Page 49 of The Book That Wouldn't Burn

Evar passed the pool by and moved on to the next. He studied the ground, the tree trunks, and even the pattern of their branches for clues. It still felt like a dream to be here, somewhere different. He breathed in the air, rich with strange aromas and absent the scent of mouldering books that had dominated every breath he’d ever taken to this point.

It would be beautiful just for its difference, but the place truly held a peace to it that Evar hadn’t known he needed. It was somewhere you could lie down and sleep, perhaps for years, and wake up a new person.

He moved on to examine the tree beside another pool. The fifth along from his. The rough whorls in the bark put him in mind of a face, and for some small fraction of a second he saw her, there in the shadows of his imagination. He glimpsed a woman’s eyes, the curve of her cheek, and he knew it was her. The book in his hand seemed to pulse. He held it up, and for a moment the shape on its cover, the figure of a young woman, described by so many interwoven threads... held a shadowed face.

She had been there with him, in whatever world the Mechanism had stolen him away into. She had been there through those missing years. She was the core of it. Important to him in ways he couldn’t explain or properly remember. But for a moment he had held her face in his memory like a dissolving fragment of a waking dream.

Evar studied the water. Leaves and sky: reflections patterned the still surface. Was this the pool he should try to leave by? Or was his stirring memory a coincidence, driven by this place rather than by this specific pool? He decided to walk on down the row. If he found nothing better, he could return to this one, five down from where he started.

Tantalizing wisps of memory continued to tease him as he walked between pools and as he paused to study them. Sensations of places, of open skies, of wind on his face. The feel of her hand in his. He walked on, hardly looking now, past ten pools, twenty, maybe more, enthralled in this slow awakening.

“What?” Evar stopped dead, shaken from his reverie. The pool before him didn’t reflect the leaves above, or anything else. It was as black as the tunnel into the char wall. He couldn’t tell if there was even any water there, or just a midnight void, a shaft straight down into the underworld. Disturbingly, he had almost stepped into it, and he had no idea if it had been black all along or if it had darkened at his approach. Surely he would have noticed it as he walked the row had it been a tar pit all along?

A white hand suddenly emerged from the blackness near the edge of the pool and pressed itself to the underside of the surface. Evar stepped back sharply, shocked by the suddenness of it. He tensed, waiting for something to emerge, but the water didn’t so much as ripple. Just a hand, the palm pressed to the surface as if it were unable to pass through, fingers splayed, the rest lost in the darkness beneath. The hand slid to the side, tearing at the barrier, seeking a way through and finding none.

Evar’s momentary fear for himself turned to fear for the person lost beneath. He had nearly drowned getting to this place himself. The memory of that desperation for air made him gasp. He hurried forward, falling to his knees, and reached towards the hand. He stopped short, fingers hesitating, seized by a host of fears. The only strangers he’d ever met had been Escapes that wanted to destroy him, to drink his soul and wear his skin. What any of them wouldn’t have given to have him take their hand in his he couldn’t say.

And there it was again, that flash of memory haunting the recesses of his mind, her face seen and yet not seen. The woman whose name his lips knew but couldn’t speak... surely this was her... and he knew, in that moment, that even if the pool had been a pit of burning coals he would have reached in to save her.

The importance of “between” is often overlooked in the hurry of getting from one place to another. In truth it is these interstitial spaces which, in their linking of this to that and of now to then, might be considered a more fundamental layer in reality’s manifold.

Connective Tissue, by C. S. Leylandii

CHAPTER 22

Livira

The raven seemed to be tiring. It had entirely stopped making attempts to launch itself into the air and its hopping gait had become more of a plod, both wings trailing on the floor, several of its sparse feathers looking as if they might be abandoned in its wake. Livira wondered if it would recover its strength by resting—did it need to eat like a real bird? She thought it unlikely that it had endured for many lifetimes only to expire during its bullying of her. Though perhaps it had spent decades perched atop a shelf deep in the chamber waiting for some book crime sufficiently heinous to bring it down to ground level. Making such an ear-splitting cry had to take something out of it, surely?

Livira was considering offering to carry the guide when without warning it stopped and directed its beady gaze upwards.

“What?” Livira gazed up at the shelves.

The raven made a sound that was actually closer to a caw than a squawk.

“We’re here?” Livira looked around. “Really?”

The raven refused to look at her, keeping its stare on what she realised must be the book from which her scrap was torn.

“This one?” She reached up to touch the ridged spine of a fat tome on the shelf. Silence. She moved to the next. “This one?” She waited then reached for the next. “This—”

“SQUAWK!” The sound nearly made her wet herself.

“Gods dammit!” She pulled the book out and staggered beneath its weight. The thing was as heavy as a small child. A big small child.

She set it on the floor before the raven, rubbing her aching arms. The book was a good two feet tall, covered with a hide that still bore the pebbly texture of whatever beast originally wore the skin. The legend indented into the cover and gold-foiled was presumably the title and author. The unreadable text matched the alphabet on Livira’s scrap. Metal hinges reinforced the structure, dark and time-polished.

“A lock!” Livira spread her hands in exasperation. “Who puts a lock on a book?” She knelt and put her finger to the keyhole. A lock had to mean that some books should not be read by some people. She wondered who got to decide such things and why. Was the book being protected against the wrong people, or were people being protected from the knowledge it held? She would have complained that if books needed locks, then didn’t the whole library—but she remembered that the white door had refused her. She was only standing here because the bird at her feet could go where she could not.

Livira fished her scrap from her pocket. “This really came from here?” She stroked her fingers across the cover in front of her. The lettering in dark grey on black was hard to see but it was the same alphabet as her scrap bore. What had they called it? “Crunian,” Livira spoke the name out loud. “Crunian Four.” Lord Algar had been the one to narrow it to a particular dialect. “You’re not much of a guide really,” Livira complained. “Couldn’t they have made one that could answer questions?” She raised her hand as the bird opened its beak. “With words!”

The bird closed its beak.

“Well, look, I can’t put this back”—Livira pushed her scrap against the edges of the pages—“if the book won’t open.” She was fond of her scrap and despite the distance she’d had to walk she didn’t feel too bad about not being able to return it. She looked at the familiar markings. It was something she’d brought with her from the Dust. The only thing she still had. Even the clothes she’d worn were gone. She’d found it and it was hers. Livira stood up. “It’s really time I should be getting back.” It was past time, in fact. She was sure of it. There was no way her exploration had taken less than a day and in her current state of exhaustion the return would take longer. She regarded the raven and it looked back at her with its head cocked to one side. “This has been...” Livira hunted through her recently expanded vocabulary for a word that fitted. “...educational.” It was the kindest thing she could find to say that wasn’t all lie. “Can I...” She looked around to see if there were somewhere she could set the raven that was more dignified than the floor. There wasn’t. “Goodbye then.” She gave a small bow like the ones she’d seen city people do outside the Allocation Hall, then turned to go.

“SQUAWK!” The cry hit her between the shoulder blades, setting her teeth on edge and making her stumble.

“What!” She spun around. “I can’t open the damn book!”

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