The Alien Library Read Free Page A

with Cameron. Make requests and no dictating. Please, aunt, take your days and see if you can win her confidence. I will keep some distance. Until she finds ease with me.”
    “Apologize for striking her, Tendar,” Pindari suggested and pulled away from the table. “I will assist her in moving. Consider how to personalize the new quarters.”
    He nodded. “The flower she admired. The gardener wanted to destroy it. I refused, but it is isolated. It will be placed in her quarters.” He remembered how gently Cameron had cupped that flower, gently cradling it as she inhaled the perfume. It would be a thoughtful gift for her. He bid his aunt farewell and slowly left for his bath, lost in thought.
    *****
    The tub filled and the two women left Cameron, with a final admonition not to touch the water. She nodded, closing her eyes as she sought to quiet her mind. She had to stay safe, stay quiet and perhaps he’d just send her back to the kitchen.
    The water steamed slightly and she opened her eyes to admire the play of it on the surface. A bit of air current pulled at her hair and she lifted it away from her neck, to enjoy the coolness. Her eyes casually watched a single hair dance away and float on the air…
    It landed on the water and she suddenly grew fearful. The other women had been strict about nothing marring the pool. She scrambled forward, but couldn’t reach the stray hair. It seemed to glare at her as it floated, just out of reach. She leaned, gently blew to see it skitter towards the other side. She hurried to the far edge and found she could just reach it. Curling a single finger, she caught at a bit rising above the surface tension and swept it away.
    The sound of a door opening saw her scramble back to a bench a good distance from the pool. Tendar turned a corner and smiled at her. “Cameron, thank you for being so patient.” He looked for the other two. “Where are Susan and Jean?”
    “I don’t know. They left when the tub was full.” Cameron kept her eyes low, gazing only at his feet.
    He sat on a second bench and observed her. Her knees were glued together, her arms tight around her torso. The tunic Pindari had given her swam around her body. He smiled slightly. “I have new quarters off the library I would like you to move there. Six days of the week, you will work there.”
    “I don’t know anything about how to work in a library,” she objected.
    “I understand. But you do know how to work in a bookstore. Consider it a bookstore. Organize it how you know. You have free reign. Every seventh day, Pindari bargained for a day in the kitchen with her. She enjoys your assistance. I will visit now and then, make requests for certain topics.” He paused as she shook her head. “Yes?”
    “I…” She paused and looked up at him. “Why me?”
    He considered how to answer her with honesty, but in a manner that wouldn’t frighten her. He didn’t want her to be scared. He looked away. “You must be aware how rare it is for a human to come to us with full intellectual abilities?”
    “Yes.” She swallowed. “The rest…it is like they are drugged. What do you do to them?”
    “Nothing. I swear to you. It wasn’t always this way, but it has become the norm. Less than ten percent of any given harvest retains real cognition.” He noted how she flinched at his choice of words. He didn’t know how else to put it. “Cameron, we are not slave and master. We…I understand you call us Kharmon and that is appropriate. We care for the humans. All of them, Thinker or not.”
    “How did this…? Who…? Why…?” She sounded terribly scared.
    He shrugged. “I don’t have set answers. I will speak to you of it more, in time. For now, find some peace in the books. Request help if you need it, with hauling or moving shelves. Organize as you wish it. Visit with Pindari, though do not explore beyond the kitchen and library. I regret striking you in the garden. I apologize. My brother is cruel. He has no