This follows the previous short story labeled “LD55: A Short Story Continuation”. The previous work may be considered “part 0”, and this is “part 1”.
A Library in the Cold District Link to heading
A lone figure scribbled some notes upon parchment resting upon his knee as he balanced an open book with his other hand upon a rickety table inside a lookout post at the entrance of the library. Ideally, he would be inscribing notes of the reading material, but the library was short of hands, and someone needed to be a lookout for this particular day. And so, Ulres the scholar would keep to his odd position, glancing nervously upon the outside world every so often, then back to his book and parchment of notes. All that rested outside of his little rickety lookout post were grass forever brown in this northern region of the country-side. It would appear that this particular day would hold nothing much of interest outside of the book Ulres was reading.
Until he saw movement out of the corner of his eye. A brown scarecrow was twitching its way along the beaten path towards the main doors of the library.
“Ah, so its you again I see!” yelped Ulres, leaving his parchment as a makeshift bookmark in the dusty tome, and hastening himself off his sitting place to greet the odd sight.
“But, this is of an odd time for you, and you seem to be in a hurry?”
The scarecrow merely nodded, and trudged dutifully towards the main doors walking past Ulres.
Ulres hurridly stumbled past the scarecrow and rapped upon the door a few times, hollering, “The puppeteer has arrived! Bring forth the index!”
There was some sound of movement inside the old building that had an appearance of an old monestary, but there were boards nailed over where there once were stained glass. Had the building remained as it had been initially built, it would’ve been quite the sight. But it now served as a strange library maintained by stranger folk.
The door opened, and a fairer looking woman took a glance outside.
“EEK! Oh.. it’s you.”
“Still can’t get used to it I see.”
“Oh be quiet you. Come along…”
She motioned for the scarecrow to follow and let it in, pausing only long enough to give a “what is going on?” look at Ulres, only to be met with shrugged shoulders. With a sigh, she closed the door after the scarecrow and Ulres sauntered back to his looking-post only to spend most of his time taking notes on his parchment again.
…
“So what brings you here today?”
Reinne presented a white board with a finely printed index of categories that she was holding behind her back to the scarecrow. It turned to point the stick for an arm and with surprising dexterity, quickly pointed line to line, until it rested upon the words: “The Occult and Dark Magick”.
Reinne frowned. She pointed towards the last aisle in the distant far side of the library. “You can find such books in the last aisle over there.”
The scarecrow bowed a little, then stumbled its way to the direction pointed out, but Reinne quietly opened the doors again to leave the building.
Ulres was, as expected, failing to keep a good lookout but succeeding at adding more notes to his parchment. Reinne poked his shoulder.
“Something’s amiss.”
Ulres looked up from his book.
“It asked for the “Occult””.
Ulres frowned. The category was a false one. A sort of trap to find out those of indecent motives.
“I think something happened, but I’m not quite sure.”, said Reinne.
Ulres sighed. “Well, I suppose we’ll have to ask for more details, but knowing “it”, it has to be a good reason. It always leaves with enough coin to let us continue for a while.”
…
The scarecrow was settled in front of Ulres, Reinne, and three other library staff. Ulres was assigned the role of documenting the proceedings, and Reinne the interrogation.
“I know it is hard for you to communicate with us, since you’re clearly commanding this scarecrow from afar, but I don’t think we can help you unless you can explain yourself.”, said one of the other staff.
The scarecrow didn’t move, but then slightly leaned back, then forward as if it were sighing.
“As you have surmised, we do not have a section on such dark dealings. But for one of our best patrons to seek out such material. Well, it is a shock to all of us you see…”
The scarecrow remained still, slightly moving as if it were somewhat breathing.
Then something strange happened. Every piece of straw on the scarecrow started shedding onto the floor. The library staff gasped (some even cursed), and moved back, expecting some foul magick to reveal itself. But the scarecrow merely fell apart in front of them.
“Look! The floor!”
The straw fell into a rough shape of a magic circle. And it started to glow. But it glowed like a faint afterimage of the sun; golden, and peaceful. And then a voice familiar to all of the staff could be heard.
“Sorry to surprise you like this, but this is an urgent matter for me. If you can recognize my voice, then you’ve heard only one side of the story.”
“Good god! Gander? Is that you!?”, Ulres bellowed.
“I’m well, for now. But time is of the essence. I just need a single piece of information, and then I will be off to whatever lies in rest for me.”
“Gander, they tell tales of treachery about you! You have been accused of murdering adventurers!”
“I know. I was the one who discovered their bodies. But it was a trap to conceal the true murderer. But enough talk about my side. If I can just figure out the location of a certain hidden place, I think I can get everything to work out.”
“I trust him.” Reinne stepped forward. “You saw that golden light, there cannot be foul magick that could create such a warm glow like the sun.”
“I appreciate the vote of trust, but I have to be quick. Do you know anything about the so called “Hand with an Eye”? I need to find the first documented location of such an artifact. If I can just figure that out, then everything else will fall into place.”
“What will fall into place for who?”, asked one of the library staff. “You do realize that the wanted posters for your head have reached places even more remote than here?”
“It’s in Belldom. The city of Belldom in the Western province of Alter.”, spoke up Ulres. “I don’t know where you are right now Gander, but there lies a range of mountains to its east, and the west of it is the “Fell Sea”. You may have a long journey ahead of you..”
“Actually, I’m not that far off from that place. Are you certain of this? If this information is incorrect, then my journey may be in vain.”
“It’s me, Ulres. You can be certain of what I have to say.”
“Good point. I will have to cut off this talk now I’m afraid. May the light shine on us all.”
With those parting words, the straw on the floor lost the golden light. Something fell off of the last standing piece of wood that held up the scarecrow, and rang with a clatter of metal as it hit the floor.
Reinne picked it up and chuckled. “That fool Gander, he gave us double this time. I mean fool to give us so much.” She showed the staff the object was a small coin pouch and held a few silver and one gold piece.
Ulres was standing at this point and fell back into the chair behind him with a sigh. He held his head in his hands. “I knew something was amiss when I first heard the stories. But this..”
One of the younger staff spoke up: “How did you know about such a thing Ulres?”
“When you’ve been working here as long as I have, you pick up some things. Actually I got in so much trouble once, that they created the “The Occult and Dark Magick” category to catch troublemakers like I was…”
The rest of the staff chuckled, then started to gossip to one another about what kind of trouble Gander had gotten himself into.
Ulres remained holding his head in his hands, and closed his eyes.
“Gander you fool. You’d better make it out of this one alive. The next time we meet, I’m going to let you drink my wallet dry.”