The creature presses forward mid-incantation, jaws hinged wide over a folio split at its spine, as if the words themselves tugged it out. Ink curls upward from the page in a serpentine breath, scattering punctuation like ash. This study belongs to another century—heavy wood, linen paper, calfskin bindings—yet nothing rests. A quill stalls in a reader’s hand; margins tear. On the shelf behind, the small placard asks Where Vojta? and the question ricochets off the spines, each volume a witness refusing to answer. Someone prepared this meeting. The book lies open to a familiar diagram, circled and circled again, the desk arranged not for comfort but for reach and recoil. The reptilian weight dents the paper; claws test the grain, spine bowed, tail dragging unseen across the floorboards. Script continues to unravel, repeating earlier phrases, seasons folding into each other. Was Vojta the reader, the scribe, or the missing safeguard who never returned when the letters began to move? The desk remembers his posture. The room keeps waiting. He does not appear.