Declaration of Names

Laurra hefted her backpack and pulled one strap over her head. It sat askew on her back and the other strap dangled uselessly.

Ugh, why did I bring all three notebooks?

She clicked the light on her helmet on and looked down the well.

“Going in.” she spoke into a small yellow radio.

“Gotcha. Signal is strong here. Ping every minute so we can isolate where we lose you. The new repeaters should send the signal deeper than last time.” the voice coming out of the radio was clear and concise. All business.

“Roger.”

Laurra began repelling down the well. Last time she made it about halfway before losing signal. She placed a glowlight directly at the bottom for future reference. It wasn’t bright enough to see from the top, but it would last several days.

She moved slow at first, then found her rhythm. She held her wristwatch out as she walked down the wall supported by her harness. After timing her steps for a few minutes, she timed her pings by the numbers of steps to give her arm a rest from hovering. She could make about 18 steps per minute, taking her time to look at all the walls around her. She didn’t notice anything on the first climb, the goal was speed last time since they didn’t know how deep it actually went. Her pings echoed in the well and fell in a cadence with her steps and breathing. Halfway down she grabbed the radio off her waist and checked the signal. Two bars. Two more than zero.

“Half-“ Laurra’s voice was loud and echoed. She lowered her voice and started again.

“Halfway. Looks like those repeaters helped. Still got two bars here.”

“Plenty of-”

“-ood to hear”

“-ottom.” Peter’s voice sound more robotic than usual. Laurra pieced together the jist and kept moving.

When she reached the bottom, she saw the glowlight had dimmed more than expected, but luckily it was still there. She pinged Peter with one bar on the radio.

“Bottom.”

Static.

Laurra clipped the radio back on her waist and looked around. The ground was still dry, they purposely chose the dry season for their investigation. A washout at the bottom of a well would not be ideal. The walls around were much the same as they were the whole way down. She did notice a new scent now that she had settled. Sawdust? Her headlight lit up a path going west.

“West.”

Static.

The static in response at least meant Peter was receiving something on his end.

She shrugged and walked down the path. The path was large enough for an adult to walk through. There were hooks in the walls every ten feet on alternating sides. Most likely for lanterns to hang from.

After walking for five minutes her light revealed a door. The remains of a door anyway. It was still on the hinges on the left side, missing one third of the top off the right side and stood ajar. Laurra checked her radio. No bars.

“Door.”

Silence. She shrugged.

She walked closer and poked her head through the missing section of the door. She saw a scuffed dirty wooden floor and a narrow hallway that opened to a larger room. The hallway was lined with books on both sides. There was a wooden desk at the back wall. The back wall itself was a bookshelf filled with books as well.

Laurra pulled the door and it fully fell off the hinges and fell to the ground. She jumped back to avoid it falling onto her legs. She peeked inside the hallway and looked at the ceiling to judge the integrity. The ceiling looked much more solid than the door. The wooden floor also looked solid even though it was clearly worn from years of foot traffic. All the books on the left side wall seemed to be notebooks or journals with different names written on the spine. Many were in different languages and characters. The right side seemed to be a continuation, from the ones she could read, they seemed to be in alphabetical order. She looked for one with her name. She found ‘Laura’, spelled with one ‘R’.

Close enough.

The book was brown leather, quite clean and good condition. The cover only had the name ‘Laura’ in the same font as the spine. She opened to the first page and the leather crackled, the pages inside looked much older than the outside, they had frayed at the edges and had oily stains where fingers had raked the pages thousands of times. The first page was a handwritten diary entry with the date 5-2-1502 in the heading.

A curiosity. The lads mentioned such a catacomb. But, a lady such as myself knows better than to believe such fanciful tales. A book with my name. I write upon this as the prophecy details. I, Laura of the Havlers, declare my piece of history and share it with the future generations.

Then a signature.

Laurra flipped through to another page.

09/08/1888

I did not believe it myself, but here we are.

Signed,

Laura Menor

Hundreds of similar pages. Some with just a signature. Many mentioning a prophecy or legend or story passed down through families. She replace the book on the shelf and walked into the room to check to perimeter before diving into more books. The floor still looked solid all around. The ceiling was raised much higher like a cathedral, only darkness was at the top. Books lined all the walls similar to the hallway. There were wooden rocking chairs in the corners to her left and right and a large throne looking chair behind the desk near the back wall. There was a tall metal pedestal on either side of the desk. The desk itself was clear save a layer of dust.

Laurra decided to check out the desk first. Paused to ping Peter. Then walked over to the other side, it didn’t seem to have any space for storage it was just a thick piece of polished wood on four legs carved as lions claws at the bottom.

The chair had red cushioning attached to the seat and back with golden buttons. She saw a small book on the seat of the chair. The book was white with dark blue streaks like marble. When she grabbed it she found the cover was in fact made of marble, heavy and cold to the touch. The spine and covers were separate pieces so the book could be opened as normal. There was no writing on the cover, so she opened to the first page.

This is the Declaration of Names. All sentient beings will eventually to add their names and their eternal thoughts with the recordings of their kin.

The remaining pages were column lists of names, some using letters that seemed to be more illustrations than writing. Laurra flipped the book to “L’s” to look for her name.

Nothing.

She flipped again.

Peter.

Of course.

She took a lap around the room looking for a book with her name properly spelled. Her headlamp danced around the room pausing at each wall scanning the shelves, back and forth. She noted multiple volumes for Peter, but no Laurra.

She pinged Peter again. Then took off her backpack to start taking notes of her findings while they were fresh in her mind. She checked her watch. Another hour before the scheduled rendezvous. Since she couldn’t communicate with Peter from down here she would need to stick with the rendezvous plan.

Laurra piled her notebooks on the desk. There was a thick cardboard cover brown one. A slightly smaller yellow notepad. And a black leather covered journal.

She opened the brown one with her research notes and opened to the next blank page. She recounted the climb down, the increased signal, the path, and the details of the room she discovered.

She added “Backpack strap, new backpack?” to her to-do list on the yellow notepad, then put that one in her backpack.

She took a deep breath and did a 360 around the room looking for any other items she wanted to note. If she was a better illustrator she would have tried to sketch the room. Another day she could drag Peter down here he could sketch out a blueprint. While his talents in conversation lacked, he could work wonders in illustration. She put her brown notebook away.

Laurra’s eyes rested on her leather journal. It had been with her for several years. She used it seldom, but it held some of her deepest thoughts that needed expression from years past. As she considered writing a bit about her feeling in discovering this place, and she had an idea.

She added a new entry with the date and her thoughts on discovering this hidden library.

05/23/2024

I’ve discovered this hidden library deep underneath the village of Lake Horo. It seems to be dedicated to something called The Declaration of Names. I am leaving a book dedicated to all future Laurra’s to come and any past Laurra’s that may be missed their opportunity to etch their thoughts in history.

Laurra Di Mateno

The journal had her name on the cover where she had inserted the additional “R”. She added her name to the spine with a silver marker that showed up well against the black leather. She walked to where she found the “Laura” book in the hallway and slid her book next to it.

She stepped past the fallen door, looked back into the room and hit the button on her radio to ping Peter.

Static.