The Bell Between Worlds (36 page)

Bayleon shook his head slowly as he stirred the pot of stew, a smile playing on his lips.

“But what
is
it?” cried Simia impatiently, unable to contain herself any longer.

“You’re right, Simia,” replied Espen, “we’re straying from the point.”

Simia smiled proudly.

“Sylas – read the first line again,” instructed Espen.

Sylas read it out loud: “
Reach for the silvered glimmer on the lake…
”

The Magruman nodded. “What do you think that refers to – the
silvered glimmer
?”

“I’m not sure,” he said with a shrug. “A reflection?”

“Precisely,” said Espen. “Now read the next line.”

“
Turn to the sun-streaked shadow in your wake…
” Sylas thought for a moment. “It’s talking about your shadow – you know, your shadow in the sunlight.”

“Exactly. The poem is telling us all to turn to our own reflection, to our own shadow.” He leaned forward so that his face was lit brightly by the flames. “To another part of ourselves.”

Bayleon dropped the spoon and threw his arms in the air. “Oh, this really is too—”

“The myth poses us a question,” continued Espen, speaking over him. “What if each of us has another side? What if there is a part of ourselves that we can turn to – a ‘Glimmer’ of our own being – one that we can reach out and touch?”

Sylas and Simia looked at each other in puzzlement.

“I don’t understand,” said Sylas.

Espen held his gaze. “We all know that our two worlds are connected in some way.” His voice was still quiet but excited. “They have the same hills and mountains, the same rivers and seas, even the same sun and moon. The very seasons are the same, but in reverse – when it is winter here, it is summer in the Other – as though they are the
reflection
of one another. Just as you see your own image in a mirror or on the surface of a lake: the same, but reversed. Do you see?”

Sylas nodded uncertainly, starting to wonder where this was leading.

“Well, the poem is telling us something even stranger. It tells us that it is not only our two worlds that are twinned – not just the fabric, the things, the places. It tells us something far more profound, something that runs to the very heart of us.” He looked into every face in the circle. “It tells us that
we
are twinned too. Each of us. All of us.”

Sylas’s eyes searched Espen’s face long after he had finished speaking. Was he
serious
? Each of us with a person just like ourselves, but different – changed in some strange, unnatural way. Surely it was impossible.

Simia clamped a hand on either side of her head as though to contain the great torrent of thoughts. “But this is all so… so—”

“Ludicrous? Insane?” interjected Bayleon with a bitter smile. “I quite agree. Espasian, you know as well as I that this goes against our whole philosophy! The entire basis of Essenfayle! We believe in connections and togetherness – the bonds that bind all things. How are we to believe that two parts of our own being could be divided and separate? There are good reasons why such ideas have been spoken about in hushed tones: they’re a child’s fantasy! Worse than that, they’re an affront to Essenfayle and all it stands for!”

“And yet we accept that the world itself is divided,” Espen reasoned, his tone conciliatory. “And we accept the divisions between night and day, earth and the air, men and women. The myth simply completes the picture: it is the final piece in the puzzle.”

“No, Espasian, it is fanciful! And dangerous! And wrong!” snapped Bayleon.

He turned away and, as though to signal the end of the conversation, began ladling a portion of stew on to a plate.

Espen looked at him steadily. “But Bayleon, some of the most important people in our two worlds have believed this fancy.”

“People like you, you mean?” scoffed the Spoorrunner.

“Yes, like me.” He paused while Bayleon scoffed again. “And like Merimaat.”

The Spoorrunner froze with the ladle halfway to a plate.

“People like Filimaya and Mr Zhi.”

The camp was suddenly entirely still. Espen turned and looked earnestly at Sylas.

“People like Sylas’s mother.”

“… and so these men, these Priests of Souls, drank deep of
their ill-gotten power, clothed themselves in
deceit
, and set
out into the world.”

S
YLAS FELT THE BREATH
rush from his lungs. He stared at Espen. “Did you say
my mother
?”

“I did,” said Espen.

“You
know
her?” He pressed his palms into the dry, packed earth.

“Yes, Sylas, I know her,” said Espen softly. “Though the Merisi know her far better than I.” He paused as if unsure whether or not to continue. “Your mother and Mr Zhi have known each other for years.”

