My eyes shift from the streets up to the rearview mirror, where I silently study Ryia’s face. I still don’t know the purpose of her bringing me along on this stale journey to the library.
Though I suppose the chastisement she received for my disappearance would be reason enough. She was up for a promotion it seemed, and how well she can guard me, seems to be the determining factor.
This will be a drag.
The driver, who I can’t recognise, and Ryia are silently still on their seats, though I can’t be sure that they aren’t communicating.
I wish I could tap into kinetic and telepathic waves just to find out. If the driver is also an Arcane Witch, they may very well be sending telepathic messages to each other without me knowing.
The vehicle came into an abrupt halt between two tower-like lamps engraved with words in different languages.
I was only able to decipher one of the words. ‘Knowledge’.
In this world, it’s one of the things all beings crave, though no one seems to fancy visiting the place where it’s made readily available.
I check the nearby buildings, and there’s a steady stream of people going in and out, but the library...It’s almost as if there’s some kind of ward around it that keeps people away.
Outside, the building is walled with old dry stone and is filled with tall yet narrow arched glass windows. The centre is adorned with an enormous circular stained glass with a double door at its centre. There are some symbols I’m not familiar with.
Looking at the whole structure from bottom to the top, I would estimate this old ass building to have at least four stories. At the back, a clock tower, painted in dirty yellow, proudly stands with an enormous bronze bell on top.
If I depend on what memory I have right now, I’ve been to the Central maybe twice, but I don’t remember coming to the town library even once.
Which is odd considering how much I crave knowledge… I think. The inner walls offer the charming proposition of comfortable silence. Magical beings are known to be pursuers of knowledge. With the multitude of families bearing magical blood ties living in this town, it is puzzling to me why such a grand edifice stands bare… void of human traffic.
I refuse to believe I’ve never been here before, but I wouldn’t dare ask Ryia for fear of setting her off.
“What are you doing standing there, idly?” Ryia scowls before making her way to the huge double door of the entrance, bidding them open without so much as lifting a finger.
I follow behind her quickly, not saying a word.
On the inside, there’s another door, and I stop almost immediately, staring at the substantial frame. Like the stained glass on the outside, it has many carved symbols around it, and in the middle, there is a gate-shaped carving split between the double doors.
There is something familiar about all this. I can’t help but feel that they are speaking to me…telling me some kind of a story.
I stepped in just before the door closes on its own. The loud thud echoes through the empty entrance hall which stretches like a lazy yawn to another double door.
When we’re just a few meters from the door, Ryia makes a motion with her finger that opens both doors.
I can’t help but gawp at the multiple floors lined with tall shelves that seem to be jutting directly from the wall. Just above us, there are books flapping around and papers seemingly synchronizing as they form floating shapes around the flying books.
Oh, my days! This is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen!
The spiral staircase that connected all the floors in the middle didn’t take up much space, but it was still a sight to behold. The intricate carvings on the rails appeal to something inside me.
Curiosity got the best of me. I approach one of the glass cases and inside the case, the smoke forms into a dark forest where the moon shone. There’s a silhouette of a group forming a circle with someone in the centre. The circle glowed red and fog rose around them, and while I can’t be sure what they’re doing, something draws me back to the ball at the Penrhyn Mansion, and I instinctively know that it’s a ritual.
The smoke then shifted to form a double door, the same shape of the one in the stained glass outside. The door opened and showed what I assume to be a place of abundant trees, rivers, mountains.
“Paradise.”
I was so immersed in the moving imagery that I didn’t notice someone appearing beside me. The owner of the voice smiles at me as a greeting. She has long, straight hazel-coloured hair and gentle doe eyes.
“Paradise?” I ask her, still a bit startled by her sudden appearance.
“Oh, that was Paradise, the one it showed in there,” her voice is about as thin as she is.
“So, this one is showing the history of this Paradise?”
Her eyes widened in surprise as if it was the first time she heard someone asked about it.
“You don’t know about Paradise?”
I shook my head.
I know what it means, but something tells me there’s more to the term than just the dictionary definition. She suddenly had my full attention.
“Paradise is a place of joy. Something a bit like heaven on earth. It’s usually implied that it’s a place, but according to ancient belief, it’s a whole other world.”
She returns her gaze to the history show that looped itself back. I could see the same shapes and forms again.
“As you can see, this tells the story of the people who tried to open the gate to that world. A ritual was held in that forest,” she points at the same first form I’ve seen in the case, “by these groups of people.”
Seeing how the double door, which I now assumed to be the gate, opened, I raised the question.
“Then, were they able to open it?”
For a few moments, she looked at the smoke’s form of Paradise.
“No.”
“Why?”
“Apparently, it’s incomplete,” she said with a flippant shrug.
“Incomplete? Why?” I ask, completely rapt in her story. I don’t know why, but I need to know more about this Paradise and the people who tried to open the doors to get there.
