by Jon Etter
Amberjack Publishing
An imprint of Chicago Review Press Incorporated
814 North Franklin Street
Chicago, Illinois 60610
http://amberjackpublishing.com
This book is a work of fiction. Any references to real places are used fictitiously. Names, characters, fictitious places, and events are the products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, places, or events is purely coincidental.
Copyright © 2019 by Jon Etter
Printed in the United States of America. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, in part or in whole, in any form whatsoever without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data is available on file.
ISBN: 978-1-948705-62-2
E-ISBN: 978-1-948705-63-9
“Libraries are about Freedom. Freedom to read, freedom of ideas, freedom of communication. They are about education (which is not a process that finishes the day we leave school or university), about entertainment, about making safe spaces, and about access to information.”
—Neil Gaiman, “Why Our Future Depends on Libraries, Reading and Daydreaming”
from jon:
To my parents, Stan and Connie Etter, for reading to me and countless other acts of love, and Forrest Public Library, for letting me grow up in its stacks.
from quacksworth:
To my dear, darling family for their kindness and comfort as I slogged through this odious assignment: my splendid spouse, Quintessa, and my precious, precocious progeny, Quentin, Jr., Quigley, Quinn, Quentin III, Quimbey, Quentin IV, Quella, Quinten, and Becky.
• Preface •
An Admonition from the Narrator
Let me begin, dear Reader, by telling you how terribly you have disappointed me.
At the beginning of Mr. Etter’s previous fairy book, which focused on the adventures of the cranky sprite Shade, the crooked brownie Ginch, and the just plain silly pixie the Professor as they found their way to the most wondrous Grand Library of Elfame, I warned you that it was a truly dreadful tale filled with disappointingly contrary fairies and urged you to move on to more proper and morally improving tales. And knowing what an intelligent and thoughtful reader you were, I had little doubt that you would put down the dratted thing and read neither a jot nor a tittle more. But did you heed my warnings? Did you put down that horrendous book that I was contractually obligated—much to my chagrin!—to narrate and pick up one of the wonderful books that I am actually proud to have worked on, like Lovey Tumkins and the Pleasant and Helpful Wee Folk or Honest Jim and the Do-Right Lads?
Sadly, we both know you did not. Instead, you read that dreadful book cover to cover and even urged friends to read it, doing who knows how much damage to the moral character of all involved including, I fear, me. Why, after narrating that terribly improper book, I actually began to wonder how important it truly is not to mix up one’s fruit salad fork with one’s leafy green salad fork at dinner, and if perhaps Honest Jim might not be a tish more interesting if Jim were to get up to a little mischief at some point (the correct answers being, of course, horribly important and perish the thought!). And all because you refused to follow the advice of your elders. Dreadful, not-so-good Reader! Truly dreadful!
Since appealing to your decency and good taste has clearly failed, I feel a different approach is now in order, for all of our sakes. I warn you: Do not read this book! If you do, I shall be forced to report your actions to your parents, your teachers, local law enforcement, and your dear, sweet aunt Agnes. And once I have done that, I sincerely doubt you will receive any of Aunt Agnes’s delightful hand-knit socks for your birthday this year. Just think about that before turning this page: no hand-knit birthday socks!
There! I am sorry to issue such threats, but enough is enough. Now I have a dreadful tale to narrate that you under no circumstances should read, lest you encourage the author to write more tales such as this one and possibly lead us all down the road to moral ruin. Sweet St. Figgymigg help us if that happens!
And so I remain,
Your Reluctant Narrator,
Quentin Q. Quacksworth, Esq.
United Federation of Narrators, Raconteurs,
Anecdotists, and General Tellers of Tales, Local 42
In which one of Shade’s least
favorite people pops in for a visit . . .
Shade closed the door to her room high inside the immense magical oak tree that housed Elfame’s Grand Library, walked to the railing, and looked down. Hundreds of feet below, the wood floor showed thousands of years of growth rings on top of which sat tables, study nooks, and one large wooden desk. Shade smiled . . . then dived over the rail.
