The medi-bot whirred through a long silence.

“You think I’m bluffing,” Roland said after a while, his eyes still closed. “Pleading for attention from a beautiful woman. No. Suicide is definitely an attractive proposition.”

“Because of instant self-knowledge?”

“Because I have the parrot’s blood on my hands.”

“Come on, Roland,” I said, “it’s a shame you killed the poor little thing, but it was only one small animal. It’s not worth — ”

“Lyra,” he interrupted me. “I have the parrot’s blood on my hands.”

He held up his palm for me to see, the hand he’d punched me with, the hand that had crushed the parrot. It was streaked with rusty brown stains reaching down as far as his wrist. He turned the hand slowly and stared at his palm. I could see more stains on the back of his hand, where blood had squirted between his fingers.

“It’s in their blood,” he said calmly. “Whatever it is. The telepathy. And now it’s in me. The bot tried to wash the blood off, but my hand won’t come clean. I wish I could remember that passage from Macbeth.”

Out, out, damned spot, I thought.

“Yes, that’s the one,” he agreed as if I’d spoken aloud. “I’ll wait a few days to see if it wears off. But I’m not optimistic.” He lifted his head and looked straight into my eyes. “Instant self-knowledge conveys a certain amount of wisdom, Lyra. Wisdom says I can’t handle knowing what other people think. Let alone myself. You saw it — two minutes talking to you while I was holding the parrot, and I went berserk. Ugly. Very ugly.

“No,” he said loudly, interrupting what I was going to say. “Don’t, please. You were about to forgive me for hitting you. I’m in bad shape, and you feel guilty. Don’t. Just don’t. It’s stupid. If you want to do something, stop using the parrot. That’s why I asked you here. To warn you. Just stop.”