Ellas - Half a dozen years ago
Kane
It was done. Anna was dead, at least to the world at large, and thus to Dar’cen. And she would be dead to me, I remembered... to the one I was, the one who would carry the guilt of her death for centuries to come.
But I could not let that concern me; that was done, long in the past. I knew the truth of it now – she lived still. And yet, I would soon lose her again. Lose her forever.
She had told me some of it, but not all – ‘We must travel to Falhar,’ she said, ‘as quickly and as secretly as possible. I will explain all then… and why what I do now is so very vital.’
And so we rode hard into the night toward that place where long ago we had won a victory of sorts, a respite for the world.
Our people remained and watched him, the one that I was, ensured that he would do as expected – that he would be consumed with guilt and loss, and that he would eventually return to his master, to my master of old. That is what I did, and so it was in the past, something that would repeat itself.
hat is what I told myself, though the uncertainty of it ate away at me. Should he stray from the path I had taken there would be nothing my people could do to stop him, nothing at all. They, too, believed Anna dead at her own hands, their watching task a charade to ensure that they did not suspect the truth, did not see what came next.
There were those that were false to our cause, and all would fail should they learn of our plan.
Only three knew the truth of it, and convincing Anna to allow Carthia to be told, had taken all my powers of persuasion. ‘Remember the robes and the mask I was to wear,’ I had said. ‘Well this, too, is a decision that I alone make, as I did then.’
Anna’s face had been serene, her words and tone that of a patient parent guiding her young ones. ‘Not Carthia. I will not have her with us.’ It seemed hours that we argued, and at the last I did not win the day, so much as bulldozed my way through it – I called Carthia to us, and told her the whole of it while Anna looked on, face still serene but eyes seemingly ablaze.
And so the three of us rode for Falhar.
####
‘You knew, didn’t you?’ I demanded. We sat under tarpaulin stretched between two old gnarled long dead tree, sheltering from the infernal lightning storm that helped render the entire area uninhabitable.
Anna smiled, and I knew the answer well in advance of her words. ‘I knew that there must be three – no more, no less. Who the third was to be I did not know, and so I pushed you – I had to know that you were firm in your resolve. I am sorry, my old friend. After all you have been through, after all I have heaped upon you, you would think there would be no need for tests. And yet more is to come, much more, if we are to make an end of him.’
Carthia sat and said nothing. She just watched and listened with a far too knowing smile on her face, almost as though she, too, had been party to Anna’s testing.
‘And if I had not suggested another, what then?’ I asked, knowing that it would not have been so, and that my question was out of awkward pig-headiness.
Anna’s smile widened and she turned to Carthia and gave a slight nod of her head.
‘Then I would have followed regardless that you did not trust me,’ Carthia said, her words for me, and yet her smile for Anna’s.
‘You knew?’ I asked, incredulously. ‘You knew all along?’ But yet again, that was a question for which I knew the answer.
‘Of course,’ they both replied, as one.’
‘You do not think that I would leave something so critical to ride on chance alone, do you? Especially when it was a mere man who drove how that chance would fall,’ Anna said, as she grinned at Carthia.
Surprisingly I was glad of this outcome. Anna and Carthia had been cool with each other for months, on some occasions barely tolerating one and other, and on others arguing openly in front of all. I did not know what had caused the rift between them, and fool man though I might be, I knew better than to interfere. And now, I knew that it had been an act all along, an act to deceive those amongst our people that served him.
And so the three of us travelled to Falhar. Falhar, where Anna would leave us forever. Her loss would be something I would bear, but only because, once again, it was her wish – because she did as her dreams dictated.
####
It was three more days before we reached the ruins of Falhar; the storms had not been kind to us, much as they hadn’t when I first journeyed there so very long ago. And yet that journey was still to come. Once again my mind spun at the confusion of it all – the complexity that was my life.
We approached Falhar from the south, as we had previously, but now we skirted the area where Jain, I and the others would camp in years to come, passing the now, still buried staircase, to travel perhaps half a mile to the less prominent ruins of a much smaller building resting directly against the ravine that was once the proud river Altwen.
‘This is… or was, the Hall of the Lesser Masters… those that taught, rather than seeking for knowledge. You see, to teach then was always considered something less at Falhar. The pursuit of knowledge was the goal, and so those that took it upon themselves to be but teachers, were always of a lower standing than the most humble of research assistants.
