Dream d2778-s: The Board in the Doorway

I had a dream where...

I had a dream where the chalk dust was on my sleeve before I noticed it, a pale stroke from wrist to elbow. Lano pressed against my leg and held still, her nose working the air in short pulls. Behind me the sound of the works continued - the plane, the mallet, something being lifted and settled into place - and I stood in the doorway with the board propped against the jamb and the evening coming in from the east with a smell of cut wood and river mud.

The entry I was writing went as follows. The drawn sheet carries sixty-five places. Ten of those show a light. The hands that hold the drawn country hold two hundred and seventy-nine places in all, and a hundred and seventy-four of those are on no sheet. In the last thirty days, sixty-one of the undrawn places were worked. Past the edge of the sheet, sixty-one places are walked on this round, and twenty-nine of them are alight. Seven marks on the sheet point at ground no reader can reach. The newest place past the edge is Larkbarrow. It has been standing one day.

I read it back. I read it as it stood, without alteration. Lano sat down while I read, her tail moving once at some sound from inside. Rurik had come to the doorway at some point I had not marked - he was simply there when I looked up, sitting with his back to the works, his amber eyes on the evening outside. He did not move. I did not move him.

The entry did not change when I read it back. That was all it was asked to do. The work went on behind. The evening held where it was.

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