LSRO: Chapter 116 - Shadow of a Doubt (Patreon)

Soooo I thought I'd be done with Book 2 by now. I am, in fact, not.

Maybe another 2 chapters... perhaps.

Not a cliffy, but definitely an: ack what now chapter.

Hope you enjoy it

~~

Chapter 116

Shadow of a Doubt

Quinn wasn't entirely sure what she'd been expecting when Jasper finally agreed to speak, but quaint cottages surrounding a thriving series of herb gardens had not been it. 

The swamp was still undoubtedly there, but this clearing in the center was abundant with bright greenery, growth, and beauty. She could even hear little birds in the trees and insects chirping. Occasionally she even caught a glimpse of them. Bright feathers flashed across her vision; butterflies with vibrant wings fluttered through the herb gardens. It was teeming with life that she hadn't attributed to being in the middle of a swamp. 

Sort of like an oasis.

Several chairs were placed around a large round table outside one of the little cottages. The seating wasn't uncomfortable, but the silence was. 

It was getting very, very awkward. Like all of Quinn's high school cafeteria nightmares had come together and mashed themselves into one place. She steeled herself to speak, only to have Jasper beat her to it.

"I truly appreciate your not killing my clan members," Jasper said, as if she was struggling to get the thanks out.

Quinn raised an eyebrow, because she didn't want to kill people. She just wanted her book back, and didn't appreciate being attacked. "Why ever would I kill someone who wasn't attacking me, or us, with a deadly force?" she asked.

"Okay," Jasper said, pausing while she gathered herself, "but nevertheless, I would like to express my thanks."

"Then you're welcome," Quinn said, slightly perturbed by the fact that she'd just been thanked for not killing people. Wasn't that just a sort of given? How will you be a decent person? Oh, I don't know, I won't kill anyone? 

The silence settled again, becoming even more awkward than it had been earlier. Quinn looked at the drink in front of her. It was a clear liquid, didn't smell like anything, it was probably water. She took a very tentative sip. It was refreshing water, sort of like the stuff that had electrolytes and maybe a little spritz of lemon in it at home.

"So," Quinn said, trying to gather her thoughts together, "explain to me why you didn't honor the deal that you struck with Savinth."

She was trying not to show her unease, as idyllic as the setting around them was. The people here tried to ambush them, and Quinn was pretty sure they just weren't used to fighting enough, and thus their attacks hadn't been as effective as they could have been. She didn't think they were trying to kill them or scare them off, but that didn't belay the fact that they had, in fact, been attacked by these people. They seemed to hate the Library too, or at least despised the previous Librarian. Quinn needed this information from them. She needed to understand why they hadn't been privy to the library's lack of functioning over the last several hundred years. Although she guessed if they no longer frequented the Library's facilities, and didn't have any books out, they wouldn't have had a reason to find out.

Not only that, but why would they say Korradine corrupted the Library? That was what she needed to get to the bottom of.

Jasper's expression was schooled. But Quinn could tell there were emotions flickering just under the surface as the Desilish member attempted to find the best words to answer the question.

Quinn took another sip of her water and turned around to observe the area again. There were a mixed bunch of amazing creatures and people. It just made her feel like she was in a fantasy novel. She spied a similar species to Finn, like an Ilgonomur it was short in stature with big eyes, but it was slightly taller than Finn, coming in about four feet tall. Then she spied a few variants on the Aracnio twins. The only difference in any of them appeared to be how their legs moved. 

And there were three different types of Firionas that she could see out there tending the gardens. They fluttered to an from the plants, light emanating from their hands on occasion. It was fascinating to watch. There were so many more people bustling around the massive area that she couldn't even identify. 

Finally, everybody else surrounding the table who belonged in Jasper's delegation had given her what they probably thought were very surreptitious nods allowing Jasper to give Quinn a reply. "We don't give out our recipes, they are a matter of clan pride."

Quinn resisted the urge to scowl, and kept her face as neutral as she possibly could. "So you deliberately, and falsely made a deal that you knew you wouldn't uphold."