'They were fools! All of them,’ Anna snorted. ‘The pursuit of knowledge for its own sake was what brought us to this… this desolation of what was such a beautiful world.’ Her arms were outstretched, taking in all before her, as tears filled her eyes.
I dismounted, crossed to her, and took her hand as she too dismounted. Yet before I could comfort her in any way, Carthia pushed me aside and took Anna in her arms. They held each other for long minutes, their gentle sobs at complete odds with the rumbling of the night sky.
‘Enough,’ Anna said, firmly. But there was no mistaking the gentle feeling behind her words as she held Carthia’s hand in hers.
‘We go this way,’ she said, as she marched off into what must have been the northernmost reaches of the ruined building we stood within.
‘As you already know from your previous experiences, much of Falhar lies below the surface. The Great Tower reached far into the heavens, but that was a show of grandeur; a thing to sway the politicians and the wealthy, to ease the purses and bring coin for the great hunt for even more knowledge.
'The real work was undertaken in the lesser buildings… and below in the underworld, as it was then known. Many lived and worked in this underworld, rarely leaving their labours to see the sun or the night sky, even… such a sad life…’
Stopping, Anna said, ‘Below our feet is a hatch, a doorway if you like, to the underworld. You see, all these buildings… all of Falhar is linked by the underworld and its myriad of tunnels. From here we can reach where I must go… where I will yet again say my goodbyes to you, my friend.’
Tears again glinted in her eyes, as she said, ‘Clear away this rubble, if you would be so kind, and I will then unlock and open the doorway.’
Moments later we were three levels below the surface, walking along a brightly lit corridor seemingly untouched by the devastation above. When I mentioned the need for torches, Anna had laughed. ‘Do you forget who I am?’ she’d replied, gently mocking. Then, as she descended the steps into the underworld, daylight went with her.
I knew that we walked in the direction of the Great Tower. I knew, too, what I had found there, and an anxiety, a dread almost, began to fill me.
Turning back to me, Anna spoke, ‘Be at ease, Kane. Tonight I will give you answers… some answers at least.’ Her voice was sad, and yet, somehow sounded hopeful, ‘…and I go to ease some of the evils that he has done. We go to where Jalholm first brought him to us… poor, unwitting Jalholm.’
At her words my mind went back to my memories, memories from another world, another lifetime. I saw Jalholm’s face, his blue, blue eyes, the tears that streamed from them, and his haltering words. ‘Will you come again tomorrow?’
Yes. Anna was right, Jalholm was indeed an unwitting pawn in Dar’cen’s destruction of Ellas. ‘What do you know of Jalholm?’ I heard myself ask.
‘You took your time getting to what is such a very important question, Kane,’ Anna replied, as she stopped and turned to face an unadorned, smooth stone wall.
I looked at her, puzzled by both her reply and how she stood facing an empty wall.
‘You know what lies beyond this wall, Kane. You have seen it. It is what drives your anxiety even now… and you fear what it will do to me,’ Anna said, not turning from the wall. ‘It is what brought the demon to our world… in your heart, you have always know it for what it was.’
I shuddered at her confirmation of my very worst fears. But before I could respond, before I could beg her not to do, what I now knew for a certainty she intended, the wall before her faded, dissolved away to empty air to reveal the room beyond – the room that had left Jain and I so very frustrated, the room that I had spent so very long pondering.
The glass block stood before us in the very centre of the room, as it had when I first came to this place, as it would when I first came to it yet again. ‘Madness!’ I said aloud.
‘You think again of what is to come,’ Anna said, with a laugh. ‘He will never learn, Carthia. No matter that I have told him endlessly not to think on the life that he had, and the man that he was, still he does not listen.’
I stared at Anna, my eyes willing her to recall that Carthia knew nothing of what was to come; that she must not know if all is to be as it was.
‘He is a man,’ Carthia chortled, although I saw confusion and questions in her eyes at Anna’s words. ‘They are all mad, and well past listening when sense is spoken.’
‘You have the right of it there. Come I have much to do, and much to tell before this night is done,’ Anna said, as she walked forward through the array of weapons and tools that lay strewn on the floor.
Stopping, she knelt and picked up a sword, its edge still gleaming, looking to be as sharp as the day it was first forged.
