The Dark Volume by Gordon Dahlquist

wistfully of his city routines, longing to be standing in the cool, dusty darkness of the Library stacks. But then he sighed. It did not matter where he was— his world would still seem lost. Behind him, the door abruptly opened.
    “Cardinal Chang!” called Elöise. Chang turned to her. She waited for him to speak, realized he did not intend to, then nodded with a smile. “Good morning. I was wondering if you had seen the Doctor.”
    “I believe he was dragooned by Sorge—something about an ailing goat.”
    “Ah.”
    “Is Miss Temple in danger?”
    “She is unchanged, which, as the Doctor says, is good news. She has even been able to drink a little of the Doctor's herb tea.”
    “She is awake?”
    “For instants only, and never herself within them, but able to take a swallow and slip back to sleep, or into dreams. She dreams constantly, I think… like clouds passing before the moon, they cross her face… and her hands clutch so…”
    “The Doctor will return as soon as possible,” said Chang flatly, wondering when and for who else Elöise had ever evoked the moon and clouds. “He cannot love goat-tending.”
    Elöise nodded at the sand still clinging to Chang's boots. “You walked to the sea?”
    “I did.”
    “I so love the sea,” said Elöise. “It lightens my heart.”
    “On the Doctor's suggestion I searched again for any refuse from the airship, or any corpse washed ashore.”
    “I'm sure that's very wise. And what did you find?”
    “That the sea does not lighten my heart at all,” said Chang.

    SVENSON CALLED to them from the muddy lane behind the house that ran to the village. Limping a step behind came Lina's husband, Sorge, whose conversational skills were such that Chang was certain the Doctor had shouted to them as soon as he could, to escape the torpor.
    “The fellow himself,” Chang observed to Elöise, smiling at Svenson's awkward waving.
    “He is a very good man,” replied Elöise quietly, and they said no more until the Doctor reached them. Svenson shook hands with Sorge, refusing any thanks, then waited until the fisherman stumped up the steps and into the house.
    “How fares the goat?” asked Chang.
    Svenson waved the question away and turned to Elöise. “Our patient?”
    “Very well, I think—of course, you must see for yourself.”
    “At this point your observations are fully the equal of mine, but I will be in momentarily.” He paused, and Chang was on the verge of excusing himself, so obviously did Svenson long to say more to Elöise. Instead, before he could, the Doctor turned to him, glanced down at his boots, then back up at his face. “Did you find anything?”
    “Nothing at all,” said Chang.
    He was not sure why he did not mention the broken glass to Elöise—hadn't she as much right to know as Svenson? Wasn't her life as much at risk? Could it be that he did not fully trust her even now?
    “Yet I am unsure if I have walked the same ground you searched before. Sorge has mentioned the power of the tides—something might have come ashore some distance away.”
    A complete fabrication—the Doctor and Chang had never spoken of this at all.
    “Why don't I show you?” offered Svenson. He turned to Elöise. “We shall just be two minutes.”
    “I will see if Lina will make tea,” Elöise replied, smiling, with the exact same careful tone.

    AS THEY walked to the sand Chang quickly described finding the blue glass shards. They stopped at the ring of black rocks, where Svenson lit a cigarette, hands cupped round a match. The tobacco caught, and after a deep breath and an exhaled plume of pale smoke, the Doctor waved a pale spidery hand back toward the house.
    “I did not want to say in front of Mrs. Dujong, for I do not know what it means—and after your own discovery I am even less sure. Something has happened in the village.”
    “Something aside from sick goats?”
    Svenson did not smile. “The men will not speak of it openly… I am convinced we must