The Library of Meadow Sea

After days of traveling through the endless grass and flowers of the Meadow Sea, the two travelers finally arrived at their destination: the Library of All Things. 

The brothers had spotted it a few days ago, and from a dark smudge on the horizon it had grown into the gigantic structure that stood before them now. The Library seemed to stretch now to the sky and beyond, its very towers raking the drifting clouds. To the boys’ eyes, it looked like mountain, shaped into being by the very gods themselves. The oracle had told them the Library contained the combined knowledge of all things, so a massive construction such as this seemed able enough.

The brothers approached the Library of All Things, the meadowland going right up to the doors of the building without so much as a path or a plaza. Two doors were set into the stone, taller than the tallest trees the brothers had ever encountered. Huge stained glass windows were set into the building higher up, depicting scenes the brothers could make no sense of.

“Should we knock?” asked the younger brother, poising his fist in the air in front of the ancient wood.

“Wait!” cautioned the older, pushing his brother’s eager fist down. “Maybe there’s some kind of bell to announce ourselves?” 

The two brothers agreed to head in opposite directions, looking for some form of chain or lever they could pull. Finding nothing but door and stone, the brothers reconvened in the middle again.

“Now can I knock?” asked the younger.

“I’m bigger, so I should do it,” said the older. He raised his knuckles and rapped them politely on the right door. It seemed ineffectual, as if the sound couldn’t reach even a few inches past its point of origin. They waited for a few moments as the wind raced through the miles of grass and flowers behind them. That and the sound of their breathing was the only thing they could hear. No resounding footsteps on the other side, no creak of chain from whatever mechanism was strong enough to pull the ancient doors open. Nothing.

Scoffing in frustration, the younger raised both fists and hammered them on the Library doors. “Hello? Open the doors!” he shouted.

“Hey! Knock it off!” shouted the older as he grabbed the younger’s wrists and they began to struggle. “You can’t just knock like this is Old Blod’s tavern! This is the Library of All Things! Built by beings of unknowable-”

The doors suddenly began to creak open, freezing the brothers in their moment of struggle. The older had the younger’s neck in an arm lock, keeping him from touching the door, but they both saw as a head popped into view from around the door.

It was the head of someone who indeed looked like the owner of a tiny village tavern. The old man had a set of wild white hair, frizzy and reaching to all directions. His wrinkly skin was dark and splotched with liver spots, the clothes he wore were somewhat rumpled. He was short too, somewhere between the brothers in height.

“Yes?” asked the old man as he narrowed his eyes in suspicion at the two boys.

“Um,” started the older brother, uncertain of the proper protocols in a situation such as this. He was expecting someone or something else to open the doors, perhaps an armed and armored guardian of epic proportions, a creature of terrible strength that could protect the Library of All Things from those who wished to do it harm. Was this old man the Library’s protector? It seemed that a strong enough wind can knock him on his bottom. Should the older ask for someone else? Should he-

“We’re here for answers,” said the younger confidently and to the point.

“Is that right? Well, you certainly got past the Flowers of Ill Intent and the Library Dragon just fine.”

“Dragon?” asked the brothers at the same time. The only living things they had encountered in the Meadow Sea besides were crickets. Certainly no fire-breathing dragon in the skies.

“Yeah, my dragon. The flowers sniff out the bad ones, and the dragon takes care of them.”

“We didn’t see a dragon,” pointed out the younger. 

“That’s cause he’s invisible. The last of his species in fact. They make for perfect guard dogs.”

“So how do you know they even exist?” asked the younger.

“Because of their victims. And the smell. The Library Dragon has quite a stink to it. Now, do you want to come in or not? I’m in the middle of something and hardly have the time to stand around and twiddle my thumbs discussing whether this or that exists or not.”

“We thank you,” said the older, hesitantly bending his body forward in a bow. He wasn’t quite sure the procedure upon meeting what seemed the… butler of the Library of All Things? Some form of servant for the powerful being that ruled this sacred place?

“Please, none of that. Come in, come in,” said the old man, gesturing for the boy to stand up straight. The older stood there for a few moments, embarrassed, while his brother brushed past him to follow the old man into the dark opening of the grand doors. 

All thoughts of bad smells, unseen dragons, and correct protocol soon dissipated when the boys beheld the sight of the Library of All Things before them. 

