Library of Laughter Ch. 01

"No, I'm looking for a..." Rufus bit his lip, thumbing through the translation app on his phone. "... a fón cúiseamh?"

The three villagers exchanged confused looks and shrugged at him. The two men—one old, the other young—were dressed in woolen vests and simple breeches. The woman wore a simple pale dress and carried a basket of what appeared to actually be potatoes. She wore a simple rosary around her neck.

The older man said something in Irish which Rufus did not understand.

Rufus had arrived in Ireland one night ago. While in Ireland, he had stayed in an air conditioned hostel while his bunkmates below argued about the proper techniques for defeating a Skyrim final boss, dropped by a McDonald's to get a Big Mac, and caught a bus plastered with advertisements for skin care, suicide prevention hotlines and the upcoming Minions 4 film to make it out here.

He had stepped off the bus and found himself in another world. Had he been dropped off here to begin with, without the stay in Dublin, he likely would have assumed that all of Ireland was still a lot of intensely quaint pastoral villages. Villages where, apparently, no one spoke English.

He grimaced. "Um... Mój telefon się rozładowuje." Rufus's Polish was terrible, but at least he knew a little. In his university days, he'd learned Polish, Spanish, French, and a good chunk of Russian. Never Irish. Damn it.

They only shook their heads. The woman said something that Rufus was pretty sure referred to the Poles. It probably wasn't very flattering, given that they all laughed afterwards.

He groaned. His phone had seven percent of its battery remaining, and after that, he was going to be absolutely stranded—unable to even call a bus back here. Nobody had told him how isolated this area was. He glanced back, biting his lip, at the covered bridge the bus had led him over. The bus driver had seemed so uncomfortable leaving him out here. Now he knew why.

They looked sympathetic. The older man gestured to the phone and made a gesture, miming plugging something into an outlet.

Rufus's heart leaped. "Yes! Uh... tá!" He nodded eagerly.

The older man nodded, smiling now. He beckoned, saying something to the other two. They laughed and nodded at Rufus. They were all smiling now, the puzzle solved. The mysterious foreigner's problem revealed.

Rufus profusely thanked them—in English—as they led him back towards their home. They really were out in the middle of nowhere. This dale was surrounded not only by hills, but by thick forest and moor. Rufus had checked his maps a dozen times, and as far as he could tell, the bridge he'd taken represented the only wheeled access. It was hard to find transportation to take you there, too.

The dale was a true bubble in the middle of a fully industrialized country. A look at Ireland's past, or a slight twist on it—at the very least, these people had outlets, so it wasn't exactly the Middle Ages.

It was an enormous hassle. It was also a point of tremendous excitement to Rufus, now that his phone emergency was settled. Bubble realm meant not much outside access. Meant not many archaeologists had been through here already.

Meant that his theory just might be right. Or at least, there was no reason to assume it was wrong. Less reason.

Professor Rufus Hastings, archaeologist in exile, had nothing left to lose here. But here, he had a chance at redemption. And that tiny chance made his spirit soar.

The woman asked him something, beaming at him. She was young—probably a bit too young, in her early twenties at most and more likely close to nineteen—but pretty, with long, curly red hair and pale, freckled skin. She walked barefoot, and there was an unmistakeable spring in her step as her toes sank into the grass. She had a smile that Rufus was quite familiar with.

Rufus was in his late twenties, with thick brown locks, dusky browned skin, and bright brown eyes that blinked rapidly when he was thinking hard about something. A pair of tiny spectacles constantly slid down his slightly pointed nose. He was slender, with wide hips and long, willowy arms that always stayed close at his sides—a habit developed after many years spent around college dormmates who were just a little too handsy. He was used to pretty men and women smiling at him like that, but it never failed to make him blush.

He tried to piece together what she'd said. He was pretty sure she'd given the words for 'why' and 'here', which probably meant she was wondering the reason for his presence in the dale. That was a pretty fair question.

They were coming up on the cottage now—a quaint brick house that probably served these three just fine, but wouldn't long accommodate a guest, Rufus quickly noted. Smoke billowed from the chimney. That was a bit strange, considering it was late spring. It can't be for heat. Do they cook on a woodstove? I suppose I'm lucky they even have an outlet!

