When he reached out, they were there, smooth and solid. But what if, he wondered, some of the hand-rails had been broken in the chaos he had so studiously avoided being part of.
Best go carefully then. Rather than turning left to start towards the stairs, he turned right, deeper into the maze of ladders and shelves. His progress was tentative, but he found his navigation more than sufficient. Here was the steep ladder up, here the rail that curved tightly around the short-circ.u.mferenced gallery.
He walked slowly, making sure of each footfall before taking it, and when he"d measured out enough steps to put him opposite and above his own desk, he stopped.
"Master librarian? Are you there?"
He listened, and was rewarded by the soft whisper of cloth. A divan creaked, and a throat coughed drily. "Who? Who"s there?"
"Under-librarian Thaler, Master. I"ve come to help you outside."
"What"s that?"
Thaler spoke louder and clearer. "Thaler, Master."
"I appear to have been struck blind, Under-librarian. Old age, eh? Bit of a b.a.s.t.a.r.d."
"You"re not blind, Master. The lights have gone out."
"What? I"m not blind?"
"No, Master. You"re not blind. Or I"m as blind as you are." Thaler took three paces towards the voice, and listened again.
"You"re blind too? And you so young. A tragedy."
Thaler could hear the thin, reedy whistle of the librarian"s breathing now, and he dropped to his knees and shuffled the remaining distance. "Hold out your hand, Master."
"Shouldn"t we wait for someone who can see, Under-librarian?"
"It"s the lights, Master. The library lights have failed. Once we get to the porch, you"ll see what I mean." He moved his own hands through the air in front of him until he knocked against the sleeve of the master librarian"s robe. He felt along it until he found cool, dry skin.
"Is that you, Under-librarian?"
"Yes, Master. I"ll put your hand on my shoulder, and we can go."
He placed the master librarian"s hand accordingly, and put his own on it. It was awkward, but it would have to do.
"Did you say the lights have gone out?"
"Yes, Master Librarian. Can you stand when I say?" Thaler got his feet under his body. "Now."
He ended up mostly dragging the man off his bed. He was shrunken and thin, whereas Thaler was big and more than just a little fat. The master was a weight that the under-librarian was used to, no more than a decent-sized folio.
"Did you say the lights have gone out?"
"Yes, Master. The lights have gone out all over the library. Not one is left."
"How extraordinary. That"s never happened before, you know."
"Yes, Master. I know both that it"s extraordinary, and that it"s never happened before. There seems to be a lot of that about." He kept the bony hand pinned to his shoulder, and started to retrace his steps.
If reaching the master librarian"s eyrie had taken time, getting back down again seemed to take several lifetimes. At least, Thaler felt he"d aged that much by the time they"d made it down to the ground floor.
They"d stopped for a rest so many times, he"d lost count, and the master librarian would ramble on so, often about exactly the same subject they"d just finished discussing and which, as far as Thaler was concerned, had been settled to the satisfaction of all.
"Where are the lights, Under-librarian?"
Inwardly, he groaned: his temper, already stretched to breaking point, was plucked taut. Outwardly, he barely did better.
"The lights," he said, "have gone. Out."
"Have they? How ...?"
"Extraordinary? Yes. Very extraordinary."
"It"s never..."
"Happened before. I know." Thaler decided that his humouring the old man had gone beyond what duty required. He could either leave him there, or tell him to shut up. "Master? Silence in the library."
"What? Oh. Of course, Under-librarian." And it was as if the G.o.ds themselves had intervened, for the endless flow of words simply dried up.
Why hadn"t he thought of that three floors above?
He should, by now, be able to see the light spilling in from the porch. That he couldn"t, worried him. Perhaps he had been struck blind after all. But that couldn"t be right: the lights, as the master librarian had so perceptively and repeatedly noticed, had indeed gone out.
The doors had been closed again. Those outside had decided the building was empty and had attempted to secure the library against thieves. Yes, but anyone who had bothered looking would have realised that both he and the master librarian were missing. They"d closed the doors anyway.
