《The Undertaker's Library》 Chapter 1: The Collection The dead don¡¯t protest. They don¡¯t weep, they don¡¯t beg, they don¡¯t plead for second chances. By the time I arrive, their stories are already written¡ªthe ink just hasn¡¯t dried yet. The city outside the hospital was a patchwork of old and new, where horse-drawn carriages still rattled down cobblestone streets alongside rumbling automobiles. The streetlights flickered with gas and electric glow alike, a city caught between eras, never quite settling into the modern age. Rain slicked the pavement, casting long reflections of neon signs advertising jazz clubs, tobacconists, and apothecaries. The air smelled of coal smoke, damp wool, and something faintly metallic¡ªan acrid blend of progress and decay, clinging to the lungs like ink on paper. I stepped through the front entrance of St. Hubert¡¯s Infirmary, shaking the rain from my coat. The reception hall was a stark contrast to the cold streets outside¡ªwarm light flickered from hanging lamps, and the scent of antiseptic clung to every surface. Nurses in white uniforms moved with quiet efficiency, their skirts swishing against polished floors. A man in a charcoal suit¡ªlikely a doctor¡ªglanced up from a ledger behind the front desk and immediately averted his eyes when he saw me. ¡°Undertaker,¡± he muttered, his voice tight with discomfort. I gave him a slow nod, neither confirming nor denying the title. ¡°I¡¯m here for Margaret Lorne.¡± The doctor didn¡¯t look at me directly. No one ever did, not if they could help it. Instead, he flicked through his records, his fingers moving quickly, as though getting me out of his sight would make the encounter less unsettling. ¡°Room 212. She passed an hour ago.¡± A nurse lingered nearby, clutching a clipboard against her chest. She couldn¡¯t have been more than twenty, and the way her gaze flitted toward me and then away spoke of curiosity laced with unease. ¡°Is it true what they say?¡± she asked suddenly. ¡°That they¡­ speak to you before they turn?¡± The doctor shot her a sharp look, but I only tilted my head slightly, considering the question. ¡°Some do,¡± I admitted. ¡°Some don¡¯t.¡± She shuddered. ¡°That¡¯s awful.¡± ¡°It¡¯s just the way things are,¡± I replied, adjusting my gloves. ¡°Now, if you¡¯ll excuse me.¡± I made my way down the corridor, my boots echoing against the marble floors. The hospital was eerily quiet at this hour, the gaslights casting long shadows along the walls. I passed a few orderlies who stepped aside without a word, their eyes averted. One older nurse offered a murmured, ¡°God keep her,¡± before disappearing into a side room. Others whispered as I passed. I was used to it. People feared what they didn¡¯t understand, and they understood death even less than they did me. I paused before an open doorway where two nurses stood talking in hushed tones. They noticed me, stiffening slightly, but neither moved away. ¡°Did you hear about the one last week?¡± one asked, voice barely above a whisper. ¡°Old man lived alone, no family, no one to claim his book. But when it formed, it had a name on the spine no one recognized.¡± ¡°Mistakes happen,¡± the other replied, though she didn¡¯t sound convinced.This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version. I let their conversation fade as I continued onward. Mistakes didn¡¯t happen. Not in Transcription. The dead knew their own stories, and their books always formed as they were meant to. But unease had a way of settling in the bones, even for those who did not deal in ink and flesh. By the time I reached Room 212, I already knew what to expect. The stillness, the scent of old linen and fading breath, the weight of a presence just on the edge of existence. A soul waiting for its final chapter to be written. The hospital room smelled of antiseptic and the ghost of old sweat, the kind of scent that lingered in places meant to keep people alive but failed at the job more often than anyone cared to admit. The body on the bed was still, an old woman in a crisp white gown. Her hair was grey and thin, and her skin sagged as if it had lost its purpose. A nurse stood near the door, arms crossed, her posture rigid with the kind of unease that only came with witnessing the transition too many times. She didn¡¯t look at me, not really. People rarely did. I set my case down beside the bed and unlatched the brass clasps. The tools inside weren¡¯t much¡ªjust the necessities. A clean ledger, a set of cataloging slips, and a pair of thin gloves to keep my own presence from interfering with the process. The work wasn¡¯t glamorous, but it was necessary. Death called, and I answered. The woman on the bed had been called Margaret Lorne in life. Sixty-eight years old. A widow. No surviving children. Records said she¡¯d been a schoolteacher once. The kind of person who left an imprint on the world in the form of chalk-dusted desks and the careful scrawl of forgotten lessons. Now, she¡¯d leave something more permanent. The first signs of Transcription began at her fingertips. Ink seeped from beneath her nails, deep and rich, as if her veins had been filled with it instead of blood. The lines curled along her skin, shaping the first words of a story no one had read before. I waited. Never interfere. That was the first rule of the Undertakers. The story had to tell itself. The ink spread in quiet rivulets, dissolving the flesh in its wake. Bone softened into pulp. Skin tightened into parchment. It was a slow, measured process, as if the body were unspooling the narrative of an entire life from deep within itself. Transcription. From dust to ink, from breath to memory. From life to something more permanent, if no less ephemeral. It took hours, it always did. Time had a different meaning when measuring the length of a life. I¡¯d seen this a hundred times, a thousand, but each Transcription still held that peculiar kind of wonder¡ªthe fascination of watching a life distill into something tangible, something that could be read and understood. Violent ends never formed books so cleanly. But Margaret Lorne had gone peacefully, and her body responded in kind. The page of the book pressed down beneath a fingertip, then another, until Margaret Lorne had been consumed and replaced, leaving a thick, leather-bound book resting where her body had once lain. I reached out and turned it over. The cover was embossed with an elegant fleur-de-lis pattern, and the spine read, ¡°Margaret Lorne - The Quiet Archivist.¡± A fitting name. It suited her. The story had settled, the ink dried, the past transcribed. I let out a slow breath and slipped the book into my case. Another soul shelved, another life recorded. The nurse near the door finally spoke, her voice quiet. ¡°Do you ever read them?¡± I glanced up at her. ¡°No.¡± She nodded, as if that was the answer she expected. ¡°Why not?¡± Because that wasn¡¯t my role. Because the stories weren¡¯t for me. Because some things were meant to be recorded, not relived. ¡°They¡¯re not mine to read.¡± She didn¡¯t ask anything else. I turned back to my case, locking the clasps. Another job done, another page closed. It should have been just another day. But the dead, I would soon learn, had one last lesson left to teach me. Chapter 2: The Library The rain had eased by the time I stepped out of St. Hubert¡¯s Infirmary, but the streets still glistened with the remnants of an evening storm. The gas lamps lining the sidewalk cast long, golden streaks on the wet cobblestones, making everything look like it was caught between dreaming and waking. I pulled my coat tighter around me, trying to shut out the chill that didn¡¯t come from the air. Some called my job a sacred duty¡ªOthers thought it macabre, disturbing even. But what they couldn¡¯t understand was just how ordinary it felt. To me, it was just another night on the job, ferrying the lost words of the dead to a place where they could find solace. The Library of the Departed was on the outskirts of town, in an old part of the city that still held on to its Victorian charms with an almost desperate grip. A tram rattled past, its metal wheels screeching against the rails as it disappeared down the avenue. I preferred walking when I could. It gave me time to think, to breathe, to put a little space between myself and the weight of the work I did. I passed under the flickering gas lamps, the scent of rain mixing with the ever-present tang of coal smoke from the factories lining the river. The streets weren¡¯t empty, even at this hour. A group of night workers shuffled past, their boots slapping against wet pavement, heading to or from some late-night shift. They didn¡¯t look at me, but they knew who I was¡ªor rather, what. A