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All libraries hold secrets, and Mr. Linden knew that better than anyone else.
This one held more secrets than most. Mr. Linden, The Library Keeper, had inherited The Library from his grandmother, who had inherited it from her great uncle, and so on. Then notes taken by his ancestors about The Library spanned hundreds of books and none told the story of where The Library came from, or how it was made. The Library was simply there, it exists to exist and give a tantalizing glimpse of what could be but never was.
Small reading nooks and alcoves were there one day and gone the next. Doors would appear just to disappear as soon as someone took a look inside, and not all of the adventurers made it out. And the books, the books! The wonderfully mysterious books were Mr. Linden’s favorite part.
You could find any sort of book if you looked hard enough, anything from books about deadly diseases to healing plants, from diaries from leaders in the past to the future. The books just had to be found, usually by expressing a need and a lot of luck.
Which is why Mr. Linden was so confused when a young girl came to him asking to borrow a book on magical plants. It wasn’t the plant part that confused him, plenty of people enjoyed plants enough to read entire books about them, granted they were usually well into their forties.
What really confused him was that she wanted to borrow a book on magical plants, The Library was well known for its ‘strange’ and ‘odd’ books and architecture. It was especially known, and people were warned frequently about, the unpredictableness of what exactly each book may entail. Each book was different from the other and any book found out of The Library, even if one appeared to be a copy. The Library’s books were, strange; a novel of war stories might include screams and the sounds of bullets and cannons flying throughout, a medical text could include the smell of a sterilized room in a hospital, and a book on magical plants? Well, there was a reason the warnings in front of The Library existed, no matter how many times The Library forcefully tore them down.
The young girl stared up at Mr. Linden, waiting for him to speak. “Are you sure this is appropriate for you?” Mr. Linden forced his voice to stay neutral, not wanting to give the girl any reason to be frightened or suspicious. While most knew The Library had, peculiar, books, no one was willing to vocalize it, and neither was he.
“I can read all the words on the first page!” The young girl almost began bouncing in her excitement, “Lilly said I could borrow any book if I could read all the words, and I did!” Mr. Linden’s smile turned pained, clearly, this ‘Lilly’ didn’t mention which books were best to look at, and which ones were best left untouched.
“Congratulations,” The Library Keeper informed her, “that is a very big accomplishment.” Wanting to drag this conversation out long enough to convince her to borrow something else he asked, “where is Lilly? Is she waiting on you?” The young girl scanned the floor of The Library they were on before pointing to an older teenager, who was simultaneously reading three books and typing on a laptop.
“She’s working on a super big project, she said it’s super important.” The young girl emphasized the second “super” with a wave of her hands. She suddenly turned towards Mr. Linden with a very serious face, “do you like plants?”
“I do,” Mr. Linden replied just as seriously, “are you sure you want to borrow that book? It has a lot of big concepts in it, I’m not sure if it’s your reading level,” he lowered his voice imperceptibly, “and many of the books here do strange things, they can be dangerous if you aren’t sure how to handle them.”
The young girl stared, looking just as solemn, “Lilly told me to be careful, don’t worry!” She beamed up at him with her hands on her hips, “I’m a big girl!”
Mr. Linden winced at her statement, this was not going as planned. However, he wasn’t sure how to get her away from the book she was currently coveting in her arms without seeming rude or aggressive and unstable. Maybe this “Lilly’ would be able to help, he highly doubted she’d want the young girl to be hurt by whatever the book decided to do.
The young girl bounced over to Lilly, eagerly showing off the book she had picked out, Lilly smiled before packing up her things and getting ready to go. Mr. Linden was forced to take his eyes off them as he checked out a few books for others; The History of Animation, Calligraphy for Beginners, and Skating legends. Nothing that would incite as big of a response as that magical plants book would.
He glanced over to the two girls as they walked up to his desk, the young girl bouncing around, but always returning to Lilly’s side to show her one thing or another. They made their way up to the desk with bright smiles and bags on their shoulders.
“Welcome back Miss,” Mr. Linden said in their direction as he finished checking out books for the patrons waiting at the desk, “are you both ready to check out?”
He hoped they’d say no, that Lilly would speak up about how she wasn't sure if the young girl’s book was the right fit for her. Maybe the young girl would ask him if there were any books more suited for kids her age, perhaps that book with a moose and a muffin? But neither of them said anything of the sort, they both cheerfully set their books on the table to be scanned and Mr. Linden was forced to take them with a smile of his own.
“Have a nice day!” They chorused at him as Lilly helped the young girl put the books away.
Mr. Linden sent out a prayer to The Library to take mercy, to the book to be gentle, to anyone who might listen. “You too,” was almost whispered, maybe some deity would hear and help her before tragedy inevitably struck. Maybe it would end up alright.
A week later Mr. Linden sat at his desk reading the newspaper as the morning crowd, usually consisting of sleep-deprived college students and mothers with young children milled about quietly. An article about a recent death caught his eye: “a young girl,” dear heavens she was almost ten, “mysteriously dead in her bed while surrounded by plants. Friends and family worried and confused as to how this tragedy could have occurred.”
Mr. Linden set down the newspaper and covered his face with his fingers, watching the picture of the young girl he had seen just a few days ago peer up at him, with that bubbly smile on her face.
He had warned her about the book. Now it was too late.