“Something more needs to happen,” she gave me a mysterious smile.
I stared at the glass case, looking at the history in smoke playing in a loop. The speed of smoke’s transition gradually became faster. Faster and faster until I find myself in a different place.
Dead trees surround the place as a thick fog envelops them. The dried leaves and twigs lay scattered upon the black marsh soil.
A gong resounds through the eeriness of the dark night.
I hugged myself to shield from the bitter cold, but I feel the thick cloth of a coarse cloak hanging on my shoulder.
This cloak, I remember this.
I was left with no time to wonder as another horrifying gong sent shivers down my spine.
Out of nowhere, one person after another started appearing, forming a circle around me. A mix of males and females of unknown races. They approach me, only to turn their back to me. One after another, until finally there were seven.
And then there was me… at the centre of the circle.
Why do I always seem to find myself at the centre of these circles?
As soon as it hit me, the ground below me intensely shook. The dead leaves and twigs, even the pebbles, trembled as the land vibrates. The dead trees appear to be dancing before the red glowing light seeped through the soil and encircled around us.
And to take its place, a ritual diagram is formed.
The fog made its way to us as if it was being sucked in by the circle. It cloaked us replacing the breathable air with a suffocating thick white one.
I could feel the air being squeezed out of my lungs by the cold, heavy air. I struggle to gasp for air, but the fog took that chance to enter my mouth. My throat was suddenly filled with the slicing air going straight to my lungs, filling it until it forced out the oxygen with me.
The fog felt
like an arm going into my mouth, reaching for my organs.
I feel like I’m dying.
My eyes bulge, threatening to pop out, and my ears ring like metal being scraped against shards of glass in my ears.
“This is the price.”
The voice in my mind said.
“This is the price you have to pay...”
My insides twirled around with each other.
The blood in my veins pumps with a force that threatens to rupture me from the inside.
The beating of my heart grew faster with every desperate attempt I make to draw a breath and bloats like a balloon continuously pumped with air.
Right when I felt my heart is going to explode, the voice inside me completes her prophetic statement with a whisper.
“…This is the price you have to pay to open Paradise.”
Chapter 3
Speaking of the Devil
“Lili? Liliwen!”
The sound of my name being called pulled me back wherever I’ve been.
I could breathe again, and my heartbeat steadily in my chest.
My eyes adjusted to the surrounding after coming from a total blackout.
Then, I realized I was still standing in the library.
The mysterious lady is nowhere to be found, but standing right in front of me is Ryia, who had a puzzled expression drawn on her face.
“What is going on with you? You’ve been staring at nothing for hours there,” Ryia looks genuinely concerned as she creased her brows in worry. If I were still her puppet, I would believe this act for sure.
I blink rapidly to get a grip on what had just happened to me.
I turn my attention back to the glass case, which is already empty.
No smoke.
No form.
No shape.
Nothing.
Just a transparent box.
“Is there a problem?” a tall man arrives behind Ryia.
“Oh, hi Artair, no, there’s nothing wrong. I’ve just been looking for this girl to introduce her to you.”
The witch turns to me for the newcomer’s introduction.
“This is Artair. He manages the entire library.”
He appears to be almost six feet tall. The short bangs of his jet black hair fall neatly over his semi-rimmed eyeglasses sitting on his perfect nose bridge. The sharp eyes underneath the spectacles contribute to the whole strict professor vibe he seems to be going for.
He’s wearing a light yellow polo shirt beneath a caramel vest, and his black flannel trousers complement his light brown monk-type dress shoes.
Ryia continued, “He needs a hand in maintaining this enormous place. So, from now on, you’ll be working under him.”
I’m sorry, what?
I can’t help but gawk, this sudden proclamation that seems to be a final decision that needed no input from me. Never mind the fact that it’s my life.
Work under him?
“Pleasure to meet you, Liliwen,” he said the words but his face and flat voice told a very different story. Don’t worry old man; the feeling is mutual.
I glance down at his outstretched hand then back at Ryia whose eyes have not left my face for a second, before reaching out to accept it.
This is one fancy-ass prison if you ask me. She’s really not going to give me room to breathe, is she?
I somehow manage to give Artair an amiable smile from my repertoire of falsehood, in an effort to look even remotely accepting of the circumstances as they’re presented.
“The two of you are going get along just great,”
Are we?
“You both share that ridiculous interest in burying your noses into books and texts and blah-di-blah-blah. A boring hobby if you ask me.”
Nobody asked you, sis.
The man seems utterly unaffected by her attitude. He simply nods in my direction before turning back to Ryia.
“You should go. You don’t want to be late, do you?” His voice remains flat. I suppose that has nothing to do with me after all.
“Oh, right!” Ryia turns to me, “You best behave yourself. I’ll pick you up at seven-thirty.”
