“What are you waiting for?” Dottie asked, her tone and stance expectant.

Quint blinked at the bench, not quite understanding the question. “What do you mean, what am I waiting for?” she asked. No matter what she considered, she couldn’t think of anything but the patients right then.

Dottie laughed as if it was the silliest thing she’d ever heard. “Don’t you want to go and get the book?”

“Well, it’s in the Library, right? Like, I don’t need to go and fetch it from somewhere...” Quinn said. Suddenly confused, she was sure Dottie had just told her that the second last book they needed for the alchemical branch had been returned.

“Well, of course, it’s here,” Dottie said. Now she sounded confused. “Don’t you want to meet the person who brought it back?”

Quinn blinked and narrowed her eyes in suspicion. “Do I want to meet the person who brought it back?”

Milaro laughed. “Dottie, who is it?”

“Come on, you should see.” Dottie sounded unbelievably excited about this visitor. Quinn wasn’t too sure how to take that. She reached out with her senses but couldn’t identify anybody that she already knew standing anywhere around the check-in desk. At least not somebody she knew who was unexpected. They were all here or in the infirmary as a general rule. She even scanned for Eugea just in case she’d come to visit or something. But no, no one.

It wasn’t Hal either, which for some obscure reason was oddly disappointing for Quinn.

With a heavy sigh, Quinn looked at the superellux futora. She guessed they could spare a few minutes. Everything did seem to be under control after all. “Fine, Dottie, lead the way.”

“You don’t need to sound so excited. I thought you’d be interested to see who brought the book back. After all, I don’t think we’ve had a visit from her yet.” Dottie sounded oddly disgruntled.

“Which would probably make sense,” Milaro said as they all began to walk toward the check-in desk, exiting Quinn’s office. He chuckled and continued, “After all, if they’d already visited, then they would have realized that the Library was in fact open and returned the book sooner than now. Sooner than us summoning them to bring the book.”

“Oh,” Lynx said. “I see.” And he stopped talking, but wore a very smug grin.

Quinn stepped up into the check-in desk and right in front of her, standing on top of a very thick book titled The Mattiniman Balance Between Mana and Energy Explained for the Beginner, was an absolutely tiny fairy. At least, that’s what Quinn thought at first.

She stood about five inches tall and had regal silver hair that looked sort of like lametta on German Christmas trees many, many years ago. Her nose was extremely pointed and there were faint scale imprints all over her skin that glowed with a silver-golden hue. Her wings weren’t like butterfly wings, either. They were more like multiple sets of hummingbird wings all down her back. Maybe three or four, but they moved so fast Quinn belatedly realized this tiny being wasn’t actually standing on the book. She was hovering constantly. The wings never stopped and if Quinn let her senses extend, she could tell that there was an ever-so-soft hum in the air emanating from them.

She inspected the tiny creature.

Sprite - Keeper of Alchemical Lore

Located in the: Farinth Region

Library Allies for: Since inception

Library Standing: Fan-bloody-tastic

Books currently overdue: Total 1

Name: Betty

Quinn raised an eyebrow at the Library’s embellishment and practically felt the chuckle in the back of her mind.

The little Sprite raised her hover to Quinn’s eyes. The silver hair sparkled in the light that suddenly shone on her. Then she lowered herself back down, her tiny foot tapping against the massive book. Quinn wasn’t exactly sure what to say. Frankly, she really wondered if the Sprite had read the massive book or if she’d used magic to condense it down to be a tiny book, that would still feel massive to a Sprite but wasn’t actually massive to a human and yet still contained all the magical properties and language. Which was probably a little too fantastical, even for magic, but Quinn wouldn’t put it past that.

The Sprite cocked her head to one side. Her eyes were massive and reminded Quinn very much of many anime characters that she’d watched. The eyes seemed to take up most of her face in a very animated way. Quinn could practically feel the grin radiating from Dottie.

“Hi,” Quinn said. “Nice to meet you, Betty.”

