‘You do rate yourself highly,’ Irene said, trying not to feel irritated. ‘All right. You remember the stages of infestation? Affective, intuitive, assumptive and conglomerative?’
Kai nodded. ‘From what you and Dominic were saying, this world is affective going on intuitive, right? So the theory suggests it’s being warped, and it would then reach the stage where things tend to fall into narrative patterns. So instead of natural order prevailing, events start taking on the kind of rhythm or logic you might find in fiction or fairy tales. Which could be terrifying. But it must be hard to spot, surely, as even in order-based worlds fact can prove stranger than fiction . . . It isn’t fully there yet, is it?’
‘No. And that’s interesting. It makes me think that Dominic’s got a point with his theory that order is being asserted. I wish I understood more of it.’ Irene pushed away from the desk, and began to wander round the room, staring absently at the various glass display cases. ‘Now if a world could be stalled at this point, so it didn’t head further into chaos, it’d be useful to know how it’s done. We don’t know how many worlds there are, so we don’t know how many we lose to chaos. But we lose enough that we do know about. And the dragons aren’t interested in talking to us about how they do whatever it is that they do.’
Kai coughed. ‘Just like we aren’t interested in talking to them about how we do what we do?’
Irene turned to look at him. Witheringly, she hoped. ‘Do you think you’re the first person to have made that argument?’
‘Course not.’ He shrugged. ‘Fact remains, though. We don’t talk.’
‘I met one once,’ Irene said.
‘What did you talk about?’
‘He complimented me on my literary taste.’
Kai blinked. ‘Doesn’t sound like a life-threatening sort of conversation.’
Irene shrugged. ‘Well, he was the one who got the scroll we were both after. You see, there was this—’ She saw him glance away. ‘Oh, never mind.’
There was this room full of fabulous woods and bone, and I’d been escorted there by a couple of servants, and I was honestly afraid that I was going to be killed. I’d trespassed on his private property. I’d negotiated with one of his barons for that scroll without realizing it. I’d been dropped in the deep end and I was sinking fast.
‘I don’t mean to pry,’ Kai said unconvincingly.
He looked almost human. He had scales in the hollows of his cheeks and on the backs of his hands, as fine as feathers or hair. He had claws, manicured to a mother-of-pearl sheen. He had horns. His eyes were like gems in his face. His skin was the colour of fire, and yet it seemed natural; my own skin was blotchy and dull in comparison.
‘There isn’t much to tell,’ Irene said. ‘He let me go.’
He discussed the poems in the scroll. He complimented me on my taste. He explained that he did not expect to see me or any other representative of the Library in that area again. I nodded and bowed and thanked him for his kindness.
‘Just like that?’
No language that I knew had any words to describe him.
Irene tried to look nonchalant. ‘As I said, he approved of my literary taste.’
An hour later, Irene was buttoning herself into a jacket and long skirt while Kai sat outside the dressing room on a rickety chair and read through the dossiers. The cheap clothing shop which Dominic had directed them to was certainly cheap, very definitely cheap, and had little that could be said for it other than the fact that it was cheap. If they were going to infiltrate high society, they’d need better clothing. And costumes that didn’t rely on heavy overcoats.
‘These lists don’t make any sense,’ Kai complained. ‘They say the same thing on both sides of the page.’
Of course, he was looking at the Language vocabulary pages. Since he wasn’t a Librarian, he’d be seeing his native language instead of the Language. ‘Yes,’ Irene agreed, ‘they would, to you. Should I be surprised that you’re trying to read them?’ She arranged her blouse’s neckline so its ruffles sat above her jacket collar, and opened the dressing room door to join him.
‘Can’t blame me for trying,’ Kai said cheerfully. He looked her up and down. ‘Are you going to wear the hairpiece? Most of the women we’ve seen so far wear their hair longer than yours.’
Irene looked unenthusiastically at the tattered partial wig that lay on the table like a mangy dark squirrel. ‘Wearing that thing’s going to cause more problems than going without,’ she decided. ‘I’ll be counter-fashionable. Let’s just be grateful that corsets aren’t required wear any longer.’
‘Why should I be grateful?’ Kai asked, raising an eyebrow.
‘Because you don’t have to deal with me while I’m wearing one,’ Irene said flatly. ‘Now, give me a summary on what you’ve just been reading. Think of it as—’