They were standing in the foyer of the massive building, which was made entirely of marble the likes of which the brothers had never seen. It was almost as if the floor itself was made of ice, so clear was the stone that the boys were able to see a few inches past where their boots ended and the floor began. The foyer itself was as big as the village they had hailed from. The only thing on the entire length of the floor was a statue, larger than even their village chief’s house. It depicted a man sitting on a log, listening to a young girl who seemed to be telling him something, arms raised earnestly. The brothers were able to read the plaque as they drew near it.

It all starts with a story remembered.

Something about the phrase filled the older with a feeling he couldn’t quite place, unlike any excitement the boys had faced on their journey so far.

At a gasp from his brother, the older looked up from the plaque to take in the rest of the library beyond, which extended into an unfathomable distance beyond the foyer. For almost as far as the eye could see, shelves of books crisscrossed the entire length of the building. There were other floors on the sides of the Library, supported by gigantic columns that held up the angled roof of the building. The middle space of Library was left open, with the occasional crystalline chandeliers dropping from the ceiling. Colored rays of sunlight illuminated this space through the hundreds of tinted windows, falling on the chandeliers and splaying every shade of rainbow on surfaces. 

The older felt his knees begin to buckle at the grand scale of it all. He had already been struggling to understand how such a structure could have been built by anyone but the gods. The thousands, no, millions of books that lined the shelves of the Library was simply too difficult a concept to wrap his mind around. How will they ever find the answers they came here to seek? It would take the lifetimes of their entire village to even put a dent in the wealth of knowledge here, let alone the few weeks the boys had left to complete their quest. The older felt his heart drop heavily in his chest, the darkness that had begun growing spreading even further despite how close they’d come to their goal.

“Come, come,” said the older man, not even sparing a second glance at the grand space before them as lead them past the foyer. The younger followed, his gaze glued to the upper heights of the Library. The older fell into step behind his brother, his thoughts swirling anxiously.

They let the old man guide them onto an aisle that seemed to run down the entire length of the Library, with countless corridors of books to either side. It took several minutes of walking pass between the columns. Upon closer inspection, the older saw that the columns were wrapped around by spiraling staircases, like the ribbons they used to put up around wooden beams for village celebrations.

As far as the older brother could tell, there didn’t seem to be any particular way the Library of All Things was organized. He didn’t see any signs that indicated what category of books they were walking by. The books on the shelves didn’t seem to share much similarity either, as they were all kinds of shapes, sizes, and colors. There were even scrolls as well, rolled up and stacked upon each other.

The older also noticed with some dismay that there were many chaotic stacks of books on the floor, some precariously leaning towers even taller than the old man. Others were loaded onto carts, clearly with the intent of being taken to other parts of the Library. Perhaps there was some form of organization to this vast wealth of knowledge, but as to what it was exactly the older couldn’t tell. Though, it appeared the old man leading them deeper into the building seemed to know his way around. He barely casted a glance to any of the aisles they passed by, intent on his heading. 

There were other things in the Library besides books. There were sections where the endless book shelves ended and made way for areas for sitting, writing, or contemplation of statues and other exhibits. There were items on display that excited the younger’s attention especially, things like swords and spears and shields of ancient heroes. There were also taxidermied remains of frightening animals, creatures that could have only come from mythical tales. At one point, the younger thought he spied some movement in one of the creatures, but they had moved past it too quickly for him to take a second glance. 

It seemed that for the most part they were the only living souls in the entire Library, a thought that sent chills through the older’s body. Surrounded by the work of living people, people that were nowhere to be seen, perhaps dead by hundreds and hundreds of years, the only legacy of theirs left being words on a page.

The old man suddenly slowed to a halt as they approached an aisle that looked no different than the dozens they had already passed. He stepped into the corridor of books, scanning some on the shelves. There were just as many unmarked books as there were ones with names on the spine, with many in languages unfamiliar to the brothers.

The old man spent some time taking down books from the shelves and looking at the pages, muttering incoherently to himself. The boys watched as their guide cursed under his breath and let one book fall to the floor, and placed another on a stack of writings nearby. He abruptly left and continued on the main path they had been traveling so far. The younger had picked up a book that the old man had dropped to have a look, but the older grabbed him by his arm and pulled him away. The older didn’t want to lose sight of the old man, lest they were lost to the endless work of long gone, long dead writers.

