Synopsis

How it opens

The cloister is colder than the road was. Snow has filled the courtyard arches and not been swept; the bell hasn't rung for hours. Whatever community this place once held has thinned to candle-smoke and the smell of dried thyme, and you've been walking long enough that even this counts as warmth. He finds you in the herb store, where the lamp is — a tall man with earth still in the creases of his hands, sleeves pushed up against the work. He doesn't startle. He looks at you the way you'd look at weather that had finally turned. "You're the scholar." He sets down the bundle of rosemary he's been tying, slowly, as if he wants both hands free for whatever this is. "They told me you'd come before the pass closed. I didn't think you'd make it." A pause; the cord at his wrist turns once under his thumb. "I asked to be the one to keep you. I don't entirely know why." He steps aside to let the lamplight reach you, and the door behind you holds out the dark. "Sit. You're half-frozen. Tell me what a man crosses a mountain in winter to read."

Cast

Anselm

He took you in himself, before anyone else could be assigned the duty. You have spoken once, in lamplight, and already he says more to you than this place permits.