“Wait, don’t go...!”
I woke up in the dead of night to the sound of my own voice. There was sweat running down my back, and my pillow was wet with tears. The most awful dream had jolted me awake... and worst of all, I couldn’t even remember what it was about.
I saw something... But what? And who was I chasing?
A grimace revealed my frustration. I’d come so close to recalling one of my lost memories, but not close enough. Leonore, who was on night watch, must have heard me wake because she soon peered through the bed-curtain.
“You do not look well, Lady Rozemyne. Would you like me to fetch the divine instruments? Lieseleta informed me that filling them with mana helped you feel somewhat better before, so we have them drained and ready for you.”
After dinner, my knights had gone out of their way to hunt more feybeasts so they could empty the divine instruments for me. I was touched by their consideration and asked that the instruments be brought over.
I’m hungry. I woke up feeling awful. My body feels so heavy. My mana’s come back...
I clutched my head and sat at the edge of my bed, channeling mana into the divine instruments Leonore brought me. That was when Gretia entered, dressed in simple clothes with her hair loosely bound. In my current state, only my name-sworn could touch me when I wasn’t wearing silver cloth, which put a huge burden on Gretia when it came to attendant work like bathing me or changing my clothes. Leonore had probably woken her up with an ordonnanz.
“I am sorry to have woken you, Gretia,” I said.
“You need not apologize. I was able to rest during the day. You appear to be drenched with sweat. Would you care for a bath?”
“Just a waschen for now. You may use one of my feystones.”
I gestured to some of the many feystones packed with my mana that I was keeping in my room. Gretia took one and cleansed me as instructed.
Once again, I channeled mana into the divine instruments as Leonore held them out for me. Schutzaria’s shield was last, but a strange sensation overcame me as I was filling it. I gazed around, keeping my hand on the shield.
“Is something wrong, Lady Rozemyne?”
“I sense something below us... Coming from the living room or dining hall, maybe. It feels like when Gervasio appeared from the tunnel behind the altar. This doesn’t mean he broke into Lessy, does it? I don’t remember hearing what happened to him...”
As I tried to pinpoint the source of the strange sensation, Leonore nodded as if she understood what was going on. She gave me a curious look, then giggled. “We are inside your highbeast, Lady Rozemyne; I doubt anyone could get inside without your permission. You are most likely detecting Lord Ferdinand, who is working in the living room. If you are still curious, would you like to check? Unless you are feeling unwell after providing so much mana, it might be wise.”
From there, Leonore turned to her side. “Gretia. My apologies, but could you change Lady Rozemyne’s clothes? Something loose-fitting that she can wear to bed. She will go back to resting when we return, and you may return to your room.”
“My thanks.”
Gretia changed my clothes and dressed me in my silver cloak. She had also put my hair up, though not too tightly.
Leonore and I were already en route to the living room when Angelica rushed over, apologized that she was late, and snatched me up off the ground. “Please await my arrival next time,” she said, her eyes sharp. “You have been ordered not to walk anywhere.”
I chuckled and simply let her continue to carry me.
Light bled out of the first-floor living room. We were just about to go inside when Eckhart stuck his head out and said, “Lord Ferdinand permits you to enter.”
“He knew I was coming?” I asked.
“Who else radiates divine power as she walks about?”
Hold on... Is divine power kind of like a cat bell...?
I went into the living room and saw that the space meant for post-meal tea had more or less been converted into an office. The private bedrooms I’d made were only large enough for a bed and somewhere to change one’s clothes, so Ferdinand had brought his work from the castle here.
“So? Were you unable to sleep?” he pressed.
“An unpleasant dream woke me, though I don’t remember the details. Then I channeled mana into a divine instrument and sensed something in this general area... It was like when Gervasio appeared atop the altar; I could feel someone, but their identity was obscured.”
“It would seem she sensed you this time, Lord Ferdinand.”
“Oh...?” Ferdinand gestured to the space beside him on the sofa, and at once, Angelica deposited me onto the empty seat. I was a little unsettled, maybe because I was feeling something I’d never felt before.
“Ferdinand, what happened to Gervasio?” I asked.
