm Reive," he said. "When did you say he was here?"
"Yesterday." She was wary now. "Are you with him?"
"No, no, not at all," Reive said quickly. "I just thought it might be an, um, a professional rival."
"Are you writing a book too?"
Reive couldn't help smiling. "No, just interested. It's a hobby of mine."
"Well, I hope you'll find what you're looking for here." She turned a corner and gestured eloquently. "Ta-da!"
The shelves were stuffed with various-sized books, papers, folders, and periodicals. Reive reached for a book at random, only to fumble it with the clumsy fingers of his right hand. He pulled it out with the left instead. It was a large, recently published book of photographs of gargoyles on churches in Europe. The book fell open to a page of a grotesque stone monster, and Reive felt a physical reaction, a twinge that went all the way down his aching right arm to his fingertips.
It's only a photo. And not even a real gargoyle at that. Just a statue.
"Is this the kind of thing you need?" Marion asked. She checked her watch again. "You know, I need to start closing—"
"I know," he said, desperation tinging the words. "Couldn't I just stay for a few minutes? I won't be any trouble."
"Well ... maybe Jessamy could stay with you. She's our assistant librarian. This collection is her project. I can't say I was that pleased in the beginning," Marion rambled on, time pressure apparently forgotten now that she had an ear to bend, "to have her taking up shelves with this. We're a small library, you know, without much room and not that much of a budget. But she's done a good job with it. She even bought most of the collection out of her own pocket. The kids love it, and it really brings in more than it costs us, between book sales and sometimes even tourists coming in to look at it ..."
While she talked, Reive took the opportunity to quickly scan the shelves, trying to get a feel for what kind of books were here. He'd come in the hopes of