Title: All in the Numbers
Author: kenzimone
Disclaimer: Don't own
Fandom: The Librarians
Rating: PG
Word count: 6,300
Summary: "An end is coming, Colonel, and trust me; if you do not learn how to fight the war, instead of just winning the battles? None of us will survive."
Note: Character death warning (though none of the main four)! This speculative fic was conceived and plotted out halfway through the first season (and then promptly Jossed by the finale), so imagine that this takes place in a somewhat near future in which the events of And the Loom of Fate never happened. Possibly tiny hints of Stone/Baird and Cassandra/Ezekiel, because that seems to be the way I roll when it comes to this fandom. Unbeta'd.

"It's never the Genie's Lamp," Jenkins had said, and that should've been her first clue: it's never the Genie's Lamp until it actually is.

She feels the shift when it happens. It's like lightning cutting across the sky before the roll of thunder; a brief sense of vertigo, a split second where everything seems to jump out of sync before slotting back together again in a vaguely different manner, and then the dust hits them.

The shock wave knocks her off balance and she ends up falling down on all fours, the invisible force sending her sliding on her knees along the rough and uneven stone floor. She twists away from the blast, raising an arm to shield her face as best she can, and the sand feels like a thousand needles biting into her skin. Her lungs burn with the need to draw breath, and for a moment she thinks that this might be it, that this is where she'll meet her end; in an underground temple beneath the Eye of the Sahara, Guardian and Librarians and caretaker and Serpent Brotherhood, all buried alive alongside one another.

And then it's over as suddenly as it began, and she finds herself coughing, gagging, spitting a mouthful of sand onto the dust covered ground. Wiping at her eyes she turns to find the Genie's Lamp sitting prettily on the pedestal in the center of the temple, unaffected by what has just transpired, wrought gold finish as smooth and flawless as ever; it's the epicenter of the blast, a powerful magic unleashed for but the briefest of moments, enough to blind them all and push them back with enough force to drive even the heavy dunes of brilliantly white sand away from the Lamp, blasting rock and dust and men against the thick sandstone walls of the temple.

Eve pushes herself back up on her feet and leans against a nearby pillar as she attempts to regain her bearings. The flaming torches lining the temple walls have all been extinguished, suffocated by the dust storm, but a thin beam of sunlight still seeps through the hole in the ceiling which they entered through, fifteen feet above. In what little light there is she can make out the vague shapes of sand covered bodies scattered across the floor, and on the other side of the room she thinks she might see Stone, his flashlight still working, the soft beam flickering on and off in the shadows as he slowly begins to rise.

"Everyone alright?" she calls, coughing and moving forward to crouch over the closest form.

It turns out to be that of Ezekiel, alive but disoriented; he blinks up at her, his face a pale mask of white dust, and from somewhere behind her Eve can hear Cassandra's pitiful whimper. By now she's learned to read the cues of her charges – knows how to tell their groans and exclamations apart, hurt and dying from alright though afraid and surprised – and so she gives Ezekiel a reassuring pat on the shoulder and leaves him to spit sand onto the floor as she makes her way toward the center of the room and the pedestal on which the Lamp sits.

Flynn had been one of the people closest to it when the shock wave hit them, and after a quick scan of the room she finds his crumpled form slumped against one of the temple walls, unmoving.

There's a lot of blood. It covers his face and the back of his head, the sticky red caked in a thick layer of dust and debris, and there's a matching smear a few feet up the wall where she suspects he must have hit it head first when the blast pushed him off his feet and sent him flying.

Nobody should have been able to survive this, but if Eve's learned anything it's that Flynn Carsen isn't just any man. She fumbles for his wrist and checks for a pulse, and when she finds none she moves on to his neck, pressing her fingers against his carotid artery, and there is her second lesson, learned in the moment when the Library's anchor snapped, severing its connection to the physical world:

Even Librarians run out of luck eventually.

There's a sudden movement to her right and when she turns she comes face to face with Stone. He's as disheveled as the rest of them, crouched over the still form of Jenkins mere feet away; the older man had insisted on accompanying them, absolutely adamant about it and refusing to state his reasons for being so, and Eve doesn't even have to ask because when Stone's somber gaze meets hers she knows that Jenkins, too, is dead.