Especially since the next-nearest house was about a mile away, further into the dale. Rufus had no wish to walk that far, especially wearing his heavy leather coat and jeans. It was not a cool day.

He decided the easiest way to answer the woman was a visual trick. So as he came to the doorway, he reached into his pocket, where he had been delicately toying with the item up until now, and drew out a rather plain medallion.

The medallion was made of brass, with a thin, chipped gold plating. A misty green glass rhinestone was embedded in the center, visibly cracked and chipped. The chain was copper, and deliberately (as far as Rufus could tell) stained a greenish hue, giving it the look of tangled creeper vines.

Overall, it was a cheap, tacky decoration—the kind one might find in a sketchy pawnshop. Which was exactly where Rufus had found it. The real meaning of the medallion, though, lay on the back, scratched by a crude implement—perhaps a knife or file. Ogham runes. Faded, dented Ogham runes in a language that had, as far as anyone could tell, none living to recall it. A language found only on ancient stones, tablets and gravestones.

When Rufus had found the medallion in the pawnshop, something about it had called to him. He had let the chain dangle from his finger, staring at the engraving.

As he'd stared at the medallion, a thrill had run down his spine.

The medallion wasn't proof. Far from it—it was basically trash. But it was different. It was no old withered stone. Somebody had engraved this thing and sent it overseas to what would later become England to end up in an old pawnshop. The language, the writing, the alphabet, the phrase—it had nagged at him.

Decoding the phrase had taken weeks. The only known text utilizing the language—a widely discredited parcel of inked goat skins generally agreed upon to be a very cunning fraud—was not easy to get access to.

And all he could firmly establish, in the end, were two words:

Property

Library

And for Rufus, so badly disgraced, so devoid of hope for his career... that had been enough. The text had a corroborating sample, even if it was on a tacky old talisman. The Library could be real.

And if it was, it likely existed here, where the medallion had been made. That was what the medallion meant to Rufus.

But what it meant to these villagers seemed quite different. Because the second he drew it out, the woman's smile melted away like water off a roof tile. She said something, and the two men turned—and froze, their eyes widening.

Rufus blinked rapidly.

The next instant, the men were shouting at him, waving the medallion away—as though it were a wasp that would fly at them at any moment. The young woman was backing away, her eyes narrowed, clutching at her rosary.

"I'm sorry," Rufus said uselessly, putting the medallion away, "I don't—"

The older man grabbed him by the wrist. Rufus nearly jumped out of his skin. He didn't pull away. He was too frightened to even move.

The man said something in a terse growl. He pointed, very deliberately, at Rufus's pocket. He turned and pointed in the same emphatic way at the houses a mile off.

He then turned and, glaring fiercely, as if willing Rufus to understand, pointed back west.

Towards the bridge.

He was speaking slowly, and carefully, and clearly. Rufus couldn't understand a word of it. He tried to look at his phone, but the battery icon was flashing, it was red, and...

The man released his wrist roughly and pulled away.

Rufus stared at them. His heart was racing. He took a step back.

They stared back at him. Their eyes were wild, almost... terrified.

No, not terrified.

Rufus's old roommate and colleague, Charles, had once told him about the time a moose had broken into his uncle's house while they'd been sleeping there. The moose had been scared out of its mind, bucking and swinging and kicking at anything that came near. It had nearly killed his uncle's dog before an Alaskan ranger had arrived to shoot it down—extracting it alive hadn't been an option.

Its eyes had been pale, wild, mad. Not mad in the way of illness, but mad in the way of total lack of reason or rationality, mad in the way of cult patriarchs and grieving parents. Mad in the way of an animal with no way out, no ability to understand or control what was about to happen to it.

Their eyes reminded Rufus of Charles's story. They looked lost. Helpless. The younger man and woman were clutching each other's arms as they watched him.

The older man pointed again—medallion, village, bridge. Then at the bridge again. And again. And again. And again.

Rufus slowly backed away, then turned and ran, his heart pounding hard enough to shatter his ribcage.

~ ~ ~ ~

For about a minute, Rufus did nothing but run—run to the bridge, run for the road, for civilization, for sense. His heart was beating hard and fast enough to serve as an orchestra's percussion. His vision was blurred with fear. He ran in almost complete mindlessness, almost every thought in him dedicated to raising his feet high enough to clear the next step without falling flat on his face.

