For the first time in what felt like an eternity—though the Halls were timeless by design—I stood in Danatallion's dominion uninvited.

No guiding sigil had opened the way. No gentle ushering from the Puzzle-Keeper. One breath I lay half-asleep in the manor's guest wing, and the next I opened my eyes to a corridor of black frost.

Everything was silent. Not the hush of knowledge settling, but the suffocating stillness of a library abandoned by its own heartbeat. Shelves that once stretched beyond physics now curved inward like ribs. Every leather-bound tome was rimmed in hoarfrost, pages sealed shut under glassy rime. Even lamplight—normally a warm amber drifting through the stacks—hung in the air as dim, frozen motes.

Unwelcome, my aura whispered back to me. Unclaimed. Unbound.

I gathered Lunarias in my grip, more for comfort than threat. The bow's pale glow trembled, its string coated instantly in a lace of ice. This was no ordinary chill. It clung to my mana, drank the warmth from my soul like a starving ghost.

"Danatallion?" I called, the word cracking in the brittle air. My breath frosted, fell as glittering dust. No echo. No rustle of pages. Just the groan of ice settling deeper into the grain of oak and parchment.

I reached out with aura—light, wary—seeking the library's familiar pulses: the hum of catalog runes, the thrum of endless indexing. Nothing. Every sigil lay dormant, frozen mid-glow like stars trapped at dawn.

What happened here?

A book on the nearest shelf splintered, its spine cracking as if in answer. I jumped back an involuntary step. The cover burst outward, pages fluttering like broken wings before shattering to the floor as a cascade of feather-thin shards.

Behind me, a second book groaned. Then a third. One by one, volumes ruptured, vomiting brittle leaves that skittered across the marble like dead locusts. The sound—paper cracking, parchment sighing—built into a soft, hideous storm.

And beneath that cacophony, I heard it: a heartbeat. Slow. Thunderous. As if the entire maze inhaled at once.

"Lumivis?" My voice was a rasp. No answer.

The heartbeat sounded again, closer now, carved from bedrock and winter. I couldn't place its direction—the library's geometry warped and folded, corridors bending back on themselves. Frost crept over my boots, up my calves, numbing skin.

Instinct said flee. Walker's pride argued press on. I compromised: I moved—cautiously, quietly—between stacks toward the central rotunda. Each step crunched, echoing like rifle shots in the hollow hush.

At the rotunda's threshold I stopped. The grand dome hovered overhead, painted constellations snuffed out by a rind of ice so thick it shimmered like obsidian. The giant reading table beneath was half-buried in snowy drifts of shredded parchment. And in the center, where the great Catalog Locus normally pulsed with manifold runes, stood a monolith:

A single, black pillar. Faceted, jagged, bleeding frost from seams like veins. It resembled the ivory pillar from my vision—but this was darker, coarser, its surface crawling with frozen glyphs I didn't recognize.

With each of its subterranean heartbeats, a wave of frigid air rolled outward, extinguishing invisible candles. My teeth chattered in spite of soul-forged resilience.

Why am I here?

A faint shimmer coalesced at the pillar's base—script scrawling itself in cold-burning runes. I knelt, brushing ice aside. The glyphs rearranged, resolving into Continental Common:

THE LIBRARIAN IS GONE. THE VAULTS ARE UNWATCHED. THE PRICE IS DUE.

My pulse hammered in my ears.

"Gone?" I whispered. "Gone where?"

The text dissolved, replaced by a single commanding line:

WRITE YOUR NAME.

The words pulsed once—beckoning.

I gripped Lunarias tighter. Every instinct screamed trap. Yet the pillar's presence pressed on me like a geas. Recall: the black ivory spire in my awakening, the angels' chorus. Different aura—yet kin in purpose. A test. A bargain.

"I will not sign blindly," I said aloud, voice steadier than I felt. "Reveal terms."

Silence. Frost crackled. Then, as if conceding, the pillar birthed a slender slit of light—a slot just large enough for a single page.

A contract. Empty.

I reached into my coat, fingers brushing the edge of my travel journal. I hesitated. To write here might bind more than paper and ink; it could yoke me to whatever power now claimed the Halls.

The heartbeat quickened. Shelves groaned in protest, ice splintering like ribs. Choice dwindled.

Everything has a price, my Truth murmured. Always.

I drew a blank sheet, dipped my pen. The ink froze before it could drip.

"Star-Writer…?"

I spun, bow half-drawn. There, half-collapsed against a pillar of cracked ice, lay a figure swaddled in tattered librarian's robes. Skin pale, lips blue. Their eyes, once bright with endless curiosity, now filmed with frost.

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

"What…What happened here?"

The figure shook its head.

"Master… summoned away. Something… called beyond." Their teeth chattered violently. "Wanted to save the tomes. Couldn't… stop the Tithe."

"The Tithe?"

They coughed frost, forcing a whisper. "When the Librarian leaves… the Vault takes… payment." Their gaze flicked to the black monolith. "Bind… or it devours all."

I swallowed. "And my name…?"

"Anchor," they wheezed. "A living custodian. Until he returns."

I stared at the contract in my hand. A choice laid bare: sign, become warden of a frozen sanctum—risk bonding to an unknown geas—or watch the greatest repository of knowledge collapse into icy oblivion.

My mind raced: The Crimson Lance, Wallace's drills, my looming Seraphic resonance. Each step forward seemed to invite another chain. Yet… to leave this to entropy felt like betraying Danatallion, Lumivis, and most of all, myself.

I looked back at the Archivist. Their breath slowed.

Everything has a price.

Hand steady, I pressed the pen to parchment and wrote:

Alexander Duarte-Alizade, Walker, Star-Writer—Custodian pro tempore.

