In Finding, Losing

In the Scriptorius Library’s receiving hall, a young woman sat sunk in velvet cushions, fidgeting Tygrid’s ikon through lithe fingers. The habit guarded against many inconveniences. It allowed her to ignore the cool air growing cold. It allowed her to wait out interminable bureaucratic paper shuffling. It allowed her to forget how the hall’s massive size reduced her already small frame to insignificance.

The hall flaunted its grand aesthetics across the whole of its cavernous volume, a fantastical amalgamation of marbled floors, gilded rails, oak walls polished to a mirror sheen… All extravagant, all impressive, it was the kind of room that reassured bankers their investments were put to good use. But wait a long enough time, minds acclimate to luxury, the grandiose becomes ordinary. Opulence fades to background.

Such had the room become. Background. Scenery. The luxurious surroundings blurred behind the focused point of her golden ikon, the double-looped ankh passing from finger to finger, knuckle to knuckle, Tygrid’s catechism spinning line to line in her mind, when at last, Valyn heard her mark. Shuffling leather shoes echoed across the hall, the sound of a slouched gait preceding an old man in plain brown robes.

“Pardon the wait, Valyn,” the old gentleman said.

No hint of apology could be found in his tone. Professional. Cold. Habitual. Valyn fastened the ikon back on her necklace and acted out her most winning smile.

“No, Maester Oidric, I am grateful the Bookkeepers are so thorough. It bespeaks an assurance of the Library’s quality. Really, I must thank you for your meticulous efforts,” Valyn said, face beaming.

If the monkish man caught the lie, or even suspected insincerity, he did not show it. He readjusted his gold-rimmed spectacles and coughed politely.

“Well, Valyn, all your papers are in order. We had some concern that the Monastaries of Thalea were struggling to recover from the recent, erm, incident, and considering such circumstances, we Maesters decided we could expedite your request for a temporary pass into our Library.”

“Wonderful news! The Monastaries have lost much, it is true, but with the generous aid of Scriptorius, I expect we shall recover quickly.”

The Maester led her towards a grandly carved door. Gold inlay traced runic words across the length of its polished face.

"Now what's Tarkish script doing on the doors here," Valyn muttered.

Maester Oidric heard nothing. Plodding through the portal into the Grand Stacks, he beckoned her to follow. Valyn tucked her frustration away and promised herself to research the matter another time.

*** *** ***

The extravagance of Scriptorius was not limited to their receiving room. Book shelves and scroll racks towered above her and the Maester as they passed, row after row of texts of every shape and size and material. Baroque decorations depicting angels, historical figures, and demi-gods of knowledge spun up columns supporting the floors above. Iron stairs spiraled around these columns, thin gold patterns tracing the black iron steps and hand rails. The smell of paper and glue was near to overpowering.

It was a clearly place built not to impress, but to impose. Most who walked through The Grand Stacks came away with near epiphanous descriptions, experiences bordering on the divine. Had Valyn been alone, she would surely have stood in slack-jawed awe. Alas, Maester Oidric had formalities to cover. His droning voice dulled Valyn’s senses and drowned her enthusiasm.

“Per Scriptorius’s guest researcher policy,” Oidric began, “you will only be allowed on the first five floors of The Grand Stacks. Only books and scrolls from the first two floors are available for check-out, and…”

And so on. Maester Oidric continued thus until they came at last to the central landing. A great circular room, somehow more marbled, more gilded than the rest, greeted the pair with cold disinterest. Bifurcated stairs opposite them drew the eye upwards to see floors and floors more of books and shelves and columns and sculptures. Far more floors than five, Valyn noted.

Having finished his tour duties, Maester Oidric coughed politely again. Valyn turned and smiled her gracious smile as best she could.

“Well, Valyn, if ever you need assistance, each floor has a dedicated archivist who can locate what you need, and our cogworkers can help obtain any material, no matter how far removed. If you still cannot find what you seek, I advise you fill out the forms for a Delegated Research pass, which…”

Valyn gently interrupted.

“Maester Oidric, I am quite sure this,” she said, gesturing broadly, “will suffice my needs. Compared to even a single hall of the first floor, Thalea’s remaining libraries are quite sparse, indeed.”

Maester Oidric nodded.

“A tragic loss, yes. I remember well my time perusing Thalea’s monastic libraries. True fonts of knowledge, they were. My own studies here in Scriptorius would have hardly been so smooth had I not spent that summer abroad reading Theoxinus’s ‘A Full Accounting of the Creation of All.’ The volumes on the Holy Heavens were especially enlightening, and…”

And so on. Valyn nodded along, pretending to listen as the Maester droned his reminiscence. She scanned the library’s foot traffic and noted the halls less traveled. The cogworkers would be an issue, but perhaps she could work something out. In fact, a plan was bubbling along in her brain already.

*** *** ***

Combing the five floors yielded much information, absolutely none of which were in any books.

First: to Valyn’s great relief, there did seem to be an entrance to her ultimate goal from the floors available to her. She had seen a number of higher ranking archivists enter a gate on the fifth floor, one clearly not meant for public use. That was obviously her way in.

Second: the layout, overwhelming though it seemed, was actually quite simple and well organized. Memorizing it was an easy task. A few practice runs assured Valyn could beat a hasty retreat, if it came to it.

Third: though there were many more people than one might expect in a library, they were each and all fixated on their own research and had hardly the time, interest, or inclination to give much thought to a random passerby.

Finally, and most importantly: it was entirely possible to engage multiple cogworkers at the same time. Valyn knew these menial constructs doubled as security, so finding a way to keep them busy was paramount. Luckily, she had enough pieces to make a puzzle.

Working closely with the archivist of the fifth floor, Valyn created an elaborate, sprawling research project, one that would cover an immense amount of ground. The archivist warned her that, as a guest researcher, only two cogworkers could be assigned to her at once, slowing the project considerably. He voiced concerns that she could finish her project in the time allotted her as a Guest Researcher.

Had the archivist followed what Valyn did next, such concerns would have been replaced with entirely different ones. Stepping lightly from unworldly student to unworldly student, Valyn flirted, cajoled, and pleaded her way towards an impressive collection of cogworkers, plenty enough for her needs.

Thus armed with an armada, Valyn set the constructs to impossible, endless tasks. One cogworker would deliver a book to her table, another would pick up the tabled book and return it, the first would recognize the book had been replaced before it had been used and deliver it again, and meanwhile, a third cogworker would be kept searching for exactly the same book that was bouncing back and forth between table and shelf, never finding its target. Others were soon engaged in similar interminable requests.

