The trek back to Dr. Hayes house was relatively uneventful. people were still only now rising and Soren ran into very few people on her way back. with her head down she managed to avoid more than a nod in greeting. Looking through the window she saw the kitchen was empty. Soren unlocked the door and entered, quietly returning the key. She made her way up the stairs as quietly as she could. Yalina Pickett was just walking out of Soren’s empty room as she crested the stairs and looked down the hallway. Her heart stopped for a moment before her mind caught up to her.

“Mama!” she called out.

“Soren?” her mother replied, looking at her inquisitively.

“Mama,” Soren said again, racing to her mother and wrapping her skinny arms around her waist.

“Soren, where did you get off to this early in the morning?” her mother asked. To Soren’s amazement she was not angry, not even worried. Thinking quickly, Soren said,

“Just outside to watch the suns rise. I couldn’t sleep. Mrs. Hayes let me out. You locked my door?” Soren tried to deflect the conversation. Her mother looked somewhat abashed, though it was hard to tell on that stoic face.

“Sorry little one, your father insisted.” Was all Yalina said, then she too changed the subject,

"Come, I’ll make tea downstairs. You have a headache?” She'd already had tea but of course couldn't let her mother know that.

“mmhmm” Soren said as the two made their way downstairs. Soren was surprised at how well her mother knew her way around the Hayes kitchen. She wondered if her mother just knew her way around all kitchens or if she’d been here before. Yalina took the kettle out of the fireplace as boiling water steamed and spewed out. She set a steaming cup in front of Soren and studied her daughter. The two were quiet for a long time before Soren finally asked,

“May I look at some of the books today? Or at least the globe in the other room?” her mother smiled and said,

“I will ask Mr. Hayes”

“Doctor” Soren said automatically with a smile back at her mother. Yalina huffed and stood from the small table in the kitchen. She bustled about for a minute before turning and setting a tray of food in front of Soren. Bread and butter, dried meat and a bit of honey drizzled over the bread. Soren realized it was probably the food Mrs. Hayes had brought up to her room before she left. Without saying a word, Soren tore into the offering, devouring the entire meal wordlessly. As she finished, sucking the last of the honey off her fingertips, her mother set down another tray in front of Soren. It looked like a much, much larger version of her breakfast.

“Take this to your father. He’ll be hungry this morning I think.” The platter had half a loaf of day-old bread, a huge hunk of dried meat and a small bowl of honey. There was also a bowl of steaming gruel that Yalina had made, though it lacked the usual assortment of dates, nuts, seasonings and salt Soren usually had in hers. She gulped the last of her tea and stood taking the tray and making her way back up to her father’s room.

As she walked in, Soren was surprised to see Dr. Hayes again at the side of her father’s bed. The two spoke in hushed voices. Voices that cut off quickly as Soren entered the room.

“Papa? Breakfast's here.” Soren said. She made her way towards the small bedside table next to her father’s bed and set down the platter. He looked at the food with obvious hunger.

“Mama said you might be hungry this morning.” She said, then looking at the doctor said,

“Good morning Dr. Hayes. Have you eaten yet?” the older man smiled saying,

“Thank you yes, I ate earlier. My mother still insists on bringing me my meals at dawn every morning.” Soren stifled a giggle. The Doctor looked up at Soren saying,

“It wouldn’t be so bad if she didn’t insist on trying to feed me too” he winked at her. It was this more than anything that gave Soren the courage to ask,

“Dr. Hayes, can I look through a few of your books today? I’ll be very gentle I promise. I don’t know how to read or anything but I thought I could look at some of the pictures maybe?” She said all this in one breath as if saying it faster would help. Dr. Hayes looked at her with a kind wrinkle in his eyes.

“Alas child, there are shockingly few pictures in any of those books.” Soren’s face fell but, before she could even utter a dejected ‘oh’ Dr. Hayes continued,

“I do however have some free time this afternoon. Maybe we can use it to start teaching you some of your letters eh? It would be much more useful than looking for the few pictures I do have.” Soren’s face lit with excitement. Learn to read! She'd always wanted to but life on a farm left little time for it. But surely she couldn’t learn in one afternoon. Excitement and disappointment swirled in her as Dr. Hayes said,

“I won’t be able to teach you everything but, I have a couple strong Bicar Controls that can certainly speed up the process. You should be able to read most Central text by this evening if we start early enough." Soren’s eyes widened. Bicar Controls varied greatly depending on the control date. They all had something to do with understanding some else’s mind. The weak ones could tell if you were lying but the stronger ones could actually impart information into someone else's mind. As she understood it, that particular Control wasn’t rare but did require more than one Control date within Bicar.

