During the Waning Sun’s mild years, Sherkaner Underhill drives his new Relmeitch automobile along the coastal Pride of Accord toward Lands Command, delighting in the scenery and the machine despite reckless near-misses. In Nigh’t’Deepness he hires a blacksmith for simple leather-and-metal improvements, pays up front, and continues searching for lodging.

Exploring backroads at dusk, Sherkaner descends into a dell that reeks of offal and notices a ramshackle house and lurking figures. When two childlike watchers and a larger ambusher move to pounce, he guns the auto, fords the stream at a hidden crossing, evades them, and climbs to a hilltop house.

There, Lady Enclearre—an elderly retired parish teacher and former sailor—feeds him and offers a room. As distant drums throb from the dell, she explains the parish’s “vermin”: out-of-phase breeders who shirk preparing for the Great Dark, neglect and brutalize their many offspring, thieve, and become most dangerous when deepness spaces grow scarce. She recounts thefts from her home, including stolen books and pets.

Enclearre describes local poverty, the duty to provision deepnesses, and how some of her books were later quietly replaced by a new priest. Sherkaner claims he’s considering enlisting, though he intends to sell Lands Command on his own schemes. Enclearre notices his abundant “spare parts,” and they part for the night.

From his room, Sherkaner watches the dell’s ember-dark smoke while woodsfairies’ stridling fills the forest. Their rise-and-fall song and childhood rhymes lull him to sleep, underscoring themes of preparation versus fecklessness as the Waning yields toward the coming Dark.