She thought again of Aether, of the silver resonance that had answered her compass so strongly when she first discovered the Choosers' sanctuary, and felt the suspicion she had already begun to form settle deeper into certainty.
Someone had wanted the Choosers forgotten. Completely. And she was beginning to understand exactly who.
Far from the Vault, within the vast and careful order of his endless work, the Redactor pursued a different investigation entirely, driven by the doubt that had taken root within him since his conversation with Aether and deepened further through his own troubling review of the Revisions' cumulative cost. He found himself drawn, almost against his own better judgment, toward archives he had never before had reason to access — records so deeply buried within the architecture of his own existence that he suspected they had been placed beyond his reach quite deliberately.
He found a way in regardless.