She opened her gray, brown, yellow, and black butterfly wings—which, when fully open, looked a lot like the face of an owl—and began to glide downward in lazy circles, following the spiraling path that took visitors to every level of the great library tree. Along the path, the walls were lined with books, their leather and cloth covers all the colors in the world. Shade’s heart was still filled with joy at the sight, even after she had lived and worked in the Grand Library for over six months. She closed her eyes for a moment and inhaled, savoring the musty smell of old books.
“Could life ever get better than this?” Shade murmured.
“Oi! Flutterbutt! Stop muckin’ about!” a bulldog-headed fairy wearing a bowler hat and pinstriped, double-breasted vest shouted.
“Okay, maybe it could get a little better,” Shade muttered to herself. “Go chase your tail, Fleabag! I’m getting there!”
“Bloody sproites,” she heard Caxton mutter, although she could see the smile on his jowly face.
Shade circled down another hundred feet and then alighted in front of the maple desk that sat in the middle of the great main reading room. Behind the desk sat a black cat in a cream-colored shirt and brown vest who looked up over the top of his reading glasses at Shade. “Guten Morgen, Fraulein Shade!” he said cheerfully.
“Good morning, Johannes,” Shade replied. “Where should I start today?”
“Vy don’t you open the doors, then I have the very exciting discovery to share vith you.”
“Really? What is it?”
“First, you let in the patrons, ja?”
“Fine, fine,” Shade said as she walked over to the first of ten doors that opened identical doors hidden in the sides of ten identical trees growing in different parts of Elfame, the magical land of the fairies. I know, good Reader: Ten different trees in ten different places that all lead to the same space that exists in all ten locations and separate from them at the same time is a terribly confusing concept. I’m afraid that to make sense of it, one would need to know an awful lot about both dimensional magic and extra- and intra-spatial engineering, neither of which, regrettably, were covered during my studies in narrating school. No doubt one of your exceedingly clever parents can explain it to you. But to get back to our story, Shade flipped the latch on the door labeled “Meadowbrook” and pulled open the door to allow the sun of the pleasant meadow beyond to shine momentarily on her chestnut brown face and a cool spring breeze to blow through her curly black hair.
Shade sighed happily, then proceeded to the door to Dinas Ffaraon, the home of the Seelie Court, the longtime rulers of Elfame. On the other side, waiting patiently for it to open, as she did most days, was a young elf, hardly older than fifty seasons, her pale face barely peeking out from the ho
od of the green cloak she had worn on every visit to the Grand Library. “Good morning,” Shade said. The child nodded politely on her way to the nearest section of bookshelves.
Next Shade went to the door to Ande-Dubnos, the home of the Sluagh Horde, the longtime enemies of the Seelie Court who now controlled roughly half of the fairy lands thanks to an uneasy truce established after the last great war. Another elf, the same age as the last and similarly attired but with a black cloak and dark skin, waited eagerly. When greeted, he paused long enough to smile and return her greeting before rushing off to the stacks.
Shade unlocked door after door until she came to the last one: the door to her childhood home of Pleasant Hollow. She frowned. Her frown deepened when she heard an insistent pounding coming from the other side. Quite certain she knew who was there, Shade rolled her eyes and opened the door. The vivid orange hand that had been knocking connected sharply with Shade’s forehead.
“Ow! Watch what you’re dingle-dangle doing!” Shade cried, using exactly the sort of dreadfully rude language—two of the rudest swear words of the fairies, no less—that makes this book so utterly inappropriate for you, dear Reader.
Sungleam Flutterglide, chieftainess of the sprites of Pleasant Hollow, looked down her nose at Shade. “I see that your time around all these . . . books . . . ”—Chieftainess Flutterglide looked like she swallowed a bug when she said the word—“hasn’t improved your mood or your manners, Lillyshadow Glitterdemalion.”
