As Griffin remains absent, Robin plunges into an intensified third year known as the “Siberian winter,” juggling heavier Latin, theory, and etymology, plus proto-dissertations under assigned supervisors. Ramy resents Professor Harding steering him into editing the Persian Grammatica, while Victoire clashes with Professor Leblanc, who prizes access to Vodou texts over her wish to study Kreyòl. Letty’s ignorance about Kreyòl and sacred texts triggers a rift with Victoire.

Group dynamics sour under pressure. Letty and Victoire drift into cold avoidance, while Letty’s exchanges with Ramy turn prickly and victimized, provoking sharper retorts from Ramy. Robin, stuck between them, feels growing hostility and even violent fantasies, recognizing their solidarity has twisted into mutual irritation driven by inequitable workloads and insensitive remarks.

Apprenticeships begin. Robin assists Professor Chakravarti with silver-work upkeep around Oxford, repairing a garden bar and learning activation nuances and endurance limits tied to silver purity and design. At the Ashmolean, a “verify/參” bar fails; back at Babel, Chakravarti reveals a locked hall of resonance rods that sustain linked bars across Britain via paired smelting and a proprietary symbol system. Robin sees how a few Sinologists keep vast systems running and feels both needed and awed by the empire’s dependence.

In mid-January, they learn Anthony Ribben vanished in Barbados and is presumed dead. Babel offers no memorial; his station is reassigned, deepening fears of expendability. Victoire, who was close to Anthony, avoids the topic, while Letty fixates publicly, revealing Babel paid for Anthony’s freedom from enslavement, further exposing the institution’s cold pragmatism and the cohort’s splintering morale.