and tightened my fists. She’d already chosen who she wanted protection
from. Who she trusted. And it wasn’t me.
Neve gave Savannah a warm smile. “With the sketch you sent me, the
monster wasn’t hard to track down.”
“What did you learn about it?”
“It’s a noctith demon. Fun fact: they breathe poison gas that puts people
to sleep. They’re classified as a third order demon, though technically,
they’re not really demons…more of a beast native to the Dreamlands.”
“What are the Dreamlands?” Savannah asked, her voice laced with
wonder.
“A realm of dreams, sort of like one of the fae realms but different. Most
of the information is myth and anecdote. The best source is a book written by
a witch, The Grimoire of Nightmares. But when I went to look for it in the
Archive of Bound Tomes, it was gone. Stolen.”
I started to open my mouth, but Savannah beat me to the punch. “The
Archive of Bound Tomes?”
Neve nodded. “It’s the section of our collections where they chain down
particularly malicious and deviant books. Like a prison for knowledge.”
A confused expression crossed Savannah’s face. “Chain down deviant
books? I don’t think I…”
Neve smiled and closed the leatherbound tome. “Books of magic can be
tricky things. If you cram enough spells and secrets and forbidden knowledge
together in one place, sometimes the book will…well, sort of wake up and
take on a personality of its own.”
“But it was stolen?” Savannah shot me an anxious look. “Was it
Kahanov?”
“The moment I discovered the book was missing, I called security and
had them do a facial recognition search for Kahanov between now and the
day he escaped. They got a hit on the cameras in the Archives.”
She held out her phone and hit play on a recording. The video feed