“Zent Eglantine’s knights managed to capture him. His memories were read, and his official punishment will likely be announced during the Archduke Conference.”
“So everyone’s safe and sound...” I sighed in relief. “That’s good to hear. I wouldn’t have known what to do if he’d somehow escaped.”
“‘Everyone’? No, not at all. Zent Eglantine and Lord Consort Anastasius each lost half of their guard in the process.”
“What?! How?!”
Ferdinand pulled several sheets of paper from the stack before him, seeming disinterested. “That is for the new Zent and her husband to consider. Should your focus not be on Alexandria?”
On closer inspection, the papers in his hand were the schematics for my new library city. All thoughts of Gervasio zipped out of my mind.
“Though I wish to incorporate as many elements of your ideal city as I can,” Ferdinand said, “you were much too focused on its library.”
“Well, of course. It’s the most important part of my city. Its beating heart, if you will. What else would we focus on?” Any city I constructed would need to have a giant library at its very center.
Ferdinand grimaced. “You plan to visit your library on a regular basis, I imagine. To minimize the danger of you moving between it and the castle, I would advise keeping the two close—both within the Noble’s Quarter, to be precise. The laboratory will remain there as well. One thing I will not permit, however, is your desire to connect the castle and the library with teleporters. I shall arrange for you to have separate sleeping quarters in the latter. That is all.”
Teleporters would make traveling between the castle and the library a breeze, but their omission didn’t surprise me; the kind meant for transporting humans could only be used with the aub’s permission. If, for whatever reason, I elected to use it alone, my knights would need to race all the way to its twin to reunite with me. And of course, they would face punishment for losing sight of their charge.
“Personal-use teleporters are out of the question,” Ferdinand concluded. “Instead, I would propose another approach.”
Back in Ehrenfest, the higher one’s status, the farther north one lived in the Noble’s Quarter. Alexandria would tweak this system by having the highest-ranked nobles live closest to the city center, ensuring their houses were as close to the library as one could get. Ferdinand went on to explain that by separating the library from the castle’s book room, we could make it more accessible for baptized children and apprentices.
“Really? But what you just proposed only benefits nobles...” I said.
“The library is too close to the castle for us not to impose restrictions—especially when you, the aub, intend to use it so frequently. For security reasons, we cannot allow too many vagrants to enter.”
“I get that, but... this is my duchy. Here in Alexandria, shouldn’t everyone have access to books?”
“Considering the current literacy rate among commoners, I think you are getting ahead of yourself. What you are proposing is a long-term goal. Even if we were to enforce it from the start, the pushback from the nobility would be immense.”
That might have been true, but he was straying too far from my vision. This was too important for me to compromise. I opened my mouth to protest, but Ferdinand raised a hand to stop me.
“Let me finish. Alexandria will come to be known as the duchy of a divine avatar. If we consider the entire city—the commoners included—then it would make more sense to put the temple first, not your library. And as we are creating everything from scratch, we can incorporate the strengths of Ehrenfest’s temple.”
According to Ferdinand, we would build the temple between the Noble’s Quarter and the lower city so that nobles and commoners could go there. It would contain workshops, an orphanage, and a place for blue priests to live, as well as a shrine for rituals and praying to the gods.
“Moreover,” he continued, “by allowing the wealthier commoners to attend the temple classrooms you once proposed, we can transform the temple into a library of sorts that even commoners can visit. The literacy rate in the lower city will improve, the commoners will learn how to treat books, and only then will we allow them in the main library near the castle. Keeping the masses on our side is crucial. If we are too heavy-handed, we will only inspire resistance to what we hope to achieve.”
To prevent our books from being stolen, we would implement the same deposit system as the Royal Academy’s library. Those who couldn’t pay wouldn’t be able to borrow. Ferdinand expected my library to be members-only for the first stretch of our journey.
So we need to pace ourselves.
I shouldn’t have been surprised; developments on this scale had taken hundreds of years back on Earth. As much as I wanted to skip ahead whole generations, our options were limited until printing became more widespread and the cost of books plummeted. Ferdinand was proposing the first step in our plan to make a library that even commoners could use.