The Seven Riders

The librarian who hated me lifted the Letters of the Eidolon Queen from its bed of crushed velvet with great care, and carried it over to my desk as though he were carrying a sleeping child.  He set it down, placing it precisely and squaring the corners.  Then he moved some lever or armature set into the back of the desk and the book's far end lifted up to an angle of thirty degrees or so, an ideal pitch for reading.  He regarded me for long seconds, his hazel eyes seeming faintly luminous in the shadows of his eye sockets, and then laid a hand very gently on the cover of the book.
"Be very wary with her, Mr. Debraun," he said.  "The gentleman on the wall brought her here, and she is... restless still."
With that he left, taking slow, measured steps across the thick golden carpet, opening the door silently and closing it behind him equally quietly.  I looked up at the portrait on the wall once more, the reason why this was called the Derleth reading room, and shuddered.  The implication of the librarian's words was clear to me.


*
Later than evening, as I sat in the Bar of the Seven Riders, I had two glasses in front of me: one of Psaltrum and one of Deinore.  Psaltrum was a fortified wine made two hundred miles south of Crécy and usually brought up via mule train, across inhospitable desert scrublands and broken hills that occasionally hid salt-basins and ghost-mines.  Deinore, served in a much smaller glass, was made from pressing the must of the local grapes and fermenting what was left with a botrytis yeast.  The yield was small, hence the serving size, and was something of an acquired taste.  Both were more expensive that I could normally afford, but I needed my nerves settling.
"Debraun!"  Henrix was the first of our crew after me to arrive, and as he did so he spied the glasses in front of me.  His eyebrows rose fractionally, and he hove to the bar without saying another word.  Only when he'd returned with a glass of port for us both did he sit down and look around him, checking habitually that no-one was listening in.
"You were admitted?"
I nodded.  I hadn't spoken since I'd thanked the librarian and left.
"You saw... well, you saw why it's called the Derleth reading room."
I nodded, and couldn't help but shudder a little, no matter that I tried hard to suppress it.  Henrix nodded, and I realised he'd been looking for just that reaction.
"What did you think of the egg?" he asked next, and he looked hungry.  Finally I had reason to speak again.
"I never saw an egg," I said.  "There was very little ornamentation in there."
"Well done," he breathed.  "You have been admitted.  Damn, but you're doing well."
"What do you mean?" I said.  Now that I was speaking again it felt like I'd spent a lifetime in silence.  I needed to hear voices around me.
"I... well, I was crying when I came out; took me two days to dry up and talk to normal people again.  Constant, he's the one with the obsession with the Librum Nox, he was shaking like an Aspen tree and wouldn't see anyone for a week.  You look like you've been on a date with the Lords of Hell, but you're talking, you're drinking... you're doing well."
"I don't feel like I'm doing well," I said.  "The book was–"


*
The book was haunted.  It was probably the wrong word for it, but there was something about the book that there isn't about ordinary books.  When I touched its cover it was warm, and if I left my fingers there I began to feel a pulse.  It wasn't mine, I checked, holding two fingers firmly at my wrist and feeling my pulse there completely out of time with the one from the book.  I almost stood up then and left.  But I only needed a few references to complete my paper and so I told myself that this was a trick of library, a mean-spirited little antic played by the librarians to keep up the reputation of the place.  I opened the book.
I would have been happier if it had howled, or if blood had spilled from its pages and flooded across the desk, or even if demons had leapt down from secret hiding places in the walls and stabbed me with pins and tridents.  All of those things would have made sense, in a way, they'd all be easier to deal with.  Instead.  Instead a voice started reading the letters to me, a soft, feminine voice that sounded as though it had been trained to read.  There were stress and intonation patterns that suggested the owner of the voice was used to giving orders, to being understood.  And the things it was saying... they were just the words on the page.
At first.
When I turned the first page the voice paused, and then said 'Wait.  There is text missing.'  I froze, my fingers still holding the corner of the page, feeling that dreadful pulse begin anew at my fingertips.  'Curse Aloysius,' said the voice.  'I shall have him skinned when I find him, and his skin shall be used to record the missing text.'  Then it started reading words that weren't present on the page, words that fit with everything I'd read previously and added a whole new dimension to what had been recorded.  I let the page fall at last and scrambled for the paper and pens in the drawer so that I could write down what was being said.


