1·01An Obscene Amount of WaterChapter I · The ReturnTwo years on a plateau where you could see to the curve of the world, and one of them has come home to a place with a lid on it and the other has come home to the sea.1·02They Split at the StepsChapter I · The ReturnNo contact. Two figures on a long public staircase going opposite ways, and the fact that neither mentions it is the whole content.2·01Hed Cry in PublicChapter I · The ReturnA man standing at a corner with his hands in his pockets who did not write to say he would be there. Two years is a long time and what happens is that she notices his hair.2·01Hed Cry in PublicChapter I · The ReturnA man standing at a corner with his hands in his pockets who did not write to say he would be there. Two years is a long time and what happens is that she notices his hair.2·01Hed Cry in PublicChapter I · The ReturnA man standing at a corner with his hands in his pockets who did not write to say he would be there. Two years is a long time and what happens is that she notices his hair.
1·03A Door That LocksChapter II · The Joint WorkThe best place either of them will ever work. One of them has already emptied a crate onto the floor and is sitting in the middle of it.1·03A Door That LocksChapter II · The Joint WorkThe best place either of them will ever work. One of them has already emptied a crate onto the floor and is sitting in the middle of it.1·03A Door That LocksChapter II · The Joint WorkThe best place either of them will ever work. One of them has already emptied a crate onto the floor and is sitting in the middle of it.1·04Both of Us Are WrongChapter II · The Joint WorkTwo people at the absolute top of their powers, enjoying being wrong together. The laugh carries down the corridor and is the warmest thing in the book.1·04Both of Us Are WrongChapter II · The Joint WorkTwo people at the absolute top of their powers, enjoying being wrong together. The laugh carries down the corridor and is the warmest thing in the book.1·04Both of Us Are WrongChapter II · The Joint WorkTwo people at the absolute top of their powers, enjoying being wrong together. The laugh carries down the corridor and is the warmest thing in the book.2·02The Color of a WallChapter II · The Joint WorkTwenty-two and visibly worse than last time, and being fed against his will by somebody who did not stop to think about it.
2·03Youre the One Who Came Back from the High PlaceChapter III · Deyn ArrolThe first conversation, and the whole of his function: a man who says measurements rather than opinions. He is visibly human, from a different people and not a different species.2·03Youre the One Who Came Back from the High PlaceChapter III · Deyn ArrolThe first conversation, and the whole of his function: a man who says measurements rather than opinions. He is visibly human, from a different people and not a different species.2·03Youre the One Who Came Back from the High PlaceChapter III · Deyn ArrolThe first conversation, and the whole of his function: a man who says measurements rather than opinions. He is visibly human, from a different people and not a different species.2·04Nine DaysChapter III · Deyn ArrolKyra Davan does not turn things over. She is not built for it. That is what makes this image unusual.
2·05Twice a Week Then Three TimesChapter IV · What We Know About Each OtherFully clothed, at a table, in public, with other people working twenty feet away. Nothing has happened and everything has.2·05Twice a Week Then Three TimesChapter IV · What We Know About Each OtherFully clothed, at a table, in public, with other people working twenty feet away. Nothing has happened and everything has.2·05Twice a Week Then Three TimesChapter IV · What We Know About Each OtherFully clothed, at a table, in public, with other people working twenty feet away. Nothing has happened and everything has.2·06An Anecdote with ReferencesChapter IV · What We Know About Each OtherTwo people with scientific training reading a bad literature together and arguing about the sample sizes. The whole plot is decided at this table and nothing happens at it.2·06An Anecdote with ReferencesChapter IV · What We Know About Each OtherTwo people with scientific training reading a bad literature together and arguing about the sample sizes. The whole plot is decided at this table and nothing happens at it.2·06An Anecdote with ReferencesChapter IV · What We Know About Each OtherTwo people with scientific training reading a bad literature together and arguing about the sample sizes. The whole plot is decided at this table and nothing happens at it.2·07I Have No Right to Decide it for YouChapter IV · What We Know About Each OtherShe can see it while it is happening, which is a strange and specific sensation and not one she has ever had before. She then takes eleven days.2·07I Have No Right to Decide it for YouChapter IV · What We Know About Each OtherShe can see it while it is happening, which is a strange and specific sensation and not one she has ever had before. She then takes eleven days.2·07I Have No Right to Decide it for YouChapter IV · What We Know About Each OtherShe can see it while it is happening, which is a strange and specific sensation and not one she has ever had before. She then takes eleven days.
1·05Aro KethChapter V · Comparing NotesThe bottle neither of them intended to open. Val comes off the stool and sits down on the floor with her back against the bench, which she has never done in her life.1·05Aro KethChapter V · Comparing NotesThe bottle neither of them intended to open. Val comes off the stool and sits down on the floor with her back against the bench, which she has never done in her life.1·05Aro KethChapter V · Comparing NotesThe bottle neither of them intended to open. Val comes off the stool and sits down on the floor with her back against the bench, which she has never done in her life.1·06It Wasnt BrokenChapter V · Comparing NotesThe funniest moment in the first three books, and the single most self-implicating thing Val ever says.
