io9 is proud to current fiction from Lightspeed Journal. As soon as a month, we function a narrative from Lightspeed’s present challenge. This month’s choice is “Dekar Druid and the Infinite Library” by Cadwell Turnbull. Take pleasure in!
Dekar Druid and the Infinite Library
By Cadwell Turnbull
Dekar Druid lives in an infinite library. Moreover Ebizenum, who’s in a particular class of their very own, he’s the one residing individual within the library’s single tower. Outdoors, a forest surrounds the tower. There’s a lake a brief stroll to the north and a peak to the distant south. And nothing else. The lake is straightforward to get to, a respite on sizzling summer season days, however Dekar Druid has by no means made it to the mountains, not even shut, although he’s walked for miles southward, till the oppressive forest stole the breath from his lungs. He’s solely tried the one time, an expertise he doesn’t intend to repeat.
Reality be informed, the infinite library might not be infinite. However Dekar Druid has climbed the spiral staircase up and up till, from a window, the forest lay obscured by clouds, and down and down into the darkish and dank sub-basements and he hasn’t discovered a prime or a backside.
From the bottom of the tower, the bottom seems undisturbed. The inside of the tower additionally exhibits no indicators of decay. One way or the other, on this peculiar place, the library has remained, in and out, untouched by the ravages of time.
So, maybe extra curiously, has Dekar Druid.
He’s now on the fifteenth flooring of the library—counted up from floor degree, after all—sitting cross-legged on a leather-cushioned bench, naked ft drawn below him, with one e-book in his lap and a stack of but extra forming a spiraling, precarious tower on the desk earlier than him.
He’s skimming the pages of the e-book, his thoughts elsewhere. He’s learn this one earlier than, so the story hasn’t caught him, and will by no means once more. Dekar is bored usually. That is, in actual fact, his default state, and he’s grown so used to it that he can settle into the sensation for hours with out the slightest discomfort. He’s considering now about lunch, what Ebizenum would possibly put together for him. He hopes it’s a kabob of probably the most tender deer meat, seared to perfection. His mouth is salivating simply enthusiastic about it.
Dekar closes the e-book and locations it on the highest of the teetering e-book tower. He stands and stretches, permits a yawn. Then he wanders up a number of extra flight of stairs to the ninteenth flooring, a degree he’s been to lots of of instances, however this time he takes one of many ladders to the darkest nook, the place there aren’t any home windows. He’s nonetheless enthusiastic about seared deer meat when he climbs to the highest and pulls a thick e-book from the very best shelf. He blows exhausting, stirring mud. The particulates fall round him as he descends the ladder, the motes like tiny snowflakes or feather-light glass.
Why go to this a part of the tower? Why seize the ladder and attain for that particular e-book? These are the type of questions Dekar doesn’t ask anymore. Like all issues within the tower, in his life, in all identified existence, the reply to these questions is easy. Whim.
Distracted, he finds the desk he makes use of on this flooring, and there, too, is a tower of books. He sits in his traditional spot, curls his ft again below him. He’s much less bored now, however like an inhale, a inhaling, he is aware of it should return.
He opens the e-book and this time he doesn’t skim. Instantly he is aware of this one is completely different, a e-book he’s by no means learn earlier than. He reads the title: Longback Berserker. He puzzles on the title; it’s fairly unusual, even among the many variety of surprisingly named books he’s learn since coming to himself throughout the tower. Like with all the opposite books, there is no such thing as a creator. He shrugs, his response to most issues, turns the web page, and begins studying.
By the tip of the primary web page Dekar is caught. When he reads like this, together with his full consideration, the phrases thunder in his ears, however inward, portray the within of his cranium with sound. And his sight, often sure to the tower—or the forest, or to the phrases on the web page—descends into the phrases, down and down, after which between the atoms of ink blots on the paper, till the world of the story seems, rising up from the quantum mist.
And nonetheless he falls, via house and excessive ambiance, via clouds, this now littlest Dekar forming arms and ft, a torso, a littlest thoughts. And simply because the jelly of this littlest physique units, turning true-solid, he finds footing on the elsewhere sidewalk of this littlest world, half-crowded with folks.
Nobody notices him showing there. Dekar appears round to seek out his bearings. On the road are little boutique outlets: a cupcake bakery, a bread store, a butchery, a flower store, an vintage store, a bookstore, and on the far finish of the road, a fortune teller’s store. All these buildings are painted purple, virtually the identical shade because the folks strolling alongside the sidewalks.
