That first day was endless, without time. No one knew what to do. They just sat around the house without talking or wandered aimlessly. Sometimes they cleaned something just to keep their minds occupied on something else. There was no music played at any time. Silence was again the only presence in the room, but this one was completely different from the ones that had invaded the caravan in previous days. This was a shared silence, the sound of hearts processing a shock and a loss at the same time.
Almar and Meira went to sleep immediately after finishing the spell, not having energy for anything else.
Natalia sat on the couch the entire day, her eyes never lifting higher than the fireplace in front of her. She hugged her knees and stayed in that position for hours, making herself as small as her body allowed her and trying to ignore the throbbing pain on the back of her head. It was her first time experiencing the loss of a loved one, so this was confusing and overwhelming. Even though she had seen explicit death since she'd arrived in Amentia, this hurt three times more. She knew exactly what she was going through; she'd studied grief at university, but theory cannot prepare you for the real thing. Her objective mind was telling her to move on, because there was just nothing to be done, Maylin was gone and her body would soon disappear forever. That was reality. But her real mind could only focus on that absence, and the fact that she had laid there on the ground while Maylin bled to death. She'd been right there, unaware. She could've prevented this from happening. If only she'd woken up sooner or had stopped her fall and avoided hitting her head in the first place.
With Nina's help in the kitchen, Ruvyn served lunch, but didn't insist on everyone sitting at the table. She just approached them one by one to let them know it was there and they could eat whenever they wanted.
After eating some, Nina went upstairs to check on Adam, who had not left his bedroom since they had brought Maylin's body back. She knocked softly on his door and peeked in. He was lying sideways on his bed, all curled up into a ball, his head hidden behind his arms. From time to time, his chest quivered and he sniffled. He looked smaller, and Nina wondered if he had used his power without realizing it.
She went inside without being invited in, walking slowly, cautiously. She would leave if he didn't want her there, but knowing Adam, he probably did. She sat on the edge of his bed and didn't move for a few moments to see how he reacted. Since he didn't turn her away, she gently put her hand on his arm. Feeling her presence, he began crying more openly, though quietly. Nina took a deep breath, trying not to cry too. If she cried, she wouldn't be able to comfort him. She kept her hand there for a bit, letting him get used to the touch. Slowly and carefully, she lied down next to him on the edge of the bed. He let go of his knees and stretched his legs. Nina opened her arms as he settled on her chest and hugged her waist, his face fitting perfectly on the curve of her neck like a puzzle piece. Nina closed her arms around him: one around his shoulders, and the other on his head. She softly ran her fingers through his hair and caressed his cheek with her thumb, the same way Angel used to do to comfort her after a fight with her mum. For a second she thought of conjuring warm and soft wings to wrap around him, but there was no place for magic tricks right now. It was important to her that she comforted him alone.
Still caressing him and with her eyes on the ceiling, Nina sighed, preparing herself to speak and to keep her voice from breaking. "You know, a few days ago when we went to the Plaza she thanked me for being here in the troupe." Nina felt Adam move slightly, reacting to her words. "Well, technically she thanked me for making you happy. Really took me by surprise. She was a lot more caring than I gave her credit for... and attentive. She knew exactly how much pain you've been carrying your whole life." Adam whimpered and rubbed his face quickly, settling his arm around Nina's waist again. "She didn't say it out loud, but I think she was very proud of the man you turned out to be, and she was glad to have been able to see you grow up."
Nina paused for a moment as Adam cried more loudly, getting her neck all wet with tears. He had no strength to speak; he barely had strength to breathe.
"I guess what I'm trying to say is, she left this world knowing that she'd done all she could do for you, that you'd be okay without her. She had peace of mind, so you don't need to worry about her."
Nina felt him smile against her neck, and he settled in more closely on her. Relieved to have gotten a positive response, she held him tighter as well.
"But if you need to cry your lungs out for her, by all means do it," she said. "I'm sure she'd be mad if you didn't, actually... would probably call you an ungrateful little brat or something."
Adam chuckled very, very softly and nodded. As silence settled in the room, he began crying again, memories of Maylin playing over and over in his mind. He had never lost a parent before, not like this at least, and while Maylin hadn't been a parent, Adam thought this was the closest to it he would ever get. And it hurt. It hurt in places he didn't even know could feel things at all. And he didn't know how to stop it. He felt empty, like someone had carved out a hole in his chest with a rusty knife. He wondered if he'd ever feel whole again.