And then for about ten minutes, as he hunched, panting, his chest in stitches, he felt like a complete idiot.

Of course the locals would be superstitious. What gossip he'd been able to dig up from the driver and pawnbroker had indicated that this region was known for being extremely 'backwards'—meaning non-Catholic. Roughly two-thirds of the population apparently favored old 'pagan' worship, and had never been fully won over by the missionaries. Where Christ was acknowledged, it was as another great being or spirit, not as any singular godly being.

He'd just found a family among the 25.6% of the district. Of course they'd be upset by what was clearly an artifact from the old times—maybe even the old faith. This family probably felt constantly under siege, a minority in the very nation their religion had conquered. And they'd probably thought he was... well, who knew what they'd thought?

He straightened, leaning against the side of the bridge, and gave a low sigh. Still, the encounter had taught him something: Waving around relics, even exceptionally tacky ones, probably wasn't a great way to win people over. He had to approach this area sensitively. Clearly, there were conflicts and grudges he had no place interfering in.

I am here as a scholar, he reminded himself. I mean, a scholar looking for a probably fictional library, hot off the scandal of lending my support to a... a paper about Atlantis, but I am a scholar. I need to be more subtle. More careful.

He reached down and opened his briefcase, reached into his pocket and drew out the medallion, and delicately placed the medallion inside. No more playing.

For a moment, he stared out across the bridge.

He was still scared.

Part of him wanted to walk back across this bridge and... and hail the first actual car he saw. This was a mistake. It was a waste of time. And he didn't exactly have nothing left to lose. He still had a neck.

Rufus Hastings turned back and gazed down the path at the village in the distance. He mopped his brow—he was already drenched in sweat from the run. It was midday.

At least he didn't have to worry about keeping clean and presentable anymore. He snapped the briefcase shut, straightened, and started walking back—this time, bypassing the cottage by a wide berth.

It was time to head into town.

~ ~ ~ ~

Rufus let out a long, tired, miserable sigh.

Nobody here spoken English. Not a single soul. He had arrived in town a sweat-drenched mess, his jacket now opened all the way, his shirt undone down to the third button.

Two young ladies had nearly run into him, hefting pails of water (pails of water!) from the well (they used a town well!), and had stopped in shock as they saw his condition. One of them had worn a denim skirt, and the other had shoes that looked far too nice to have been hand-made here.

Immediately, they had set down their pails, fetched rags, and drenched them in the pails. They'd pranced up, looking at him questioningly, and he'd nodded gratefully. They had draped the rags over his shoulders. The relief from the cool groundwater had been instantaneous, and he had smiled in relief.

They had smiled back.

And then they had spoken in Irish, and he'd realized he was completely screwed.

Since then, he had spoken to five others—two more young women, a young man, and an elderly couple stitching up rag dolls. Nobody spoke a word of English. There were some hints of modernity—a plastic cup here, a bicycle there, and one house had an old tractor with a blue tarp draped over it that was getting partially pulled off by the wind (the lawn gnome weighing down the southwest corner had fallen off). This place wasn't in a perfect bubble.

But it was damn close.

He leaned back against the fence, sighing. At least it was beautiful. Every house here was unique, painted in brilliant greens and pastel pinks and oranges, like trees against the sunrise. They seemed to grow out of the ground, and many were covered in moss and lichen—especially those with thatched roofs. The village had 'sprouted' amid rolling hills and forested marsh. He couldn't even see the bridge from where he was now.

Almost every house had a little bit of a garden, too. The fence he was leaning against right now doubled as a trellis for climbing morning glories, making up the wall around a brilliant flower garden. It smelled wonderful. Ferns draped over every post, like big, old, verdant octopi.

"Y'like what you see?"

Rufus's heart leaped into his throat. A patch of red in the garden shifted, and he realized it wasn't a flower at all. The red hat tilted upward, and Rufus found himself staring into two brilliant green eyes.

He bit his lip. Rufus always tried not to fixate on appearances, but this lady was something else. There was something about those bright eyes, those fulsome lips curved upwards in a little smirk, the cute button nose, and the long, curly red hair spilling down beneath the pale red hat that just... captivated him.