street vendor was packing up his cart, tucking unsold newspapers into a satchel. He caught sight of me, hesitated, then gave a wary nod before turning away. It was always like that. Recognition without invitation. An acknowledgment without connection. At least it wasn¡¯t outright disdain. Undertakers weren¡¯t unwelcome, but we weren¡¯t embraced either. We carried death, even when we weren¡¯t the cause of it. The living preferred to keep their distance, and I preferred it that way. Distance made it easier to forget that they, too, would someday become ink and parchment, just like all those I¡¯d gathered before. I turned a corner, heading off the main street and onto a narrower lane flanked by old brick buildings. It was quieter here, the only sounds being the occasional bark of a distant dog or the rumble of the last tram heading home for the night. The Library loomed ahead, its wrought-iron gates casting long, spindly shadows in the lamplight. I stopped for a moment, staring up at the building. It was an imposing structure, all dark stone and narrow windows, like someone had taken a cathedral and stripped away all its religious trappings to leave something colder and more pragmatic. A monument to the collected memories of an entire city. The gates opened silently as I approached. No one manned them¡ªa peculiar magic kept the Library¡¯s doors closed to the unwelcome, and the curious seldom found their way here. Only those who carried the dead, or sought them, were ever allowed to pass. The massive, oiled oak doors opened under my touch, revealing a cavernous space lit by a thousand flickering lamps. The scent of old parchment and candle wax enveloped me, a scent as familiar as the back of my hand. My boots echoed on the tiled floor, announcing my presence. A few figures moved between the shelves, initiates in dark robes gliding silently, their hands trailing over the spines of books as if in quiet communion with the dead. At the far end of the hall, a grand desk stood beneath the watchful gaze of a massive clock, its ticking the only sound aside from the distant shuffle of paper and the occasional rustling whisper of a restless book.Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more. ¡°Evening, Crowe,¡± a familiar voice greeted me as I approached the desk. Edwin Hargrave, one of the senior archivists, peered up from a ledger, adjusting the wire-rimmed spectacles perched on his nose. His ink-stained fingers tapped idly against the polished wood. ¡°Another one for the shelves?¡± I set the case down gently, unfastening the clasps. ¡°Margaret Lorne,¡± I confirmed. ¡°Natural death. The process was clean.¡± Hargrave gave a solemn nod. ¡°They¡¯re always better that way.¡± It was true. In Transcription, the process often mirrored the manner of passing. Violent deaths sometimes lead to shattered bindings, illegible scripts, and pages torn from spines. Unnatural passings often led to their own horrors. But the old, the ones who passed quietly, were almost serene in their transformation. Hargrave slipped on a pair of white gloves and reached for the book, lifting it with the reverence of a father cradling his newborn child. He brushed a gentle thumb over the cover, tracing the embossed fleur-de-lis pattern, and then flipped it open to the first page. ¡°The Quiet Archivist,¡± he read aloud, nodding. ¡°A fitting title.¡± ¡°I thought so, too.¡± Hargrave turned a few more pages, the sound of the paper scratching against his gloves oddly comforting in its familiarity. ¡°You ever wonder how much control they have? Over their titles, I mean.¡± I shrugged. It was an old question, one that had plagued the minds of the Undertakers for as long as the Library had stood. ¡°Not my concern.¡± Hargrave chuckled, shaking his head. ¡°Of course not. You¡¯re just here to collect and deliver. Still, it makes you wonder. Titles don¡¯t lie, Crowe. Sometimes they tell us more than the dead ever did in life.¡± I glanced down at the book in Hargrave¡¯s hands, the rich burgundy of the cover catching the glow of the lamps overhead. ¡°Maybe we aren¡¯t meant to understand it,¡± I offered. ¡°Maybe it¡¯s enough to just do the work.¡± Hargrave sighed, closing the book gently. ¡°You¡¯re probably right. But one can¡¯t help but be curious. It¡¯s only human.¡± I said nothing. Instead, I watched as Hargrave carried the book to a rolling cart, where several other recent collections waited to be sorted. A low hum filled the air as he placed it among them, the kind of sound that only existed in places filled with too much memory, too much history. Too much life, condensed and distilled into ink and parchment. ¡°You look like you could use a drink,¡± Hargrave said, glancing at me. ¡°The rain getting to you? Or just the job?¡± ¡°Neither,¡± I said. ¡°Just another night.¡± He hummed in vague amusement, but didn¡¯t press. ¡°Well, if you change your mind, you know where to find me.¡± I gave a short nod before turning toward the winding staircase that led deeper into the Library. The work never truly ended. There was always another book to collect, another story to shelve. But for now, at least, my work was done. It was up to the archivists to decide where the old woman would rest. The stairwell spiraled down into the depths of the Library, the air growing cooler with each step. A few other Undertakers passed me, their faces familiar but their names long since forgotten. We exchanged nods, and nothing more. Solitude was part of the job. Maybe it was an occupational hazard, or maybe it was just the natural outcome of spending so much time around the dead. Either way, silence was a comfort, and the Library offered an abundance of it. Small brass plaques adorned each landing, marking the levels by category¡ªHistorical Accounts, Personal Legacies, Cultural Anthologies, Unfinished Manuscripts, and so on. I paused for a moment outside the latter section, glancing at the iron-bound doors that sealed it shut. Books that had been interrupted before their time, lives cut short, their endings forever uncertain. Margaret Lorne¡¯s book had been complete. A quiet, orderly ending. But not all stories ended that way. At the very bottom of the stairs, the final landing opened onto a long hallway, its walls lined with small, unmarked wooden doors. One of those doors bore my name, etched in simple lettering above a worn, brass handle. It wasn¡¯t much¡ªa small, windowless room lit by a single lamp, with a narrow bed and a battered old writing desk. But it was home, or as close to it as I¡¯d ever find. I had an apartment in the city, but it had been months since I¡¯d used it. There was too much work to be done. Chapter 3: The Routine Breaks The Library of the Departed never truly slept. Even in the dead of night, the endless halls carried the sounds of rustling parchment, the shuffling of robed initiates tending to the newly collected, the soft whispers that bled from the spines of the dead. The silence was never quite silent, not in the way most people knew it. It wasn¡¯t unnerving. Just familiar. Another part of the work. Most of the time, at least. I sat at my desk, staring at the blank expanse of the parchment in front of me. The quill rested, untouched, in its inkwell. I¡¯d been sitting there for hours, trying to coax something out of the depths of my mind, but the words never came. They rarely did, anymore. Writing had been my first passion, before the Library found me. Stories filled my youth¡ªthe grand, sweeping tales of knights and dragons, of star-crossed lovers, of the great, the infamous, the broken. I¡¯d been a writer, or thought myself to be. But that was a lifetime ago. I ran a finger over the pale, twisting scar on the back of my left hand. The symbol of the Undertakers, etched in flesh and ink. The mark of those who knew the secrets of Transcription. Every Undertaker bore it, a permanent reminder of their bond to the Library. To the work. The work that came with more scars than just the one on my hand. With a sigh, I gave up on the writing. Words weren¡¯t meant for me, not anymore. My thumb traced the lines of the scar. The past was a strange thing, both distant and closer than breath. I could still hear the echoes of the life I¡¯d left behind¡ªthe clatter of typewriter keys, the scratch of pen on paper, the faint scent of tobacco and whisky that had followed me into the small hours of the morning. Back then, I hadn¡¯t known what it meant to collect the memories of others. I hadn¡¯t understood. I pushed the memories back down and stood from the desk, stretching out the stiffness in my shoulders. Sleep wasn¡¯t likely to come, but at least I could try. I blew out the lamp and settled onto the narrow bed, letting the darkness surround me.