Something flashes across Stone's face in that moment, as he kneels over the caretaker of the Annex – a shadow of an expression, one she thinks appears out of place on his features – and something about the way he looks at her makes Eve think of apples. A sharp, unbidden thrill runs down her spine and then the connection is broken as Stone turns away, moving on to check on what's left of the Serpent Brotherhood: the still corpse of DuLaque, fallen next to Jenkins – the detached head of a snake symbolized in one man – and not far from him, Lamia, weakly clawing her way through the sand blanketing her as she slowly regains consciousness.

Sensing no immediate threat Eve turns her attention back to Flynn. He's staring up at her sightlessly, sand clustered in the corners of his still-open eyes, and she reaches out to gently close them. She wishes, not for the first time in her life, that it was an act in which she wasn't so well practiced.

Her fingers leave tracks in the dust on his skin, dark smears of blood that make his eyelashes appear shockingly white in contrast. She sighs, lowering her head and allowing herself a moment to meditate on their losses – just for a breath or two – and then, because she's the Guardian, she pushes the grief away – saves it for a later, more suitable time – and rises to her feet. She feels stiff, muscles aching, as she turns to take in the aftermath of the disaster.

"Who is it?" she asks, her voice is clear as it cuts through the shocked silence even though her tongue feels dry and cumbersome forming the words.

It's Cassandra who answers:

"Me," she says quietly, as if she's afraid someone will contradict her. "I— I think it's me."

The Librarian is dead. Long live the Librarian.

...

Raising the bodies up through the hole in the ceiling of the temple with nothing but rope and sheer power of will is a laborious task, but somehow they manage. Well on top, desert sun mercilessly beating down on them and nothing but sand and rock spanning the horizon, Ezekiel bends to retrieve their equipment, but Eve stops him:

"Leave them," she says.

Lamia's mournful cries are mere echoes here up on the surface; a sorrowful lament to a fallen master, distorted and broken sounds drifting through the jagged opening hewn beneath the stark desert sun and dispersed upon the wind.

They carry their dead down the rocks, and Eve and Stone share the weight of Jenkins as Cassandra and Ezekiel struggle with Flynn's gangly heft. The ropes are left secured in place behind them, coiling down into the shadowed void that lies beyond the mouth of the temple in the center of the Eye of the Sahara.

The truck is sitting exactly where they left it, undisturbed in the middle of this vast, unpopulated desert. With a little bit of trouble they manage to load the bodies into the back of the vehicle, and Eve hands the keys to Ezekiel; she's seen enough death to want to spare them all the ride that is to come, and she's not surprised when Cassandra claims the front passenger seat, leaving Stone to share whatever little space there's left in the back of the truck with Eve and the dead. He doesn't protest but helps her secure the bodies, holding them in place as she awkwardly straps down their lifeless limbs using the seatbelts, before giving Ezekiel the go ahead.

They drive southwest, into the setting sun, toward the ruins of Ouadane and the door.

...

Stone had grabbed the Lamp before they left the temple, and as soon as they have carried Jenkins' body through the door of the Annex and laid it out next to Flynn's, he grabs his bag and climbs the stairs to the second floor.

Eve watches him go and doesn't like the thought of having something as powerful as the Genie's Lamp stored on a shelf in a back room of the Annex. It makes her feel uneasy, but with the Library untethered and adrift across dimensions she doesn't know what other choice they have.

She sighs and rubs at her face, a gesture that accomplishes nothing but to grind lingering grains of sand deeper into her skin. Ezekiel brushes past her, wheezing a dry cough, and disappears into the back of the Annex, leaving Eve and Cassandra alone with the question of what to do with the dead.

Eve was never briefed on this. She finds herself somewhat at a loss, standing in the main room of the Annex, dusty and sweaty and tired and staring down at the bodies of the people who used to hold all the answers. She wonders if there even exists a precedent, or if Guardians are supposed to die alongside their Librarians, bodies never meant to find their way back to the Library or any instance thereof.

"Is there someone we should... call?" Cassandra asks. She had been silent on the ride back to the Annex and now, judging by the tremble in her voice, she's on the verge of tears.

