Seven saw him swearing and painting, roaring, despairing—heard him yell at the baby, Tweety, who screamed back at him just as lustily. Seven fell into Josef briefly, looked out through the warm brown eyes, felt the intimacy of the buzzing flesh, looked at Bianka who in this now was full of a form into which Tweety had not yet entered.

“We’ll be left all of this,” Josef said with joyful craftiness. “The house, the land—”

“And you’ll grow fat and prosperous, I suppose, and give up painting,” Bianka said, grinning.

“No, no, never!” Josef thundered. But Seven as Josef felt the divisions, the conflicts, saw—But then Josef as Josef vanished, replaced by Josef the Speaker, painstakingly etching in stone the Sumari pictures that would be found by Ma-ah and Proteus in their times.

And Lydia—

Was Story!—and he, Seven, had forgotten who he was and what he knew. Forgotten, so that his parts could grow and learn on their own. Yet all the while unknowingly he nourished them as he was—

Nourished by Cyprus, who had learned to remember, to teach with a light hand, and to learn, gracefully. And the sounds of the Speakers were an important key that Cyprus would help him decipher.

Seven’s consciousness flew together, and then parted seven times in which he glimpsed Ma-ah, Josef, Lydia, Proteus; and, with surprise and wonder—Story, who would develop quite on her own as Tweety would and Lydia had; and Sumpter, who was Window—each apart, yet whole, knowing and unknowing—

And Cyprus’ consciousness parted—into such myriad shining realities of being that Seven could no longer follow, and he yelled out, “Cyprus!”

She sat beside him by the tiles, changing form so swiftly that he said, “Now stop that. I’ve learned so much that I’m dizzy. I don’t suppose you could have just told me?”

“Oh Seven, told you?”

“Forget I said it,” he replied hastily.

“Well, this examination is over,” she said. “I thought you’d like to know.” Cyprus paused, looking nowhere in particular, and added: “You passed, you know.”

“I’m too confused to think,” he said. “And what about Ma-ah’s origin? I didn’t answer that question yet.”

“That’s for next time,” she said. “Anyway, some questions can’t be answered in the context of the question itself. You have to find a new context. Of course, the question itself is deeply symbolic—”

But Seven said, “Next time?”

“In your terms of experience,” Cyprus said gently. “Of course, in other terms—”

“Never mind,” he said. “And if I’m correct, then you’re to me as I’m to Ma-ah and Josef and—”

“Precisely,” she said.

“So, what did you do for this examination?” Seven asked. “I did all the work.”

Cyprus smiled. “I wrote this book,” she said.

“But Cyprus—you aren’t physical,” Seven cried.

And Cyprus sighed. “Seven, you still have a lot to learn.”

Epilogue