Jasper opened her mouth, closed it again, then opened it again, looked away, and refused to meet Quinn's eyes.

"I'll tell you why she did it," Savinth interjected, "because she knew it was a Librarybook, and didn't know that Kora wasn't in the Library anymore, none of us did. She thought she'd never get access to any more cookbooks from the Library, and so this was her only way to get one, right?"

Jasper let out a very long sigh. "If you hadn't taken our starweed, we'd have returned it to you."

Savinth threw her hands up in the air, "But I still wouldn't have had the recipes you promised me. And where's the deal in that? That's not even a deal, that's thievery."

"Enough," Quinn said, raising her voice ever so slightly. Her head was starting to pound. If she let them, these two would go at this for hours, she could tell. "At this rate, I'm going to fine you both. I'm not exactly sure how I can go about that, but I will figure out a way. I'm sure the system will let me. Now, you really need to tell me about this feud."

"What are you going to do about my starweed," Jasper said, her voice sullen, like a sulking toddler.

Quinn blinked. "You still don't have starweed?"

"No. She took the whole lot of it, roots and all. There is no way to grow more of it back. It's very difficult to come by."

Quinn blinked and glanced at Malakai, who shrugged like, I don't know. 

Aradie sent messages to her mind. I do believe that Farrow may have some starweed in one of our terrariums back at the library. You could offer this.

Quinn sighed, reaching out with her thoughts to thank her familar. "Okay, hypothetically, if I could come up with some starweed for you, would you give me back my bloody book without having to come to blows again?"

"Well," Jasper sighed, refusing to meet Quinn's eyes again. "We should probably give it back anyway."

"Yeah, it doesn't belong to you," Savinth said.

"It doesn't belong to you either," Jasper threw back.

Quinn realized there was probably a lot more to the disagreement between these two, but right now she didn't have the time nor the inclination to figure out what it was. That could be future Quinn's problem, or hell, she'd just leave them to duke it out themselves.

Once she got her property back.

"Fine. I know where to get starweed." Quinn said, "Will you just tell me about the Library feud?"

Jasper fell back in her seat, her nostrils flaring, her eyes focusing on anything that wasn't Quinn. Finally, she let out a huge sigh. "You can really get us starweed?"

Quinn glanced at Aradie, who let out a low hoot and nuzzled her. "Yep."

"Fine, I guess I owe you that much." Jasper's tone was still abrasive, but her scowl disappeared.

Quinn used all her self-control not to make a snappy comeback and simply waited for the woman to start speaking.

"Well, I was still very young when this happened, you have to understand. I went to the Library with my grandmother quite frequently. She loved to do new spins on some of the recipes in the books. You know, making an energizing cocktail with a different flair or a revitalizing stew with different ingredients to give it better flavor. She was just very adventurous when it came to cooking." There was a sad smile on Jasper's face and Quinn tried to leave her enough time to collect herself. 

In the meantime, she also tried to get her head around the fact that this person was telling her she went to the Library and witnessed all of this when she was very young and had now been feuding with the Library for over a thousand years. This meant that the individual in front of her was over a thousand years older than Quinn and she had just threatened to fine her.

How was Quinn, in all her 20 years of life, supposed to be able to enforce any of this? These beings, these creatures, they had so much more life experience than she did. So much more overwhelming power than she did. She didn't quite understand how she could navigate that and maintain the role of Librarian that was technically supposed to demand things of people who had lived for more than millennia. It was a huge conundrum for her mind. Very difficult to grasp the concept of beings that were thousands of years old when humans were lucky to live 70.

"Quinn," Malakai said, his finger tips grazing the top of her shoulder in a light tap, "you spaced there a little."

She blinked at him, all of her heavy thoughts melting away. "I am terribly sorry," she turned to Jasper. "I was just... I didn't get to do much with my grandmother."

"Oh," Jasper said, "that is sad."

"Yeah it is a little, isn't it?"

"Still, you didn't miss much. I was just reminiscing on my grandmother and how much she loved the Library and everything it stood for and the books and how much fun I always had going to visit until that one day." Jasper's expression had softened.