Sylas’s lungs burned and his heart pounded in his chest.

Fathray had been right: she and the Merisi
were
connected. “Why?” he asked, looking up at Espen.

“Your mother is special, Sylas. Almost as special as you.” Bayleon was no longer smiling. He had lowered the ladle into the stewpot and his eyes were fixed on Espen.

“It was to do with her dreams,” said Espen.

Simia frowned. “Her
dreams
?”

Sylas was silent.

“They helped to convince her – and Mr Zhi – that the Glimmer Myth is true.”

Sylas dug his nails into the dust. He thought of her illness, her nights sobbing in his bed. He felt a shiver run down his spine. “Her dreams...” he whispered. Images of her long nights of suffering rushed through his mind, of her talking to herself, of her pleading and sobbing, of her quiet chatter when no one was there. And then, almost despite himself, he said: “She spoke... she talked as though someone was in the room... like... like it was a...” “A
conversation
,” said Espen.

Sylas’s eyes flicked to the Magruman. Espen looked at him with uncharacteristic tenderness, and nodded.

“I don’t think your mother was ill at all,” he said quietly. “I think she shares your gift. She shares your connection with this world. But hers is with her Glimmer.”

Sylas covered his face with his hands, trying to take it in. “It seems that for whatever reason,” continued Espen, “your mother was aware of her own twin in this world. The Merisi weren’t sure how, but Mr Zhi, who spent a great deal of time with her over the years, said there was little doubt.”

Sylas raised his head from his hands. “Her
twin
,” he said under his breath.

There was another long, awkward silence. Simia placed a tentative hand on his knee.

Ash gave a low whistle. “This is for real, isn’t it?” he said to nobody in particular.

“It was Mr Zhi who had her taken to Winterfern?” asked Sylas, rubbing his temple. “To the hospital?”

Espen nodded.

“And he visited her?”

“He did. Often. And even before that, at your home.” Tears suddenly welled in Sylas’s eyes and he looked away to the fire. Bayleon stirred, straightening his back.

“Leave the boy alone,” he said firmly. “He’s heard enough for now.”

“No!” snapped Sylas. “I want to know why they made me believe she was dead. How could they
do
that? How could
she
do that?”

Espen’s eyes searched the boy’s face for a moment. “I know very little, Sylas, but of this I am certain: the Merisi believed that her gift came with great dangers, both to herself and to those she loved. They did it because they truly believed they had no other option.”

“But how could they let me suffer like that?”

“They did all they could to ease your—”

Sylas felt a swelling rage in his chest. He scrambled to his feet and glared down at Espen.

“Did all they could?” he cried, tears burning his eyes. “What did they ever do for me, except send me to this godforsaken place?”

Espen was silent for a moment. “They had you brought to Gabblety Row, Sylas. They gave your uncle rooms and made sure he had a business. They had Veeglum watch over you.” Sylas took a step backwards and stumbled slightly on the pile of earth. He turned from Espen to the faces around the fire.

He tried to find words, but finally he whirled about, clambered unsteadily over the heap of soil and walked off into the night. Espen stood and took a step to follow, but stopped himself.

“Don’t go far!”

Simia leapt to her feet and pulled her coat about her shoulders. She jumped over the earthen barrier and darted off into the blackness.

“He can’t go alone. I’ll stay with him!” she shouted over her shoulder.

Sylas walked blindly, taking deep breaths of the chill night air. He had no idea where he was going or why. All he knew was that he needed to get away, to think. He stumbled until the dim glow of the fire had faded into nothingness and all that was left was silence and blackness.

He stopped and turned slowly about, blinking at the emptiness, soaking up the smooth closeness of night on the Barrens. He lifted his hand before his face and saw nothing; he looked to the sky and saw the same oily void as everywhere else. In some part of him he knew that this should terrify him, that such darkness was his worst fear, but now, just as everything seemed meaningless, chaotic, undone, he surrendered to it. He sat down in the black dust, drew his knees up to his chest and rocked gently backwards and forwards.

