“I saw the excitement in your eyes. You don't hide much.”

She sighed with relief, but said, “You haven't even asked about pay.”

Beko turned. He was holding a round stone, and he drew the blade of a short knife across its surface. “I know that Ventgorian fruit has made you rich. Come back this evening and I'll give you a price.”

Nomi nodded, and jumped when something thudded onto the floor above them.

Beko rolled his eyes. “Dragging out last night's drunks to make room for tonight's.”

“Yes. Very homely.” Nomi went to the door and opened it to the smell of vomit.

“Nomi,” Beko said.

She turned around, looking back into the cavern of a room.

“Thank you for asking me.”

“Who else would I go to?” Then she shut the door, climbed the steps to the street and went to find a runner.

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

RAMUS SAT JUST inside the library entrance, holding his head and hissing as the pain receded. His vision and hearing throbbed with each heartbeat, but the nausea was passing.

Not now, he thought. Not while I need all my wits about me. He grasped the rolled parchment pages in his left hand, and they too seemed to pulse with each beat of his heart.

It had started as a headache three years ago, one that lasted four days and seemed to reach out to every nerve in his body, drowning him in a pain he had never imagined before. He had thrashed and cried in his bed, unable to move or go for help. Even back then, Nomi was the only person who ever paid him a visit, and then not frequently, but she had been away on her second voyage to Ventgoria. He had suffered alone, and recovered without telling anyone what had happened. One of those things, he had thought at the time. A sickness in the air, or bad food from one of the street vendors. Looking back, he now considered it the period of impregnation, because every time an attack came he had visions: strange, obscure, sometimes disturbing, other times quite mundane.

Ramus stood, resting his right hand against the wall for support. He gasped in a few deep breaths, trying to clear his head, and smelled the unmistakable must of age. This library was his home away from home. He stood still for a few moments, feeling the last of the pain drift away, and then he reached for the library's inner door.

THERE WERE THREE other people at the tables immediately inside. One of them worked for the Guild, and she nodded at Ramus. He recognized the other two by sight, although he did not know their names. Scholars, probably, working for themselves or one of the local Chieftains. They scratched at rough paper on the tables before them, taking notes from a book here, a parchment there, and the frown of confusion on their faces was ever-present.