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.She bounded over to the books, collecting them into one armload, and very nearly ran up the ladder.She piled the books into their compartment haphazardly then leaped back down to the floor.She swept the last parchment up, rolled it quickly and placed it in a scroll case.She put it in the correct case, I noted, but I figured that was more luck than intent.I separated out the maps, moving to hand her the correct fragment.But she ignored me, climbing the ladder again, and placing the scroll case and the index scroll among the tomes.Down the ladder she came again, grabbing the remaining empty scroll case.She held it out to me expectantly.When I hesitated, she tried to grab the maps.Realizing what she meant to do, I rolled up the parchment sheets, figuring I’d be a lot gentler than she was being.I slipped the maps into the case.“Wrong case,” I said.“Oi, I don’t care,” Joen said, popping the cap on the case.“Come on!”She took off at a near sprint, rounding the corners in the maze of books with such speed I feared she’d careen into the shelves and cause a serious disaster.But she’d always been graceful, and the year of training at the Tower of Twilight had only enhanced that, and despite her speed she moved in perfect balance.I followed.The boots I’d procured from Sali Dalib so more than a year ago in Memnon magically allowed me to move so quickly it was easy to match her speed.On the journey through the library, Joen kept her head down, and I figured she wasn’t paying much attention to our route.But, as it turns out, I was wrong.She never hesitated at a turn, but moved with purpose and direction, and only a few moments later we were bursting through a door into the antechamber of the library.The librarian wasn’t surprised in the least as we came through the door.She didn’t even lift her head as she asked, “Did you find what you were looking for?”“There’s a scroll missing from your collection,” Joen said.That got the librarian’s attention.“Missing?”“Missing.Not present.It ain’t where it’s supposed to be, you know?”The librarian looked shocked.“All the documents in this library are magically marked,” she said.“They can’t be removed, or I’d know about it!”But Joen had already pulled me past her.It was then that I realized Joen wasn’t carrying the scroll case anymore.“Oi,” Joen said as we rushed to the door, “if you say so!”“But …,” the librarian sputtered, “you wait now.”Joen, still running, let go of me to push the doors open with both hands, and we were out in the bright spring sunshine.Sunshine? I thought.How long had we been in there?I followed her down the steps at a run while a loud clamor of gongs and bells sounded behind us.“Do you still have that scroll case?” I asked Joen as we ran out into the street.Joen shot me a mischievous glance and tore off into a shadowy alley.“I can’t believe you just did that,” I said as we crouched in a narrow alley next to a pile of old wash buckets.We had spent most of the day crisscrossing the city, barely ahead of one group of city watchmen after another.“That’s not all,” Joen replied, pulling a small object from her pocket.She flipped the magical lens into the air, caught it, and pocketed it again.“You are a pirate after all,” I said.“They’re going to track us down for that, if not for the map.”“We’ll be long gone before she even bothers to check on it,” Joen answered.“Will we?”“Anauroch isn’t that far from here, you know? A month, at the worst.”“To Twinspire?” I asked.“That’s where the gods chose the Sentinels, right? Maybe we can find their names there.”“Oi, to Twinspire!” Joen said happily.“Not so fast,” said a man standing in the shadows nearby.“Twinspire is long buried, and the world is better off because of it.”CHAPTER THIRTEENChrysaor emerged from the shadows, his blue skin shining in the sun, his hair a bit longer than I remembered.“You’ve been following us all this time?” Joen asked.Chrysaor shrugged.“I didn’t have to follow you.I simply waited for you to take the next logical step on your journey and to come here.”“You wasted a year just waiting?” I asked.“A year spent in Silverymoon is hardly wasted,” Chrysaor countered.“Trust me, my boy, I have my own ways of keeping busy.”“Well, you should spend another here, then,” Joen said.“You ain’t coming with us.”“You shouldn’t be going at all, young lady,” he replied.“It’s far too dangerous, especially for you.”“I can handle myself.”“I’ve no doubt you can fight.But it’s still unwise.”“And for me? Is it too dangerous for me?” I asked.Chrysaor laughed.“You forget my purpose, boy.If you go to Twinspire, perhaps you further your quest to destroy the stone, or perhaps you fall and the artifact is lost for a time.Either way, I gain.”“If killing me would benefit you, why haven’t you tried it yet?”Chrysaor shrugged and threw me a crooked smile.“I’m with Joen on this one,” I said.“You stay here, we leave, we never see you again.”“If you so wish,” he said.“But you’ll never find Twinspire without me.”“Oi, that tune’s getting old.”I patted the map on my hip.“We’ll find it.”“How old is that map?” he asked.“And how detailed? The world is not static, you know.Things changed over the eons.Twinspire is long since gone.And besides, you know there are beings with a vested interest in the stones not being destroyed.”“You mean the Sentinels,” I answered.Chrysaor nodded.“Powerful beings, those Sentinels.Ages old.And you want to kill them.”“No,” I said.“I just want to be rid of the stone.”“Which will kill them, which they do not want.So you think they’d let you get any closer to your goal? Even now, they surely have eyes upon you.”Of course I knew he was right, that cultists of Beshaba at least had already confronted us, were spying on us.“Oi, don’t listen to him,” Joen said, turning to me.“And don’t trust him.”“I don’t,” I replied.“And I don’t believe him, that we can’t find it.But I also don’t see the harm in taking him.”“He just said he wants you dead, didn’t he?”“But he’s had plenty of opportunities and never tried to kill me,” I answered.“The boy speaks wisely,” Chrysaor cut in.“Quiet,” Joen and I both answered at the same time.“Oi, it’s your quest, it’s your decision,” Joen said.I pondered a moment, then said to Chrysaor, “As before, you walk ahead, you don’t share our camp, and you don’t share our food.”“Of course,” the blue pirate said with a bow.“Then let’s fetch our horse and be off.”“To Twinspire,” Chrysaor said, and I thought I caught a hint of excitement in his voice.“To Twinspire,” Joen echoed, her tone remarkably similar to that of her most hated enemy
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