Twice Bitten (Chicagoland Vampires #3)(65)
Author: Chloe Neill

I wasn’t really feeling either option. Both felt like ploys in a supernatural game, and I wasn’t sure I was holding the right pieces. I certainly wasn’t crazy about picking one or the other based on which vampire I wanted to piss off more, especially given what was at stake – my life, my friends, the shape of my immortality.

"I’ll call Noah when I’ve made a decision," I finally told him, then turned and headed back toward the bar. For obvious reasons, I kept the conversation with Jonah to myself. I faked a smile back at Temple Bar, then faked a yawn so that I could extricate myself from the crowd and head back to the House.

Lindsey decided to stay, so I took a cab home, ready to spend the little rest of my evening in the thrall of the books. Say what you had to about Ethan, but the boy filled a library very, very well.

Okay – arguably, that wasn’t the only thing he filled out well, but let’s stay on track.

The library was a two-story space that occupied a chunk of the second floor toward the front of the House. The room itself was two stories tall and ringed by a balcony full of books, the balcony ringed by a red wrought-iron railing. A spiral staircase in the same iron led up to it. Three giant windows filled the room with light, and tidy rows of library tables filled the middle.

Long story slightly shorter, it was lush – a booklover’s dream.

When I reached the second floor, I slipped inside the library’s double doors, then glanced around, hands on my hips. I didn’t have a research assignment per se, but I also didn’t think I had the knowledge I needed to live and work hand in hand with shifters.

Historical animosity or not, there had to be material on shifters in here. Unfortunately, as big and well organized as the library was, it was still old-school about one thing: it had a card catalog – and not just any card catalog, but three massive oak cabinets with slender drawers, each containing thousands of alphabetized cards.

I went to the S row, pulled out the appropriate drawer, then set it onto a slide-out shelf. There were lots of entries for books on shifters, from the Encyclopaedia Tractus – the "preeminent guide to shifter territories across the world" – to A Life in Fur: One Man’s Journey. I scribbled down the call numbers of a handful of nonfiction titles (minus the biographies and memoirs), then slid the drawer back into place. I bumped a hip against the slide-out shelf to fit it back into its slot, then scanned the slips of paper I’d collected to figure out what parts of the library the books might be in . . . and ran face-first into a brown-haired twentysomething who scowled up at me with obvious irritation.

"Oh, God, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean – "

"Surely you didn’t think you were the only Novitiate who used this room. Surely you didn’t think the books just organized themselves?"

I blinked at the man – shortish, cute, bedeviled expression – who’d just cut me off midapology.

"I – um – no? Of course not?" Stuttering or not, I was actually being honest. The first time I’d seen the library, I’d assumed it had to have a librarian to keep things organized. I’d thought it weird, actually, that I hadn’t seen him or her before. I guessed this was him.

The librarian seemed to relax a little at the answer, then ran a hand through his hair, which made it stand up on end. He wore jeans and a black polo shirt –

another vampire apparently exempt from Cadogan’s all-black dress code.

"Of course not," he repeated. "That would be incredibly naive." He motioned at the books behind him.

"There are tens of thousands of titles in this library, you know, not to mention that we’re an official Canon depository." He lifted his eyebrows, as if waiting for my response – my awed response.

"Yeah," I said, "that’s – wow. Tens of thousands of titles? And an official Canon depository? Also very wow."

He crossed his arms over his chest, his expression all skepticism. "Are you just saying that or are you really impressed?"

I scrunched up my face. "How would you like me to answer that?" One corner of his mouth quirked up. "Cute and you don’t kiss ass. I can appreciate that. You’re the new Sentinel? The researcher."

"Former researcher," I said, holding out a hand. "And you are?"

"The librarian," he said, apparently not interested in offering a name. He also didn’t take my hand.

Instead, he waggled his fingers and bobbed his head at the papers in my hand. "Gimme your notes and we’ll find what you need."

I did as I was told, then followed as he turned and headed toward the social sciences section. Funny, I thought, that most libraries probably stocked books about shape-shifters and were-creatures in the myths and fantasy section. But here, in the confines of this vampire-owned library, they were real. That meant the books were more akin to anthropology (or maybe zoology?) than mythology.

We walked to the back-right corner of the room, the librarian’s gaze on my notes as we moved. He didn’t bother to read the signs on the ends of the shelves, apparently having memorized the locations of the volumes.

"Vampires are talking," he began as he turned into a narrow aisle between shelves. I followed him, books of every shape and size, new and old, paper-and leather-bound, stretching above us.

"Talking about what?"

"The convocation." He stopped in the middle of the aisle and turned to face one of the shelves, then glanced back at me. "Word is, they voted not to leave for Aurora, and then attacked you." Stories of the convocation had traveled; truth, unfortunately, hadn’t. "They voted to stay and support us, not to run away," I clarified. "The attack was against one of the Pack leaders. They didn’t attack me. I just helped defend."

"Still," he said, "doesn’t that just show what they’re like? Fickle? And meeting to discuss their future in Chicago. Who’d have thought the day would come?"

When he began to run a fingertip across the books’ spines, I assumed the comment was rhetorical. But I still had a question.

"Why are they called ‘Pretenders’?" I asked. I’d heard Peter Spencer use the term against shifters, as well. I knew it wasn’t flattering, but I wasn’t sure of its origin.

The librarian pulled a long, slim, brown leather book from the shelves, then handed it over. It was actually a portfolio that held sketches of shifters in animal form. The usual suspects were there: wolves, big cats, birds of prey. There were also a few more unusual options, including seals. Maybe that was the origin of the silkie myth.

"Shifters pose as humans," he said. "They pretend to be humans. They mingle among them, even if they aren’t really humans."

I had to admit, the argument confused me. "But we aren’t humans, either, right?"