Jeb returned to his desk in the Stacks with his new book tucked carefully under his arm. It was everything that he had hoped for. Not only did it describe what each plant looked like, it also gave some details on how they were grown.
Unfortunately, very few of the plants grew in conditions that he could reproduce with the field he had access to. Those few that could were written in thin black ink, which made sense once Jeb took a step back and thought about it. If the plants could be grown in any field, there would have been nothing stopping any Farmer from growing them, or from the Republic demanding that they did.
As the book described more esoteric methods to grow plants, Jeb began to wonder about his first visit to the Library after receiving his Class. The Librarian had told him then that there were no books on Agricultural Magic, but Jeb struggled to describe this book as anything else. There was a possibility that the book was not labeled that way by some Library system, and that the Librarian hadn’t thought about Druidic Magic when Jeb had asked the question. He had a hard time believing that, especially given how quickly the Librarian had led him to other forms of Magic. That meant there had to be a reason the Librarian had kept Jeb from learning about Magical Plants and Druidic Magic. What could it be though?
Jeb stared at the constantly shifting Stacks for hours as he considered the question. When the bells tolled midnight, he shook his head and left the Stacks. His mind had run consistently blank on any ideas to explain the Librarian’s choice. As he tossed and turned unsleeping that night, he continued to wrestle with the question. When he finally faded out of consciousness, his dreams were filled with betrayal.
In the morning, Jeb still did not have a good answer to what the Librarian had been trying to do by shielding him. The best idea he had was that the Librarian did not want Jeb to become a Druid, which seemed plausible. Still, why couldn’t he have told Jeb about Druidic Magic while warning him to not develop a Skill for it?
He realized that he had a single way to potentially learn the answer. Skipping breakfast, Jeb ran towards the Stacks. Despite the fact that the geography of the Academy was fluid, it still seemed to take him where he needed to go more quickly when he moved with more urgency. In the Stacks, he wandered, searching for Margaret.
After a few minutes of searching, he saw her leaping up the shelves to pull down a book. She leaned over the side of the book case, giving him a grin.
“Someone misshelved this book a decade ago. The records have it listed as missing.” She took the book and hopped down to face Jeb.
“Now, then, how can I help you this morning?”
“Would it be possible for me to send a letter to the Librarian, rather than to my family?”
“Which Librarian do you wish to send a letter to?” Margaret asked.
Jeb let out a frustrated breath. “The Librarian from my hometown.” As he said that, he realized that he still had no idea what his hometown Librarian’s name was. On top of the fact that he did not know why he had lied to Jeb, the secrets were beginning to grate. “Why haven’t you ever used his name?”
Her smile fell. “I had been wondering when you would get around to asking that question. The Academy Librarians set up an entire betting ring over it, in case you are curious.”
Jeb could tell that she had said that to try to distract him from the question of the Librarian’s name. “I am curious,” he admitted, “but not curious enough to be distracted from my question. Do you not know my Librarian’s name?”
Her smile returned. “Ooh, that is a good question. In fact, that is a much better question than the last one you asked. I do not know what name the the Librarian of Humdrumville uses to refer to himself.”
The difference between Jeb’s question and the answer Margaret gave him was subtle enough that he almost missed it. “You don’t know what name he uses for himself, or what name the Republic uses to keep track of him?” he pressed.
She sighed. “I do not know the former. An argument could be made that I am not entirely sure that your Librarian is actually in any current Republic systems, but that would be needlessly pedantic, even for me.”
Jeb waited for her to continue, but she stopped speaking as though she had nothing more to say. “So you know what his name is?”
She let out a heavy breath and nodded slowly, as though weighed down.
“Can you tell me his name?”
She shook her head, each action slower than the one before.
“Can you tell me why you cannot tell me his name?”
She paused, a quizzical expression overtaking her features. After a long moment of consideration, she shook her head and spoke again, “no.”
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Jeb figured there was no harm in trying one level deeper, “can you tell me why you cannot tell me why you cannot tell me his name?”
She let out a shaky laugh. “Interesting,” Margaret said, “I think that I can, at least in part.” She opened her mouth, but no words came out. “I guess that I’ll have to be careful about how I do so, though. I cannot tell you why I cannot tell you his name for the same reason that I cannot tell you his name.”
Margaret paused, as though she was unable to believe that she had been able to say even that much. In a slightly dazed tone, she continued, “I do not know the exact circumstances of that reason, though I was told as an Apprentice Librarian that it was as much for the safety of the Republic as for his safety. There were implications that it would be dangerous for me if it became widely known that I knew his given name, but-”
Her voice cut off suddenly. After a moment, she began to cough. “Well, at least we know where the limits are to what I can say,” she said. “I apologize that I cannot be of more assistance with this request. Do you still wish to send him a letter?”
