Twice Before Bedtime

Prologue--Cassandra

Five years ago

The psychiatrist's office began to fill up with numbers, equations and colors. Soon charts and graphs followed, numbers, equations, more and more and more, spinning in overwhelming amounts. Smells and music and colors and lights, flashing in front of her. Cassandra Cillian cringed in the corner, hoping for a seizure or unconsciousness or anything. But the tumor that would have provided almost blessed relief from the hallucinations was now gone and she felt herself spinning out of control. In the distance she could hear her doctor calling her name and saying something about pi. But she couldn't call back. All she could do was sink to her knees in the corner, chanting the word "off" over and over again. Until she was sobbing and it finally, finally stopped.

"This is why," she said softly a few minutes later when she'd stopped crying. "This is why I'd like to commit myself. I've lost my mind and I can't . . . I need help."

A week later, she was sitting in a sterile office in a private institution. The doctor had explained that it was a very nice facility, the best that what was left of her trust fund could afford. She looked down at her floral skirt when she'd been left alone for a few minutes while paperwork was being brought for her. She'd probably not be wearing any of her clothes again for a very long time.

The door opened and a man walked in. He wasn't wearing a lab coat and he didn't look anything like the other people she'd met in the place. Instead he was wearing a slightly rumpled suit, sneakers and a carnation in his lapel.

"Hi, Cassandra," he said with a grin.

"Hi," she said hesitantly. "Are you another doctor?"

The man chuckled. "Well, I do hold several PhDs, so I guess you could call me a doctor. But not the kind of doctor you're thinking. I'm Flynn Carsen and I'm the Librarian."

"Why would a librarian be seeing me? Are they giving me a job while I'm here?"

"Nope," the man said sitting on the edge of the desk. "They're not, but I am. "

"I don't follow."

"You're not crazy, Cassandra Cillian, at least not any more crazy than anyone else is. You're accessing magic and I'm here to help you control it."

Cassandra shrunk back in her chair. "You're one of the patients aren't you?"

"Oh dear," Mr. Carsen said, shaking his head. "Poor thing, you're really frightened aren't you? Maybe it would be best to show you? Come with me."

"Come with you where?"

"I'm going to show you the Library. Hey, what do you have to lose? If I am a patient, then they're gonna find us, aren't they? And I'm harmless, well at least to you," the strange man who called himself the Librarian winked at her.

Cassandra shrugged. She really didn't have much to lose. And honestly she wasn't so sure she wanted to stay here if the patients just wandered into offices and no one came after them. Luckily she hadn't yet signed the papers and could leave at will.

He opened the back door of the office, which she expected to lead into a hallway. Instead, she felt like she'd tripped over a rock and landed in . . . a library?

"What? How?"

"Magic," Flynn grinned. "Well that and science. You're gonna love it here."

Cassandra looked behind her and looked around. "Magic is real?"

The Librarian grinned. "Oh yes, magic is real. Let me show you around."

--

Cassandra was shown some of the wonders that were held in the Library. And the Librarian explained to her that her "gift" was not a product of her tumor like she'd always believed it was.

"You were born with magical abilities. Your medical condition was actually holding you back, not enhancing them."

"But I could control it before," Cassandra sighed. "Sort of. And I can transfer thoughts. That's terrifying. So are all the visions."

"And that's why you're here. We can help you here at the Library."

"We?"

"You'll meet the others soon. Right now it's our caretaker Jenkins and our bookkeeper Charlene. But I have had assistants from time to time. Most of them have decided to go back to their lives, but they still help out occasionally. Which is what I meant by offering you a job. I'm in need of an assistant and you're in need of help with your gift. So what do you say? Wanna work at the Library?"

Cassandra beamed. "You've got yourself an assistant."

One year ago

"You're retiring?" Cassandra asked, her voice even more high pitched than usual.

"Well, I wouldn't call it retiring, I'm far too young for that. Let's call it a very extended leave of absence."

"He's retiring," Ezekiel Jones, who'd joined her as Library assistant the year before, said from her other side.

"But why?" Cassandra asked. "I thought you loved it here. I thought it was your home, like it's ours."

"It is my home," Flynn said, putting a hand on her shoulder and giving her a fond squeeze. "But I've been the Librarian for ten years. I've defied the odds. Librarians who get to retire are the minority, you know. I'm still young and Eve and I want to start a family. I want to devote myself to them."

"But who is going to be the Librarian?" Cassandra asked, starting to panic. Beside her Ezekiel scoffed, already a step ahead.

"You are," Flynn said. "The Library and I picked you because we knew you'd be taking over for me. You're ready Cassandra. You're the Librarian now. And I'll be around if you need me, just don't need me too much, that would be disappointing."

"And Ezekiel?"

Ezekiel scoffed. "Quite happy being the second banana thank you very much. Librarians are the ones on the firing line, assistants not so much."

Cassandra rolled her eyes at him but then sobered and looked at Flynn. "You really think I'm ready?"

"I know you are. I'm leaving the Library in good hands. Charlene is mostly retired but she'll do the books from home. You have Jenkins and Ezekiel. And like I said, if you really need me, I'll be there. Especially if you just need to talk, just don't make it every night."

"Thank you, Flynn." Cassandra said, throwing her arms around his neck. "You've done so much for me. I'm honored to be your successor."

They hugged for a moment and he gently stepped back. "You'll be just fine. I know it. Now, it's time for me to go, I have a marriage proposal to make. Try to stay alive until the wedding at least."

Cassandra and Ezekiel laughed and just like that Flynn was gone.

"Well," Cassandra clapped her hands. "Now . . . ." And the clippings book on the desk signaled a case. "I guess it's that. Let's go, assistant."