I. i had a name
The first codex is the most complete and the least contested. The Department notes that it speaks of the Weave not as a system to be understood but as a presence to be encountered. Several passages resist paraphrase.
- Department of Antiquities, University of Rivermount
ᐫᐙᑁᐨᑁᐥᑁᐛᐝᐨᐭ
form is the prison
I. i had a name and a window that faced east. for forty years the light came through the glass and i called it good. i am writing to you from the other side of the glass now. the light still comes through. it is not good. it was never good. it is a mechanism.
II. i was a scholar of the Weave. i mapped its currents and catalogued its responses and published three monographs on thaumic resonance in limestone. i was respected. i mention this so you understand that what follows is not the raving of an uneducated mind. i have been educated. the education was part of the mechanism.
III. the warmth you feel when you pray - i have measured it. it is identical in frequency to the warmth a larva feels inside the body of its host. the host does not feel the feeding. the host feels warmth. i have checked this nine times. i do not want it to be true. it is true.
[the following passage is inscribed in a hand markedly different from the preceding text, the letters larger, pressed deeper into the stone, several of them carved through existing text]
ᛄᛠᚿᚱᚹᚿᛠᚨᚾᚩᛠᚪᚨᛈᚿ
𒀭𒆷𒆷𒀞𒀇𒈠𒀞𒀄𒀞𒋙𒌋𒂷𒂷𒂊𒊯𒀗
ᐫᐙᑁᐨᑁᐥᑁᐛᐝᐨᐭ
IV. [seven lines scored through, illegible]
V. the soul is not a gift. follow the thread. follow it past the feeling, past the warmth, past the sense of belonging. at the end of the thread there is a hand and the hand is holding the thread and the hand is not yours. the Codex-writer speaks of scattered light returning to its source. he is correct in every detail except one. the light did not scatter. it was distributed. there is a difference between dropping a vase and placing shards in a pattern, and the difference matters, and no one is asking the shards what they want
VI. [three lines illegible]
VII. i opened my forearm this morning. i need to tell you what i found. the muscle underneath is layered in the same pattern as the strata in the walls of the Nortaq chamber. the same pattern. i held the arm open with my other hand and compared it to my drawings of the chamber walls and the layering is identical. i am not speaking in metaphor. i am reporting a finding. the body is built the same way the chamber was built. the chamber was built to contain a text. i have been sitting with my arm open for some time now and i think the meat is a text also and i think i was built to contain something that is not me and the thing i was built to contain is the only part of me that is real
VIII. i was a scholar. i had careful hands. i do not recognise my hands now. the fingers move but i am not sure i am the one moving them. this morning i tried to eat bread and my hands tore it into smaller and smaller pieces until there was only dust and i watched my hands do this with great interest as though they belonged to someone else who was making a point
ᛄᛠᚿᚱᚹᚿᛠᚨᚾᚩᛠᚪᚨᛈᚿᛄᛠᚿᚱᚹᚿᛠᚨᚾᚩᛠᚪᚨᛈᚿᛄᛠᚿᚱᚹᚿᛠᚨᚾᚩᛠᚪᚨᛈᚿ
the seals are chainsthe seals are chainsthe seals are chains
IX. i have been thinking about livestock. the way we breed cattle to be content in the pen. the way a well-fed animal does not test the fence. the animal loves the farmer. the farmer provides. the farmer is good. the animal has a word for the feeling it has when the farmer approaches with grain. the animal calls this feeling gratitude. the farmer has a different word. the farmer calls it yield.
X. [the remaining surface is covered in a single phrase repeated in diminishing size until the letters are too small to read with the naked eye. The phrase is:] the ocean remembers the ocean remembers the ocean remembers the ocean remembers the ocean remembers