2·08With Her Back to a MirrorChapter VI · The MarkA back, a mirror, and a face. Low on the left above the hip, about the size of a palm, soft grayish with a paler center, flat, soft-edged. The color is the trouble.2·09Since the Eighth WeekChapter VI · The MarkHis is a mark. On his world it is a mark. On this world hers is something else entirely, and that is the chapter.2·10Explaining the Quiet to an OfflanderChapter VI · The MarkBoth of them standing. Nobody sits down for this.2·10Explaining the Quiet to an OfflanderChapter VI · The MarkBoth of them standing. Nobody sits down for this.2·10Explaining the Quiet to an OfflanderChapter VI · The MarkBoth of them standing. Nobody sits down for this.
2·11Under the Field Notebooks There Was a SockChapter VII · M.V.An object image. The most ordinary possible hiding place, which is what makes it bad.2·12M VChapter VII · M.V.Two initials, and they are not legible. Render the tube and the hand and the stillness; the label is small and out of focus.2·13Four EveningsChapter VII · M.V.The best result either of them will ever produce and it is unusable, and she knows it already.
1·07A Second and a HalfChapter VIII · SeenA back, a gap between garments, and a face. The mark is visible and is the plot. Nobody else in the room notices anything.1·07A Second and a HalfChapter VIII · SeenA back, a gap between garments, and a face. The mark is visible and is the plot. Nobody else in the room notices anything.1·07A Second and a HalfChapter VIII · SeenA back, a gap between garments, and a face. The mark is visible and is the plot. Nobody else in the room notices anything.1·08Forty Yards up the PathChapter VIII · SeenNo contact — she is alone. And everything she builds in the next four seconds is coherent, sympathetic, and wrong in every particular, and she never goes to check.2·14Thirty Runners Coming in out of the DarkChapter VIII · SeenEstablish the room before the two scenes that happen in it. Crowded, cold, functional, entirely unerotic.
1·09Bit of Grit off the PathChapter IX · The Locker RoomThe best single action in the first three books. Val crosses a crowded room from a direction Kyra is not facing and covers the mark with a color she mixed at a bench, in four seconds, speaking to somebody else.1·10Itll Hold for Two DaysChapter IX · The Locker RoomShe does not look at her. She does not wait for an answer. She tells her the technical specification and leaves.1·11How Long Have You KnownChapter IX · The Locker RoomVal does not turn round for the first half of this. Kyra holds on to the back of a chair and asks her to keep talking, because she cannot work out what she feels and needs more information.1·12I Mixed it in HereChapter IX · The Locker RoomNo contact — this is a memory and she is alone in it. An hour and eleven minutes at a bench matching a color against her own skin, so that one day she can cover something in four seconds.2·15She Has No IdeaChapter IX · The Locker RoomShe has done nothing whatsoever and never will know it. Twenty years old, entirely open, entirely fond, utterly without malice.
1·13Did He Do the ThingChapter X · The RequestFour words, and somebody overhearing would get nothing whatsoever out of it, which is the point. Neither of them notices that they have built a language.1·13Did He Do the ThingChapter X · The RequestFour words, and somebody overhearing would get nothing whatsoever out of it, which is the point. Neither of them notices that they have built a language.1·13Did He Do the ThingChapter X · The RequestFour words, and somebody overhearing would get nothing whatsoever out of it, which is the point. Neither of them notices that they have built a language.2·16The Custody Board WritesChapter X · The RequestA form letter, sent to eleven other people that week, signed by somebody who has almost certainly not read the file. Val reads it three times standing up.
2·17Bit Late in the Year for ThisChapter XI · What Val DoesThe most consequential act in the trilogy, performed by a bored man at a counter in under a minute.2·18It Was ReliefChapter XI · What Val DoesThe most damning paragraph in the book , and the image is a woman sitting alone on a flight of steps in the afternoon.2·19Eleven PagesChapter XI · What Val DoesAn object image. Eleven pages in a careful hand on a bench, squared, finished.
2·20With Her Arms Full of FoldersChapter XII · A CorridorThe cruelest image in the book and nobody in it means any harm. A cold corridor full of people, and a kindness arriving as a demolition.2·20With Her Arms Full of FoldersChapter XII · A CorridorThe cruelest image in the book and nobody in it means any harm. A cold corridor full of people, and a kindness arriving as a demolition.2·20With Her Arms Full of FoldersChapter XII · A CorridorThe cruelest image in the book and nobody in it means any harm. A cold corridor full of people, and a kindness arriving as a demolition.2·21Second ColumnChapter XII · A CorridorAnd four notices further down, an eleven-word line about a disclosure lodged by a fourth-year of Polaris house. It does not name her. It does not have to.2·21Second ColumnChapter XII · A CorridorAnd four notices further down, an eleven-word line about a disclosure lodged by a fourth-year of Polaris house. It does not name her. It does not have to.2·21Second ColumnChapter XII · A CorridorAnd four notices further down, an eleven-word line about a disclosure lodged by a fourth-year of Polaris house. It does not name her. It does not have to.2·22Four Miles in BootsChapter XII · A CorridorNot yet angry. Assembling, and unable to stop, and every piece fitting the piece before it.
