Mary couldnt sleep. Every time s tense h fear.
times, until s sleep going to come; so s up and dressed quietly, and stepped out of tree s tentlike branches under which ill and Lyra were sleeping.
t and landscape tled , like tion of some s. But animals migrated for a purpose; crossing to places o mate and bear offspring. t of pure c of utterly random events at toms and molecules; t all.
Nevertense and driven did. Mary felt it, too, except t s kno purpose unlike o knoire world was alive and conscious.
Mary climbed tide laced a brilliant silver tening dark of ts and tful beening to embrace somet was, Mary would never know.
Surned toree stood. It y minutes os great o say, and s hem.
So, moved by tement of t, and desperate to join in. told ill about t everyted to everytian, s connected, too; but loose and free and lig purpose.
And to anot, and it everyt s off from it. And it o find a connection, because there was no God.
ation and o climb ree and try once again to lose .
But before so t sound among treaming of te like an organ. And above t, the squeal and scream of wood on wood.
Surely it couldnt be ree?
Sopped balks of green icks and fell all to tself, tree she knew so well, leaned and leaned
and sloo topple.
Every fiber in trunk, ts seemed to cry out separately against t it fell and fell, all t lengt smass of to lean to a breaker; and trunk rebounded up a little tled doorn wood.
So toucossing leaves. tered ruins of form. t t.
S a brancook out t se different movements in the sky.
One of tion, and t of tream of Dust, seeming to cross it in quite another.
And of t mucer volume. In fact, to be flo, a great inexorable flood pouring out of t of all to some ultimate emptiness.
Slohings joined up.
ill and Lyra tle knife least. So tohem.
told tured ty-to fail just over three hundred years ago.
According to ill, torre degli Angeli, tle knife, aler all, and t be many others.
Suppose t all time, little by little, Dust of tle knife ure...
S dizzy, and it only t t and , gazing at the scudding clouds.
tle knife , and s talk to ill and Lyra and find a o stop it.
But t flood in tter entirely. t astrop stopped, all conscious life o an end. As t came into being needed some feedback system to reinforce it and make it safe, as trees. it somet, it ion, feeling, a brutisomatism; and t brief period like a candle in every one of t ly.
Mary felt t keenly. It felt like age. S eig and o die.
S of t fallen tree, and ill off o the village.
At t of t time at t stream, and tanding firm in the middle.
And t t last: s t great urgent purpose was.
trying to flood. triving to put some barriers up against terrible stream: and hurling
to truggle to keep ticles in they so enriched.
Matter loved Dust. It didnt to see it go. t , and it oo.
t t.
quot;ell, t; s;t;
As s t flotle tiny pebbles trying to trying, all trying till thing.
ayed out, Mary didnt knoy of o subside, and exion took its place, sohe village.
And - on ts. te, a steady movement: sometide.
Sood still, gazing intently. It couldnt be tualapi, because ts own.
But everyt it about it. S alone, and sated before running doo opped, in any case. It ing on ter close to th.
And it ... No, sometting off its back.
thing was a man.
Se clearly, even at t distance; t , and ed to it. S tter beyond doubt: it .
ick of some kind. running, but moving like an ate or a er. light.
And as o t t stick was. he was carrying a rifle.
S as if someone er over . Every separate irred.
Soo far ao do anyted, o cepped into to t and rigopping every so often to listen, moving from o house.
Marys mind felt like trying to as s silently: Dont look under tree, go aree ...
But o it, finally stopping outside bear it; s t and began to run do to call out, anyt just in time s it mig back.
t bear not knoopped and fumbled for to stand still w.
. , altir in t be. Mary ed for an endless minute, and then he appeared again.
ood in to rig past tree.
tepped off tood still, almost at a loss. Mary erested in the village; and
ly away.
Scep ook doe clearly epped onto t cross-legged as it turned to glide aes later t to sight.