The Library

A Story by JRTillay

Another section of my book, see top of text for preface

In this section, the main character finds a library in the city he's born. Information is heavily restricted, so there is quite a bit of contraband that has been smuggled into the city limits. Also, in general, books and education are hard to come by. The city is poor, and books are expensive. For a curious intellect like the main character, this place is like a playground, the only playground he has ever seen.

The people in the library are all members of a sort of clan/gang/society that protect the library, study from it, and vow to look out for the interests of other members of the clan. They receive some tax money and it is enough to sustain themselves. They can also sell engineering/scientific/etc services to people in need of them, but the city is so poor that this is not a reliable income.

Blue, the main character, wonders what makes these people want to learn so badly.

Also note that in this universe, Earth is in tidal lock with the sun. Half of the world exists in day always, and half of the world exists in night always. The main character is on the side of the world constantly in nighttime.

Finally, know that magic exists in this world. Arcane Magic is the type most of the people in the library know, and one of the abilities it grants is the ability to fly through the air, teleport, or make other things float through the air.

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So Blue left and went outside. It was still night, it was always night. But there was still about half a moon in the sky. The sky looked bigger, and he wasn’t sure if it was because he felt smaller or because his eyes could see better, but it made him feel safer, like he was wrapped up in a huge blanket.

He remembered the way to the library, and started his way there. Now there was a new guard in front. As he approached, he saw it was a woman.

“Hi, um.” She looked down with fierce eyes and an aggressive stance. “Adam said I was welcome any time.” She looked behind herself, whispering to the door, and a minute later turned around to face him again. She said nothing, and the door opened.

Adam was standing immediately in front.

“Hey there kiddo, did you already finish that book?” He asked, his tone bright and welcoming.

“Almost, but I wanted to see if I could borrow another just in case they trap me in my room for a while.” He said, bashfully.

“Well come on, we’ll pick something out for you.” He said. While they were walking Adam kept talking and asking questions, but Blue didn’t really feel like talking much, content in just biting his nails. And Adam figured that out after a bit, so the man just did all the talking. Blue liked that, and the man didn’t seem mad about it.

Blue could hardly believe Johan was his brother.

A young man, about Rian’s age, joined their conversation while they were walking. He came right up to them and stopped, then he started walking backwards while looking at them, keeping pace. He didn’t even look back to make sure he didn’t run into anything, though there dozens of things he could have tripped on. He said “hey kiddo, why the long face?” not in a mean joking way how people usually ask such a question, but as if he was genuinely curious. “Would you describe it as more of a melancholy or a depression? They only have treatment for one, so I hope it’s depression.”

Blue smiled because something about the boy was funny and Adam waved him away with a bemused smirk.

Adam kept talking, he mentioned there was going to be a huge collection of meteors passing by in a couple of months. Adam said it looked kind of like how day looks in Turon. It passed through every year.

“Have you ever seen the day? Not the way the sky lights up once a year, but the sun itself?” Blue asked the man. He looked sad all of a sudden, and Blue sort of regretting asking.

“No, but Evan has. You should ask him about it.” Blue nodded and he wondered if Adam had ever asked him about the sun. But then he didn’t ask because it might make him sad again and Adam was being awfully nice.

Adam opened the familiar old doors. Blue saw a library very different than he saw the first time, it was more active, happier.

The library was full of people of every skin color, height, age, and gender. Some floating and gliding and flying, gracefully pulling several books and making them float around their bodies like moons in orbit. Others closed their eyes, calling books through the air, making them fly at various speeds as passerbys ducked under them. It looked like a flock of birds made of paper and secrets flying chaotically in both directions down the great hall. Some of the books were written on paper, some scribbled on leather, or scratched into stone. He even saw some writings carved into bone. They were tidbits of information, smuggled into a city where information was heavily restricted. Sometimes smugglers could not afford to have information copied onto paper. Sometimes paper was too expensive, sometimes smugglers had to be aware that guards were looking for what was written on paper with pen, but not what was carved into a rough piece of rock. But no matter where it was written, the people in the library read from each thing like it was a precious holy relic. Even with the chaos of books flying around, the intensity on all of these people’s faces said that nothing was broken or burned or lost…ever. The things written here were invaluable, irreplaceable.

Some of them, particularly the youngest ones, scampered and pulled out ladders to get the books by hand. Or else they tugged on the rags or the decorated robes of elders, smiling meekly, stuttering shyly, and gently gesturing to a shelf high up. And the young boy or girl would take the book that was passed to him like it was a gift and smile wide with eyes full of a spark so bright it could have lit the library aflame. And the child murmured thank you but it sounded far away because he was already gone. His voice was attached to his soul and his soul was slithering over the pages like a well-intending snake searching for a nest in a garden made for men. Blue felt that they all looked like ants, ants building. What were they building, he wondered? No wait, not building. Searching? No...discovering.

They were archaeologists running wildly from head to toe of a great half-sleeping giant. Mapping every bone, every cell. Some were trying to see the color of his eyes by squinting in the moonlit sliver of his iris that peeked from his sleeping lids. For what? He did not understand what made knowledge so appealing.

And then Blue suddenly understood without knowing where the realization came from. There were two giants. The one pretending to sleep and the unknowable one sleeping and dreaming and in that dream all these men lived, men who would cease to live if he woke. The two giants, one was the slowly waking, forever waking purpose. And the other had a form shifting from one second to the next, a dreaming giant who gave them a chance to know purpose. There was a giant they could measure and begin to know, one they studied in the hopes that perhaps he could be like a mirror through which they saw the ethereal sleeping giant that housed them. And there was a giant they could ponder and imagine without ever knowing, except perhaps in pieces and moments of time. So they learned, they studied what they could. They hoped by knowing all of how, they could one day know just a bit of why. They hoped that by learning, studying all of what was around them, they could understand why they even existed in the first place. They hoped that by learning what made the stars in the sky, perhaps they could know why it filled them with such joy to stare at them.

“What would you like to read?” Adam asked the boy.

Blue’s mouth was half open, his eyes trying to search all of the room at once. “Everything.”