The dim library seemed to brighten when the girl entered it.
"Oh," Alice In Wonderland breathed, her dark green cover shifting ever so slightly, "There's a girl!"
"Psst!" whispered Treasure Island, inching himself to the bookshelf's edge, "It's the girl. It's Indira!"
"Humph!" growled his neighbour, The Tightwad Gazette, "Don't be silly, boy. Indira has been gone for ten years. She will never be back. If she really cared, she would have come back sooner. This girl isn't—"
"No!" Alice In Wonderland broke in, "No, Tightwad, you are wrong. Treasure is right. It really is Indira. She has come back to us at last. And my, how she has grown. She was a wee child last time I saw her, and now she is practically a woman."
A tattered book shoved in between Tightwad and Alice let out a small, choked sob. The old book shuddered, surprising his shelf mates. "You are right, Alice, it is Indira. We cannot fail her this time. We must not. We must stop the man who claims to be her father!"
Indira could have sworn that she could hear pages rustling, yet how could they be? She was alone in the library. But hadn't Grandpa always told her books were magical? When she was little, she had believed that, but she was too grown up now. Books were books, and that was that.
"Really?" asked a little voice in the back of her head.
"Yes, really," Indira said emphatically to the empty library, "Books are just books, and magic is not real." She laughed. It was a bitter, angry laugh, a laugh tinged with cynicism, although perhaps the girl did not realize it. Of course books weren't really magical. They held magic-filled stories, sure, but Magic wasn't real. Her father had told her that often enough since Grandpa had died. Grandpa had believed in Magic, but Dad said that Grandpa was an old fool. Reading was for fools too, Dad told her. Even so, something in Indira made her seek out books. Indira needed books like one needs water.
Not long after Grandpa disappeared and Dad had taken her away from the mansion, Indira found a copy of Rumpelstiltskin in her dad's office. It was strange, because all of the other books in his office were boring law books. Dad was a lawyer, she supposed, although in truth, she wasn't at all sure where he went each day, or what he did with his time.
When Dad caught her with Rumpelstiltskin in hand, he had torn the book frantically from her hand, swearing.
"Don't ever let me catch you with a fairytale book again!" he had thundered, his voice angry, short body tensed. She thought she had heard a hint of fear in his voice, but had brushed it off, because what reason did Dad have to be afraid of fairytales? And if he was afraid, why did he keep Rumpelstiltskin in his office?
For a month, she succeeded in fighting down her need for the stories, but but the pull was too strong.
When her Dad finally put her in school, she discovered that there were fairytales in the school library. That was all it took. Secretly, she began devouring all of the fairytales in her school. She read them whenever she had a spare minute.
Indira was careful to never let anyone see her reading the fantastical stories that she loved so much, for fear that her dad would find out. Indira was terrified of what her father would do to her if he knew. His temper was unpredictable, and he lashed out at random times. Nevertheless, Indira's desperate need for story outweighed the fear of her father's dangerous temper.
There was one book in the school library that Indira never touched. Rumplestiltskin.
***
Indira supposed Dad must not yet know that there were shelves and shelves of fairytales in Grandpa's old library. Perhaps she should hide them before he came to check. It was one of the first things her father always did when they moved somewhere new. He checked each new house for fairytales, and burnt any that he found. Twaddle, he called them. Then he’d make her repeat after him, "Books are just books, and Magic is not real."
Indira found the shelves of fairytales that Grandpa used to read to her each night. She set about choosing which ones to hide. She knew it wouldn't be long before her father showed up to rid the library of books that even hinted of Magic. Quickly, she drew Cinderella and The Goose Girl from the bottom shelf.
She debated on taking The Golden Bird from the second shelf up, but as she simply could not take very many books and still manage to hide them all, she passed The Golden Bird by.
Next, Indira reached for Alice In Wonderland on the third shelf. The book's dark green cover shifted ever so slightly in her hand. It almost seemed as though the book was giving off a slight humming sound. It was her imagination, Indira knew.
"Really?" that little voice in the back of her head asked again.
Indira shook her head. "Seriously? Of course it is my imagination. Books don't hum. That is the stupidest thing I ever heard! Books are just books, and Magic is not real."
