Librarians Are Magical

Wordsworth Silvertongue library was the biggest library in the county. Thousands of books lined the shelves which filled the two story building to full capacity. Sunlight poured in through the windows and warmed the Adult section on the top floor. Saffrin rubbed her temples as a patron’s shadow slithered off her desk and followed its owner towards the stairs. It moved like smoke that never rose from the ground and left everything it touched cold.

“Finally, I thought he’d never leave,” Saffrin groaned quietly after a minute. She brushed her black hair out of her blue eyes. “If I get one more shadow coming up to me and explaining the moroseness of darkness and its use in poetry, I’m gonna blind them with the desk light.” 

The shadow’s owner had been checking out materials at a self serve station near the desk. Saffrin had been engrossed in writing an email to Support when the shadow had risen onto her desk. It’s form had morphed into a copy of its owner, only black and with no distinguishing features. She’d jumped at its sudden materialization as the shadow began prattling on about symbolism and how dark and depressing shadows were depicted in writing. The shadow’s owner either ignored his shadow while checking out books, or didn’t seem to notice that it had wandered over to the desk. He finished scanning his items, gathered his belongings and left, the tethered shadow being pulled behind him.

“Well, at least it was mostly polite, if not a little . . . depressing,” Annie said, taking her seat next to Saffrin at the Adult Services desk. She had curly red hair that was pulled back in a high ponytail and purple glasses that shaped her face. She pumped hand sanitizer into her palm and worked it into her hands. “Did anything else happen with shadows while I was gone?”

Patrons, and their connected - though limitedly wandering - shadows browsed the surrounding bookshelves. The shadows removed books, looked through them, and then either put them back as they found them, left them lying on other books, or put them back upside down. Some shadows drifted away from their owners, like dogs or children. Other shadows, like Saffrin’s and Annie’s were mostly dormant and did not move independently much unless they felt like it or were asked to by their owners. Most humans whose shadows were more active ignored them until they became too rambunctious. They’d pull out their phones and point the flashlight at them or walk away from whatever the shadow was fascinated with. Others would ignore their shadows completely and let them do whatever they pleased, not caring about the consequences of their actions. Of course, not everyone who had a spirited shadow was irresponsible with it. There were many patrons of the library who kept their shadows in check, and often employed them into being useful. Those shadows helped carry books, opened doors, or fetched library cards out of wallets for their owners.

“A couple shadows pulled down some books in the Mystery section and another decided it would be fun to shove the short book carts into each other like bumper cars. Of course, almost all of the shadows’ owners were too busy talking among themselves or looking for their materials to do anything about it.” 

“Gotta love people,” Annie sighed as she pulled up a list of books that they’d have to make room for in the New Titles section. They’d spend some time sorting through the current “New” books and sort the older ones onto the shelves with the rest of the Fiction and Non-Fiction collections.

After a few minutes of computer keyboards clicking and people checking out books, a young man in a red flannel approached the desk. He looked like he was in college and had short brown hair. A backpack was slung over his shoulder. He was slender, but average height for someone between the ages of 18 and 22.

            “Can I help you?” Saffrin asked, automatically forcing a smile and her best customer service voice. 

            “I need any books you have on D Day and World War II tanks,” he said. “School report due next week.”

“Sure thing. Just give me a second and I’ll be right with you.” She rolled her chair back to a storage cabinet that had thousands of keys, all organized with labels and icons attached to them. Saffrin’s eyes scanned past wooden dragons, cars, Greek architectural columns, crosses, and many others until she found two keys. One had a green wooden tank with the words World War II painted on its side. The second had a French Flag and a tag that said D Day. Saffrin grabbed both keys and stood up from her chair. 

“Follow me,” she said to the boy, grabbing a shelving cart and leading him towards the Non-Fiction stacks. She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw that his shadow didn’t move independently.

The Adult Services desk sat in the middle of the Adult section. To the right of the desk stretched the Fiction and Mystery sections with a few study rooms along the wall. To the left, the Non-Fiction section filled the other side of the room. The door to the Quiet Room stood next to the Computer Lab which faced the main desk. A couple short shelving carts stood at the end of the stacks for patrons to put books on that they didn’t want to check out. Computer stations also bookended a bookshelf in each section for patrons who wanted to use the Catalog or order books online from another library. All of these things could be found in a normal library. What made Wordsworth special was a large stone Summoning Circle that was carved into the floor between the stacks. Smaller circles and diamonds intricately decorated the circle and two small metal key holes marked the center.

A sign next to the Summoning Circle read: “Intended for library use only. No pentagrams, graffiti, chalk, non library use summoning spells, mushrooms, or spell ingredients allowed. Please see a librarian for assistance. No children allowed unsupervised.” 

Saffrin and the boy entered the circle and parked the cart next to the keyholes. Saffrin then took the keys for D Day and World War II Tanks, put them into the keyholes in the floor, and turned them clockwise. The diamonds and circles began to glow purple beneath their feet. 

“Have you ever used one of these before?” she asked.

“Once or twice,” the boy said, unzipping his backpack.

Saffrin placed her hand on a purple glowing diamond and said, “Omne Libre.” A white light began to glow from the shelving cart and a humming noise sounded throughout the Summoning Circle as Saffrin straightened. “Now, just say the topics you want to write about and the books that have that information will appear on the cart. There are more carts by the sign if you need them. Come get us if you need any help.”

