“I really don’t think now is a good time to—”
“Tora?” I ask, because I’m not about to pretend I can’t hear them. “Who’s she?”
Ryn tips his head back and lets out a sigh before looking at me. “Just . . . someone you knew. Look, Oliver, I’m taking her to Uri to see if he can help. Can I talk to you later?”
“Yes, certainly, of course. But this is great news, Ryn.” He clasps Ryn’s shoulder and his smile returns. “You found her!” He squeezes my arm as he passes, which is pretty weird since he doesn’t know me. Or maybe he does. He certainly seems to know about me.
We continue down the corridor. “So, who’s Uri?”
“He’s actually a friend of yours. Well, sort of. I mean, you know him a lot better than I do. At least, you did. He was the potion maker at the Creepy Hollow Guild. He makes all kinds of potions, so I thought he might possibly have something that can help you.”
“Are there a lot of people here from the Creepy Hollow Guild?”
“No. Uri probably managed to escape because he’s small and ugly and people in general like to stay away from him.”
I frown. “That sounds rather harsh.”
“Well, it’s the truth. He’s an urisk. They’re just not that attractive. You’ll probably get a bit of a shock when you first see him. Actually—” Ryn stops walking “—you stay here. I’ll go talk to him first.” And he heads off once more before I can answer.
I lean against the corridor wall and run my fingers along one of the tiny braids Natesa put in my hair. Then I push away from the wall and follow Ryn. He’s been keeping his thoughts locked up since he first realized in the forest that I don’t know him. There are things he isn’t telling me, but perhaps he’s going to say them to this Uri guy.
I peek around a corner and see a pole reaching from the floor to the ceiling in the middle of the corridor. Ryn wraps himself around the pole. When a hole appears in the floor beneath his feet, he slides down and out of sight. Cool, that looks like fun. I hurry after him and peer down the hole just in time to see Ryn stop two floors below me. Then the floor seals up and my view of him is gone. I step closer to the pole, but the floor remains intact. I wrap my arms and legs around the cold metal, and that’s when the surface beneath my feet vanishes. I slide swiftly down, a lot faster than I was expecting. I tighten my grip on the pole and jerk to a halt at the floor Ryn got off at. Tiles reform beneath my feet. With a shaky laugh, I detach myself from the pole. Another corridor stretches out ahead of me, with doors here and there. I walk forward, keeping my footsteps quiet. A strange smell hangs in the air, pungent and unpleasant. As I near an open door, I hear Ryn’s voice.
“. . . and I really, really need you to fix something.”
A gravelly voice that sounds much older than Ryn’s responds with, “You people are always walking in here with demands.”
“I guess we are, but you’ll want to listen to this one.” There’s a pause before Ryn says, “We found her.”
Silence. I hear a shuffling walk, and then Uri says, “You found Violet?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, thank goodness. Is she okay? Where is she now? Will anyone mind if I visit—”
“Uri, wait. There’s something else. She . . . she doesn’t remember anything. She doesn’t remember me. At all.” Ryn’s footsteps move across the floor. He’s probably pacing again. “I can’t tell you how I felt when I first saw her. I swear, my relief and joy were so intense they almost knocked me over. My brain was screaming, She’s safe! You found her! All I wanted to do was wrap my arms around her and never let go—and then she tried to shoot me straight through the neck.”
“Hmm. That can’t be the first time that’s happened.”
“No, but at least she used to know who she was trying to hurt. This time there wasn’t the slightest glimmer of recognition in her eyes. And . . . Uri, I’m going to go flipping insane! I finally have her back. Everything in me aches to touch her and kiss her and hold her, but she’ll completely freak out if I do because I’m nothing but a stranger to her. A stranger, dammit!”
Okay, maybe I should have stayed up there where Ryn told me to. I wanted to know what he was thinking, but this is a little too much. I turn around and tiptoe back to the pole. Great, how am I supposed to get back up? There must be stairs somewhere. I hear footsteps behind me. Too late.
