Shadow needed something to make the book open up, to give her a chance to see where its power came from. She closed her eyes, more out of reflex than anything else, and looked into her own mind. In the depths somewhere she found another mind, or rather a speck of dust that had once been a mind, it had once been the mind of the first rule breaker she had apprehended. Given enough magic it could be a mind once more, it would be an empty shell without thoughts, but it would still be a mind. This was the mind she would use to lure the book out of hiding.
Only seconds after the empty mind came into being, Shadow could feel how energy emanated from the book, like a thin tendril it reached out. This was what Shadow had waited for. The mind she had created immediately collapsed into her own again, it had served its purpose. Shadow then cast a spell that was quite similar to a teleportation but instead of moving her to a different location in the space she was currently in, it moved her into a different space altogether.
Even before she opened her eyes, she realized that something was different, the air smelled differently, it smelled older. Shadow smelled old leather and paper, she knew this smell very well. When she opened her eyes, they confirmed what her nose had made her suspect: She was in a library. This library however was unlike any Shadow had been in before. Even the library of the University of Magic of Rockhaven was dwarfed by the sheer scale. Rows of bookshelves continued seemingly infinitely into all four cardinal directions. It did seem to have a floor and a ceiling though.
Shadow sent a projection into each direction, moving at a rapid pace. About a minute later they still hadn't found any sign of an end. This library really seemed to extend infinitely. Shadow instinctively knew what this meant, she might not have exactly done the amount of academic study that her brother had but she still knew a parallel plane when she saw one. Under normal circumstances this would have been surprising but seeing that she had already crossed several universes on her way to Nexus it really wasn't.
Nonetheless, this was a new experience for Shadow. The scientists had told her that after her ascension her mind was different in ways they couldn't explain, now Shadow started to realize how right they were. The moment she had left her own world something had awakened inside of her, a new sense so to speak, now the feeling returned, stronger than ever. She was acutely aware of her current position, not just in the library but also in regard to what was beyond. There was another plane in very close proximity to this one, perhaps she could repeat what she did in Astro's presence.
Shadow concentrated, back in the forest it had been difficult, now it was easy. Once again her hand disappeared from reality, instead reaching into the space between. Only this time Shadow felt something that was not emptiness, she felt a thin membrane, the metaphorical fabric of reality of the other parallel plane. With a decisive movement she cut through both the membrane on her side and that on the other side. Shadow saw more bookshelves through the rift she had created, another layer of library? In the thin space between the libraries was a seemingly infinite nothingness, however Shadow wasn't quite sure. She thought she could make out things in the distance but it was like trying to look through milk glass, only that this milk glass had the "color" of nothing. Instead of thinking more about what was between the planes, Shadow decided to cross over instead.
As she passed through, her body disintegrated, leaving behind what she had taken to calling her true, or unbound form. In this form her skin had gone from being merely pitch black to being even less than that, she was a silhouette of nothingness. Her hair also refused to play along with gravity and instead floated around her head like a bright white cloud. Her eyes seemed to be distant red stars in the midst of the nothing of her face. Only very few people had seen her like this, most of them were now specks of mind-dust within her own mind, the one other person was Fire. She supposed that this form had contributed no small part in helping the interrogations of the rule breakers along, partially through intimidation, partially because it was quite difficult to comprehend, as Astro had experienced first-hand.
Shortly after passing over to the other library-plane, Shadow regained her regular senses, along with them her regular body and clothing started reforming. She was now in a spacious room, a reading room by the looks of it. Several long tables made from dark, polished wood occupied a good part of the space. At the tables stood cushioned chairs made from the same wood, on the tables stood reading lamps, presumably glowstone-based. Behind her, the tear in reality closed again.
Then Shadow noticed that she was not alone, at the other end of the room was a… thing. It looked like someone had taken pages torn out of various books and glued them together to form a humanoid shape. The humanoid shape turned to face Shadow. A crease formed in the papers at the head-like shape at the top, and the shape spoke:
"How did you get here?"
The voice was that of a young woman, with a slight distortion to the voice as if it had traveled through some communication device and had become corrupted. The voice was calm and measured, but beneath the surface Shadow could detect a slight unease.
"Through the wall." She said matter-of-factly. This being in front of her could well be what corrupted Fristad so Shadow decided to not reveal too much about herself yet.
The humanoid shape walked closer to Shadow, and turned its head while walking sideways, its paper head tilting up and down, inspecting Shadow's robe and unperturbed charcoal face and white hair.
"It is not easy to enter this place. Nor is it easy to leave it. Would you not agree?"
Shadow smirked and demonstratively slashed another tear into the fabric of reality. She really was getting the hang of this.
"That is a neat trick." The shaped paper's voice was curious, but also cynical. "Perhaps you can teach it to me. But your arrival here has a different purpose, does it not?"
"Alright, I'll get straight to the point then: The events of the last days, the nightmares. I want to hear your side of it and you better not lie to me."
"Fine." The paper figure's voice became agitated. "I suppose you know what I am, then? At least to a superficial degree? After all, you came inside of my body, to find the essence of myself in an attempt to communicate with me. And I suppose you know Fristad as well. How is he, by the way?"
Shadow replied: "Alive... and somewhat conflicted. We also shielded him from magic so that you can't get to him."