“Not when I have to deal with clodheads, Flutterbutt,” Shade retorted.
“That’s Chieftainess Sungleam Flutterglide, Lillyshadow, and you know it.”
“It’s ‘Flutterbutt’ until you start calling me ‘Shade,’ Flutterbutt,” Shade said, crossing her arms. “So what can we help you with today? St. Whitman the Wise’s Blades of Barley? The Crimson Character by Nathaniel Thornapple? Maybe—”
“You know I want nothing of the sort. I want this . . . this . . . ” Chieftainess Flutterglide searched for the word. Failing to come up with it, she gestured frantically all around.
Shade smirked. “Library?”
Chieftainess Flutterglide pointed her finger at Shade’s face. “Yes, library,” she said, her voice dripping with contempt. “I want this library out of Pleasant Hollow.”
“And what exactly is the problem with it?”
“First of all, all sorts of new fairies are coming to our village to visit this place all the time now. Different fairies.”
“Yeah, I noticed them coming through the door to the library lately. It’s great.”
“It most certainly is not! Pleasant Hollow is a community of and for sprites, as you well know, and we believe it best if fairies stay with their own kind,” Chieftainess Flutterglide returned stiffly.
“And that’s why I don’t live there anymore.” Shade frowned. “Well, that and because you clodheads burned my house down. So, have anything else profoundly ignorant to share?”
“I absolutely do! In addition to the . . . unsavory element that this library has brought to our beloved Pleasant Hollow, it has caused some sprites of the village, including some of our children—our children—to question the wisdom of the decisions made by the village elders and myself.”
Shade’s smirk turned into an actual smile. “Really? Huh. Maybe there’s hope for all of you yet.”
“Now see here, Lillyshadow Glitterdemalion—it is bad enough that you and your parents and grandparents and great-grandparents have been thorns in the side of authority for four generations, but now other people are asking questions and suggesting that we do things differently. Differently!”
A chorus of shushes sprang from the many visitors who had entered the library during her tirade.
“Sounds like a very promising development,” Shade said dismissively. “Now if you’ll—”
“Oh, it is not. Especially when it’s coming from—” Chieftainess Flutterglide stopped abruptly and jabbed an accusing finger toward a chubby gray sprite and a thin, moss-colored one who had just come through the Pleasant Hollow doorway. “Right there! Exactly what I’m talking about. Those two are children and here they are: reading books and getting big ideas—”
“Which is exactly why I am here,” a deep, haughty voice rumbled.
In which a bugbear bugs Shade,
the head librarians, and even me,
your humble Narrator . . .
Shade turned to see who had spoken. Striding toward her came what looked like a bear—a long, lean, hungry, vicious-looking one with brownish-red fur the color of dried blood, except his face, which was going white with age, giving it an almost skull-like look. No Teddy or Winnie he, for he was a bugbear, one of the most ill-tempered and vicious of all fairies. This one was clad in a black suit and greatcoat with a stiff white collar and a circular, wide-brimmed hat sitting atop his head. Poking out of the elbows of his outfit were two wicked, barbed spikes like the stingers of bees, and perched on his grizzled muzzle was a pair of glasses with smoked lenses, hiding his eyes from view. The bugbear looked down at Shade, gave a dismissive snort, and gazed around the library. “I must speak with the head librarians!” he declared loudly.
A gray, monkey-faced gargoyle dressed in a blue satin jacket and knee-pants strode over. Atop his head perched a curly white wig and clutched in one hand was a china coffee cup. Not so much walking as gliding next to him was a thin, elegant woman with long hair and a flowing gown, every inch of her body made of brilliant white marble.
“I’m sorry, but we must ask zat you keep your voice down,” the gargoyle, François Marie, said. “Zis is a place of study and contemplation.”