“V?” Ryn says. “What are you—I told you to wait up there.”
I swivel around. “Well, perhaps I don’t like you telling me what to do.”
He rolls his eyes. “Same old Violet,” he mutters, “even if you don’t remember anything.”
I follow Ryn back down the corridor. “Can Uri help me?” I feel a twinge in the region of my stomach at the possibility that I might just be about to get my memories back. It’s what I want, of course, but it scares me at the same time.
“He doesn’t know. He wants to ask you some questions.”
The unpleasant smell gets stronger as we enter a laboratory with several parallel workbenches. Glass beakers and cylinders of all shapes and sizes cover the benches. Most of them are filled with liquid of varying colors. Sparks jump from a giant pot in a corner, and puffs of smoke rise here and there, joining the haze that hangs near the ceiling. The whole room looks like a disorganized mess to me, but perhaps Uri enjoys working in chaos.
“Violet!”
I jump as I see the short creature coming around a workbench toward me. His head is completely bald and weirdly misshapen. Wrinkled skin hangs from his scrawny body, and the hair that’s missing from his head seems to have found a home in random patches on his arms and legs. My body wants to shudder at the sight of him, so I focus on the broad smile stretching across his face. It works. I find myself smiling back, caught up in the radiance of this ugly creature’s joy.
“Violet, my dear, dear girl.” He takes my hands in both of his. His skin feels worn and leathery, and I see a few scars and burns across his knuckles. Potions work can be dangerous, I guess. “I’m so relieved you’re not in the clutches of our enemy,” he says.
“Yeah, me too. So, Ryn thinks you might be able to help me.”
“Possibly, possibly.” He lets go of my hands and hoists himself up onto a high stool. “Is it true that you don’t remember anything before The Destruction?”
“Well, I remember a few things, but they aren’t very clear. And none of them seem that important.”
“Okay. Why don’t you sit here—” he pats the stool next to him “—and tell me everything you remember.”
We talk for a long time. Uri asks Ryn if he needs to be somewhere else, but Ryn clearly isn’t interested in going anywhere. In fact, it seems like he plans to run through every person I’ve ever known and every incident that’s ever happened to me. Do you remember Raven? Do you remember Flint? Do you remember Nate? Do you remember Amon?
Most of my answers are ‘no,’ as I knew they would be. No, no, no, and . . . “Amon? I can picture a guy called Amon surrounded by loads of books. Is that right?”
With a nod, Ryn says, “Yeah. He was the head librarian at our Guild. We haven’t seen him since The Destruction.”
And so it continues. Until Ryn has exhausted his supply of questions, and I’m starting to feel the need to scream. Uri sits quietly on his stool, tapping his chin with a skinny finger and murmuring, “Interesting.”
I lean my elbows on the bench, slide my hands into my hair, and stare at two beakers stirring themselves with glass spoons. Apparently patience isn’t a virtue of mine, because the words what’s so freaking interesting are threatening to tear themselves free of my lips.
“It’s fortunate for you that I’m here,” Uri says eventually, “because I’m almost certain I’m the only one who knows what happened to you.”
My hands fall away from my head, and I sit up straight. “You are? What happened?”
“I don’t think it’s an answer you’re expecting.”
“Whatever it is, just tell me.”
br /> He nods slowly. “Okay. No one did this to you, Vi. I believe you did it to yourself.”
“What?” I grip the edges of my stool tightly. “Why would I do that?”
“Why?” He raises his hands. “I have no idea. I think I can help you with the how, though. Several months ago, you came to me with an unusual request. Someone had broken your heart, and you were so angry and upset that you wanted to forget you ever cared for him. I created a potion for you, but I didn’t trust it, so I recommended you didn’t take it.”
“But you think I did,” I whisper.
“I think something happened during The Destruction that made you decide to take it. And it didn’t make you forget only that specific person you wanted to forget. It made you forget everyone and everything you’ve ever cared about. So you remember the librarian and the man who guarded the entrance because you weren’t close to them. You remember basic spells and magic, but nothing that has to do with being a guardian—because you loved that life.”
