At 05:20, the first weather report arrived. The Arctic camp had been awake for an hour. Canvas snapped against the wind. Dogs shifted impatiently beside loaded sledges. Ice crystals moved across the ground like smoke. Beyond the camp stretched a white plain nearly indistinguishable from the sky. The Expedition Leader read the report beside a lantern. Pressure holding. Winds moderate. Crossing window favorable for approximately eighteen hours.

Long before our oldest maps were drawn, a tower watched over a nameless harbor— No road reached it— No record named the people who built it. The stones were already old when the oldest citizens were young— At the top of the tower lived a Keeper— That was not a name. It was the work— Each night, the Keeper climbed one hundred and twelve steps to a room without a door— The room held a brass wheel, a bowl of dark water and a narrow opening toward the sea. It also held a