The Library at Mount Char

On the bench in front of him sat the newspaper picture of Carolyn on the water slide. In the background of the twenty-five-year-old photo someone who looked an awful lot like Steve Hodgson, aged about ten, waited for his turn.

Rachel’s catalog was concerned with the prediction and manipulation of possible futures.

She, not Father, was now the master of her catalog. She was the only one of them he had honored in this way.

Peter, whose catalog included mathematics and engineering, looked up at the ceiling for a moment, thinking.

Now, as David tormented Michael, Jennifer—the smallest and slightest of the librarians—worked at tearing down Margaret’s grave.

Emily had visited the librarians’ dreams the night before, saying that David required them to assemble at the bull “before sundown.”

But Isha was loyal to Nobununga, who was Emperor of these forests, and thus loyal in turn to Father.

From the shore Father called out the doe Isha, who had recently given birth. Isha and her fawn, called Asha, came as commanded, of course.

Michael, who was training to be Father’s ambassador to beasts, balanced on a branch in a tree nearby, conferring with a family of squirrels.

On the way she saw David, whose catalog was murder and war, swinging a knife around in the field at the end of the road.