Manacled Book Novels & Stories

“This is impossible. Such things cannot be erased. Once written, they endure forever.” Nyra laid her palm gently upon the page. For a heartbeat, something flickered—shadow, or memory—but then all fell still again. “It feels as if it’s watching… as if the book itself doesn’t know whether to show me what it holds,” she murmured. “Some bindings reveal themselves only in time,” I said darkly. “Perhaps your blood has not yet fully awakened. Or someone sealed it away from you deliberately.” I shut the tome. The chains slithered back into place of their own accord, and the sigil pulsed darker than before. As if now it knew us. And was watching.

I demanded, eyeing the mysterious device untrustingly. Indigo didn’t try to hand it to me though, he merely unwound a string of leather from around it and flipped it open, revealing more and more pieces of parchment inside, hundreds of them, bound together and fanning up from the center between two thicker outer shells to make an arch. Captivated as all the parchment settled again, I watched in awe when Indigo pressed his hand down on it. “This,” he told me, “is called a book.” “A book,” I repeated reverently, easing cautiously closer. “Is it dangerous?”

“I bet you taste like roses and honey.” I didn’t break our stare-down. “Can a prisoner at least get a book? I mean, if you’re not going to entertain me in any other way…” It was probably not wise to poke him, but I wasn’t some weakling he could bend with a few harsh words and threats. He stared at me before disappearing into his “office” but surprised me when he came back over with a book in his hand. He let loose a battered and beaten flutter of pages through the top of the cage. It landed in my lap with a thump. The binding was cracked and the worn pages indicated it was a much-read book. The cover wasn’t familiar, but it was also scuffed and torn.

Then, to the right, and at the end of a long row of books, one book jutted out from the shelf. I pulled it out. It didn’t have a name. It was a leather-bound volume, and its cover had a skeletal hand clutching a wilting rose. I opened the book, skimming through the pages. My stomach turned at some of the rituals inside. Selene was too arrogant, too vein, to resort to grave robbing, and there would be no need to stitch me together if her plan was to take over people’s bodies as she had before. The Binding.

I managed to ask, my head banging against my skull. “I don't know yet. We have to go somewhere else to find out the cause of this, but one thing I'm sure is that someone has been going to that place. A book only acts that way if it has already been bound to someone else. It rejected you both, your union is something that it was meant to work against” Elana said, and I tried to sit up. Augustus was on the chair, he wasn't awake yet, and I could see that his head had been bandaged. I got up and immediately made my way to him, cradling him in my arms as he stirred in his unconsciousness.

Some were bound in what might have been leather, but most were wrapped in cloth stained with strange patterns that seemed to shift when one looked away, or sealed in wax that had melted and hardened again in uneven blobs like frozen tears. “This is where we keep the things you didn’t write,” the woman said, running her fingers over a stack of books wrapped in dark green cloth. Her touch was gentle, reverent almost. “The parts of the world that grew on their own while you were gone, while you were living your life in another place and time. Your manuscript was just a seed, Miss Isadora. But seeds have a way of sending roots into soil you never knew existed.”

BBAP CHAPTER 114 “Who would drive me to that place, then?” The man furrowed his brows as his hold on her wrist tightened. Dalmi tried wagging her hands to get away from his hold, but the man seemed like he was determined not to make her succeed in going away. His vision darkened, and for seconds, Dalmi thought it was one of the things she wanted to avoid: his piercing black eyes. It sent shivers down her spine, and his stare seemed like it was hypnotizing her to stop.

The librarian, a wise old man with spectacles perched on his nose, had greeted them warmly and invited them to explore the dusty shelves filled with ancient tomes. As Scarlett's fingers grazed the spines of the books, a particular leather-bound volume caught her eye. Its title, "The Prophecy of the Shifting Stars," called to her with an inexplicable pull. She plucked it from the shelf and dusted off its cover, revealing faded golden letters etched into the leather. Curiosity burned within Scarlett. She opened the book and began to read aloud, her voice barely above a whisper. The words flowed like poetry from her lips, resonating deeply within her soul.

The two men who'd escorted me in left with a curt nod. Alone in this room with him, the man who'd just so rudely kidnapped me from my home. It felt suffocating. Yet, I stayed in place, my gut told me trying to make a run for it wouldn't end in my favor, seeing as I had no idea where I was, or where to head. For all I knew, home no longer was home. Rowan beckons me forward with a come-hither bend of his fingers, the rings adorning the long slender fingers glittering in the light of the auburn flames emitting from the fireplace.

Emily leaned forward, almost stumbling open the poor lady, and watched in anticipation. We watched with eagle-like eyes as Mary took a hold of the cover and... she couldn't open it. Confused, the old lady held the book tightly and tried to open it again, and again and again. "I know I am old but not this old." She mumbled with clenched teeth. I gasped as she kept the book on the counter and tried to pull it apart with both her hands. If not for the weird spell on it, the book would have been ripped apart into two pieces.