Eve shakes her head. Flynn had only ever mentioned a mother and that she'd died, and for some reason she can't imagine Jenkins having any close immediate family that would be interested in a notification of next-of-kin. And even if he had, how would she find them? Where would she even begin to look?

She sighs. "I don't think so."

Ezekiel chooses that moment to reappear through the doorway, holding a glass of water in one hand and wearing a strange expression on his face.

"Is it just me," he says, jerking his thumb over his shoulder, "or did there not used to be a burial tomb next to the kitchen?"

On the table behind Cassandra the clipping book opens. Its pages rustle as they begin to turn.

...

When it comes to the Library and any extension thereof, Eve decides, it ultimately doesn't matter what has or has not existed at any previous point in time, because the tomb is as real as any other room in the Annex.

It's cut from stone, dark and cold, like it's situated several dozen feet below the surface instead of at the bottom of a short set of steps, hidden behind a perfectly innocuous-looking door. In the center of the tomb there rests two stone caskets, carved from heavy gray rock. Eve has to enlist the help of all three of her charges to slide the slab covers off, stirring up dust and revealing nothing but space, the caskets' insides empty and bare.

"What the Hell?" Ezekiel breathes, and Eve's inclined to agree.

It's purposeful, this place— this tomb chamber. A macabre gift just when they needed it the most, and she's tempted to leave. Wants to herd them all back up the stairs and bar the door behind them, making sure no one ever steps foot inside again, but what good would that do?

What else can they do but accept this offering?

The bodies have, if possible, grown heavier since they carried them through the front door of the Annex. They fit neatly inside the stone caskets, a perfect tailor fit, and while sliding the covers back on – the harsh sound of stone scraping against stone echoing through the chamber – Eve almost wants to laugh at the absurdity of the situation they've found themselves in.

They gather in front of the caskets, more of a lineup than a huddle, dirty and downtrodden. Eve expects Stone to speak up and insist that they say a few words in honor of the dead – he would know the right things to say, she suspects – but instead he surprises them all by being the first one to wordlessly turn around and walk away.

It catches them all of guard – Cassandra's face falls, though she tilts her head down in an attempt to hide it – and Eve wants to whirl around and grab Stone by the arm and prevent him from leaving, but she doesn't. Instead she watches Ezekiel, and the subtle look of worry that graces his face as he places a light touch on Cassandra's shoulder. When she sniffles he pulls away, and Eve closes her eyes against the tension in the air.

She's tired. Numb. It's a bone deep exhaustion that she knows the rest of them must feel as well, every one of them on their last legs by now, and it's a miracle they're still up and moving. It'll set in soon enough, the shock of what's happened, and maybe then there will be time to grieve, but Eve can't stop just yet.

There's something tickling the back of her mind. Something she's missed, some tiny piece of information she's overlooked, and they're back in the Annex, the Lamp secured, and she still doesn't feel comfortable letting her guard down. Her gut's telling her to pay attention, because this is important, and it's never led her astray so far, which could only mean that—

"Something's wrong," Cassandra murmurs.

Eve exhales and opens her eyes to find her new Librarian staring at the caskets, her arms crossed over her stomach and her expression a mix of confusion and distress.

"What do you mean?"

"The numbers." Cassandra raises a hand to touch her forehead. She sounds upset. "They don't add up. The pattern is— I don't—" She trails off and Ezekiel steps closer, hand hovering above her arm like he wants to touch her again but is afraid to do so.

Eve hopes that Cassandra's not having another episode. She's gotten better under Stone's gentle guidance and has learned to handle them on her own for the most part, but sometimes when she's upset or under pressure she can still lose herself – still get stuck, overwhelmed by the connections between facts and figures and theories, unable to pull herself out on her own. Guardian and thief both wait patiently, hoping for the best, and Eve's relief is mirrored on Ezekiel's face when Cassandra's eyes finally widen and she shudders, letting out a sharp exhale.

"Three," she says, turning to face Eve. "There were three of us – so why did it choose me?" She looks lost, confused and sad, and Eve doesn't have an answer to her question.

"I don't know," she replies.

