They were going to be caught and there was nothing she could do, the terrifying Loxodon was unstoppable.
A flash of red caught her eye ahead and she blinked as she spotted a number of teddy bears hauling a cart laden with crates down an alley.
"Hey, you've got to help me!"
The teddy bear riding on top of the crates turned to see her, a red scarf fluttering in the breeze. He quickly took in Fey, then the Loxodon just turning the corner at the end of the alley, then he waved his blunt paw to follow and jumped off the crate.
Fey, not sure what else to do, chased after him as he darted into an alley. This alley seemed different than the others, even narrower, and as they progressed it split into many many more, a spiderweb like maze. The thundering steps behind slowed, but still came on.
Then the bear stopped.
"Wh-why are you stopping?!"
The bear pointed and Fey realised she was standing outside a door, a heavy door, one with a huge chained padlock on it, the door seemed to be part of an enormous building several storeys tall, a warehouse far larger than anything else they had passed by in the alleys so far.
"I- I can't go in there, it's locked!"
The bear pointed at the lock this time with emphasis.
"But!"
The sound of a wall collapsing and angry trumpeting came from behind. "Give me snu snu!" came a distant bellow.
Fey grabbed hold of the lock and pulled on it, dragging the chain from either side.
The lock groaned as metal began to fail, flashes of colour sparking as magical runes came apart across its surface. All at once it broke with a flash of light and a dozen chunks of metal fell around Fey's hooves. She didn't hesitate and grabbed the door handle, opened it, and slipped inside, closing it behind.
"Did she see?" whisper hissed Kayla.
They held their breath, slumped against the door, listening, waiting.
The sound of heavy feet came closer, closer, angry breathing, and then… it passed, the steps leaving them behind.
They let out a breath at the same time.
"I think you dodged an arrow there Fey, Loxodons are famous for being erm, scary brutal in bed, and nearly as strong as dragons…"
"I got the impression... " said Fey faintly.
After a moment she struggled to her feet, her hooves clicking on the flagstones. She hesitantly stepped forward, amongst the shelves, the shelves of the warehouse…?
The massive shelves towered over Fey even with her size and height, their tops dark in the shadowed ceiling, tall intimidating things crammed with books of varying sizes, all covered in a layer of dust, decrepit weathered covers, aged and split and worn away, titles barely visible and often unreadable.
Fey sneezed as the disturbed dust tickled her nose, the few beams of light that filtered through the tall windows highlighting a million motes of dust suspended in the air.
"What is this place?"
"I… don't know," said Kayla.
Fey blinked down at her, for once actually able to see the otterkin girl, or at least her outline, the motes of dust swirling around her unable to pass within her body and so loosely showing her shape.
The motes roiled and an invisible arm lifted, a small hand reaching for the nearest shelf and gently touching the cover.
"It says, 'Hydromancer, water magicks.' Hey, you don't think this is a Class library do you?"
Fey looked around at the dusty disused shelving. "I don't know but it seems a bit unused and abandoned if that is what it is, erm, and all the books look old?"
"Then maybe not a Class library? Maybe a storage place for old Class books? Maybe ones that are outdated, or, uh, damaged? That has to exist right? I doubt a Class book can last for centuries without needing to be replaced right?"
Fey rubbed her chin. "That makes sense, I think you are probably right, but that maybe means they are dangerous too? There was a huge padlock on the door remember, an enchanted padlock, I doubt just anyone would be able to break in here, I nearly couldn't break the lock and I'm, erm, really strong…"
The dust moved suggesting Kayla was nodding her head in agreement
"Then this is perfect!"
"It is?"
"Yes! I just need…" the dust shimmered as the otterkin looked around. She soon spotted what she needed, a dusty disused desk, and rushed over to it. A moment later the draws were being rapidly dragged out and tossed to the ground, each of them empty and barren, that is until she pulled free the last draw and something clattered within.
The dust billowed and rose as she stood up, a clear cracked crystal seemingly floating in the air held by an invisible hand.
"Erm, Kayla I'm not sure that it is a good idea to do this without a professional. We don't know anything, these books could all be broken for all we know, or banned, or- or dangerous!"
The crystal moved slightly as though the fist clutching it was white knuckle gripping it.
"I don't care anymore Fey, I'm tired of being useless, and if the perfect Class for me exists it could be in here! A class with as much Affinity for me as Lily's Class is for her! I could catch up to her with a perfect Class, I could help! I don't know if that class is here, but I'm going to look!"
"Kayla!"
But the crystal suddenly darted away, fleeing down between the towering shelves, the dust swirling violently as the invisible otterkin passed by.
Fey blanched and tried to follow, running between the shelves after her, flickering beams of light passing by as she passed between bookcase after bookcase. One passage three, five, and then Kayla was simply… gone. Any indication she was there nowhere to be found. Fey turned her head desperately searching for a sign of her, a whirl of dust, a floating crystal, but there was nothing.
"Kayla!" she cried out again, but no one answered, only the dark shelves, her voice absorbed into the silence.
She slowly came to a halt in the still warehouse. "Dammit Kayla... I didn't know you were this desperate…"
She trotted forward, vaguely hoping to catch sight of the otterkin, but was only greeted by more shelves, more darkness. The warehouse was vast and without end and an invisible otterkin would be near impossible to find if she wished not to be.
A few minutes later she turned a corner and was bathed in light from a wall of tall windows, an open space amongst the shelves. She had apparently reached the other side of the building.
