Page 151 of Cast in Atonement

“Maybe. Maybe not. She certainly wrote as if she did. Serralyn is now annoyed with my commentary. What she wanted me to tell you is: Azoria didn’t trust the green. She considered the green inimical to true research. Deliberately inimical. Serralyn therefore advises you, if you have any doubts, to trust what Azoria would not trust. What Azoria built, the green would have destroyed. If the green is here—and given the dress and the flowers, Serralyn doesn’t doubt its presence—it means Azoria’s obfuscation of the connection vanished when she died; the connection itself did not.

“And if the green wishes to obliterate what Azoria built, do what you can to help.”

“It’s not—not like w-w-we have much choice.” Kaylin found it hard to speak, she was so cold. Bellusdeo released her; Severn did the same, but with more reluctance. She felt the absence of his warmth.

But it was time. She could walk for a few steps without physical aid; she moved toward the statue, only then realizing just how much of her weight the Dragon and Severn had been carrying. Her legs shook, her knees threatening to buckle beneath her. Had she been forced to take more than half a dozen steps, she would have fallen.

The marks on her arms were humming; they were vibrating. All the marks, not just the marks of the Chosen. The green and ivory cast of the original marks was now gold and emerald, almost the same color as the marks that had once been the color of jade.

“Are you ready?” Evanton asked. He, too, had stepped forward, Mrs. Erickson’s hand on his arm. They stopped in a line with Kaylin, each of the three close enough to raise a hand to touch the statue. In Kaylin’s case, that was entirely theoretical; she couldn’t lift her arms.

“Evanton—I have no idea what I’m supposed to be doing.”

“How is that different from usual?”

Hope snickered.

If Kaylin had no idea what she was supposed to be doing, it didn’t matter. The dead Ancient moved. Had it taken a step forward, it would have knocked three people over—at best. It didn’t. Instead, as if bowed by the weight Kaylin carried, the Ancient knelt. As it did, it opened its eyes. Those eyes flickered over Kaylin and Evanton, before fastening onto Mrs. Erickson.

Of course. The Ancient was dead.

Kaylin didn’t know what Mrs. Erickson saw; she’d been too involved in her own struggle just putting one foot in front of the other, and hadn’t thought to ask.

But Mrs. Erickson was unencumbered by the weight of the ghosts that had consumed so much of her energy; she immediately lifted her hands, palms up. She didn’t appear to lift her head much, which confirmed Kaylin’s expectations. She didn’t see what anyone else present saw.

“Hello,” she said, her voice the same gentle, yet bright, tone Kaylin had grown to love.

I greet you, Warden, the Ancient replied.

“Oh, I’m not anyone important,” Mrs. Erickson said. “I’m not a Warden—unless you mean Evanton?”

I speak to you. The Ancient lifted its slightly bowed head. I speak to all of you: Keeper, Chosen, and Warden.

Kaylin’s marks hummed in harmony with the Ancient’s voice.

What must I do? My purpose is long ended. Without purpose, what point is existence? A hint of a tremor inflected the words. A terrible longing.

“Rest,” Mrs. Erickson said, her voice gentle, her expression empathic. Of course it was. She had lived with the children for literally all her life; her life had been built around keeping them company. Even her connection with the Hawks had come down to the children in the end—she wanted to have new stories to tell them, new events that would tie them to her life, to the life of the living, which they had yearned for so desperately. They couldn’t leave the house; they left it vicariously through her, and she returned to them every night.

But they couldn’t interact with anyone else. When she’d fallen and hurt her leg, they couldn’t call for help. She was theirs, yes—but they were the beloved burden she bore; they couldn’t carry her weight.

She knew about losing the purpose that defined her life.

But her solution was to open up to the rest of life. To start again, to start anew. To accept new friends, and to let her beloved old friends go. She could do this only because she was alive. She was alive, living as the children had wanted her to live. Wanted, and were too young, too needy, to convince her to do.

Rest?

Mrs. Erickson nodded. “Rest. My purpose vanished, and I wanted to see what my life could be like without it. But you’re not alive, dear. There’s a place the dead go, where they can set down all the burdens of life: all the sorrow, all the fear, all the resentment.”

This was more than Kaylin had heard her say to any of the dead; she didn’t acknowledge death if they didn’t. She spoke to them as if they were alive until they were ready to tell her they weren’t, as if speaking of their death would drive her away.

“I’m not sure it works that way for you,” Mrs. Erickson continued.

Both Evanton and Kaylin turned toward Mrs. Erickson. The hands she had held out, the Ancient reached to touch; the Ancient’s hands were far larger than Mrs. Erickson’s, but Mrs. Erickson clearly occupied a different reality. The Ancient’s hands were placed in Mrs. Erickson’s, obscuring them.

“Tell me,” the old woman said. “What would you do in the ideal world?”

Kaylin’s skirts were swept back in the wind of the Ancient’s answer.

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