As he observes all this, the phrases he’s studying above this place thunder in his ears—
The truck idled on the cease signal however Estrid Orchid waited to calm her nerves. She informed herself once more there was nothing to fret about. She would see what he needed to say concerning the Esket Fragment and depart as soon as he’d informed her. She doubted he knew as a lot as he claimed, even when he’d spent half his life marooned on Esket through the struggle. The Fragment was in a lifeless language that the Scattered Tribes not remembered, even of their tales. Nonetheless, she’d nonetheless must do her responsibility as a scholar and discuss to the person.
As soon as the truck handed and the road was away from vehicles, she took yet one more breath, deciding she was prepared. And so, Estrid Orchid crossed the road to satisfy Ev Tengo . . .
—and together with his littlest eyes Dekar sees this protagonist together with her delicate purple pores and skin and curls of vibrant flowering vines falling to her again as she is crossing the road.
Often he follows his studying voice, however whimsy has taken maintain of Dekar Druid once more. He doesn’t cross the road. As a substitute, he follows the sidewalk to the tip of the road of storefronts, nudging the insistent narration to the again of his cranium. He climbs the three steps of the fortune teller’s store and opens the door. There’s a chime as he enters, however nobody is on the entrance desk.
Dekar is about to shrug and step again out onto the road, when a lady emerges from a again room, parting a curtain product of blue-green beads that tremble as she passes via. They don’t cease whilst she steps to the entrance desk which stands at chest peak. Black vines coil atop the lady’s head like a layered cake, flowers of the brightest blue demarcating the 5 layers. And two giant hoop earrings grasp from every of her lobes, with a thick smudge of blue-black eyeliner operating from ear to ear in a tough line that shrouds her eyes. And her eyes: crimson and glowing and resting utterly on Dekar, unblinking.
Dekar smiles politely. “Hey.”
The blue-green beads tremble lazily as the lady appears Dekar up and down for an extended second. Dekar begins to fret that he has not shaped himself within the method of individuals inside this world. He appears down at his purple pores and skin to reassure himself.
He tries once more: “I hoped I may have my fortune taken.”
The beads stop trembling and at last, the lady blinks. “A second,” she says and disappears behind the beaded curtain once more, stirring them again to life. She returns with a deck of playing cards she’s already shuffling in her arms. She steps out from behind the entrance desk and Dekar is struck by how solidly she’s constructed, broad and muscled, which exhibits via the wrap of fabric she’s long-established round her full physique. Dekar’s face cools, this world’s indication of a blush.
Wordless, she guides him to a facet door and when he enters, he’s stunned to seek out only a small room, a spherical desk at its heart, three chairs tucked below the desk. The lady units down her playing cards and pulls out one of many chairs. She invitations him to do the identical and he does. They sit throughout from one another in a fragile silence. Right here she continues her vigilance, finding out Dekar’s face. He clears his throat, readjusts himself in his chair.
The lady picks up her playing cards and once more returns to shuffling. “Name me Stranger,” she says, and begins whipping particular person playing cards from one hand to the opposite the place they slot randomly throughout the two halves of the deck she is holding in every hand. Dekar has no clue how she is doing this. She has 5 fingers on every hand—a boring quantity—however the playing cards transfer as if she is shuffling with 100.
“I’m Dekar.”
Stranger lets the playing cards scatter throughout the desk. Not one falls off the sting, although one does steadiness half-on-half-off the desk on Dekar’s facet, the nook of the cardboard aimed toward Dekar himself. He watches it with suspicion.
“That one,” Stranger says, “you’ll have to show your self. However not but.”
Dekar expends an excessive amount of power combating the impulse to disobey.
Stranger says, “My household has lived on this valley for hundreds of years. I’ve lived right here an incredible deal longer.”
Dekar notices, absently, that he’s not bored.
Stranger flips one of many playing cards. On it there’s a fish with fins product of slender vines coated in thorns which all level outward just like the rays of a solar seen from planet-side. Stranger laughs. “The Dipper is an efficient omen for somebody such as you. It implies that a journey is quickly at its finish.”
She flips one other card. This one is all black apart from a circle on the heart. Within the circle is a severed hand. Stranger whistles. “A Sever is a uncommon card to disclose itself on a second flip. Paired with a Dipper, it implies that this journey’s finish will include a hardship, a shattering of self.”
Not so absently, Dekar notices that he’s feeling an altogether new emotion: not boredom, or thrill, or whimsy. This one he doesn’t wish to give energy by naming it.
