Lena was eleven years old and liked the silence of the bookshop. That evening she was helping her grandfather in the quiet bookbinder's workshop. On a shelf, behind a heavy tattered atlas, something glinted. It was a thin book in green leather, without an author. On the spine it had an embossed title: the Atlas Between, without a date. Lena opened it, and there were blank pages inside. As she breathed in the warm air, the letters lit up like fireflies. They formed a map with the names: Echo Bay and Shadowless Staircase. An inscription flashed in the corner: Open only when you hear silence. Suddenly the clock stopped ticking and the shop fell into a deep silence. The air near the shelf wrinkled and parted like a curtain. There was a whiff of salt, wet paper and the smell of thunderstorm from the clearance. Mru, the shop cat, jumped inside without a second thought. Lena squeezed the bookbinding knife and went in after him. She did not set her feet on the board, but on the beach of letters. Each grain of sand was a sign that sounded when touched. Overhead flowed a second sky, composed of turning pages. The water hummed like a whisper, and Mru left sentences instead of marks. She read: Don't be afraid, go straight, don't break the letters. On the horizon glided a paper ship sewn with a thread to the light. Right next to her hand, the map suddenly began to rewrite itself. New words unfolded on the shore and disappeared into the sand. One sentence remained, sharp as a razor blade: Lena, don't turn around. Behind her back, something crunched the letters and a shadow grew.