Those displays were all placed in an even grid pattern, almost resembling pieces placed on a chessboard, and yet the way the cabinets, cases, statues, and pedestals were mixed together randomly made no logical sense, except perhaps as a representation of chess pieces of a game in play.
Ludwig found the confusing arrangement rather obnoxious. He realized, then, that if he wanted, he might have them lined up together in an orderly manner, or placed against walls. He thought it would make more sense if he grouped like things together. As he walked through the room, he mentally began redecorating the place, placing specific things together and making it more convenient to find particular items.
He didn’t know how Hannis Arc had worked in such seeming chaos. He supposed that he had lived here his entire life and was used to it. And, of course, Hannis Arc was an advocate of chaos, so in an odd way it did seem fitting.
But it also told Ludwig something important about the way Hannis Arc thought. He was in certain ways brilliant, and in many ways highly focused, while in other ways incredibly powerful, effective, and dangerous, yet he wasn’t necessarily logical. At times, he went about things on whim, or became fixated on one thing to the exclusion of all else, such as his obsession with the House of Rahl.
Ludwig saw that the glassed cabinets he walked past held an odd mixture of rarities such as bones from strange creatures, or small statues, mechanical devices, and even round tubes with carved symbols all over them. The symbols resembled those tattooed all over Hannis Arc. They were called story tubes and they had been written in the language of Creation. Ludwig knew that items with those symbols were ancient and exceedingly rare. Lives had been traded for such rare treasures.
There were a number of stuffed animals in various places around the room. Besides the more common creatures in common poses—deer standing in an oval display of grass; a family of beavers on a mound of sticks; and raptors, wings spread, on bare branches—there was a large bear towering up on its hind legs, jaws spread wide, with its claws raised so that it looked perpetually ready to attack.
The things that really drew Ludwig Dreier’s attention, though, were the dozens of pedestals evenly spaced in various places throughout the room, conforming to the grid pattern. Each pedestal held an open book. The books were all enormous, with heavy leather bindings that showed great age and wear all around the edges. They would have been hard to move because of their sheer size, but also because they looked quite frail, so they appeared to have permanent homes on their pedestals, rather than on some of the bookshelves against the back wall.
Tables near the book pedestals were piled with disorderly stacks of scrolls. Ludwig recognized many as scrolls he had sent to the citadel—to Hannis Arc—to be recorded in the books of prophecy.
Some of those scrolls still had unbroken seals as they sat waiting their turn to be opened and recorded. Ludwig found that irritating. He had gone to enormous trouble in both time and effort to collect each and every one of those prophecies, to say nothing of the people who had given their lives in that work.
Mohler held out a hand of gnarled, arthritic fingers. “This is my work, Lord Dreier. These are the books you asked about.” He gently laid his hand on one of the open books with a kind of reverent affection. “This is where I write down all the prophecy brought to the citadel.”
Ludwig frowned. “You mean the prophecy that I sent to the citadel.”
The old scribe stroked the knuckle of his first finger back along his gaunt cheek. “Well, yes, Lord Dreier, those, and others.”
Ludwig’s frown deepened. “Others. What do you mean, others? I was Bishop Arc’s abbot. I am the one who uncovered prophecies on his behalf and sent them here, to the bishop.”
Mohler dipped his head. “Yes, but there were others.”
“Others? What others?”
The old man shrugged his hunched shoulders, hands opened out to the sides. “I am sorry, Lord Dreier, but I was not privy to such things.” He gestured to one of the tables piled high. “Scrolls and books are brought in, and I record what is in them here, in these books.”
“And only you record prophecy? You recorded all of what is in these books?”
He again placed a deformed hand on one of the books on a pedestal. “These books are my work, but they predate me, of course. They contain the work of many who came before me. All of it is recorded here. I have entered all the prophecy found in these books since Bishop Arc entrusted me with the task back when I was still young. I have worked at this my entire life.”
Ludwig realized that Hannis Arc was not the only one privy to prophecy. Ludwig was sure that in all those many years of working with the books, Mohler would have had to go through the books and read what had come before. This unassuming old man probably knew more prophecy than just about anyone else alive.