Sam couldn't have picked a better translator for the Book of Woe, Manda thought, as she was ushered into a grand, oak-panelled room, containing both translator and manuscript. The man was bald and sombre, with downward-pointing creases at the corners of his mouth. He had already steepled his long, thin fingers over the cover, and was looking down at it with distaste, as though he thought it was going to contain far too much levity for him.

At the moment, Sam was only concerned with translating the passages opposite Ellini Syal's picture. And Manda wasn't going to say—not yet anyway—that this blinkered fixation on Ellini Syal was exactly what Ellini Syal was counting on.

"So," said Sam, leaning on the room's only table, while the sombre medievalist worked diligently behind him "You found the book under the floor? What were you doing levering up the flagstones in your bedroom?"

"Cell," said Manda.

"What?"

"It's a cell, not a bedroom."

Sam heaved a shuddering sigh, which gave Manda a brief, pleasant shudder of her own. She couldn't help it. She lived a cloistered life, surrounded by over-emotional ladies, and only ever saw the man she loved when he wanted something from her. She'd had to cultivate a taste for little pleasures, and infuriating Sam was one of them.

"Is that really important?" he said, through gritted teeth.

"I thought policemen always say that the slightest detail could be important!" Manda protested. "Anyway, it is important, because it reminds you what kind of building you're dealing with here. The University Church has always been an important, spiritual building, and important, spiritual buildings will be home to important, spiritual texts."

"It doesn't remind me why they'd be under the floorboards. Or why you'd be digging them up in the middle of the night."

"There was ink under my bed."

"Ink?"

"Yes," said Manda. "The book's ink had gone wandering, because books are designed to be read, and this one was tired of being ignored."

Sam passed a hand across his forehead and managed a sour smile. "I'd ask you to repeat that, but I have a nasty feeling that it's going to make about as much sense the second time."

"Look, it's very simple. You're not thinking about it from the book's point of view—"

There was a delicate little cough, and they both looked over at the translator, who had laid aside his fountain pen, and was staring at them through his spectacles with grey, thin-lipped solemnity.

"Might I persuade you to listen to my translation, Inspector?"

Sam narrowed his eyes. He had found a new target at which to direct his frustration.

"Well?" he demanded. "What are you waiting for? Don't you know that two people have died already?"

The translator returned his gaze coolly for a few moments, and then said, "Well, you'll be happy to hear that the text is surprisingly legible, in spite of the pernicious influence of the damp—which is not to say that it all makes sense..."

"I'll decide how much sense it makes," said Sam, with an abruptness that was rude, even by his standards. "What does it say?"

The translator cleared his throat, looked down at his papers, and began:

"'At the new moon of the sixth month, on the three hundredth anniversary of the demons' departure, a willing sacrifice will come to the city of Oxford: a woman with three names, handmaiden of Eve. The first two names shall be given to her, but the third, she will give herself, and it will tell her story, and speak of her intentions. She will be pursued, but the hand of the Doctor's last descendant shall be raised against her pursuers. With her will come liberty and chaos.'"

The translator glanced up, and added, "Then there is a paragraph in which the ink has completely faded, probably through long exposure to the sun, but it goes on: 'The last Charlotte Grey will die thirty-one days after her arrival in the city, on the stairs where the music plays'. After that, there is a series of predictions about failed harvests in Cambridgeshire, with which I presume we need not concern ourselves?"

Sam ignored him. He'd been pacing to begin with but, one by one, the strange predictions had slowed his momentum, until he looked more unbalanced than furious. He was standing with one foot half-lifted off the ground, as though he had to keep absolutely still, in case he frightened his ideas away.

"OK," he said, and lowered his foot to the floor. "OK. I want the rest of the book done by tomorrow morning, cover to cover. And look out for any other mentions of 'the Doctor's last descendant.'"

"Very well," said the translator, blowing on his spectacles and folding them, very neatly, back in their case. "Did it mean much to you, what I just read out?"

"More than it would have done yesterday," said Sam. "And I'm telling you right now, she can bring as much liberty to my city as she likes, but I'm drawing the line at chaos."

"Perhaps she intends to liberate the inmates at the castle prison," said the translator. "Then you could have both at the same time."

Sam glared at him but didn't explode. "Your job," he said, rounding on Manda, "is to make friends with her. She's lonely, she doesn't trust men, she can't cry—all these things make you perfect for her."

"I know," said Manda, thinking uneasily how much this miserable young woman reminded her of Lily.

"So, talk to her. Find out her third name." Sam hesitated, as though noticing her troubled expression for the first time. "By the way, what have you found out already?"

Manda opened her mouth to speak, and then closed it again. She wanted to say, 'Oh, Sam, it's awful! She's escaped from somewhere—somewhere like hell—and she's distracting those living gargoyles so that other women can escape too. But they're frightened new-breed women, and they hate men with a fiery passion, and they're sure to restart the war because, apart from anything else, everyone seems to want it restarted! That's what liberty and chaos means, Sam—liberty for those poor women, for a few seconds, and then chaos till the end of the world! And yet you mustn't—you mustn't—leave them where they are or lock them up. They've been through hell. Those women need to be treated with kindness. They need to be taken back to their mothers. And the ones who don't have mothers should be found mothers. I know they're dangerous—I know they could spell the end of everything—but it is not their fault!'

Of course, she didn't say any of this—just as she had never said she loved him. Because, in both cases, she wasn't sure he'd feel the same way. The peace in Oxford meant so much to him, and he literally made a living out of locking up anyone who threatened to disturb it. You could always trust Sam Hastings to protect the innocent, but what about the people who weren't innocent, but who needed protecting all the same?

She looked at him, blinking bravely in the face of his glare. Of course she could trust him. Of course she could tell him everything she knew. But... maybe not yet.

"I'll find out more when you let her out," she said.

"I'm sorry?"

Manda folded her arms patiently. "These living gargoyle things are after her, yes? And they killed the apple-seller—Helen what's-her-name—because they thought it was her? So I don't think they're just going to give up and go home if they can't find her. Are you sure you can control them? Because it seems to me that only the person they're looking for has a chance of keeping them busy."

"Two people have already died while she's been 'keeping them busy'!"

"I know," said Manda, patting him on the arm. "So imagine how many people would die if she wasn't."