The Last Guard

Nothing had prepared her for the silence and the darkness of the end of the world. But she'd made a vow, a promise to stand guard until there was nothing left. The explosion had been weeks ago, maybe months. The time had blurred. This Library held all of the knowledge of the Great Land. She'd been chosen to be its guard. Not only did she make sure that those who came looking got the information and found what they needed, she made sure those who shouldn't have it didn't get it. The children called her The Librarian, the adults - the Gaurd of Knowledge.

She has done her job well. But then, that day, the explosion, it shook the library to its core. Books fell everywhere, and the world had gone so dark. Birds stopped singing, children stopped playing. Her little border town slowly quited, had people looking for loved ones or out of desperation fled to to larger towns, and villages to see if they could find something. Maybe they'd tried to get to the Capitol? Or where they all in hiding like her?

Surely, it was protected. Deborah wasn't so sure. The other guard's messanger birds that had been sending messages back and forth, had stopped coming back. Deborah was starting to think that the birds had become prey for the monstrous beasts that now roamed in the dark.

Her own bird had not come back. She was isolated. No one dared darken the doors of the library. Not now. Surely, she couldn't blame them. The answers they were searching for could not be found here. They were in a territory unknown. She hoped and prayed for the sun to break through the darkness, but it seemed as though the explosion had sent the sun out of the sky.

One morning, out of pure desperation, or at least what had become her morning, she climbed the highest tower in the library, to open shutters. Hoping that the air was no longer thick with ash. With great effort she pushed them open, and was greeted by the smell of smoke, and a thick fog, but the air felt palatable, so she drank in the fresher air.

Then she noticed it: a faint glow piercing through ash-filled fog, it was the sun! She knew it in her heart, she felt its warmth. Maybe the world wasn't ending? But the world she knew had certainly ended.

Over the next few days, the sun’s light grew stronger, and as she climbed the tower daily, Deborah saw a world that she did not recognize. Anywhere that wasn't covered in ash had claw marks. There was red staining throughout the streets, she shuddered to think what had happened to those who braved the streets in the darkness. Had they tried to come to her library? It was one of the most secure buildings this close to the border.

She'd sounded the alarm, telling them to seek refuge here. But they hadn't come. Maybe they couldn't. Maybe they were afraid. Had the king been behind this? That was almost heresy to say. The King wasn't a good man. Not unlike the prince, she’d met the royal family once. The king had eyes like stone, as if he had no love left in them. His son, however, had eyes like pools that never ended, as if he had a lifetime of love yet to find. She was sure the prince had been a good man, a kind man.

If the royal family was still alive, where were they? They’d made visits during war times. Surely, if they were okay, they would have sent out at least the royal hunters to slay those horrid beasts. The royal bird had not come either.

Isolated and alone, she wasn't sure anyone was left in the village. She wasn't sure at all. She'd lit the lamp as frequently as she dared. Trying to alert people there was a safe haven here. But no one came.

Even with the sun's return, people did not leave their homes. The sun seemed to keep the beasts at bay, but when night fell, she heard the beasts rattling at the door. Leading her to believe no one else was left in the village and now they where trying to get to her.

She'd sworn a vow, a promise to never leave the live to leave the library unguarded. It's what she'd been born to do; her father and his father had been gaurds. Just like his mother and her mother and so on, and so on. Her family had been the Libaray guard for generations, hardly ever leaving the walls of the library. Had it not been for the explosion, another guard would have been arriving shortly to allow her time to enter society and find love, to produce an heir to continue to guard the library doors.

Maybe that is why the loneliness had been eating away at her. She knew was running out of time. How much longer could she stay? The food reserves were dwindling. And without the other villagers. There was no way she could survive here on her own. She knew she had to leave. Even if it went against everything she knew.

She would be entering a world she knew nothing about, and she wasn't convinced the book she'd spent her life reading had enough knowledge to save her. She put the library in as good of a lockdown as she could. She had debated burning them to the ground to protect the knowledge, but if her world sureved, people would need those books. Saying a prayer that the beasts would not destroy the books, she went down to the basement, deep into the tunnels. One of her previous generations had created supply bags in case they ever had to flee during a war. Deborah grabbed a bag and an ill-fitting set of leather armor. As the sun rose, she exited out the secret exit of the library into the Lost Woods. Unsure of what she'd find or how she'd get by. But she didn't have much choice. She had to try.