She watches as Cassandra turns away and wipes at her eyes, and when Ezekiel touches her arm Cassandra allows it, lets him pull her gently toward him as he steps closer to her. He leans in to murmur something – exactly what Eve can only guess – and it seems to have the desired effect because when he pulls Cassandra into an embrace she doesn't hesitate to sink into it, welcoming the comfort of the gesture.

It feels like an oddly private moment – Cassandra's tears and Ezekiel's rare show of empathy – and one that Eve shouldn't be witness to. She meets the thief's eye over Cassandra's shoulder, long enough to give him a small smile of encouragement, and then she leaves them there to work through their shared grief together, alone in the cold and the dark.

...

The Library sends the invitations, Charlene had said.

Eve blinks against the overhead spray and feels the water catch on her eyelashes. She's cold, shivering even as the steam rises, and there's sand gathering in the grout between the floor tiles of the shower, tiny dunes forming against the swirl of the water headed for the drain.

The Library sends the invitations. All of them, including her own. And it does so without the knowledge or consent of anyone, because when she had taken it up on its offer neither the Librarian nor the First Librarian had known to expect her.

There's something there, she thinks. Something in the details that she hasn't considered.

The Library sends the invitations, but not everyone shows up; at least three potential Librarians ignored the summons, and by doing so they unknowingly bought themselves time. Enough time that, ten years later, as the sword is about to fall, the Librarian and a newly appointed Guardian are able to arrive just in time to whisk them away to a place of safety.

Which just so happens to be the Library whose invitations they had rejected in the first place.

Eve frowns, rubbing at her scalp and feeling the remnants of sand and grit beneath her fingers. She tilts her head back to give her hair a final rinse before turning the water off and stepping out into the cold air of the bathroom.

The mirror above the sink is fogged up, condensation turning it into a large opaque slate, and she wraps a towel around herself and wipes at the glass. Her reflection slowly reveals itself and it looks tired, almost detached – she feels like a soldier again, on the offensive, pushing forward even as her brothers and sisters fall at her sides; always advancing, no matter what.

The numbers don't add up.

Three. Three potential Librarians turned three Librarians-in-training.

Why that number? The pattern, Cassandra had said, and what had she meant by—

In the mirror she can see her eyes widen as it hits her:

Morgan le Fay.

Witch, sorceress, whatever you want to call her. Using the Rule of Three to her advantage, sowing destruction, feeding off of it—

But she hadn't known about the Librarians-in-training. Hadn't even known about the new Guardian, and had thought Eve to be the Librarian before realizing her mistake. And then Jenkins had stepped in and—

Oh.

Galeas. That's what Morgan had called him, and there had been history there. Very old history, and bad enough that he'd asked Eve to kill her, and then berated her when she had failed to do so.

Eve taps a finger against the glass of the mirror, considering.

Morgan has many vices, Jenkins had said. But she never, ever lies.

Noli timere malum, sed time heroa:Do not fear the villain, fear the hero.

She turns away, running the towel over her hair before quickly pulling on a fresh set of clothes.

It's time to talk to Stone.

...

She finds him in Jenkins' private living space. It's a large room, spacious in the way a lot of the rooms in the Annex are, belying its true size. Jenkins kept his own personal collection of books here, the windowless walls covered in shelves overflowing with parchments and scrolls, and in the middle of the room a large, ornate writing desk takes up center stage; its surface is a mess of papers, scribbled theories thrown together with fine lettered facts, a testimony to Jenkins' never ending experiments and constant research.

Stone's got his back turned to her. He's standing in front of the desk, leaning over it, palms pressed flat against its surface and head bowed forward, and she can clearly see the stiffness in his shoulders. His hair's still white with dust, sand and dried sweat caking the back of his neck and clothes, and it worries her that he hasn't bothered to wash it off yet.

"Stone?" she says, slowly and carefully, because he hasn't seemed to notice her approach and she doesn't want to startle him, but the sound of her voice still manages to make him flinch.

He turns to face her and that's when she sees the Lamp, sitting on the desk atop the papers. It looks harmless against the cluttered backdrop of Jenkins' workspace, but her heart still skips a beat recalling what it threatened to bring down on them – on an unsuspecting mankind – and what it ultimately did take in retaliation for stopping it.

