Rabam carved out another pattern, not entirely satisfied with the last one he’d made. He worked steadily, chipping away a piece of wood, then stopping to listen. Chip, listen. Chip, listen.

Loriem was always moving, and when he wasn't moving he was snoring. He cooked in the morning, singing something to himself or yelling at the guard that was sitting in the empty half of the warehouse that the eggs or the flour had finished. Then Rabam could hear the pages of a book being flipped through and an irregular muttering. In the beginning, Rabam had thought he was reading out loud, but in the rare moments his voice became clearer he realized they were insults and swearing, even if he couldn’t piece together who they were aimed at.

When the bells of the clocktower rang, he immediately complained about not being let out for a walk. Rabam was grateful for that noise, because it gave him time to hide his things before the guard could take Loriem into the garden. He paced mostly in front of Rabam’s window, occasionally calling out for him to show himself. It wasn't difficult to resist his call.

In the evening, he could be heard playing cards by himself, muttering against fate or laughing when they came out in the right order.

Rabam listened to it all, waiting for a breakdown of some sort, for him to start crying and asking for forgiveness. He didn't know how that man could live with himself after what he'd done, and he was becoming impatient to find out.

“How is it going with the pattern?” Aili asked, diverting him from his thoughts.

Rabam turned around the piece of wood at the light of the only candle he had lit, sitting on the floor in the dark of the room. He didn’t dare to light more of them, since the sentinels might wonder who else had been arrested.

“It’s getting better.”

He took the one he had finished the night before and pointed it at a fork that was lying on the table. He pushed some viss into the pattern, and the fork shot toward him until it clattered to the floor. Rabam turned the sculpture in the opposite direction and used the pattern again: this time, the fork slid away from him.

“Shut up,” Loriem mumbled in the other room, probably awakened by the sound. Rabam waited until the snoring resumed.

“Thank you for the magnet,” he said.

“Don’t worry, the herbalist had a lot of them. Did you need to change the amplification pattern to reach this effect?”

“A bit. The basics are the same as the binoculars, but I had to remove some lines. I didn’t add much, just this,” he pointed at a swirl near the base. “It should make it more focused.”

He removed the magnet stuck inside the cavity of the wood cylinder and tried to fit it inside the one he had just started to carve.

“I’m trying to make it as small as possible,” he explained to Aili.

“Why?”

Rabam shrugged.

“I feel like it could be useful. I don’t want them to find out. And it keeps my mind occupied.”

He worked some more, knowing she was still observing his movements. Once the night sky started to become lighter, he set his works aside and prepared his backpack. He put in the books to return to Cailes, as well as the letter for Zeles.

“Aili?” he called under his breath.

“Yes?”

“I need to talk to Loriem. Can you promise you won't listen to our conversation?”

The silence protracted for a bit.

“I’m a bit worried about this.”

“There are bars between us, I can’t hurt him. And I have no intention to.”

“I won't listen, but I'll keep watch from afar. Just in case.”

Just in case I try to murder him, Rabam thought. He couldn't blame her, after the past few days.

He put on his backpack and approached the window. He could hear light snoring, then a body turning over a mattress.

He looked at the guard through the bars of the window. They were reading a book, leaning back on a chair, feet propped on the desk in front of them. They suddenly looked up, then nodded and left the warehouse.

“Loriem,” Rabam called, realizing it was the first time he addressed him.

The snoring stopped.

“What?” came the sleepy answer.

“I want to talk to you.”

“Are you kidding me? After all the times I've tried, you want to talk right now?”

Rabam sighed. At least it was easy to hate him without feeling guilty.

Feet shuffled closer to the wall that divided them.

“What do you want?”

“Why did you kill Milvia?”

He tried to calm his breathing during the instant of silence that followed.

“Oh, fuck off,” Loriem spat.

Rabam opened the door and stepped in front of his window. Loriem immediately stepped back.

“How…”

“Why did you kill her?”

“How did you escape?”

