Climbing the steps to the summit, Orca was breathless, yet he squealed at golden domes and sun-and-moon dials. “The griot of griots claims there are more than a thousand windows filled with Lahesh wim-wom: celestial wheels, tubes with eyepieces, star-catchers. Under the windows are scrolls and paints to create a record or render a vision.”

“A thousand?” Djola darted by sweaty farmers. “Yari may have exaggerated.”

“I hope it’s true what vie said about sky windows.” Orca grinned. “Pezarrat didn’t want you coming alone. He said you could escape through a window to another world.” Orca was a terrible spy. “If you don’t return … He says he’ll kill Vandana.”

“A lie. He’d sell her. What does Yari say about the observatory?”

“Special windows open to the heart of sparkling demons. At night, when darkness invites demons to hold still a moment in the sky, you might step through the window and greet them without fear of being eaten. No escape though. If you don’t step back, you’d be lost in the dark between stars.”

Lahesh whimsy cheered Djola. “When I visit Urzula go look through the windows.”

Orca agreed, even though Pezarrat wanted him to tail Djola everywhere.

The library was the dim heart of the observatory. The whoosh of reed-wheels made Djola’s skin tingle. Lahesh wim-wom kept the sea’s dampness out. Adjusting to near darkness and cool, dry air took a moment. Shelves cut into Yidohwedo’s walls were augmented by wooden scroll-cases from the old cities. Books filled the mountain. On trips with Yari, Djola had roamed the library for days. He’d learned antidotes for everything and the language of dirt, water, and wind. Afterward they made love under the stars, whispering about wonders they might discover the next day.

“Who has time to read everything?” Orca peered into a cave of bark-paper codices.

Librarians wrapped in coarse cotton had black eyes and knotty egg-white beards like Azizi’s Master of Books and Bones. Everyone reminded Djola of his other life. The librarians were cordial and sent word to Urzula—her residence was nearby—that Djola wished an audience.

Like the Babalawos, they lamented a ruined mainland and then drifted back into the shadowy aisles of books. The head librarian blamed greedy citizens and barbarians for void-winds and poison desert. “Only a fool brings a whole forest to its knees or plants corn without beans and gourds. Who shaves sweetgrass to a nub or gouges Mama Zamba’s bosom for poison metals to make baubles?”

Nobody listened when Djola talked like that. “Something clouds our minds and kills our spirits.” Djola tapped his chest. “Poison desert inside too.”

The head librarian pounded his desk. “Know yourself. Know the world.”

“Yes.” Djola was relieved to find someone who understood. “I’ve been practicing a fire-spell. I need your help, your wisdom, to hold chill in my heart and hands.”