But what would her mother say? She'd always been very weary of anything written. The Yunadaya by and large believed very strongly in the danger of written words. They saw it was a kind of magic that could easily take on a life of its own. The Yunadaya had a strict custom of passing history orally from one generation to the next within each family as well as the community at large. Part of a child’s inheritance was the oral history they took with them. Famous families with long lineages were able to boast of long recitations of the deeds of past family members. Soren loved this part of her mother’s heritage. Still, she had also always wanted to learn to read. The two desires conflicted and she was suddenly struck with indecision. Was there some sort of control power involved in reading? Would she have to have some sort of birthdate that allowed her to innately understand the world around her? Dr. Hayes must have seen the distress in her, or was it those strong Bicar Controls? Either way he corrected himself,

“Don’t worry there are no ancient control’s involved. Honestly Dolor, I need to have a talk with your wife.” Soren’s father looked at the doctor and smiled,

“Not a lot of time on a farm for reading doc.”

“I know what Yalina would rather. I respect her for wanting to keep her traditions. But Dolor, the child should know how to read if she ever plans on leaving that plot of land of yours."

“Doc, please.” Dolor replied through a mouthful of bread.

“Soren,” Dr. Hayes turned back to her and said,

“Today you will learn how to read. I’m clearing my schedule for this.” And with that he strode out of the room. Soren looked at her father and he simply shrugged and continued eating. Soren waited for a moment before asking,

“Papa, I can’t really learn how to read in a day can I?” Dolor stopped eating and looked at his daughter,

“mmm, I did. Well, mostly. I cannot read nearly as well as Dr. Hayes of course. He is a learned man of means, comes from a big family far to the northwest. ‘supose that is why he is such a good doctor.” Soren nodded as if this made all the sense in the world. Though she didn’t really understand what her father was talking about. How could someone be better than someone else at reading? She always thought you either could read or you couldn’t. Before she could ask her father said,

“Soren do not worry what your mother says about the written word. Your mother’s folks,” and he sighed and rubbed his eyes with his good arm before continuing,

“They have always been fearful of written words. They believe a word written down is made true, no matter what. The truth is, many people write down many things. Some of it is true, some not. Writing something down does not make a lie true, or a truth a lie.” Soren nodded her head again. This she understood. Her mother had worried, even been fearful when Louis had wanted to learn his words. Yet, Soren had never seen any ills from reading, in fact, she could remember thinking Louis had grown a bit kinder if a bit more insufferable from his reading. Before he had left, Louis had confided in Soren that it was the main reason he was going to Newton City in first place. The moment she began thinking about her brother, an image of a geometric container formed in Soren’s mind then disappeared as quickly, as did any notion of her brother.

Suddenly, she felt apprehensive. She thought it must be about the prospect of reading. She wondered what her mother would think of her learning to read. She didn’t want to upset her. In fact, now that she thought about it, she wondered if her mother didn’t have the right of it. Maybe learning to read was dangerous.

“Papa, maybe I shouldn’t learn to read today.” She said before she could second guess her thoughts. Her father frowned at her. Swallowing a bite of food he said,

“Soren, I told you. Do not worry about your mother. She will understand. It is important you learn this; it will help you in life, whatever you choose to do. Go on now, it sounds like Dr. Hayes wanted to get started early with you.” Soren wanted to say more but the look her father gave her brooked no argument.

Soren made her way downstairs. She wanted to use the strange closet she had seen Mrs. Hayes use earlier in the morning. As she began walking towards the strange contraption however, it began to move again. Scared, Soren dashed back to the familiarity of the stairs. Thinking on it later, Soren felt a little embarrassed being scared of Mrs. Hayes. Soren got a distinct feeling of unease around the woman she couldn’t put a finger on. She concluded it best to avoid her if possible.

