In the Eyes of a Child

It wasn't, Charlie thought, staring blankly out at the shadowy lighthouse, that she was angry. Anger would be understandable, appropriate even - but without someone to be angry at, what was the point? They were all victims. Rhastia, Milliner, Troika; they weren’t born as monsters, they became so against their will, so how could she hate them? Carmine and Dominic too, set on paths that had to be fulfilled, no matter how much it hurt them. Hurt their loved ones. Hurt her.

No. This was not so much anger as - a hollowness. A sad, tired, unfathomable void left after the victory she had been fighting for all of her life.

Within the recesses of her mind those sentiments were manifest. At the centre stood a castle that had once seen better days, the bare brick walls cracked and weathered, though still standing. Above them the stars, constellations vaster than infinity, swirled and fought against the darkness of the sky; but with no sun to anchor them, the light they brought barely illuminated the landscape. The trees it landed on were cold and lifeless, no leaves to speak of, and dead air sat above the equally lifeless water of the ocean. The space sat, unmoving, deafeningly silent.

For the first time in her life, she understood Kyle Cavendish. Understood him on a level she didn’t know was possible and wished wasn’t. How he had become who he was, what he was. Why the mausoleum had been built.

The surface of the water began to stir, a gentle whirl becoming indistinct shapes. Between two trees a shape flickered and moved, purpose unclear. In the sky a tune seemed to start and stop, the stars glinting in time. And between the castle and the central tree, both stretching impossibly high, sparks of fire and shards of ice started to flare, mixing in a wind that moments before had not existed.

It was his memories that made him continue. That let him continue. Charlie had known that, of course, but she hadn’t truly understood it. And now, as she sat slowly piecing herself back together, it made more sense than any other lesson she had ever had.

A man in a chair, rocking a small child, head leant down. A figure, bent towards the earth, working it with a trowel. Notes made of pure light, suspended between the stars, shaped like a dancing man. An angel, made of ice, and a woman, made of fire, both smiling so purely towards each other, yet looking at the space between.

For a moment it seemed like the shapes would come solid, join the landscape and merge with it; but then they dissipated into nothing and the air stilled once again.

“I’m sorry, Doc.” The words caught in her throat as she tried and failed to pull forth happy memories, tried her hardest to believe that she could rebuild some semblance of what she’d lost. “I can’t do it, it’s too much. All of them? …it’s. Just.”

With an inaudible cry, Charlie buried her head in her hands and wept.

In the corner of the castle, nestled deep in the crevices of the stone, the soft glow of one solitary brick….began to fade.

Time passed, measured only in her quiet sobs and the stars slowly moving across the night sky as darkness set in. It seemed that nothing could break her grief now it had been released.

And then a soft noise cut through the air, interrupting the tears. Her head rose immediately, eyes clear despite the pain.

Like a lightning bolt, the sound surged through the forest, reaching to the sky and into the ground; and everywhere it touched rippled, regaining colour, moving with it, unable to resist. Following a path that had been thread a thousand times, it arced from tree to brazier, star to sea, but always, always, moving towards the castle. Towards home.

“I’m coming, Kyla.”

And the sound reached its destination, and the brick, barely a flicker in the darkness…exploded into light once more.