Silence (46 page)

“
So I’m like… fake Emili?”
Emili asked slowly.

“
No-

“
A memory that you couldn’t
give up?”

“
That’s not-

“
Is any part of me real at
all?” Emili demanded of him.

He opened his mouth with a crinkle
between his eyes, but she pushed away from him and trotted down the
stairs. She suddenly desperately wanted to be alone. At the same
time though, she never wanted to be alone again.

What was happening to her?

Emili wandered down the vaulted corridors, past the
uncountable artworks and paintings that looked like cross-sections
of dreams, sliding her fingers on the shadowed white of the wall
paper as she went. The rooms she looked into were wildly varied,
with colors ranging from pale and earth colored to explosive reds
and brilliant yellows that hurt her eyes even in the
dark.

She was lost in a world of piercing
thoughts. If she wasn’t real, what did that mean? Did that give the
Sycrarian more claim to her own body than she did? What if she was
the aggressor rather than the victim?

She kept walking the winding halls,
legs aching and eyelids drooping. When she passed a cavernous
sitting room opening out to expose a long, leather couch that
resembled some kind of tongue, she realized that she’d passed that
room before. And then the white-washed, silver kitchen, then the
pillar covered with little patches of glowing leaves. She kept on
walking though, counting door-knobs to keep from
thinking.

   
Then
Emili came to a door that wasn’t quite closed all the way, and she
stopped. Her tired mind fought through quick confusion, trying to
figure out whether there was some kind of relevance in this fact.
But of course there wasn’t; it was simply an open door, alone among
a hundred closed ones of its fellows. There was a sigh inside, then
a rustling sound. Emili peeked inside and caught sight of a blob of
sheets shoved around the darkness.

Then a child with a mass of curly,
tangled hair hopped out of bed and walked towards Emili, rubbing
her eyes. Emili stood there, paralyzed. Her heart leapt, and she
felt that same peculiar draw she’d felt with that angry, obstinate
boy, that Sheikoh. For some reason she wanted to laugh, but,
paradoxically the corners of her mouth were tight and
immobile.

The yawning girl drew ever closer, and
then finally, the door swung outwards, spilling shadows onto the
wall. Emili stood face-to-face with the girl, staring into a young,
face that was staring back at her with shock. Her chest lurched
forward, forcing her a stumbling, hesitant step towards those
silver-blue eyes. Then Emili drew back, sure that she wasn’t
behaving appropriately, that something was wrong here and the girl
was staring up at her with fear. She remembered her reflection and
shivered with disgust.

Right as she did so, the girl flung
herself at Emili, knocking her back against the wall. Emili
unconsciously drew this small, dear girl into a tight hug, as they
crashed back against the wall. She suddenly realized that the girl
was crying. And then Emili tasted salty tears and realized she was
crying too. They lay there and rested in the soothing embrace of
another for a while, half sobbing in a way that felt absolutely
right.

“
Emili…” the young girl
whispered into Emili’s chest. “You… You’re back.”

Emili stared down at the girl, her
sight blurry with thick tears.

She was back..?

She was back.