Where Books Breathe and Memories Burn
The village of Wyrndale had lain undisturbed at the foot of
the Mount Aeldros, and its roofs were sprinkled with moss and its stone streets
turned like old dreams. It was a quiet spot in the world of time that was known
to most people as another. But to the close-listening, the mountain told
wonders--in the stillness of late night when the wind died, and the stars
brightened their eyes. Farren Greaves was an apprentice of a watchmaker, who
had heard stories about a secret library that lies deep under Aeldros. It was
not a library where old encyclopedias are kept or how to farm books. No, it was
a thing of legend--a thing of books that could think, that could bleed, that
could speak truths no tongue had ever dared to utter. His grand-mother had
always told him that it was only seen by those who brought too heavy questions
to the world above. The question asked by Farren ever since he was eight, was
why did his parents disappear in the woods and never come back? Why had none of
them spoken of it since, as is the silence itself a curse? He never gave up the
belief that somewhere under the mountain was the solution that he deserved.
The Locked Path and the Laughing Raven
When he was twenty-two years old, on the morning of his
birthday, Farren stuffed his satchel with few provisions other than dried
fruit, a tattered compass, a flask of water and the single thing left to him by
his mother, a silver locket that never once opened. He set off in the dark, and
the dew was on the grass that he walked through in his crunching boots, as he
turned his eyes towards the mist-topped peak of Aeldros. The way was old and
forgotten, and covered with roots and hints of warning, and the further he went
into the forest the more the silence grew loud. Once a black raven alighted on
a branch whose tip was not high above the ground, and gave a weird, guttural
utterance--a caw, not a laugh. It turned its head at him in a way of mocking
what he was going to find. He did not heed it and continued his progress. Hours
passed. And he was about to give up on the trail altogether, when he happened
on to a little crack between two jutting boulders. An unnatural warm wind was
blowing in. He wriggled through, heart beating with excitement, and was in a
kind of tunnel that throbbed like a living creature. There were weird signs
creeping up the walls which he could not see full on. The further he went the
stronger it seemed to grow, the sense of an emotion in the air--not of one
thing only, but of several; of fear, certainly, but also of sorrow, of longing,
possibly of guilt. His own memories spoke in low voices to his ears, and it was
as though they were lullabies of long ago forgotten.
The Shelves That Sang
This tunnel led to a cave too big to make out the ceiling. There
were mushrooms that were shining on the floor like stars on the ground. The
middle of it was a vast edifice neither of stone nor of wood but of something
more ancient still, something animate. It was like a library breathing, and
writhing out of its own mountain. The shelves were wrapping around them like
ivy up towards heaven and all the books were just floating around in the air
and some of them were spinning like a top and some of them were quivering like
they were dreaming. Farren, as he came into the room, saw all the living
creatures therein take a breath, and the mere clatter of that breathing gave
him a start down his spine. His locket heated on his breast. one of the
floating books turned abruptly round towards him, and stirred in unseen wind. It
swung closer, and opened. There was no answer, but a question written in fire
of gold, and that was, What art thou seeking? Farren gulped, and said, in a
whisper, he wished to know why they had vanished. The pages unfolded themselves
and swallowed up the light. The world went tilt and Farren was in a memory not
his but a separate memory.
The Memory Door
He was in his childhood home, yet everything was too vivid,
too accurate, as though it has been painted by someone who has been trying too
hard to remember what exactly it looked like. The mother was cooking something
in a pot over the fire. His father was winding up a clock at a window. They did
not know him. He drew closer, shaking his hand, and it passed through them like
mist. Then the door was knocked. His father answered: and there stood a great
personage covered over with green silk and eyes as burning as the sun. His
mother and father got down upon their knees. And the man handed him a scroll of
red thread. His mother opened it and read it, and some thing in her knit and
set all at once. She opened the silver locket, and the picture it held was
taken away, and a drop of whirling gold light was in its place. She put that
into that of the stranger. Not to keep it we were not, she said. He had to be
defended by us.” And she looked full at the place where Farren lay. White light
flashed in the memory. He collapsed in the Library, and could not breathe. The
book had been closed. The lights were lowered. And then was the Keeper.
The Keeper Appears
It came forth out of the dim distances of the room, neither
walking nor floating, but changing its form with each breath. Its face wavered
between that of a child, that of a fox and that of a blank slate. It had robes
of white parchment, and its eyes were bottomless. You have struck a fact, it
replied, its voice was laden with whispers. Almost none make it to the first
page. “Who are you?” Farren asked. And it said: I am the Keeper of unwritten
things. I keep what is not to be recalled yet. Farren was holding the locket. This
then was the key? This was it? said the Keeper. “You were. The locket was a
piece of a story not of its time--a story that was not ready yet. Your parents
have defied a tradition. Sacrifice bought you silence.” “Can I bring them
back?” It was with a broken voice that Farren asked. The Keeper said, You can
make the story your own. And the Library will have it. But tales are not
gratis.” How much would it be?” Farren asked. It is your memory, the Keeper
answered. “Of them. Of why thou hast come. You will go away empty. Other people
can come in with full hearts.” The decision was out in the open. Live with the
truth and the burden and keep the story. Or take it back, and forget it, and no
more, and the Library might open itself to the world.
The Choice That Breaks the Cycle
Farren leaned over the locket beating in his hand. He was
thinking of his mother and her eyes, and his father and his quiet laugh, and
the bedtime stories, and the lullabies, and the gentle scoldings. give it up,
and he would lose them. Still, maybe in this way someone would get answers that
he or she never would. He walked up and gave the Keeper the locket. The
mountain shook. There were flashes of light on the shelves. Books were opened
and started writing their own ends. This time the Library breathed, but with
relief. The Keeper put his hand on the forehead of Farren. After that he
forgot.
The Return and the Whisper
At the foot of Mount Aeldros he awakened with the sky pink
in early dawn. There was his satchel by him. The locket disappeared. So was the
question. He did not know why he had gone up the mountain. Yet there was a
feeling of repose, airiness, liberation in him. He went back to Wyrndale, and
an old woman there welcomed him with a smile, and said, You have been away an
afternoon. But your eyes are different.” And that evening, when he was in bed,
with the mountain in his window, one phrase was sounding in his ears,--whereof
he knew not the source: Stories are the only magic that never asks applause. And
somewhere deep down the mountain the Library mumbled the latest truth.
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