by C. A. Pack
SECOND
CHRONICLES OF
ILLUMINATION
Library of Illumination:
Books Five, Six, and Seven
C. A. Pack
[email protected]
PREFACE
You may get a sense of déjà vu reading the Second Chronicles of Illumination.
The Library of Illumination (LOI) is an ongoing series of novelettes, novellas, and novels about a special library where books literally come to life. In 2014, I published Chronicles: The Library of Illumination, comprised of the first five stories in the series. It included an adventure entitled Portals, in which LOI curators Johanna Charette and Jackson Roth discovered gateways to libraries similar to their own—on other worlds.
I’ve chosen to include Portals in this book as well, because it kicks off a continuing story line. Think of it as a bonus. If you’ve already read it and wish to jump straight to The Overseers, start this book with chapter eleven. The Second Chronicles of Illumination also includes the novel Myrddin’s Memoir. The three titles are all part of the same storyline but are not the entire adventure. This is an ongoing saga, and that means it will continue in future “Chronicles.”
Call it episodic. Call it Dickensian. Call it opus magnus interruptus.
I hope you enjoy it.
CHAPTER 1 PORTALS
Jackson carried an armful of returned books to a dimly lit alcove in the Library of Illumination’s cupola. It was a special area reserved for some of the library’s quirkier offerings. The teen enjoyed reading the various titles, but after looking inside The Pop-Up Book of Phobias, he refrained from opening any of the others. Unleashing overpowering arachnophobia is not fun.
He hesitated as he shelved Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal. When he had some time, he would have to come back and take a closer look at that one. He wasn’t sure what a few of the other books were about. Prodigiorum Ac Ostentorums Chronicon was Greek to him, and he had never heard of The Codex Seraphinianus. There was the Egyptian Book of the Dead, but there was no way he would ever open that one. And no library would be complete without Ripley Scrowle and Prophecies by M. Michel de Nostredame. I wonder if Johanna has unenchanted versions of these.
The recess appeared shadowy, which mystified Jackson because there was an octagonal window at the end of the alcove. It should have allowed light to flow into the library, but the aging etched glass looked frosted and did not permit a view of the outside.
Jackson shook his head. Something’s not right here. After shelving the last book, he ran down the cupola stairs and shouted, “Illumination,” as he took off out the front door. He looked up at the area where he thought the alcove should be located, but didn’t see a window.
He tried circumnavigating the library, which wasn’t an easy thing to do considering it had no side alleys, so he had to go around the entire block. Still, he couldn’t find that particular octagonal window.
Johanna stood waiting by the door when he walked back in. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing, really.”
“Where did you disappear to? I thought somebody died, the way you ran out of here.”
“The thing is,” Jackson mused, “there’s a little window in the alcove where we keep the wacko books, which should be visible from outside, but there’s no corresponding window out there.”
“Repeat after me, there is no such thing as a wacko book. And there has to be a window. If there’s one in here, you should be able to see it from out there.”
He grabbed her arm and dragged her out the door. “Look up. If the cupola stairs are near the center of the building and the weirdo-book alcove is on the left, the window should be right there.” He pointed. “But it’s not.”
“Wait. That doesn’t make any sense. I’ve got to go back inside and get my bearings.” Johanna went all the way up to the cupola, and then carefully traced her way back down and out the front entrance. “You’re right. There should be a window there. I guess the one in the alcove is a fake.”
“Why would anyone put a fake window in a library hundreds of years ago?”
“I don’t know. It doesn’t make sense.”
“So I’m thinking, maybe it hides a safe and there are piles of gold in there.”
Johanna covered her face with both her hands for a few seconds. When she finally looked up, she said, “That is so ... you.”
“C’mon. Let’s go look.” Jackson grabbed her hand and dragged her back to the alcove window.
For several minutes, they stood and stared at the octagonal wooden frame filled with radiating triangles of leaded glass. “I never realized you couldn’t see outside,” she said. “I wonder what would happen if we cleaned it.”
“Your wish is my command.” Jackson practically flew down the cupola stairs to retrieve some rags and a spray bottle of glass cleaner from the utility room.
He returned before Johanna had a chance to miss him. He doused the fabric with cleanser and started rubbing the window. Grime came off on the rag, but the view remained obscured. “It’s not a window, so no matter how much I clean it, we won’t be able to see through it. I’m telling you, it’s hiding something.”
“Forget it. There’s no way we’re going to open it,” Johanna said dismissively. “Besides, it looks like it’s painted in place.”
Jackson tried prying it with his fingers. “Wait ...”
He bolted down the stairs again, and returned a few minutes later with a box cutter. This time his breathing sounded a little more ragged. The cupola steps spiraled straight to the first floor—five stories below—with no exits along the way. Running up and down the staircase several times took a toll on the teen, but not enough to derail his overall enthusiasm. He used the box cutter to slice through the paint that sealed the window to the wall. Once he had cut through all eight sides, he tried to pry the window open again.