Alice couldn't help it. "You say that a lot, you know." she said, ever so quietly. 'Books are just books, and magic is not real.' That isn't true," she said, her voice barely above a whisper. She could feel Indira's hand tighten around her. The girl had heard her. Good.
"It is too true. Books are just books, and Magic is not real!" Indira stopped, puzzled. Why had she felt the need to say that? The voice inside her head had said something else. No, that wasn't right. The voice was lighter, silvery, more feminine this time, but it was still inside her head. What was going on? Was she ill? Indira tried to shrug it off, but a general feeling of uneasiness was beginning to settle over her.
Indira's hand hovered once again in front of the third shelf, her eyes scanning the titles. Suddenly, Indira froze. "Rumplestiltskin," she whispered, her eyes wide. Indira's hand moved slowly for the old, tattered book. It fit right in the palm of her hand, it was so small. She shouldn't be doing this. Dad would kill her. And yet, something inside Indira told her that she needed that book. Maybe it was that voice inside her head again. She wasn't really sure what was happening. All she knew is that she had to take Rumplestiltskin. She felt some desperate need to know the story. Dad had ripped his copy from her hand all those years ago before she had a chance to read it.
Indira's hand closed around the ragged copy of Rumplestiltskin just as footsteps sounded in the stone corridor outside of the library.
"Indira, baby girl, where are you?"
It was Dad. Indira's hand shook as she shoved Cinderella, The Goose Girl, and Alice In Wonderland beneath the bookcase. She shoved the old copy of Rumpelstiltskin inside the waistband of her shorts, beneath her knee length, flowing sundress. Dad would never find it there. Indira stood quickly, moving to another part of the library far away from the fairytales, her heart pounding like a crazed jackrabbit.
"In the library, Dad," she called, willing her voice to stay steady. She took a deep breath, desperately trying to calm her heartbeat.
"There you are!" Dad rounded some bookcases, smiling. "Why are you looking at the law books, darlin'?"
"I—" Indira cleared her throat shakily, "I thought there might be some books in here that you might like to have in your office." Indira kept her gaze on the stone floor. Dad liked to see her submissive, he said. That meant never looking him in the face, and never ever looking into his eyes—unless he told her to do so. It was difficult to avoid his eyes because he was so short. Indira had never met anyone else with a father only three feet tall.
"You seem nervous, my dear. Is there something you would like to tell me?"
"No."
"Nu-uh-uh," Dad scolded. "What did we talk about?"
"No, Your Most Royal Highness." Indira's hands were sweaty. Another one of his strange, eccentric rules. He'd decided a few days ago that she was too old to call him Dad. He had decreed that from now on, she would call him Your Most Royal Highness.
"I think you are hiding something, dear. Aren't you going to tell me what it is?"
Indira stayed still and silent. He was toying with her, playing a sort of cat-and-mouse game with her.
"Indira," Dad's voice went sickly sweet. Indira's heart sank. "Indira," he repeated, "look me in the eyes." He lifted her chin, holding it up with one gnarled finger. She met his icy blue eyes. He smiled.
It wasn't a nice smile.
It was a wolfish, devilish smile, an I-know-you-are-up-to-something smile, and, most of all, a smile that sent sharp pangs of fear shooting deep into Indira's body. Dad knew the sort of effect this smile had on her. Yes, oh yes, he knew. He knew just exactly how much she hated that smile.
"You know that each time we move, you are supposed to let me go into the library first. What are you doing in here?" Dad's voice was dangerously, poisonously sweet. His cold, cold eyes bored into her, daring her to keep the truth from him. He was trying to intimidate her, she knew, and it was working.
"It's just Grandpa's old library. I didn't think you'd mind, Dad—I mean, Your Most Royal Highness." She swallowed. Yet another blunder. This was why she always tried to stay out of Dad's way. Because every time she was around him, he found something wrong with her or something wrong with what she'd done. Sometimes he seemed normal, but then something would happen that would set him off. It only took one little miss-step, one little blunder, to put him into one of his awful, unpredictable moods. Evidently he was in one of those moods today.
"Indira."
"Yes, Your Most Royal Highness?" Indira's gaze faltered, shifting to the floor again.
"Look at me!" Dad's voice was just as cold as his icy blue eyes now. Indira dragged her eyes back to meet his gaze.