Cowards.
There was nothing else to do but feel his way to the main entrance. "Master librarian? Hold tight. There"ll be debris on the floor. Look, why don"t I just carry you?"
It was the obvious solution, and again, if he could find his own a.r.s.e in the dark, he"d kick it long and hard for being an idiot.
"Think, Thaler, think!"
"What was that, Under-librarian?"
"It doesn"t matter. Now, put your other hand on my other shoulder. That"s right. Keep still." He crouched down and backed up, reaching behind him and seizing the master librarian"s spindly legs.
When was the last time he"d done this? He"d have been a child, playing with his friends in the streets and squares of Juvavum.
"Hold tight." Thaler straightened up and, in the event, hardly noticed the extra weight.
"Oh my," came the voice in his ear.
"Hush, Master Librarian. Silence in the library."
He set off, treading carefully, scuffing his feet to knock the fallen books, chairs and desks out of his way. The furniture could look after itself: the thought of kicking valuable ma.n.u.scripts across the floor pained him almost to the point of paralysis. He got a grip on his wits, and continued the painstaking journey.
He knew that if he kept the wall to his left, he would eventually find the entrance. He found the main desk first: at least, that was what it felt like. Solid, immovable, and long. He crept along one side, then back down the other to the wall.
And there: light. Two thin rectangles that marked the library doors.
"Can you see now, Master Librarian?"
"My eyes! They"re working again."
"Yes, Master Librarian. Yes, they are." Even that mean light hurt after the utter darkness, but he hurried towards it.
Thaler couldn"t open the huge latch with his teeth: he"d be foolish to try, and he"d had enough of foolishness for one day. He lowered his burden gently to the floor, gripped the catch with both hands and heaved. The latch moved up against its stop with a bang and he heaved the heavy door back.
He was blind again, dazzled by the brightness, and he covered his face with his fingers.
"Mr Thaler!"
Wiping at his watering eyes, Thaler found himself surrounded by a semi-circle of ushers, and, at its midpoint, Glockner.
"Ah, Mr Glockner. Surprised to see me?"
Glockner lowered the switch he was wielding and glowered at Thaler.
"I thought..."
"Clearly your first mistake, Mr Glockner. I have rescued the master librarian, and would very much like some help carrying him outside." Thaler put his shoulder to the second door and pushed it back. Damp light poured inside, illuminating an area past where the main desk used to be and into the reading room proper.
The master librarian lay propped up against the wall, and the shaft of daylight showed two bodies stretched out against the opposite side of the entrance.
Thaler looked at Glockner with undisguised disdain. "The ushers are present, and are indeed paid, to keep order within the library. As head usher, you are responsible for their conduct and moreover, your own. Are those men dead?"
"I don"t know, Mr Thaler."
"Then perhaps," roared Thaler, suddenly furious and seeking a target for his pent-up fear, "you had better all go and find out rather than cowering disgracefully behind each other. Order, Mr Glockner. Not chaos."
As Glockner and a couple of the other ushers recovered enough to dart forward, Thaler suddenly realised that he was momentarily in charge. Not just of the situation, but of the whole library.
He felt himself tremble. "Where are the other under-librarians? Where are Grozer and Thomm?"
None of the ushers responded, and Thaler looked beyond them and out into the square for the first time.
It was a melee, almost a mob. If it hadn"t been for the rain dampening the impotent rage, there would have been a riot. Shouting, arguing, scuffling even: the good burghers of Juvavum were out on the streets and looking for someone to blame.
It wasn"t just the library lights that had gone out. It was all the lights. And the fountain across the square. And the cart abandoned on its back near the entrance to Wien Alley.
The seriousness of it all hit Thaler like a hammer. He wanted to run out into the square and demand to know the meaning of this, just like everyone else. But in the absence of the other under-librarians, and given the incapacity of the master librarian, he was the senior officer. Not just for today, but for the next day too. And beyond.
