Secrets of the Hidden Library - Fiction Competition

She walked through the ancient library slowly, the guttering, green, light from the copper torch in her hand casting weird dancing shadows along her path. She knew the answer she wanted would be down here, somewhere, she simply had to find it. The shelves loomed over her, each of them stretching to the ceiling over a hundred feet above her head. Each of the dark wood shelves was lined with rows of dusty tomes, claimed from a thousand conquered worlds, written in countless languages, each caked with the dust of time and a few splattered still with the dried stains of blood that had been spilled to claim them.

She held the torch high, her eyes dancing along a row of ancient books, her mind struggling to decipher the alien languages. How was this place organized? How could she find what she needed? She looked to her left and right down the aisles, seeing the shelves stretching as far as her eyesight could strain into the murky gloom. There seemed to be no end to the collection. Her eyes drifted upwards to the towering heights of the shelves, a sense of wonderment at the knowledge here warring with a growing sense of the impossibility of her task.

"May I assist you?"

The voice hissed from the shadows behind her, as dry as dust, as thin as paper. She spun around, her hand flashing to her side to draw forth the thin venom blade that rode at her hip. She found only darkness behind her, nothing more. The green light danced along the edge of her blade as she turned in a tight circle, peering down the aisles, searching for the speaker.

"Who is there?" She demanded, her voice sounding like it had a waver in it, she snarled as she tried to sound bolder. "I am Draconess Isme Hy'till, of the Kabal of Shrouded Knowledge, show yourself or prepare to know torments undreamed of!"

"Undreamed of?" The papery voice hissed like a bellows slowly deflating. A dry and rasping chuckle. "Such ambition, such ardor. Who is to say what has not been dreamed? I have read so many dreams, so many hopes. What is your hope, small thing?"

"Who are you," she demanded again, stamping her foot. She thought she saw movement to her left and spun to face it, but found only shadows and an ancient shelf, bowing under the weight of the mighty books upon it.

"I am nothing, a simple servant. I am the caretaker here, the librarian, how may I assist you?"

"You know this place?"

"I know it as well as anyone who still draws breath."

"You can find me the book I want?"

"I can find you many things, but what you want, what you need, and what you receive...those things I cannot promise you."

"I need to know how to breach the gates of Archon Vezzintyr's estates." She was being placed in the vanguard of that attack, and she knew that her enemies within the Kabal intended for her to fail, fail and die. But she knew it had been done before, and knew a tale of it was within this library...or so the information broker had promised.

"To breach a gate? To attack a house? To storm forward? The rains of chance fall upon you and you cower from the thunder and feaar the lightning. Yes...yes, I know many stories about storms."

"Not storms, the gate, I need to know how to-"

But she could already here the sound of rustling papers and shuffling feet in the darkness. She set off after them, but soon found her path cluttered and blocked. Books, reams of scroll-work, ancient tablets, even a few dust caked data slates all lay upon the floor. Each of them opened to a story, marked with a small gem, or gleaming with a file already accessed. Isme reached down and picked up the first, reading the story hurriedly.

"This isn't..." she sighed, realizing the caretaker was already long gone amidst the maze of shelves. She found her gaze returning to the words of the book in her hands despite herself.

She began to read.