Contractbound

He arrived fifteen minutes later and got out. The city"s public library was located in the same square as the Town Hall. Everyone had access to the library as long as they could show an ident.i.ty card. Many citizens from various cities would often come to Sloten"s Public Library because it was deemed as one of the best libraries in the country in terms of collection and facilities. It was also open 24 hours, so the patrons usually spent much time reading from the many collections inside. At night, many people would visit the library with the purpose of staying the night. The city allowed it, as long as they abode by the rules.

The library itself looked cla.s.sic, just like all the other buildings around the square. It was a big three-story building with giant marble pillars supporting it. Inside, marble columns stood high up to the ceiling up above. The inside of the library was very s.p.a.cious. Bookshelves towered high wherever eyes could see. There were rows of tables and chairs available for people to read at and sofas were gathered in some corners of the building. There were stairs leading to the second and third floors where more chairs and sofas could be found.

There were a lot of people inside the library at that time. Graham went in and was asked to show an ident.i.ty card by library security. Once he showed it to the man, he was permitted entry. He stopped at the entrance to admire the beautiful architecture of the library.

"We"re back here, Val. When was the last time we came here? Back at Uni? I remember we used to come a lot. The library at uni sucks compared to this." he reminisced.

Graham looked at the labels of each bookshelf to find the one he was looking for. He needed to find the history section which contained books on mythology and history of the world. It didn"t find him the right shelf, but to find the right book among the countless books there would take some time. He wanted to do divination but he might burn down the whole library if he did so.

After browsing for a while, he took two heavy-looking books from the shelves and sat down on a sofa with the books next to him. He leaned back and started reading one. He skimmed through the book with the t.i.tle: The Evolution Theory.

"At the beginning of time, there were giant creatures roaming the Earth. Mankind didn"t exist at that time until one day, a cataclysmic event happened and wiped away all the giant creatures. Millions of years later, humanlike creatures started appearing, and very slowly, they evolved into the bipedal mammals that we are today."

Graham went into thinking. "Val, this theory sounds plausible, but there has been no proof as of now. No remains of the "giant creatures" nor the "humanlike" creatures have been found. And the way this theory was written is too vague. There is no detail at tall, only vague descriptions."

There had been no discovery of remains of giant creatures as far as Graham knew. There were, however, rumors of some giant creature sightings coming from around the world. Although, most of them were not very reliable. They only had blurry photos which could really have been anything. But people liked this kind of story; it gave them something to talk about.

He put down the first book and picked up the second. It was t.i.tled "A Creationist Theory of Human Existence". He skimmed through the book again.

"At the beginning of time, there was only Chaos. The Earth was barren with Fire raging everywhere. One day, G.o.d rose from the depth of the Earth to create Order. From Fire, He created light on the first day. From Fire, He created the sky on the second day. From Fire, He created dry land, seas, plants, and trees on the third day. From Fire, He created the Sun, Moon, and stars on the fourth day. And then, in his image, He created mankind from Fire. After G.o.d had created Order, He went back to His slumber in the depth of the Earth, only to wake up on the Day of Judgment."

Graham a.n.a.lyzed what he had just skim-read and thought for a while.

"Val, I"ve also heard of this one, but some things do not check out. According to this, the Earth had existed before everything else was created. How is that possible? And everything was created from fire. How is water created from the fire? And right now we know that numerous Deities do exist. The book doesn"t mention any of that."

Currently, Graham had confirmed the existence of at least five Deities, and he was sure there were many more. He didn"t know what those Deities were or how they came to be. He needed to find out more in order to be prepared for anything. However, he knew that information regarding the Deities would be controlled by the Government, so he didn"t expect to actually find a book about them in the library.

Graham got up and went back to the shelves. He wanted to look up the bizarre image or even the numerous Deities. He went through all the shelves, scanning all the books with his eyes and quickly skimming through the ones that caught his attention, but there was none that had what he was looking for.

By the time he finished reading, it was almost six. He quickly returned put the books down in the read-book box. He didn"t put it back on the shelves himself because it would make it harder for the librarians. A lot of people had misplaced a lot of books before, which was why they came up with the box idea. It also made it easier for the librarians to check which books had been read.

Graham left the library and hailed a public motor carriage to take him home. He arrived at Tuinstraat and paid the driver. He entered his apartment building but something was off. There were a lot of Police motor carriages parked outside, and people talking in the street, their faces looked very curious and concerned. Graham tried to listen in their conversation.

"I can"t believe something like this is happening so close to my house!" said a woman in a house dress.

"Yes! It"s scary. I hope the Police catch the killer soon. I don"t feel safe." said another woman hugging her toddler.

"Val, I think someone has been murdered in our apartment building," he muttered and started running inside.

A lot more people were gathered inside, watching the happenings in a room on the first floor from the corridor. There were Police officers inside the room and the body of a woman sitting on the sofa in the living room. With his eyes, he could perfectly see the condition of the dead woman from outside.

She was leaning back on the sofa with her hands on the face, like she was trying to cover it from whatever was in front of her. Her mouth, which was visible from the gap between her hands, was wide open. Her shoulders were all tensed up. She was wearing a house dress, and there was no visible bloodstain on it. In fact, there was no bloodstain anywhere, not even on the sofa or on the table in front of her.

The Police officers in the room were inspecting her house thoroughly. They flipped over every picture frame, opened every drawer, and checked every room. If Graham was correct, her apartment room layout should be similar to his and Luuk"s, so from outside, he wouldn"t be able to see her bedroom or her kitchen. He gave up trying to find clues by looking in from outside, and he couldn"t enter because of the Police line.

Graham turned to the man standing closest to him and asked, "What happened?"

"Can"t you see? Someone was murdered!" the man said frantically.

"I know that. I mean, who found the body, and who is she?"

"I don"t know who found her like that. I only heard screaming and I ran down here. People had already gathered when I got here. I don"t know who she is either." the man said with his voice still quivered.

"Thank you," said Graham, then turned to a woman that tried to look calm but a hint of sadness was apparent in her eyes.

"Ma"am, do you know her?" Graham nodded up, pointing to the dead woman with his head.

"Yes... She"s Nora. She"s my friend." her voice was wavering. It seemed like she had just overcome her initial shock.

"Are you the one who found her?" he asked with a soft voice.

"Yes. We were going to have dinner together..." she said. Tears were starting to form in her eyes.

"I"m sorry for your loss," he said to her.

She only nodded and did not say anything else.

At that point, Graham"s intuition told him to look inside the room again, and there, he saw a Police officer walking out of her bedroom with a transparent plastic bag that was used for containing evidence. Inside the evidence bag, there was a drawing that Graham knew very well. It was of four interlocking rings with numerous eyes. In the dead center of the rings, there was a disfigured black silhouette that he couldn"t make out of. It was the same one he found in Étienne Dechant"s house!

Graham went away from the crowd and spoke,

"Val, this confirmed my theory. That drawing is a death threat!"