“Good,” her father said. “Don’t stay up too late celebrating. They want to get an early start as they have a number of sites to show you. And Farilane”—he took her hand—“thank you.”

Chapter 21: The Library

Chapter Twenty-One
The Library

Farilane was up before dawn, leaping barefooted from carpet-island to carpet-island, as she sought to avoid the cold stone. Her progress was hampered by the lack of light and a clear path. The twin chambers of the tiny room, one containing her bed and the other her office, were still a chaotic mess that even she regretted. Despite the disarray, the princess couldn’t recall the last time she’d been this happy. Not since she had been a child waiting for the festival of Wintertide had Farilane been so excited. Now, just as then, she had struggled to doze but failed miserably. Tossing and turning in her bed for most of the night, she gave up on any attempt to sleep and tried working on her book. But her mind was a wild animal that refused to be harnessed.

I’m going to have my book house, or should I call it a bochous, bibliary, or library.

She still hadn’t settled on a name. Book house struck her as the most comprehensible and inviting. Such a virtue would be crucial at the start, when the whole idea would be viewed as strange and unnatural. However, over time, the childish name might prevent her baby from being taken seriously. A mother might be inclined to nickname her child Pretty Boy—cute when the lad is three, but not so much when the kid becomes a man and is being considered for the command of a legion. Farilane envisioned learned scholars crossing the empire to study at her revered and respected institution, and book house sounded a tad too on the nose—what a person might call it who never set a foot inside. She considered leabharlann which was book house in Belgriclungreian. This was marginally better, but also felt half-measured, noncommittal, and cowardly. Besides, for dwarfs it would still be the infantile book house.

Bibliary was drawn from the elven word relating to written dispatches, while library was an early imperial word for the little trash heap uncovered in the old palace, where written records no one felt comfortable destroying were deposited. Both words had inherent problems. Farilane liked bibliary. It sounded refined, and she enjoyed the way it rolled off the tongue. But it was obviously elvish, making it instantly pretentious, and with the growing animosity caused by the Nyphron Cult, potentially hated. Library—well, library was a word for a trash heap, a place of unwanted things. Few knew the word anymore, but Farilane did, and it left her still puzzling what to call her new institution even as she prepared to find a spot for its birth.