Hasse

Despite being blind since birth, Hasse has developed a keen sense of awareness. He helps out Addie in the library and finds his way around faster and quicker than any patron. Many dragons come to the library just to visit with him and the hatchlings especially enjoy his animated story telling time.

Hasse has lived his whole life among the shelves of the library, finding peace in the darkness and the stories. Each day, when there are no patrons to help, he ventures farther into the shelves, bringing forgotten things to light. Today, he tread strange aisles, in the less-travelled section of the building.The fae ran his small talons across the shelf, wiping away dust. His claws brushed brittle scrolls and felt all the dips and scratches of the wood, finding nothing out of the ordinary, until his scales hit something cold and hard.

He jerked back, as if it had shocked him. It hadn't, but the stun of the freezing surface felt like a jolt of static electricity. He reached out into the darkness again, calming his wildly beating heart and seeking the strange thing to investigate it. His grasping hands found it immediately, skimming over the surface. It felt like a ball of glass, though strangely cold. Whatever it was wasn't supposed to be on a library shelf- a student's forgotten trinket, perhaps? Maybe one of the patrons had set it down by accident as they stretched to reach a new document. It had best go to the lost-and-found bin, he thought, so whoever owned it might be reunited with their paperweight.

It was not a paperweight, and it was not forgotten. It was left there, deliberately, in terror. It was meant to be forgotten, abandoned by a desperate dragon long ago. Hasse should never have picked it up. But as his talons closed around the ball, the glass immediately stole warmth from his blood. And this time, it did shock him: painfully. He tried to drop it, but the unearthly cold of the ball crept like frost across his hands and forearms, freezing him to the ball.

For one of the first times in his life, Hasse was fortunate to be blind. If he wasn't, he would have seen what the long-ago student had seen before he abandoned it. The glass became a window into all the hellish realms, places not meant for mortal eyes. If he could see, he would have seen all the terrible, shaded corners of the world. He would have seen the Shade, plagues, and demons. But he didn't.

As the reflection of the glowing orb flickered in his glassy, unseeing eyes, the ball lessened its hold. Perhaps there was no point showing the hells to someone who could not see. Hasse wrenched his hands away, trembling, and fled. His eyes ached. But he never told anyone, not a single soul. For there are secrets among the stories that are never meant to be seen.

Lore by EverAthena

Adelaide Rosalie Hasse (1868 - 1953) is listed as one of the "100 most important leaders we had in the 20th century" in the December 1999 edition of American Libraries. She is credited with having developed the Superintendent of Documents Classification system, or SuDocs, used by the Government Printing Office and Federal Depository Library Program.