bella turns a bit fishyy

chapter 18

Chapter 18

Thirty minutes have gone by. A whopping thirty minutes of searching through this jumbo sized book case and we weren't even four shelves down. Good gravy, why oh why did they insist on the need of such a large library. Now don't get me wrong, I love a wide variety of book choices, but seriously! The thing was nearly 500 feet tall!

Lucky for me, the history section was right next to the classics. So I stayed close to the side, where I could read some of the titles. There were some familiar ones, like, Pride and Prejudice, The Scarlet Letter, and Romeo and Juliet. But there were several new books that were mermaid related. I am defiantly going to have to check some of those out.

I had found an interesting title of a nice big book when I heard a soft chuckle. I looked over my shoulder to see Edward wearing his crooked smile.

"Go ahead and explore your new found books. I'll be fine here."

"No, I can't leave you stranded here. We still have 6 trillion more books to scan. I can always look later." I told him. "How long do you think this will take?"

"I have absolutely no idea." Edward sighed as he looked at another book. "I really wish they had some sort of searching device."

"Me too. I wonder how Carlisle is doing?" I looked over my shoulder and found him across the room about halfway down the reference section, (it was much smaller than this one) running a hand through his soaked hair. "Not so good I guess."

Edward sighed. "Well, better keep on hunting for this seemingly non-existent book then."

Two hours. Two hours of a mind-numbing quest through the numerous rows of books, and we were finally two layers away from the last one. And still no book. Carlisle came over to help us after he finished with no luck. I was kneeling on the floor, (it's amazing how there is no buoyancy what so ever down here) running my fingers over the spines.

"Nothing." I breathed. "I can't believe we didn't find it."

Edward came up behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist. "Maybe… maybe there's another book with the Mermaid Crystal in it. There is at least a hundred thousand books in the history section. One of them must have it."

"No, none of them will. The website said that that book is the only book ever made with the history of the crystal." I leaned my head back on his chest as I closed my eyes frustration. I felt his lips graze the top of my head.

"Are you sure this website is accurate?" Carlisle questioned me as he sat down next to us, his eyes glued to the wall of books in front of us.

"Well, it was pretty accurate with the mermaid info." I sighed and turned my head so my cheek was resting on Edward's chest. My eyes locked on a desk where an older man hovered behind it.

He was on the thinner side, probably didn't work out much, and was wearing a navy blue vest with a silver trident embroidered on the breast pocket. His hair was gray and thinning. A stereotypical male librarian. He was writing with what looked like a skinny stick of sharpened coral, dipping it every so often into a conch shell ink well. I was curious as to how the ink didn't come up and mix in with the sea water.

"I wonder if he has a record of all the books?" Edward said looking at him, too. Edward pulled us up right and we began swimming in the direction of the large desk.

When we got there Carlisle swam up in front of it and knocked on the smooth rock the desk was made of.

The librarian looked up at him with dull, gray-blue eyes. He had unattractive bags under them. "Can I help you?" He asked in a voice that matched his eyes.