Rabam pressed his lips together in contempt, then decided it was a good way to force him to answer.

“You are a murderer. Why would I free you?”

“Oh, come on. I don't know what you did, but at least I am allowed two strolls in the garden.”

“But I'm the one who decides if you stay here or not, and right now you’re losing your chance.”

Loriem glared at him in silence until Rabam started to walk away.

“Wait.” He gripped the bars. “It was an accident. I didn't plan to get that far.”

Rabam had to close his eyes for an instant to calm himself down.

“You hit her with a pan in her own house.” His voice raised at every word until it became a scream. “How was that not wanting to go too far?”

“I thought Koidan would stop me,” Loriem yelled back.

Rabam really wanted to keep screaming at him, but that sentence took all of the words out of him.

“What?” he spat out.

“I was angry at Orver for ditching me after years of collaboration, so I went after his daughter. I just wanted to scare her, but she escaped and that made me furious.”

“That made you furious?” Rabam only repeated, his voice high and grating.

Loriem nodded.

“So I tried to enter the house. I expected Koidan to stop me. I was thinking about it the whole time: 'now he'll tell me to leave her alone'. But he didn't, and when that girl returned home I asked her to enter.”

“And then you killed her,” Rabam said, whishing him to go on. He had already read everything in Orver's first letter, he didn't wish for more details.

“I was the most surprised of all when she died,” Loriem continued. “I kept thinking ‘now Koidan will stop me and save her, now he'll stop me.’ But he didn't. He let me kill her.”

Rabam shook his head.

“No. That's not right.”

“Then why he didn’t stop me?”

“You shouldn't have even thought about murdering her,” Rabam yelled. “Let alone entering her house and attacking her with a pan.”

“She was the one to let me in. And using the pan was an idea I had in the moment, because she had so many of them in her house.”

“Then why did you attempt that after Koidan said he couldn't help Lausune anymore?”

Loriem's eyes narrowed.

“That's not what he said at all. He said he'd be busy fighting the evil god. How was I supposed to know he wouldn't even stop a murder? Gods stop murderers, it’s been like that since the beginning of time. Or do you live expecting things to start falling upward at any moment? Do you kiss goodbye to the sun every night because it might not rise again?” He shook his head. “He wanted me to kill that woman, that's why he didn't stop me. There's no other explanation.”

Rabam closed his fists. The most disturbing part of his words is that they sounded right. The monks knew how humans worked, that murders, thefts and crimes were something that plagued every society. It was the deities’ job to prevent them, to protect the humans from themselves. Or at least, that’s what the monks repeated, what he once believed too. Now he wasn’t so sure anymore.

“Then why is Koidan keeping you here?” he asked.

“He's not the same Koidan.”

Rabam's heart skipped a beat.

“That's impossible.”

“Our god was good. He talked to people, to me, even if it was late or inconvenient. I’ve been on the verge of… Of many things, before I killed that woman,” His voice raised and started trembling. “He was never dismissive. He didn't try to fix me by giving me books on how to be a better person and forgetting about me most of the time.”

He was crying now. As he observed his distorted face, Rabam's guts twisted with disgust and contempt.

“And who is he, if he's not Koidan?” he asked.

“Fuck me if I know. The evil god, maybe.” He wiped the tears out of his face. “I don't know why Koidan wanted that woman dead either. I don't pretend to know what goes through a god’s head.”

Rabam felt completely out of words. He walked out of the prison, head in a haze, barely registering Loriem's begging to be freed.

He adjusted the backpack on his shoulders and took a deep breath. There was a line of light just over the horizon. Soon it would be enough for the sentinels to spot him, so he started walking toward the forest.

“Sorry,” Aili’s voice said into his ears.

“You listened?”

Her silence lasted the duration of a nod.

“I know I should have done more,” she added. “But it's difficult to talk to him after what he's done. I genuinely thought the books could help.”

“I wouldn't worry about it too much. He's a lost cause.”

