Soul of the Fire

"It's my job, Master Rybnik."

He leaned closer to her and lowered his voice to a playful whisper. "I prefer beautiful women call me Ruben."

Zedd, when circumstances required the use of an assumed name, favored the name Ruben Rybnik. He thought it a dashing name. Leading a simple life fostered the urge for occasional flamboyance. Zedd considered lighthearted diversion essential to balance. Something as simple as using the name Ruben Rybnik satisfied that need.

The woman blinked, not catching on to the flirtation- surprising, he thought, considering she was nice enough looking that she would have to have had ardent suitors throughout her long life. Zedd was forced to clarify himself.

"Therefore, Mistress Firkin, I prefer you call me Ruben."

She stared blankly, and then, as he saw in her dark brown eyes realizations making connections, a sudden giggle burst forth to echo through the long room. A few people down at other tables glanced up. He noticed the eyes of one of the guards turn their way. Mistress Firkin put the back of her hand to her grin as her face went scarlet.

"Ruben." She giggled again with the mischievousness of using his first name. She glanced around before leaning toward him. "Vedetta."

"Ah," Zedd cooed. "Vedetta. What a lovely name."

She tittered as she scurried off, her shuffling steps echoing softly through the huge room-the lower of two floors of the elegant Anderith Library. From his place at a table, Zedd had long since watched through the windows as the sun set. The array of lamps lit with a warm glow the honey-colored oak of the room and provided illumination for those still more interested in devouring words than dinner.

Zedd dragged in front of himself the heavy volume Vedetta Firkin had found. A quick glance told him it was of no value. He opened it anyway so as to appear he was reading it with earnest interest.

He was not. The book he was really reading was to the upper right, but even with his head lowered, he could still turn his eyes up to the right and read the other, and any nosy person wandering past would be fooled. There were a few such people about.

He had already created a sensation with his grand entrance when he stood at the head of the library and made sweeping proclamations of having a hypothesis of law involving the accountability of secondary suppliers of goods to the signatories in trade agreements nullified by clauses involving acts of Creation not specifically specified in the subtext but implied by common law of ancient trading principles, and he knew he would be able to prove them out with the fine examples of rational law set forth in the examples found in the history of Anderith law.

No one had been bold enough to dispute his claims. Everyone in the library was perfectly happy to let him do his research. It helped to have Franca escorting him, since she was known in the library.

It was late, and the people running the library wanted to go home, but they feared incurring the wrath of anyone having such extraordinary command of law. Because he lingered, a few others did, too. Zedd didn't know if it was to take advantage of the extra time the library was open, or to keep him under observation.

Franca sat across the table but down a ways to provide room for all the books spread, out in front of the two of them. She pored through books and occasionally brought to his attention items she thought he might need to see. Franca was smart, and pointed out things few others would grasp, things that could conceivably be significant, but so far he had seen nothing of any practical use. He wasn't sure exactly what it was he was searching for, but he was sure he hadn't seen it yet.

Deep in concentration, Zedd started when someone touched his shoulder.

"Sorry," Vedetta whispered.

Zedd smiled at the shy lady. "Quite all right, my dear Vedetta." He lifted his eyebrows in question.

"Oh." She reached into the pocket of her apron. She turned red again as her hand fished around.

The hand paused. "Found it."

"Found what?" Zedd whispered.

She leaned closer, lowered her voice yet more. Zedd noticed Franca watching from across the table as her head was bowed to a book.

"We aren't supposed to let just anyone see this. It's very precious and rare." Her face flushed red again. "But you are a special man, Ruben, so brilliant and all, that I brought it out of the vault for you to see for just a minute."

"Really, Vedetta? How extraordinarily kind of you. What is it, then?"

"I don't rightly know. Exactly. But it belonged to Joseph Ander himself."

"Realllly," Zedd drawled.

She nodded in earnest. "The Mountain."

"What?"

"The Mountain. That's what some of that time called him. When I don't have anything to do, I sometimes read the ancient texts of the time-to learn more about our revered ancestor, Joseph Ander. Back then, as I gather, some called him the Mountain."

Zedd was at full attention as he watched her draw the hand from her apron. She had something small. His heart sank because he thought it too small to be a book.