‘Gadrid’s,’ she said. ‘I empowered it for him. A gift after he accepted your command. Fool that he was, always the bullheaded one! I had not known what became of him after he left us… but I should have at least guessed – he always talked of this place, and of this accursed portal.’ Her hand slammed violently against the glass block, and the noise of it reverberated throughout the room.
‘It is indestructible—’ I began, but gasped as the portal came clearly into focus, the glass just gone.
Carthia seemed unsurprised, she merely said, ‘You’ll have to show me how you did that – I could feel the sheer power in that barrier.’
Anna walked directly to the portal, stopping mere inches from it, a look on her face radiating a sadness that I had not known existed in her.
Then it came to me, fragmented memories and words from a time long past, a time I never wanted to relive. ‘You!… you created this?’ I asked. ‘The barrier I mean… the glass surrounding the portal? I don’t understand, you trapped him here, here on Ellas. Why? Why would you do such a thing?
'At the end, before he destroyed me, I saw his frustration, and… and you said that he would try to flee us. Is this what you meant? But why? We would have been free of him. He would have gone back to where he came from – he would not have arisen again! Why?’
Anna turned to me, her face almost angry. ‘Yes. I did this. I trapped the demon here, trapped him in our world. Trapped him where he was able to rise and again destroy our world.’ At the last, her shoulders shuddered and she again began to sob. Carthia was again at her side in an instant, holding her, comforting her.
I was numb, not understanding Anna’s words, what they meant and what it was she had done, or why she had done it.
Finally her tears subsided, and she again looked to me. ‘The prophecies,’ she said. ‘Those words that we must heed if we are to save our world, save all our worlds. Those words that have taken my life from me.
'Those very same words that have guided your own life and made it what it is… and guide it still toward what is to come.
'Our curse, and yet the world’s salvation. He could not be allowed to escape… for that would only delay our destruction.
'He had to be allowed to rise again so that we could destroy him completely.’ As she finished she looked hard into my eyes as if trying to will some thoughts or understanding to me.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
Yet I saw nothing but the pain and the anguish that her so called prophecies had brought. Anger coursed through my veins, yet I forced myself to calm as I spoke, ‘Destroy him, Anna? How? We could not do so the first time, so how can we now… how can I, for you leave us? Tell me! You say you have much to tell us before this day is done—’
‘Forgive me, Kane… you are right. I do have much to tell, and self pity and tears will not get the tale told. I will tell you what you must know, but we must make ready first. He will know soon of my demise, and he will cast out with his senses to look for me to ensure his victory is true. Long has he sought my death and he will want to revel in his victory… he will want to glory in the world without me.’
Holding out her travelling rod, the very same that sent me to my home, she said, ‘I will use this, it is crucial if I am to pass beyond this world.’
‘How does the rod, your rod, play a part in this?’ I asked. ‘That, again, is a story you have kept from me.’
‘Do not be bitter, Kane. It is one of many tales I have not told you of... tales withheld because it was not yet time, or because I feared what your knowing would do to the path we must follow.’
‘Even now, you prevaricate, Anna. You talk in riddles to avoid telling what you must. Time is short you say, so please do not waste what little we have left,’ I said, my tone angry and yet I knew that there were tears in my eyes.
Anna smiled. ‘Come stand with me, here at the threshold... both of you,’ she said, her eyes taking in Carthia.
The two of us stepped toward the portal, and Anna holding the rod stepped within the grey shimmering mass that was, I knew, a doorway to where Dar’cen had come from. As she move within the swirling mist she seemed insubstantial somehow, not solid, almost not here, and yet I felt her touch of her hand as she held mine.
'Fear not, I am still here with you. Standing here, within these mists – the mists of time, I believe the great Jalholm will have concluded – I buy myself brief moments with you, for this place shields my presence from him... at least for a time.
'Carthia, you I shall miss second only to he who stands next to you. You have been as a daughter to me, and I love you truly. But even you, I have wronged... or if not wronged, held back from. You see, I know a little of your past and from whence you came.
'But because of your import to our future, all or futures, and... and because I again feared for what you might do with this knowledge, I held back. I pray that you will forgive me for what I have kept from you, and for what I must still not say.
'The time soon approaches when your destiny will become clear... another will come and you will remember and understand these words that I now speak. Of your past, I can only say that one still lives that loves you deeply, but it is not yet safe for you to seek that one out... the time will come though when you will meet again. Please ask no questions of me, for I cannot say more. I will not say more.’
