The Librarian scrambled to his feet a dozen paces away. Half of his coat was burned away, and dozens of books lay scattered around him from the blast. He gaped at the empty space on the table where the infernal Ledger had been moments ago. "What have you done?!" he wailed, disbelief and fury warring in his voice. "You broke the game! You broke… everything!"
The Coinbearer, still catching his breath, weakly reached out and found his Coin lying amid a blackened scorch mark on the table. He dragged it across the wood back toward him. The small disk was charred around the edges, but as he closed his fist around it, a gentle chime sounded, the musical ting! of a completed coin toss.
Heads or tails?
He opened his palm.
Tails.
The moment he saw the image, the interlocking squares now warped at the edges, the Coin pulsed. Not softly this time, not the usual faint warmth. It throbbed like a second heart, radiant and angry. A tremor passed through the table, and the air grew thick, warping around the coin as if reality itself flinched.
Then, where the design of tails once lay, the surface shifted. A triangle emerged. In its center, an eye. The Coinbearer recoiled.
The eye blinked.
The air turned brittle, like old glass about to shatter. A scent of scorched parchment and rusted chains seeped through the cracks in space around him. Hell stirred.
He had never seen this.
Not even the devils.
The mask tilted down toward the coin in his palm. The Coinbearer's breath grew shallow. He'd flipped it countless times across centuries, but never had the coin answered him and never like this.
He closed his fingers around it again. The pulse did not stop.
"This isn't Hell's game anymore," he whispered.
As that chime rang, the Librarian's face went deathly pale. A second ethereal gong answered the first from high above. The Librarian's single green eye bulged. "You... what have you done to a coin... They heard that," he whispered, one hand clutching at his wild hair. "The Keepers… The others… They will come!" His gaze shot upward in terror, as if expecting vengeful arbiters to swoop down from the shadows at any moment.
Elise rose to her feet, standing boldly in front of the recovering Coinbearer. Her own anger had cooled into grim satisfaction. "It appears the game ends in a draw," she said into the echoing silence.
"A d-draw," the Librarian repeated hollowly. He gave a strained, high-pitched laugh, swaying on his feet. "A draw, in my own domain… never in ten thousand tournaments…" He stumbled toward the table, running a shaking hand over its scorched surface and the toppled, ashen cards. The oaken table had cracked clean down the middle, split by the Coin's final magic.
All around, the library's normal golden light was returning. Far above, Elise glimpsed dark winged shapes descending rapidly from the highest stacks, perhaps the mysterious Keepers the Librarian so feared, drawn by the cosmic disruption. The Librarian's attention snapped to those silhouettes. Fear flashed across his ink-stained features. "No, no, no… you've brought them upon me," he hissed at the Coinbearer and Elise.
He whirled to face them, and for a heartbeat Elise thought he might lash out in desperation. But then he simply sagged, shoulders slumping. The fight, quite literally, had gone out of him. In the flickering light, he looked smaller, almost feeble. The mad light in his eyes had dimmed to an exhausted flicker.
Near Elise's feet, one loose page from Elise's fate-tome fluttered down, freed in the chaos. She carefully picked it up. Singed at the edges but intact, it showed a sketch of the shrine,– likely torn from the book during the whirlwind. She folded the page and tucked it securely into her coat. A precious clue salvaged from the storm.
Behind Elise, the Coinbearer gingerly rose, shrugging off the last brittle bits of broken chain still hanging on him. He was unsteady, and Elise moved to brace him. Together, they faced the defeated Librarian.
"You…" the Librarian spat softly, pointing a quivering finger at the Coinbearer. The old curator's voice was filled with a kind of awe and fury. "No Coinbearer has ever dared what you just did. You shattered an infernal contract and defied this Archive's order in one stroke."
The Coinbearer's voice came out raspy but resolute. "I did what I had to do."
Above, heavy wingbeats and raised voices echoed, the Keepers were close now. The Librarian flinched, looking truly afraid for the first time. Whatever punishment those approaching wardens would mete out, it would not be pleasant, Elise guessed.
Despite everything, Elise felt a small pang of pity for the Librarian. He had brought much of this on himself, true, but he was also a victim of his own hubris and now likely to face censure from powers even he answered to. Softly, she spoke to him: "We should go. We have no wish to see you come to harm for what happened here."
The Librarian huffed, wiping his face with a shaking hand and inadvertently smearing more ink across his cheek. "Harm… The only harm is to my pride," he muttered sourly. He shot the Coinbearer a resentful look. "Hell will want your head for breaking that contract, you know. And your coin…" His gaze slid to Elise, and for once it held no lechery or malice, only a weary caution. "will make you pay the price. The real game is just beginning for you two."
All around them, the library's magic was already working to repair the damage. The shelves that had moved to form the arena were sliding back into their original places. The cracked marble floor was sealing itself, erasing the scars of battle. In the heights, the winged Keepers' alarmed shouts grew louder as they descended to investigate.