The old man stopped again a few aisles later, repeating the process of taking down books, scanning them, and either putting them back or building towers out of them. It made the older brother feel that the man was in reality some kind of assistant, attending to his duties of organizing the Library in some kind of fashion that was lost to the boys. After several instances of this process, the older made his frustrations known to the old man.

“Look, good sir. I’m sure what you’re doing is of the utmost importance, but we are in a bit of a rush. Can you please take us to the Librarian so that-” uncertain of who or what the Librarian would be in such a place as this, the older said, “it could take us to the answers we’ve come to seek?”

“The Librarian?” said the old man, not even glancing from the dusty tome he’d cracked open to read. “You met him already,” he said, throwing the book over his shoulder. It landed perfectly on a stack of books behind him, which swayed haphazardly without falling. 

“Met him already? But we’ve only been introduced to you,” said the older. 

“That statue of the man at the entrance. That was the Librarian. The first, but certainly not the greatest. We’re still trying the organize the mess he left us with.”

“We?” asked the younger.

“Yes. Me, a librarian. And others before me,” said the old man. He promptly shut the book he’d been scanning and put it back on the shelf. “Aha! We’re in the wrong section!” he shouted, holding up a wrinkled finger. “Up! We must go up!” And with that, the librarian headed for the nearest column and staircase before the boys could offer any protest or questions. The brothers followed, surprised that they had to nearly jog to keep up with the old man as he continued with a renewed energy. 

The older felt his frustration return, growing into anger. He felt as if they were being dragged along on a fool’s errand, their questions ignored or vaguely answered as the librarian pursued his own unfathomable goal. The older wasn’t even certain the old man still retained all his faculties, cooped up for so long in the Library alone. He wondered if he and his brother would have just as much luck setting out on their own in the Library to seek the answers they had been told were here. The older deliberated with his brother in whispers as to their next moves, even as they passed one floor, and then another.

They were dozens of feet from the ground level of the Library, a height that made the older’s head spin, before the old man finally left the stairs to follow the aisle that ran the entire length of the balcony. 

When the older brother finally worked up the courage to announce that they would strike out on their own, the librarian rounded on an aisle of books and disappeared.

“I’m sorry to say, mister librarian sir, but my brother and I will seek answers elsewhere,” announced the older to the librarian, who was running a hand down the spines of books on the shelves and muttering to himself. We don’t have the time to-”

“Here! Here it is!” shrieked the old man in celebration, taking down an inconspicuous leather-bound tome from a shelf above his head. He thumbed through the pages as he approached the boys, his eyes alight with his own personal goal reached.

“Sir, we seek a remedy or cure for-”

“Your mother’s illness, I know,” said the librarian turning the open book towards the brothers to show them something within its pages. On the left-hand side there was an illustration of a strange plant, star shaped but not wholly unfamiliar. Across from it was a description of the plant, where it could be found, and a listing of its healing properties and uses, including that which ailed their mother.

“How… how did you…” began the older, at a loss for words as the book was shoved into his hands.

“I believe we have these growing here, I could take you to it. They also grow higher up in the mountains, near your region I believe,” said the librarian, clapping the dust from his hands in pride. “Brew it in a tea, and have your mother drink it. She should be in tip-top shape in no time.”

The boys stared at the picture and accompanying words in mute apprehension, as if this book was a figment of their imagination. Perhaps the Library of All Things was just that, some kind of hallucination brought on by the many strange flowers of the Meadow Sea.

“Of course, you could take the book with you. But we have a strict return policy here, alright? If you fail to return in your life time, the responsibility shall fall to your next of kin, and so on and so forth.”

The younger suddenly hugged the librarian, surprising the old man. The older followed suit, certain that this wasn’t proper.

“There, there now,” said the old man with mock grumpiness, a smile spreading on his face. He patted the brothers’ backs and then gently pushed them back to hold them at arm’s length. “I will await your return. I could use some help around here. Going up and down these blasted stairs does quite a number on these old knees of mine.”

The boys laughed through the tears that had begun to tumble from their eyes.

“You’ll need to fill this library with your story after all.”