For a moment, I felt the thousand books stacked quietly around us and imagined Bear had heaped them up just for me, like children in a fort of blankets and cushions. “Are we the only ones here?”

“No.” Bear shambled forward to peer at another shelf—Aquinas, Athenagoras of Athens, Augustine. His slouched spine and hands in his pockets said nonchalant, but the smug set of his mouth said very pleased with myself. “Some of the staff are in the third-floor office.”

I paled, thinking of the lie I’d told Bertilak.

“Don’t worry,” Bear said quietly, smiling. “They won’t even know we’re here. They tend to keep quite busy.”

“So I can just . . . ?” I glanced around, disbelieving.

He nodded, grinning complacently, totally self-satisfied. “Go explore.”

I tried to make orderly stacks as I pulled down volumes and thumbed through their pages, telling myself that I would catalog the titles and plead that they be lent to Potomac someday. But I was too excited to be organized. More than once I found myself sprawled between bookcases, two chapters into a story I’d only meant to look at.

The old grandfather clock had just clanged a warning—two o’clock—when Bear discovered me holding court on the second floor between shelves of fairy tales and folklore. Rain clinked against the windowpanes as he surveyed the towers and cities I’d built of heavy volumes, gold and silver foil gleaming like pieces of jewelry against their deep red and green bindings. “Are you hungry?”

I bit my lip and let the book fall closed around my index finger. “I’m not ready to leave.”

“I thought not. Come on.” Bear held out a hand, eyes flickering.

I let him help me up. He didn’t let go as he led me to the spiral staircase, as we climbed up, up, up the stone steps. Somewhere on the walk, his fingers laced through mine. I swore to myself that the shaking in my limbs was from the cold air whistling through the old tower wall.

At the top of the stairs, Bear retrieved a key from a chain around his neck and unlocked the door to a small circular room.

Flames inside a crumbling brick fireplace and lamps misted with ash threw light on mismatched chairs and couches. A rickety old desk was stacked with books and papers, and a half-dozen teetering shelves were so crammed with volumes they looked in danger of collapsing. From its patched wooden ceiling to the hodgepodge of worn rugs spread across the floor, the room had a makeshift sort of coziness, its comfort cobbled together from things cast aside or forgotten.

His insistent hands drew me over the threshold, floorboards creaking beneath my feet. I watched Bear, careful, careful, questioning.

“It’s mine,” he said quietly. “Myrddin thought I’d like a place here, and the library staff don’t mind me using the attic.”

Myrddin thought.