It was a fun time enacting her plan. The students were adorable, bless their hearts, and the making of endless loops for the hapless automatons was an intricate, greatly entertaining puzzle. Were the gods less reticent, she imagined Tygrid would have smiled upon her solution. No matter, she thought. She was satisfied. That was all that mattered in the end. Valyn then proceeded to the gate (not a cogworker in sight), waited for a couple of professors to open it, and slid on past behind them.

*** *** ***

It took a moment for Valyn to gather her bearings. The Grand Stacks were almost obnoxiously well lit. These halls, musty and cool, were near to dark in comparison. Bulbs full of bonflies glowed a hazy blue. The shelves were endless long, cramped, haphazardly arranged. Gone was the grandeur, the baroque fancy. Gone were the student throngs, the background bustle. These were the Simric Stacks, the purview of professors and government researchers. Here was where the real library began.

There were many secrets kept in a place like this – histories of back dealings, no-fact-left-behind biographies, encyclopedias of islands governments pretend don’t exist. But Valyn was not looking for secrets. Her vision had sent her for the forgotten, and she would not find that here. The Simric Stacks, tempting as they were, were simply another obstacle in her path.

Quietly, ears sharp for footfall, Valyn made her way through the narrow corridors. Her pulse quickened. Her breath shallowed. It was the only thing Valyn loved more than puzzles, more than reading. This game of cat and mouse. The hunt. The time behind forbidden lines. Listening, halting, readjusting routes, stopping quick at the sound of a grumbling cough. Valyn could think of no pleasure greater.

Navigating the Simric Stacks took time, time which Valyn barely noticed passing, but she came upon her exit. A small wooden door. Plain. Simple. A door like any other tucked away in the farthest corner of the labyrinthine halls. Valyn knew. This was the door in her dream.

She took a moment to ensure her solitude. No professor present, she pressed on, picking the door lock and closing it behind her.

Here was no light. No sound. The smell of paper and glue, yes, but older.

Ancient.

Dust.

Mildew.

There was no breathing easy in this place. Valyn could sense she had not crossed a mere bureaucratic proscription. The room knew she was here, its intent obscure.

A spell for light rose to her lips, but went no farther. Neither darkness nor silence would brook trespass in this place. Valyn crept cautiously, almost tip toe, fingers forward. Each blind step gave no indication of progress — her position remained still in spite of her movement. All the thrill she felt in Simric Stacks had been blanched, hollowed by the watching dark.

Valyn had no idea how she would find her object. Like the door, it would be plain. Nondescript. A book like any other. That would have been difficult enough. To find it in this place, though… A lifetime could be spent in vain. A fear flicked through her, the first fear. The fear of wandering forever the dark, caught in unbreakable silence.

But the second fear was far worse. In her experience, she had known fear to be a cloying thing, a sticky feeling on the skin, in the stomach. This was not a fear so subtle. This one tore through her, struck her nerves numb. Something was here. Not just the watching dark, something else within it. A professor? A Maester? No. Or rather, perhaps it was, but is no longer.

Valyn noticed she was praying. She did not know when she had started. Unvoiced words left her lips, instinctively mouthing the catechism of Tygrid. She stopped. This thing would heed no prayer, and prayer alone would not bring her past it.

She listened. It made no sound. Yet it moved. She could follow it by the prickling on her skin. She knew it knew she was here. Did it see? Did it watch with the eyes of the watching dark? Perhaps.

It came closer. Valyn grew cold, clammy as a cadaver. The room was not cold. It was. And it came closer still. Too close. A snap in her heart, a clinging on her lungs – then instinct broke her caution.

Valyn ran, full sprint. It followed. How she did not crash into walls, into shelves, into whatever forgotten objects were stored here, she would never know. Tygrid guided her, she would later think. In the now, she followed only her legs, one pounding step after another. Still it followed. It was slow, she thought, but always behind her. Or before her? She had lost direction. Perhaps she ran in circles. Perhaps she ran in place. There was no knowing. Still it followed.

Her legs gave out before her heart could. Every breath ragged. Eyes throbbing. Mouth desert dry. Still it followed. She tried to crawl. She could not. She could only wait as the cold consumed her.

Somehow, the darkness grew darker.

*** *** ***

“Trade?” came a voice. Confusion caught Valyn’s mind. She could find no reply. She had thought herself dead, but no text, religious or sacrilegious, made mention of death speaking.

“Trade?” it asked again. She was cold to the stomach. She could not feel her unfeeling. She knew what it would give, but not what it would take. She reached out. Tygrid was not with her here. Only darkness. Darkness and cold.

Why? What was a book worth? Wrong question. A book could be worth a great deal. Not the book itself, of course. The words in it. But why her, she thought. Why was she brought to this nothing-dark? Why was she to suffer the price of a forgotten thing? She wanted to cry. She had no eyes.

“Trade?” it asked. She knew it would not ask again. What if she walked away? What if she refused? Would Tygrid simply send another in her place? Would she have no place on her return? Was it really a choice after all? Maybe a test? Maybe she was meant to refuse. Maybe…

No. No maybes. At last it came down to faith, she thought. Whatever answer, whatever consequence, would Tygrid still be with her? She had to think yes. Tygrid had not sent her vision for nothing. So. Yes or no? No maybes. It was time to jump.

“Trade,” she thought back. She sensed an affirmative in the cold that could not be felt. And then, like waking from a sleep one had passed into unawares, a ceiling blinked into space. A stone ceiling, a stone room. A circle. Small. In the center, a pedestal, and on the pedestal, a plain book. Nondescript. A book like any other.

Valyn gingerly lifted it. She thought it might fall apart, it had been forgotten so long, but it held firm. She thought to open it, then second guessed herself. She opened it. The words were Tarkish. Not like the runes on the Great Stack’s door. The old script. Somehow, she knew. This was not just the right book, it was the book. Deciphering it would upend everything.

This was a book people died for.

The Zhruuming House

Finding the Zhruuming House from Sythra is tricky hard. Its proprietors have a habit of drifting, and the House drifts with them. To start, you follow the falling sun along Rivverroad for about a week, then peel off lodestar way when you first sight Red Plinth. It’ll take a day or two in the shrubland ‘afore you see the flattop of it, and when you do, you take a left and keep going ‘till you hear the humming. Or feel it, if your senses are such inclined.

