Rob took Irene’s arm, pressing the revolver unobtrusively into her side, and walked her onto the street, towards a car parked by the curb. The other man was just a few paces behind.
The street was busy, with yellow cabs shooting by and people walking past. It was almost strange to see so many people without the scarves or veils that Irene had grown used to in Vale’s world – a combination of local fashion and local pollution. Instead hats were worn jauntily, both male fedoras and female cloche hats. Clothing blazed out in vigorous colours, with all the advantages of cheap machine-made dyes. The whole street scene buzzed with an energy completely different from the quiet drive of Vale’s world, with people hailing each other or talking loudly as they strolled past, rather than moving through the fogs and murmuring politely so as not to disturb other pedestrians. But nobody looked twice at Irene and her escorts. If anything, they were rather obviously not looking at them, which gave Irene a good idea of how freely organized crime was operating in this city.
The windows of the car were darkened glass. She couldn’t see inside. If she was going to make a run for it, she needed to do it now.
Then she realized the car wasn’t idling at the curb: the engine was dead. She’d have at least a few seconds of warning before being driven away anywhere, long enough to do something. She’d play along.
‘Get in,’ Rob ordered. The other man was already opening the rear car door, muttering something to whoever was inside. Still exaggerating her limp, Irene stepped up on the running board, ducking her head to enter the car.
There was another man sitting inside. It took a moment for Irene’s eyes to grow accustomed to the darkness and see him clearly, but one thing was very evident from her first glimpse. He was a dragon.
He was wearing the same basic type of three-piece suit as the two men who’d escorted her to the car, but it was more expensive by an order of magnitude. No surprise there; Irene had yet to meet a dragon (admittedly she’d only met five so far, that she knew of) who didn’t prefer high-quality clothing. His skin was pale enough to be almost luminescent in the enclosed darkness of the car. He was handsome, with the sort of profile that begged to be sculpted in marble. But he didn’t possess quite the same dangerous degree of perfection as Kai or Li Ming. Irene wondered if she’d managed to walk into Qing Song during her first hour on this world. That would be remarkably unhelpful.
‘Would you mind identifying yourself?’ he said gently. ‘It must be a shock to see a library in ruins.’ Perhaps he thought he was dealing with a novice, or a Librarian who’d never interacted with dragons before.
That settled it. This wasn’t Qing Song. A dragon with the same rank as Jin Zhi would have felt more powerful to Irene’s senses, and would never have been this polite to a total stranger. But in that case, Irene had even less idea who this was, and no choice but to go with the flow and appear harmless. He’d clearly been waiting for incoming Librarians. If this wasn’t connected with the whole Evariste business, then she would eat her hat without mustard.
‘Oh, thank goodness,’ she gushed. ‘I was afraid this was some sort of Fae kidnapping. I can’t tell you how relieved I am.’
He raised an eyebrow. ‘Relieved?’ But Irene thought she could sense a slight relaxation of tension on his side. She was being stupid, obvious, and predictable, and it was what he wanted to hear.
‘To meet a dragon, of course. I mean, not that I’ve really met many dragons before, to be honest . . .’ She put her fingers to her lips, like a nervous teenager confronted with a pop idol. ‘I’m so sorry, I think I’m babbling. My name’s Marguerite. And you are?’
‘Hu,’ he said. Now that she was more accustomed to the light, she could see that his hair was light copper. His suit was a pale reddish-brown, but his tie and cufflinks were dark green. ‘And you’re a Librarian, I take it.’
One of the few fragments of cultural information that Irene had dragged out of Kai concerned the colours that dragons wore. Most dragons preferred to wear clothing in the same shades as their natural colouration, where the local culture allowed it, but accented with the colours of their direct superior. The dragon for whom Hu worked was probably dark green – as a dragon, not a human, of course. She filed that information away for later.
But for the moment she was supposed to be a total innocent, and a nitwit on top of that. She nodded. ‘I should have said I was a Librarian, but you seemed to know already. Did your men say that I behaved strangely?’
‘They said that you dropped a smoke-bomb, actually. And two oddly dressed strangers came out of a library, when no one went in . . .’ He spread his hands. ‘A reasonable guess.’
Irene nodded. ‘Oh, that makes sense. And ordinary people wouldn’t have known you were a dragon. I hope it isn’t awfully rude of me to say so.’
Was she overdoing the cute inexperience? She leaned forward. ‘But why did you have your men bring me over here with a gun in my ribs? The Library and dragons are on good terms.’
‘This world is disputed,’ Hu said, drawing back a little. ‘We’re on the alert for any signs of Fae intrusion.’
Yes, which totally fails to explain why you have armed guards watching a ruined library. You don’t do that because you’re worried about Fae – you do that because you’re worried about Librarians.
But Irene nodded, putting as much sincerity into her eyes as she could manage. She pointed in the direction of the library. ‘You think they did that, then?’
‘Exactly. We were hoping to find some trace of them. I’ll be reporting to my own lord later. I’m sorry that you walked into the wrong end of my investigation, but under the circumstances . . .’ He shrugged elegantly.
‘No, please don’t apologize! I’ve learned so much because I ran into you.’ That was absolutely sincere. Irene wasn’t sure what Hu was up to, but she was sure it was worth pursuing. ‘So if it was the local Fae, do you know where they’re based, or if they have any particular leaders?’
‘My men are investigating,’ Hu said. ‘This . . .’ He gestured towards the ruins of the library. ‘It only happened a couple of days ago. I’m still trying to get the full details. The police are patrolling regularly, so we’d better not stay here too long. By the way, my men also said that you were accompanied – another Librarian?’
Irene nodded. ‘He’s my supervisor on this mission. Of course we both took cover when your men tried to capture us, but he managed to get away. I’ll meet up with him later . . .’
‘And the mission?’ Hu said, a little too casually.
At this point, Irene decided, even an overwhelmed novice Librarian would be starting to worry that she was saying too much. ‘I – that is . . .’ she faltered. ‘Of course, it doesn’t involve the dragons at all, quite the opposite. And now that you’ve confirmed the Fae were behind blowing up the library, we know what to watch for. So we won’t need to bother you any further.’
For a long moment he was silent.