The Librarian closed his eyes and drew a long, steadying breath. When he opened them again, he had regained a measure of composure, though he looked profoundly tired. "Fine. Run along, mortals," he grumbled, waving a hand at them as if shooing children.
With a snap of his fingers, he conjured a doorway of swirling darkness a few steps away, their exit. Through it, Elise could just make out the shapes of trees under a night sky – the forest of the mortal world. A way home.
The Coinbearer inclined his head toward the Librarian – a gesture almost respectful. "You have our thanks… for the knowledge, and for the game," he said quietly.
The Librarian barked a wry, pained laugh. "Keep your thanks. You cost me far more today than you realize." He cast another nervous glance upward at the oncoming Keepers. "I'll be busy with damage control for the next century at least."
Elise mustered her courage and offered a small, sincere bow. "We will take our leave, then. I'm… sorry it turned out this way."
The Librarian stared at her for a moment, then shook his head in exasperation. "Sorry, she says. Hah!" He made a dismissive shooing motion again. "Begone, foolish girl, and pray our paths don't cross again unless you intend to pay your overdue fines."
Elise nearly smiled, trust the Librarian to have the last jab. She turned to help the Coinbearer toward the swirling portal. He was limping, but together they managed a steady pace. Just as they reached the threshold, the Librarian called out, unable to resist one final parting word.
"Child," he said. Elise paused and glanced back. The Librarian tapped the cracked monocle over his green eye and regarded her with an inscrutable expression. "Seed of starfire… the world will bend around you in the days to come. Tread wisely." His gaze then flicked to the Coinbearer. "And you, Coinbearer, remember what I told you. That Coin you carry is older than Hell itself. That scrap of truth is yours, free of charge. Use it well."
Before either Elise or the Coinbearer could respond, the Librarian snapped his fingers sharply. A gust of mundane wind surged from behind and shoved the two of them forward. Elise tightened her hold on the Coinbearer as together they stumbled into the darkness of the portal.
The last thing Elise saw of the Palace Between Pages was the Librarian drawing himself up straight as three winged, glowing figures alighted near him on the marble floor. Their voices rose in alarm and anger, demanding explanations amid the fluttering pages still falling like ash through the air. The Librarian cast one final glance toward Elise and the Coinbearer, a complex mix of irritation, admiration, and perhaps relief then turned to face his approaching superiors.
Then the portal whisked shut, and the vast library was gone.
Cool night air caressed Elise's face. A chorus of crickets chirped nearby; the scents of pine and rich loam replaced the must of dust and parchment. They were back in the mortal realm, standing in a shadowy woodland glade lit only by a crescent moon.
Elise and the Coinbearer stood together among mossy stones. Only a few strides away, the massive oak gate-tree loomed, its gnarled roots unmistakable and comforting. They had emerged near where they'd entered, the witches' clearing. The forest was silent now, emptied of witches and demons, the ground still charred and scarred from the recent battle.
The Coinbearer exhaled a long breath and nearly buckled. At once, Elise slipped under his arm, supporting his weight against her smaller frame. Now that the adrenaline of battle was ebbing, his accumulated injuries and exhaustion were taking a harsh toll.
"You're free," Elise whispered, equal parts question and statement. "Your contract… it's gone, isn't it?"
The Coinbearer pressed a hand to his chest where red chain-burns crisscrossed his skin beneath the tattered cloth. Those wounds still throbbed, but beneath them he felt an absence of something that had always been there. He nodded faintly. "I'm bound to a coin... but yes." There was wonder and disbelief in his voice, and just a hint of joy that he dared not fully embrace yet.
Elise's heart swelled despite all the sorrows of the day. In the span of a single night and day, both of them had slipped bonds that were supposed to be unbreakable. She closed her eyes and silently thanked whatever powers had watched over that coin toss. Gently, she looked up at him. "How long were we inside the Library?" she asked softly. "It was dawn… and now it's night. And somehow… my wounds are gone...."
The Coinbearer glanced up at the moon and stars overhead. "Hours, perhaps. Time flows strangely in places like this." He shifted his weight, leaning on her a little less as his balance returned. "Come. We shouldn't linger, Hell's agents won't be far behind."
He paused, then added more quietly, "As for your wounds… you are neither dead, nor truly alive."
Elise nodded. Though she was bone-tired, a deep exhilaration fluttered within her. They had survived the unsolvable. With the Coinbearer leaning on her shoulder, she began to guide them out of the clearing and into the shelter of the woods.
Above the trees, a single bright star shone amid the night's darkness. Elise couldn't help but feel it shined a touch brighter than the others as if heralding the path ahead.
Together, they left the ruined sanctuary behind, stepping into the unknown that awaited beyond the trees.