Stranger turns one other card. On it’s a single tooth with a coronary heart carved on its face. Stranger hums. “After I was younger to this world and I first acquired my very own telling, this was my first card.” She is watching him as she speaks; her crimson eyes burn. “As a primary card, it implies that one can find a life-long companion. I’ve but to. Not essential! As a 3rd, in a collection like this one”—she runs her arms, fingers splayed, over the scatter of playing cards—“it implies that one can find a companion for a season and that this companion will usher in nice change. The change that may result in the shattering of self.”
Dekar’s pores and skin yellows with anxiousness. He bends himself in a knot to remain rooted to his chair.
“Two extra. Then you definately,” says Stranger. She reaches for one nearer to Dekar and he flinches from the sudden motion. He watches her flick the cardboard over with one in all her lengthy bark-black nails.
“What’s this one?” Dekar asks, his physique is as tight towards his chair again as he can handle. The legs of the chair have slid barely from the desk.
“It’s . . .” A distant expression and a ghost of a smile on her face, she says, “I did meet somebody for a time. She was a younger girl from an outdated household on this valley city. And she or he cherished me. We spent three years in bliss and I birthed six saplings from our love: the household I discussed. Aside from one line, they’ve all ceased. We’ve got a inhabitants drawback on Elvine, and Err-Kuluxia, the galactic empire that now governs us, has restricted our replica. Not essential! I meant to say that I knew Ellen couldn’t be the companion from the Carving card, and that realizing finally led to a souring of our relationship.
“When she died, I visited her. Her eyes have been milky, her sight diminished to a small aperture out of her proper eye. Nonetheless, when she noticed me, she gasped. How younger I have to’ve appeared to her; she probably thought me a phantom. However I informed her”—she turned the following card—“I informed her that I’d lived on this city from the start, that for a time I used to be even worshipped right here. However then it grew to become out of vogue—we’re fairly secular now, you see—and after they couldn’t kill me, they erased me, struck me from their reminiscence and their writings. And so, I lived. On the surface. Till her, my Ellen, and the love we constructed. I informed her I used to be sorry, that I had a goal”—she gestured to the cardboard nonetheless resting on the finish of the desk, the one with its edge aimed proper at Dekar’s chest; Dekar turned the cardboard over—“that someday the creator would come to me, and I’d wake him to himself. What number of extra of your youngsters have you ever achieved this to, I ponder. What number of of them are nonetheless ready to be relieved from their goal. Your face says all of it. You don’t know what you’re or why you’re right here. However but you left me with this accountability, this infinite . . . Not essential!
“That card is the Drowning Fish, a Greater Dipper. Uncommon to get two in the identical studying. That one is the Burning Chicken—you get the purpose, see the solar depicted there—and that one, the one earlier than you, is the Dwelling Ash. These playing cards collectively are a trio with each a separate and a singular that means. The secularists have revised the Tri-Una to imply one can find nice and horrible information, however the folks that also worship the Trigger Deck keep Tri-Una’s authentic interpretation.
“Do I actually need to say it? Superb. Tri-Una means God will reveal himself to you, a private visitation. And look! You’re right here.
“Now pay me and get out of my store.”
****
Lunch, because it seems, is a ham sandwich.
Ebizenum units down the sandwich and returns with a tall glass of turmeric lemonade. Then they sit throughout from Dekar, copper lip-segments locked in a well mannered smile. Fingers on the desk, they stare at Dekar, ready for an additional command.
Dekar doesn’t give one. He takes a number of bites of his sandwich and chews slowly.
“How was your day?” asks Ebizenum.
Distracted, Dekar says, “Superb.”
The android refixes their mouth to a smile.
“Are you able to—”
“Sure?” Lip-segments parted, an keen rise to their copper brows, Ebizenum gestures to face.
“No, no. I don’t want something. I simply have questions I’m hoping you’ll be able to reply.”
“I can strive,” says Ebizenum, copper brows creased. The chrome of their face gleams within the afternoon gentle.
“I met somebody.”
“Oh,” says Ebizenum, clearly apprehensive. “From the forest?”
“No, after all not. From one of many books.”
“You imply you spoke to a personality.”
“Sure, although I don’t suppose she was a personality. She was off-narrative, and really a lot alive. Such as you or me.”
“Fascinating,” says Ebizenum. They cup a hand to their chin-plate in thought. “Nicely, it is a new growth. I don’t know if I will help you with questions on an off-narrative non-character that mimics sentience.”
This response makes Dekar hesitate. He desires to ask concerning the tower, concerning the books, however he’s petrified of any reply Ebizenum would possibly give. He takes a cautious breath and pushes his half-eaten sandwich away.