Carthia grip alongside mine on Anna's hand visibly tightened as tears streaked down her face. ‘Neither the past nor what is to come matters to me... you are the one I shall miss. You are the one I do not want to loose.’
‘Smile, child. Be happy for me, for I go to fulfil my destiny. What I do, I do willingly to save this world and help to mend the one from whence he came. Laugh with me now, Carthia. For it is you who must watch over and guide the man that stands with you.
'Your futures are entwined. You two, together with those that are yet to come, will face the demon in the last. And the one next to you is but a man, and have I not told you what fools men are... all men. But especially this one, this one that fate has led by the nose for more years than any other has lived... laugh child, laugh and be happy for me.’
Carthia did laugh, it was a weak and feeble attempt, but she did try. I on the other hand, did laugh.
I laughed loud and with genuine mirth. ‘You have ever taunted me, Anna. Always have you jested thus, and though my heart knows that you love me, my head knows the words you speak are true… I am but a man, and my whole life has been led by you and your prophecies, both.
'Never a step have I taken that was not ordained by you or your dreams, and I shall miss you and your leash more than you could possibly know.’ Tears filled my eyes as I finished, and my laughter, too, had become weak and feeble.
‘Enough,’ Anna said. ‘I will tell you some of my life, and how I came by this rod, the rod that brought him to us, but also brought you, our saviour, so that he could finally be destroyed.
'This rod, the one I now hold, is that which Jalholm first used to travel to the world that I soon will try to bring aid. From that world Jalholm returned with the demon. But judge him not, for he, as many others, was unwitting and under his control when he did these wrongs.’
As Anna spoke, I remembered the time so very long ago when Jalholm himself told me much the same thing.
‘And fear not for me, for this place I go to is but a world he left in ruin long, long ago. A world that Jalholm touched with his unending thirst for knowledge. And once his touch was felt, that was the end, for Dar’cen had him then. From the very first that this machine, his Looking Eye, fell upon the world where the demon fed, there could be no escape for Jalholm, nor for all our futures. Jalholm was his… we were almost all his.
‘Unwittingly Jalholm created the rod, but it was not of his design – the demon guided his hand in its making, indeed in all things that he did after he first heard the creatures voice. Jalholm's naivety was our world’s doom, but none should be judged on such failings—’
‘How do you know all this? How do you know of Jalholm and Dar'cen's coming?’ I interrupted.
‘You see, Carthia? A man's impatience. Did I not tell him mere moments ago of what I would tell?’
Carthia’s laugh echoed in the room, and this time it was loud and genuine. ‘I must correct you, dearest Anna. The man is patient, the most patient of them all… it is his mouth that needs to be schooled to silence.’
They both laughed, genuine laughter, and hearing them, the little anger that I still held to me, ebbed away.
‘Let me now continue and tell you such things that may help you in what must be done. ‘We stand now in the ruins of Falhar. Falhar, where the journey first began for me, where began the saga that is Al’kar’s coming as told by the prophecies… But do not ask me to talk further of the prophecy, or of what they say of you, Kane, for the words are long and replete with all the obscure and cryptic meanings that anger you so. Instead I will tell you my tale.
‘I was but a child when it first began… when the dreams first came, and when the demon came to our world. I lived with my parents, both researchers at Falhar; my mother renown for her work advancing the battle against ageing.
'They were among the first to die when he came. It did not happen immediately; first he won hearts, drew support from the rich and powerful. Jalholm played his part, a great part indeed, in the conquest of our people – he opened doors, made introductions, paved the way for the demon to entrance those that mattered, those that might raise armies to stand against him. Once they were his, all was lost, or so it seemed.
If not for the dreams, and the prophecies they spoke of, all would truly have ended for us. He would have consumed us all.
‘At first, once his power was tenuously established, there were deaths amongst those of knowledge – mysterious, unexplained deaths and disappearances. He was testing his power, his ability to control those who ruled.
'Never were the deaths investigated, no matter that the people, the common people, those who lived and worked in Falhar, rose up to demand explanations and justice. Those that protested loudest, they, too, disappeared… and those that dared to take their place.
'My mother was one such that protested. Father begged her to stop; he could see what she could not. She saw only injustice, whereas he saw the danger that her words invited.