Jeb had almost forgotten where the conversation had moved to the Librarian’s name from. “I think so?” he said hesitantly. “Though I am less certain of that now.”
She nodded. “What were you planning to ask him? If it is something too dangerous, I would not be able to send it to him.”
“When I was first given my Class, I was stunned and disappointed,” Jeb said, remembering how terrified he was that his family would reject him. That fear, while ridiculous in retrospect, had left him grasping for any lifeline possible. “I went to the Library in town to ask if there was any way for me to somehow learn Agricultural Magic, because I had no desire to become a Mud Mage.”
Margaret gave him a sad but understanding look. “I assume that he told you there was no such Magic?”
Jeb nodded.
She bobbed her head, as though weighing some sort of mental scale. “I do not know if he will answer your question. However, I can offer a few hypotheses as to why he would have done so, if you would like.”
“I would appreciate it,” Jeb responded.
She held up three fingers. “First, it sounds to me as though you were not in a good mental state when you approached him. Being a Druid is not an acceptable choice in the Republic right now. The most likely answer is that he was worried that you would become a Druid and then be forced to leave the country and your family.”
Jeb was glad to hear that she had the same impression that he did. “And if it isn’t that?” he asked, seeing that she still held two other fingers up.
She shrugged. “The second reason is similar, if more self-interested. If a Druid was to suddenly appear in the middle of the Republic, I can guarantee that any number of Auditors would have been sent to understand why. Given how low of a profile he was trying to keep, drawing the ire of higher ups would have been completely out of the question.”
Jeb nodded thoughtfully. He hadn’t even considered the fact that the Librarian could have been concerned for his own safety.
“Finally,” she lowered her last finger, “he may have been concerned that you learning to grow Magical Plants at that point would have been ultimately harmful to your development.”
Jeb frowned, eyebrows creasing in confusion. “What do you mean?”
She gave him a blank look. “Can you honestly tell me that if you had been given a path to becoming a Magical Farmer that you would have hesitated for even an instant before taking that option? I may not have known you then, but I can read the echoes of the boy you once were.”
“I probably would have,” Jeb admitted, “but would that have been so bad?”
She shrugged. “Bad for who?”
Jeb waited for her to continue, but it seemed as though she were legitimately asking him to think about who it would have harmed. He started thinking aloud. “I never would have learned how much I love Glyphs or other forms of Magic.”
She gestured for him to continue talking.
“The Censusmaster would likely still have kidnapped me. If he had, I would not have had any recourse to be able to escape the debt.”
Margaret nodded slowly.
“But wait,” Jeb objected, “there is no way that the Librarian could have known the Censusmaster would have done that.”
The Stacks Librarian shrugged. “For that reason alone it would be worth asking him what his reasoning was. I simply provided some possible reasons. Consider, however. How long has that Censusmaster had Humdrumville as part of his route?”
Understanding began to shine in Jeb’s eyes. “The Librarian could have had plenty of time to learn what the Censusmaster is like over the years. I do still want to know what he was thinking, though, so I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
Jeb rushed over to his desk and quickly penned the Librarian a note. Only as he began searching for Margaret again did he realize how ridiculous his leaving to go write a note was. He knew that she read each message he sent to his family before she somehow transmitted it to the Librarian. There was no reason he couldn’t have just told her what he wanted to ask the Librarian.
Something about that thought must have showed on his face when he found her again, because she smirked slightly. “Did you just realize that there was no reason you needed to pen a note?”
Jeb blushed and nodded slightly, handing over the page.
She quickly skimmed it and handed it back to him.
“I will leave his response, if there is one, on your desk.”
“Thank you!” Jeb said, moving back towards the Stacks. Now that he had done everything in his power to learn what the Librarian’s motivation had been in denying him the information before, Jeb found that it was much easier to focus on the reading. Only after a few hours of reading did Jeb realize that Margaret had, for the first time, referred to the desk he kept in the Stacks as his desk.
A few hours later, a folded piece of paper ran into the back of his head, clearly tossed there by Margaret. On the front, she had written “make sure to eat food. You cannot sustain yourself on knowledge alone.” It looked like the word “yet” might have been written and erased beneath the text, but he could not say that with any certainty. As he unfolded it, he saw that the Librarian had sent him a response.
His answer was more or less what Jeb had been expecting. The Librarian apologized for misleading him, before explaining that he did not think that it would have been in his best interest to learn about Druidic Magic in his early days as a Classholder. The Librarian did not expound on why he did not believe it would have been in Jeb’s best interest, but he supposed that Margaret might have editorialized one of the two of their messages. If not, the Librarian probably just trusted that Jeb would be able to walk himself through the potential pitfalls.