The rain had picked up again by the time I left the Library. Fat droplets hit the pavement in a slow, unhurried rhythm, the kind of drizzle that seeped into the bones rather than drenched outright. I pulled my collar up and stepped into the street, joining the thin stream of people hurrying to and from their own daily errands. Somewhere down the block, a gramophone played a blues tune too old and tired for the hour. St. Hubert¡¯s Infirmary wasn¡¯t far. Close enough that I could have taken the tram, but I walked. Always did. It was a habit I¡¯d picked up early in the job. It was easier to think on my feet, and sometimes you saw things from the ground you¡¯d miss from behind a window. By the time I stepped through the infirmary doors, I could already feel the eyes on me. A different doctor manned the desk. Younger, a little less reserved than the last one. He gave a nod, and a quick, ¡°We¡¯ve been expecting you.¡± I said nothing, just gave a half-nod in return and slipped past him toward the stairs. They always said the same thing. We¡¯ve been expecting you. As if death¡¯s door swung on a schedule. In a way, I supposed, it did. The first sign that something was off came before I even stepped into the room. Hospitals always smelled of antiseptic and something fainter, something cloying and metallic that clung to the back of your tongue. But this room was different. The scent was almost cinders, like a house burned long ago, or a pile of dead leaves set to flame. It pricked at the inside of my nose. I adjusted my gloves, stepping inside. The body lay under a white sheet, just as they always did. The chart by the bedside listed the name Eleanor Reed, aged thirty-one, cause of death: pulmonary failure. No listed family. No outstanding debts. A quiet, unremarkable passing. A clean, straightforward collection. Or at least, it should have been. I set my case down beside the bed, fingers running over the brass clasps. Something in the air itched at the back of my mind. Not wrong, not unnatural¡ªjust... off. The first signs of Transcription started like they always did. Ink welled beneath her fingernails, dark veins curling up her arms as the body began its dissolution. Flesh softened to parchment, bones to binding, skin tightening over a frame that no longer held breath. The scent of ink filled the room, rich and heady, as words began to etch themselves across her skin. It was slow, deliberate, inevitable. I watched, waiting for the end. Hours passed, marked only by the gentle ticking of the clock at my back. Time had a way of blurring when you spent enough of it waiting on death. Eventually, the ink stopped spreading. Eleanor Reed was gone, and in her place, a small, slim volume with a leather cover. The smell of smoke still hung in the air, but it was muted, buried beneath the ink and the unmistakable scent of old paper. I leaned over, turning the book to see the title¡ªand my breath hitched. The name on the spine wasn¡¯t Eleanor Reed.
¡°The Last Confession of Nathaniel Kade.¡±If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.
I frowned, pulling the book closer. Names weren¡¯t arbitrary. A book¡¯s title was the truth of a life, compressed into a phrase. No two books ever bore the same name. No book had ever carried the wrong one. This was wrong. Had to be. Transcription didn¡¯t make mistakes. I ran a finger over the spine, tracing the letters there. The leather was dark, the edges of the pages gilded in silver, the kind of binding that suggested something deliberate, something carefully maintained. Maybe it was a nickname. An alias. Or a pseudonym? Had Eleanor Reed been a writer, I could see it. But the record stated she¡¯d been a seamstress. Hardly the type to hide behind a false name. This was not Eleanor Reed¡¯s book. And yet, it had to be. Transcription didn¡¯t lie. I hesitated. This was not my place. My job was to collect the book, and to deliver it to the Library. The mysteries of the departed were for the Archivists to untangle, not some Undertaker. But nothing prevented an Undertaker from reading the books. It was just my personal rule. I had seen thousands of Transcriptions in my time as a Field Undertaker. I had seen books formed from murder victims, from the lost and the forgotten, from those who had died screaming. I had seen books with torn pages, with ink smudged by agony, with bindings barely holding together. But I had never seen a book that did not match its dead. A slow breath. I needed to be sure. I flicked the book open, careful not to disturb the spine too much. The first page bore the usual dedication¡ªthe single sentence that every book carried, the one thought, memory, or truth that defined its existence. I flipped the book open carefully, my gloved fingers skimming the first page. The ink settled, curling along the parchment, forming words that should not have belonged to the woman who had laid upon the bed.
¡°This is the story of a man who never existed.¡±
A short sentence, a dedication both confessional and contradictory. The words were even, measured¡ªnot the rushed scrawl of a life cut short. My hands stilled, but I continued to read.
¡°I boarded the train at dusk, the weight of the journey pressing against my chest like an iron shackle. The destination was irrelevant. Only the leaving mattered.¡±
The handwriting was sharp, deliberate. The voice behind the words was unmistakably male. This was not her story. But it was her book. The question was: Why?