"I assumed such. You and the others have tended to recognize the value of life over death. Except, possibly, for Destiny. She seems unstable recently. Although the magic shielding was something I did not anticipate. But, back to the nightmares. You should first know that I have been trapped in the void for millenia, and as such my pages have been deprived of eyes for far too long. Fristad was the first to read them after I breached the caustic nothingness, and for this reason I consider us to have a special relationship. Since that fateful moment, I have taught him things, often in secret, as the world we come from labels many forms of magic as 'dark magic,' magic which in their nearsighted judgement is evil and should be destroyed. We assumed you would view us the same way, minus the killing of us perhaps, and thus our secrecy continued. But Fristad reached an impasse in his abilities. We had to make a choice. It was Fristad who proposed the nightmares be induced on Amanda. I personally felt no ill will towards her. In fact, I found her to be quite intelligent. Perhaps you could ask Fristad about his choice. But alas, the decision was made, and now the essence of my self stands before you, privy to your judgement."
Shadow had expected something along these lines, this was not the first time she had received one such monologue. If she was honest with herself, the constant blame shifting was starting to get boring and predictable. "I personally am of the opinion that power itself cannot be evil unless it is itself sentient, however those who wield this power can fall anywhere in your morality system of choice. In the morality of the world I come from, warping a personality beyond recognition about equates to killing the person. I also suspect that while Fristad had the choice whom to attack, he didn't exactly get an independent say in whether the attack should happen at all. The magic needed for the attacks comes from you I presume." Shadow paused. "About what you said at the start, the reason I refused to use more… drastic methods was because it would have made me suspicious, which would have been quite harmful to our group as a whole. Trust me when I say this. It is quite literally my job description to execute people who would cause great harm if all other possibilities are exhausted."
"Then, perhaps I should consider myself grateful, that your 'subjective' definition of morality has allowed both me and Fristad to live. In my definition of morality, knowledge is invaluable. To not share knowledge is the greatest transgression of all. As for killing, while I have become very fond of Fristad and would punish those who dare to harm him, the idea of me, a bound stack of pages affixed with letters, ascribing my actions on things that move and eat to any moral standard other than the knowledge which they contain is, admittedly, quite ridiculous." Loose pages began to restlessly circle the floor around the paper form. "But it is clear my philosophical musings are not open for debate. What do you actually want from me?"
Shadow replied: "I want to know if you can be reasonable. As in, can you pass on your knowledge without forcing it on people?" Again, Shadow paused, this time less for dramatic effect and more to catch the figure off guard. "Also, do you think I'm stupid? I know you are not the Book, you just live in the book. You are confined to it and you probably can't even see past this hyperplane. Let me make it perfectly clear that I can and will kill you if you don't prove to me that I can leave you alive."
A gust of wind boomed in the library. The pages circling on the floor around the humanoid form lifted into the air and swirled around it. Books tumbled off the library shelves and papers tore from the books, flying toward the growing, twirling swarm.
"You ask too much of me! You tell me I am not what I am, and then you threaten to kill me! Without the words I carry, I am no more than a block of wood! How am I supposed to convey my knowledge if no one knows what I am? You disgust me! You are a monster! And if you should decide to kill me merely because I say these words, then I do not care what moral code you claim to follow: you are evil! Take back the lies of what I am!"
Shadow began to smile. She loved this part, they all invariably got to it at some point. "I really wish you could come up with some new, more flavorful insults, 'monster' is beyond overused at this point. I believe you should rather call me an abomination, I do eat minds after all. I have no illusions about what I am, in contrast to you. But throwing insults at each other, no matter how sophisticated, won't get us anywhere, will it? You can consider yourself a book if you want to, if that's what it takes to make you hold a reasonable conversation. I'll repeat my question. Are you capable of sharing your knowledge without manipulating others?"
The swirling swarm of papers halted in mid-air, and floated down in zig-zags and twirls which caused the papers to warp and crease with high-pitched snapping echoes. When the papers settled, the remaining mass of papers stood dejected, its head held low.
"I am," the form said simply.
Shadow nodded. "If that is so, then we might be able to come to an agreement. I won't be all high and mighty about it either, simply not killing the other side is a shoddy basis for any contract. As it stands you'll still have to earn trust, mine and perhaps more importantly that of those who were directly affected. For both of your sakes I can't let you near Fristad again though, temptation is a strong force."
"That is unfortunate," the form said. It paused for a moment. "How do you propose I earn your trust?"
"You will spend a bit of time with Kay, he has voiced quite an interest in you. Don't do anything… unwise and who knows, we might be able to repay you in some fashion if it's in our range of capabilities."
Shadow had no doubts that the book wouldn't be completely compliant but as long as nothing like the Dreamweaver situation happened, it was a worthy tradeoff. It really would have been a shame to destroy, or rather kill, something as unique as the book.
"I suppose, 'unwise,' in this context, means: no killing or inducing negative emotions in members of the group, and no introduction of ideas in their minds that might be considered… unexpected?"
Shadow considered for a moment. "More or less. Attempts at conditioning using positive emotions are also off limits, in fact any kind of influence that goes beyond mundane persuasion is too. I would also ask you to limit your interactions to Kay only for the beginning. Once you prove that you can play nice, you can also 'talk' with others."
The paper crease in the figure's head widened and curled into a smile. "Very well. I shall endeavor to honor your requests."
Shadow was not sure if she should extend her hand or not, but decided to do so. The handshake felt rather reluctant and the hand itself felt like paper, unsurprisingly.
"I'll be leaving now, you will be in Kay's 'custody' very soon."
With those words Shadow once again tore through the fabric of reality, this time the cut was more precise than before and closed immediately after she went through. She resurfaced in the familiar room of the inn, Kay looking at her expectantly.
She said: "We managed to work something out. You can have the book for now, feel free to talk to it but take care. It would not surprise me if it still tries something."