The Rage Eater

Epilogue: The Lost Book

By the time the flowers had bloomed and trees burst with green, Aubrey's heavy grief had settled into numbness. It had been well over a month since the attack on the Academy, and still there was no sign of Sadie. Aubrey had turned over the day's events in her mind again and again—the sheer senselessness of it almost driving her mad—but how Sadie, Dylan, and Hector had vanished from that roof remained a mystery.

When the orcs began to fall, Aubrey knew right away what Sadie had done. It was Dylan, transformed into a lotus clouds tree, a delicate poison raining from the sky. It was a daring plan, brilliant even, and Aubrey recalled feeling a pang of shame for not considering it herself. But when she and Master Padwe walked onto that roof not ten minutes later, what they found was violence and horror—Brutus' twisted spine, a trickle of blood spilling from his ear; Keri's cracked neck and lifeless eyes. And yet, there were no cuts, no bruises. The monster had worked without a weapon. There were no signs of Sadie or Hector either, just a tiny splotch of green slime, proof only that Dylan had been there.

For weeks, as Masters and volunteers searched every inch of the campus for clues, Aubrey tried to put the pieces together, testing her theories on Tim and Master Padwe. She'd thought of every possibility she could—a big flying beastly had snatched them up and flown away; an orc had scaled the castle walls—but nothing added up. No flying beastly that big could've escaped everyone's notice. No orc could climb down a castle wall holding two people, one of whom was Hector Reynard. There was no explanation for what had happened. She'd wanted to ask Wizard Dvesha, but by the time she worked up the courage to approach him, he'd left for the Council of Kings to advise them on the coming war.

Three weeks after Sadie had disappeared, when the search parties had been called off and hope long abandoned, her mother Gillian came to the Academy to collect her things. Aubrey still remembered her fair skin, her bright green eyes, and her quiet, unhurried elegance. Gillian had asked Aubrey what she remembered about Sadie, what her time here at the Academy had been like. So, Aubrey told her everything she could—the details of their friendship; the fun they had with Dylan; their battle against the water elemental; their victory during the Game of Thieves; and how Sadie had saved the Academy from doom not once, but twice. Gillian's eyes had brimmed with tears as she listened. And when Aubrey had finished, Gillian gently took Aubrey's hand and asked her to tell it again.

And so, with her friend gone and her heart numbed with sorrow, Aubrey disappeared into her studies. What free time she did have she spent meditating with Sim or helping Tim in the Great Library. Together, they'd thumb through old texts in that dusty room, filing and shelving books and searching for the so-called lost books. Both Tim and Master Sanders believed it could be a link to their past, a treasure trove of civilization's secrets. Aubrey was unconvinced, but she found the work soothing, nonetheless. She enjoyed the repetition and Tim's company. And sometimes, when they were lost in the work, she forgot, just for a second, that her friends were gone, and would likely stay lost forever.

#

Late one evening, when the wind outside had stilled and the castle was quiet, Aubrey and Sim found themselves in the Great Library once again, helping Tim and Emily sort through massive stacks of books. Many years ago, someone had tried to arrange some of the piles, even organizing a few sections into themes, but it was still a mess. The only real good the previous organizer had done was assemble all the books on shoemaking into a single stack. It was easily one of the dullest possible subjects for a book, and they were all glad to avoid it.

"The Eating Habits of the Yellow-Bellied Crocodile," Aubrey said, reading aloud from an old, but well-kept book. Boring, yes, but it was still better than shoemaking.

"B-b-b biology," Tim said. "Is it in good shape?"

"Good enough," Aubrey said as she crossed the room. They had to be careful not to store mildewed books in the main stacks, lest it spread. She scribbled the name of the book on a sheet of parchment and added it to the stack of biology books to be shelved.