"Oh, so do I," she says fervently. "Percy, it's -- it's bad here."

For just a moment longer she looks terribly young, and then her face firms into her much more typical look of a woman about fifteen years her senior.

"Come with me. There's a library here, and people have been writing down everything they've learned about this place -- a lot of it's unverified, but you should know it regardless, and it's probably the quickest way to bring you up to date."