“I don’t think it’s going to open,” Johanna said. “Let’s quit before you hurt yourself.”
“No. This is my mystery, and I want to solve it.” He ran downstairs again, and returned with a crowbar.
“No.” Johanna grabbed it away from him. “I can’t allow you to destroy library property.”
“I’ll fix anything I destroy.”
“Oh really?”
“Yeah. Ask my mother. I’m the one who fixes everything around the house. If I destroy this, I’ll fix it and you can deduct the cost of materials from my salary.”
“I don’t know ….”
Before she had a chance to think it over, Jackson jammed the edge of the crowbar under the window frame and tried to pry it off.
“They must have screwed this thing in place, because it’s not giving way. Nails would have pulled out by now.” He inspected the wood, but it had been covered by so many centuries of paint and varnish, he couldn’t determine where the screws would be. “I need to give this one more try.” He grimaced as he shoved the crowbar against the window frame with all his strength. Little beads of sweat broke out on his brow, and a vein in his forehead became clearly visible. He stopped to rest for a moment.
“This is crazy,” Johanna said. “It’s not going to open. There is no safe behind it. Why are you wasting your energy?”
“It’s my energy to waste. Besides, I think I can do it this time.” Jackson took a deep breath before applying force against the crowbar. “Aarrgghh!” He grunted as he worked to remove the window frame. Crack. A one-inch chunk of wood broke away and dropped to the floor.
“At this rate, you should be done in less than a week.”
“Not funny. The least you could do is help me. If we both pushed against the crowbar, I bet it would work.”
&nbs
p; Johanna sighed. “Okay. Whenever you’re ready.”
“On the count of three. One ... two ... three.” They pushed as hard as they could, but nothing happened.
“Okay,” he said reluctantly. “Forget it. I’m throwing in the towel.”
“It’s not like opening it is going to provide any illumination for this space.”
As soon as Johanna uttered the word illumination, the octagonal window flew open, and the great outdoors did not appear on the other side.
Johanna and Jackson each held their breath for a few seconds.
“You said, ‘illumination.’”
As soon as he repeated the word, the two of them were sucked through the portal to a place that was extremely strange, yet eerily familiar. It had the same proportions as the Library of Illumination, but instead of books, row upon row of crystal obelisks lined the narrow shelves. They walked out of the alcove and found the surrounding area laid out exactly like the cupola in their library.
“Where are we?” Johanna whispered.
“It looks like a mirror image of the library, but it’s got all these tall, pointy things where the books should be.”
“Let’s get out of here.”
“Wait. I want to see where we are.”
Johanna shook her head. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Where’s your spirit of adventure? Where’s your plucky, can-do attitude? Where’s your imagination?”
“It’s my imagination that’s telling me to go back where we belong.”
“Okay, see you later.” Jackson said it breezily as he walked to the cupola steps. “Look.” He pointed to a strange symbol embedded in the stair post. “This must be their equivalent of the number one. I’ll never understand why this floor is considered the first level, while the main floor is called level five. It doesn’t make any sense.”
Johanna walked closer to look at the symbol. “I read about it in Mal’s diary,” she explained, as Jackson grabbed her hand and pulled her down the stairs. “The cupola is the highest level, so it’s number one. Think of it like winning a prize. If you win first place, that’s the highest you can go. It’s first, not fifth. With that in mind, it makes sense that the window level right below it is the second level. Those massive arched windows were designed to flood the library with light, although the light in this library is sort of unearthly.”
“Yeah, like they’re lighting the place for a horror film.”
“The third level,” she continued, “is the halo. It’s just a single layer of shelves on a narrow balcony that overlook the floors below. The fourth level is known as the residence level.”
“That’s a no-brainer, considering that’s where your apartment is.”
“And the main floor is the fifth level.”
They had reached the main reading room. The circulation desk was the same familiar shape, but the shelves still held crystal obelisks.
*
Johanna reached for Jackson’s hand and relaxed when his warm fingers curled around her own.
He pulled her toward the curator’s staircase. It was right by the residence, and it was the staircase they used most often. There were also stone steps built into the foundation near the front door that linked the main reading room to the residence level, but that staircase was rarely used because the books closest to it were about obscure musical tonalities with archaic chord-scale relationships—not a trendy topic. The more popular books on music could be found closer to the curator’s apartment.
Johanna studied the main floor as they walked across it. The reading room looked downright uncomfortable. The furniture, or what she supposed was furniture, included an assortment of oddly shaped surfaces dwarfed by the thousands of obelisks crowding the shelves. She looked up. The windows, opaque with grime, looked like they hadn’t been cleaned in a millennium. It looked like their library, and yet it wasn’t their library.
“Let’s go up to the next floor,” Jackson urged.
