*
Sarah Clarke was quite possibly the world’s last librarian. She was also the last schoolteacher. And with such a ridiculous, inch-thick pair of spectacles as hers, she suited both roles to a tee. The warehouse behind Main Street was her domain, and everything beneath its high roof was under her protection.
To most, she was a kook to be avoided, hovering upon that delicious sweet spot between giggling lunacy and unbounded enthusiasm. To Norman, she was instead something to be appreciated, like a piece of experimental—if not overambitious—art.
An average day saw her flitting back and forth between the endless, sweeping towers of rescued books brought back from the wilds. The warehouse, an industrial-storage behemoth the size of an aircraft hangar, was filled to capacity; save for a network of narrow alleys, not an inch of floor space had been spared.
There were similar buildings for articles of art, electronics, and vehicles—but none as large as this. The Old World’s books, which housed all its knowledge and secrets, lay strewn in the rubble of towns and cities, waiting to be picked up like nuggets of gold shimmering in a riverbed.
The city folk saved as many as they could—had been doing so for years—but there were always more to find, and time was beginning to take its toll on their vulnerable pages. Here, they were sorted before being moved to vast storage catacombs beneath the streets.
Norman gawped at a new, yellowed skyscraper of leather-bound volumes close to the doorway until Sarah’s flowing figure rounded a bend in the aisle ahead and cried, “You’re back!”
She approached from an unsorted heap of hardbacks, her bony face and tomato-red hair illuminated by the widest of smiles, which was occupied by her four million teeth. Hanging from her shoulders was a robe identical to those worn by the elders, a simple white cloth that billowed around the body and stopped just beyond the knee. Precious few younger citizens were awarded the cloth, Norman among them, though he only wore his during ceremonial times, when it was expected of him.
“Morning, warden,” he said. “How are the inmates today?”
“Stale. Rotten. But still singing their sweet songs.” She threw her arms around him and giggled. “Welcome home.”
“Careful now,” he said. “Robert catches us and I’ll have a stump instead of a head before you can blink.”
She drew back and glanced out the door, to where Robert’s silhouette clambered the pigeon-infested pylon on Main Street, her eyes swimming with puppy love. “He’s not the jealous type. At least, I don’t think so. I suppose time will tell.”
Norman forced himself to turn his attention to the task at hand, but did so grudgingly. He’d have liked to spend the day here. After the struggle, hunger, and horrors that lay beyond the city, the warehouse never failed to act as an all-curing tonic. In his youth, when Alexander had been working so tirelessly to keep society alive—when even his name had been but the stuff of legend to a handful of scattered tribes—Norman had spent his days in similar secret troves, his nose buried in books written by long-dead Old World writers.
In addition, Sarah was among the few who were unlikely to ever look upon him with any degree of hero worship. Her gaze never failed to penetrate the aura of godliness erected by the city folk, to see him for the clueless idiot he truly was.
She would never expect anything of him.
However, the thought of the maelstrom that was Allison Rutherford held his attention, and he peered around without another word, scouring the scale-model city of yellowed paperbacks and leather-bound tomes.
Sarah was wittering on, “Library running thin? We just got a new batch of first editions from a bank vault in Dover.”
He shook his head. “I’m well stocked for the moment. I heard Allie was here. You mind if I borrow her?”
Sarah blinked, her lashes magnified to huge proportions by the slab-like lenses of her spectacles. “Not at all.”
While Norman had spoken, as though summoned, Allison had poked her head from behind the stack of hardbacks from which Sarah had appeared. Her face was downcast and sheepish.
He beckoned her imperiously before she could disappear. “Come on,” he said. “We have things to do.”
She hesitated momentarily, reluctant to leave her sheltered hovel, but then her shoulders slumped and she stepped forwards.
“I’ll be back to see those first editions,” he called as he made for the door.
“Do keep a look out for more Tolstoy!” Sarah cried from the depths of the paper maze. “Our stocks are dangerously low.” She paused. “But no more King! We already have enough to build a whole new ridge on the east side!”
Norman couldn’t help smiling. “What’s wrong with King?”
She made a noise of disquiet. “I don’t play favourites when it comes to the world’s heritage.”
Norman’s smile widened. “Prude,” he said. “All work and no play…”
Sarah scoffed from the foothills of the pile he called Mount Fitzgerald and was gone, leaving behind a single resounding call, “Good luck out there, Gunslinger.”
Norman led Allie back towards Main Street.
“I wasn’t hiding,” she said quickly.
“I didn’t say you were.”
“Yes, but—oh.”
He turned to her. “What did you do?”
“Nothing.”
“Who did you talk to?”
“Nobody.”
Norman didn’t speak again until they reached the stables, glad that Lucian had made his suggestion.