Betty’s face cracked into a massive grin. “Oh, thank you. That’s very kind of you, Librarian. Now, how long has the Library been open again? I didn’t believe the rumors, you know. I’ve heard many rumors over the last few hundred years. There were several times I tried to bring the book back and as you know it is rather large and it does take a lot of energy for me to actually adjust the book to its proper size again once I’ve borrowed it and so I have tried to return it multiple times and always been inconvenienced because of it. I just didn’t believe that the Library was truly back. Am I still going to be fined?”

Quinn blinked. There’d been a lot of expectations she’d had for the sprite. A veritable waterfall of words had not been one of them.

“I swear...” Lynx muttered as he stepped in front of her in his human form. “Hello, Betty.”

Her eyes grew even larger, if that was at all possible. “Lynx! Oh my darling, it is good to see you again. Oh, it’s been what, 500 years? 469 I think give or take a few. How have you been?”

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

He smiled, and Quinn realized it was a genuine expression. “I have been better, but I am getting well again.”

“Oh, lovey,” said Betty. Her little face so expressive that Quinn was fascinated with her. “It’ll get better,” Betty said and turned back to Quinn, looking her up and down. Not in a rude way, but in a more assessing one. “You’re an odd duck,” she said. “You’ve got scales too. There’s got to be a story behind those.” She squinted and a silver shimmer took over her entire body, reaching out to brush up against Quinn. “Oh, I think I’m going to like your story. Do you have time for a cuppa? Can we sit down and have one? I would love that. Oh, did you mention, and I missed it? Am I going to be fined?”

Quinn couldn’t help herself. She laughed. The adorable little sprite-berry-pixie thing was the nicest person she’d had walk into the Library in a very long time. However, Betty wasn’t exactly sure how to take the laughter and stepped back, crossing her arms as she looked up at Quinn quizzically.

“Did I make you laugh? Is it really that pitiful for me to be asking whether I’m going to be fined or not? You see, I’ve always been a rather large patron of the Library and I am rather finicky about getting my books back on time. I did try... but you were close for so long.” She paused for a second, looking around with a frown. She gestured with her tiny hands at the whole Library. “It doesn’t even look like you did any reservations... nevermind that the Library can just adjust itself however it wants. Anyway, I didn’t think it was open this time. There have been so many false alarms. I mean, surely you should have sent out something that was verified.”

Quinn spoke hurriedly before Betty could start up again. “What made you think we were back before this time?”

“Oh,” Betty said, cocking her head to one side as if she was giving it some serious thought. “Well, you see,” and then she paused. “Well, I heard it through the grapevine, you see. We get to chatting and we’re not gossips, mind you, but you know, Sarila always says..

“You know, Sarila?” Quinn asked incredulously. Did they all know each other? Of course, when you could just walk through a door to wherever from the Library, she guessed that meant interplanetary travel wasn’t nearly as exciting as tv shows had made it out to be.

“Of course I do! Did you hear about Escadril? Oh, dreadful. That’s so sad. They’ve been together for millennia, those two. I don’t know how she’s going to fare without him. But anyway,” Betty stopped when she saw the stricken look on Quinn’s face. “Oh, I’m sorry, dear. Didn’t you know? Or you did? Oh, dreadful. People always tell me I just run off at the mouth and never stop. I apologize. I’ll pay any fine you need me to.”

Quinn smiled faintly at the onslaught of words from this tiny, magical creature. “You know, if you want to donate some energy, that’d be great. Otherwise, if you happen to know where the Jezishian Solution to Maladies of the Mana Pathways: A Beginner’s Guide is, I would absolutely love for you to tell me.” Quinn figured it was worth a shot because right now she was still reeling from the amount of information that this tiny creature had imparted to her inside of 60 seconds.

And it reminded her of someone her foster mother used to hang around, who chattered all the time, inanely about nothing. Although this pixie seemed to have a little bit more of an actual knowledge base to work from.