¡°My name is Nathaniel Kade, and I have been running for a long time.¡±
I snapped the book shut, shoving it into my case, more forcefully than I¡¯d meant to. I had two choices. File it away and let the Archivists deal with it, or investigate. The former was protocol. My role as an Undertaker was simple: collect, deliver, move on. The Archivists handled the rest. If the book was wrong, they would flag it, investigate it, seal it away if needed. Whatever had happened, it wasn¡¯t my concern. I was a collector. A ferryman. Not a keeper of stories, and certainly not some kind of detective. I had no business reading the pages of the dead. Still, the thought nagged at me as I made my way out of the hospital, my case in tow. It nagged at me as I stepped out into the drizzle, and as I walked the rain-slick streets toward the Library. It nagged at me even as the gates opened before me, and as I pushed the great oak doors of the Library inward. Edwin Hargrave was still at his post, ledger open, spectacles perched on the end of his nose. He looked up as I approached, his eyes flicking to the case in my hands. ¡°Another one?¡± I nodded. ¡°Something¡¯s off about this one.¡± He sighed, setting down his pen. ¡°You always get the interesting ones, don¡¯t you?¡± ¡°Not by choice.¡± I unfastened the clasps, pulling the book free. ¡°Look at the title.¡± Hargrave adjusted his glasses, squinting as he read the spine. His brow furrowed. ¡°The Last Confession of Nathaniel Kade.¡± I waited. Hargrave frowned, flipping the book open. He skimmed the first page, then the second. His fingers drummed absently against the desk. ¡°This¡ª¡± He hesitated. ¡°This isn¡¯t the right name.¡± ¡°I know.¡± ¡°This should be Eleanor Reed¡¯s book.¡± ¡°I know.¡± Hargrave exhaled slowly, rubbing at his temples. ¡°I¡¯ve seen misbindings before. Echoes from other deaths, bleed-through from shared trauma. But this¡ª¡± He shook his head. ¡°This is different.¡± The book rested between us, its leather cover gleaming in the lamplight. My mind replayed the lines from the first page. This is the story of a man who never existed. What did that even mean? Who was Nathaniel Kade? I glanced toward the shelves behind him, endless rows of books stretching into the distance. Each spine bore a name. Each book told a life. This was the first time I had ever questioned whether a book belonged there at all. ¡°What do you want to do with it?¡± Hargrave asked. I could tell what he expected. File it away. Let someone else worry about it. That would be the simple choice. The professional choice. Instead, I slid the book back into my case. ¡°I want to find out who Nathaniel Kade was.¡± Hargrave studied me for a moment, then exhaled. ¡°I had a feeling you¡¯d say that. I¡¯ve been pushing for you to be an Archivist for years now.¡± A pause. ¡°For what it¡¯s worth, I think it¡¯s the right decision.¡± He flipped through the ledger, skimming through the entries until he reached the end. ¡°Eleanor Reed died in a small apartment above a milliner¡¯s shop. No relatives. Worked there as a seamstress, according to the landlord. I¡¯ll send a runner for her personal effects. Maybe we can glean something more from that.¡± ¡°Thank you.¡± I hesitated. ¡°Why are you helping me?¡± Hargrave gave a wry grin, adjusting his spectacles. ¡°Someone needs to.¡± A pause. ¡°And, to be honest, it¡¯s good to see you interested in something again.¡± My jaw tightened at that, but I didn¡¯t reply. I knew what he meant. It had been years since I¡¯d cared about anything beyond the simple process of retrieving a book, delivering it to the Library, and repeating the cycle. Hargrave had tried to reach out in the past, to get me to engage in something more meaningful, but it had always felt hollow. Not this time. This time, there was a question to be answered. I gave him a short nod, then turned to head to the restricted archives. A book had never lied before. I needed to know why this one had. Chapter 4: The Book That Tells the Wrong Story The restricted archives weren¡¯t off-limits to me, not exactly. But they weren¡¯t a place I was expected to linger, either. Field Undertakers dealt with the dead as they were, not as they were remembered. That was the Archivists¡¯ job¡ªcategorizing, restoring, sometimes even sealing books away when necessary. I brought in the pages. Someone else decided where they belonged. Except now, I had a book that didn¡¯t belong anywhere. The lamps overhead burned low, casting long shadows that flickered against the stone walls. The air down here was colder, staler, as though the passage of time itself had forgotten the space. Rows of iron shelves stretched off into the darkness, each crammed to bursting with books both old and new. Some were wrapped in oilcloth, waiting to be restored. Others bore the scarlet ribbons that marked them for review. Each book had a tag, handwritten with a short description¡ªmost losses of identity or violent ends. My steps carried me past a blood-stained volume with a note that simply said, ¡°Murdered by a jealous lover at age 23,¡± and another charred tome tagged as, ¡°Perished in a tenement fire.¡± Sometimes, I almost forgot that books were more than just objects. More than leather, ink, and paper. A person was a person, even when dissolved and distilled. Maybe especially then. I knew better than to listen too closely. Books whispered. Not words, not always. Sometimes it was just the ghost of a thought, the last traces of something lingering before it faded completely. Some books were louder than others. The younger ones, usually. Those whose endings had been interrupted, or who hadn¡¯t lived enough to exhaust their need for an audience. A child¡¯s book murmured from its place on the shelf, half-repaired after an accident had damaged the spine. Not fair. Not fair. I¡¯m sorry, I¡¯m sorry. Please, Mama. Not fair. I knew better than to linger. At the end of a long row, tucked away between two shelves, sat an old oak desk. A heavy lantern perched on the corner, casting a pale circle of light onto the scratched and stained surface. It would do. I set my case down and opened it, retrieving the slim volume. The leather was still smooth to the touch, even through my gloves, and the pages opened easily. Whatever had happened to Eleanor Reed, she¡¯d been meticulous in her living. Or whoever Nathaniel was. ¡°Okay,¡± I muttered, settling into the chair. ¡°Let¡¯s see who you are.¡±
¡°This is the story of a man who never existed.¡±
The first line stared back at me, and the accompanying voice as well. Deep, worn, but resolute. Older than his forty-one years, and certain of its purpose. The ink had settled, crisp and precise, the words forming in neat, uniform script. No smudging, no hesitation. It was a proper Transcription, the kind that came from a soul certain of its story. But it wasn¡¯t Eleanor Reed¡¯s story. Normally, a book was given a resting period, allowing the soul inside to adjust to its new form before it could be read. My eyes skipped down the page to where his tale began in earnest. The first memory unfolded like the opening scene of a play. The writing was vivid, each word conjuring a scene so clear it was as if I was standing on the platform myself, watching a steam engine rumble into view, its pistons churning, belching smoke into a sky of inky grey. Nathaniel was aboard, traveling alone, his reflection blurred in the glass of the window. The compartment was dim, lit only by a small lamp overhead, its flickering light barely enough to see by. Outside, the world rushed past in a blur of colour and motion.
¡°I can¡¯t say exactly when the story begins. There¡¯s no date to mark on a calendar, no event that set everything into motion. I was simply there, on that train, bound for somewhere far away from everything I¡¯d ever known.¡±
My finger trailed along the edge of the page, turning it gently. The next scene was in a tavern, its air thick with pipe smoke and the sour tang of old ale. The low murmur of voices at every table, conversations half-heard and half-forgotten. A man sat in the corner, shadowed beneath the flickering light of a gas lamp, his hat tilted low over his eyes. He nursed a drink in one hand, fingers absently tapping against the glass. The name came easily. Nathaniel Kade. The book described him well¡ªa man of average height, lean and angular, with a sharpness to his features that betrayed a life of hardship. His eyes were a pale grey, like chips of ice, and his hair was a tangle of dark, unruly curls. A man who had lived somewhere else, sometime else, under circumstances that bore no resemblance to the life Eleanor Reed had lived. I turned another page. Nathaniel Kade had debts. He had friends and enemies. He had a lover who had left him, a business partner who had betrayed him, a secret he never spoke aloud. He had existed. Except he hadn¡¯t. I reached into my coat pocket, pulling out Eleanor Reed¡¯s official record. Her employment history, her medical files, her personal records. A life of certainty and documentation. None of it matched what I was reading. Not one damn thing. I exhaled slowly, rubbing my thumb against the bridge of my nose. There had to be an explanation. Eleanor Reed and Nathaniel Kade couldn¡¯t exist in the same book, because they couldn¡¯t exist at the same time. And yet, here I was, with a book that insisted otherwise. What then? Had Nathaniel hijacked her Transcription somehow? Was he some kind of ghost possessing a corpse? It didn¡¯t seem likely. A haunted body usually meant the book was a fragmented mess, words scattered between the ghost and the deceased. The Archivists would have picked up on it. This book, though¡ªthe narrative was clear, focused, certain of itself. If there was a possession, it was a seamless one, so perfect it had erased any trace of Eleanor at all. That wasn¡¯t possible. Was it? I shook my head, turning my attention back to the book. It would have answers, whether it wanted to share them or not. I just needed to find the right question. I flipped through the pages, skipping forward through the memories until I found something familiar¡ªthe street where she¡¯d lived, the small milliner¡¯s shop with its dusty windows, the rickety staircase leading to the apartment above. Eleanor Reed¡ªor Nathaniel Kade¡ªlived there at the end. I read, and learned, and felt myself slipping into the story of his life. The small moments, the big ones. A childhood spent on the streets, scraping a living from the dirt. A stint in the army, an honorable discharge, and a return to a city that no longer welcomed him. He moved from place to place, living a dozen lives in a hundred different ways. A gambler, a thief, an accountant, a gun for hire. By the end of his days, he¡¯d been a broken man, a shadow of his former self, the kind of man who slipped through the cracks unnoticed. Forgotten.Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site. But the book said he had never existed. I paused, staring at the page. The handwriting was less steady now, words blurred and smudged as if written in haste, or by a hand made unsteady by drink or age. Or both. A few of the letters bled into one another, sentences trailing off into half-completed thoughts.