Stone must've observed the expression playing across her face because he takes a step to the right, blocking her view of the artifact, and it strikes her as such a Stone thing to do that she's not sure whether to be annoyed or grateful. In the end she settles for neither and goes straight to angry, because he's been distant and subdued ever since the temple, withdrawing from them when they needed his steadying presence the most, and she's tired enough that she won't have it.

"Baird," he says and sounds almost guilty, like he's been doing something he knows he shouldn't have. His voice is hoarse and he won't meet her gaze, and she knows whatever it is he's hiding from her, it's bad.

Eve quickly reprioritizes, shoving Morgan le Fay into the backseat for the moment, and considers her options. She wants to get straight to the point, wants to ask direct questions and receive honest answers in return, but she knows that'll never happen because if Stone doesn't want to tell her, he simply won't.

He's good at twisting the truth when it matters; where Ezekiel tells bold faced lies which he backs up with his own bravado, Stone's deceit is far more intricate. He tells half-truths with open endings, enough left unsaid for any listener to fill in the blanks themselves, spinning the lie tighter with their own memories and hopes and interpretations, and it's difficult to see through that kind of deception. They're two sides of the same coin, the thief and the art historian – lives lived through lies and excuses, hidden in plain sight – and no, Stone won't tell her anything about whatever this is if she straight out asks him to.

"Jenkins," she says instead, because she's got a hunch that it will all fit together in the end. Somehow, it'll all line up and connect, because that's the way it seems to work when it comes to the world of magic: Jenkins and Morgan, the Library and the events at the temple, whatever it is that Stone saw or heard or experienced— Once she finds the common thread and starts to pull at it, the rest will unravel. "I need you to tell me what you know about Jenkins."

Stone shakes his head. He's frowning, his lips pursed, and she can't tell whether he knows exactly what she's trying to do and is silently refusing her, or if he's simply trying to clear his head. Eve folds her arms over her chest and waits.

"Legends never die," Stone says at last. He leans back against the desk, and his delivery is slow like the answer's coming to him as he speaks, details fading into place like a long forgotten memory. "They aren't— It's like an idea. All Legends are created, but none of them can be destroyed. King Arthur, Lancelot— They shift. Take on different forms at times, but they literally can't be destroyed. We're talking old magic, in the purest form, from before the Ley Lines drained most of it into artifacts. King Arthur's crown, Excalibur – they're powerful on their own, but they got nothin' on the Legends themselves."

Eve frowns, waiting for the connection to become clear. "And how does Jenkins fit into all of this?"

Stone's still not looking at her, and for a moment she's not even sure he knows she's there, his gaze fixed on something over her shoulder, beyond the walls of the Annex.

"Galeas," he replies at last. "Galahad. Knight of the Round Table. Achiever of the Holy Grail. Illegitimate son of Lancelot and Elaine of Corbenic." He pauses, and she can see his knuckles turn white as his hands grip the edge of the desk. "God's Knight. Jenkins was the embodiment of the Legend. Not the first, but older than most. You can destroy the embodiment, but you can't destroy the Legend. It'll just reshape itself."

"'Not the first'?" Eve repeats, feeling her stomach begin to drop.

He raises his eye to meet her gaze then, and for a brief moment he looks... other. It's like being back in the temple, amidst the blood and the sand – Stone picking up the Apple of Discord and his eyes flashing red – but then it's gone and he's just Stone again, standing before her looking weary and lost and worn around the edges, like he's stretched too thin.

And it strikes her that he can control it, whatever it is. Can already suppress it, even if it takes a toll on him, and will most likely grow better at it as time goes on, which is why she never noticed it when Jenkins—

"Stone," she says, and then she's moving toward him even as a part of her wants to take a step back.

There's something guarded about the way he watches her approach, as if he knows he's said too much. She can almost see the tension humming beneath his skin, unable to dissipate, and her first instinct is to touch him; to clasp him on the shoulder or maybe lay a hand on his arm – to soothe, no matter how alien that thought should've been – but she doesn't know if he'd welcome the gesture.

Before she can decide he does it for her; seems to read her intentions and gives her a small smile, like the ones he's taken to giving Cassandra – friendly but with the slightest edge of distrust to it – and it's a small thing that still leaves Eve reeling, bringing her up short and leaving a sour taste in her mouth.

