I lowered the book to my lap and took out a fresh sheet of paper. The ship swayed as I set a squat pot of ink next to it.

“Tell me what words you understand.”

It was slow going. I’d recognized the word for “Alanga”. Mephi recognized others, though his interpretations were somewhat vague. I had to pin down some words through context; complete sentences still evaded me.

I stopped to ask a servant to bring dinner to my room, as well as food for Mephi. He ate his meal with gusto and then eyed my work. “What does it say? Do you know yet?”

I pointed to a word. “This one here is ‘Alanga’. And there’s the Sukais, I know that much. So this talks about the beginning of their dynasty. According to what you’ve been telling me, this word here is ‘kill’ or ‘destroy’.” I flipped through some more pages. “Men, women, children. Hunt. Sleep. All.”

Mephi lowered his head, as though expecting the ceiling to collapse. “Yes. A killing. Of everyone.”

“The Alanga couldn’t have killed the Sukais.” I stopped myself. Of course. This was written by one of the Alanga. This wasn’t about that. This was about the Sukai defeat of the Alanga. Men, women and children. Somehow I hadn’t even considered that the Alanga had children. But of course they did – even if they lived for ever, they had to have come from somewhere. I’d thought of them as supernatural beings for so long, spurred on by the stories of them unleashing destruction on mortals, heedless of how many they killed. They’d had families.

“The Sukais killed all of the Alanga. You’re right. A massacre.” I ran a finger up and down the page, flipped to the next one, trying to pick out words I recognized. It was the first time I’d ever thought of the defeat of the Alanga as a massacre. The plays and the songs always framed it as a glorious victory. The commoners defeated the Alanga and were free to live their lives without fear of being slain by their magic.

They’d traded fear of the Alanga for fear of the Sukais, eventually.

“What else?” Mephi sniffed the pages.

“I’m not sure. I’m trying.” I flipped to the end. Perhaps translating the ending of the book might help me get a better idea for the contents. I could get a sense for what might have happened to the author.

The words here were starker, the pen pressed harder into the page.

Mephi shrank back once he got a look at them. “I don’t like this,” he said. “It smells angry. It looks angry.”