It’s midnight in the library and gears are changing as the books shift into new knowledge. A dark light passes over the spines and the titles change in a wave. A spin and little clicks as the localized reality Unders with barely a shudder and the borders are locked down. The corners of the giant building are subtly redefined with a barely audible shutter click but not changed. The doors spin to new configurations and can now open into new spaces from precisely where they were before. Security guards caught outside will see all business as usual and empty rows. They will see the normal empty non-events of a night time library. It won’t occur to them to go inside. It will never occur to them to go inside. Security guards caught inside will go to sleep and awaken, embarrassed but refreshed, in the morning. All libraries overlap. The library is closed.
And then.
The library is open.
They come in twos. They come in threes. Some sad souls come by themselves, possessing great power.
Black rags, blue faces, skeletal frames, softly clinking jewels, striped leggings, hooves, and staring eyes.
No eyes, white skin, probing noses, red saris, black toenails and slicked back wet hair. They head for the Braille and the headphones.
Teeth at war, long hairy arms, too many fingers, wearing bifocal glasses perched on sensitive snouts.
Cracked faceplates, eyepatches, and an eruption of legs from the millipede body.
There is variety here. There is great danger. There is a sense of community. Above all else, there is silence.
The swoosh of skirts, the carpet muffled thump of a prosthetic leg, the drag of a tail. The dry sound of dry skin searching, running over dry pages. The lick of a fingertip. They come for knowledge. .
The necromonicon is part of the ‘books on tape’ series here with serious enchantments. They have the memoirs of an 82 year old Jim Morrison. Fairies have left recipe books here. This is the repository of all the knowledge. This is the repository of all the knowledge. This is the repository of all the knowledge.
And she is the Night Librarian.
She is Ganesh. She is the Scribe. She is Kwuatl. She is Ptah. She is Farlend. She is the Underauthor. She is the Ghost Writer. She is Black Jenny. She is the Musemother.
She has the power to keep the peace.
The lenses of her glasses and the tight corners of her eyes hold a terrible talent. Her full mouth twists tonight in a grimace of satisfaction. The downward smile of a well organized event underway. She holds the keys behind her back and thumbs silently through them, counting, as she walks primly amongst her guests.
The crowleaders ask her a query and she walks them over to the glass cases and unlocks the first one for them to step inside. They will wait until she comes back to lock up when they leave.
A shindigger is told take the elevator down the fireshelves. He suits up and goes down.
A water baby gurgles a whisper into the librarians ear and is shown over to the pool of aquages to thumb through the ripples.
Rulemanner signs a question to her with four of his rapid six fingered hands. She grows two more arms with a rustle to answer him just as quickly. He is amused and shuffles over to the rulebooks.
The stretchers raise a jaw and she nods in the direction of the skinbooks. They fold from view.
Gustus puffs a pheromone laden question to her in the airy flowery scents of high politeness to cover up his dank snapdragon subtext stink of nervousness. She sighs an answer back on the wind with the light humour of violets to put him at ease. A slight crinkle of her eyes and Gustus slithers off quietly to Taxidermy and Torture.
She strides slowly.
They learn.
She watches.
They read.
She scans alertly.
They whisper questions.
She whispers exact answers.
The Night Librarian has three loves.
Silent reading, silent learning and silent organization.
Her fines have extinguished civilizations.
Her raised voice has laid waste to continents.
A person is only what other people know of that person.
She can erase that.
Violence in the Night Library is not tolerated. No one truly knows how many people have been punished by her because they simple cease to have ever existed. No one is eager to find out what that’s like. They’ve entered the covenant by entering the door.
This is allowed to be the place where you find out how to kill your enemy but it is most emphatically not the place where you try it out
They read. They gather information. All is found. All are satisfied.
Come sun-up, there are no stragglers.
She closes her eyes and her lenses flash as if a light passed across them.
The gears shift again, this time Up.
There’s a slight shuddering that can only be felt.
There’s a light tearing like the purr of ripping fabric as the mundane library surfaces, suddenly having always been there.
The doors click locked and switch back to the regular kind that only open into the rooms they’re supposed to.
The Night Library scatters to all libraries, hidden or seen, ancient or new, and relaxes into preparation for tomorrow night.
The Night Librarian scatters herself to all librarians and keeps all the knowledge through their hands, through these aspects of her self.
No librarian works in a library because it’s just a job. They are called.
She calls them.
They become her.
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