Ryn’s fist thumps down onto the workbench, causing Uri, me, and a number of glass objects to jump. “Why did you give her the potion if you didn’t trust it?”
Uri shakes his head and raises his skinny shoulders. “I suppose I didn’t think it had the potential to go that wrong. And Violet’s always been a sensible person. I didn’t think she’d actually take it.”
Ryn closes his eyes and mutters, “I don’t think The Destruction left any of us in a sensible frame of mind.”
*
We leave Uri’s lab after he promises to try and come up with a potion to counteract the effects of the one I took. I’m not exactly hopeful, though; the last potion he gave me certainly didn’t work the way he planned.
After finding one of the many unused bedrooms for me to sleep in—I guess the guardians who built this place ages ago were expecting a lot more people to use it—Ryn leaves me alone with little more than a short “Get some rest.” It’s difficult to read him, but I’m pretty sure he’s angry with me. I don’t blame him. I’m angry with myself. I know The Destruction was a terrible, horrible thing to live through—I’ve heard too many stories not to know that—but it was a selfish and cowardly thing to make myself forget everything. And having spent the past several weeks blaming it on some non-existent person makes it even worse.
I curl up on the bed, trying to push away the blanket of shame that wants to wrap itself around me. I won’t go there. I won’t wallow. I’ll rest, as it’s been a while since I slept, and perhaps when I wake up Uri will have something that can fix the mess I’ve made of myself.
*
The loud knock startles me from an underwater dream of mermaids and turquoise hair and deep blue eyes that watch me with sadness. I sit up and push my hair back. “Come in.” My voice is croaky. I clear my throat and watch the person whose eyes are still swimming in my mind enter the room.
“Sorry, I know you’ve only been asleep a few hours,” Ryn says, “but there are important things we need to talk about.”
“That’s okay. I don’t need much sleep.” I push the covers away and try to erase the image of Ryn floating in water just out of reach.
“Um, there’s a bathing room at the end of this corridor, if you want to use it,” Ryn says. “Do you know how to get to my room from here?” I nod. “Okay, meet me there when you’re done.” He leaves, closing the door behind him. I wanted to ask him where Jamon is, but that’ll have to wait a few more minutes.
After washing myself in a pool of magenta colored water with matching bubbles—that popped and vanished along with the water when I got out—I walk down one flight of stairs and find Ryn’s bedroom. There’s no reply when I knock, so I let myself in. Another armchair has been added to the room, probably so that one of us doesn’t have to sit on the bed. I wander over to the table against the wall and pick up one of the books. It’s a collection of poetry by someone I don’t recognize. Did Ryn rescue these books from his home in Creepy Hollow, or did he get them here? Perhaps the base has a library.
I turn my attention to the wooden box resting beside the books—and my heart tumbles over itself when I see my own name engraved on the lid. I run my finger over the grooves of the letters. I place both hands on the sides of the box and try to lift the lid. Nothing happens. It must be—
The door behind me creaks open. I swivel around quickly. Cold guilt rushes over me, even though the box I was trying to open must surely belong to me. Ryn frowns, his hand still on the door handle. “What did you do?”
“Um . . .”
His eyes slide to the table behind me. “Oh, the box. It’s yours, V. You don’t need to feel guilty about looking at it.” He closes the door while I turn back to the box. I pick it up and carry it with me to one of the armchairs.
“So what’s the story? Why do you have it?”
Ryn sits in the armchair opposite mine and leans forward, elbows on his knees. A sad smile stretches his lips before he says, “I wish you knew how badly you wanted that box. Your mother left it for you, but . . . it got lost. You’ve never even seen it before.”
I rest the box on my knees and touch the hole where a key should fit. “Where did you find it?”
“Underground. I have contacts there who were keeping an eye out for it. On one of my recent visits I checked in with one of them. Turned out he’d found the box. I just had to . . . retrieve it from its latest owner.”
I raise an eyebrow at the word ‘retrieve.’ “Does that, by any chance, mean steal?”
