The library was cold.
Not normal cold — not a draft through a broken window or an unlit fireplace. This was the specific cold that happens when something very wrong has passed through a space recently and left its fingerprints on the air. My wolf felt it the moment Darius pushed through the library door, and she pulled back against my ribs, hackles raised.
Elder Maren was standing in the center of the room.
She was not distressed.
She was looking at a wall.
"Maren," Darius said sharply. "Report."
"Hush." She lifted one hand without turning around. "I'm reading."
I peered around Darius's shoulder. The wall she was studying was covered floor-to-ceiling in bookshelves — ancient things, leather-bound, the kind of books that looked like they'd outlived several civilizations and planned t