The space was not empty however, a long red silk dangled from the shadowy ceiling far above. Fey blinked at it, the silk was clearly quite out of place, the red bright and unfaded, which it wouldn't have been had it been left here long enough to bleach in the sun.
It was clear that the long red silk was a new addition, someone had placed it here recently, maybe very recently. She turned her head at a sound and caught sight of a multicoloured thing crawling on the shelves, a patchwork of brightly coloured scraps, a thing with eight legs and a striped tail. The thing scuttled up the shelves like some mad insect and disappeared over the top.
Fey eyed the spot where it had disappeared in alarm. A spider?
"Uhm, h-hello? W-we didn't mean to trespass, really we didn't know, and uh, it was an emergency! An elephant was trying to get me!"
The sound of frantic whispering came from the shadows, what sounded like two voices arguing.
"If there is anything I can do to make up for breaking the lock I'll do it! p-please don't call the city guards…"
The whispering increased in intensity and then suddenly cut off as though reaching an agreement.
The sound of someone clearing their throat followed. "We will accept something in return for your, uh, vandalism! As payment!"
Fey blinked as something scuttled above and she turned her head back to the red silk to find a large spider slowly easing its way down, the silk curled around their splayed limbs.
Fey warily took a step back, but then the spider became clear up close, what she thought were legs in fact appeared to be sleeves, empty sleeves behaving like they were filled with regular arms, in fact as the thing drew near she realised that she was actually looking at a cloak, a cloak made of patchwork with six sleeves emerging from the sides of the cloak that reached out and clutched the silk.
The spider reached the bottom of the silk and came to a stop. Then in one incredibly graceful motion it pivoted, limbs swinging in all directions as it rolled around, the head of the cloak flopping back revealing a human like head, a human like head with white hair and large yellow eyes, like a lemur.
"We will accept payment for your crime! Payment in the form of s-sex!"
Fey looked over the 'spider', now realising that it was just a rather attractive girl wearing a cloak, apparently a magical one going by the way the four empty sleeves moved of their own volition.
She also caught sight of a white leotard beneath the cloak and a lot of naked skin.
"Erm, are you sure you are librarians?"
"Yes! We are absolutely librarians who do bookish things all day and nothing else!"
It's just, I haven't heard of any librarians who wear leotards before...?"
The lemurkin froze up momentarily, but then sprung into motion, the silk spinning around her as she flipped and spun before coming down in a three-point landing on the ground.
Her arm reached to the side and the cloak dramatically whipped around, spinning, a flurry of colour that flicked from her bloody and whirled through the air before landing casually on a desk by the windows.
Fey stared at the lemur kin girl who was left behind. Her body was sleek and attractive, the body of a gymnast, her extremely revealing leotard made that clear, in fact very little was left to the imagination as the thin material quite clearly outlined a puffy camel toe at the bottom of a deep V, even the slight bump of her clit pressing out against the stretchy white fabric.
This was the least librarian like clothing that Fey could imagine.
"We are librarians, uh, just we are also librarians who moonlight as t-tumblers. Hey, don't give me that look, you would find a hobby too with a job as insanely boring as looking at dumb dusty books all day. And there's nothing like tumbling through the air as the crowd oohs and ahhs watching every inch of my body with their eyes, every flex and stretch, every time I do the splits!"
She suddenly lowered to the ground as if to demonstrate, her legs reaching out either side, her camel toe squishing down on the sun-warmed flagstones.
"I... see?" said Fey, not seeing at all.
The lemurkin lifted herself by her hands, her legs rising into the air still doing the splits before she spun them in a circle and around above her head and flipped into a standing position following it up with an elegant curtsey, her lemur tail waving in the air.
"Names Zoey, member number one of Head-Over-Heels, Tumblers for hire, acrobatic performers with fans across the continent, uh, I uh, m-mean, that is when we're on break from being l-librarians, and b-book stuff." the lemurkin tugged nervously at her leotard.
"Hmm."
"She's lying." came a voice, which caused Zoey to look stricken.
Fey turned to see another spider descending from the ceiling, this time from a white silk that lowered with it.
It spun at the end and landed gracefully, the cloak already being flung away through the air, somehow folding as it spun until it landed on the same dusty desk, a neat shape next to the messy shape that was Zoey's cloak.
A grey furred squirrel girl was revealed with an impressive bust which was desperately kept in place by a dozen strips of white silk, softness spilling over the top and bottom, and doing little to keep them from bouncing with her motions. At first glance she was wearing panties, but on closer inspection, her 'panties' were actually just two inch wide strips of silk that wrapped around her hips and converged on her muff, the V so deep that her pink clitoral hood was partially visible, the strips covered little on her rear too, only a comically small percent of her cheeks while squishing them in from being drawn tight. Above her tightly bound cheeks a huge fluffy tail emerged that filled the space behind her.
"Lying about being librarians?" said Fey squinting at the incredibly lewd looking squirrel girl.
"What? NO! She's lying about being number one in our business, I am number one."
"Business? I thought you were librarians?"
"Y-you can have a job and still run a business too you know, that's a thing!"
"Quite," said the squirrel girl adjusting a pair of armless spectacles balanced on her nose, just about the only libraryish part of her, "We are ah, both librarians, yes. My name is Penny, number one tumbler of Head-Over-Heels… and we," she glanced at Zoey, eyes narrowing, "Apparently want payment in the form of… sex?"