She crossed through the kitchen, her mother conspicuously absent, and entered through the bay doors into the study. Soren entered the large room trying to grasp the amount of knowledge contained within the room. books lined every wall floor to ceiling. She noticed Dr. Hayes had moved much of the furniture in the room. The chairs and globe had been replaced with one small chair and a large black panel with a small sill under it. On the sill sat a few white pieces of material. As Soren sheepishly walked into the room Dr. Hayes said,

“Welcome to the first day of school Soren Pickett.” He smiled at her and she tentatively smiled back, waiting to take the seat in front of her. Dr. Hayes continued saying,

“Normally we’d have years of time to exercise that brain of yours. Transforming you into a storehouse of knowledge. Unfortunately for us, we have but one short afternoon.” The doctor said motioning to the empty seat,

“Please sit down.” He said before taking his own seat and continuing,

“I’ve spent a large part of my life studying these works,” he motioned at the room,

“and while I’ve read much, I believe I’ve actually understood very little of this world. Before we begin with the lesson, I’d like to learn a little bit more about what you know of Meridian.” Soren looked around nervously but before she could even begin to feel her nerves, Dr. Hayes continued,

“Its quite alright if you don’t know the answer, just do the best you can. Let’s start with something easy, tell me how many Patron gods are there?”

“Twelve.”

“Good, and you know their names?”

“Bicar, Enki, Zabi, Shukra, Pacha, Kekara, Sera, Eadra, Shamash, Silurian, Arcus and Bakara.” She counted them off on her fingers.

“Very Good. I think we can assume your mother has taught you of the Twelve and how to follow in their will. Next I’d like you to tell me the names of the continents.” Soren subconsciously glanced towards the globe before her view was blocked by a smiling Dr. Hayes.

“Hm, well we live in lower central, south of the rest of the continent of Central. Above-”

“To the North of us.” Dr. Hayes corrected.

“To the North of us is High Central and then Sentoria is er, North of that.” Dr. Hayes nodded saying,

“Good and on the other side of the globe?”

“On the other side of the globe is the Basin I think and…” she couldn’t remember more, realistically the world was so big it hardly mattered. The world she knew was big enough. Dr. Hayes didn’t even pause. He seemed to actually come alive a bit as he beckoned her to the globe.

“We are here," he said pointing the a large band of flat yellowish brown on an huge oval of land. Below his finger stretched a huge desert of tan bowled in by large rolling hills on the left side and jagged peaks along the right. The size of the desert, if this globe was accurate was enormous. The mount range on the right of Central snakes up along the left side of Sentoria to the north. where the two landmasses would presumably meet was a massive mountain surrounded by water, the mountain of storms. Even Soren knew of it, no one went anywhere near the area. As the name implied, a massive storm raged around the mountain unabated for millennia. "As you said we are in Central and above us is Sentoria. We are separated on the west by The Living Ocean and the east by the Straight of Sentoria." He pointed here and there then pointed out the Archipelago Basin on the other side of the world, as well as the other large land masses of Meridian. then he motioned for them to sit back down.

"I’d like to pose a question to you. You don’t need to answer it now, but I’d like you to think about it.” He paused taking up one of the pieces of white stuff and put it to the panel. He spoke the words as he drew them,

“When have we understood?” At first Soren thought he was pausing to write more. After he did not say anything or draw anything else on the board, she realized that was the question. She wasn’t sure what to say and decided the best response was to remain silent. It must have been the right one because Dr. Hayes eventually smiled and continued saying,

“Right. So first will be memorizing the alphabet.”

