Chapter Three
Entry Four.
I feel guilty.
I do not know why, but I feel awful for even thinking of doing what I did, for the dark imaginings that filled my mind back on J'nanin.
I thought of sorrow. Half-formed memories and thoughts of home, of my lost life, of my dear, sweet Tamra all but clouded my head and slowed my thinking. It became hard to put my brush to the paper. I could not draw. I could not create. I felt like I was losing myself. It was as if the Weaver Herself had abandoned me, leaving me floundering without my raft of inspiration. I felt so helpless, so lost…
Her eyes… Her eyes were my breaking point. When I looked upon the half-finished portrait on the wall, I saw emptiness where her beautiful emerald eyes should have been. I knew then that I had finally lost my vision, my purpose for being. I was gone.
I thought of revenge. I thought of reasons to hate those who had done this to me, ways to punish them in the most painful way possible, ways to repay them with the same kindness that they had shown to me. It filled the holes that sorrow made with bitterness and darkness. It began to overflow and consume me, and soon I was little but bitterness. I thought of pain. I thought of rage. I thought of murder.
I remember that I felt that same rage when I first discovered that the girl had come instead of Atrus. But, inexplicably, I also felt hope. One small glimmer of hope, a faint, flickering star in the endless night that dominated me. That hope only grew when I saw Narayan alive. The darkness begged me not to trust her, but I was so sick of it by then that I did not listen.
Perhaps that was for the better. Yes, she trapped me, but she released me soon after. Trust rewarded with trust. I easily could have killed her if one thing had gone wrong, and yet she made the choice that she felt was right. She did not and could not fully trust me, but she trusted me enough to save me from a terrible fate.
And yet I am still so unsure, and I still feel guilty for thinking of what I could have done to her had she made so much as one mistake…
---
I stare, astonished, at the misty pink horizon, so warm and friendly. The great green lattice trees are like so many beacons of light from here, like port lanterns beckoning to a boat at sea.
It is beautiful.
It calls to me, awaiting my return.
It is my home.
Alani…
She had done it. The girl had opened a door for me, had opened the outer shield and become the key to my world, my life…
And yet she taunts me with it. She is baiting me, setting treacherous hooks into the troubled waters of my soul and hoping to ensnare me with them.
She will destroy you…
I am well aware of that, little one. I know that she only wishes to strand me again, to leave me floundering as a fish plucked from the ocean and strung up by the gills.
She frightens me. I do not know why. Something about her – maybe her subdued attitude, or her dispassionate, incredulous gaze – terrifies some small part of me. I do not trust her. I do not trust anyone…
Ah, but fear runs deep in her, as it does in all beings, whispered the Squee. She fears you. She fears your anger. See how she freezes when you set eyes upon her? Fear begets irrationality, Saavedro. Use it.
I see… Play on her fear, her uncertainty… Make her do what I want her to do…
It is ingenious. She'll never know what hit her.
I look to her, eyes scanning her face for emotion. Save for an uneasy aura, she is placid.
If this does not work…
I close the outer shield and, clenching Releeshahn close to me, start towards her.
She flinches, but does not move.
"You see," I said, my voice as dispassionate as the expression on her face, "I still have something he wants. Something that he sent you to bring back for him."
I am mere feet from her, and still she does nothing. Where, after all, can she run to? Where can she possibly hide that I cannot find?
I step a bit closer and show her the cover of the lock-bound book, staring at her intensely.
"The Releeshahn book."
Calmly, as I would have done for a struggling student of mine, I order her to open the outer shield while I wait out by the gondola. Only then do I leave her to her task and take to pacing slowly, back and forth, stopping only to look in on her through the tough lattice vine grill. Just a small pause in my rhythm of waiting. Just enough of a pause to let her know that I am watching…
Several minutes passed before I turned to look at her again. She was taking far too long, deliberately trying my patience yet again. She stood in front of the grate, her calm-yet-panicked brown eyes watching me intently, calculating… something.
She is testing you…
I know that. And she will not do it any longer.
I stare at her hard, holding up the book.
Come now, girl, I think. I know you desire to bring this back to Atrus, your false friend. Do as I say…
She looks a bit nervous, but does not move.
I start towards her. She is beginning to grate on my nerves, tenuous and taut as they are.
She is gone before I have even taken three steps.
Good.
I resume waiting.
---
A sudden roar, like that of a mechanical monster, breaks the icy stillness, rending through air and soul alike. Fearing the worst, I turn to see…
Ice. I am surrounded by ice, encased and stranded betwixt the outer shield and the orb-like inner shield. Slowly, a horrifying realization dawns on me.
