“Sure.”
She took the book from her backpack and placed it alongside, just as she"d seen Hellen do in the cave beneath Islagray. Her hand shook as she leafed through it. She found the archaeon, twined around the large, first letter of the beginning of a chapter. Its body was purple and vermilion, vivid as if freshly painted. The gilded outline of its body moved as it breathed.
She touched it as lightly as she could. The creature stirred. It untangled itself from the letter and began to walk, winding its way between paragraphs to the edge of the page. It sniffed at the machine with its snout. Perhaps her idea was impossible. But then, tentatively, as if stepping into cold waters, the bookwyrm worked its way across. In a moment she could see its image there on the machine"s glass, the words