“I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” she whispered.
“Why? I don’t think there’s anyone here.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Do you hear anybody?”
“Maybe they’re in the antechamber, binding books.”
“What books?”
“All right, they’re polishing the crystal.”
“One more level isn’t going to hurt.” He tried to pull her up the steps.
“No,” Johanna said, wrenching her hand away from his. “That’s the residence level, and I have no intention of finding out who lives there.”
“I hadn’t thought of that. Wouldn’t it be cool to see how your other half lives?”
“My other half!”
“Shhh. They’ll hear you,” he whispered.
“Exactly.” She turned to go back.
“I’m going without you.” He quickly climbed to the next level.
Johanna couldn’t help herself. Instead of returning to the cupola, she walked into the middle of the reading room, where she could keep an eye on him. The balconies on the residence level were fairly visible, and Johanna followed Jackson’s progress until he stopped just outside the curator’s apartment. She waved to get his attention, but either he didn’t see her or he ignored her. Why does he have to be so difficult? He’s playing with fire.
*
Jackson began to notice subtle differences in the obelisks, not just in their height and width but on their surfaces as well. At first he thought they were dusty, but on closer examination he saw that they had subtle etchings on them, like a design, or another language, or code. He looked down at Johanna and waved at her to come up.
She adamantly shook her head from side to side.
She’s so stubborn. He felt sure they had discovered something monumental about this library, but he didn’t know what it was. He wanted to discuss it with her, but knew if he walked back down the stairs, she would interpret that as a signal they could leave and would head back up to the cupola. There has to be a way I can get her up here.
*
Johanna’s impatience grew. Why tempt fate? Why can’t he wait until I ask Mal about this? She needed to know what to expect. She motioned for Jackson to return. He held up one finger, as if to say, wait a minute. She didn’t want to waste another moment. I should just leave, and if he wants to follow, fine. She raised her arm to wave goodbye, but could not stop herself from shouting “No” when Jackson reached for the crystal lever that opened the bookcase-door to the residence. He looked down at her and waved.
She watched in horror as a dark tentacle shot out of the residence, wrapped itself around Jackson’s neck, and dragged him inside. Her heart nearly stopped. Jackson had been caught trespassing, but by what? And who knew what kind of trouble he had gotten himself into? Her fear was for him rather than herself. She practically flew up the stairs to the residence. When she got there, the shelf that disguised the entrance had swung back into position and the crystal lever was gone. She began hammering on the wall behind the obelisks, hoping for Jackson’s sake that there would be strength in numbers—hopefully, two against one. After not receiving any response to her pounding, she decided the best way to get attention would be to make some real noise. She picked up the closest obelisk and hurled it across the aisle, sending it crashing into a shelf crammed with more of the literary crystals.
Instantly, the balcony filled with swirling fog. An odd being that looked like he had been formed out of molten gold rose from the depths of the mist. A blue diamond band surrounded the entity’s head, and lightning bolts shot out of it at varying intervals. It began communicating in a language Johanna could not understand. Even the translation app on the iPad would not have been able to help her. The words sounded more like grunts—“iks” and “ogs,” “nnhs” and “utzs.”
She shrank back against the shelf that had held the obelisk. She suddenly realized she couldn’t calmly close a book and make the apparition go away. There was no book to close, and the
obelisk that she had sent sailing through a sea of air had broken into tiny pieces. She thought about how she would feel if someone had trashed one of her precious books. Her shoulders sagged. She had done something childish, something to gain attention, although not the kind of attention she wanted. In the process she had destroyed something precious, if not to her, to someone else. Not to mention she could be electrocuted at any moment.
Before she could give it any more thought, something wrapped around her neck and dragged her into the residence. The sudden loss of oxygen coupled with surprise caused Johanna to black out. When she came to, she saw Jackson standing in the middle of the room.
“I knew you’d come,” he said.
She struggled to her feet, choking on the oily mist that enveloped her. She looked around, but couldn’t see much in the hazy darkness. “Where’s ...”
“He went out after dragging you in.”
“Come on, then, let’s get out of here.”
“I’d love to, but I can’t move.”
“What do you mean, you can’t move?” She took a step toward him, afraid that she, too, might be unable to move, but if that were true, she would have never been able to get up off the floor. She reached for his hand. Zap. She felt electrified, in a bad way.
“Force field ...” they said in unison.
“I have to get you out of here.” She thought of how they had handled the force field surrounding the blue orb. “Illumination.”
“Uurrgg.” Jackson gurgled and squirmed. He suddenly looked like he would choke to death.
“Delumination,” she cried out.
He loudly gasped, taking in great gulps of air.
“Can you move?”
“No.”
“I was hoping ‘delumination’ would work.”
His body relaxed. He took another deep breath, then a step. “The second one worked, which is good, because for a moment I thought you might kill me.”