I am trapped.
Great Weaver, I'm trapped…
I feel very cold…
An icy numbness floods me. I open my mouth to scream, but hear no sound. Wispy tentacles of Fog tightly grip me, slowly squeezing the life from me and pulling me to my knees. Submit, it whispers. Let me take you away from here… You need never suffer again if only you let me take you…
Yes… Oh yes… Please free me from this misery… please…
I feel watched…
I look up, sight blurry from salty droplets tracing wet tracks down my face.
The girl. She is there. She could save me from this wretched trap of ice and fear…
"Oh please, no," I beg as I begin to stand. "Please… don't do this to me. Not when my family could still be alive out there…"
The Fog begins to grip me again, determined to drag me back into despair.
I can't. I can't go back there, not now, not when I am so close to home. I must use this rare moment of release to call for help while I still can…
The book! whispers the Squee, its voice drawn perilously thin by terror. Use it!
What are you…? Oh. Oh. I see – she wants Releeshahn from me. Maybe if I…
"Here," I say, holding the book out to her. "You want the book? I'll give you the book..."
Submit! yells the Fog as it wraps about me again. I strain to stay focused… Must not let it take me… not yet…
"Just… please… please don't do this."
She is placid… always placid…
It comes… It pulls at me, grips me, begins to drag me back…
"Please don't leave me trapped here like this! I can't do this again! I can't! I…"
No… Let go of me! NO! No, no, no…
I am ice. The blood in my very veins has frozen solid. My heartbeat slows, and the sound echoes hollowly in my ears.
Submit…
Yes… please… take me…
Why did you even try?
… I do not know…
… I…
A roar builds inside my head, threatening to burst forth and consume me in a wave of sound. It grows louder, shattering ice and bone; tearing through the Fog.
I look up to see…
Ice.
The door, hisses the Squee. It is open…
But… I don't understand. Why would she…?
I look up to see the girl. She is staring at me in mute horror, awaiting my next move.
She… did this… to you…
I know…
She must pay for her betrayal…
She must pay… they all must pay!
Anger, hot and searing, rises in me. It fills my core, burning like an ember in a fire, tinting the world blood red...
I run through the door with the speed of a predator bearing down on its prey. The hammer in my hand is such a dark, heavy weight...
My footsteps clatter on the metal stairs as I run, each a harbinger to the doomed girl above.
There… I see her…
Her face is a look of sheer terror as she runs towards the locked bunker, hoping to reach safety as I run at her, my hammer raised to strike…
She fumbles vainly with the lock, willing it to open, desperate to escape death…
The hammer collides hard with her head, crunching sickeningly as her temple caves in under the force of the blow. Not a sound escapes her lips as she falls, bleeding, to the floor. She never even got the chance to scream.
I pant heavily and stare at her lifeless body, yet I strangely feel no remorse as I do so.
Oh, Atrus… see what you made me do? See what your torturous game has turned me into?
Blood spatters my robe and face; it drenches my hammer and drips onto the floor. Fearful, red liquid seeps through the holes in the metal grill, slowly trickling onto the cold vines below.
I smile bitterly and reach for the book in her hands, the green linking book that she will never have the chance to use. Perhaps a proper burial is in order. Surely, Atrus will want to know what became of his lackey…
I holster my hammer in my sash and set the book on the floor, the cover open to display the shining linking panel. Carefully, I walk over to the girl and gather her corpse in my arms, her blood seeping into my robe as I walk back over to the linking book.
Pity. Bloodstains are so terribly difficult to get out…
I kneel and touch the linking panel, feeling the familiar, sickening lurch spread up my arm and through my body.
I arrive in minutes, slowly walking towards the door.
I look to the girl. Her eyes are open, staring towards the heavens without seeing, staring at me lifelessly.
I stop in front of the door, waiting for it to open.
Atrus' wife is first to answer.
"By the Maker, you -"
Her ear-splitting shriek cuts off her words, and she stands staring, in mute, pale horror, at my gory burden.
"Catherine, my love! What is - ?"
Atrus trails off, and his eyes go wide with horror. The color slowly drains from his face as his wife clings to him, trembling.
"Yahvo have mercy," he whispers, his voice strained by fear.
I look up from the dead girl in my arms to the terrified man before me, feeling a grin slowly creep across my face as I finally speak to the man who left me stranded for twenty years.
"Hello, Atrus."