Nina held him as tightly as she could, fearing he would fall apart if she let go of him. He was inconsolable, crying until he had no tears left, his sobs coming from somewhere very deep within him. He whimpered like a wounded animal until he was out of breath. Nina could almost hear his heart breaking, and feel the edge of each shard under her fingertips. He would calm down every few minutes and then start crying again. Nina tried to stay as serene as possible, only shedding quiet tears. She knew Maylin was relying on her to keep her Ahlit safe, and she'd sooner become a serious adult than let Maylin down. So she held him in her arms for long hours until they both fell asleep.
Meiko and Anna sat outside to keep an eye on Zoe for a while; they held each other and spoke softly about death. Anna talked about her mom, how she could still hear her melody inside her house back home, how the pain of loss never really leaves, it just becomes bearable after a time, easier to think and talk about. But it's always there, reminding you of what's missing. Meiko saw a different side of Anna as she spoke of her mother; her voice sounded different, heavier. She thought she knew Anna enough now to realize she was pretending to hurt a lot less than she actually did. Meiko wasn't good with comforting words, so she just held Anna for a while until the conversation faded away.
A little while later, Ruvyn approached them to tell them about lunch. They both nodded but made no attempts to get up to go inside and eat. They spent a few more minutes in silence, still watching Zoe's encapsulated figure.
"Are you thinking about Omylia?" Anna asked Meiko then.
"How did you know?" Meiko asked, completely dumbfounded, but glad Anna seemed to be in a lighter mood.
"You've been fidgety," said Anna, unable to stop herself from smiling at Meiko's surprised expression. "Well, more fidgety than usual. I imagine you'd prefer to be doing something instead of just sitting and waiting for everyone to wake up. You wouldn't be you if you weren't thinking about helping people, and I wouldn't like you this much."
Meiko covered a half-smile with her hand. "How do you do that?" she asked.
"Do what?" said Anna, feeling amused.
"Say things so easily."
Anna tilted her head back with a smile. "I'm like the wind: I never lie and I always speak my mind. Well, not always; my openness got me into a lot of trouble as a kid so I've learned to choose the time and place," she added with a cheeky smile.
Meiko imagined an Anna with a smaller body and height but with the hair just as big as it was now, looking sort of like an anime character, going around her neighborhood telling people brutally honest things about their lives and then running away laughing.
She felt warm in her chest. It was still new for her to have loving feelings for a girl with warmth attached to them instead of shame; she hoped to never get used to it or take it for granted.
Embracing that nice feeling in her chest, she stood up and told Anna she was going to see Omylia. She hadn't gotten there in time to save Maylin; she had to try to get Omylia back before the burial. A sense of duty came over Meiko, which was one of her most driving emotions, so she felt ready to take this on.
First she sat down to eat, because she would need the energy. Nina was eating as well, her eyes far away, her mind most likely focused on Adam, whose sobs floated downstairs every once in a while.
Standing on Omylia's doorway, the silence coming from inside the room was dense and upsetting, a very different silence than the one downstairs. She announced herself in a low voice and walked inside, closing the door behind her. She observed Omylia's unconscious figure and breathed deeply. She tried to think of Omylia as a patient, but this was very different from the work she was used to at the hospital back home, not only because there was magic involved but also because she knew this person. She had shared meals with her, run lines with her, seen death with her. They were bound forever, regardless of how close they were personally. Her patients had always been strangers, so it was difficult to see her in this state of unconsciousness. But then she thought maybe this connection was good to have. After all, she was not about to attempt to cure Omylia's body.
She pulled the bed away from the wall a bit and slid behind the headboard to have a comfortable access to Omylia's head. Her thin blonde hair rested at her sides; so used to seeing that hair float around her face as she moved, the stillness it had now felt wrong. She took a moment to clear her mind and find a serene place within herself. If she carried anything personal with her, it might affect Omylia.
She readjusted her stance, steadying her core, raised her hands to place them around Omylia's head, and gathered all her healing energy on her palms. She knew this would not be regular healing; she was not looking for physical wounds. She had felt the turmoil of those who fell unconscious due to this unknown dark force, but only briefly and superficially. She had not delved into it. So when she closed her eyes and pierced through Omylia's energy, she could only stay there for a moment before pulling away, stumbling back against the wall. It was like stepping back into the darkness she had felt right before Anna had pulled her back from it. It was rage, despair and desolation in their purest form. Meiko had to lean against the wall for a moment to catch her breath.