The boy nodded and began rummaging through his backpack for a notebook as Saffrin returned to the desk. The purple hue reflected off the Quiet Room and Computer Lab windows. Annie was filling out a spreadsheet on her computer and glanced up when Saffrin returned. 

“I’m going to start pulling books when I’m done with this. Are you good to man the desk?” she asked, adjusting her glasses.

“I can once he’s done using the Summoning Circle.” 

A couple of patrons came up to the desk for checkout assistance or to ask for book recommendations. After a few minutes assisting them, Saffrin glanced at the purple reflection in the windows. Flashes of white were emitting from where she’d put the cart as books appeared from their spots on the shelves. Then the light started flashing faster, almost like a strobe light. Saffrin jumped up from her chair and hurried towards the Non-Fiction stacks as the purple glow turned bright red. 

As she ran, the normally low humming noise coming from the Summoning Circle grew louder and louder. She rounded a bookshelf and stopped just outside the red light, her eyes wide. A cyclone of wind and books swirled inside the Summoning Circle. The shelving cart was shaking under its weight of books, filling all three shelves to the brim. The boy knelt in the middle of the circle, trying to turn the keys and yelling something while his hand glowed red over a diamond carving. 

Then the books that were flying through the air began to gather several feet above his head, almost as though it was forming something. The books oriented and layered themselves so that spines became limbs and covers became a torso, hands, and feet. At the top of it all, several books came together to resemble a face, one which scowled with thick eyebrows and narrowed eyes. Once the book figure was complete, the wind died down and Saffrin ran into the circle next to the boy.

“I have had it!” the book being yelled. Their voice boomed like a stack of books landing on the floor. “I have had it up to here with this insanity! Shadows running rampant with the carts. Books being mishelved and mishandled. And now, this!”

Everyone in the room froze and stared at the book spirit. It pointed to a shadow who was ripping pages out of a book while its owner slept soundly in a chair next to them. A pile of loose parchment was growing on a small table. From her place at the desk, Annie carefully hurried over to the shadow and struggled to take the book from its hands. When that didn’t work, she pulled a small flashlight out of her pocket and shined it on the shadow, who shied away from the beam and released the book. 

Annie gathered up the pages and quickly brought them and the book over to the Summoning Circle. “We will make sure to take care of the books and do what we can to fix this one. Please calm down, Crella,” she said in a beseeching tone.

“Who is that?” the boy whispered to Saffrin as Crella’s attention was now on Annie. 

“Crella is a spirit who inhabits the library. She cares about books more than anything, but can only communicate with us like this if the Circle is activated,” Saffrin whispered quietly. 

“I have been angry for a very long time.” Crella growled in a low voice. “It’s only now that the boy used the summoning circle that I can voice my anger.” She waved her tomb hands and a strong wind started pushing patrons towards the stairs. The sleeping patron’s chair rolled towards the elevator with its occupant still asleep. “Do not come back until you can keep your shadows under control and learn to give books the respect they deserve,” she thundered. The patrons quickly hurried downstairs or into the elevator without protest, their shadows having no choice but to follow their humans. Crella’s winds now swirled around books that lay on the carts or were out of place on the shelves and tables. The books floated through the air and slid into their places on the shelves where they belonged. Crella lowered her hands and the wind faded away. She stared down at the three humans beneath her, her expression still hard. 

“The only reason I do not throw you out is because I know your shadows are under control and will not wreak havoc throughout my library. I will excuse the children downstairs, but the adults should know better by now. As for media, books will always be superior in my opinion. Now, please hand me the book that insignificant shade destroyed.” 

She held out a hand and Annie gave her the damaged book, the girl’s hands shaking. Upon closer inspection, Crella saw that not only were there pages ripped out, but the spine was also damaged and something black had been spilled on the back cover. It was an older book about the invention of the light bulb and had a worn brown cover. Crella put the pages in their proper place and sandwiched the novel between her hands. She closed her eyes and a small tornado formed around the book, reattaching the pages and mending the spine and cover. 

Once the book was restored, the wind carried it to its place on its shelf and Crella opened her eyes. “See to it that this doesn’t happen again. If anyone comes here and destroys another one of my books, I will trap them in a cyclone until they wish they’re in Oz.”

Annie and Saffrin nodded. “We’ll keep the patrons informed.” Saffrin said. 

“See that you do.” Crella’s voice faded and the books that formed her body returned to the shelves. The humming sound quieted and the Summoning Circle went from bright red to purple. 

All three of them breathed a sigh of relief. “I guess we better let everyone else know,” Annie said, heading over to the desk phone. 

Saffrin turned to the boy. “Are you alright?” she asked. 

“I’m fine, yeah. I might not be using the Summoning Circle for awhile, but I’m fine. I think I have all the books I need,” he said, pointing at the cart and all the books on it.

Saffrin nodded, turned the keys in their keyholes, and pulled them from the floor. Then she placed her hand on the purple light and said “Cessare.” The purple glow faded away and the room became quiet except for Annie’s voice on the phone. 

The boy pushed the cart to a long table, took out his laptop, and started combing through the books. Saffrin walked among the stacks and made sure that all the books were in their proper order, straightening them as she went. She smiled quietly to herself as she adjusted the books on the light bulb and Thomas Edison. Extending from her hands, her shadow used its hands to straighten some books on the top shelf that were too high for her to reach. Then it sank back out of sight. This was a good use for a shadow, and she once again counted her blessings that her shadow was easy to manage.