Bastet wanted a seat among the Deep Scholars, the ones who chose which drowned knowledge rose again. She was only the Scrollkeeper of the Sunken Library, it was her job to catalogue sunken lost scrolls. Then the stars began to fall. Spilling from the sky. She peeked from her library door and watched them drop into the black sea, past scattered sheets of papyrus that drifted like leaves, one after another, stars were sinking like coins. One fell straight toward her. She caught it against her chest. It was a gold star, carved with a sun and rows of tiny Egyptian marks. It was surprisingly hot still despite the cold dark waters. This was a special sunken scroll despite it not being a scroll, it still held a sunken message. She knew the council would want to see this. And This was the thing that could earn her the seat she craved. She held it up to the light and pushed her glasses up her nose. The marks blurred and swam. She could not read a single one. There were more that fell. The location unknown to her. Each bore its own inscription. Without reading them, she could not tell which mattered and which were junk. She might carry a warning and it could really just be a shopping list. Still, the star in her arms felt too important to hide. She gathered it up and swam for the city of black pyramids. The Obsidian Pyramid City rose from the dark water, its towers cut through by a river of ink. A dark river ran between the shining black forms. Bastet clutched the star and followed the current inside. She had wanted to enter this place her whole life. Now she came with something she hoped was important, holding a message she could not open. The scholars gathered around her in a low council room. They floated in a slow ring and studied the gold star she set before them. One turned it over. Another leaned close. They spoke in murmurs she could not catch, and none of them smiled. "You bring us a star," one said. "But you cannot say what it tells us." Bastet felt her ears flatten. "I can bring it," she said. "I can find things no one else can find. That is what a Scrollkeeper does." "Finding is not knowing." The scholar slid the star back across the stone toward her. "Decipher it. Learn what it says. Then return, and we will hear you." So they did not turn her away. They gave her a task instead. Bastet lifted the star and pressed it to her chest. Her seat was no longer a dream. It sat behind one locked door, and she held the key without the way to use it. She swam out through the dark river with the star glowing under her arm. The marks still made no sense. But somewhere on the black sands, someone charted these very stars. Someone could read what she could not. Bastet fixed her glasses and turned toward the beach. She had a message to break open, and no time to lose count again.

Bastet swam out of the black pyramid city with the gold star tucked under her arm. Its carved sun still glowed against the dark water. She needed to reach the sands and find someone who could read its marks. But near the city's edge, something moved that should not have. A shadow drifted between the pyramids, shaped like a woman, black as ink and dusted with stars. It watched her. She told herself it was a trick of the current. She kept swimming. At the last row of towers she looked back. The shadow was closer now. Two pale eyes fixed on the star. A small light burned in the spirit's chest, twin to the glow in Bastet's arms. It wanted the star. She had catalogued tales of these things once. Void spirits, they were called, risen from the deep to claim what fell from the sky. Bastet turned and swam hard. Ahead a wall of black ivy spilled down a ledge, thick leaves curling in the water. She dove behind it and pressed flat against the stone. Through the leaves she watched. The spirit slid past, then stopped. Its head turned. The star's glow leaked through the ivy and gave her away. Her hands shook. She pulled a scroll from her satchel and hurled it. The papyrus unrolled and tumbled through the water. The spirit's eyes followed it a moment. Bastet threw another, then a third, scattering scrolls to pull its gaze off the star. It worked for a breath. The spirit drifted after the drifting papyrus, curious. Then it swung back toward the light in her arms. Scrolls would not fool it. Only the star's shine mattered. She swam for the shallows where black sand glittered under the water. The spirit followed, faster now. Bastet remembered her own notes. These spirits hunted the star's pull, its glow, its heat. Take those away and there was nothing to chase. She ducked behind a cluster of jagged black rocks and dropped to the sand. With both hands she dug. The dark grains hissed and folded around her fingers. She pushed the gold star deep into the sand and packed it over. The glow died. The warmth vanished. She held still against the rock and did not breathe. The spirit reached the rocks. It hung there, turning, searching. Its pale eyes swept the sand and found only black. The small light in its chest dimmed. Slowly it sank back toward the deep and was gone. Bastet waited a long time before she dug the star out again. It came up cold and dark until she brushed it clean, and the sun on its face lit once more. She could not carry it openly. Not with the deep still watching. She needed a way to read its marks that did not wake the thing below. On the far sands, a woman charted these very stars each night. Bastet fixed her glasses and swam toward the shore.

Bastet reached the black sands and knew she had a problem. The star still glowed under her arm. She had no idea where the star-charting woman lived. The far sands ran on for miles, black and empty. Worse, every step she took carried the star's light with her. If the light burned too long, the spirit from the deep might find her again. She stopped behind a cluster of jagged black rocks. She could not hide the star in the sand forever. She had to carry it, but the glow put her in danger. She needed a shield. She opened her weathered satchel and dug through it. Her fingers found a scroll she barely valued, a common recipe for guarding one's goods. She had read it a hundred times. She spread the papyrus flat on a cool patch of sand shaped like a wide oval. Then she folded the scroll into a snug bag, tucking the edges the way the recipe showed. She slid the star inside and pulled the seam closed. The glow dimmed. Thick papyrus swallowed most of the light. Not all of it. A faint gold line still leaked from the folds. But it was faint enough. The spirit hunted bright things. This would have to do. Bastet let out a slow breath. She could carry the star now. She just had no direction. The sands stretched every way, all the same. Something moved near her tail. She looked down. A small black axolotl slid across the wet sand. Gold dust shimmered on its frilled gills and along its back. It paused, blinked at her, then turned and crawled on. Bastet almost ignored it. Then she noticed it moved with purpose. It did not wander. It followed a line in the sand, straight and sure. She had nothing better. She followed the little creature. It led her over glittering dunes and past sharp rocks. Bastet kept the folded scroll pressed to her chest. Twice she looked back at the water. It stayed still. The dim star had not woken anything. The axolotl brought her to a long pier of black wood standing over the dark tide. Bastet climbed onto the boards and looked up. Far ahead a great telescope rose against the sky. Its long barrel pointed sideways at the stars, mounted on a heavy stand. A carved star marked its side. Bastet's heart lifted. Only one person would keep an instrument like that. The star-charting woman lived there. She had found the way. She hurried down the pier toward the tower. The folded scroll held the star's glow tight against her chest. Behind her the axolotl slipped back into the black water and was gone. Bastet did not slow. For the first time since the pyramid city, she knew exactly where to go.