The Arkanist

Chapter Five: Caelum Vinture

Chapter Five: Caelum Vinture

           

            The next day, I took to the library, having found my way back to the city easily enough. It was, besides the woods, the only place I felt safe, truly safe, a very difficult thing to achieve, indeed.

            It was there I would find refuge, escape the pain, and withdraw deep within its towering walls, each one heavy with shelves of a thousand books and scrolls, searching for answers, answers to questions too big for one man to answer.

            The library at Raenish would be my new home. I would live there since I had nowhere else to be. My father left me with nothing, and because of his suicide, had left me alienated. His rooms in the royal keep had been gutted, and therefore, in turn, so had mine.

            On the positive, being alone wasn't all too bad, I suppose, at least for the short term. I didn't have to worry about people telling me what to do and what not to do. I didn't have to worry about much, really. It was better than being with people, at least, for the most part. Most people are stupid, and I don't like stupid people. Not one bit. But I missed the smart ones, the clever ones, the funny ones. I missed them most of all.     Being alone, I have found, while it does appeal at times, is one of the worst tortures of this world. It's what hurts when the initial pain has subsided, lingers in the back of your mind, and drives you mad. Solitude is a prison and I had been locked in.

***

The library stood near the heart of the city, within the lord's estates. Raenish was held by, and had been held by, for many centuries, House Riveiar, a noble lineage tracing itself back to the Kings of Lent and the royal house: Avanion.

            It was an old edifice, dating back to the founding of the city, all of pale white stone. A tall central tower rose into the grey skies, flat as paper, and squared at its top; an unobtrusive building in any sense of the word. It was arched at the base, wherein the gates stood guard, two large wooden doors, detailed with carvings of the great poets, and playwrights, and historians. Etched in the stone above, were two words, plated in bronze: Ivent Versae, an Old Lentish verse. Anybody worth of their salt knew them to be quotes from the great poet, Onctis, from his epic: Niraxes. I didn't know exactly what it translated to, nobody does. To translate Old Lentish into the current tongue is extremely difficult, and only the general meaning can be deduced. What I had learned, what my father had taught me, was that it meant: Words live on.

            I opened the doors, which were heavier than they appeared, and strode into the library. It was a dim place, open flames prohibited, shadows pooling the corners, heavy in their slumber. Where I was, the main atrium, surroundings were dark and ruddy, a circular desk alight at the end of the red carpet.

            Knowledge was held in high regard in those parts of the world. You needed to be someone or know someone to gain access to their stores. The common serf, however much they wanted to learn, would never enter. Such was custom in Raenish, and much of Lent. I had always hated that. Academic snobbery is a terrible crime, but one that will never disappear, I'm afraid. Some things just will never change.

            I made my way to the desk and saw Alace, one of the clerks. She was an attractive woman, with almond brown hair, and tanned skin, lips as pink as roses and eyes like the ocean, which of course meant, I had no chance with her. It was common knowledge that every boy in Raenish wanted to be with her. It was a sort of unwritten competition, one that I took as stupid. I'm old fashioned that way when it comes to women. I treat them well; treat them like people. They aren't anything else. None of use are, if we're being honest here. Yet the events of late had got me feeling a bit weary, and I really, desperately, just wanted to search through the last books my father had been reading. They might explain something, even if it was the littlest clue. Right now, I was hungry for answers, starving. Anything would satisfy. I did not have time to flirt.