Dad ground out his words one at a time. "What. Did. You. Do?"
A thud sounded on the other side of the library. Dad's head jerked around. "What was that?" he let Indira's chin drop, striding across the library to find out what had made the noise. He disappeared behind the bookshelf where the fairytales were.
"Indira, come here. NOW."
Indira's heart sank deeper. She forced her feet to move forward, towards where Dad was waiting.
Clutched tightly in his hand was a copy of Rapunzel. "You've been reading fairytales, haven't you? Is this the way you repay your father for all that he has done for you? By reading the one kind of story I have asked you to never read?"
Asked? More like threatened her within an inch of her life if she so much as dared to even glance at a fairytale book. And now he'd found her out. There was no use denying it. Somehow he always seemed to know instinctively when he guessed correctly what she was up to.
Dad reached up on his tiptoes and backhanded her on the cheek. "Go to your room this instant. Stay there until I give you permission to beg my forgiveness. There will be severe consequences for this blatant defiance of yours."
Indira saw stars after her dad struck her. Her cheek was on fire, and unbidden tears had sprung into her eyes. He was constantly humiliating her this way, but what could she do? He was her father, after all, and capable of doing anything. That was what made him so terrifying.
Suddenly, unexpectedly, she laughed. Who else had a father who was so short that he had to reach up on tip-toe to smack her? Who else had a father who was seemingly terrified of fairytales? Who else had a father who demanded that he be addressed as Your Most Royal Highness? Who else had a father who insisted upon giving people his permission to beg forgiveness for imaginary wrongs? Somehow, she was related to this madman.
"Are you?" That little voice in her head asked, nudging her brain.
Dad's eyes went wide, his angry mask slipping for just one second. "Did you just laugh? Nothing about this is funny, young lady. You are in serious trouble here."
"I know." Indira's shoulders were shaking, and laughter was still bubbling out. Although she was still terrified, she couldn’t seem to control her laughter. Something inside her had snapped. She felt as though she was watching this scene from afar, it was so ludicrous.
"You're short,” she crowed. The little, bubbly laughs turned into full belly laughs.
"What?"
"I said, you're short!"
Dad's hand came up to strike her again. She caught it. Dad frowned, looking at his hand. Indira shrieked with laughter. She couldn’t believe she just did that. She'd just insulted her dad, and she'd touched him. Dad hated to be touched.
"Room. Now."
Indira, laughing so hard that tears were beginning to flow down her cheeks, nodded obediently, turning to go.
***
Indira closed the door of her bedroom behind her, turned, and flopped on the huge bed. She was breathing hard from laughing, and from the exhilarating feeling of having stood up to her father for the first time. Sure, she'd pay for it later, but it had been worth the look on his face. Right now, she hardly cared about anything.
"We're alone now. Can we talk?"
The voice that had been inside her head so much today was back.
"Who said that?"
"The book in your waistband."
Indira slapped her waist. She'd forgotten about the book she’d hidden.
"Ow!"Please don't slap me. My cover is in rough shape."
"Am I seriously talking to a book?" Indira asked, pulling Rumplestiltskin gingerly from her waistband, trying to make up for accidentally hitting his cover so hard.
"Yes, you are. Thank you for handling me so gently. And thank you for freeing me from that bookshelf. It gets to feeling mighty cramped after a few years. May I ask you a question, Indira?"
"Sure."
"Do you know your dad's real name?"
"Umm...no? I am going to ask you a question now. How do I know I'm really talking to a book and that I'm not dreaming?"
“I’ll start with the basics, some of which you already know, like the fact that you’ve always gravitated towards fairytales, and you have felt as though you could not live without them. This unique need for fairytales stems from the fact that you are a Story Warden, just like your grandfather is. He—"
"Hold it. What do you mean, is? My grandpa is dead."
"Ah, see, this is where you are mistaken. Your grandfather is still alive. I know it is hard to believe, there will be a lot of things I am going to tell you a lot of things that will be hard for you to accept as true, so you may as well get used to it."
"Prove it to me. For the past ten years I have believed my grandpa to be dead. I can't just blindly accept that he is alive because some old book tells me so out of the blue. Prove to me that my grandfather is still alive."
“Very well then. Open me. Your grandfather is trapped inside.”