*
"She spoke to you?" Henrix's voice was awed.  "The Eidolon Queen?"
"Someone, someone spoke to me," I said.  I gestured to the barman, and held up the glass of port.  I really wanted more Psaltrum, but I knew I couldn't afford to keep drinking it.  "Someone who knew what was missing from the book."
"Do you believe her?"  Henrix gripped the table so hard that his fingers were turning white.
"I think I have to," I said.  "She told me who the Seven Riders are."
The barman laid the port down on the table; I noticed he'd doubled the measure for both of us.
"No-one knows who the Seven Riders are," he said.  "It's just a name, one of those historical things.  Nothing special."
I let him go before I looked at Henrix and toasted him with the new glass of port.  "Eight people know who the Seven Riders are," I said.  "And I don't know why she told me."

The Derleth Reading Room

A few of the other patrons of the Library had mentioned the Derleth Reading Room, but usually only towards the end of the evening when we'd moved on from Eiswein and the seven varieties of Port to the exotic liqueurs, like Sangraal which is every bit as rare and intriguing as the name would suggest.  As the bar of the Seven Riders wavered around us, low-key hallucinations hovering in the corners and grotesqueries hiding under the tables, our conversations would turn to the things that we thought we'd seen, things that might have happened to us, things we'd not discuss with anyone else.  Evidence can be fantastically hard to come by when you're on the threshold of reality, and it was our experiences of things that scratched and tugged at the fabric of reality that had brought us to Crécy in the first place.  And also to the library, for which we were not only members, a source of income, and keen students, but also authors and procurators, depositors of things found in places that others would never see.
They keep it locked, was usually the opening line when the Derleth Reading Room was mentioned.  It's named for him, you know, HIM.  I'd suggested a few Derleth's the first time this had happened, and people had been too kind to laugh openly at me, but it was quite clear that when I knew who he was I'd also only be referring to him by a pronoun.
There are safeguards in there, would be the next thing.  People would adopt serious faces and nod in quiet agreement.  They won't let you in there without a librarian present, and only a senior one at that.  I'd had to ask about that, because I'd only ever seen two librarians in the library, one of whom hated me.  There was a tense moment then, as the people in the know considered if I was suitable for this kind of knowledge, and then they drank as one, six glasses lifted in unison and sipped from, then brought together in the air, clashing together, and I was accepted, if only for the evening.  The library, they explained, had a staff of twelve, and a librarian was assigned to every member.  If I'd seen two of the librarians, then I'd experienced a rare privilege.  And the librarian who hated me?  Of course, he was a senior librarian.
They don't keep books in there, would be the last thing they'd say, and then the conversation would change to something else, like the disappearance of the stone lions from the plaza (rumoured to all have stood up one night and walked away) or the death of all the gorillas in the zoo (rumoured to have been mauled to death by some very big and heavy cats).  Except one evening, Henrix had been particularly far gone on Sangraal and so he and I were the last to leave.
They do keep books in there, he whispered to me, his breath intoxicating and little golden flecks swimming in his eyes.  A very few, chained down in special cabinets.  There's nowhere else they can keep them, or they'd call out to their authors and demand to be returned.  He collapsed in a drunken heap after that, and I left him in the care of the stewards of the Seven Riders.


*
"The Derleth Reading Room is this way," said the librarian who hated me, appearing from off to my left where I could have sworn was nothing but a green expanse of carpet before the shelves containing common esoterica.  I followed him, noting that he wasn't carrying a book.
"I am sorry, Mr. Debraun," he said, his voice soft and uninflected, "but I'll have to ask you to leave you coat outside the reading room.  And perhaps also that shapeless piece of cloth you were wearing on your head before you arrived."
I didn't ask how he knew I'd been wearing my flat cap and submitted to his sartorial decisions with reasonably good grace.  After all, I needed access to this book, and getting access to the Derleth Reading Room would move me a little closer to the inner sanctum of the members of the library.
He held the door open for me, and I walked through.
Directly opposite the door, hanging on the wall and surely three times life-size was a portrait, and immediately I understood why no-one ever named Derleth and why I now, too, would be keeping that secret.  I averted my eyes, which were already stinging; tears were forming at the corners, and looked around at the rest of the room.  Behind me, the librarian closed the door.
There was a sage-green leather topped desk, behind which was a heavy wood-and-leather chair.  The desk appeared to have a number of lockable drawers in it, and I suspected that they'd all be locked.  The room was panelled in a dark wood I didn't recognise, but it had a warmth and shine to it that suggested it was polished daily.  The wall with the portrait hanging on it had no other furniture by it, but the two side walls of the room both had wooden chests, tables and cabinets positioned against them, with small ornaments atop them.  My eye was drawn immediately to a knife supported on a silvery stand; the unusual shape of the blade meant it had to be a Brinchev Kris.  I had one of my own, but I was still tempted to go over and admire the workmanship.  The wall with the door in it had a number of framed documents hanging on it, all hand-written, and all a little too far away for me to read now.
The librarian coughed softly and indicated that I should sit at the desk.  As I did so he produced a small brass key from a pocket and handed it to me.
"The third drawer on the left-hand side is now allocated for your use," he said.  "You will find paper, pencils, a soft eraser and four paper-clips in there.  You may use them as you see fit, except of course, that you may not write on the books or paper-clip things to them.  Supplies will be replaced as needed, and should you be asked for the return of the key, you will of course do so."
I nodded, accepting the key.
"As for the Letters of the Eidolon Queen," he said, walking to one of the cabinets, "Please take great care with this."
He laid his hands on the top of the cabinet and then moved them like a pianist, touching and pressing the top and sides in a complex sequence of movements.  Like a puzzle box, nothing appeared to happen at first, and then there was a soft click, loud in the silence of the Reading Room, and a drawer about two-thirds of the way up from the feet of the cabinet slid open.  There, on a bed of crushed velvet, was the Letters of the Eidolon Queen.

