I stumbled when I reached the landing. When my foot reached for another stair and didn't find one, my forward momentum sent me sprawling forward across the stone floor. The rifle fell from my grasp and skittered across the smooth surface.

A booted foot stopped it.

I looked up at the owner of the dark leather boot. A woman peered down at me, her curly dark hair falling forward around her face. She wore a floor-length midnight blue tunic, with a broad belt sporting dozens of hanging blue tassels that brushed against her skirt as she moved. In her hand was a weathered wooden staff, an obsidian stone imbedded in the head.

"Hello," the woman said, her tone curious and friendly. "And you are?"

I opened my mouth but before I could say anything, she waved her hand at me. "No, no, don't tell me." She whipped her head back over her shoulder, calling excitedly, "Evelyian!" Looking back at me swiftly enough to give me whiplash – and I hadn't even moved – she continued, "You look like a Huntris. Which must make you...the daughter. Right?"

"Sable," another voice chimed in, and I looked over to see another woman glide onto the landing. Her dark hair was straight and shorter than the first woman, wearing a similar tunic to hers. Her belt was narrow, however, with a silver buckle on the side. In her hand was a short sword, sheathed in a decorative ebony covering. "Her name is Sable."

"How do you know that?" the first woman asked, furrowing her brow.

The second woman, Evelyian, gestured to me with the tip of her sword. "You said she's a Huntris, right? She's not Megana; she's too young. That must make her the daughter. Sable."

The first woman gestured wildly. "I know that."

Evelyian just laughed.

"How do you know who I am?" I asked.

"Your mother was here, once," Evelyian told me. "A long time ago."

She died there.

Mom died here.

"Did you kill her?" The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them.

The first woman looked offended. "No, we didn't kill her. What do we look like?"

I frowned. Whatever I had been expecting from the guardians of the Library, this was not it.

"Who are you?" I asked, pushing myself off of the ground.

"I am Laurelyn," the first woman said.

"I am Evelyian," the other introduced. "We are the Librarians."

[----]

The main room was full of lines of bookshelves, forming intricate patterns throughout the spacious chamber where someone could easily lose themselves. Shelves towered up the walls, tilting slightly forward the further up they climbed, and deep recesses high up in the conical ceiling looked both cozy and frightening at the same time.

Laurelyn gestured grandly to the space. "This is the Library," she said proudly. "Our collection of rare texts."

"Nonexistent texts," Evelyian corrected.

I stared at the room full of manuscripts, wondering if the Muse 9 texts were really here. Were those who were holding Luktor right? Were the texts here?

Were the texts even real?

"I'm looking for something," I said, turning to Evelyian and Laurelyn. "A set of texts."

Laurelyn nodded. "Yes. We know."

I furrowed my brow. "You know?"

Evelyian attached her sheathed sword to her belt. "Your mother was here, Sable. Megana searched for the same texts as you. The Muse 9 manuscripts, correct?"

Warily, I nodded. "Yes, that is what I'm looking for."

Laurelyn clapped her hands lightly. "We have those very texts."

I frowned. Was it this easy? No, it couldn't be.

Evelyian moved her hand in a rolling motion. "Sable, the hard part isn't finding the texts – it is the reading of them and accepting what they say that is the difficult part."

"Did my mother read the texts?" I queried as Laurelyn waved for me to follow her. The two Librarians glided off and I walked along behind them.

"Yes," she answered. "She did."

"Why?"

"It is not for us to know the whys of the world," Evelyian responded. "Just its words."

Laurelyn stopped in the middle of one of the rows of shelves. She turned to the right and reached up on tiptoe into what looked like an empty space, feeling around for a moment before her hand seemed to light on something. "Aha!"

Withdrawing an old manuscript, Laurelyn dropped back to flat feet and dusted off the cover with her sleeve. "This hasn't been touched since Megana," she said, holding it out to me. "It was meant to be that way."

I frowned as I took the book in my hands. The texts were bound with a thin piece of glossy black leather. Staring at the texts, I glanced back up at Laurelyn, and then over at Evelyian.

"That's it? No trap, no monsters, nothing?" It probably wasn't the best thing to say, but it popped out of my mouth before I could stop it.

Evelyian laughed. "We're Librarians, not assassins."

"The Drain is a dangerous place, but you have been well prepared," Laurelyn added, seeming to read my thoughts. "Morath Eurykhan and your parents readied you well."

I shook my head. "The Drain is a lot more deadly than I have seen so far. I know that is true. But why haven't I seen that danger? Why?"

Laurelyn and Evelyian exchanged a look. "A copyist's skill with stealth and weaponry enables them to survive down here," Evelyian told me.

"Only hunters survive down here," I said.

Laurelyn pursed her lips. "True. But you are unique. You are a copyist with a hunter's mind."

I narrowed my eyes as Evelyian continued, "I know you have believed in the evil down here ever since your parents died. But our evil is only the runoff, not the origin. It doesn't come from us. It just descends through us."

I thought of the countless drainage pipes that spouted water into the tunnels of the Grid. I thought of the gutterfalls. I thought of the filtering of sunlight in the grate villages. "Kycene," I stated. "The surface. That's the origin."

Gravely, both Librarians nodded. "Yes. Kycene is where our evil comes from," Laurelyn said.

"But there is still danger here," Evelyian added. "If you decide to follow through with what you read in those texts, you will have to face more threats than you did on the way in."

I nodded. "Thank you. Now, may I ask a question?" Before, I hadn't wanted to know, but a burning inside me made the question hover on the tip of my tongue, demanding an answer or at least to be vocalized. If I didn't ask now, I may never know and I couldn't stand that.

"You may," Evelyian replied.

"How did my mother die?"

The Librarians exchanged a look. "She died facing the darkness," Laurelyn said, and while it was quite poetic, it wasn't exactly the answer I was looking for.

"Stark! Just tell me how she died!"

Evelyian looked like this subject pained her. "Megana Huntris died facing the darkness."

"Can you elaborate on darkness?" I asked, feeling my self-control starting to wear thin.

"You faced it yourself," Laurelyn said, her voice quiet. "On your way in."

The Shadows.

Evelyian nodded briefly, as if reading my mind. "The memories. We often just call them the darkness."

I thought of what the Shadows had shown me. I had seen my mother, and then I heard Luktor's voice, taunting me. My father, too, I had heard briefly. The Shadows were memories? Whose memories? Mine? Or everyone's?

Did it matter? They had killed my parents, first my mother and then my poor father when he attempted to rescue her body.

"Now, we will leave you to the texts," Laurelyn said, interrupting my thoughts, and she bowed deeply. Evelyian bowed beside her, and then the two Librarians glided off, leaving me with the book in my hands.