The ribbon was a city stretched over a sunken valley, with bridges like spider threads. On the rooftops stood windmills and flags that read the language of the morning air currents. Kaja, a journeyman of the Order of the Wind Line, drew maps that did not yet know the roads. Her compass was shaped like a drop and trembled as the winds carried forgotten melodies. Master Ivar used to say that the streets here move at night, like lazy rivers. That evening the bells tolled for the thirteenth time, and there was a crisp silence in the workshop. Ivar had not returned from his measurements, but an envelope with her name on it was waiting on the desktop. Inside she found a pen made of salt and a sentence: write down a place that does not exist. The compass suddenly turned frosty and pointed downwards, as if a horizon flowed beneath the floor. Kaja closed the studio, put the pen behind her collar, and walked down to the Old Market. The stone slabs muttered signs she had not seen before, like crumpled pavement notes. A glassy-eyed fox, a gatherer of echoes, jumped down from a lamp stall and looked into her hands. - 'Where it smells of ink, there the path can be treacherous,' he said, twitching his moustache of crystal. They walked together towards the Broken Street, which ended in a wall as smooth as blank paper. A cool draught flowed from a crack in the wall, smelling of rain and unspoken letters. Kaja marked her wrists with chalk to remember where to come back from, and tied a pen with red thread. A fox carried a handful of audible crumbs that buzzed as they slipped past the silence of the street. The thirteenth bell flashed like a shadow, and the stones began to ripple, soft as sleeping water. Letters moved on the wall, arranging her name from the end, as if the alphabet was receding. The compass buzzed in a low tone, and the metal of the needle glowed like the blade of a stopped moon. Kaja drew a doorframe on the smooth stone, and the line spread out, like a gaping card. Footsteps came from inside, though they sounded as if someone was walking on the other side of the world. A hand of stardust blossomed on the inside of the crack, delicate, disturbingly similar to her own. A whisper pronounced her childhood nickname, which she never revealed to anyone, and she paused like a string. The city held its breath, the lamps dimmed and the needle froze, pointing to a snow-white space without edges. Kaja raised her hand to touch the light, and felt something touch her back. A fox circled the slit, its paws sounding as if it were stepping on thin glasses. - 'On that side, names bounce crookedly,' he whispered, 'and come back quietly. The chalk on Kaji's wrist faded, and the red thread tightened and entered the crack. From inside came the rustling of reverse streets, as if the stones were changing their minds and walking back. A voice from behind the light croaked: Bend the map and I'll come; just don't turn around now. Kaja took a breath, mistrustfully, feeling the thread cut her skin, and lifted her foot over the threshold.