CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

Loneliness and heartache tend to swell

when the clamor of the solo drowns out the

polyphony. You would do well to bid them both

farewell.

And lift your voice.

—THE HARMONY OF BEING

Mooriah was not good with good-byes. As Kyara and Darvyn explained to the others where they planned to go and why, she had no desire for a drawn-out farewell. King Jaqros had arrived with all the desperation of a man separated from his wife during a calamity. He was also a longtime friend of Darvyn’s and was having trouble understanding where his friend was headed and why he had to leave at all. Mooriah left it to the others to fill him in; she wandered to the side of the plaza out of earshot of the rest of them.

One wing of the hospital was discharging funnels of smoke. Someone—a wraith no doubt—had thrown a truck into the side of the building and while the fire had been put out, the wreckage smoldered on. The rest of the building was usable, though without electricity. However, it would be empty soon as Earthsingers were still filing in, volunteering to heal the injured.

The uncomfortable press of this modern city had not grown any easier for Mooriah to manage. She’d spent weeks back in this world and part of her had actually been eager to return to the meditative stillness of the World After. Though having someone to share it with like Kyara did would have been agreeable.

Her dear husband had passed into the Flame, as he should have. Now he was at peace. She would not have asked him to forego that on her account, though he no doubt would have.

She stood at the edge of a concrete barrier, separating the plaza from the street several steps below. Her back was to the hospital and though she did not hear the footsteps approaching her, she felt his presence when he arrived. For a long time, he just stood behind her, observing the city or observing her, she could not say.

“Will you go to the Flame now?” Fenix finally asked.

“The Flame holds as little appeal to me as it ever did. But I have no other options. I cannot resist for much longer. Its pull grows stronger now that peace has returned and my reasons for fighting it are gone.”

“Hmm.” The centuries had not changed the annoying habit he had of humming in response to things. But she’d taken note of other changes. He was not the same irreverent, headstrong, selfish man she’d once helped escape captivity. Part of her missed that version of him, but he had come into the potential she’d seen in him all those years ago, and for that she was grateful.

“Speak plainly, man,” she snapped to hide the burst of sentimentality she could not acknowledge.

He chuckled. “You have grown, too. No longer a shrinking violet.”

She spun around. “I was never a shrinking violet.”

“Yet you weren’t always this shrewish harridan.”

She narrowed her eyes, and he smiled. She turned away again, hissing under her breath.

“What if there was another way?”

She clucked her tongue. “There is death and the Flame, what other way?”

“You could come with me.” He spoke so quietly she wasn’t certain she’d heard him properly. He stepped fully into her periphery.

“To your world? How?”

“There are ways.”

“But I remember you saying—”

“I know. It will not be easy but it is possible.” He was quiet for a time, letting her consider before speaking again. “Is that something you would want?”

She had seen little of the world in her lifetime, and while she had no regrets for the life she had led, the possibility of the unknown still pulled at her, just as it always had.

Could she take what he offered?

“Your parents have arrived,” Fenix said. She turned around to find Oola and Yllis clustered with the others.

Mooriah sighed and made her way back to the group, Fenix’s offer ricocheting around her brain. It would cost him something to take her with him—cost him any chance of returning to this world, she suspected. Would it be worth it?

Oola and Yllis stood side by side amidst the chatter and tears of Kyara and Darvyn’s explanations. The two were studiously ignoring one another, though their shoulders were touching.

Mooriah chuckled at the sight of them. Stubborn until the end. “Can you bring them, too?” The words were spoken before she’d considered the implications, but they felt right. She hadn’t had the chance to get to know her mother. Or her father for that matter. Not really. And the two of them had been torn apart by war and guilt and probably other things she had no idea of. None of them belonged in this world any longer—their jobs here were done. If their options were the Flame or Fenix’s mysterious home, then the choice was infinitely easier. What he was really offering was more time.

“Is my mother bound in some way, too? Could she survive the trip?”

“Not in her current form, but as a spirit she could—the same as you.” Fenix’s gaze was a physical force on her skin, but she still avoided looking directly at him.

“Would it … harm you to bring them?”

He paused. “There would be no permanent damage.” So, yes. But he would if she asked.

Oola looked over at her, a question in the woman’s gaze. Mooriah faced Fenix, standing just out of earshot of the group. His intense attention burned into her, sparking like a fireball. “And you do not mind?”

“I have waited lifetimes for you. The cost is nothing in comparison.”

“Neither of us are the same people we once were. We would need to get to know one another again.”

“In this new lifetime.”

She swallowed as something in her middle fluttered. She turned away, cheeks hot. It looked like she would have to say her good-byes after all.