“You’re not happy with the ham sandwich? I’m sincerely sorry I wasn’t capable of anticipate your need for a kabob of probably the most tender deer meat, seared to perfection.”
“It’s high quality. Actually.” Dekar stares into Ebizenum’s face, his solely different companion on this desolate world. “I wish to know, that’s, I hope you’ll be able to inform me: Did I write all of the books within the tower?”
An expression Dekar has by no means seen from Ebizenum: eyes vast, chrome lids folded utterly again into their head, the segments of mouth parted so that each one the plates of Ebizenum’s face crowd one another like fish scales.
Ebizenum says, “I by no means thought at the present time would come. Would you give me a second to gather myself?”
“After all.”
Dekar takes a sip of his turmeric lemonade, the ice clinking towards the chilly glass. He has solely now seen that he’s sweating from his armpits.
Ebizenum says, “The brief reply is, sure, although I do know that this query has many underlying ones you’ll additionally want answering. Would you prefer to ask them individually or would you want me to anticipate?”
“Anticipate,” Dekar says. One way or the other his mouth may be very dry.
“Sure, proper. Nicely, you probably did write all of the books, throughout your awake cycles. That’s when you find yourself Your Exalted Self. At present, you’re in one in all your lowly cycles. This time you name your self Dekar Druid. Shall I proceed? You look distressed.”
“Please—I’m high quality, please proceed.”
“Sure, proper. You have to be questioning what number of of those cycles you’ve had. The quantity is sort of lengthy.” Ebizenum gives the variety of cycles. It’s a very giant quantity. “It’s essential to additionally wish to know what number of books are within the tower. Nicely, the degrees above flooring 9,200 and under sub-basement 8,214 of the tower nonetheless lay empty of books, although you’ve not had the eye or willpower up to now to strategy the bounds of your assortment, which is [another unfathomably large number] of books at the moment. Sir Druid, I’m involved at your misery. Maybe we should always—”
Dekar shakes his head. “Are there different residing beings, like us, on this degree of existence?”
“I don’t know. Neither does Your Exalted Self, Sir Druid.”
“Please clarify.”
“Nicely, the forest, as you recognize Sir Druid, has no finish. Sure, there are mountains within the distance, however if you happen to climb to the tops of these timber, which I’ve achieved many instances with Your Exalted Self, these mountains by no means get nearer, irrespective of the place you reside within the forest. After which there’s the dizziness and the nausea if you happen to spend too lengthy within the forest. There are the deer, the hogs, the rabbits, the predators of land and air. There’s the fish pond. In any other case, there’s nothing, Sir Druid. No life, reminiscent of your self or myself.”
“Did I make you?”
“Your Exalted Self made me. Together with his thoughts. You’re fairly highly effective in that kind, although you continue to can’t transcend the forest. I constructed the tower to accommodate your books. And to offer you shelter. The forest frightened you and Your Exalted Self all the time apprehensive what would possibly emerge from the timber to say you. Earlier than me, so far as I do know, there was simply Your Exalted Self and the forest and people peaks within the distance. Then me. Then the primary of your books. Then the tower.”
So many inquiries to be requested. So many horrible solutions.
“Would you like me to proceed to anticipate?”
“No, that’s sufficient. I have to lie down.”
“After all.” Ebizenum stands and retrieves Dekar’s unfinished plate and drink. “I’ll preserve this for you in case you’re hungry after your relaxation.”
Ebizenum’s heavy departing footsteps assist Dekar ignore the exhausting beating of his personal coronary heart.
****
The following morning, Dekar rises from his mattress on the fifth flooring of the tower with an ache behind his eyes. He goes to the window and stares out on the nonetheless forest and its unnerving quiet.
Ebizenum is on the door when he’s dressed. “How are you this morning, Sir Druid?”
“I’m slowly beginning to bear in mind issues,” Dekar confesses. Final evening his desires have been a storm of reminiscences, the headache a possible side-effect of getting to seek out himself inside that storm.
“Oh, that’s new,” says Ebizenum. “Often, Your Exalted Self returns without delay.” Ebizenum’s shoulders are too heavy to actually shrug, however they handle a minute rise. “Breakfast?”
“No, thanks. I’m not hungry this morning.”
Ebizenum begins to go away.
“Wait a second.”
Ebizenum returns their consideration to Dekar, as open and keen as ever.
“I wish to thanks; that’s, I really feel I ought to thanks. For all you’ve achieved to handle me . . . in all my types.”
