By the time Lyra makes it back to her cottage, a pure darkness has settled down for the night, darker than she can ever recall- but she isn't sure if it's her imagination, or some feeling of trepidation, that makes it seem as such, or if it's reality. She supposes it doesn't matter, for what was reality, truly, when you'd experienced as much as she had in her short life?
With a soft sigh, she begins to gather up the books needed to read her Alethiometer, the familiar bitterness crawling up her throat and settling on her tongue like bile, making her scrunch her face and swallow thickly. Oh, how she hated having to read her precious Alethiometer this way, and her heart ached for the ease and grace with which she had once read it. If only she could go back to the days of her youth, days of a changing Pan and muddy feet and sweet fruits shared with the only boy- now a man- she would ever love.
She would give anything to back in the world of the Mulefa with Will by her side and the clarity that came with reading her alethiometer.
Something feels different as she sets her books down and picks up the heavy wooden box that contains her Alethiometer, but she can't figure out exactly what it is. She feels oddly compelled to walk away from her books, to sit in silence with nothing but Pan and her truth-reader, but what would that accomplish? The grace that had once allowed her to read it was no longer with her, it had vanished with the innocence of childhood the day she had given herself completely to Will.
Or had it?
With a sudden spark in her eye that hadn't been there since the day she left the world of the Mulefa, Lyra opened up the box and lifted up the heavy, golden truth-reader, and walked away from her books. "Lyra?" Pan queries, almost nervously, beady eyes bright with surprise and suspicion as he follows her to the hearth by the crackling fire. "Shh, Pan." She hushes him as she settles on the floor cross-legged, Alethiometer cradled carefully in her hands on her lap. The needle quivers almost anxiously, twitching between the Owl and the Baby, even though she hadn't framed a question yet. "Somethin' is different, Pan. I can feel it." She whispers, not taking her eyes away from her Alethiometer, cheeks flushed, teeth worrying at her bottom lip.
With half closed eyes, Lyra tries to frame a question in her mind, trying to recall that feeling of climbing down a ladder that had helped her find the answers she sought so many years ago. "Just like putting one foot down below the other, you can do this, you can feel it." She mutters to herself, voice barely above the whisper, not quite loud enough to be heard over the crackling fire. "Start simple." She says, a little louder, but the words taste wrong coming out of her mouth and she shakes her head, closing her eyes briefly as she inhales. "No. I'm going to ask about Will."
She says, loudly and clearly, biting her lip so hard she tastes copper, hands trembling a little as she begins to move the hands of the Alethiometer, trying to slip into the trance-like state she once had.
She's nearly there, she can feel it, and she lets out a deep sigh, letting her eyes wander, unfocused, over the face of the Alethiometer, trying not to think, but instead to feel. To feel for the next rung of the ladder, those deeper meanings…
And she can't do it. She lets out a cry of frustration, resting the Alethiometer on her lap to cover her face with her hands, body trembling as she tries to fight back tears. Pan watches her in silence, draped across the back of her shoulders, whiskers twitching.
"Recall how that spot in the alley made you feel, Lyra. The something that's both there and not there, tangible and intangible."
Lyra drops her hands from her face, sniffing loudly to regain her composure, narrowing her eyes in determination as she sweeps her dark blonde curls back behind her ears. "There, and not there. The edge of real, and not real." She mumbles, picking up the Alethiometer, which seems to vibrate just a little, as if in excitement.
As if it were ready to speak to someone who could understand it once more.