Bookworm

by JunoMagic
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives-ShareAlike license

Bookworm

‘Get out of there!’ his uncle shouted, shoved him out of the room and slammed the door shut behind them. A cloud of dust dissolved in the dimly lit hallway.

Julek blinked at the rotund librarian. ‘What the hell?! Uncle Gerwazy, is everything quite all right? You act as if there are dragons in there, not just old books and the odd bookworm or two!’

‘Drachenbuch’ is the oldest publishing company in Wroclaw, so ancient that nobody knows anymore how often the name of the company was changed from German to Polish and back. Since perestroika and glasnost and the subsequent downfall of the USSR, the name is German again, ‘Dragonbooks’ – and the owner has been happy to receive generous subsidies both from the German government and from the European Social Fund.

Much has changed (new managers, new authors, new computerized printing presses, a grand new website). More has stayed the same. Especially at the original Drachenbuch shop, archive and library. Since the publishing company is so old, there’s an archive and a library attached to the parent store of the company, where the original manuscript and first copy of every book ever printed with Drachenbuch is archived.

Old Gerwazy is the current archivist and librarian with Drachenbuch; he’s been with them since forever – since he was a scrawny apprentice of a mere thirteen years. Julek is his grandnephew, and currently studying languages and literature in Warsaw. He’s also the only one of his family who’s still on visiting terms with his crotchety old uncle.

And right now Julek was wondering just how long that would last.

‘Bookwyrm,’ Gerwazy muttered at last, frowning at the heavy wooden door. It was very firmly closed. ‘And more than a few. This time of the year, they get frisky after dark. You’re not trained to handle them, they’d have you on your knees before you can say Hail Mary.’

‘Bookwyrm,’ Julek repeated. ‘As in, wyrm, like …. wyvern, like, err… dragons? With books?’

‘No,’ Gerwazy growled, rolling his eyes at the obstinate youth. ‘Bookwyrm. The dragons of the living word, biding their time between the lines, hiding under covers, waiting within whispering pages. – What do you think I’ve been doing here, boy? Dusting old tomes? Re-organizing index cards?’

‘Err,’ Julek awkwardly cleared his throat. ‘Yes, actually.’

Gerwazy harrumphed, and dragged the youth back up to the his flat on the first floor, another helping of goulash, and a bottle of becherovka for his joints; best applied from the inside. They talked a while longer, about Julek’s study, about the publishing business; Julek had interned with Drachenbuch last summer, and Gerwazy was secretly hoping to train him up as his successor.

Best to keep things in the family, Gerwazy thought. And at another time of the year, he’d have taken him inside the archive for sure. There were a few books safe to touch even after dark, their bookwyrm having grown old and feeble over the centuries. But not tonight, oh, no, not tonight. The Wild Hunt was riding again, and the dragons eager to get out.

Of course he might have known that things would go wrong. Readers, writers, and librarians alike know how such things generally play out in books and stories, after all. So at least theoretically they might be better prepared than others for the terrible temptation of forbidden rooms, no matter if you’re four or twenty-four.

On the other hand, readers, writers and librarians lack practical experience. An avid player of MYST may well have faired better, under the circumstances.

But be that as it may, shortly after midnight old Gerwazy was nodding off into his third glass of becherovka, and Julek couldn’t resist a moment longer.

Julek crept down the rickety steep stairs. He knew them well, having traipsed them up and down all his life. Thus he knew to avoid the third step from the top, and to take the last two at a jump.

Downstairs he knew better than to turn on the lights. The old fuses hummed and buzzed like a hornets’ nest. It was very dark. But luckily, the car key for Julek’s trusty little Opel Corsa came with a tiny flashlight so he’d find the lock more easily in the dark.

Julek padded down the corridor. Lit only by his tiny flashlight, it seemed longer and a lot darker than he knew it was. To the left and the right, doors led to rooms filled with books. The atmosphere was unmistakable; the sounds of his steps was muffled by the walls of paper surrounding him, the creaks and groans of the old building softened by the whispering presence of many pages.

There! The last door. The entrance to the room with the oldest and most precious manuscripts and first copies. Solid oak, if he was not mistaken. And what else could it be? Julek smiled. As if the hero in a story ever encountered locked door with beech veneers. It was always oak, and always solid.

Solid this door definitely was, and age darkened. He knew that, but even in the dim light of his car key lamp, that much was evident. Pressing his ear against the wood, he only heard the echo of his own heartbeat. Much too loud. And he thought it smelled faintly of smoke. He almost laughed with the wild excitement of this adventure.

Juli, Juli, he told himself, you must have had more than one becherovka too many…

Slowly he lowered the door handle. He found it well-oiled and breathed his relief. His uncle might be growing senile, but his lungs were still lusty and he was quite capable of screaming down the house and the whole neighbourhood.

Julek cracked the door open, slipped inside and drew it shut again behind him.

With a pounding heart he leant against the solid oak-wood of the door. Suppressing a giggle – dear Lord Jesus and the Virgin Mary, he must have had rather two becherovka too many! – Julek raised his miniature flashlight, pressed its lever with his thumb, opened his eyes, and –

FUCK.

Make that three.

Becherovka.

Julek gulped.

…and dragons.

~~~*~~~

When Gerwazy found his nephew late the next morning, huddled at a table in the room with the oldest manuscripts and tomes, madly scribbling away with an ancient quill on a piece of parchment of all things, he knew very well what had happened to the boy.

Bookwyrm bite.

Rarely fatal, bookwyrm bite has destroyed many splendid careers in middle management over the centuries, and only now and again produced Pulitzer, Noble or Jozef Mackiewicz Literary Prize winners.

Sadly, there is no antivenin.

Song of the day:

Link(s) of the day:

Bookworm – The insect | Bookworm – The plushy toy! | Bookworm – The painting by Carl Spitzweg

…and my wish for you today is:

May it find you, may it bite you, and may it bite HARD!

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