A History of the Liminal Library

: “Hmm…” He shrugs after a moment and then flicks his hand, and a slab of rectangle, mostly white opal with rounded down edges appears in it and is then laid down on the ground. “A… tablet should suffice, as a storage and reading device.” Something in the tone of his voice suggest he’s making a joke, but Goddess knows what it is.

: “I think…” He runs a finger along the surface, tracing various symbols into it, alternating between tenebrous and flourishing energy. “We can probably have it pull energy from the light of suns and stars when it’s not in use like this, a rechargeable energy source in lieu of a fuel source… And then on the other side,” He flips it over after finishing, “You do your thing to reproduce the webs.”

reaches out and presses her palm into the font of the tablet and she thinks of roots, rhizomes, mycelia, reaching, touching, connecting–all of it in a web, a snarl of string, at its best a tapestry, and then a library. But she also thinks of walls, of boundaries, of what-if-they-were-not, what if there was not soil or roots to reach through but instead you could make a fold in space, in time, in thought, and be precisely where you’d like to be.

takes a step back from the portal, tilts his head to the side, then steps back close to it and begins to draw small runes into the frame around the gateway.

: “So! The runes?” He folds an arm across his midsection, supporting a rested elbow that cranes a pointed finger. “What’s their purpose that a sign won’t provide?”

: “So, it didn’t occur to me when we were building this, but like… it’s. Comically easy to actually get inside this thing, right? Despite us wanting to store memories in here? And seeing all these groups of one or two wander in and out all night and morning made me realize… we definitely need to be able to track who’s coming and going from this place, and potentially even develop a black list for it.”

: “Or a white list. One of the two. Either way.”

places one hand against the wall where the runes are, and begins to channel pellucid, tenebrous, and radiant gnosis into them in short sequences. And as he’s doing that, he point his uses his other hand to run it over the space where nothing used to be there, but slowly a small pedestal along with a book and pen attached to the pedestal are attached begin to shimmer into existence.

laughs as the energy stops flowing from his hands. The runes all blink a few times in a complex sequence before settling on a dull glow that’s nearly impossible to notice, and the pedestal, book and pen fully take shape. “Good luck convincing Salme that.”

is seated on one of the many available chairs, with the tablet resting on top of the desk when Caion arrives. He’s currently leaned over it, using something that looks halfway between a pen and a knife to… carve some kind of circle into the top of it? Though rather than simply scratching the stone, it’s immediately filling it with a dull radiant gnosis.

: “Oh, no I was basically done. And more eyes on it to make sure it works are always welcome.” A few more notches here and there, and he’s finished. There’s now a large circle covering the center of the table, with a smaller circle inside of that which is a bit bolder and filled in. Small lines surround the larger circle, moving outward from it. Something about it gives you a strong impression of an eyeball radiating power, even if it only vaguely looks like one.

: “That makes that easier, I suppose.” And he follows behind. Inside: The Library is… slightly different than Caion remembers it? For one, the pedestal with the guest book near the entrance is there now (Aurelius double checks it when entering to confirm if Caion and Synthesis’ names are in the same blue as Archie). And on the far wall, the chalky bookshelves have been removed and replaced by an enormous crystalline pane that looks like a mirror. Only it doesn’t reflect your image, but instead, seems to show a view of the outside world immediately surrounding the tablet instead.

slips into the Library, carrying two comically large bags of … stuff … hooked over each shoulder. She stops at the guestbook to add a little note—not up to anything, I promise—and then heads for the wall where the Key-and-Gate shines.

carefully sets each bag down, and then kneels. She knows exactly what she wants to do, she just needs to exert her will strongly enough.

spreads a wide square of lavender cloth on the ground in front of her, and then sets a heavy, round bowl in the center. Into it, she pours thick, oil-slick black india ink, enough that the liquid almost crests over the top edge of it, but doesn’t.

dips one, two, three beautiful dark feathers into the ink bowl, careful not to spill a drop, and then draws a triangle in ink around the bowl, using each feather to brush one edge of the triangle onto the cloth at each point. She sets each feather radiating inward at each angle, and then pulls out three more things—a small hand harp strung with crystal wire, a sheaf of thick paper crowded with writing, and a pair of stylized green-tinted glasses. The last was a commission. The Scholar-Emissary’s name really does get you a lot around here.