Once you got ahold of the signal, you hone your senses sharp. The only directioning now is your ears, so you best listen, and listen close. You follow the changes, see. Louder isn’t always right – sometimes the sound bounces off the Plinth and overlaps at empty points. More correct is the pitch, for lack of a better word. Not like two keys on a squeeze-box, but like a pulsing? Or… 

Aw hell, it’s too tough to put into words. Just hire a guide, and they’ll get you there. 

Anyhow, what I’m trying to put across is, finding Zhruuming House under normal conditions is a pain. All that talk so when I say this year was a particular pain in the haunches, you understand I’m not just talking about the days on horseback. Not that weeks in a saddle help matters, no, just not what I mean.

After another day of sweating up empty, I look to my Paired Eye, Kitj. He was shoving his bronzed face to the end of his neck looking out towards open sky, straining his ears. I wonder to interrupt him or no. We weren’t bone tired yet, but damn if a good sit wouldn’t be welcome.

Kitj answered my question for me, dismounted his horse, and unpacked his roll. Every movement he made of his thin arms flicked irritation. At last, he flopped down, put his wide brim over his face, and pretended to sleep. I knew so because when he actually slept, his feet would go still.

I sat all of the red hours that day watching clouds. Wispy clouds, mostly, not the long even cloud banks that pass over Sythra. Clouds that trick the eye and take shapes, even for adults that lost the game in growing. Like me, I guess.

There’s a lot that’s hard to explain to one who hasn’t taken the trip. You ask a Sythran about the Krzk Shrublands and you either get romantic notions about the Zykric ranchers, or you get glassy-eyed, dismissive boredom. Not a lot to do out in the shrubs, compared to a big city, and Sythra was especial big.

It’s a state of mind, the shrubs put you in, that just putting in to words doesn’t quite get. Maybe the Asyla Monks would. Anyhow. There’s a lot of sitting when you’re out in the shrubs. A lot of sitting and waiting for time to pass. I suppose it should get boring. That’s what’s hard to parse for a Sythran. That sitting could anyway be anything but a chore. 

Somehow, it doesn’t. I think… It’s like this. You sit in the shrubs a while and a Sythran would say nothing doing. Maybe a pack of kitnips scurry by, maybe a group of white flitters dance their flocking dance. That’s about all you’re like to get in the way of action.

Sit a while longer, though, and you notice everything is changing but slow. Too slow for city eyes, maybe. The sky filtering black to gold-blue dawn, turning white at  high sun, then bronzing back to black. The cloud wisps move and shift. The Red Plinth, stone and solid, wouldn’t change, you would think. And it doesn’t, except that you travel by it and its never quite the same Plinth from one day to the next. I’m talking changes of hours, of days, of weeks. It’s not a city mind, what you need to appreciate the Krzk Shrublands. It’s a slow earth mind.

That’s what I mean when I say I sat. I couldn’t grudge Kitj for his annoyance. I just couldn’t get that worked up, myself. You get a green-heart Sythran talking about it, they say it must be a religious experience, what I’m sitting in. They talk about upheavals in the soul, transcendence, divine visions and all that. No, not really. It’s just sitting. I could never get a Sythran to quite believe it, though.

It was getting on towards the hours of Deep Stars when I heard it. A pulse in the zhruum. A long swell, like the ocean pulling back into a big wave. I was about bowled over when the wave hit. Kitj jumped awake, knife in hand, scanning the dark, his small nostrils flaring and scenting. 

I myself was midway into a spell mandra, fire flickering at my fingers, watching Kitj. If there were threat there, that knife would be thrown, and I’d be firing before he could pull the next. Which is saying something. Kitj’s a pretty quick draw.

We waited a tick. And then another.

Nothing. Just sand crickets. The zhruum had gone back to normal.

We exhaled at the same time. Kitj flopped back on his pack. Neither of us needed to say anything. Neither of us would have wanted to, besides. The zhruum has a way of making you not want to talk. All that mattered was, whatever happened was done. 

It’s funny. Thinking back, the wave wasn’t all that big a change if you put a measure on it. It’s just the zhruum stays so constant, even a little ripple is pretty potent.

***

Finding the Zhruuming House the next day was easy. I don’t think I’ve ever had such a clear signal as that day’s, and I don’t expect I ever will again. I could see Kitj was relieved to finally have a bearing. He was looking up instead of out. It was as easy as sitting, getting to where we were going.

Zhruuming House isn’t a house, exactly. That’s just what people who live in houses call it. The Zykr call it something I can’t pronounce because I don’t have the mandibles for it. Communication is tough, when it comes down to it.

Backing up a bit. It’s not a house in the sense of a house, but it is a dwelling. It’s made of dirt, and shrub, and mud, and Zykr spit, just like all Zykr hives. Zhruuming House isn’t a hive, either, though. It’s a personal dwelling, which is pretty odd for these folk. Then again, that’s why it’s important to them.

Kitj and I sidled up to the Zhruuming House. We dismounted. I got out my squeeze box, then looked at Kitj. He shook his head. He never once has wanted to go in and meet Kzapth, but I always asked just in case he ever changed his mind. So I shouldered the pack of offerings and went to knock.

It’s not knocking, what you do to get the Zykr’s attention. It’s more of a buzz. Humans can’t do it proper, mostly, though there are some clever bardly types who’ve figured some tricks for it. I don’t got the knack for it. So I walked up to the door (not a door, just an opening) settled my fingers on the squeeze box, and then kind of trembled my hands and fingers to get the right sound. It’s not a technique taught in music school, what I heard.

There was a subtle change in the zhruum. All clear to go. I looked at Kitj one more time. He was tossing a coin over and over, which is what he did when he was nervous. This got me worried. Kitj always heard more than I did, and he only rarely got unsettled. I wondered what he was hearing I couldn’t. Too bad for me, I guess. I shrugged it off and headed in.

Kzapth sat on a kaztl, a kind of traditional rug the Zykr make. It’s bright and sky-colored, or I guess it must’ve been. It’s kind of raggedy and dim with dust now. I made another tremor on my squeeze box, a kind of hello, the zhruum pulsed a bit, and all go. I sat on the dust next to another, slightly less bedraggled kaztl, and proffered my offering – three sacks of sugar, and two jugs of sweet tea. Kzapth pulsed another affirmative. I took my cue and sat on the guest katzl.

Now came the tricky bit. Kzapth knew exactly what I was here for – I only ever came for the one reason, and it was the same reason any Sythran would ever want to see him – but it was improper not to assume. So I had to ask. I set my fingers on the squeeze box again and scratched my way through the situation.