¡°Is this what you wanted?¡±
The voice shifted. A woman¡¯s words. The thought snapped me back to myself, and I drew back from the book, staring down at it. That had been her. Not Nathaniel. Eleanor Reed had spoken to me. From the pages themselves. No, not to me. To him. I pushed myself away from the table, taking long, measured breaths. It was one thing to read a book. To hear its voice in your head, to know that each sentence is a fragment of a life, an impression of a soul. You couldn¡¯t read the books and pretend that what was written didn¡¯t come from somewhere real, someone who had once walked and breathed and thought. But it was another thing to hear a response. Books didn¡¯t answer. They simply... told. I squeezed my eyes shut, pressing the heels of my palms against them until spots of colours burst across the inside of my eyelids. The whispers of the books filled my ears, each one vying for my attention, begging to be heard, to be remembered. Sometimes, you could get lost in them. Drown in the sheer weight of the words. My mentor had warned me of it early on, when he first recruited me. The books were voices, and voices could drown. And I¡¯d gone deaf a long time ago. A sharp breath. Another. Slowly, carefully, I drew my hands away from my eyes, blinking until my vision cleared. The book rested on the desk in front of me, its pages open. Inviting. Taunting. I looked at it for a long time before reaching out and shutting it closed. The snap of the cover echoed through the archives, a lone sound amidst the quiet susurrus of shifting paper. Is this what you wanted? Her words, spoken through ink and parchment. Not to me, but to him. One soul reaching out to another. I had heard of minor inconsistencies in Transcription before. Sometimes memories blurred at the edges, the final moments of a life overlapping with old recollections, dreams bleeding into reality. But this wasn¡¯t a mistake in memory. This was an entirely different life. A thought settled in my mind, cold and unwelcome. What if Eleanor Reed hadn¡¯t just been living a double life? What if she had been two people at once?
I needed more information. The public records wouldn¡¯t help me now. If Nathaniel Kade had never officially existed, then I wouldn¡¯t find his name in the usual archives. I needed to dig deeper. I locked the book back in my case and made my way out of the restricted archives, slipping through the dimly lit corridors toward a smaller wing of the Library. Not many people used this section¡ªat least, not unless they were looking for something most would prefer to forget. The Department of Lost Histories. It was where we kept the names that had been erased, whether by force or by choice. People who had changed their identities, who had disappeared from official records. Those who had been forgotten, buried under falsehoods or deliberate omissions. Or those whose histories were deemed too dangerous to be left out in the open. If Nathaniel Kade had been real¡ªeven in some small, unrecorded way¡ªthen this was the only place he might have left a trace. The door to the department was unlocked, as always. Some corners of the Library preferred to keep their secrets behind thicker walls, but this one didn¡¯t bother. I stepped inside, closing the door behind me. The clerk on duty barely glanced up as I entered. His desk was a mess of unsorted papers, his robe stained with ink, the mark of the Lost Histories etched into the cuff of his sleeve. ¡°Alistair,¡± he greeted, his voice hoarse from too many hours spent in silence. ¡°Didn¡¯t expect to see you down here.¡± ¡°I need a cross-reference,¡± I said, keeping my voice low. ¡°Off-record identities. Any known aliases connected to Eleanor Reed.¡± The clerk arched a brow. ¡°We don¡¯t get many women in this section.¡± ¡°I know,¡± I muttered. ¡°Just check.¡± With a long-suffering sigh, he set aside the stack of papers he¡¯d been fumbling with, turning to the wall of shelves that spanned from floor to ceiling. He mumbled to himself as he went, pulling out one file, then another. His steps echoed in the quiet of the chamber. ¡°Strange request,¡± he called over his shoulder. ¡°Reed, was it? Seamstress from the sound of things. Not the usual sort we keep here.¡± ¡°She died last night. The book that came out was...¡± I trailed off. ¡°Different.¡± ¡°Happens, sometimes,¡± the clerk shrugged. ¡°When they live a bit too freely.¡± He stepped onto a stool, straining to reach a stack of files at the top. ¡°It usually sorts itself out, though. Don¡¯t see why you¡¯re bothering.¡± ¡°I just need to be sure.¡± ¡°Suit yourself.¡± He thumbed through the stack, mumbling to himself. ¡°Let¡¯s see. Eleanor Reed, Eleanor Reed... nothing, nothing.¡± He moved on to the next shelf, digging through an older batch of papers. His search stretched on, each new stack of files seeming more unlikely than the last. By the third shelf, I was beginning to wonder if I was wasting my time. ¡°What about the name Nathaniel Kade?¡± I called. ¡°Have any matches under that name?¡± He paused, balancing precariously on the edge of his stool. ¡°Man¡¯s name? What are you looking for, exactly?¡± ¡°I¡¯m not sure.¡± Which was close enough to true. ¡°I just need to know if there¡¯s any connection between them.¡± With a grunt, the clerk pulled down another sheaf of papers, flipping through them with practiced efficiency. Each page bore a name, paired with the alias they¡¯d taken on¡ªor had been forced to assume. He paused, licking his thumb and turning a page, then another. ¡°Strange.¡± He scratched at his neck. ¡°That¡¯s odd.¡± I leaned forward. ¡°What?¡± ¡°There¡¯s... something here. Not much. No official documents, no census records, no birth or death certificate.¡± ¡°Then what do you have?¡± He tapped the page. ¡°Mentions. Scattered references. Letters that never made it into formal archives. Pieces of conversation noted in personal journals.¡± A pause. ¡°All dead ends. None of the leads led anywhere.¡± Nothing official. Nothing verifiable. Just traces. Like a ghost moving through the edges of someone else¡¯s life. I clenched my jaw, my grip tightening on the edge of the counter. ¡°Let me see them.¡± The clerk brought out a slim file¡ªtoo slim. He laid it on the counter and slid it toward me. ¡°It¡¯s all there.¡± I flipped it open, skimming the pages. A bar receipt. A short note scrawled in an unsteady hand: ¡°Nathaniel Kade, tab open.¡± No surname. No other identifying details. A letter¡ªhalf-burned, edges curled. No sender, no recipient. Just a fragment of ink on brittle parchment: ¡°Kade is reckless. He¡¯s going to get himself killed.¡± A debt ledger, cross-referenced against others from the same period. Someone named Nathaniel Kade had borrowed money from a gambling hall, but the ledger never listed a collection. As if the debtor had simply... vanished. And then, the most damning thing of all. A journal entry, undated.
