Fic: Sara and the Book, Part I
Nov. 9th, 2009 08:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jackSara was 14 when she came to Cambridge University. This was very young and a very very great achievement, although it was only a footnote to all the things she would do later. Unfortunately she was a shy studious child ill adapted to making friends with students five years older than her.
So much of her identity was bound up in being a prodigy that she couldn't relax with students who wanted to let their hair down. She still needed to experiment socially, and make and lose friendships, and push boundaries, but everyone she knew had already gone through that, so she had lots of friends, but not really any peers. She would go to lectures, and go to supervisions, and play intellectual board games and card games, and even stand up to big people in intellectual bragging contests. But she had no true friends, and sometimes before she went to sleep she would lie awake wondering why she couldn't cry.
It was in this time that she first found the book. She loved bookshops, and libraries, and houses with books in, and would often just go and walk slowly round, even if she wasn't looking for anything. She was in an old shop in St Edward's passage, ambling the long way round before going to the supermarket. It sold more antiques and old books than novels she wanted to read, but she loved the atmosphere. She would dump her rucksack behind the counter downstairs, and go up, and drink in the must and knowledge.
She wasn't intending to look, but she started flicking through a shelf of old tomes. They seemed to be all sorts, and she'd open one, look at a random page, see if anything caught her eye, and return it. But about half way through, she found the book that would later become famous.
Like the others, it had no dust jacket, but thick cardboard covers. Any lettering on them had faded to illegibility. The book seemed to be an old French children's story, though she couldn't read it. But in the middle were a collection of thirty thick pages with incredibly glossy pictures. They looked old, and she wasn't sure when coloured printing had become so good. Were old pictures this well preserved rare, or impossible?
She flipped back to the first one and stared at it. It showed a lean white lioness standing proudly, head thrown back, and soft fur cascading along her lean flanks. In places her fur gave way to twisted bits of metal and wood in place of flesh, like small bits of armour. In the background was a rolling green plain, covered in short grasses, with glowing sky above, and small humanoid figures running on the horizon. The lioness seemed to stir, as if preening for Sara's enjoyment.
Sara smiled. She wanted the book immediately, just for that picture. Resignedly, she flipped to the front cover to see if there was a price written in. Most of the old books were twenty or thirty pounds, to the few people who wanted them, and unlikely for anyone else to buy on a whim. But though the scrawled figure inside was unreadable, it was clearly in pence.
She nervously flicked through the other pictures and awkwardly carried the heavy book downstairs in both hands. She was a little embarrassed asking the owner if the price was right, scared that the book would be worth hundreds of pounds and she'd look silly, or that it really was worth less than a pound and she'd feel silly for worrying. But the owner obligingly examined his scrawl, and assured her that it was. She handed over the exact amount of silver, hefted her backpack, and walked out still carrying the book.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
She would later learn all of the pictures in the book could be brought to life with the right keys, but other than the last, the picture of the lioness was the simplest, and was the one she discovered first. Some of pictures she would later study for years before unlocking, even with all the aid of her allies from earlier pictures.
To unlock the lioness, you had simply to touch the page with a single human tear. Sara rarely cried, but one night a few tears leaked along her cheek, and she cuffed them away, and rolled out of bed to stare at the comforting book. Her hand brushed against the page as if imagining stroking the fur.
The next morning, she woke curled round the lioness, who filled all of her bed and jutted half out from the duvet over empty air. A gigantic rumbling of lion-snoring and lion-heartbeat comforted Sara. She lay there for minutes, refusing to wake, and indeed, as soon as she sat up, the lioness was gone, though enough damage had been done to her sheets and bed to assure her she'd really been there.
The bedmakers glared at Sara very severely when they saw the damage, but she curled up inside herself and stared back blankly until they went away. Soon they learned not to disturb her too early in the morning, and if they saw a massive shape engulfing her bed, not to come close enough to see what it was.
So much of her identity was bound up in being a prodigy that she couldn't relax with students who wanted to let their hair down. She still needed to experiment socially, and make and lose friendships, and push boundaries, but everyone she knew had already gone through that, so she had lots of friends, but not really any peers. She would go to lectures, and go to supervisions, and play intellectual board games and card games, and even stand up to big people in intellectual bragging contests. But she had no true friends, and sometimes before she went to sleep she would lie awake wondering why she couldn't cry.
It was in this time that she first found the book. She loved bookshops, and libraries, and houses with books in, and would often just go and walk slowly round, even if she wasn't looking for anything. She was in an old shop in St Edward's passage, ambling the long way round before going to the supermarket. It sold more antiques and old books than novels she wanted to read, but she loved the atmosphere. She would dump her rucksack behind the counter downstairs, and go up, and drink in the must and knowledge.
She wasn't intending to look, but she started flicking through a shelf of old tomes. They seemed to be all sorts, and she'd open one, look at a random page, see if anything caught her eye, and return it. But about half way through, she found the book that would later become famous.
Like the others, it had no dust jacket, but thick cardboard covers. Any lettering on them had faded to illegibility. The book seemed to be an old French children's story, though she couldn't read it. But in the middle were a collection of thirty thick pages with incredibly glossy pictures. They looked old, and she wasn't sure when coloured printing had become so good. Were old pictures this well preserved rare, or impossible?
She flipped back to the first one and stared at it. It showed a lean white lioness standing proudly, head thrown back, and soft fur cascading along her lean flanks. In places her fur gave way to twisted bits of metal and wood in place of flesh, like small bits of armour. In the background was a rolling green plain, covered in short grasses, with glowing sky above, and small humanoid figures running on the horizon. The lioness seemed to stir, as if preening for Sara's enjoyment.
Sara smiled. She wanted the book immediately, just for that picture. Resignedly, she flipped to the front cover to see if there was a price written in. Most of the old books were twenty or thirty pounds, to the few people who wanted them, and unlikely for anyone else to buy on a whim. But though the scrawled figure inside was unreadable, it was clearly in pence.
She nervously flicked through the other pictures and awkwardly carried the heavy book downstairs in both hands. She was a little embarrassed asking the owner if the price was right, scared that the book would be worth hundreds of pounds and she'd look silly, or that it really was worth less than a pound and she'd feel silly for worrying. But the owner obligingly examined his scrawl, and assured her that it was. She handed over the exact amount of silver, hefted her backpack, and walked out still carrying the book.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
She would later learn all of the pictures in the book could be brought to life with the right keys, but other than the last, the picture of the lioness was the simplest, and was the one she discovered first. Some of pictures she would later study for years before unlocking, even with all the aid of her allies from earlier pictures.
To unlock the lioness, you had simply to touch the page with a single human tear. Sara rarely cried, but one night a few tears leaked along her cheek, and she cuffed them away, and rolled out of bed to stare at the comforting book. Her hand brushed against the page as if imagining stroking the fur.
The next morning, she woke curled round the lioness, who filled all of her bed and jutted half out from the duvet over empty air. A gigantic rumbling of lion-snoring and lion-heartbeat comforted Sara. She lay there for minutes, refusing to wake, and indeed, as soon as she sat up, the lioness was gone, though enough damage had been done to her sheets and bed to assure her she'd really been there.
The bedmakers glared at Sara very severely when they saw the damage, but she curled up inside herself and stared back blankly until they went away. Soon they learned not to disturb her too early in the morning, and if they saw a massive shape engulfing her bed, not to come close enough to see what it was.