Letters of the Eidolon Queen

The librarian at Crécy hated me.  It was, as far as I could tell, one of those instinctive things, like when you meet a dog for the first time and it snaps at you, or when you pick up a baby and it starts bawling.  With the dog you can usually befriend it with patience, calm and the occasional savoury treat; with the baby I've always found it best to hand it off to the nearest person with the comment that it needs changing, but with the librarian at Crécy I was at a loss.
He was handsome in a certain light, which he clearly understood as his desk was situated in front of the window in such a way as to present him at his best.  His profile was sharp, his nose a little too angular for any but a Roman I think, and his chin needed just a little more jut to it to make artists weep and bite through their palettes.  He dressed well, though obviously on a budget, and his hands looked cared for; long-boned fingers that delicately caressed books as he tended to them, flickered over the keyboard of his computer like a virtuoso pianist, and folded themselves implacably in front of his stomach, just below his rib-cage, whenever I asked for anything.
"I am sorry Mr. Debraun," he said, his voice soft, hovering just at the threshold of audibility, forcing me to lean closer to him than I felt comfortable with, "but that book has been borrowed by one of our patrons."  Or, "I am sorry, Mr. Debraun, but that book is currently off the shelves for repair.  Might I make a note that you'd like to be informed when it's available again?"  Or "I am sorry, Mr. Debraun, but that book is restricted and it would seem," and here he would make a point of calling up my details on the computer screen, "that you have not been granted privileges to view it."
I woke from dreams once or twice a month where he was stood just off to one side of me, one long-boned, delicate, hand gesturing to a burning bookshelf, saying in his quiet, unemotional, uninflected manner, "I am sorry Mr. Debraun, but I'm afraid we've decided to burn all these books rather than lend them to you."
So it was with a heavy heart that I looked at my writing and realised that to complete my argument I would need to refer to a book I didn't have a copy of in my study.  The Letters of the Eidolon Queen was sufficiently rare that I'd been beaten out of the bidding on the last three copies to come to auction, and there were known to be only eight or nine copies still around.  The British Museum was supposed to be carefully transcribing it so that they could make a limited re-publication run of it but the timescale for that was being measured in decades, and though my research could hardly date in that time my reputation would surely wane.  I put my favourite flat cap on, then took it off again, recalling the prim disapproval I'd received from the librarian when I'd tried entering the library wearing it.  Then I put it back on, feeling that if I were going to be turned down at least I could be defiant.  Then I took it off again.
When I arrived at the library I took it off and stuffed it in my pocket, my courage quailing at the last.  I tapped lightly on the door, and pushed it open.  There were twenty feet of muted green carpet between the door and the librarian's desk, and I could see him sitting there, gazing thoughtfully at the screen of his computer.  I nearly turned aside and went to the card catalogue, but I knew that even if I could find it there I would still have to come to him to request access to it.  It was far too valuable to be left on a shelf, even if all the patrons of the library were required to be members and undergo some fairly extensive background checks before being admitted.
The librarian looked up only when I had been stood at his desk for thirty seconds.  I stood in silence, fearing immediate rejection if I interrupted what he was doing.  He looked at me, unemotional as ever, and I swear that for a moment, for the first time, I saw a distant spark in his eyes, a trace of humanity I was sure he suppressed.  He folded his hands across his stomach, and I saw that two of his fingers on his left hand were bandaged together.  He saw me notice, and an eyebrow so immaculately presented that it had to have been combed just that morning arched fractionally.
"Your hand?" I said, forgetting what I'd come for.
"I am sorry, Mr. Debraun," he said, "but my hand is not part of the library's stock and so may not be borrowed."
"No, I meant, what happened to it?" I stuttered a little at the start, which he affected not to notice.
"A slight accident," he said.  "There are many things in a library that are more dangerous than a patron might realise.  Books can be astonishingly heavy, for example."
"Ah."  My small talk dried up, as did my mouth as I realised I now had to make my request.
"Um, I'd quite like to borrow The Letters of the Eidolon Queen," I said, struggling over the word borrow as my tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth.  "For my research, you understand?"
"I am sorry, Mr. Debraun," he said, and I was nodding already, scarcely listening.  "but that book may not be taken out of the library and may only be read while at least one librarian is present.  I can bring it to the Derleth Reading Room in fifteen minutes, if that suits you?"
I stared at him as what he'd just said sank in, and then I nodded, stammering my thank-yous.  As he walked away from me to collect the book I wondered just how dangerous it was if he was willing to let me look at it, and then I recalled that he hated me.