Trouble in Sythra. Looking for omen.

It’s always hard to know if a Zykr is looking at you, because compound eyes don’t track like a human’s, but I knew Kzapth was looking at me. He was waiting for my ears to get into gear. I closed my eyes to tell him I was listening. I’d seen the sand reading before, anyways, I didn’t need to see it again.

The zhruum stilled to a low, steady pitch. I could hear Kzapth scratching at the sand with his coxa, picking it up and sifting it across his leg hairs. I’ve been told the Zkyr would be able to hear the shape of every individual grain they touched. I wouldn’t doubt it. How else would a sand reading work?

The sand sifting stopped, the zhruum picked up a more complex tone. I took a deep breath and focused. Time to translate.

Shaking ground, shaking sky.

Fire mound, bloody eye. 

Crystal honey, spoiled spit.

First part was easy. That’s just Kzapth confirming bad trouble. 

The last bit was also straightforward, if you knew Zykr. Only Zykr queens ate crystal honey, so they say “queen” as a stand in for any kind of human governance, queenly or not. Spoiled spit is especial bad news. I guess you could say it’s the Zykr way of saying “poisoning the well.” Or “a bad apple.” Or both. This case, probably both.

The middle bit was too cryptic, too generic. The “rhymes” connected it to the trouble, but the reading was otherwise obtuse. I wondered a tick if Kzapth was hiding something. He’d done so before, to my great trouble. But it also happened that certain events were too complex for a sand reading. Could also be my ears weren’t subtle enough. Zykr hear a lot more than we do, mostly through their legs I’m told.

I’d be pushing asking more. One sack of sugar, one stanza is all you get. The sweet tea was just because we were friends. Of a sort. I scratched at my beard stubble a bit, then opened my eyes. It was only then I noticed Kzapth was off somehow. Kind of hunched a bit, maybe. It’s hard to chit-chat with a Zykr, but with the previous night’s zhruum wave, I got to curious a bit. 

While pondering, something clicked in my ears. Not a sound click, an understanding click. I heard what Kitj heard. Or couldn’t hear, as it were. Something was missing in the zhruum since last time. There was a layer gone.

I fluttered a “thank you” and then, polite as I could, asked if I could ask a question. A non-omen question, I clarified. Kzapth buzzed an affirmative. Then carefully, very carefully, I threaded my squeeze box through what I had to ask. One thing I learned very early on in the shrubs, you don’t screw up Zykr women’s names.

Where is Zazhlia-zg-Zh’zlk?

There was a long pause in the zhruum. An uncanny pause. I became keenly aware of silence, like when you finally dig out a stickburr that’s been lodged in your leg a week. It was all the answer I needed, but Kzapth spoke one anyways. 

The Great Hive.

The zhruum quivered, agitated. I wasn’t quite sure it was his grief or my impropriety. Could be both. Probably both. 

The zhruum shuddered a bit and settled. Zazhlia-zg-Zh’zlk contribution to the zhruum was now painfully obvious to me. The tone was flattened and shallow. Hollow, somehow. It would be like looking out on the shrubland and finding the whole of the Plinth was gone.

We sat an awkward moment. Looking back, I don’t remember starting to play. I just remember, someway, my fingers had gotten into The Hills of Thylla Green. I don’t know why that song. Now I’ve got some distance between, it seems a wholly wrong song for the situation. It’s not a lament, it’s not a love song. It’s just a ditty about how pretty Thylla Green is, almost a nonsense song when you get to it.

But the way it came out... it came out slow. So slow. If a Sythran were to listen in, they’d not even know I was playing the tune. Not even music, just droning. The tune runs about six minutes, four if you got a showy fiddler. Someway I stretched that song out to about an hour, and I’ll never know how. Just sitting on notes, chords, intervals. Just sitting until they changed. I wasn’t changing them, I don’t think. 

Maybe it was one of those religious epiphanies the romantics like to talk about. I kind of doubt it. No divine lights, no visions, no grand upheaval of the soul. We were just sitting. Just that we were sitting on tones, is all. 

Just sitting.

***

By the time I left, Kitj had stopped his coin tossing. If he was calm, I was calm.

“The trouble is bad. Worse than,” I said. 

We both startled. It was the first time in two weeks either of us had said a word. The words felt a trespass. They sounded foreign, like we had forgotten our own tongue. Too late to take them back, I continued on.

“Best drop off the omen and carry on elsewhere. Not sure where, just not Sythra.”

Kitj nodded. He got the picture.

On the way back, I thought a lot of city thoughts. What were the fire mounds? Whose was the bloody eye? Did Kzapth appreciate what I done? Did I get Zazhlia-zg-Zh’zlk’s name right?  Had I unwittingly made enemy of the whole of Zykr? For that matter, who were my enemies in Sythra? There were bad bones somewhere in there – worse than usual, I mean – and I didn’t want any part of it.

There was nothing doing about these questions. I tried to focus again on the open sky, bring my mind back to the clouds. 

Day after day, the zhruum left our ears. 

Day after day, my peace left with it.

An Academic Exchange

In the Research Quarter of Sythra, standing proud and gleaming, is the academy known as the Gilded Tower. The name has become a misnomer since its founding. Besides the glorious main structure, built some 700 years prior, there are now dozens of towers, each with their own, unique golden inlays spiraling their walls.

In one of these smaller towers, named The Sylex, strode a bulky man, cinched into a black uniform a half-inch too small for his girth. Students gave deference as he passed, then sniggered behind his back. One pulled her youthful cheeks side to side in imitation of the older man’s jowls. Stifled laughter joins the school’s shuffling foot-traffic.

The man neither acknowledged nor even noticed their reactions. His thick brow was pinched. His lips drooped like a toad’s maw. Everything about his face exuded determination. He had a mission, and he aimed to win.

He stopped before an oaken door, his fleshy bulges jiggling. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He held it a second more than is comfortable, then expelled the air in relief. His cheeks made a wet flapping sound. He frowned a headache away, then knocked.

No answer.

He knocked again.

No answer.

He knocked a…

“Yes, yes!” called a high, raspy voice. “Come in, if you insist.”

The man entered a room laden with books, papers, scrolls, arcane tools, discarded lunch wrappers, and gods know what else. Opposite him was his adversary: a gnomish looking man who was obviously old and yet his face, beneath a prodigious beard and mustache of snowy white, was somehow also ageless. 

Reams of paper lay before the elder fellow. A quill wrote notes of its own accord while its master flipped through pages with quick, unexpectedly agile fingers.

