“Go,” the Maker said to the dove. “Seek him that maketh.”

The Maker reached into the well. His arm stretched impossibly, gear by gear, shadow by shadow, until He pulled up not a bird, but a book. Its pages were wet but not ruined. On the cover, embossed in gold that had never tarnished, were the words: The Manual of Small, Faithful Things .

The priests arrived then, fat with silver and fear. They demanded a sign. The Maker looked at them with His copper-burning eyes and said nothing. Instead, Tamar opened the book and read aloud the only passage that mattered:

And then it fell.

Tamar descended. Her bare feet left prints in the ash that had begun to fall like soft, gray snow. She held out the jar. The Maker opened it, sniffed once, and smiled—a sad, worn smile.

The dove, meanwhile, floated to the surface of the well. It was wooden again, eyeless, and perfectly still. But everyone who looked into its empty sockets saw, reflected there, the one thing they had lost: the image of themselves, bent over a workbench, learning to make something true.

“Read it,” the Maker said to Tamar. “Page one: ‘To make a world that lasts, begin with a single, honest joint. Glue is the enemy of repentance.’”

“He makes things that cannot be unmade,” Eliab said, tapping the jar. “And He hides them in plain sight. The dove seeks Him not by flight, but by falling.”