sets one item at the point in each triangle and then stands, looking down at her handiwork. Then she stands and holds out her hand, draws up gnosis—flourishing, liminal, a bit of radiant, and yes, a spike of pellucid, because if she had to pick, it would be pellucid. The corners of the cloth draw up, the items folding impossibly into them, apart but separate. The edges of the cloth twist together, reaching for her hand, and she looses the flourishing and the draws more heavily on the pellucid and the radiant, thinking of structure, stillness, shells, until sitting before her is a perfect, beautiful, two-foot-high lavender egg.

crouched down in front of it. “Did you know, that if a chick cannot crack the shell, it will die without being born?” She taps the outside of the shell with a fingernail and a brief, certain application of burning gnosis. “You are the chick, and the world is out here, waiting. Wake up.” She taps the shell again with another flood of burning gnosis, a hope, and a certainty.

grins and laughs at him. “I knew you could do it, Jory.” She looks around the library. He’ll need perches, or several. She closes her eyes, and imagines several comfortable perches, and opens them, hoping they’ve populated.

reaches up and offers something that looks like it might be a worm—but no, upon closer look it’s a curled scrap of paper with words scrawled on it. A secret, even. It’s a treat. “I’m hoping he’ll use you to hang around, so he doesn’t have to go through the whole performance every time. But if he doesn’t use you, well. You’re still lovely, and I love you.”

strokes his soft head with her finger. “You were made for the purpose of speaking and for the purpose of opening doors for those who seek knowledge within this library. And if you discover another purpose all your own? I will love that too. I left room for that, you know. You’re part of him, but also you are your own thing as well.”

frowns, and turns to look at the wall behind her.

: “Oh. Well. That’s unexpected.” She moves forward and looks at the bookshelf, frowning. If she looks up at the Key-and-Gate, can she make any sense of the bookshelf out of the corner of her eye?

frowns, and reaches for the deep, familiar azure.

: “Hm.”

: “Two doors seem a bit much,” she says. She reaches out to touch the door.

: “Why the orange? Is that supposed to be me?”

steps into the hallway. “The azure would be Awoken, right? The gold would be Aurelius. Though the other colors feel. Confused. Maybe I’m not right about this at all.”

: “‘not up to anything’ my ass. First of all, Angels are not birds. 99% of the time. Secondly, what in the fuck are you doing?” Not a bird, just a projection, floating in the air behind you.

beckons to Jory, the beautiful raven to join her, and tells Jory, the shitty projection, “I don’t know what an Angel is, so you can’t blame me for not understanding, and I am obviously exploring recently opened pathways, Mr. Key-and-Gate.”

: “Okay but why is it here?”

: “CLEARLY. This space seems to run like 80% on intent. What were you thinking about that caused it to appear?”

leans down and tries to look through one of the keyholes. Any luck?

straightens. “I was mostly curious. I was thinking about how I’d like to have an atelier somewhere, but not clearly.” She reaches up and pets Jory the raven’s head. “Any thoughts on how to open one of these?”

: “Hmm… oh, because you saw 86 bring his fiend out of here. … Wonder how that would work with more mundane creations. Well. NIP said they duno what’s going on despite the uh, you know, telling glyph that would suggest otherwise but lets see. Hidden hallway that leads to locked doors with a ten eyed mark upon ‘em.” He shrugs, floating past Salme as one of his fingers turns into a key before it’s shoved into the keyhole.

: “I was sort of asking both of you, and the fiend.”

frowns, pulls it back out with a shake. “Not even a roll, huh? Okay.”

places her palm against the door and pushes. Not hard, just curious.

: “Right, no one was arguing that.”

: “Gunna assume that means ‘still under construction’ though, like… the vast majority of the internals.”

