The Bookman - Lavie Tidhar [94]
"What sort of book?" Orphan said.
Catherine sighed. "That," she said, "I did not find out until a long time afterwards."
Books (so Catherine explained) were forbidden amongst the humans on the island. Their charges at the Nursery used no books, but rather strange play-devices, similar to pliable balls, that were (apparently) similar, but used smell and a high-pitch sound not audible to humans (Orphan asked again about the Nursery, and again received no direct answer). Books were the domain of the Bookman (again, the sign, made by both Catherine and Elizabeth this time), and were objects of evil and misfortune.
But to Mary, this book she had found was a thing not of evil, but of hope. Which (Catherine said with sudden vehemence) was perhaps more evil than all.
It was a very curious book. Had Mary known any books she may have been more wary of this one she had found. But she did not, and was not. She took the book with her that night, and hid it in the hollowed cavity of an ancient tree on the edge of the crater. And she returned to it most nights, when everyone else of the subterranean court (for that, as Orphan found, was what the mushroom gatherers called it) was asleep.
And so time passed.
Mary (Catherine continued) had become a beautiful young woman. She continued her work at the Nursery, tending the young lizard-spawn ("So that's what it is!" Orphan exclaimed. "Shush," Catherine said. Elizabeth giggled), learning the manners of the court ("such as there still are," Catherine said) and, all in all, arousing no special curiosity. Her habit of pulling pranks, as far as they all could tell, had abated. Life went about its daily routine.
Or so it seemed.
The truth ("And I only found this out much later," Catherine said) was that Mary continued to visit the book, and she continued to read it nightly. It was, she soon realised, a special book, in that its contents never remained the same. The book's title, embossed in gilt on its hard, leathery cover, was Bible Stories for Young Children. Of all the stories, Mary liked most the ones about Adam and Eve. There were many stories about them. In the beginning, Adam and Eve lived in the Garden of Eden. Then Adam did something very bad, awakening a monster that lived in the garden, and the monster, which was in the shape of a lizard standing upright, had a fight with God and then took over the garden. Adam and Eve were still in the garden but, since it was on an island in a big ocean, they couldn't leave. A kindly old wizard, however, helped them. He was shaped like a strange, multi-legged creature, and he was once a servant of the monster but he had escaped and was now living in the garden in secret. He became Adam and Eve's teacher. Every time Mary opened the book, Adam and Eve were doing something new. To begin with, they merely studied geography, and the book showed her continents and oceans, the trade routes that passed between them, and the different people who lived in those far-off places. Then Eve decided to become an engineer, and the book showed Mary blueprints and diagrams and conversion tables, and the ways to build vehicles and machines. One day Adam decided to run to sea and become a pirate; after that, only Eve remained in the book. Then there were more lizard-monsters, baby ones, and Eve had to take care of them. Eve did what she was told, but there was revenge in her heart, and the desire to escape. She began to plot ways to get off the island – which was heavily guarded by powerful sorcery – until one day…
The fire threw twisted shadows on the walls, and a cold wind seemed to whisper under the door, insinuating itself into the confines of the hut. Orphan shivered, and wished for a hot bath.
"One day," Catherine said, "I was called to the Nursery by my husband. I had no intimation that anything was wrong. Mary had left in the morning as she always did. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. And yet…"
"What did she do?" Orphan leaned forward. "Did she do it?" He was excited despite himself. "Did she manage