AFTERMATH
It
was a late – a very late – autumn day. The
great chamber at the heart of the New Royal School lay closed and stuffy;
no-one had been in or out for two weeks. The only moving things there had been
the climbing and declining rays of sunlight across the walls and the shuffle of
spiders now and then in the high corners of the room.
An abrupt clanking
of the doorhandle broke the silence, setting echoes that seemed to startle and
stir the innumerable shelves of books and papers and set them rustling with the
inrush of air as the door creaked open. A Morgish muzzle poked cautiously into
the room, followed by a black beard bristling nervously beneath. There was a
loud, inhaling sniff.
“H
… Hello?” A voice quavered hesitantly into the echoing chamber.
It was
followed the next instant by a squawk as its gangly owner was pushed stumbling
into the room. Almost immediately behind him came a stern, matronly Morgess, her
plain shift the mellow yellow color of the staff proctors. She crossed her arms
impatiently as the Morg caught his balance, then adjusted his green tunic, brow
wrinkling.
“Was that
absolutely necessary, Ena?” he grumbled.
“What, you
were waiting for an answer, Master Grax?” she said flatly. “We’ve got too much
work to do clearing this place out without wasting time.”
“Well, you
never know,” the Morg said vaguely. He cut his cut his eyes around the room.
“After all, history is full of stories … lingering presences, you know … it
doesn’t hurt to be respectful ...”
He
shivered.
“Don’t you feel
something?”
The stolid
Morgess shrugged.
“He wasn’t
the head of my department. Just the Grand Master of the School.”
Grax’s jaw
flopped open.
“But he was
Korm!” he protested. “The greatest scholar of his generation, if not in all the
history of Forlan! Student of Belmok! He discovered the treasure of the Lost
City of the Moon! Almost the last of the Goldfire Questers!”
Ena
shrugged again and raised an eyebrow.
“As I
recall, he had them looking in the wrong place to begin with, which almost led
to their deaths,” she said, her voice dry.
“Well,
nobody’s perfect.” Grax looked around and tangled his claws through his stringy
beard. “Honestly, though, can’t you feel something … personal in the air?”
“Of
course,” Ena said briskly. She stepped over to the grand desk that was the
centerpiece of the office. Grax followed in her wake. “My old Madra explained
it to me before I even became a proctor and started the job. My uncle had
passed away and I thought his room was haunted. She told me it was like this.”
She pulled
out the chair and sat down by the desk and began examining the objects that
cluttered the top, straightening papers and books.
“The most
essential part of a person is the spirit or mind, and very close to it is the
body, which picks up and discards material as it goes along.”
“Well, that
seems pretty obvious.”
“Right. If
we didn’t have bodies, there’s no way we’d know anybody else has a mind. When
the spirit that gave the body form is gone, the body collapses into mere
material … but that material is how we knew the spirit was there.”
Grax
snorted. “What does that have to do with … well, hauntings?”
“There’s a
third circle of existence that most people don’t think about, and that’s the
influence a person had on things while they were alive.”
Ena
finished straightening the desktop and stood up, eying the room critically as
she moved toward the bed.
“You mean
like their legacy, their influence on history?” Grax moved over and sat down
himself. Now that Ena had broken the ice, as it were, he found himself filled
with awe to be sitting at the great Morg’s desk. He ran a reverent claw slowly along
the edge.
“It’s even
more personal than that.” The old Morgess went over to the bulky wardrobe next
to the bed, swung open the door, and looked over the contents. Her nose
wrinkled at the stale smell.
“The things
a person collects … the things that only he uses … they’re like the armor a
twister slug leaves behind when it changes. The bug is gone elsewhere, but
there’s a hollow shell where he used to be, in the shape of what he was.” She
shut the wardrobe. “Eventually it collapses or something else takes up residence.”
Grax’s eyes
widened.
“I don’t
think it’s quite respectful to speak of Master Korm as a slug. He was a great
person.” His claws were wandering over the desk drawers with an eagerness of
their own, feeling the knobs in anticipation. “Who knows what great legacy he’s
left behind for other scholars to find? Who knows …?”
Almost
unconsciously he pulled a drawer open. Surprised at his action, he looked down,
stopping in mid-sentence. He went still.
After a
moment he cleared his throat.
“Why do you
suppose,” he asked shakily. “That anyone would save a drawerful of
nail-clippings?”
“What?” Ena
barked, hastening to his side. She stared down into the drawer.
“Ugh. Well,
that’s going into the fire, for starters.”
Grax shook
his head.
“That’s
just … odd.”
“Well, they
do say it never pays to look too deeply into the great ones’ lives. You’ll find
they all raise their flap to poo.”
“I suppose
so.” He wrinkled his muzzle. “I suppose we’d better buckle down to work. The
next High Master will be wanting to move in soon.”
“That’s
so.” Ena looked around with an assessing eye. “Looks like more work for you
than me. How many boxes do you think you’ll need?”
The other
Morg around helplessly at the shelves bulging with books and papers.
“About
twenty?” he ventured.
“Let’s make
it thirty. It’s always better to have too many than not enough.” She walked
over to the bed – a rather simple and narrow piece of furniture, Grax thought,
for the legendary hero – and began stripping the bedclothes, folding them
neatly at the foot. “By the way, any idea who the new High Master will be?”
“I only
know it won’t be me.” He sighed. “There are a few candidates of course, but
none stand out. How can you replace someone like Korm?”
“And yet he
will be. No-one’s irreplaceable. Like my madra said when the old King died, you
can stick your hand in a bucket of water and take it out again, and the hole
that’s left is equal to the absence in society what’s felt when even a great
one passes.”