“And how may we be of assistance?” Émilie, the stone woman, asked politely, but with a hint of annoyance in her marble-smooth voice.
“I am Grand Scrutinizer Norwell Drabbury, head of the newly formed Ministry of Ordinariness, Averageness, and Normalcy. I am duly authorized by both the Seelie and Sluagh courts to seek out and . . . ” Drabbury sneered, exposing sharp, yellow fangs, “ . . . attend to any threats to either court, the established peace, and the physical, mental, and moral health of all parts and residents of the land. And M.O.A.N. has determined that this place is most clearly a threat.”
“What?” Shade asked, stunned. “That is one of the dumbest things I’ve ever heard. And that’s saying something since I grew up in Pleasant Hollow.”
“Just as I have always said!” Chieftainess Flutterglide crowed. “For four generations your family have been nothing but ill-mannered troublemakers, and it’s all been because of those horrid books you’ve kept your noses buried in.”
“I’m sure you’re quite right, milady,” Drabbury agreed, shaking his head in sorrow. “And troublemaking, bad manners, disrespect for authority figures—these and so many other problems—will no doubt spread throughout the land unless something is done about this library.”
The foreheads of Émilie and François furrowed; their eyes narrowed. “And what exactly do you propose to do about it?” Émilie asked.
“Well, we at M.O.A.N. hope that we won’t have to do anything and that we can count on your wisdom and good sense to do what is right. For one thing, you can begin by restricting access to this library to members of the Seelie and Sluagh courts and authorized scholars and dignitaries. All others, especially impressionable children, are to be banned. As we know, reading has a tendency to lead to questions, and society works best with strict obedience to authority. Questions cause problems.”
“Oui—ze best questions always cause problems for zose ’oo should ’ave problems,” François replied.
“We absolutely refuse,” Émilie said, her usually melodious voice now sounding like flint sparking against flint.
“In fact, we’re adding a children’s section to the library specifically to encourage kids to come in here and read,” Shade said, pointedly. It was an idea she had considered for a while and now seemed an ideal time to mention it. François and Émil
ie turned to her, puzzled. Behind them, Shade noticed that the two cloaked young elves who had come in earlier were also looking at her and seemed rather pleased.
“Oui! That we are,” declared Émilie. François gave Shade a wink and a nod.
“We shall see about that,” Drabbury growled. He reached into his coat and drew out a large sheaf of papers that he held out to François. “In the meantime, M.O.A.N. has determined that the following books in your collection are filled with troubling content and are likely to corrupt readers. I insist they be handed over this instant for removal and disposal.”
“What? Let me see this!” Shade cried, grabbing the sheets from Drabbury’s sharp claws. Books so terrible that nobody should be allowed to read them? The idea seemed ridiculous. “The Adventures of Hagan Finnegan? That’s a great book!”
“Utterly inappropriate for young readers. It uses and encourages the use of foul language,” Drabbury replied coolly.
“Oh, puckernuts to that!” Shade replied. “Fuzzy Tinker and the Wizard’s Rock?”
“He engages in conjuration while still a minor and is rude and disobedient to authority figures.”
“Yeah, because some of them are stupid and evil, you mudbrain!” It felt like Shade’s blood was about to boil. “The Fairy Godfather? The Snatcher in the Barley? An Expedition to the Underground World? What could you possibly—”
Drabbury snatched back his list. “I am a very busy fairy and do not have time to explain my actions to impertinent young sprites. In the name of M.OA.N. and for the good of all fairies, I demand you hand over every copy of every title listed on these pages,” Drabbury growled, thrusting the papers at François.
Everyone in the room—Shade, Émilie, Flutterglide, Johannes, and the many visitors—looked at François. He calmly handed his coffee cup to Émilie, took the papers from Drabbury, smiled, and tore them in half. “’Ere,” he said, shoving them back at the bugbear. “As ze good junior librarian Shade would say, get dingled and dangled.”