"I'm tired," he says and she knows that it's the truth, but it's also a dismissal – or as close to one as you can get.

She brushes it aside; ignores it and steps closer instead, until they're standing almost chest to chest and she's able to force the connection, blue on blue as he looks up to meet her gaze.

"You come to me," she says, and for the first time in a long while it's not Eve speaking but Colonel Baird – the Guardian of the Library – voice all steel and authority. "If there's anything, you come straight to me."

Stone nods, but she can see the way his shoulders have stiffened – the way his fists have clenched – and she knows he'll never take her up on her offer.

She reluctantly steps back to give him some room to breathe and he seizes the opportunity to push away from the desk and move to the side – to escape, brushing past her as he walks out and leaves her standing alone amid Jenkins' private clutter.

It's startling, this shift in their dynamic. She feels slightly breathless, almost sick to her stomach – like she's lost something she never even knew was there to begin with.

...

A month ago, in the shadow of the Gangkhar Puensum, as Cassandra calculated the orbit of Mercury and Eve had tried to keep them all alive, Flynn had laughed a holy woman in the face.

"I'm sorry," he'd cried, dodging a punch and leaping back against the wrath of a few dozen cultists, brandishing his walking stick like it was Excalibur itself, "but I don't believe in fate!"

And maybe that's the problem: maybe he should have.

Maybe they all should have.

Morgan had called this world doomed. You've already been woven into the Loom of Fate, she'd said, her smile sly and cold, and she had wanted somewhere to hide from what was to come. Eve hadn't thought anything of it at the time, but now—

Now, lying in bed and staring up at the ceiling, unable to sleep, she wishes she had taken Jenkins at his word when he'd spoken of endings – of fighting a war.

Because in the end, it all comes back to the Library.

It remains lost – adrift in time and space, as Flynn had put it during one of his more melancholy moments – after nearly a year spent searching and with little to show for it.

Flynn had tried his best. He'd given it his all, gone off on his own for months on end, returning to the Annex now and again to drag them all along on a dangerous quest in the hopes that it would help further him in his search. Each time he'd presented a facade of optimism, telling them that he was getting closer, that he was nearly there, and they had believed him; Eve still believes him, believes that he did think he was making progress, what little there had been.

In the end it had been impossible, because how do you find something like the Library unless it sends you a summons? Searching for it had been a hopeless endeavor. Like looking up at the night sky, trying to find an entirely new star unknown to man using nothing but the naked eye.

Different realities – that's what Lamia had called it according to Cassandra. A pocket dimension, once anchored to this one but now untethered and lost to all.

Thrust headfirst into a world of magic where everyone – and seemingly everything – seemed to want to kill you, there had been little time for Eve to stop and try to make sense of it all. She hadn't bothered thinking about the hows when it came to the Library; she'd simply accepted the facts as they were presented to her by the people who seemed to be in the know, and that might have been a mistake on her part.

What little time she had been able to spend in the Library before the Serpent Brotherhood had struck and Charlene and Judson had been forced to cut the anchor chain, it had been more than enough for her to get struck dumb by the sheer size of it. It had felt old, vast in ways that simply aren't anymore; a grandness like that of ancient times, but still more, working with scales of space beyond man's understanding – in scales of time beyond that of a normal lifespan.

Adrift in space and time, Flynn had said, and she'd been so focused on the space that she hadn't considered the time.

Convenience. That's what it all boils down to: the Library, and how nicely everything had seemed to fall into place once its tether had been cut.

I've never been this deep in the Library before, Flynn had confessed, confronted with a wall of doors – a wall of what Eve now knows must have been possible destinations, different interfaces across the world – and he'd chosen one made of steel, old and worn and as good as any in that one moment. Only, at the last second, his hand on the handle, he'd hesitated. And then he'd changed his mind, had whirled around and opened a wooden door instead, and they'd all gone through and found themselves more than two thousand miles away, in the middle of a forest, at the edge of which there had been Jenkins, waiting.

I think the Library chose you to be their Guardian, Flynn had told her before he left, and that had implied knowledge of the future on the part of the Library, from the moment it sent Eve her invitation and maybe even beyond that. The words had implied omniscience, which should have been impossible, but what else could Flynn have meant and what else could being set adrift in time imply?

