Not as big as the library in Unseen University, of course, but that library had one or two advantages on account of its magical nature. No other library anywhere, for example, has a whole gallery of unwritten books-books that would have been written if the author hadn't been eaten by an alligator around chapter 1, and so on. Atlases of imaginary places. Dictionaries of illusory words. Spotters' guides to invisible things. Wild thesauri in the Lost Reading Room. A library so big that it distorts reality and has opened gateways to all other libraries, everywhere and everywhen . . .
And so unlike the Library at Ephebe, with its four or five hundred volumes. Many of them were scrolls, to save their readers the fatigue of having to call a slave every time they wanted a page turned. Each one lay in its own pigeonhole, though. Books shouldn't be kept too close together, otherwise they interact in strange and unforeseeable ways.
Sunbeams lanced through the shadows, as palpable as pillars in the dusty air.
Although it was the least of the wonders in the Library, Brutha couldn't help noticing a strange construction in the aisles. Wooden laths had been fixed between the rows of stone shelves about two meters from the floor, so that they supported a wider plank of no apparent use whatsoever. Its underside had been decorated with rough wooden shapes.
“The Library,” announced Didactylos.
He reached up. His fingers gently brushed the plank over his head.
It dawned on Brutha.
“You're blind aren't you?” he said.
“That's right.”
“But you carry a lantern?”
“It's all right,” said Didactylos. “I don't put any oil in it.”
“A lantern that doesn't shine for a man that doesn't see?”
“Yeah. Works perfectly. And of course it's very philosophical.”
“And you live in a barrel.”
“Very fashionable, living in a barrel,” said Didactylos, walking forward briskly, his fingers only occasionally touching the raised patterns on the plank. “Most of the philosophers do it. It shows contempt and disdain for worldly things. Mind you, Legibus has got a sauna in his. It's amazing the kind of things you can think of in it, he says.”
Brutha looked around. Scrolls protruded from their racks like cuckoos piping the hour.
“It's all so . . . I never met a philosopher before I came here,” he said. “Last night, they were all . . .”
“You got to remember there's three basic approaches to philosophy in these parts,” said Didactylos. “Tell him, Urn.”
“There's the Xenoists,” said Urn promptly. “They say the world is basically complex and random. And there's the Ibidians. They say the world is basically simple and follows certain fundamental rules.”
“And there's me,” said Didactylos, pulling a scroll out of its rack.
“Master says basically it's a funny old world,” said Urn.
“And doesn't contain enough to drink,” said Didactylos.
“And doesn't contain enough to drink.”
“Gods,” said Didactylos, half to himself. He pulled out another scroll. “You want to know about gods? Here's Xeno's Reflections, and old Aristocrates' Platitudes, and Ibid's bloody stupid Discourses, and Legibus's Geometries and Hierarch's Theologies . . . ”
Didactylos's fingers danced across the racks. More dust filled the air.
“These are all books?” said Brutha.
“Oh, yes. Everyone writes 'em here. You just can't stop the buggers.”
“And people can read them?” said Brutha.
Omnia was based on one book. And here were . . . hundreds . . .
“Well, they can if they want,” said Urn. “But no one comes in here much. These aren't books for reading. They're more for writing.”