He blinked rapidly. "Um..."

She laughed, tossing her hair back and taking off the sunhat. She straightened, hands on her hips, and looked him over. "Well, y'are new, aren't ye, stranger?" She reached over, tugging at his jacket. "What's this, then? Wrappin's? The sun'll bake you up fine in these, boy." She sniffed. "And has been, seems like."

He leaned away from her overly grabby fingers, his eyes widening. "You speak English?"

"Hm." She tilted her head from side to side, seeming almost surprised by the question. "Sure. I mean, a li'l. Mum was a proper sort, felt us ladies should be able t'deal with folks that come from outside." She giggled. "Don't happen often, mind ye. I can't say I've seen a fella like ye in... agh, a time or two, that's sayin' it."

This woman didn't talk exactly like any Irish woman Rufus had met so far—at least, nothing like the people on the bus, or the ladies from the hostel arguing about how to defeat the Draugr Deathlord. But she talked in English. He could forgive an eccentric accent. He gave an unsteady laugh. "You have no idea the time I've had today trying to find someone who understood a word I've been saying."

"Did ye not know we din't speak much of Her tongue?"

"I didn't know it was this... well, not bad, but inconvenient." he shrugged. "And I had a phone app, but, um..."

"Couldn't find a charge." She was grinning now. "I can fix ye on that front."

"Really? You have an outlet?"

"I daresay I do." She rolled her eyes, making her way over to the gate—carefully stepping over a particularly large fern as she did so. Her nimble little toes wiggled in the clearly soft grass of the garden. "Half the young lads and lasses o' the town come by every other day ta charge their phones. I think I've got one of maybe three in town."

"I thought Ireland was, um... well..." 'Modern' seemed tactless. "Electrified."

She reached down for the latch. "Change comes slow ta these lot. They like their old ways. But I been tellin' 'em, if we don't allow some change, we'll all be made tourist attractions for our oddity, an' that's a good sight worse." Those brilliant green eyes shot up to his. He was caught momentarily off-guard by just how bright her eyes were. "Wha'd ye say ye name was again, stranger?"

"Rufus." He gave a bashful smile. "Rufus Hastings. Professor Rufus Hastings."

"Agh, a Professor!" She playfully batted at him. "How excitin'." The vine-laden gate swung open, surprising Rufus—she seemed to be barely touching it. "My name's Brielle. I'm a local, uh... well, I daresay the modern word for it is 'weirdo'." She winked. "I hunt mushrooms an' keep the gardens o' the town green an' pretty. For an introduction to town, you couldn't find none worse—they all say I like the mushrooms an' ferns better than the silly antics an' such that they get up to here."

Rufus giggled. "And do you?"

She giggled back. "The folks o' this town are a funny lot. Comes from the land, I think. All their rituals an' tradition... I keep up, but I don't much care for all the worship an' ritual. They think I need to immerse myself deeper in the land, but all I want's right on the surface." She beckoned him inside. "They also say I chatter too much, which is a fair pip ta hand me. I tend ta talk over folks. What do you think?"

He walked down the narrow path, or what passed for a path. There were no stepping stones, and the ferns covered everything that wasn't covered by flowers, but he managed to follow her steps along several holes in the dense undergrowth. "Get me talking about archeology and I'll be a lot worse, believe me."

"Ooh! Archeology, eh?" She pushed the door open and trotted inside. "If ye're here to check on the old fellow O'Larson, ye should know he ain't dead yet."

He laughed, following her inside a quaint little home. It wasn't too unlike a London home, albeit without so much as a fan to ease the heat. It was clearly a very old house. "Actually, I'm here looking into a... an old library, of sorts."

Belatedly, he cringed, remembering his intentions to be more subtle now. You really weren't kidding about not being able to shut up about archeology, were you?

But she didn't seem to notice any slip as she danced around an island laden with fruit baskets and came to a solitary plug on the wall, connected to an old sputtering computer monitor—one of the old 'fatscreen' computers Rufus only dimly remembered nowadays. He'd just walked past a woman churning butter, and this was still the most ancient thing he'd seen today. "A library? We've got a bookstore here, but it's all silly dreadfuls an' the sort, Rufus. An' it's not that old, either—it used t'be a pharmacy."