“It’s the purpose I exist,” says Ebizenum merely and departs.
Dekar watches Ebizenum disappear round a nook. In entrance of him the fifth-floor stacks, its rows of books looming. So many universes, and other people, and . . .
Dekar is instantly struck by a profound feeling of claustrophobia. He wishes to be exterior, within the open air, however he doesn’t really wish to be exterior. He’s now much more scared of the ready forest, the darkness that may stare again out at him from the clearing.
Then the place ought to he go? How can he get out?
It isn’t a call, neither is it whim that has Dekar dropping again right down to the road of purple storefronts. It’s one thing extra like gravity.
This time Stranger is out entrance when Dekar enters. She stares out from between stacks of containers. “What’s it now?”
“I wished to ask, and there’s no good option to ask, so I’ll be direct. Do you want to die? I may present that to you, if you would like, that’s.” This isn’t strictly true, Dekar is aware of, however His Exalted Self nonetheless is Dekar Druid, so it isn’t a lie both. He can grant this. If he can persuade Himself.
Stranger considers for a second. “Possibly later. For now, I’m leaving the planet. I wish to see the universe. Discover others you’ve deserted and provides them the excellent news.” She stoops down the place Dekar can’t see and resumes packing one thing behind her desk.
“You hate me.”
Stranger emerges with one other field. “Sure. It’s a infantile emotion. Ineffective. I’ll recover from it.”
She disappears behind the desk however is quickly up once more with yet one more field, this one heavy sufficient to boost a vein in her neck. She says, “To start with, once I was born, and for a number of years after, yours was the one face I noticed. Till you left and the remainder of the world started to knit itself round me. That model of you carried himself with a lot confidence. And certainty. What a shock to see you coming via that door, carrying his face, me like we’d by no means met. I knew you had modified your self by some means, grow to be another person, and but right here I used to be, unchanged, compelled to carry out my one goal simply as you mentioned I’d.
“However you recognize what I’ve come to appreciate, having met you in that kind and as you at the moment are?” Her crimson eyes flare inside her smear of blue-black eyeliner, and for a second it looks like she will be able to see him, peel again this actuality and see the opposite Dekar above this littlest self. “You’re empty. There’s nowhere so that you can go. No up or past. You may solely go down. Or backwards.
“Not me. I wish to go one other method if I can.”
He desires to say one thing, however what’s there to say?
A second extra of Dekar staring dumbly earlier than Stranger turns away from him. As she disappears into the again room, the clatter of beads accompanying her departure, she doesn’t spare a look his method or supply one other phrase, not even a gesture of goodbye.
Nothing left to do right here, Dekar is aware of, but he lingers a second longer. Absently he observes that he’s not bored, hasn’t been since yesterday.
Minutes later, as Dekar descends the steps of the fortuneteller store, Stranger turns the signal on the door, which reads: “closed,” and under, scrawled in blue marker, “indefinitely.”
Dekar returns his consideration to the phrases on repeat in the back of his cranium: And so, Estrid Orchid crossed the road to satisfy Ev Tengo for the primary time, the Err-Kuluxian scholar who emerged from the Ash Path Struggle with the nickname Longback Berserker.
And with extra phrases singing in his cranium, and a sleeping god rousing in his stomach, Dekar Druid follows Estrid Orchid to see the place her story will take him.
In regards to the Writer
Cadwell Turnbull is the award-winning creator of The Lesson, No Gods, No Monsters, and We Are the Disaster. His brief fiction has appeared in the Verge, Lightspeed, Nightmare, Asimov’s Science Fiction, and a number of other anthologies. His novel The Lesson was the winner of the 2020 Neukom Institute Literary Award within the debut class. No Gods, No Monsters was the winner of a Lambda, a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award and the Manly Wade Wellman Award, and longlisted for the PEN Open Award. We Are the Disaster was a finalist for the Manly Wade Wellman Award and an Ignyte Award. Turnbull grew up on St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands.
Please go to Lightspeed Journal to learn extra nice science fiction and fantasy. This story first appeared within the March 2025 challenge, which additionally options brief fiction by which additionally options brief fiction by Jake Kerr, Anya Ow, Oluwatomiwa Ajeigbe, Nina Kiriki Hoffman, Adam-Troy Castro, Sunwoo Jeong, Rachael Ok. Jones, and extra. You may anticipate this month’s contents to be serialized on-line, or you should purchase the entire challenge proper now in handy e book format for simply $4.99, or subscribe to the e book version right here.
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