Something's wrong. Cassandra had felt it, standing in the tomb; or maybe even before that, maybe from the very moment they crested that last dune and found themselves looking down upon the Eye of the Sahara. The numbers don't add up, she'd said, but Eve's no longer so sure.

It's a question of threes.

We do not train Librarians! Jenkins had been firm in his opinion, and yet the Library seemed to have been intent on doing just that: three Librarian candidates gathered into its fold – saved, with a Guardian appointed to look after them – and then, from out of the three, Flynn's successor had been chosen.

But why three when it would only ever need one? And why Cassandra, when it could have been any one of them? They're brilliant, each one an unchallenged master of their field, and yet she's the one singled out, appointed Librarian by some invisible decree even though she carries with her a death sentence.

Eve doesn't know what this leaves them. A break in the pattern? A dying Librarian and two—

No, not two. One.

Ezekiel is still here, still unchanged, a free spirit untethered by obligations, but Stone—

Stone, who holds an unquenchable thirst for knowledge; who spends his free time poring over the books in the Annex, soaking up the information like a sponge, teaching himself dead languages and memorizing ancient folk lore and myths like he's spent his whole life starving for it; who in later days had managed to strike up an easy rapport with Jenkins, something Eve had watched in amusement, and who'd looked her straight in the eyes and had, for a moment, been something other—

Stone's needed elsewhere now.

Eve doesn't know how or why but with Jenkins gone he's meant for something more, something beyond anyone's comprehension. And that's another timely coincidence – another vacant position filled, another piece slotting perfectly into place – and with it the pattern reveals itself again, simple but true:

One plus one plus one.

A pattern of three: a Librarian, a caretaker, and a—

A what? A spare? A backup Librarian for when Cassandra's tumor finally grows large enough to kill her? Eve isn't sure, but it seems unlikely.

She doesn't want to think about the numbers, about the two positions that have already been filled as Ezekiel waits his turn on the sidelines; doesn't want to imagine what the Library might have in store for him, because it does have something planned. It picked them – each and every one of them – for a reason, and whatever that might be things seem to be coming to a head sooner rather than later:

There's a charge in the air, spreading across the Annex like static before a storm, and Eve's felt it before; in the Library, running for her life as the building folded in on itself, breached and violated by the Serpent Brotherhood.

Magic, Flynn had explained it later. Furious and unleashed, and it's the same now even though it shouldn't be possible, the charge relentless and stifling, raising goosebumps across her skin and making the hair on her arms stand on end.

The Rule of Three amplifies the spell, for good or bad, Jenkins had said, and isn't that what the Library is? One large spell; pure, ageless magic, unfixed in space and time. Old enough to be sentient – perhaps even created that way: all seeing, all knowing, the secret riches of history hidden within its walls.

And the Annex— An interface, Jenkins had called it, separate, but connected, but there has to be more to it than that; information pulled across dimensions, doors that open up to the corners of the world, desks that reset themselves, and a main room identical to Flynn's study. The tomb chamber—

Connected, but perhaps no longer so separate. The link was already in place and what more could the Library need? Three Librarians-in-training, a Pattern of Three to solidify the connection, and suddenly it's no longer an instance but an extension; what was once divided now one and the same, no anchor needed for the power to flow through one and into the other.

The numbers don't add up, Cassandra had said, but she can't see it – too enamored with the magic that saturates this place, too trusting of it.

Eve's always been of a more practical nature.

"What are you planning?" she asks out loud, and the shadows of her room absorb the sound as words cut through the silence.

Flynn used to speak to the Library, like it could understand him and was capable of replying, and she half expects just that – a reply in the form of a flickering light or creaking door, perhaps the sound of the Annex settling around her – but none is forthcoming, her question unworthy of acknowledgment.

It's Jenkins she hears instead, his voice cold and his words uncompromising even in memory:

The end – an end – is coming, Colonel, and trust me; if you do not learn how to fight the war, instead of just winning the battles? None of us will survive.

Three Librarians-in-training. Two positions to fill. One Librarian, one caretaker, and one thief – a Guardian to watch over them and keep them safe.

It's all in the numbers, and Eve's not sure she's liking the odds.