❛the ends justify the means.❜
( part two of deadwater kings )
The board is set and Shabina chose her side. The better world she dreamed of is finally within her grasp, but she struggles when the path to victory seems to be paved in blood. The long...
"When the chorus sing that the 'name of the land will vanish' and 'Troy no longer exists', they are singing for an audience for whom Troy's name has survived."
—P.E. Easterling
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PLEASE READ DEADWATER KINGS FIRST
Shabina's family had to stay at the Library until someone sorted out the refugees and found somewhere to put them. With her parents and Pierre, her older brother, finding work in the Library's forge, she was left to wander the massive tower.
She knew right off that she hated the underground levels. The forge heated it to sweltering in some places, but the archival floors were always cold and dry as bone. There were no windows. She could almost feel the sea's weight pressing in on the walls, only a few feet of stone stopping them all from drowning and burning in the poisonous waters.
The ground levels always swarmed with smelly people moving food and cargo from island to island. She didn't stay there long, either.
Once she could climb the stairs without getting caught in the crush of bodies, she found the middle levels weren't much better. Books, everywhere. Floors and floors of them stacked on shelves and in boxes, on tables and chairs. Some rooms housed Librarians hunched over desks. They never looked up at her, even when she walked right in front of them. They just typed on their big black machines like tomorrow would never come.
Shabina was just about to peek into a stack of finished pages when someone cleared their throat behind her. She spun around, snatching her hands behind her back. Her hair beads slapped her face hard enough to sting.
A Librarian stood there, dressed in plain black robes like an old-fashioned monk. He was faded and wrinkly like the pages in his arm.
"I'm --" Shabina began, only to shut her mouth with a click when the Librarian put a finger on his lips.
The Librarian beckoned for her to follow. She did, trotting at his heels with her face burning. What would he do? Was she not meant to go up the stairs? She bit her lip. Could he kick her family out for this? The Librarians had been so generous to them, even giving them new clothes. The plain white dress they'd given Shabina itched at the seams, and it was cut so square she thought it might have been a bag at some point, but still.
He led her towards the center of the tower, where a railing separated the floor from the open core of the Library's structure. From there, she could see the other floors, all the way down to the ground level. Sunlight flooded in through the ceiling windows. It wasn't quiet here. Chatter from far below combined with whispers in the stacks of books.
The Librarian set his pile of papers down on the railing and leaned his elbow beside them. He smiled down at her.
"You're one of the refugees, aren't you?" He had a nice voice, all deep and a little raspy. "Tell me, what were you doing in there?"