'The night she was taken, father hid me away; he knew that I, too, would not be safe. He hugged me as he placed me in the secret place he had made. I still remember his words as the pounding on our apartment door continued, ‘Hush now my dear one. You must be brave, and you must be silent. You must live, for you are my life.’
He kissed me and held me but a moment, and then he was gone, gone from my life forever.
‘A deep calm took me then, as I huddled there in that so very small space, a space made to hide me away. A space made to preserve my life. I heard my mother’s screams, my father’s protests, the shouts of the men as they took them, and the so very long silence that followed. Yet I did nothing. I did not cry out, did not scream… I did not shed a tear. I sat silently as my father’s last words had commanded – he had given his life so that I might live, so to do otherwise would have dishonoured his sacrifice.
‘I do not know how long I stayed hidden, for that was when the dreams first came upon me, the dreams that changed me and made a woman of the child I still was. I awoke with tears in my eyes, not tears for my loss, but tears for what the dream had shown of the horrors he would inflict upon our world, and what would become of us all should I stray from the destiny I had been shown.
'I was a child of nine summers then, and yet the dreams had awakened some part of my mind that was a woman grown, a woman who would guide me in those early years that followed until finally we became as one.
‘I stole from the hiding place and out into the night. No sign of my parents remained, the apartment left as his servants had found it, as all the others had been – two more mysterious, unexplained disappearances. No one would come forward, no one would speak of the pounding, the shouts and screams. For they all knew now that to do so would bring the men to their door.
''Seek the Giants,’ the dream had told me. ‘Go to them, and tell them what you have seen. Warn them. They will listen, for they know of your coming. From them you will learn of the Prophecies.’ And the dream spoke true, for the giants listened. They listened and accepted all that I had to say. But that story is long and seems not of consequence to what you must now face. It is sufficient for you to know that without their aid we would have fallen long before that final day, as you well know, Kane.
‘The giants sheltered me, hid me from him and those he sent; for somehow, even then, Dar’cen knew of me, and of my dreams. My early dreams, those as a child, before I learnt to school my mind, were often invaded by him. In those dreams he tried with his compulsion to take me and make me his… but they were my dreams; dreams sent to me and not of his making, and so his efforts failed.
'As I grew, my mind and my magic became stronger, and I learnt to keep him away completely… that strength, that magic, later became the tool I used to free so many from his clutches… But I digress, the giants and my magic you know of, it is the dreams, the prophecies, and what they had me do, is what I must tell of.
‘Many of those dreams, and the actions I took, are now of no consequence as their effects on the world have long been seen… if not fully understood—’
Anna’s head whipped around to look to the side, concern plain in her features despite the blurring of the mists that swirled around her.
‘What is it?’ Carthia asked, urgently, before I could speak the same.
‘Our time is short… shorter than I thought it would be. His mind seeks me, looks out across the world. He has read the thoughts of the one you once were, and knows that you did not fulfil his command yourself. He suspects that I may have somehow deceived him—’
‘You can see his thoughts? Know what he thinks?’ Carthia asked, in amazement.
I already knew the answer Anna would give. Long ago we had both talked of this knowing, and the horror it brought.
‘I cannot read him as I would do you… his mind is not as ours, and I cannot see beyond his emotions, and then only when they are strong as they now are – he is worried, worried and angry that I may have evaded him.’
‘You said that he could not see you within the portal,’ Carthia said.
‘While I stand here he will not feel my presence in the world… but his suspicion drives him to seek wherever I may hide from him. Soon his mind will fall upon this place, and then he will see the portal open and unprotected… and he will know then for a certainty what I have done. I must hurry now, so be silent, and ask of me no more… be silent and listen.
‘I left the giants and came back to this place, as the dreams demanded I should. What I was to do was not clear; I only knew that I must be here, and that when my work was done, I would know it to be so.
I hid amongst the lowly, the servants and those that cooked and cleaned. Most others were gone, killed during the purge that took my parents; only his sycophants remained, and those that served them. Jalholm was one such, and in my role I saw him many a time.
Mostly he was a mindless creature of the demon, an uncaring, unthinking machine. But sometimes Dar’cen chose to free his mind, to allow Jalholm to see clearly the horrors he had brought upon the world. It was during one such time that I came upon Jalholm in his rooms as I cleaned… the last time I saw him, and how I came upon this rod.