1·14Dont Get upChapter XIII · You Removed MeSoaked through, at the eleventh hour, after eleven hours on a cliff. The still thing is a named weapon and it is being disarmed before the conversation starts.1·15You Removed MeChapter XIII · You Removed MeNo contact. The line the whole series turns on, and Kyra is at her most frightening — not shouting, slowed right down, hands shaking and allowed to shake.1·16Then it Would Have Ruined MeChapter XIII · You Removed MeQuieter than the line before it and worse. She has had all day and the answer is still that it was hers to spend.
1·17I Understand the DifferenceChapter XIV · Four RoomsFourteen months later, said standing on a doorstep because she would lose her nerve indoors. Val's hands are flat at her sides.1·18Does He Still Do the ThingChapter XIV · Four RoomsNo contact. The worst moment in the book, and it is a kindness landing wrong because she was not listening the first time.1·19Its YoursChapter XIV · Four RoomsNine years of a woman learning to hand something over. Kyra goes through the crate for three hours without saying anything.1·20I Havent AnsweredChapter XIV · Four RoomsNo contact, and the last image of the trilogy. They are thirty-eight and are rendered exactly as they are rendered at eighteen. Two cups, a bench, a bay, and one woman not asking a question.1·20I Havent AnsweredChapter XIV · Four RoomsNo contact, and the last image of the trilogy. They are thirty-eight and are rendered exactly as they are rendered at eighteen. Two cups, a bench, a bay, and one woman not asking a question.1·20I Havent AnsweredChapter XIV · Four RoomsNo contact, and the last image of the trilogy. They are thirty-eight and are rendered exactly as they are rendered at eighteen. Two cups, a bench, a bay, and one woman not asking a question.2·23Nothing Here is an AccusationChapter XIV · Four RoomsA year after the Account. Scrupulously fair, entirely reasonable, and about to cost her everything.2·23Nothing Here is an AccusationChapter XIV · Four RoomsA year after the Account. Scrupulously fair, entirely reasonable, and about to cost her everything.2·23Nothing Here is an AccusationChapter XIV · Four RoomsA year after the Account. Scrupulously fair, entirely reasonable, and about to cost her everything.2·24The Last MileChapter XIV · Four RoomsFourteen months of two careful letters each, and then a mile of exposed coast road on foot.2·25Val Opened the Door and Said OhChapter XIV · Four RoomsOne syllable, and it is the most unguarded thing she says in the book.2·26It Filled a CrateChapter XIV · Four RoomsAn object image, and nine years of a life in it.2·27Three Hours Without Saying AnythingChapter XIV · Four RoomsThe reading, not the giving. One woman, one crate, one lamp, and most of a night.2·28Novis EldestChapter XIV · Four RoomsThe only way to show sixteen years passing on a world where nobody ages. The child is the clock.2·28Novis EldestChapter XIV · Four RoomsThe only way to show sixteen years passing on a world where nobody ages. The child is the clock.2·28Novis EldestChapter XIV · Four RoomsThe only way to show sixteen years passing on a world where nobody ages. The child is the clock.2·29A Very Great Deal Had HappenedChapter XIV · Four RoomsThe wide of the final scene. Two very small figures on a bench on a terrace above a working harbor, and a whole city going on without them.2·30Nobody Ever DidChapter XIV · Four RoomsThe last image of the trilogy, and the same image the trilogy opened on. The ship is small, far, silent and entirely undramatic, and the two people in the frame have their backs to it.
THE MARKStudies & Variants
Alternates, studies and loose plates.
Book 3 Comparing Notes Variation 1 Broken CabinetVariation 1Book 3 Comparing Notes Variation 3 After LaughterVariation 3Book 3 the Mark Candidate 3 ThresholdCandidate 3Revised 3 You Removed MeUntitledBook 3 Title Space Athletic Variation 1 CompressionVariation 1Harbor Pair Misty Dawn Reverse AngleUntitledHarbor Pair Running Shorts Starry NightUntitledHarbor Pair Running Wear SmilingUntitledHarbor Pair Running Wear Starry NightUntitledHarbor Pair Sleeveless Running Shorts Starry NightUntitledHarbor Pair Variation 3 Misty DawnVariation 3Harbor Pair Variation 5 Misty Dawn EmbraceEqual HeightKyra Solo Split Shorts Right Hand on HipUntitledKyra Val Starry Flatland Facing Each OtherUntitledKyra Val Starry Flatland Longer Legs Front FacingUntitledKyra Val Starry Flatland Longer Legs Narrower HipsUntitledScene 1 Ammery Steps Clear LeftScene 1 Ammery StepsScene 2 Four Words Established Val Kyra ReferencesScene 2 Four Words Longer Legs Narrower HipsScene 2 Four Words on the PathScene 3 Empty Marden RoomScene 4 Notice BoardVal Solo Split Shorts Right Hand on HipUntitled