Maybe I should have Anna in the room with me, she thought. Anna was always a source of positive energy and was probably the only one who could help her if her negative emotions got out of control. But then she remembered what had happened last time... She would rather fall unconscious alongside Omylia than hurt Anna again.
But, just as she was about to start the process over, there was a knock on the door and Anna's face peeked in. Meiko couldn't hide the surprise from her face, and Anna took that as a sign to come in. The effect of her presence was immediate.
"Did the wind call you here?" she asked.
"You called me here, the wind just delivered the message," replied Anna with a sweet smile as she took a few steps into the room.
"I guess that's true."
A brief discussion followed, Anna asking what she could do to help and Meiko refusing to let her. But Anna was far more stubborn and Meiko was just too glad to have her there to insist. If merely feeling Anna's presence was enough to clear her mind, then maybe it could be the anchor that kept her in place while she navigated Omylia's sea of dark emotions. Maybe with her there, nothing bad would happen at all.
It still felt odd to Meiko to be relying on someone for emotional support, to actively seek it out; she had learned to avoid that over the years so she could live more peacefully. But Anna was like the wind, inescapable and unstoppable, and Meiko was glad to surrender to it.
So she gathered her energy again, this time more prepared for what she'd encounter and less nervous about its effect on her. She let Anna's hands on her shoulders become the rock that kept her steady amidst the turmoil. And so she dived inside Omylia's energy, feeling her way through, trying to get a clearer idea of what went on in there, to create some sort of map that she could follow towards the very center of the whirlwind and unravel it. She knew the nerves of the brain were all connected to specific things and that if one was pulled, the senses of the body would react. If she could apply that to this, maybe she could zap Omylia awake; she just had to find the right string, the right emotion, and pull.
That was the theory at least. It was much easier said than done. Spending too much time in so much negativity was overwhelming no matter how comforting Anna's presence was. But she knew from experience that some of the emotions felt in that trance would not be Omylia's. She started paying attention in an attempt to recognize certain strings of rage and hopelessness from her own episode, so she could discern Omylia's emotions from the external ones. Knowing this difference helped Meiko understand Omylia better as a person and create a more accurate map, but it also felt like being underwater for much longer than her lungs could tolerate.
At times, the emotions were so strong that she could almost see images, glimpses of things that had hurt Omylia in the past. Almost. She couldn't see or hear anything specific, but the emotions were very clear, and the longer she spent in them, the easier it was to comprehend where they came from, and a mental image was formed whether she chose to or not. The most prominent one was a loss that was lodged very deeply inside Omylia, right in the center of her body: it was a life lost before it could even begin. Upon finding it, the physical pain was so intense that Meiko could almost feel it inside herself, burning, tearing her apart. And it came with its consequences: shame, guilt, self-doubt, loneliness.
Through that pain, Meiko remembered to look for her anchor. She had a lot of experience with shame and guilt —though a different kind—, so it was easy to get lost in it. But Anna's hands on her shoulders brought her back out.
Still, Meiko insisted and persisted. Anna had to force her to take a break after five hours of non-stop work, disregarding all of Meiko's complaints. She dragged her downstairs and made her eat something to recharge. Then she took her outside so she could breathe clean air, even asked the wind to help her with a nice little breeze.
"If you burn yourself out, you won't be able to help anyone," was Anna's argument. She was right, as per usual. So Meiko took a deep, calming breath, looked up at the sky and let the breeze play with her thin hair. And she let Anna wrap her in a hug and kiss her. And after doing a few tai chi sequences, her energy was fully renewed and she was ready to dive back in.
At the end of the day, much to Meiko's disappointment, the efforts were not fruitful enough to wake Omylia up. She was getting a clearer idea of how the emotions moved, but she still couldn't find their epicenter, the main string of energy that would cause the domino effect and take all the darkness with it so Omylia could find her way back. It was like swimming in the dark and with currents that flowed all in different directions. But Meiko was very stubborn when it came to her patients' recovery, and she would not give up until she could navigate Omylia's mind as if it were her own. She just hoped to get there quickly.