“Ah!” exclaimed the gnomish man, not even glancing from his work, “Chairman Praetrix! A pleasure to see you.”

The chairman dug deep to find the will for a polite reply.

“Likewise, I’m sure,” was all Praetrix can manage.

“And what brings our esteemed leader to my humble office?” asked Praetrix’s foe.

Chairman Praetrix took a deep breath, then pulled a leather-bound document from under his sweating armpit.

“Professor Dagson, I have come simply to confirm something regarding a recent incident.”

Dagson sneezed, his beard and mustache splaying erratically, the quill skittering away like a frightened animal. Itching his nose with one hand, Dagson recalled the quill with his other. The writing recommenced.

“An incident!” Dagson exclaimed. “Sounds serious.”

“Perhaps. It depends on what you have to say. I wanted to double check – you have in your Elemental Arcana class a student…”

“Oh yes, many students, in fact,” Dagson interjected.

“… a student named Fitzip?” Praethix continued, pretending to be unperturbed.

“Could be, could be. I’ve lots of students, as I said. Before I was interrupted.”

“Ahem. Lucky you, I have your student roster! And, yes, the name is right here. Fitzip, no last name.”

“Huhn. Then you hardly need’ve asked, did you?”

Praetrix’s right eye twitched.

“Yes, well, I wanted to be sure because just this morning, I happened to be passed along a report from the Redwing Garrison. About a goblin," Praetrix positively spat the word, "A goblin whose name just so happens to be…”

Dagson suddenly spun into the air, his chair cushion rocketing him up to the top of a book shelf behind him.

“Ah! Fitzip! Yes, I do indeed remember. A young goblin girl. Though they are all young, from a certain perspective, those goblins.”

Praetrix cleared his throat, then proceeded.

“Then it is the same creature," he said, his nose scrunching and voice deep frying. "I am quite sorry to pass along, then, that Fitzip was arrested just last night. For, oh let me see… yes. Arson. Multiple counts.”

“Gracious me,” Dagson replied, his voice dripping boredom. “Those goblin parties do get out of hand… But then, that is why they are so fun to attend!”

Dagson’s cushion floated back to its seat and settled. The esteemed professor still had not looked up from his work. Praetrix’s jaw clenched.

“Is this a joke to you, Dagson? If it is, no one is laughing.”

“Oh no? I am.”

“Dagson! Really! This Fitzip here spent the past evening gallivanting across the Emerald District setting fire to… well, if this report is to be believed, she set fire to just about everything!”

“Seems a bit more damage than a single goblin could manage, doesn’t it?” Dagson quipped.

Praetrix rolled his eyes, pacing in front of the small professor’s oversized desk.

“Dagson, please, I am obviously exaggerating for effect.”

“Pfa!” Dagson exclaimed, his trailing mustaches flicking outward, “And here I thought we were expected to speak and write with exacting precision. Or does that obligation extend only to our students?”

“Precision, indeed,” Praetrix sighed, attempting to calm himself. The Chairman dabbed globs of sweart from his brow before continuing. The sweat returned as soon as he opened his mouth again.

“That is why I am here. What exactly was in the syllabus for the class in question?”

“Fire. Obviously,” Dagson said without a hint of irony.

Praetrix let the professor’s answer hang in the air a moment. “You realize this will, of course, come up in your annual review, Professor?”

The quill stopped. A smile spread across Praetrix’s face like a plate of bacon grease. Dagson scrunched his mouth a bit, then the quill returned to work.

“Honestly, Chairman? This is what you think you’ll get me with? Check the syllabus again. We covered all the necessary prerequisites for fireworking: the dangers of elemental handling, arcane ethics, the proper containment of elemental casting, and all the rest of that nonsense.”

Praetrix raised an eyebrow. “Nonsense? And how did Fitzip manage, this… nonsense? I assume she must have passed if she began the practical class?”

“Again with this old dance. You have the records right there, don’t you? You’ve read it already. Fitzip…”

“Failed.” Praetrix's voice cut callous across the room. “Miserably. And yet you went on anyhow, didn’t you?”

“Chairman, if we were seriously concerned about the theoretical side of Elemental Arcana, we would be a liberal arts school like The Scriptorious. Let those stuffy dweebs hash out the niceties of ‘proper’ Elemental usage! We’ve got more important things to do! It is hardly my responsibility to keep track of what each and every one of my students does outside of class!”

Irritation had finally crept into Dagson’s voice. The high pitch rose a step, and he began talking faster. Praetrix, sensing weakness, leaned in.

“Professor,” he said, garnishing his delivery with a slice of sarcasm, “but Professor - if it is not your responsibility to educate our students in the proper usage of Elemental Arcana, then what is?”

Dagson’s beard went rigid. Praetrix felt victory close. There was no way Dagson could wiggle out of this one in front of the board, and once he was gone, well… Praetrix had some favors to return. Sensing his upper hand, the chairman relaxed, several strands of his rope belt snapping as his gut expanded.

“The proper training of students, is it?” Dagson said with ominous calm. “I hope I am mistaken, but it seems an important detail has slipped our esteemed Chairman’s memory.”

Praetrix frowned. He did not like this change in Dagson’s voice, a change with which Praetrix was too well familiar. The chairman wiped his brow, an unpleasant tingling scurrying about his head.

Dagson ducked behind his desk. Papers shuffled about. When Dagson popped back up, a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles dangled on his nose, his eyes comically enlarged by its lenses as he skimmed tiny print on a long parchment.

“The Sylex, as we all know, was founded 327 years prior, its charter written by the Venerable Diothenax,” Dagson said in droning imitation of Praetrix’s lecturing voice, “You will find the relevant quote here in our charter’s preamble: ‘Section 1.5: That The School for the Study of the Practical Application of Elemental Arcana (henceforth called The Sylex) will guarantee the tutoring of all Imperial subjects born with connection to the Elemental Flow, for the betterment and safekeeping of the Empire, its citizens, and,” here, Dagson added weight to his speech, “‘and for all individuals of Arcane talent.’”

Dagson flicked the glasses off his face, throwing them past a still and, apparently, attentively listening quill. Passion swept the lecture-speak from his delivery as he continued.

“Now you will excuse me, for my eyesight is poor and this document abominably dense, but I cannot for the life of me find a clause in our glorious charter that says anywhere, ‘Except for goblins.’ I sensed a connection between Fitzip and the Elemental Flow the instant she walked into our doors. Five floors down from me, no less! Rejecting her would have been a gross dereliction of my duty as a professor.

