God of Trash

The library sprawled over a good chunk of the mountainside. It stood tall, its façade as grand as any of the lecture halls. The steps leading up to its front door were dusty, and when Rhys pushed on the door, it creaked and halted an inch in, its hinges all but rusted shut. He frowned and pushed harder. The rust broke off with a crack, and the door swung open.

Almost before he stepped inside, an indolent voice called, “Who goes there?”

“No one,” Rhys shouted back.

There was silence, then a grunt that echoed through the vaulted halls. “Better be.”

Black-and-white checkered tile spread underfoot. Rich, dark wood clad the walls. Shelves bent in the middle, laden with books. Some were tidy and neat, but the majority were stuffed full of books, so overstuffed that books were practically oozing out at the seams. Stacked in lines, then pushed in horizontally, and even squeezed at odd angles into the gaps remaining, until they spilled out onto the floor and stacked up in pillars around the floor. And the shelves weren’t merely capped at human height. They climbed from the floor, all the way up to the twenty-foot ceilings. Here and there, rolling ladders offered a way up, but the books that spilled forth from the shelves meant their wheels weren’t particularly operational. The scent of dust and old books filled the air, along with a mysterious spicy scent he couldn’t quite place.

Rhys turned the corner. A massive desk was tucked to the left, in the first nook available. Behind it sprawled a man who was Cynog’s opposite in every possible way. Feet kicked up on the desk, he lazed in a massive cozy armchair. Long limbs only served to emphasize how bone-slender he was. His hair spilled down his back, not in a way that said he cared for it, but simply indicated he hadn’t had it cut in a long time. He didn’t have a beard, but on closer inspection, fair whisps on hair clung to his jaw, too pale and thin to qualify as any sort of organized facial hair, but simply the result of his extreme languor. He wore white-and-black robes that fell back at his hips, black narrow-legged trousers so tight as to qualify as leggings, and a simple black belt. Of all the teachers, he was one of the simplest-dressed ones so far, barring the man in rags ranting about ferrets. Even Cynog had worn gold bracers, leg guards, and a matching bejeweled belt. This man wore no gems at all.

A book rested in one hand, and his eyes scanned across the page at speed. He reached the end of the book and set it down, a satisfied expression on his face, then stretched in his chair and yawned wide, like a cat in a beam of sun.

He and Rhys’ gazes met, and he grumbled in his chest and ran a hand over his face. In the space of a moment, his hair organized itself, his face grew clean, and the facial hair vanished. He put on a very-strained smile. “How can I help you?”

Reclusive is a kind way to put it, Rhys reflected. The man was an absolute slug. Sure ,he was skinny, but that was probably only because it was too much effort to get up and eat. From the dust underfoot, no one—not this man or anyone else—had trodden the halls of the library in a long time. It seemed there was an unspoken understanding not to disturb him.

Luckily, Rhys was a bit too trashy to pick up on such subtle social cues, so here he was. He stepped forward and nodded. “I’m the garbage collector. Are there any books you’re looking to get rid of?”