Page 65 of Daughter of the Drowned Empire
“To find magic.” Ramia rolled Nabula’s selections along the table, her eyes sliding across the titles. “You not find answers here.” She opened a leather pouch hanging from her shoulder and retrieved a set of white gloves, a slab of viewing glass, and a dark leather case. She unscrewed the lid, carefully sliding the ancient, weathered scroll onto the table. It was from Lumeria Matavia. Over a thousand years old, written before the Drowning.
“You prepared this for me?” I asked. Nabula had only given me copies, nothing so ancient I had to read it under glass. These sorts of scrolls were usually reserved for reading beneath the pyramid in the underground levels. “Ramia, how did you know I was coming?”
“A guess,” she said. “You’re smart girl. Problems? You come to library.”
I eyed the scroll again, suspicious. “Aren’t you the Afeyan librarian?”
With a shrug, Ramia smiled. “What? I can’t read outside my genre? How boring!”
“Ramia,” I asked, “do you know the Star Court ambassador? Mercurial?”
She pushed her chair back to stand. “I know every Afeya who step foot in Bamaria.” Her eyes roved over my soturion cloak and armor, the dagger at my waist. I felt like an idiot dressed up this way. But then a comment Ramia had made on my birthday struck me. She’d said I’d looked like the Goddess Asherah. Like a warrior. Like a soturion.
“Did you know I would become a soturion?” I asked.
Ramia wrinkled her nose. “No. I only know necklace make you look fierce. Fierce and beautiful. Wear it.” She tapped the scroll. “In meantime, start here. High Lumerian.”
“I will,” I said.
“Find answers,” she said with a shudder. “Arena is no place for the weak.”
I stiffened at the warning, watching her collect a stack of scrolls and head down a dark aisle of shelves. I waited until she was gone, uneasy with the way she seemed so invested in me lately. But once I was alone, I slipped the gloves over my fingers and slid the scroll between the glass plates, gently pulling the edges of the parchment through. My amethyst flickered momentarily, brightening and then calming to a soft purple haze.
The Fall of Asherah and Her Loss of Powerby Sianna Batavia.
I stared at the title, and my heart skipped a beat.Her Loss of Power. Excitement surged through me. I reread the author’s name. I’d never heard of Sianna Batavia, but I suspected we were related. How then had I never heard of her or her scroll?
I pulled the parchment farther through the glass, the ends curling and rerolling, until I had a clear view of the first chapter.
My name is Sianna, and I take the name Batavia, for I am a daughter of the land. I come here to write what I know about the Goddess and Guardian of the Light, Asherah, and her Fall, in the hopes of preserving such information for prosperity. These times are uncertain. The waves on our shores grow higher each day, and I fear for the future. I sense a coming doom, and my own sister has dreamt of waves rising from the oceans to fall upon our heads and drown us in her waters. Some speak of leaving, believing there is more land beyond the sea. I do not know of any lands beyond Lumeria. I only hope. Thus, I take the name Batavia with the desire that I will truly become a daughter of land, and by the Gods be kept safe.
Sianna rambled on for chapters and chapters, speaking of her fears that the knowledge she spoke of would be lost. After hours of reading, I came to the chapters on Asherah, but it was all information I knew. How Asherah had been a young Goddess in Heaven, chosen as one of seven to guard the Valalumir after Canturiel’s creation was nearly stolen by akadim in the Celestial Realms. How she reported daily to the Hall of Records to guard it until she fell in love with the golden-haired God, Auriel. And how their affair led to her Fall. How she was banished to Earth to live out her days in Lumeria Matavia, mortal and weakened, until Auriel stole the Valalumir and fell to be with her and save her, forever changing the light to crystal—and forever hiding some of that light within her body.
I was nearing the end of the scroll, growing frustrated with Sianna’s wordiness, when the writing shifted dramatically.
We’ve lost. The waves have come. My sister’s dreams and visions foretold this. She was right. Water everywhere. Waves so high. The summer gardens dried up. The Valalumir has shattered. The pieces gone. All is lost. Akadim have overrun our lands, Moriel’s forces have won.
And then the scroll ended. I pulled several more pages of parchment through the glass, but they were all empty. She’d never finished writing.
I took out my lamp and returned to Nabula’s desk.
“Were any of the scrolls helpful, your grace?” she asked.
I shook my head, clutching Sianna’s scroll. “Nabula, another librarian offered meThe Fall of Asherah and Her Loss of Power.”
Nabula’s cheeks darkened. “Auriel’s bane. I should have thought to pull that title for you—it’s just so rarely read. Sianna has trouble remaining focused. Many who’ve read it found it unhelpful. Did it give you any insight?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know yet. The scroll cuts off before the end. Are there any of her other works in the library?”
Nabula removed the scroll on her arm, quickly unraveling the parchment, until her eyes narrowed. “Ah, yes,The Fall of Asherah. That was only part one of Sianna’s writings.”
“Part one? How many more scrolls did she write?”
Nabula cross-checked two scrolls on her desk, her eyes rushing back and forth. “One more.”
“Can I borrow it?” I asked, heart skipping. “Or reserve it?” Maybe I could return tomorrow night.
Nabula’s eyes raced across a parchment on her desk. Fingers racing across a second scroll as she cross-checked its availability, she frowned. “I’m so sorry, your grace. All but one copy is downstairs in restoration. And it’s already being borrowed.”