"I will, for the moment, overlook the grievous possibility that you underestimate my young pupil for prejudicial reasons; but I find it hard to believe that a learned man, taught in these very halls, has forgotten what happens if those born to the Flow do not find an outlet for its power.

"If you had taken even a moment to meet Fitzip, you would instantly understand that an unrestrained Arcane Flux of her capacity would have destroyed quite more than the ‘everything’ you and the Redwing Garrison claim she burned. The last Flux of her caliber took out half of Thrael. 

"Responsible for the proper training of students? Pfa! Responsible for the saving of thousands of Sythran lives, more like. So tell me again, Chairman: what, exactly, are you bringing to the table for my annual review?”

Praetrix’s mouth gaped, a salmon gasping for air in a bear’s claws. No response forthcoming, Dagson finally looked up to meet his opponent’s gaze. The mouth of the professor, too, dropped as he took in the sight not of the fastidiously dressed, barrel-chested man he knew as Chairman Praetrix, but a fleshy, bulbous caricature of his superior whose hair, second by second, sprouted into pink flowers.

A glance behind Praetrix revealed the office door ajar, a gaggle of students giggling. The gnomely professor detected the faint traces of sylvan power dusting between one student and the chairman’s floral crown. The corpulent size, too, was quickly diagnosed as another prank, one Praetrix had not the resources, currently, to rectify.

A small boy, an orphan Dagson knew to be of great talent and promise, put a finger to his lips and pantomimed a “Shh!” Dagson screwed his mouth tight to keep his laughter in, mirth escaping the corners of his eyes.

Luckily, he needn’t hold it long. Chairman Praetrix spun on his heel and stormed out the office, the students dispersing like dandelions on the wind. Left alone, Dagson barked a guffaw as he remembered, once more, why he loved his job.

The quill tapped impatiently. Dagson looked at the entry it pointed to – Fitzip’s final grade. The professor smiled broadly and proudly as the quill entered: “Superior marks. Recommended with enthusiasm for Advanced Pyrotechnics with Professor Hodge.”

Dagson then pulled a clean parchment from his desk, and spent the rest of his day writing a proposal to increase next year’s budget for fire safety equipment.

Glass and Steel

This story makes reference to events from a previous story, "Blood in the Water."

--- --- --- --- --- ---

Brin Gaelith woke alone on the right side of his bed, as usual. He had pulled the fur blankets around him, giving his large body the appearance of a hibernating bear. He grumbled. His complaint was not against the cold - the winter air would be a welcome respite before another day at the forge. Simply, he did not wish to wake.

He did anyway.

His tabby cat mewed as he pulled canvas tunic and trousers over his muscled body. He tussled the cat’s head, ran his fingers through his own salted hair, and wandered into his shop. He ate while inspecting the saleroom. Glass jewelry, vases, and other decorative baubles glistened as a pale morning light landed sleepily upon them. Here and there, Brin wiped a little dust off with his finger.

A sharp knock rattled his door. Knuckling the last drowsy out of his eyes, Brin dragged himself to answer. A little brass bell tinkled as he opened the door. Standing outside was a young woman, feet squared and sturdy, back tall. The leather cloak she wore indicated she was born of a Lower House, but her choice of dress was simple and practical. Her face had a hard beauty about it, and her eyes were grey as an overcast sea. Brin met her determined demeanor brusquely.

“Noble or not, shop’s not open till afternoon,” he said, his voice like a calloused hand scratching stubble.

The woman nodded.

“This will take not a moment. I was told you were the finest weaponsmith in Sythra.”

Brin blinked, his lip curling. He gestured at his wares.

“These look like weapons to you?”

“No need to pretend, Brin Gaelith,” the woman parried. “I have proof enough.”

She drew a dagger from a leather sheath. The blade shone in the rising sun - simple, elegant, balanced - but the woman needn’t have drawn it. Brin had recognized the weapon from its grip, wrapped in the purple skin of a dusk ray, wound with a silver wire. He screwed his eyes shut, rubbing the bridge of his nose with a thick knuckle. He relented.

“Fine,” he exhaled. “And you are?”

“Fior. Technically, Lady Fior of Trinish, House of Herons. But save the formalities.”

“You wouldn’t have got none, either way,” Brin huffed. He made a noncommittal gesture inside, turning his back to Fior as he reentered the room. “Well, come on.”

Fior stood a moment at the door, a doubt wriggling in her stomach. It did not live long. Hardening herself, she followed the smith inside.

As the door closed behind them, Brin trudged across the showroom towards a large cabinet. Fior noticed he dragged his left foot, very slightly, across the floor. A rusty click scraped through the room as Brin unlocked the cabinet and pulled from it a practice sword. He considered it for a moment then looked at Fior out the corners of his eyes. Fior could not interpret the look on his face.

“What’s it for?” Brin asked. 

“What else is a weapon used for?”

Brin didn’t hesitate or flinch.

“Justice? Revenge?”

His voice carried no judgment or scorn. More than anything, Fior thought, he sounded tired. She measured her reply.

“Protection.”

Brin shrugged. Turning fully towards Fior, he held out the practice sword’s grip for her to take. It was heavier than the one Fior had been training with, and she took a minute to adjust to the blade’s weight.

“Who did you train with?” Brin asked, taking a seat on a small wooden stool.

“Lieutenant Thrace.”

“Guard’s Captain Thrace,” Brin corrected. Fior smiled a bit.

“His son. Thrace the Senior is now retired.”

“Well, if he’s anything like his father, he taught you Phoenix Form. Let’s see it.”

For the first time, Fior was caught off guard. Looking around, Fior truly took in her surroundings. Glassware and glass jewels were everywhere around the room, on shelves, in curio cabinets, in glass displays. Brin pursued the opening.

“You do know it, yes?” 

“Of course,” she said, regaining her composure somewhat. “But… Fine. If you insist.”

Fior took the starting stance and began plotting her course around the room. With Brin’s unwavering eyes on her, Fior took a deep breath and made her first step. It was more tentative than it should have been, and her opening strike left her off balance. The weight of the sword, too, pulled her farther than she expected, and her next step almost stumbled.

Readjusting her feet, Fior stepped and lunged, her shoulders fighting against the extra pounds in the blade. The next attacks of the form were similarly clumsy, barely avoiding a vase here and a shelf there, and sweat beaded on her brow even in the unheated room. She imagined how Thrace would frown at these amateurish attempts, and could hear his disapproving critique, “That strike wouldn’t even cut a dead branch! Put some fight in it!”