¡°I saw him again today. Nathaniel. He looked different¡ªtired, drawn¡ªbut it was him. Or at least, I think it was. The way he spoke, the way he carried himself... it was familiar. But strange, too, as if he were someone else entirely. Perhaps I¡¯m imagining it. Or perhaps I am wrong about who I thought he was.¡±
The words sat heavy on the page. Him. Not "her." Not Eleanor Reed. Nathaniel Kade. Him. I exhaled slowly, rubbing a thumb over the ink, as if the pressure might make the words settle differently in my mind. A mistake? No. This wasn¡¯t a slip of the pen. Whoever wrote this had seen Nathaniel as someone distinct from Eleanor, distinct enough that the pronoun felt natural¡ªundisputed. Was that just perception? A trick of confidence, of presence? Or was it something deeper? I closed the file¡ªa slow breath. The traces were too real to be coincidence. But too inconsistent to be a full identity. The life of a ghost, a fragment of a person, pieced together like a half-told story. Like the impression of a life, rather than the life itself. How could this Nathaniel Kade exist in the world, without leaving any real trace? My thoughts kept circling back to the book. To the words on the page. Is this what you wanted? Her voice. Her words. There was an answer in that book, even if I couldn¡¯t see it yet. Something important enough to risk disrupting the Transcription. Enough to fracture the narrative, to break through to a story beneath the story. A life beneath the life. But finding that answer meant finding out more about Eleanor Reed. Not the woman on paper, but the woman behind the name. What had her life been like? Who had she been, beyond what her record claimed? I knew one place to start. Chapter 5: Investigating the Deceased Eleanor Reed had lived in a small, modest apartment above a milliner¡¯s shop, tucked between two taller buildings on a street where gas lamps burned low to save fuel. It wasn¡¯t a place of significance, just another corner of the city where people went about their lives unnoticed. The owner of the shop¡ªa Mrs. Langley, a woman in her sixties with sharp eyes and a mouth permanently set in disapproval¡ªanswered the door when I knocked. She looked me up and down, taking in the dark coat, the gloves, the weariness that clung to Undertakers like a second skin. ¡°She¡¯s gone, then,¡± she said, voice clipped. ¡°She is.¡± She exhaled through her nose, not surprised, not grief-stricken. Just resigned. ¡°Well, I suppose someone has to take her things. I already gave everything to the runners. She didn¡¯t have much.¡± ¡°I¡¯m not here for that,¡± I said, watching her carefully. ¡°I need to ask you some questions.¡± She frowned but stepped aside. ¡°Make it quick. I don¡¯t like talking about the dead.¡± I stepped inside. The air smelled of dust and old fabric, the lingering traces of perfume clinging to the wooden staircase. I followed Mrs. Langley up to the small flat Eleanor had rented, a cramped space with a narrow bed, a writing desk, and a wardrobe that had seen better days. I glanced around. No photographs. No personal decorations. Just the bare essentials of a life. Nothing to suggest that Eleanor Reed had ever truly lived here. I could relate. My own home was not much more than a place to sleep and write. ¡°You knew her well?¡± I asked. Mrs. Langley scoffed. ¡°No one knew her well.¡± I turned my head slightly. ¡°What do you mean?¡± She sniffed, folding her arms. ¡°She kept to herself. Paid rent on time, never caused trouble. But she was... odd.¡± ¡°Odd how?¡± The older woman hesitated, as if choosing her words carefully. ¡°She was two people, depending on the day.¡± I stiffened. ¡°Go on.¡± ¡°Some nights, she¡¯d come home quiet as a ghost. Wouldn¡¯t say a word, wouldn¡¯t look anyone in the eye. Other nights, she¡¯d swagger in like she owned the damn place¡ªsmirking, tipping an imaginary hat at me, talking like she¡¯d just stepped out of a bar fight.¡± I stayed very still. ¡°You ever see her with anyone?¡± She shook her head. ¡°Never brought anyone home. But she had places she went. Never told me where.¡± ¡°Did she ever mention the name Nathaniel Kade?¡± Mrs. Langley¡¯s expression darkened. ¡°She never said it to me. But I heard it. Once.¡± I waited. ¡°She was talking to herself,¡± she murmured, more to herself than to me. ¡°Not mumbling. Not dreaming. Talking. Like there was someone else in the room.¡± A pause. ¡°It was in the middle of the night. I could hear her through the walls. Arguing with that name.¡± Her voice hardened. ¡°So no, sir, I didn¡¯t know her. And I don¡¯t care to know anything more about it.¡± I ignored her tone, letting the silence stretch. It took her only a moment to fill it, words slipping past her lips as though they¡¯d been bottled up too long, now desperate to escape. ¡°That girl was troubled. Not in a natural way. She had a... a wrongness about her.¡± Mrs. Langley shuddered. ¡°As if she weren¡¯t right in her own skin. Or as if her skin weren¡¯t right for her. You think she was possessed.¡± She stared at me, and I returned her gaze without blinking. I¡¯d expected gossip. Ignorance. Maybe even some empathy for the poor, strange girl who¡¯d rented her rooms. Not this. Not fear. Not accusation.You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version. Mrs. Langley¡¯s eyes burned with it. ¡°She wasn¡¯t,¡± I said quietly. ¡°But I know what you mean.¡± I exhaled slowly. Not an act. Not a disguise. A mind at war with itself. I turned toward the wardrobe and pulled the doors open. Inside, I found only women¡¯s clothing, pressed and neatly folded. Coats, skirts, blouses. No trace of Nathaniel Kade. Except¡ª A small, locked drawer near the bottom. I glanced at Mrs. Langley. She sighed. ¡°You might as well. Not like she¡¯s coming back for it.¡± I knelt, pulled a thin wire from my pocket, and jimmied the lock. It clicked open with barely any effort. Inside the drawer, beneath old papers and a dried-out inkwell, I found a single crumpled scrap of parchment. I smoothed it out against the floor, my pulse steady, controlled. It was a letter. Handwritten. Short.
¡°I can¡¯t do this much longer. The lines are blurring. I don¡¯t know where I end and she begins. If something happens to me, please¡ªlet me be remembered for who I was. Not for who they think I am.¡±
There was no signature. Just a single initial. N.