Six hours later, Soren thought her hand would never stop cramping. She also had no idea her brain could become exhausted. It didn’t help that the Shifts had her head aching before they'd even begun. The Doctors Bicar Control was an odd sensation. At first it was as if she'd simply known certain things. As they continued though a dull throb at her temples and behind her eyes steadily grew. Now she had an aching hand to match. She had a tiredness of thought that, while exhausting was somehow invigorating as well. She now understood what her father meant by ‘better at reading than me’ she had learned the alphabet easily enough with the doctors Controls. She learned the way each letter was formed, the swirl of the ‘o’ and the sharp movements of ‘x’. On top of that, the sounds that went along with each letter were only slightly harder to remember. None of them had actually looked like the sounds they made in her opinion. When she asked why, Dr. Hayes had said this was because the letters had changed to make the drawing of them easier and faster. Soren still thought it illogical. Likely, truly understanding and memorizing them would be a long time coming. Still, at the end of the lesson she could easily sound out the question he'd written on the board at the beginning. Looking through a random book, much of the writing still looked like strange scribbly drawings to Soren. Yet she made out a few of the sentences and was encouraged by her progress, slow as it was. Finally, Dr. Hayes set down the white stick, chalk he'd called it and turned to Soren saying,

“I think that’s as far as we’ll get today.” Soren nodded setting down her own piece of chalk and small piece of slate she’d been copying his writing onto. He went on,

“Before we finish, I've a couple books to give you. I know you won’t be able to read them yet, but I believe they will be invaluable in time.” He went over to a corner of the room looking through a stack. Soren wondered at how he could possibly know where each and every book was located, there must have been hundreds maybe thousands. Pulling down a small square thing he said,

“This one isn’t too long, but some of the words are difficult to understand. You’ll know most of them once you’ve gotten a better understanding of how the letters go together.” He walked back over and set the small book in front of Soren. Then he turned to the fireplace and took out a much thinner and older looking book. this one had a soft leather cover and no title. It looked extraordinarily flimsy to Soren

“Soren,” he said in a low voice, his entire demeanor changed.

“Your father told me about your birth signs. You realize you are incredibly special don’t you? Believe me when I say, you are going to do incredible things. Incidentally, you’re a good student too, if a bit slow. If the world was a different place, I think you’d of made a fine scholar. Your certainly curious enough.” She smiled down at the small book as he said this and tried to work out the title. It was embossed in a thin delicate gold, after a time she finally asked, unable to remember what two ‘e’ letters together sounded like,

“The Thirteenth Control” Dr. Hayes read before continuing. "This other book," he gestured at the thin thing in his hand. "I was given, quite recently in fact. By a very old friend of mine. It's called "Containing Midnight". I'm not exactly sure what its about as it's in a dialect I cannot read or even recognize. But she was insistent I give it to you." She looked back up at the Doctor saying,

“Who was your friend? how does she know me?" Dr. Hayes gave her a small smile saying,

"A recent acquaintance of yours, a very recent acquaintance I believe." Soren looked down at the books not saying anything. Would he tell her parents? how much did he know?

"I won't. and not much." he said. Soren looked up startled and after taking a breath said,

"Thank you Dr. Hayes, it’s more than I could ask for.” She noticed the tears in her eyes and for once, wasn’t embarrassed by them. The doctor smiled back at her saying,

“Never stop learning Soren. There is more to know in this world than either of us will ever grasp.” He looked her square in the eyes a glint in them that Soren couldn’t place. Then he continued,

“Well, off you go. I do believe I’ve kept you from the best that sorry troupe likely has to offer! It’ll be dark before long and you’ll want to get some dinner before seeing the show.” She thanked him again and stood up walking towards the hallway that lead towards the kitchen. Before she got there however she looked back at Dr. Hayes. She paused then saying,

“Never.” He looked up from erasing the panel of slate he had just begun started rubbing at. Dr. Hayes gave Soren an odd look and said,

“Excuse me?”

“The answer to the question, ‘When have we understood?’ the answer is never. We can only learn more.” She turned to leave but he called back before she could,

“Then why learn anything at all?” She paused a moment before saying,

“Every time I learn something new, the world gets a little bit bigger. I guess, I like living in a big world.” Then ran back up the stairs to her parents.

She never saw the look on Dr. Hayes’ face, never saw the small grin of wonder cross his face. It would be years before she was able to finish The Thirteenth Control. On the last page was the question he had posed to her early that morning. When she finally read it, Soren would be astonished to read the answer exactly as she'd answered it. "Every time we learn something new, The world gets a little bigger and this world is vast indeed." It would be many more years still before she learned just how important her answer had been. Standing there in the musty library, the old doctor wondered at the small girl, the most powerful human on the planet.