After mentioning the book about Rider's past, and the resulting brief bit of conversation that followed it, Jannik returned the book to the shelf and began to search in earnest for information on the Servant that Rider had referred to as 'Lady'. He didn't have much to go on, just the name and the notion that she was a woman who fought while wearing armor, but he did what he could with what he had.
Initially, he stumbled across what seemed like useless information, nothing more than a collection of tales of various women who fought on battlefields of all kinds, armored completely. Frustration began to boil through him as he searched further, the feeling that he was wasting his time at the forefront as he looked. He searched and searched, but his luck was sour, and he couldn't find much of anything. There were not a few instances where he sat down in a huff, his frustration winning through and causing him to pause.
In these moments, he couldn't help but envy the slightly easy posture of Rider, standing beside Revenant. They looked so natural together, that it reminded him of how barren his social life had been, both as he'd grown up and once he'd entered the adult world.
Eventually he pushed past his stubborn streak, and though it hadn't seemed like it, when he checked his watch he noticed that they'd already been in the Library for nearly four hours. His surprise was evident, but it became even more so when he went to tell Rider, only to slide on the slightly glossy floor as he spotted a book sitting innocuously close to the edge of a nearby shelf. Picking it up, he realized that it had some of the information he'd been looking for.
It wasn't much, just a scattering of names and a couple crests, notably one of a laurel leaf. He looked up at Rider briefly, alerting him that he was going to see what else the book contained, then seated himself on the floor and leaned against one of the shelves to study some.
Rider watched as Jannik looked through the grand library for hours, evidently meeting little to no success as the various groans of frustration and frowning told him, as well as the fact that they had been here for at least twice as long as they had expected to be. Maybe he should try his hand at it?
Standing up, the large man placed a hand on Revenant’s head, attracting the wolf’s attention. Pointing towards Jannik, he simply said “Go play.” Before heading on his way into the library, the sound of barking and the scrabbling of massive paws against tiles filling the area behind him.
At first, all Rider did was pick out books at random. A green one here, a blue one there, a black one high up. Yet they all seemed to be on the general topic. Women warriors, or some sort of cabal of guardians. And with each book, the more focused and refined it became. Until he found it.
It was small, about as big as you would expect from a children’s book, but the lettering was positively tiny and crammed together. Reading through it, Rider knew he had found the correct book. Turning around a full 180 degrees, because he hadn’t bothered to take any sort of turn or complicated maneuver, he made his way back towards where he had come from.
Eventually making his way to the entrance once more, he was greeted by the sight of Jannik held limply between Revenant’s jaws, the Wulgar pausing in whatever he had been doing as his Rider emerged from the labyrinthine shelves.
“Put him down.” Rider told the overgrown puppy tiredly, too mentally drained from reading to bother with being a bit gentler. At his tone, Revenant dropped Jannik like a sack of potatoes and sat on his haunches, tongue wagging as the dog gave a smile.
“Here. This is what you were after, right?” Rider said nonchalantly, gently throwing the book into Jannik’s lap before making his way to scratch Revenant behind the ear. “Were you bored when I was gone?” He cooed, doting on the massive murder machine. “Was Master a bad playmate?”
Jannik looked at the book that had been thrown to him, and was about to complain about how Revenant thought of ‘playing’, but thought better of it. He wasn’t at odds with his Servant, but they were a duo all their own, Rider and his mount. He dusted himself off and stood, picking up the book as he did so. As he read over the cover, he dropped the one he’d gathered earlier.
“And here I thought you disliked literature, Rider. Seems like I could rely on you for this sort of thing more often.” He chuckled and leafed through the pages, eyes flitting over various specks of information. He walked over to a chair, resting in it as he began to actually read the small book, the writing tough to read due to the size of its font.
As he read, he soaked up the information within. Here were details beyond what he’d seen in what he’d found. Again, the images of crests repeated, and there were names, though not Lady’ specifically. He was reading into her history, who she’d been, and while it wasn’t information that would help fight her immediately, it was leverage. It was control.
“Rider, this is fantastic. I think this might just be what we needed though we’ve spent far longer here than I’d intended to.” He looked at his watch again, surprised that another two hours had passed while the Wulgar had mucked about with him and Rider had perused the books. It was nearly midnight, after all.