The memory pressing from within, Brin’s grim stare pushing from without, Fior moved into the defensive portion of the form. The room circled around her, the glint of light off glass pricking her eyes. Her parries and ripostes were directed as much at memories of conversations she was never supposed to overhear as they were at an imaginary opponent.

“Certain investments have fallen through…”

“No, we didn’t get the votes for the bill, but we did get…”

“The debts will be repaid, I promise, just…”
“Sir, news. Bad news. It’s about Councilman Taggard…”

“Nothing certain, but the guard suspects a waterkin, a courier…”

Buffeted by these memories and the fragile room around her, she swung wildly, the blade arcing just shy of a shelf. A row of curios, little glass children and animals, rattled as the sword passed. Growling frustration, Fior looked up and saw, smiling back at her, her son. Blinking the sweat from her eyes cleared the salty haze. No, not her son, but a statuette - a smiling boy in red overalls, pink cheeks and blue eyes, skipping with hand outreached as if to catch something.

Fior stopped, breathing heavy. She thought of the Pooled Gardens of Emerald District, of catching butterflies. She thought of her son leaping in the air and coming back, hands empty, laughing. 

She thought of the hole in Taggard’s throat, covered by a cravat for the funeral. 

Closing her eyes, Fior refocused for the final phase, offensive and defensive maneuvers woven together into seamless gestures. Her steps landed lightly, now, her blade precisely aimed. Wherever she was, she allowed herself to be, and the sword found itself, several times, threaded between glass decorations. Thrace had told her, of the Phoenix Form, “Contain the fire, follow the fire.” Now, the fire flickered within her, and her final strike, a decisive thrust, landed a hair’s breath from a small earring. The glass bead quivered a second, then stopped.

Brin gave Fior time to settle. The room, even with the growing foot traffic outside, seemed silent. Once she recollected herself, she extended the grip towards the smith and said, with heat on her breath, “Satisfied?”

The old man took a long time to reply. When he finally did, he said, “Bit rough at the beginning, no?”

Fior just about stabbed him with the pommel.

“Fine, fine!” he said, grabbing the grip and pulling away. “You’ll have your sword. I’ll begin on the next day of Fire’s Waking, but it will be done when the sword says it’s done.”

For the first time since her arrival, Fior relaxed.

“Thank you, Brin.”

“You’ll owe me more than thanks when this is all over,” he said, relocking the sword cabinet.

“Money is no object.”

“Not what I meant. But, while we’re on the subject…”

Brin limped to a shelf and removed an object from it. Very carefully, he placed it in Fior’s hand and whispered, “You break it, you buy it.”

Fior opened her fingers. In the palm of her hand was a small glass figurine, a statuette of a boy in red overalls, with pink cheeks and blue eyes, and a tiny fracture running like a shadow down his outstretched arm.

Passing the Torch

 Every month, Mother sent me to give little gifts to the Barn Widow, Madge Perrithrop. A few herbs, a newly sewn handkerchief, a small fruit basket. Far as I knew, we were the only ones in the village who ever gave her much of anything, because Madge was the type who never parted with as much as a cup of sugar. Left a bad taste, it did, the way she replied - polite enough, but it was the kind of thanks that didn’t have any thanks behind it.

The gift this time was a bit of tallow, so Madge could make a candle for Passing Tide. I was especially annoyed that day - it was cold, it was rainy, and it was a waste, besides. Every year, she brought her own candle and it never lit, not once. Sure, for some it took time. A couple of years gone by with an unlit wick, you know, it happens. But Madge’s went unlit for… well, for as long as I could remember, which was when my older brother (rest his soul) lit our family’s candle ten years back. 

But mother was firm. “A gift isn’t in the gratitude,” she’d always say. Easy enough for her, I thought, grumbling as the rain turned to sleet, waiting minutes outside to receive the usual curt nod, thankless thanks, and another bone-cold walk home.

That was morning, and the weather didn’t care to let up the whole day through. It never came to ice, but that only meant we could look forward to a miserable mud slog to Cinder Gorge. Been a long time since, and that night remains the quietest Passing Tide sojourn I can remember. Conversation in whispers, only snatches of sentences. Not a song sung. Mother, I saw, was giving an arm to Madge, who grimaced with every arthritic step.

Slow, we made our way along Hinter Pass, the pebbled curbs growing to boulders towering gray as the winter clouds. Wind heaved through the valley in great gusts, and the morning’s rain and sleet never quite quit, cloud spitting weather the whole way through. The entire trek, all told, came to be a soul-brittling hour’s march. But we made it to Cinder Gorge all the same, where the dull valley rocks open to a red chasm, wider than awe can hold. Our town thinks a cataclysmic earthquake rent the range apart. Others say it was split by the fire-god, Xalatian, falling to their first death.

Whatever the case, the gorge always glowed, day and night, a soft red like embers waiting to reignite; and at every winter’s equinox, we would gather and wait for the year’s last light to die. That year, we huddled closer than ever before or since. The gorge’s shine is brilliant, but not warm. It suggests the hearth without being one. Minute by minute, the sun made its retreat beneath the distant cliffs, the air blowing icy as the sky grew darker. And we waited.

It’s always a surprise when it happens. The Pyre, I mean. You never quite know when it will emerge. This year continued to be unusual - unusually cold, unusually quiet, unusually bleak for an unusually long time. There were even mutterings that maybe this year, The Pyre wouldn’t ignite. Blasphemous as it was, we couldn’t blame the doubt, not even Father Braid, stickler that he was. I remember wondering what would happen if The Pyre didn’t come. What would it mean? It came every year, came since before living memory, but if it missed a beat, if Cinder Gorge only smoldered…

My qualm was interrupted. The dim red below glistened, quick flickers like fireflies darting across dark, the spectrum building: first red, then orange, then blue, then - with no warning - a surge of every color bursting skyward! A shimmering veil miles high and miles long dazzling eyes and illuminating the darkest of nights and souls. Winter whipped through the display, but the radiance shone on unperturbed, sheets of translucent colors melting one to the next in vast rainbow folds.