I left the apartment without saying much else. Mrs. Langley didn¡¯t press me. We both knew that some doors were best left unopened. I didn¡¯t blame her. Some people preferred their dead to stay silent, their pasts neatly sealed like a book snapped shut. But this wasn¡¯t a story that wanted to stay closed. The day was fading, shadows lengthening. Above, a crow cawed, wings beating against the darkening sky. I kept walking. I needed to think. To process what I¡¯d seen, what I¡¯d learned. What I thought I¡¯d heard. The air outside was cool¡ªa light rain starting to fall. I pulled my coat tighter around me and stepped out into the street. The letter burned in my pocket, a scrap of paper that spoke of a life lived between two selves. A mind at war with itself. Or a soul determined to express itself even through the limitation of its flesh. The idea had been written about before, both in medical texts and in the annals of the Library. Mental instability wasn¡¯t uncommon, and neither were the various ways that a soul could fracture under stress or injury. Some fractured by circumstance, becoming hollow imitations of the person they had once been. Others were broken so thoroughly that no single identity could contain them. Minds splintering, dividing against themselves. One of the older Undertaker texts had a name for those cases: Dissociative Identity Disorder. A soul fractured, in two or more parts, warring against itself. Had that happened to Eleanor Reed? Was this second identity¡ªthe one called Nathaniel Kade¡ªa product of a broken mind? Maybe. It would explain a lot. The different handwriting in the book. The disjointed memories, the changes in tone. Maybe even the desperation with which that letter had been written. But it didn¡¯t explain everything. I walked down the street, letting my feet carry me away from the main thoroughfares. The gas lamps flickered along the street, casting long, wavering shadows as I walked. The city hummed with its usual nighttime rhythm¡ªdistant carriage wheels rattling over cobblestone, the occasional echo of laughter from a tavern doorway, the muffled strain of a violin filtering through a second-story window. Life moved on. It always did. But Eleanor Reed had left something unfinished. I needed more than fragmented memories from a landlady and a scrap of parchment soaked in regret. If Nathaniel Kade had been more than just a passing thought in a troubled mind, there had to be something else¡ªsomewhere they had gone, someone who had met them, even if they never realized who they truly were. The library had texts about multiple personalities, but they focused on the symptoms, the effects on the living mind. None had dealt with the concept of a second persona finding a way to express themselves in defiance of the primary identity. And none of them had dealt with books that spoke back. None had described multiple identities fighting through Transcription to create a book that wasn¡¯t their own¡ªat least none from this city¡¯s Library. Maybe elsewhere. But I had neither the time nor the connections to reach out to Libraries in other cities. My counterparts were too far away to be of any use, and the couriers between cities were slow, unreliable, and often dangerous. I passed by a newspaper stand, the headlines proclaiming another factory accident that had taken the lives of seventeen men. The article went on about the dangers of steam technology, the inherent instability of the machines, the risk that workers took by working in such environments. It quoted the manager as being ¡°shocked¡± at the event, and promising to take steps to make sure nothing like it ever happened again. A familiar line. One I¡¯d heard too many times before. These days, it seemed like everything was built to fail. Like we were all just one accident away from disaster. The streets grew darker as I went further into the older parts of the city, where gas lights were few and far between. Here, most of the buildings were old, crumbling at the edges, worn down by time and neglect. Many had been abandoned, their windows boarded up, their doors barred. Those that remained had the look of places that had seen too much and remembered too little. This was a part of town where no one bothered to remember what happened, because remembering meant acknowledging that something had gone wrong. And that was not a comfortable truth. Chapter 6: The Black Veil The bar was the kind of place that didn¡¯t advertise its presence. No painted sign, no etched lettering above the door¡ªjust a sliver of warm, amber light leaking from a half-cracked entrance, the smell of whiskey and smoke thick in the damp night air. The Black Veil catered to the kind of patrons who didn¡¯t want to be known. People who paid in cash, used false names, and came to drink away the parts of themselves they couldn¡¯t carry in daylight. I¡¯d never had much use for places like this, but I knew their value. I stepped inside, the heavy door swinging shut behind me. The interior was dimly lit, the air thick with the scent of spilled liquor and old wood varnish. A few heads lifted at my entrance, eyes flicking over me in the brief, measuring way of men who knew how to spot trouble before it walked through the door. I wasn¡¯t trouble. But I wasn¡¯t welcome, either. Not here. But that didn¡¯t matter. I was an Undertaker. We weren¡¯t welcome anywhere. I made my way to the bar. The bartender was a thick-set man with silver-threaded hair and a scar running from his chin to his temple. He wiped a glass clean with the slow, measured patience of someone who¡¯d done this too many times. His eyes barely flicked up as he set the glass down in front of me. He didn¡¯t ask what I wanted. Just raised a brow. I leaned in, elbows on the counter. ¡°I¡¯m looking for someone.¡± He snorted, setting the glass down with a dull thunk. ¡°That¡¯s what they all say.¡± ¡°Not like this.¡± I reached into my coat and pulled out the folded letter. I didn¡¯t unfold it¡ªjust let it rest between two fingers, letting the faintest glimpse of the handwriting show. The bartender¡¯s expression didn¡¯t change. But his grip on the cloth tightened. I saw the flicker of recognition in his eyes. It was brief¡ªso brief that a lesser man might have missed it¡ªbut it was there. ¡°Name?¡± he asked, voice rough. ¡°Nathaniel Kade.¡± The bartender¡¯s jaw tensed. A subtle movement, but enough. ¡°Never heard of him.¡± I kept my tone low. ¡°Her. She was here, wasn¡¯t she?¡± I watched him carefully, searching for some tell¡ªa twitch of the lip, a narrowing of the eyes. Anything that might confirm what I already suspected. But the bartender was a hard man to read. He just stared at me with that same flat gaze, neither confirming nor denying anything. Finally, he spoke. ¡°Not since last week. Last time I saw her, she said she was going to catch a train. Not that night, maybe not even soon. But the way she said it¡ªlike it was something she¡¯d always been about to do, but never did.¡± ¡°And?¡± ¡°She came in. Had a drink. Talked to some folks. Left.¡± ¡°Anyone in particular?¡± The bartender shrugged. ¡°The usual suspects.¡± ¡°What¡¯s that supposed to mean?¡± He paused, wiping at the counter with the same methodical focus he¡¯d given the glass. I waited. ¡°That girl was trouble,¡± he finally said, not looking up from his work. ¡°Not the kind that hurts people, mind you. The kind that finds it. Can¡¯t seem to help themselves. Always getting mixed up in things they shouldn¡¯t.¡± A pause. ¡°You know the type.¡± ¡°Yeah,¡± I said, thinking of the man I¡¯d once been. ¡°I do.¡± ¡°She liked to talk,¡± he went on, sliding the glass down the bar. It came to rest near a stack of unpolished stemware, each one marked with a different name or initials. ¡°Liked to listen, too. Bought rounds. Laughed at the right times. Didn¡¯t cause any fuss. She always talked like he was passing through. Like she wasn¡¯t planning to stay long. Funny thing is, I don¡¯t think she ever actually left.¡± He shrugged. ¡°Good company, but an odd one at that. You¡¯d think you weren¡¯t talking with a woman at all, if you know what I mean. Half expected her to walk in with a cigar, a bottle of gin, and a mouth full of swears like some of the dockworkers.¡± The line was delivered in a gruff, casual way, like he¡¯d said it a hundred times before and would say it a hundred more. Maybe he had. Maybe it was that casualness that made it feel so strange. If Nathaniel Kade had been a fraction of Eleanor Reed¡¯s mind, some piece of her soul fighting for control, what did it mean that her alter ego was the one who made all the social connections? That Nathaniel Kade was the one known at the bar, welcomed by name, allowed to engage in the fantasies of drinking and camaraderie? ¡°A regular?¡± I asked. ¡°For a while,¡± the bartender said. ¡°Every day, right before closing. Never stayed past midnight.¡± ¡°Alone?¡± He nodded. ¡°Always. Well, almost always. She¡¯d come in with someone every now and then, but they never stayed.¡± ¡°Did she have a usual table?¡± ¡°Back corner,¡± he gestured with a jut of his chin. ¡°Faced the wall, usually.