Three years pass as Livira throws herself into study and clandestine research to rediscover Evar and the Exchange, all while suppressing questions about why she cares so deeply. The library remains inscrutable, but the city transforms as innovations spread and the sabber threat grows; rumors name an eastern force, the skeer. Weapons like arrow-sticks and grenades multiply, yet raids increase.

Livira reaches Master Logaris’s penultimate table at sixteen; Arpix joins later. Deputy Ellis opposes her advancement, citing the city’s hardening policy toward displaced peoples. Meeting notes, lifted by Livira, reveal a deputy deadlock that lets Logaris keep her. Ellis retaliates by setting Master Jost to monitor Livira, slowing her Kensan Index work. Livira studies the Mechanism, lock-picking, and scarce texts about the library, but hints of the Exchange remain elusive. She uncovers Ellis’s correspondence with Lord Algar and investigates Algar’s motives.

In class, Master Logaris expounds that customers seek affirmation rather than truth, framing the librarians’ cynicism. Arpix studies a massive, embossed metal text on topology to aid the inventor Champart, highlighting his reductionist focus and distance from Livira’s concerns.

A white-robed librarian, Tubberly, abruptly summons Livira—and unexpectedly Meelan—to present themselves at Master Yute’s house in their finest clothes. Livira fears expulsion but complies. With no finery, Livira chooses her short black robe; Meelan appears in costly attire, revealing private wealth and prompting a frank exchange about what money can and cannot change.

As Livira and Meelan descend the mountain, Malar intercepts them and insists on escorting them, joking about violence following Livira’s rare excursions. The trio heads toward Yute’s home, the summons hinting at a turning point amid rising political and military pressures.