Liir started awake and gazed about in the dark. He pushed his scratchy wool coverings away and scrambled to his knees. Irji and Manek were still sleeping in their beds off to one side, thankfully. He shuddered to think what would have happened had he woken either of them. Rubbing his eyes sleepily, Liir looked around him and began to wonder what could have woken him.

Everything in the room seemed still, and he had half a mind to go back to sleep, but the uneasy feeling of being roused so unexpectedly from a deep sleep would not permit it. He padded across to the door and pushed it open. A rush of cool air met him on the other side, and he closed it hastily to keep the fireplace warmth in the bedroom. Shivering in Manek's hand-me-down tunic, he made his way through the halls of Kiamo Ko, still highly aware of the abnormal silence around him.

But then there was a hint of a ghostly voice from the far tower. It's her, Liir thought, unsure of how to call "her" anyway. He knew how everyone else called her, what her real name was, and what they said about his relation to her, but Liir wasn't sure he'd addressed this strange, distant woman by name ever in his life.

Slightly spooked but still curious, Liir took to the stairs, picking his way in the dark. He half-believed this entire experience to be a dream anyway. At the end of the last flight, he slowed. Dream or no, mother or no, he was not going to disturb the Witch.

There was a song, soft and haunting, swirling down the stairs like a physical entity. He felt the hairs prick on the back of his neck, and suddenly, without reasnon, Liir felt he came into the knowledge of things he could not possibly have known.

"Won't you sing for me again, Elphie?"

A chuckle. "And why would I do that?"

"You have such a lovely voice. Please?"

"Perhaps another time, Glinda."

"You always say that, and then you never do!"

"Tomorrow, my sweet." In a pause were the beginnings of protest, soon silenced. "Come now, let's enjoy the city today."

And somehow, Liir knew that there had never been a tomorrow, the promise left unfulfilled. He knew the voice, as he had always known it, extending longer than any other conscious memory. It was the same voice drifting down to him from the tower. In both cases it was unlike he'd ever heard it before – light and airy, devoid of its usual bite.

He became aware again of the song and its mournful tune. Most of it was either indistinguishable or meaningless of its own accord, a string of nonsense syllables. Still, it spoke more clearly to Liir than any words, and he felt tears sting in his eyes. He might even have entered that forbidden room at the top of the tower had he not heard the voice hitch and break off.

Liir felt as one torn from a trance, and stumbled a little on the stairs. As if to add to the finality of the matter, a candle was blown out in the tower room, leaving Liir to wander back in complete darkness.