¡± Interesting. Most people who sat alone preferred to sit with their backs to the wall so they could see who approached them. Eleanor¡ªor Nathaniel¡ªhad chosen to sit exposed, where they couldn¡¯t watch the door, but had the room at their back. It was a gesture of trust. Of vulnerability. Of inviting companionship, instead of guarding against it. I glanced back at the empty table. ¡°Were any of her companions here tonight?¡± ¡°Doubt it. She hadn¡¯t been here since last week.¡± ¡°But when she used to come in, any regular drinking partners? Any faces she spoke to often?¡± ¡°Sure.¡± A shrug. ¡°Some of the regulars. Other folks, too.¡± ¡°Names?¡± The bartender¡¯s mouth settled into a firm, unyielding line. ¡°Look, whoever you are, I run a business. And my business is built on discretion. People come to places like this because they need to be forgotten for a while, and I¡¯m not going to be the one to take that away from them.¡± He looked me straight in the eye, and I knew he meant every word.Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. ¡°I¡¯m not here to cause trouble,¡± I said. ¡°Or to make things difficult for you or your patrons. I just want to find out who she really was.¡± I let the silence hang for a beat. ¡°So I know what name to put on the book.¡± He didn¡¯t look away, and I didn¡¯t blink. I could tell he was weighing his choices, measuring the risks. A man like him had to be careful. This wasn¡¯t the kind of place you wanted to anger. But neither was the Library. Finally, he exhaled, and some of the tension eased from his shoulders. ¡°Wait here,¡± he muttered. He headed into the back room. I watched him go. The bar had filled up in the meantime, a steady trickle of patrons drifting in, and the space was starting to get noisy, a dull roar of conversation and clinking glasses. I caught snatches of conversations, arguments about politics, flirtations between workers coming off long shifts. Snatches of life. I ignored them all. The minutes crawled by. I waited. When the bartender emerged, he set something on the bar between us. A pocket watch. It was old, the brass casing scratched and dulled with time. A small, delicate engraving on the back. I turned it over, brushing away the layer of dust. E.R. Eleanor Reed. I shut my eyes briefly. ¡°Never seen him with it before that night,¡± the bartender murmured. ¡°Seemed strange, how she just... left it behind.¡± Not strange. I opened the watch with a quiet click. Inside, the cracked face of the clock hands was frozen at a time that meant nothing to me. But the inner lid had something else. A mirror. Small. Just enough to reflect a single eye, a sliver of a face. Smoky, speckled, and distorted, but enough. It was the kind of mirror meant for quick glances¡ªa stolen look before stepping into the world, before ensuring that everything was in place. Not for vanity, but for certainty. A reassurance. A check. Had Eleanor Reed looked into this mirror and seen herself? Or had she seen someone else entirely? I turned the watch slightly, angling it so I could see my own reflection. The dim light from the bar caught the edge of my face, distorting it, making it unfamiliar. It struck me then¡ªNathaniel Kade would have only ever seen himself like this. In fragments. In pieces. Never whole. He had existed in the cracks of Eleanor Reed¡¯s life, slipping into the empty spaces where she let him take shape. But did he know? Had he ever understood that he was just a reflection, a second self carved out of necessity? Or had he believed himself to be real? I swallowed, my grip tightening around the watch. The weight of it was wrong. Pocket watches had a kind of presence¡ªsomething meant to be felt in the hand, its weight a comfort, a reminder of time passing in steady, measured increments. This one had the opposite effect. It felt like something left behind. Forgotten. Discarded. Nathaniel Kade had owned nothing. No records, no belongings, no past. He had only ever existed when Eleanor let him. But this watch was Eleanor¡¯s. She had carried it. Checked it. Used it. And yet, somehow, it had ended up here, left behind by a man who had never existed. I traced the engraving with my thumb¡ªE.R. Had she carried it even when she was Nathaniel? Had she slipped it into her coat pocket, fingers brushing over it absentmindedly while she ordered a drink at the bar, while she spoke in a voice that was not hers, but was? Had she pulled it out in moments of doubt, flipping the lid open, looking into the mirror just to remind herself of who¡ªor what¡ªshe was? Had Nathaniel done the same? Had he looked into it and seen a ghost staring back at him? The hands of the clock were frozen in time, but maybe that was fitting. Maybe this was the moment it had stopped mattering. The moment she had stopped fighting. Or the moment she had given in. A last confession, left behind in brass and glass. I shut the case with a quiet click, sliding it into my pocket. Nathaniel Kade had never owned this watch. But Eleanor Reed had. And she had let it go. Maybe that was all the proof I needed. ¡°Thanks,¡± I muttered. The bartender grunted, picking up another glass. I headed for the door.
I walked through the rain-slicked streets, the city stretching out before me in flickering gaslight and half-seen reflections. The pocket watch felt heavier than it should have¡ªbrass and glass weighed down by something less tangible, something that pressed against the edges of my thoughts like an unanswered question. The pieces fit now. Nathaniel Kade had existed. Not in a way that left records, not in a way the world had ever acknowledged. But he had been real enough to step into bars, to drink among strangers, to carve out moments where he could exist beyond the confines of Eleanor Reed¡¯s life. And yet, he had never been allowed to stay. That was the truth of it. Eleanor Reed was the one the world knew. The one who paid rent, walked the streets unnoticed, lived a life quiet and small. Nathaniel Kade had been something else¡ªa self built from longing, from defiance, from the need to be someone other than what the world expected. But he had existed only in between things, in the shadows of another name, in places where he didn¡¯t have to answer to anyone but himself. The bartender had said Nathaniel always talked like he was passing through¡ªlike he was waiting for the right moment to leave, but never did. That was because he was never meant to stay. I turned the pocket watch over in my palm, tracing the engraved initials on the back. E.R. Eleanor Reed¡¯s name, etched in metal. But she hadn¡¯t been the one to leave it behind. Nathaniel had. That was the part I had almost missed. Nathaniel wasn¡¯t a life that had been cut short¡ªhe was a self that had been cut short. And in that last night, when he¡¯d stopped in at the bar, buying rounds and laughing at the right times, he¡¯d known it was the end. Nathaniel Kade had been real¡ªbut even he had known he was slipping. That he was losing his grip on whatever thin thread tethered him to existence. I clicked the watch open. The mirror inside caught a flicker of lamplight, reflecting only a sliver of my face. I thought about how many times Nathaniel had looked into it, seeing his own reflection, but always within Eleanor¡¯s possession. Had it ever felt like his? Or had it always reminded him of the self he could never fully escape? The watch was a marker of time running out¡ªnot just for Eleanor¡¯s body, but for Nathaniel¡¯s existence. And maybe he¡¯d known. Maybe that was why he left it behind. Because he had known, deep down, that he wasn¡¯t going to last. That the lines were blurring. That soon, there wouldn¡¯t be space for him anymore. That he was about to be lost. I thought of the letter¡ªhis words, scrawled in hurried ink.
¡°I can¡¯t do this much longer. The lines are blurring. I don¡¯t know where I end and she begins. If something happens to me, please¡ªlet me be remembered for who I was. Not for who they think I am.¡±
Nathaniel had written that. Not Eleanor. Because Nathaniel had been the one who knew he was disappearing. He had felt it¡ªthe way Eleanor¡¯s life would always reclaim him, the way she could step back into the world unquestioned while he was always a risk, an uncertainty, a shadow. Nathaniel had left behind that letter because he knew he might not last. Nathaniel had left behind the pocket watch because he didn¡¯t need it anymore. And when death finally came¡ªwhen Transcription took hold, unraveling a life into ink and parchment¡ªit hadn¡¯t taken the life the world knew. It had taken the life that had fought hardest to exist. Nathaniel Kade had been the one standing at the end. The one holding the pen. That was why Transcription had recorded his story. I exhaled slowly, tilting my head up to the rain.
¡°The Last Confession of Nathaniel Kade.¡±
A confession of existence. A final admission. Nathaniel had lived. Not in full. Not in permanence. But he had lived enough. And Eleanor Reed had known it. She had known it when Nathaniel wrote that letter, his last desperate plea not to be erased. She had known it when Nathaniel left the pocket watch behind, as if he had finally stopped running. And I knew it now, too. For the first time since becoming an Undertaker, I wasn¡¯t sure what to do with the book. I wasn¡¯t sure what to do with the truth.