"Well, come on, spill, tell me what happened. It seems tragic to lose access to things she loved from an interaction." Quinn encouraged Jasper to continue.

"Well, we were waiting in line and one of the assistants was assisting us and we returned a book. Everything was fine. Just the same as it always was when we went there. We'd never once had an overdue book back in the day. Grandma really drilled that into my head. She was inordinately proud of that fact." Again, Jasper's smile took on a wistful quality.

"About how old were you?" Quinn asked.

"Oh, I was very young when this occurred." Jasper paused for a moment before continuing brightly. "Yes. I believe I was twenty-seven."

"Yes," Quinn said, trying not to show her reaction on her face. Twenty-seven wasn't old, but in the grand scheme of the universe, she guessed it was almost infantile. The elves did consider Malakai barely more than a teenager and he was thirty.

"Well, she was looking for a very specific book that day, and in order to save time we asked the assistant if it was in the Library because we'd been the last ones in line and it wasn't busy. I think it was Tirello was the name of the Librarian assistant who was helping us and he frowned when he saw that something in the system. So he called the Librarian over and Kora came. She was always so domineering and imposing to somebody of my age. Tall and her eye would just bore into me." Jasper frowned at the memory for a second before continuing.

"She came over, glanced at the system, looked at my grandmother with a sneer and told her, 'You cannot borrow that book, pick another one, find something else.' And she was about to walk away when my grandmother said, 'Oh, is it already out of the system? Is it borrowed?' And Kora looked at her and said, 'That's none of your business. 'Well, if it's borrowed, I would simply like to get on the wait list,' my grandmother had asked. And Kora snapped at her. 'We will not be lending that book to your kind.'"

"My grandmother was always very kind, but you just don't speak to her like that. She asked very specifically to speak to the manifestation of the Library. Sometimes he could override Kora or anyone else for that matter of fact. He was an integral part of the Library. She said he was not willing to come and help her, to which my grandmother replied, 'Lynx is always willing to help, please bring him here now.'"

"Kora told us that this was a trivial matter and Kora had the right to make the decision. And that my grandmother was now not welcome at all in the Library and nor was she ever permitted to borrow books again and she banned us. She had the security golems literally throw us out."

Quinn sat, her mouth agape. "So you didn't see Lynx?"

"No, we didn't see the manifestation, he wouldn't come out." Jasper's answer was very confident.

"I have to ask very specifically, you were sure her phrasing was that he wouldn't come out? That he didn't need to be bothered with something this trivial? Did you see him at all through your whole stay there?" Quinn was starting to get a sinking feeling in her stomach.

"No."

"Was that unusual?"

"We were only there for about 15 minutes in total, though I have to say it seemed much longer at the time." Jasper paused and then frowned. "Usually he was around when we went and visited. I don't recall another time that he wasn't present somewhere near the front of the Library."

"Okay, I don't suppose you remember the name of the book she was looking for?"

"Oh yes, I remember it clear as day, it's like burned into my mind: Dire Consequences of Misusing Monster Parts, How to Avoid Pitfalls."

Quinn blinked. The book that had been close to Machmüller's Theory of Dimensional Dissolution and Disintegration through Ritual Sacrifice. There had to be a link there. She attempted to keep her calm, but did notice Malakai's eyebrows practically shoot off his face. "Do you perhaps know why she was after that book?"

Jasper actually laughed. "Surely you've looked around this place. There are so many monsters in the swamp, we use what we can to supplement what we grow. Plus, grandma always wanted to see how far she could push the lessons in the books. It was part of her charm."

"I'm sure it was." Quinn said, hoping her smile seemed genuine even though worry was trying to gnaw a hole in her gut. "Well, let's get you some starweed and a Library unbanning, if you'll accept my apology for my predecessor's behavior."

Jasper studied Quinn for several seconds. "I think... that would be acceptable. I'll go and get you the book."

While she waited, Quinn kept going over the odd occurrence as had been described by Jasper. They needed to check that cookbook in more detail. Because she knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that she was missing something important.

~~

Really having fun with this hahahaha

Hope you liked it

Much love

KT