Father Braid began his chant, a signal for the Unvisited to unsheath their candles. Only a few families this year… and Madge. A couple verses recited, rich and deep as well water, and the town joined in, one shivering voice at a time. We like to believe The Pyre spirits are drawn out by the song, though who can say. Father Braid said it wouldn’t be faith if we had a knowing to it. This year, for all the troubles, the spirits came one after another: my buddy Thaler’s father, as grim faced as ever; the Mayor’s cousin, thick and sweet as the pies she made; the cobbler’s little boy Pietyr, hobbling one leg too short… 

They never talked, the spirits. They would approach, look in your eyes for as long as you could stand, and then kind of dissolve, like dandelion seeds in a breeze. Then, somehow or another, you were left with a lit candle which, if you were lucky, might stay lit for a good long while… but it always went out, one way or another. Anyhow, I saw every family gathered around their own Pyre spirit. Grief, yes, but different than a burial, knowing they were being released to the sky. People said their last peace, or stood quiet, or sniffled.

But Madge? She slumped in the back, a most defeated look I have ever seen, candle quivering in hand. I wondered if I shouldn’t console her, but what could I say? It was probably the last year her legs could carry her. She barely made it as it was. Mother, too, I noticed, looked with the same helpless feeling must have been in my eyes. It occurred to me, I didn’t even know who she was waiting for. Madge was so old, I don’t think anybody knew.

But doing nothing was worse than indecent, I thought. So I trudged over and stood there next to her, neither of us looking at the other, and I just stood and stewed. Was worse, I didn’t know who or what to be mad at, only that it weren’t fair. It weren’t fair The Pyre brought everyone but one; it weren’t fair a spirit should stand up family and keep them waiting for years and years; it weren’t fair the gods in their grandiosity couldn’t grant one little old lady, grouch though she be, one last comfort in a miserable life. 

And I just stood and stewed, getting madder and madder. The other spirits disappeared one by one, one candle lighting after another, each one lighting another match in my heart. The Pyre, too, dwindled, the light fading even as my anger grew. By the time the Gorge had returned to Cinders, the wind was lighter and the townsfolk turned homeward, pretending not to look at the shrunken figure of Madge, hunched over her unlit candle. And I couldn’t stand it. I just ran to the edge of the Gorge, kicked up a heap of gravel, and shouted, top of my lungs,

“So is that it, then? That’s all you got?”

Course there was no reply. Just my echo, and Father Braid’s indignant muttering, the rest of the town keeping abashed eyes groundward. Turns out, that was it. That was all it got.

—- —- —-

Madge hung on just a few months longer. Every month, I would bring her a gift (no motherly prompt necessary) and every month, well… she wouldn’t say thank you out loud, anymore, but she’d have a pie for me. They were small, and not very good; but I came to learn, ashamed to say, it was because she couldn’t afford sugar. “Forgive the young their trespasses,” Father Braid would’ve said, much as us kids wished he lived up to his own sermons.

She died in her sleep, and mother and I were two of only four at the funeral, the others being Father Braid and a new acolyte training for the chantry. It’s been a long time, and there’s not been another Passing Tide as miserable as that one. Since then, I’ve always brought a candle for Madge. Even in the year I lost my girl, Sammy, I brought two, just in case. I don’t expect Madge to show, but even if she doesn’t... I don’t know. I just hope she appreciates knowing at least one person is out there, waiting for her just like she did, waiting in the dark for a candle never lit.

Stars in the Slag

*A quick note: the "salamander" in this story refers to the build-up of solid and liquid matter that collects at the tap hole of a blast furnace. Removal of the salamander is necessary for repairs. This story was inspired by a salamander preserved in a park near my home. It's maybe two-three feet high and approximately four-five feet in diameter, and weighs about 13,000 pounds.

--- --- --- --- ---

The foreman pinched a tension headache from his nose while our dowser stood firm. Workers shuffled nervously in the furnace heat.

“What do you mean ‘interference?’” the foreman growled.

The dowser remained stoic.

“Exactly that. Interference. What kind? Who knows. But I cannot find a good tap.”

A boiling moment passed.

“Fine!” he blasted. “We’ll do this the old way. Karlson! Grab a team and hit a spot that looks good. We clear that salamander tonight! Hop to!”

Dismayed affirmations all around. Men geared up, taking shifts at the drill, swapping out as men ran coughing from smoke. It took twelve hours to drill the tap hole, and then the salamander was slow to spill.

It was Dag who spotted the oddity. Crew gathered round the skimmer as a glistening blue fluid trickled through the red. The fascination was more than curiosity. Somehow, it compelled one’s gaze.

“Gods asunder,” cried the foreman, “That’s star iron! Don’t look if you value your eyes! Dag! Get your team up top! We’ve got to keep this hot!”

The furnace was brought to raging, and the blue streamed like searing ice. As men struggled to keep the furnace stable, the foreman was feverishly reckoning profits while shooing away the dowser’s protests.

The explosion hit some time after the dowser ran away. Some workers on-site survived, supposedly, but no one knows their fate. All paths to Thogham are now closely guarded, and none are allowed to enter… or leave.

The Price of Memory

 “It can’t be helped,” Alora thought. 

Down dawn-lit loggia, she led her patient, Reicha. The girl of eleven had not spoken a word since entering Asyla three years prior. Stopping at an indigo doorway, Alora produced a gold key.

“We’re here,” she told the child. “The way is scary, but it will help.”

Reicha’s eyes remained unfocused, nodding more of habit than acknowledgement.

The doors unlocked to a room of granite and blue stained glass. Sunlight angled towards a leather tome floating above a wooden pedestal. Alora paused before it, Reicha’s too-small hand in hers.

“It can’t be helped,” she whispered, unfastening the manuscript. Reicha’s gaze landed on empty vellum. For a moment, nothing happened. Silence, and light. 

Then, Reicha’s eyes shot wide, wailing. Alora held the convulsing child as memories wrote themselves frantic on the empty page - cadels decorating violence, pigments coiling rinceaux around grotesques of fallen friends and family. The child’s eyes went white.

Alora perused the other leaves. The tome contained many memories removed from many minds, and too disparate a transplant risked schism. A suitable memoir from another girl: brother leaving town for work; parents succumbing to illness; an aunt adopting the orphan. Alora read it aloud, then again, then again. Slowly, color returned to Reicha’s eyes. Slowly, she refocused.

Reicha regained consciousness, confused, but clear. Looking at Alora she asked, “Auntie? What are we doing here? I thought we were visiting home today.”

Alora smiled sadly.

“My heart, the season is cold, and travel difficult. We will pray for your parents at the temple.”

Reicha nodded, disappointment in her cheeks.

“I guess it is far…”

“Yes…” Alora sighed, closing The Manuscript. “Farther than you know.”

The two left the vaulted room, Reicha babbling away, Alora silent, the morning light white on marbled tiles.