“Oh, wonderful. You do need my help? That would be absolutely fantastic,” she said. “I’ve always loved to help the Library. I’ve been an assistant multiple times in the past. Did you know that? I didn’t really care for your last Librarian much, though. She was a little, no offense, Lynx, but she was a bit on the nose sometimes, you know. There was something wrong about that girl. Pity she’s dead. Still...

“Wait,” Quinn said, trying to get a word in so she could actually understand something in all the verbosity, “what do you mean there was something off about Kor?”

“Oh, didn’t you know? Have you never met a sprite before? Okay, you see, we have certain abilities that allow us to know when somebody is not the person they’re pretending to be.” Betty smiled brightly.

Quinn blinked. “And did you tell anyone?”

“Of course, I told Lynx multiple times, but he didn’t seem to mind the next time I saw him,” Betty laughed it off. “I tried a few times, but you know, I think Lynx was a little smitten with Kor.”

Lynx scowled.

“Oh dear, I’m sorry, but you know you’re eternal pretty much and she’s sort of, well, not so. It’s not like it was a body snatcher... just that she was always putting on a mask. Something off with their waves versus their presentation, you know?” Betty’s chuckle sounded like the trickle of a stream on a spring morning. “Anyway, I digress. I don’t suppose you need assistance then, do you? I get bored in my retirement. It’s been so, so tedious these last 500 years. No new books to read.”

“What do you mean, no new books?” Milaro asked, “I know for a fact that the Farinth Kingdom has some of the best libraries outside of this one.”

“Well, you know, I couldn’t dive into different branches or go to the Academy and get some of those amazing storybooks they have in that one section. Still,” she sounded sad for a second. “I’ve missed the Library. Wait,” she turned quickly back and looked again. “Milaro, is that, is that you? In the flesh. Oh, it has been so long since I’ve seen you, little Milaro. You’ve been king a while now, haven’t you? I’m so sorry I couldn’t come to your coronation. I did have other things to attend to. My mother was still alive back then and the gods rest her soul. You know how she was with family dinners? She wouldn’t let me get out of that one. And it was a bit of a hike to get to you. How is that whole kingdom running thing going for you?”

Quinn watched for several seconds as Milaro and Betty exchanged pleasantries back and forth like good old friends that had been lost for eons. The whole incident was simply fascinating. She pulled the returned book toward her and ran her fingers along the spine. She could feel the tingle of magic as it went up her arms. And she glanced at the book again. It really didn’t seem like an alchemical book, which meant it had to be a medicinal book.

Link stood next to her, a furrow in his brow. “I legitimately do not remember her telling me anything about Kor being off. But it wouldn’t surprise me that it’s still in the 40% odd of memories that we have not yet retrieved. Typical, right?” He tossed a sort of sad look to Quinn and she shrugged.

“You know, it’s going to take time.” She spoke gently to him, not knowing how she would feel in his place and not wanting to make light of the ordeal, it was to retrieve all of his memories.

He smiled at her. “I’ve got a lot of the important memories back.”

“See?” Quinn grinned at him and nudged him. “You’ll get the rest.”

“I know. Also, so you know,” he pointed at the book she held. “It’s classified as mind healing. That’s why it’s a part of the alchemical and medicinal branch.”

“Oh,” Quinn nodded. “That makes sense. Nishpa’s type of healing, right?”

“Exactly.” Lynx looked like he was about to say more but was interrupted.

“Oh,” Betty said, “that’s odd.” She turned and looked at Quinn and Lynx. “Why is the Library not operating at full power?”

“Well, we were shut down for 500 years,” Lynx said. “Long story short, Library was shut down for emergency reasons and we’ve only just started rebuilding our powers.”

“Oh,” Betty said. “Huh. What have you been doing the last few hundred years that sapped you of so much strength? Do you need some Sprite dust?” She asked, her expression brightening considerably.

Lynx’s eyes shot up and glowed. “Are you kidding? You’d offer Sprite dust?”

Betty laughed and bopped Lynx on his nose with a tiny finger. “Well, it was my regular contribution for thousands of years, Lynx. Don’t you remember?”

Lynx shook his head. “No. No, I do not.”