Reconsider Phlebitis

The statue of the long-dead king had three legs. Phlebitis looked at it and counted again, but it definitely had three legs. It towered above him, easily four times his height and carved, it seemed, from a single block of stone. Stone like no other stone he'd seen down here in these gloomy caves. On its head was a crown with jagged points, it wore a carven robe that drew back at the waist; there was a real leather belt wrapped around it there holding nothing up. And there were three legs. Still having trouble convincing himself of what he was seeing, Phlebitis climbed up on to the statue's dais and touched each leg in turn, checking that he wasn't getting confused with a stone scabbard, or that part of the statue had broken off leaving just a spare leg behind.
But no. This ancient king had had three legs, and had commanded enough respect from his craftsmen at least that they'd created this statue of him to celebrate the fact.
Phlebitis sighed and sat down on the dais, wedging the pitch-soaked torch into a convenient gap between two of the statue's three legs. It guttered briefly and then recovered, its smoky yellow flame making shadows dance and jump all around. It stank of pitch as well, but Phlebitis preferred this to the smell of boiled frogs he'd had to breathe during the sea-voyage.
The map was in his pocket -- the treasure map was in his pocket -- so he took it out again and smoothed it out. He'd found the cave system, found the waterfall in the first cave that was actually a true cataract and had nearly drowned him. He'd made it past that to the beach of golden sand that had turned out to be quicksand and had nearly drowned him again. Then there was the limestone cavern with the pools of milky water that he'd carefully avoided in case they tried to drown him too. Now, here, in this vast cavern with the three-legged king of some ancient people there was supposed to be treasure. And apart from the statue he'd found nothing. Not even an IOU.
Something sproinged above him and he got hurried to his feet, worrying that the statue was somehow going to spray water at him and attempt to drown him. Whoever had lived on this island had, in his opinion, had an unhealthy obsession with water. He looked at the statue, and saw that the cloak had somehow popped out slightly above the waist. Touching it he found that the stone was warm and deduced that the heat from the torch must have been the key to opening it. His heart now feeling as though it was in his mouth, he braced his feet, stretched up and gripped the cloak, and pulled.
The cloak moved only a few centimetres outwards but there was a loud grating sound, a gust of air like something very large had moved like a piston, and the ground in front of the dais sank gracefully into the ground. Water gurgled and hissed and bubbled over the descending land creating a large lake. Phlebitis's mouth turned up at the corners in a wry grin; exactly where everyone but the statue-molester would have been standing on a proper expedition was now a steep-sided lake of water that smelled rather putrid. These damn people were still trying to drown intruders.
There was a clunk and then a whooshing sound and another gust of air but in the other direction. In a spray of water that nearly extinguished his torch, a small island, barely big enough for a man to stand on, rose out of the lake. On it, though it was hard to tell in the gloom and with a sputtering torch, was a wooden crate of some kind.
The treasure.
Phlebitis looked at the lake and sighed, certain that the only way to get to the crate was to swim, and equally certain that there would be something living in the lake that would attempt to grab him and drown him.