Editing Libraries of Faerie (section)

===The Stolen Book===

The Eldest said the ship comes but once each generation, a cursed relic from the Times of Sin, before the gods smote the earth with cleansing fire. All in the village were warned to keep away, lest its taint infect us and bring back the evil of centuries ground to dust, but T'mith and I were too curious. The craft was vast - bigger than a tree, a house, a mountain. It blotted out the sun, its fumes turned the west wind to a choking miasma, its roar shook the ground beneath our feet. While our families huddled in their huts and prayed, we took our spears and went forth. It had landed in the cursed valley a few miles from the village, a place of ancient ruins that has long been taboo to our people. 

It hulked in its crater like a bird brooding upon a nest. Its skin was blackened with age, coated with streaks of rust and pitted like a spearhead left too long without its oilskins. Gaping holes in its side oozed chill vapors, exposed broken ribs and empty chambers. Only flecks of paint were left on its hull, spots of bright color scoring the darkness like the pustules of a virulent disease - we drew closer, rags wrapped around our faces to make the breathing easier. Up close, the smell was even worse - we would have turned back, if not for our pride. To have come so far, only to fail now? Unthinkable. We slunk in through one of the ancient wounds like vermin wriggling into a rotting corpse.

As we stalked through the corridors on deckplates time had turned into a nightingale floor, lights flickered about us and ancient voices, their voices creaking and squealing with disuse called to us. We clung close together with fear, our spears shaking in our hands - chamber after chamber we explored, each stranger and more fascinating than the last. Shattered vidscreens, dusty computer terminals - all the technology of the Times of Sin, dead now, struck down by age or the will of the gods. And more - room upon room filled with shelves, and each shelf crammed to overflowing the books.

I had never seen any book but the holy tomes of the Eldest before, and I wanted to stop and touch them, try to read them, try to learn some of what the ancients knew. T'mith was frightened, and insisted we go back - and we did, though I took one book with me, to mark that we had been where none ever dared to go.

The villagers stoned us for sinners, cursed us for daring venture where they never could. T'mith died at his own father's hands - I fled, tail between my legs and curses ringing in my ears.

I've learned things, since then - walked the broken cities of the ancients, made deals with devils and pacts with angels to learn the secrets time has tried to erase. And I've watched, and I've waited.

The book I stole so long ago begins to glow, at night. On the back cover a tiny message burns in runes of flame. The countdown has begun.

"Your due date is approaching! Please return this volume to the Bookmobile within six months, two weeks, and three days, or your account will be charged late fees..."