Work Text:
"Are you sure this is going to work?" Enni hissed quietly. She knew Strifebane could hear her even if she only said the words inside her head, but it still felt wrong to talk to somebody and not, well, talk.
I'm sure, Strifebane said, confident as an old auntie.
So Enni squared up her shoulders, marched up to the grand doors of the Royal Library as if she had every right to be there, and said, head high, "I bear a message for Archivist Tarzakh."
"For who?" the guard said. "Get lost, brat-- Is that a blade? Where did you lift that--"
The door behind him swung open so suddenly that the edge of it caught the end of his pike and knocked it clean from his hands; it rolled down the marble steps with an awful racket, sending him scrambling, cursing, after it.
"For Tarzakh, you said?" said the man behind the door: short, soft, and squat, but with a much keener gaze that rendered him oddly intimidating. "Come in, then."
Enni scampered inside before the guard could retrieve his pike and come to stop them.
It was cool inside, and shadier than the baking streets despite the lanterns hung on every wall. They gave enough light that Enni couldn't stop herself from staring around as she followed the short man deeper into the guts of the library.
You're gawking, Strifebane said.
Enni wanted to grip her hilt, the way she'd tussle with a regular friend, but she'd found out the hard way that everyone who couldn't hear Strifebane's voice took that as a threat. "I can't help it," she muttered.
Small mercies that they came to a stop before another closed door after only a few minutes. Enni's guide opened the door and stepped aside, waving her in.
The door shut behind her with an elegant hush, leaving Enni and Strifebane alone in a room that looked like a rich man's best guess at modesty. Sheer silken drapes were drawn against the sun, leaving the room lit by magelights hovering in an empty fireplace. A lectern that could've been in the great cathedral loomed in the middle of the room, comically oversized for the book that sat open atop it. There was nothing else: neither desk nor tables; no chairs; no quills or ink. Enni had never met an archivist before, to be sure, but it seemed... odd.
Well, let's go and say hello, Strifebane prompted.
Enni had always been quicker than anyone gave her credit for; she closed her mouth and her thoughts on the What? that threatened to come out. It was obvious enough, wasn't it? If a sword had a soul, why not a book?
The edge of the lectern was just short enough that she could reach the book atop it without standing on her tiptoes. She laid her hand on the cover, respectfully, like she touched Strifebane when she wasn't being a right pain in the ass, and said, as instructed, "Hello, Archivist."
There was quiet, then, as if the room really were empty.
Wake up, you old lump, Strifebane said loudly.
Enni had an odd feeling, like waking up twice over; then the book flipped itself open with a slow stretch. Black lines swirled elegantly over the creamy-blank pages, and Enni squinted, trying to pick out letters she knew.
Just talk, Tarzakh, for the love of Elmora, Strifebane sighed.
Well, you haven't changed a bit, a new voice said in Enni's head, dryer than old hay.
Neither have you.
"I'm Enni," Enni said, because Strifebane would go on. "Can you help us?"