“Fine. Trial basis.”
I give the librarian a thumbs up. “You got the job, dude. I’d stay and celebrate, maybe share a sausage.” I will not share my sausage with anyone. Even those who are owners of the said sausage and know how to use them to make my eyes cross.
“I’ll get you a blanket,” the librarian says. “I’m not paid enough coin for this. Oh, and we didn’t discuss terms.”
“The joy of being in my sacred space is payment enough,” the All Knowing declares.
Well, that sounded delightfully dirty.
The librarian returns and pushes an itchy black wool blanket into my hands. “Cover yourself before you start a war with those knights.”
“Do you know where they are?”
The librarian nods and opens his mouth, but before he can say anything, his face squashes, crumples in on itself, and he’s sucked down a hole and pops out of existence. Wow, that is disconcerting in the worst way.
“Have fun,” I holler as I wrap myself inside the blanket.
I eyeball the books on the floor and decide to leave them. I don’t want to use up any chaos control I might have banked on stuffy books. He can sort them when he returns.
Now, to find the folks who love me but whom I must seek out myself. It becomes an obvious issue the tempo I leave the library—I can’t remember whether to go left or right to the knight’s chambers. If I keep going in the same direction, that will take me in a circle, so no matter what, I will come across the right stairs. That makes perfect sense. Look at me conquering directional challenges on my first day of existence. I am rocking my new life. I have newborns beat. They can’t even speak, and I’ve already negotiated a job and dressed myself. Being zero annus old is amazing. Everything resets. I blink as I round the first corner. Is everything reset? Like floof land? Holy Idol babies, I am a born-again virgin.
A smug dude with blond hair and blue eyes stalks toward me, a sword he’s never used dangling at his side. There’s no mistaking his lineage.
“Charming,” I shout, as if we aren’t the only two people in sight. If he’s like the Charming pursuing my sister, he isn’t all that smart. “Point me in the direction of the knight’s chambers, please.”
He freezes, his hand skimming the pommel of his sword. Ugh, nope. Traumatic memories. “You are here.”
“I am, but I want to be there.”
Told you. Not very smart.
He pales a few shades and points at a set of stone steps. “Third floor, second door on your left.”
I dash up the stairs, my heart beating double time in anticipation of our reunion. First, I’ll declare my return with naked intentions, and then hug my sister until she can’t breathe. I should do that first to avoid the nakedness.
Proving miracles happen, I arrive at the familiar door with the swords and dragon etched on it. I fling it open and throw my arms out. Guess I’m doing the naked part first after all. My body beats my brain. “I’m alive.”
“That’s amazing for you.”
I blink and study the familiar room and furniture, but it’s filled with strangers and strange things. What is this?
A candlestick scuffles across the floor, its wicks lighting up every time it jerks and then fizzles out. I wrap my body back in the blanket.
“It’s her,” a white rabbit says as he hops across the floor and pulls out his pocket watch. “It is she.” If he dares comment on my tardiness from resurrection, I may find myself with an abundance of rabbit sausage. Ooh, instead of Disaster Daphne, calamity extraordinaire, I’m now Murdery Maiden, licensed to wield sharp objects.
I like it, apart from the murder. I think my deep-rooted issues with swords need to be explored before I’m ever put in charge of one again. If ever. I should be the last choice when it comes to weapons.
Perhaps I can oversee the murders?
The creepy grinning cat from Wonderland emerges in the air before my face. “It is you.”
“This is good. We have time,” the rabbit declares, shaking his pocket watch.
Is the watch faulty?
“My sister and knights?”
“Dress,” the cat says. “You have places to be.”