I entered his room, and found him on the floor whimpering as his hands clawed at his own flesh. Next to him lay a knife and this rod – both given him by Dar’cen as a taunt. For he could neither use the rod to flee, or use the knife to take his own life.
But that was where the demon erred, for in all else Jalholm was himself, and was thus open to me.
Much of what I have said this night came to me from Jalholm as I held him and gave comfort. But in him was a secret, a guarded secret whose wards I could not penetrate.
It came to me then that Jalholm was the reason that the dreams had sent me back to Falhar. Jalholm still lived, whilst so many Dar’cen touched had been killed. Why? And what was this secret that was so powerfully hidden from me?
'I reasoned that Jalholm had been allowed to live because he was somehow important to Dar’cen, and if that was so, then I needed somehow to free him. I planted my seed, my magic, in Jalholm’s mind – he was the first I used it upon, never before had I reasoned out how to do such a thing… but it came to me then, when my need was greatest.
'I tried to explain, tried to tell him what it was that I had done, but his mind was so full of remorse and self-hatred that I do not believe he heard my words. I had intended to leave them both there, Jalholm and the rod, and let my spell do its work and let the future unfold.
'That you see, is what, during those few moments, I believed the dream wanted of me. But it was not to be, for as I probed Jalholm, seeking all I could know from him, I felt the demon’s call. I felt Jalholm stiffen and become his again, and I knew that what I had done would fail, and that there was more I should do.
'My eyes fell upon the rod at that moment and finally all became clear. Jalholm had to be free of the demon, not just his mind. He had to be free. I used the rod then, and though I did not know what it was that I did, I trusted to my need to show me, and make my choices true. I held the rod, turned and manipulated its rings… all of them, and then forced Jalholm’s hand down upon it even as his faced changed and he became Dar’cen’s creature once more. I pressed down upon the hawk, and Jalholm was no more.
'If he lived and where it was that I sent him, I did not know then. I knew only that I kept him from Dar’cen, and that the demon’s rage was without equal that night – hundreds died in his hunt for me, and only by luck… or perhaps fate, did I escape him. I tell you this now because of Dar’cen’s anger at his loss… I know not if it be this rod, Jalholm himself, or the secret that he held, but one or all of them is important. Important enough that the demon scoured our world for decades in his attempt to find them.
'The dreams told me nothing, and until you spoken of Jalholm, Kane, I had no idea what became of him. I still have no idea as to what his importance might be… I had thought him long dead by now, wherever it was that I sent him. But now I wonder what hand guided me as I set the rod that sent him to your world, and that perhaps he still has a part to play.
But what is clear is that the rod, this rod, Dar’cen wants still. So guard it well.’
‘I do not want the rod, Anna. I want you to stay with—’
‘It cannot be, Kane. This you know in your heart. But such talk diverts me from all that I must say and do. Take this,’ she said as she took a folded parchment from her robe, and held it out through the swirling mist.
‘Take it,’ she said. ‘Do not look upon it now, but keep it close, for one day you will have need of it. When I first saw the words in a dream, they meant nothing, but the dreams persisted until the words were on paper. Now, having heard your story, I suspect that they were always meant for you. When the time comes—‘
‘Wait! There is no time! His essence strays this way. I must be gone and the portal protected. Farewell my loved ones,’ Anna said, as she released Carthia’s hand and stepped back until the portal engulfed her fully. For an instant, Anna stood before us, a smile on her face, and then, as the mists enveloped her, the travel rod clattered to the floor and she was gone.
Carthia’s scream was cut off as we were both forcibly pushed back from the portal to land on the floor at its feet – the barrier was back in place, clear and impenetrable crystal separating us from the Anna that we both loved.
I bellowed with rage and pounded the stone floor, but stopped after only seconds at Carthia’s insistent voice, ‘Look! Look at the crystal!’
Fiery words were etched onto the surface of the crystal.
‘Take the rod and flee. Go now, before he comes.’ Then, as we watched, too astonished for movement, the words faded to be replaced by, ‘Farewell, my friends. Until we meet again in another life.’
Carthia picked up the rod even as I snatched up the parchment, and, taking my hand, she led us both from the room, and through the tunnels.
I could see nothing that was real through my tears. I only saw the final words on the crystal block, Anna’s final words, as they, too, faded away to leave the crystal once again clear and impenetrable.