The Bookman - Lavie Tidhar [121]
Where are they going? Orphan wanted to know. Where did the Bookman hide?
Onto Broad Street, and Orphan's senses pricked awake: the street was lined with bookshops. Somewhere ahead and to his right he could see the dome of the Bodleian Library casting its eerie green glow, and all around him books lay in plain view on dusty shelves, inside the brick and mortar stores, behind their dirty glass windows. The books seemed to whisper through the cold night air, to reach out for him, ensnare him in their sleeping dreams. A gas-lamp flickered. The Bookman's men turned unhurriedly towards Thornton's Bookshop. A door was opened; they disappeared inside.
Orphan followed.
He stood outside the door. He could hear nothing moving inside. No lights were on. This is it, he thought. The egg pulsed against his chest. The Bookman's hideout. Another bookshop; another day. He had a gun, which Irene had given him; it was tucked away under his coat. He had the Binder's Translation, what use it may prove. He tried the door, and it was locked.
He kicked it in.
He felt better now; more alert than he had felt before. Bigger, somehow. He stepped through the broken door into the darkened shop beyond. Shelves, with books on them gathering dust. A till, a ledger-book, a small ladder on wheels.
No black-clad men. No second Orphan in his coffin cell. He looked around him.
The egg pulsed close to his skin. He could feel it, affecting him: for a moment his vision changed and he could see everything in great detail, every mote of dust suspended in the air as clear as a diamond tear; they formed a web through the air, a three-dimensional pattern woven out of dirt and stale air. It was using him, he thought.
He stepped forward, located the book that his newfound senses were highlighting for him, marking it like a beacon: Through the Looking Glass, the first edition published sixteen years before, this copy in its original red cloth binding. He pulled it towards him and expected the bookcase to revolve.
Instead, the floor disappeared underneath him.
He fell – screamed.
He fell down the hole. Air rushed at his face. It was warm, and somewhat dank.
He fell – and fell – and hit a curve. His body didn't stop. He was in some sort of half-pipe, a sort of slide, and accelerating fast, going down – down – down.
His journey was abruptly ended, and his fall was broken (rather painfully) by a heap of some sort: soft, and yet with many painful edges.
He lay there for a moment, and moaned quietly to himself. This is absolutely the last time! he thought.
He stirred, carefully. Stood up. Nothing broken. Where was he?
Though it was dark, when he blinked light seemed to rush to his eyes, as if his new senses collated what minute sources of illumination they could find and greatly magnified them. It made his eyes tear up, but only momentarily. He blinked and looked at where he had fallen.
He had landed in a massive heap of books.
It was, he thought, more than a heap. It was a mound, a hill, a veritable mountain of books. He tried to move and lost his balance and, giving in, simply slid down the hill, surfing over leather- and morocco- and buckrambound boards, until at last he reached the bottom.
He looked around him in awe. He had come here seeking a dangerous enemy, and yet… This place might have been paradise, a treasure trove far greater than any to be found in a pirate yarn.
Everywhere he looked there were books.
They rose into the air in majestic columns, stacks and stacks of them forming a maze that seemed to stretch to forever; the stacks rose high into the air and disappeared towards the unseen ceiling. The air had the overwhelming smell of old books, of polished leather and yellowing leaves, like the smell of a bookshop or a public library magnified a thousand-fold.
Orphan stared about him;