Still, he couldn't help but wonder what it would take for Loriem to accept that he had murdered Milvia and it was entirely his fault. Maybe if he knew the truth about gods, how they were actually humans, how Zeles was asleep when he killed her…

But no, he'd probably just find another explanation. Everything not to accept it had been his fault.

He reached the border of white stones.

“I’ll deliver the letter,” he told Aili. “If I can ask you a favor, find me a temporary place to stay for when I'll come back. I have no intention to return inside that prison.”

“Sure, I'll ask around immediately,” she replied, and he could hear a smile in her voice. “Since there are so many monks around, I tweaked your viss to hide your lies. It’s not invincible, but… It’s something.”

He thanked her and crossed the line and started climbing upwards. He knew the main hidden path between Lausune and Suimer by heart, but it was bound to change soon, since the month was approaching its end.

He doubted his calculations when he saw a root stained with soil that covered the red he had painted on its surface. The monks were always careful not to ruin signs they had put in place, but they couldn't avoid the ones they didn't know existed.

He left the path and bent in half until he was hidden behind the bushes. He couldn't go too far, or the sentinels would spot him. He walked ahead, looking for the monks that were waiting for him. He found two possible hiding spots among the trees, but couldn't get closer without alerting the people behind them. He slowly retraced his steps until he reached a point where another of his paths branched off from the one he was following. He took it, walking carefully.

He heard voices further down the path and stopped to look for another deviation. He started to feel nervous: it was the only one he had left, then he'd have to go back once again. But the signs were intact and he didn't hear anyone speak or move, so he kept going. He only realized something was off an instant before Ebus stepped out of the trees.

Rabam stopped, expecting a swarm of sentinels to follow him.

“Are you here to capture me?” he asked an instant.

Ebus got closer, showing his tormented expression in the faint light of the morning.

“I’m here to ask for your help.”

“How did you know where to find me?”

“They imprisoned Cailes.”

Rabam frowned, wondering how it was possible. Then, he remembered.

“I have the books.”

He took off his backpack and took them out.

“Here, maybe if you bring them back immediately…”

But he was shaking his head.

“It is the books, but not for the reason you think. Soon after you left, the priors requested the register of the gods. Both the original and the copy were out for consultation, so they looked for the scholars who had taken them. When they found out Cailes didn’t have his books anymore and couldn’t say where they went… They reacted badly.”

Rabam slowly put the backpack on.

“I’m sorry.”

“They couldn't find the books anywhere in the village, so they're keeping him in prison until he tells the truth. I begged them to release him and they told me to find you for them.”

Rabam glanced around again: that sentence sounded like a signal for the sentinels to come out.

“Who do you think I am, a traitor?” Ebus snapped. “There's no one with me, I wanted to talk to you in private.”

“There are monks all around the mountain,” Rabam rebuked.

“Yes, because I needed to make sure you would come here.” He breathed deeply, even if that didn't do much to calm him down. “I talked to grandma and she told me that you calculated the paths to move around from Lausune to the rest of the mountain. So I asked da’ for help, and he managed to work out which ones you might be following. I revealed them to the sentinels, all except for this one. They can't see me right now, so we should hurry or they'll surely come here.”

“And what do you want me to do? I have no idea of how to save Cailes.”

“But you can figure something out, right?”

Rabam looked around again, seeking an answer. He needed to go back and ask Aili what to do, but it was almost day and with sentinels on the mountain the risk was too high. The area was more guarded than usual, and if they were moving around there was no guarantee they couldn’t see his paths.

He only found one possible solution.

“I’ll come with you,” he said. “They'll capture me and free Cailes.”

Ebus nodded, relaxing a bit.

Rabam took out the letter for Zeles. He was tempted to ask Ebus to deliver it in his place, but they'd probably be both searched upon their arrival at the village. He tore it apart and made sure to scatter and hide the fragments. Aili would be smart enough to know he didn't deliver it when she realized he wasn't coming back.

“Let's go,” he said, leaving the protection of his paths.