The Draykon Series (1-3)

Chapter Thirty-Three

'I won't be coming back.' Eva stood in the Library, facing down a reclining Limbane. In her corner she had Tren; in his he had Andraly. The atmosphere was tense.

The Lokantor's response to her statement was a gimlet stare, the sort that probably had young Lokants quaking in their shoes. On Eva, it had no effect at all.

'You forsake me, then, after everything I've done for you?' said Limbane at last.

Eva laughed. She couldn't help it. 'What do you imagine you did for us? You gave us only as much information as you had to, and kept the rest secret. You gave me access to your Library, but only so that you could make use of me and mine. You knew all along what Krays was up to, and never told us. You were never fully honest, not for a second.'

Limbane shrugged. 'Does it matter? The day was won, one way or another.'

Tren snorted. He stood off to one side, hands in his pockets. He might be leaving the talking to her, but his stare, fixed on Limbane, was unusually cold.

'Won,' Eva repeated slowly. 'For us, yes. Not for you, I think. The idea was never to stop what Krays was doing, was it? In fact you were in favour of his taking back Orlind, no matter what it did to our Cluster. You were going to let him do the hard part, then take the Master Library off him later. Is that not the truth?'

Limbane's stare didn't let up for a second. 'Why does this seem to make sense to you?'

'Because you wanted it as badly as he did. Both of you were responsible for the destruction of the Master Library and the land around it, because you were fighting over it so hard you lost control of yourselves. Has your desire to be the Master Librarian faded away over the years? Of course not.'

Limbane shook his head, a look of contempt on his lined face. 'And you imagine I needed Krays to do the work for me? I have more than enough resources to do it for myself, if I'd wanted to.'

'Probably,' Eva agreed, 'but why would you waste your time and resources when you could let him do it? Besides, there was a complication. You knew that Galywis was still alive.'

Limbane froze for a moment when Eva spoke that name, and something glittered in his cold blue eyes. Eva smiled in satisfaction.

'He still scares you, doesn't he? Even though he's out of his mind. He's the only reason you and Krays didn't utterly destroy Orlind before. It takes a lot to hold the place together like that, especially with large numbers of draykoni and Lokants fighting over it. There are reasons why he was the Master, and not you.'

Limbane flicked a hand in Eva's direction, the gesture dismissive and contemptuous. 'Get them out of here, please, Andraly.'

His granddaughter didn't move. She was watching Eva with a faint smile on her face.

'Krays didn't know about Galywis, did he?' Eva said. 'You let him think Galy was dead, because you'd never share information you didn't have to. But if anybody was going to rejuvenate the Master Library, then someone was going to have to deal with him. Why would you risk yourself when you could get Krays to do it?' She pointed at the cupboard in which Limbane kept his records, hidden behind an illusion of plain books. 'Whatever he took from there was information of some kind, probably about Galywis's continued residence on Orlind, and his mental instability. Krays's getting in here was a foregone conclusion: you planned it that way and arranged for him to find just the right piece of information. Properly encrypted, of course, but nothing he couldn't break eventually. You were hoping he'd pull Orlind back into shape and deal with Galywis at the same time - aided by centuries of research and technological improvements, and the deterioration of Galywis's mind. Then later you would seek to dispose of Krays, and install yourself as Master. Am I right?'