He took a deep breath. He felt weak. He put his hand out and leant against one of the pillars that supported the portico. It was cold and slightly rough. More than that, though: it felt old. If the library was going to see tomorrow, then it was going to need some help.
Starting with some leadership from Thaler.
"You, what"s your name?"
"Ullmann, Mr Thaler." The man was young and biddable, and less under Glockner"s thumb for being so.
"Take two of your colleagues, and go to the Jews" Alley you know where that is? and knock on the second door on the left. An elderly Jew called Aaron Morgenstern will answer, and I want you to say this to him: "Mr Thaler needs lanterns.""
Ullmann frowned. "Is that it?"
"Yes, for now. When you have as many lanterns as you can carry and make sure they are lanterns, not candlesticks come straight back here. Go; hurry." Thaler shooed Ullmann away and turned to the next usher. "Who are you?"
"Reindl, Under-librarian."
"What I want you to do, Mr Reindl, is to find me a stretcher, or something we can use as a stretcher, to get the master librarian away safely and back to his rooms. Very important job, so take one other and go. Come back quickly."
He did a head-count of how many ushers he had left. Six. Not enough, but he needed to deplete their numbers further.
"You, you and you," he pointed. "Go back to the apprentices" dorm and the librarians" rooms. Get everyone you can and make them come here."
"Make them, Mr Thaler?" asked one.
"Yes, by the G.o.ds, make them. Beg them, cajole them, remind them of their duty, and, if all else fails, tell them that if they don"t come, I"ll have them thrown out on the street penniless and naked. We need every able-bodied man now."
They darted off in the direction of the library"s dormitories, and Thaler gathered the remaining ushers about him. "Gentlemen? We have to defend the library at all costs. Reinforcements are coming, but for now, we"re it. If anyone looks like they want to do the building harm, or to sneak in and grab a book or two for themselves, we repel them. Understand? Throw your switches away, and arm yourselves with broken furniture. Beat any transgressor as though they are barbarians. We"re all that stands between the mob and sweet reason, so let"s acquit ourselves well."
Thaler straightened up and stood squarely in the entrance.
"There will be order," he said, facing outwards and folding his arms, "in my library."
22.
I am twelve years old, thought Felix. Twelve years old and an orphan. Twelve years old, an orphan and a prince.
He was a lot of other things besides, but at that moment, those three defined him. He was only just becoming aware of how little he knew: not just about the palatinate he was to rule, but about life as a whole. Today hadn"t taught him much. He"d already known how to defend himself from the hairy, stinking barbarian hors.e.m.e.n who"d borne down on him, although he"d never quite grasped just how much it would hurt to parry their furious blows.
He did now, and he"d broken his collar-bone in the process. Signore Allegretti had laboured hard to save him, but even he could kill only one man at a time. So he knew something new about physical pain, and about how to act through it and despite it, when circ.u.mstances were desperate enough.
Then there was the other kind of pain, the sort that cut from the inside out. It had never seemed particularly important to him that his mother had died in childbirth, that his first breath had come as her last had gone in the same moment. It was a fact he"d grown used to, and there had been nurses and playmates and tutors for company; if his mother had lived, he"d have seen little of her and even less of his father. As it was, Gerhard had become more involved in his son"s upbringing than would have otherwise been the case.
That part of his life was over. The body of Prince Gerhard V was laid across the horse behind him, wrapped and bound in several torn and blood-stained cloaks they"d found on the battlefield. He was now Prince Felix I of Carinthia, he was an orphan, and he was twelve years old.
He couldn"t run a country. The idea was ludicrous. But he remembered one time he"d been shown into a jeweller"s workshop over a baker"s in the makers" market. He"d been younger by a few years it was certainly before the signore arrived and his tutor at the time had sat him down so that the nimble-fingered jeweller could explain how he crafted ingots of metal and rough-looking pebbles of crystal into engraved rings and filigree-thin necklaces set with stones that flashed in the light.