Eyes wide and peering around the corner of his heavy eyelids, Q listens for her foot on the stair. A mouse, a mouse, he thought, and nimble fingers worked through the knots. This one was hard, tight, it didn't unravel like the others. There. He pulled the yarn through the wefts, rolling it carefilly around the shuttle. Blue, here, started at noon, a few more rows to go, he thought. Thirty nights, and he was tired. His mother knotted the knots so tight that it hurt to undo them, but he must undo her weave, so that she would live another day.