“That seems
rather cynical,” the other sniffed. He pulled a scroll out of his pocket and
began perusing the list written there.
“But
practical. Life, as they say, goes on.” She turned from her work. “What’s that,
then?”
“A list of
bequests and whatnot,” Grax said distractedly, eyes running over the scroll.
“Some special gifts of books to various persons and places.”
His lips
moved mumbling quietly, then he looked up in dismay at the overcrowded shelves
around them.
“How the
hell am I supposed to pick them out here? It’s like looking for particular
stalks in a field of wheat!”
“Oh, be
quiet!” Ena flipped the last folds of the sheets and turned her attention to
the wardrobe. “Big as the chore is, bit by bit it gets done, don’t it? That’s
what we say downstairs.” She opened the door. “Huh. Not a lot of clothes for a
Master. And pretty shabby, too.”
“Vanity was
not one of his weaknesses.” Grax sniffed. “Not like some Masters I
know.” He walked over to a nearby shelf, turned a corner to the back, and began
scanning the books there.
Ena
grinned.
“I bet I
could name a few you’re thinking of.” She wrinkled her nose. “I think these can
all go on the scrap pile. They buried him in his best, I suppose.”
“Yes, of
course,” Grax said absently, as his eyes flickered over the titles. He
muttered, reading them to himself as he bent close to see. Suddenly he stopped
and gasped in astonishment. “What the --,” he began slowly, brow furrowed,
anger in his voice.
“What?
What?” The old Morgess came hurrying over gleefully to join him. She thought
she heard scandal in his voice and was eager for a little spice on this dull
job.
She turned
the corner and found Grax leafing through a volume, an appalled expression on
his muzzle.
“What is
it?” she asked excitedly. “Our revered Grand Master been secretly reading some
fiery romances?”
“No, look
at this! Just look!” He pointed one shaking claw at a blue seal on the book’s
spine. “This is from the Great Library! No-one is supposed to remove this!
No-one!”
Ena
shrugged.
“Surely the
Grand Master could …”
“No-one!”
Ena
shrugged again.
“Well, one
book …”
“No, look!”
Grax waved his arms angrily. “Look! Shelves upon shelves of them. There must be
almost two hundred books here!”
Ena
whistled long and low out of the sides of her muzzle, eyes wide.
“Oh, he has
been a naughty boy!” she chortled. “Well, all sins must out, they say.”
Grax
covered his eyes and rocked his head, moaning softly, before straightening up
and tugging his beard in sudden resolution.
“Well, this
one mustn’t. It would be bad for morale, and even worse for discipline. Just
think what would happen if it got around that Korm … Korm, of all people, was a
… a … a book thief!” He spat the words out. “Next thing you know our shelves
would be bare, with the students using his example as an excuse.” He wrinkled
his brow. “But how to get them back in the library without anyone knowing?”
“Simple
enough,” Ena said breezily. “I’ll just bring an empty cleaning cart over
tonight, load them up with some rags on top, and wheel it over to the archives.
Sprinkle ‘em around on the tables here and there and let the librarians sort
‘em out. Believe me, nobody notices cleaners going around.”
“You’d do
that for me?” The other Morg relaxed visibly. “That would be very helpful.”
“Never you
mind.” The old lady patted him on the shoulder. “My job here is pretty light.
Never knowed a Master of any grade to be so monk-like in his living. His
personables are hardly worth giving to the School’s thrift store. But all this
…” She indicated the stuffed shelves around them. “I don’t envy you and your
assistants going through all this.”
Grax barked
shortly.
“Oh, it’s
like sorting out a dragon’s hoard for us. A pleasant task, once the guardian’s
out of the way.”
Ena looked
dubious.
“Well, if
you say so.” She looked around. “Well, I guess the first once-over’s done. I’ll
go get some carts for the lugging and by tomorrow ‘twill all be clear for you
scholar-squirrels to gather your nuts. Best meet me back here in an hour so you
can direct me about them books.”
“Yes, yes,
I have a few things to attend to right quick, then I’ll be back.” They moved to
the door, where Grax paused and looked around with a little shiver. “I don’t
think I’d fancy waiting here all alone until then.”
“Don’t let
it bother you none,” Ena grinned. “In my experience, dead folks is the least
dangerous kind.”
The door
shut firmly, and the key clicked in the lock. The echoing footsteps died away
and all was silent for a while. After a while, a voice for those who could hear
spoke up apologetically.
“Oh, dear.
I really did mean to return those books … sometime, you know. There just never
seemed to be a good time.”
“In the
last one hundred years, you mean?” The other voice was gruff, but noncommittal.
“Well …”
The other
voice changed its tone.
“Have you
seen enough? Are you ready to go now?”
“I was just
wondering how …”
“No, it is
enough.” The other voice was firm but sounded a little exasperated. “It’s
always the same with you scholar types, curious about what happens next. Well,
what happens next is there’s work to be done elsewhere.”
The first
voice began to fade away, interest in its tone.
“I thought
it was going to be some kind of rest …”
The second
voice sounded amused as it too faded.
“Where
we’re going, work and rest don’t have separate meanings. Perhaps the closest
word here in this world is play.”
“Well, that
does sound interesting …”
And then
they were gone, and there was only silence in the hollow dusty chamber.
Finished First Draft 9:49 PM
7/10/2021
I might have published this here before, but I couldn't find it in a cursory search. Anyway, it certainly didn't have an AI-generated illustration with it. So that's new, at least.