With that, her boots echo through the empty library hall as she makes a brisk walk through the double door.
“Follow me.”
That’s it. That’s all he says.
I can already tell this is going to be a painful ordeal.
I let the door close on its own and follow him around.
“Storage,” he points to a room on the right of us as we walk past and I want to throw myself over the rails.
Am I meant to endure this nonsense all day? Just how long does Ms. Ryia expect me to “work under” this plank of a man with the personality of a piece of gum. Dear god! I feel like I’m being tortured, not protected. He sounds like a mindless robot programmed to speak in a very limited human vocabulary.
Perhaps… hmm… I wonder.
At least, Zoren had more to say than him.
“Organise the books,” the brief command got my attention. His stare at a particular row of bookshelves was the only clue as to which books he so curtly ordered me to organise.
“O-okay.”
I went to check what was so wrong with the order the books were already in, and I was about to ask him, but he was suddenly gone when I turned back to speak to him.
Shaking my head, I start pulling the books from the shelf to try and “sort them”.
There’s nothing wrong with the order. He could have at least put some effort into Ryia’s weak attempt to have someone can guard me for her went about her day.
She might be meeting the Minister of Defense to report about the events of last night.
Will she tell him how Bran disobeyed them?
But it doesn’t matter anymore, does it?
Bran is already dead.
Although, she can use his betrayal as justification for her actions.
I froze at the thought. My gaze absent-mindedly lingered at the row of thick books in front of me.
It wouldn’t have happened if it weren’t for me. Ryia may have dealt the final blow, but they died because of me.
That’s enough, Lili. You’re still alive. You need to figure out why these men died in the first place. Stop moping around and seize this opportunity that lay before you. My strict companion has returned, and she’s right.
Having a job like this would make it easier to gain access to reference materials that could give me clues about what the heck is going on.
Ryia might be trying to keep me away from the truth but doesn’t realize that she has done quite the opposite.
I’ll gather Artair’s books, and I’ll read a few of them while I’m at it. One particular cover caught my attention. History of the World
I remember the floating images I saw earlier in the glass case.
What was that about?
It was like another dream. My mind goes back to the dream I had in the mansion. In the first place, I heard her voice as she spoke to Bran. I remember vivid scenes of the dream that came to me before midnight of my birthday and the blond enigma that spoke to me in the darkness of the mansion.
Something tells me there’s more to them than I think.
Perhaps, they’re fragments of my memories returning.
If that’s so then, that would mean I have something to do with this ritual for the world called Paradise? Why would that memory be wiped if it’s so important? Didn’t Ryia keep the important memories?
What was it that the lady said? The ritual was incomplete?
I have so many questions.
I have to know more about this Paradise, the ritual, and the gate.
That’s what I’ll do here… I’ll try to find anything that may help me uncover the things I have lost and lead myself back to my truth.
****
I lost track of time.
There was an overwhelming amount of information in the books I found, and they all talked about ‘Paradise’, a world without sorrow and
grief.
Utopia.
It seemed a lot of people had already attempted to gain entrance to this world, but their efforts all ended in vain. I looked for any records about the ritual the mysterious lady mentioned. I browsed the texts to find any kind of clues that would tell me anything about what it was. But my search was futile and frustratingly so.
After a few hours, I decided to stop the investigation and do what I was asked to do. It’s rather strange that I haven’t seen him since he left me here. Isn’t he supposed to be monitoring me?
Who says he isn’t?
I recall the show Bran, and I watched Ryia and the Minister of Defense.
They could be watching me right now.
I hope my book selections were random enough to not be suspicious… except I’ve only been reading about one thing for the last few hours.
Damn it Ryia. You should have thought about that before.
Hopefully, Artair or whoever is running surveillance has the brightness of moonless midnight and missed it. God, I hope so.
I busy myself, organising the books in alphabetical order. There appeared to be some missing books. From the very brief speech Artair gave, I gathered that the records of books are kept in the storage department. I suppose it couldn’t hurt to go down and try to find them.
So, I strolled along the silent halls and corridors, with my sneakers squelching along the concrete floor. There was no one there to shush me because there was no one there to be disturbed. I should probably ask Ryia about that. Would that give me away? I don’t see how?
In my distraction, I find myself walking in circles, and when I finally stop moving, much to my horror, I realize that I’m lost. Everything looks exactly the same and nothing is labelled. I can’t tell which way to go.
I wish there were someone else around to ask.
Screaming for Artair would certainly earn me an earful from him for disturbing the eerie ‘peace’ of the place.
Come on, Lili, think!
****
I was hoping I could at least bump into Artair in my desperate search for the storage unit, but it felt like the more I walked, the bigger the room became.
I should’ve asked for a map from Artair.
This may very well be the reason no one comes here.
Witch's Wishes: Short Stories - Book Three - Witch's The Cursed Circle Series (Witch's Cursed Circle 3) Page 2