: “Well, then, the third door it is.” She backtracks swiftly to the third door. “Though, I get the fiend isn’t ideal but I was thinking you could. You know. Make comments now and then. Hang around with everyone. That sort of thing.”

stands in front of the door. “Is there another hallway behind this one or will it be a room? If I’m going to create something then I want to have the image in my head.”

puts her hand on the door.

rests her forehead against the door and thinks, for the first time in a very, very long time, of home. Thinks of the little courtyard in the center of the house, where the rain would fall into a shallow pool and she would splash through it every morning and every evening. Thinks of her grandparent’s hands plaiting her hair carefully every morning, telling her she was the prettiest girl in the village, and what a nice lie that was. Thinks of the Centrelight at its brightest point, filtered through gauzy curtains or, sometimes, warming her skin. Thinks of stringing the warp-threads on the giant countermarch loom her grandparent wove at. The room itself, crowded with drop spindles, dyeworks, an entire wall of rainbow thread.

pushes the door open.

: “Oh.” She steps inside. “Oh, I didn’t think … it’s perfect.”

: “Of course it’s perfect, you made it to your own specifications doofus.”

: “Or maybe it’s a kind of gift. Or a kind of miracle.”

thinks of the crystalline perfection of the academy libraries—their well-ordered shelves; their neat, dustless crystals; their comprehensive, if baffling, cataloguing system. She moves her hands slowly, and as she does pellucid gnosis like crystalline wire weaves between her fingers. “First, the structure,” she says. ⁂

then draws up the flourishing in thick strands of gnosis like wool or roots. She thinks of stories and storytelling, parchment and palimpsest, the material of things and the roots and rhizomes and the mycelia that connect them all together. “Then, context.” She loops the flourishing threads over and under and around the pellucid threadwork girding her hands. ⁂

next draws up burning gnosis, but controlled—candleflame, lantern-light, short-fibered cotton thread that gleams orange-yellow-golden. She thinks of the first story that brought her to tears, the last story that made her laugh, of truth and lies-that-are-truer-than-truth. “Next, meaning,” she says, interweaving the burning threads through the pellucid-flourishing mesh. ⁂

holds the narrow gnosis-tapestry between her palms and looks up at Aurelius, and she smiles. “And finally,” she says, looping her arms around him without disturbing the work held between her hands. “The impossible, which you have made possible,” and then she draws up to kiss him as she drops the tapestry from her fingers, but it does not fall, it ripples, rising into an impossible, unbroken circular ribbon before floating back, drawing higher and wider, to form perfect, polished teak bookshelves on each previously-empty wall.

: “Bam,” she says with a smirk. 🙧

jumps back a half step. “…Wait you can talk too???”

laughs and laughs and laughs.

: “He has certain … stock phrases.”

Close your eyes, and open them again; something new will appear.

closes her eyes, and then opens them again, still grinning.

: “…Ah… that’s how…”

: “Well, there’s the secret hallway behind the bookshelf, but,” she tugs him over to the shelves under the Duelist’s Mask. “You can chronicle any memories you’d like for public perusal, any thoughts you have by holding a folio and thinking with intent, but.” ⁂

looks at crystalline book in her hand, and something makes the stars-and-flames flare in the book. Then, she puts it back on the Duelist’s Mask shelf, and the book disappears to Aurelius’ eyes. “You can also store things privately, just for yourself. I was going to get you a journal, but I thought—well, you don’t have to use it, but since you spend so much time in your own head it seemed like it could be valuable.” 🙧

takes a breath, and then gestures to the rest of the library. “And this,” she says, “is the Liminal Library.” All the walls that had previously held strangely flat blue walls with the suggestion of books in a strange white outline are fully-fledged shelves in a rich, aged teak. The shelves are stacked with what appear to be traditional books, but on closer inspection consist of two rectangular crystal slabs bound together with a spine of rich embroidery floss. Or, almost all the shelves look thus—the shelf that rests below the Key-and-Gate is a darker, richer wood, stacked with traditionally-bound books with bindings of gold, orange, lavender, red, green, and a familiar, stunning azure.

turns and grabs a book off the shelf. The crystal of the books is not the clear, boundless quartz of the Samudran memory crystals. Instead, the interior of the crystal seems to contain suspended sparks and starlight. The one in Salme’s hand has a binding that gleams with a glowing, pulsing purple. “This is one of the only complete folios so far. It’s called {Speaking With Constellations}.” She offers it to him.