Ink glowed, thawing into liquid starlight. The sheet vanished into the pillar. A hum like a great engine echoed through the dome. Frost recoiled in rings; shelves groaned as sockets warmed by fractions. Books ceased shattering.

The heartbeat steadied—slower, balanced.

The Archivist exhaled a grateful sigh, eyelids fluttering shut in relief. Alive, but weak.

I turned to the pillar, now silent. The Halls remained encased, but no longer dying. I'd purchased time—at what hidden cost, I could not yet know.

Somewhere in my mind, Gin's voice echoed: I know where you're going next.

Apparently, so did the library.

I tightened my cloak, lifting the Archivist gently. Ahead lay long nights of thawing stacks, deciphering frozen geasa, and defending a silent dominion until its master returned—or until I found a way to rouse him myself.

But for now, I carried the first survivor toward a reading alcove that still held a spark of warmth. I whispered a silent oath to the turning pages:

I will keep the light for you, Librarian. Until my name melts from this arm, or you return to reclaim it.

The Halls answered with a distant rustle—as if somewhere, a single book had chosen to open again.

I shifted the Archivist's weight against my shoulder and took a testing step. They were lighter than I remembered—half-ice, half-bone—and every shallow breath wheezed like parchment torn too near the spine. The Custodian's Mark still glowed, a faint pulse beneath my sleeve, guiding me with an instinct I hadn't owned a minute ago.

Find heat, it urged. Preserve the living. Preserve the words.

A map blossomed in my mind: the Halls' sub-levels, corridors that once hummed with pneumatic lifts and rune-forges, now entombed in rime. Yet there were pockets the frost hadn't claimed. One in particular—Incunabula Hearth—flared in phantom gold across my vision, three corridors south-east, nine shelves down.

"Hold on," I whispered. The Archivist's head lolled; they managed a faint nod.

Shelves groaned as I passed, crystals spider-webbing across bindings. I summoned paper from my sleeve—thin origami sparrows that fluttered ahead, their wings smoldering with dim star-fire. Where they brushed, ice cracked and fell in tinkling sheets, carving a narrow path.

Every few strides I paused to listen. No more books exploding, no new heartbeats, but the quiet was deceptive; the monolith's cold still permeated the air, waiting to rush back the moment I let the firebirds wink out.

I turned a corner. A staircase spiraled down, marble steps glassy with hoarfrost. I steadied my footing, shifting the Archivist so their robes dragged behind instead of snagging. Halfway down, the banister snapped under crusted weight. I caught myself on one knee, pain lancing up my leg, but the Archivist barely stirred.

Move. The Mark tightened like a second pulse. Heat dwindles.

At the stair's end stood a brasswood portal, its runic latch stuttering between frost-lock and memory of flame. My aura flared; the latch recognized my new sigil and the panels parted with a hiss of escaping steam.

Warm air—blessed, wet air—rolled out. I staggered inside, knees wobbling as abrupt heat fogged my vision. The chamber beyond was vast: tiered braziers ringing an octagonal hall, each brazier fed by slowly beating glyph-bellows. Soft red coals glowed beneath lattices of copper. Once, scribes warmed rare vellum here to keep ink supple; now it would keep flesh alive.

I laid the Archivist on a low stone bench near the nearest brazier. Their lips were still blue, but color seeped back to cheeks with every exhale.

"Stay with me," I murmured, tearing strips from a parchment scroll—useless now, frozen blank—and setting them alight over the coals to coax a stronger flame.

Minutes stretched. I made trip after trip, collecting ice-rimmed tomes from the outer corridor—ones already too ruined to salvage—and fed them to the braziers. Ink hissed, leather crackled, and the room warmed to a bearable glow. My guilt fluttered, but the Custodian's Mark approved: sacrifice shell to save core. Words could be rewritten; lives could not.

At last the Archivist's eyes fluttered fully open. "Star-Writer…" The whisper carried gratitude and something like awe.

"Hold that thought," I said, voice hoarse. I drew a flask of water from my belt, thawed it over the coals, and tipped a measure to their lips. They drank slowly, then sagged back, color returning inch by inch.

"Heat… wards," they managed. "You found… the Hearth."

I sank onto the bench beside them, exhaustion sliding into my bones now that the crisis abated. "The library showed me," I admitted. "Or the Mark did."

Their gaze drifted to the sigil faintly glowing through my sleeve. "Keeper… already."

"Temporary," I reminded them—and myself. "Until Danatallion returns."

The Archivist's eyes closed, but a small smile lingered. "Books will… sing again."

I let them rest, rising to inspect the chamber. Massive vent-chimneys climbed into darkness, still warm despite the ice-age outside. Old reading desks stood overturned; I righted one, brushing frost away. Two intact braziers left plenty of fuel; a third's bellows lay shattered, but that could be repaired.

This would be headquarters until I discovered how to thaw the rest of the Halls—or until the Librarian himself returned.

I pulled a half-charred ledger from my pocket and opened to a blank page. Tasks spilled from my pen, steaming in the heat:

Inventory surviving warmth zones.

Locate functional gateways for supply.

Decode monolith glyphs—determine tether limits.

Send word to Wallace and the others

—they'd need to know why I'd vanished.

Find Danatallion.

Somehow.

The list glowed faintly, runes of the Custodian curling around each entry, sealing them as vows. I felt the weight settle—Price accepted.

Behind me, the Archivist slept, breaths now steady, a tiny ember of life against the cold. Outside these brasswood doors, the Halls of Infinite Parchment lay frozen, silent, waiting.

I fed one last ruined folio to the flames, watching sparks rise like reversed snow. Then I tightened my cloak, flexed fingers still tingling with frostbite, and prepared to walk back into the ice—Custodian, Star-Writer, unwilling warden—determined that every lamp in this place would burn bright again.

It was time to thaw a library.

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