He thought of the last time he had seen his mother, her pretty face looking down at him in their kitchen, smiling at him, drinking in the sight of him. He remembered only a few fragments of conversations about school, his painting, the kites. Why hadn’t she said anything? How could she have kept all this a secret? He replayed her gestures, her expressions, her slow words, but he saw no trace of mystery, no hint of a world of magic and shadows and Glimmers. She had kept all that to herself. Alone.

He felt tears burning in the corners of his eyes and brushed them away. “Why…?” he whispered to himself.

“Because you didn’t need to know.”

It was Simia’s voice, just a few paces away. He looked about, but saw only blackness.

“How did you find me?”

“I told you – I know this place,” she said, sitting down somewhere to his right.

They were quiet for some time, listening to the silence, staring into nothingness, and Sylas was surprised to find that he did not mind her being there. He wanted to be quiet and she seemed to know that without asking. It was comforting somehow – just knowing that she was there, somewhere out there in the night.

Finally he broke the silence.

“Why did you say that? ‘
Because I didn’t need to know.
’”

He heard Simia shift on the hard earth. “It’s something my dad used to say,” she said. “I used to ask him stuff all the time, you know, why’s this happening, what’s that for, who did such and such and how’d they do it. And most of the time he’d tell me, even if he made a joke out of it or missed out the interesting bits. But sometimes, just sometimes, when I was asking about the worst stuff, the things even adults didn’t like to talk about – Thoth or the Dirgheon or the Undoing – he’d go quiet. He’d think about it, and then he’d say: ‘Simsi, you don’t need to know.’”

“Wasn’t that just annoying? Especially for you.”

“Yep,” said Simia, a smile in her voice, “and I used to kick up a real stink, but I always stopped after a while. It was something about the way he said it – a kind of knowing and softness at the same time – I knew that he was doing what was best for me.” She drew a sharp breath. “Of course, now, after everything, I understand exactly what he was doing.”

“What?”

“He was letting me be a kid. For as long as he possibly could.”

They fell silent again. Sylas stared into the night, the image of his mother in his mind, her voice sounding in his ears, and he knew that Simia was probably right. Perhaps she
had
protected him, kept him safe, kept him away from whatever all this was about – the Glimmer Myth, the Undoing, who she was, who
he
was. Perhaps she’d done it to let him be himself – to be young while he could.

He felt tears start to roll down his cheeks. He did not wipe them from his face. He just sat quietly and wept. And Simia let him.

The darkness closed in about them and both were lost in their thoughts. Sylas thought back over the years, of his relationship with his mother, the good times, the happy times, and then the despair, the grief and the loneliness, when all he had of her was her faded picture, and the few gifts she had given him. His mind turned to the book of science, with its inscription: “
Learn all that you are, my dear Sylas, learn all that you are able to be.
”

He knew then that she had not wanted to keep anything from him, she had just wanted him to find out at the right time. Find out for himself.

They sat in silence for a while longer and then he said: “We have to work all this out.”

Simia was quiet for a moment. “What?”

“Who I am, who brought me here, this Glimmer Myth, the Undoing – all that stuff. It’s all connected.”

“Well, that’s why we’re going to see Paiscion, isn’t it?”

“I know, but before I was just doing it because everyone seemed to think I should – because everything was leading me there. But now… now I really
want
to go. I want to go there and wherever I have to go next. I mean, if everything Espen said is right, if the Glimmer Myth is true and my mum and I have some part in it, this could be the most important thing I ever do.”

Simia thought for a moment. “I suppose it could be the most important thing
any
of us ever do.”

It could hardly be called a dawn. There were no rays of light, no traces of sunshine, no promises of warmth, just endless expanses of white mist glowing ever more sombrely as the day struggled into being. Neither was there any sound, for the Slithen rarely broke the surface of the river and, when they did, their oily flanks caused barely a ripple.

The prisoners huddled at the rear of the ancient, slimy boat, pressing in against the cold, straining their senses for any sign of the world around them, any sign of life. For the most part they had to settle for the occasional looming darkness of a riverbank or withered tree, and perhaps the hunched silhouette of a heron searching for fish in the putrid waters. When there was nothing else, they would look ahead to the tangle of chains that stretched in front of the crude vessel and disappeared into the depths, where the Slithen strained at their harnesses.