“It’s not stealing if it originally belonged to you, is it?” He nods toward the box. “Go ahead. Open it.”
“But it’s locked.”
“Well, isn’t it convenient, then, that you have a key.”
“What—” I stop and reach for the gold chain around my neck. My fingers find the tiny gold key with its outspread wings. The key that’s been hanging around my neck since the day I woke up. Is this the key he’s talking about? As if he can hear my thoughts, Ryn nods.
“There’s probably nothing inside,” I say, more to myself than to Ryn. “I mean, if it’s been lost Underground for so long, it’s probably been forced open already and its contents removed.”
“Protective enchantments,” Ryn says as he leans back in his chair, watching me. “Only the key can open it.”
I unfasten the chain’s clasp and hold the key between my fingers. I insert it into the hole on the front side of the box, turn, and hear a small click. I lift the lid and tilt it all the way back so it rests on its hinges. Inside is a folded piece of paper. I expect it to look aged and discolored—after all, it must have been written fifteen years ago or more—but it looks new. Perhaps the enchantments protected it against aging as well.
I remove the page and unfold it. A curling script marks the paper in dark ink. I start reading, the hairs on my arms rising and my heart thumping as though trying to break free of my chest.
My darling child,
You have not even been born and already a burden has been laid upon your shoulders. I met an elf woman today. It wasn’t a meeting that was supposed to happen, but now that I think about it, all the events of the day conspired perfectly so that I would be in that room with her at that precise moment. Alone.
She came up to me, having never spoken a word to me before, and said, “You will have a daughter. She will play a role in bringing great evil into our world. But she will also be the one to undo that evil.”
I was afraid, thinking the woman must be crazy. But then she told me things about myself. Things that only I should know. I started to believe her—and that made me even more afraid. Afraid for you, my precious child, and afraid for our world. I asked her what great evil she was talking about. She said one word that sent shivers scurrying all over me.
Tharros.
It was his power that I’d spent so many years trying to find. His power that I’d finally realized was pure evil and could never be used for good the way I’d always wanted to use it. Is this my punishment for se
eking out that power? Will you have to pay the price for the delusions that consumed me for so long? If so, I can never apologize enough.
“Your daughter will save a halfling boy from death,” the elf woman said, “and that boy will one day choose to take Tharros’ power into himself. Your daughter will be responsible for that choice. She will also be the one to send his power to its final resting place.”
I wanted her to explain further, but she was gone before I could ask anything else.
I’m still not sure I should be writing this down. If it falls into the wrong hands, someone might try to hurt you before any of this can happen. But I’m also afraid that I might not be around to tell you this, and when the time comes, you won’t know what to do.
Whatever happens, I love you with all my heart, my dear child.
Your mother
I lower the page and stare at the rug on the floor. I didn’t notice it before. It’s dark green with a grey pattern of squares.
“Well, what does it say?” Ryn asks.
Without a word, I hand the page to him. His eyes scan quickly across the words, his frown growing as he gets closer to the bottom of the page. When he reaches the end of the letter, he stands abruptly. His eyes stare through the page at something far beyond it as he says, “I know who it is. I know who Draven is.” He walks a few steps and stands near a wall, still staring at nothing. “At least, I can make a pretty good guess.”
Still partly stunned from what I’ve just read, I whisper, “Who is he?”
Ryn’s eyes finally come to rest on mine. “His real name is Nate. He’s the same person you wanted to forget. He’s the reason Uri made that potion for you. He was supposed to be nothing more than an assignment to you, but . . .” Ryn looks down at the letter. “Well, it’s a long story, but he became more to you than that. You cared about him. And he betrayed you to Zell, the Unseelie Prince. When he came to find you in Creepy Hollow to apologize and explain his actions and ask your forgiveness, you told him you never wanted to see him again.” Ryn walks back to the armchair and sits on the edge of the cushion. “If he was angry and heartbroken, he would have been in the perfect position to kill Zell and take Tharros’ power for himself.”