Things are sweeter when they're lost. I know--because once I wanted something and got it. It was the only thing I ever wanted badly, and when I got it it turned to dust in my hand.
P
riest Pravda, what do you know of desire?”
Her voice shatters the silence of the winter woods. In the twilight, everything around us is bled of true color; the light in the air is blue, shivering with our semi-opaque breaths. I do not look at her.
“Why do you ask such a question, uchenik?”
“One of the other apprentices, Priest—he seems to be interested in me.”
“Would you not rather know of love?”
“No, Priest. I would like to know of desire.”
We are waiting for the silence to break for other things. But the wait is a long one, and the clearing through the trees before us remains empty.
The wolves, in the distance, are howling.
“Desire will burn you. If it does not burn you immediately, in your rejection of it, then it will burn you in the pursuit.”
“Is it—is it immoral to want, Priest?”
“No, not necessarily.”
“Then why does it burn?”
“Because, to want something—there is a risk. We cannot always have what we want; and the things we desire sometimes change. Especially people. And our wanting, well—it consumes us, it distracts us.”
“So should I not desire him, then?”
“That is for you to decide uchenik.”
The deer enter the clearing, then; breaking out tenderly onto the fresh-fallen snow. We watch them in silence until I break it again, by whispering:
“We did not come here to discuss desire, however. This is your first lesson in truth.”
We wait. I feel Zima shivering besides me; but this is an aspect of the lesson, as well. The deer are breaking through the soft surface of the snow, attempting to graze beneath; and beyond the clearing, within the other fringe of trees, I see the glinting eyes of wolves.
The kill is swift. There had been a deer limping in the rear of the herd. On the other side of the trees we hear the deer scatter, and the guttural scream of the one killed. The pack sets about ripping it apart.
“How—how is this truth?” Zima’s voice breaks.
“This is the truth of everything. Life, death, nature, ourselves. Never forget what you see here.”
“I—I don’t understand.”
Typically soft-spoken, my voice becomes a blade when I turn away from the feast. I meet my apprentice’s eyes and she is shaking, blanched of color. “Remember, the justice of nature is never ambiguous; black and white. Kill, or be killed. Eat to live, but not in excess. Weakness is punished, and strength is rewarded. The truth is this is the most fair judgement in the world; and we, as keepers of justice, must attempt to replicate it. We replace weakness with immorality; the need to eat with the need to improve.”
"And what about the need to kill?"
"There is a place for that, in the truth of things as well."
——
I wake in a cold sweat.
I know when I go to the window there will be no snow. I will smell the spring flowers of Delumine, and hear the quiet whispers of the nights. When I go to the window, there will be nothing of my dream outside.
But still, I go to the window—and once that satisfies my fears, I go to the street. Before I can stop myself, I am beyond the city’s limits and beyond, in the fields—and further still, into the Viride.
I deceive myself into believing I go to the library, at this late hour. But on the trail there is a crossroads, and I turn the other direction. There is a meadow, just a bit beyond, and I go to it—to stand on the fringe of trees and stare at the long, swaying grasses. They are quiet tonight—and nearly identical to the one of my dream, if not for the lack of snow.
But there are no deer. There are no wolves.
There is only a girl.
I have seen her many times, now. We have shared many sideways glances in the library, between stacks of books, with golden light separating us.
I have seen her many times. We do not speak.
We only share glances, I think.
I say aloud, “Good evening, Ms. Katerina. Why are you in the woods, at so late an hour?”
Weakness is punished, and strength is rewarded. If this is true, then I am being punished daily.
There is no snow. Winter has finally bled away, crawled off to die like a deer with a broken leg, and what has taken its place is the goldenrod rush of spring, all its flowers and sun. The library has been quieter recently—everyone takes their books outside to read. (I notice because I spent nearly every day in there.) This morning, when I woke, my bed was bathed in warm yellow light; the smell of upturned dirt and pollen came in through the crack in the window, and I smiled at the thought that things were coming alive again.
(There was music playing, somewhere, the sweet, high voice of a violin. But I could not tell then whether it was real or imagined, and thinking back on it I’m still not sure. I try to convince myself it would not matter.)
Of course, this is all in the past. Now the sun has set; the moon has taken its place, a thin sliver of radiant, almost-white light hung high in a deeply blue sky. Stars sparkle faintly through the boughs of the trees. Winter is gone, to be sure, but only recently. The wind still carries a kind of bite. As I walk, I tilt my head up to watch the tapestry of the night hung overhead: crushed dark velvet, striking silver.
Weakness is punished, and strength is rewarded. I am a weak girl, then: less in the heart and more in the body, which shivers against the gnawing cold of the breeze, and stumbles on the unpaved roads; whose head is clear, tonight, but so often pulses with crippling migraines and false old memories. I try to be thankful for that clearness. I try to enjoy it, breathing in the cool, fresh air, glancing with admiration at the celestial bodies that follow me through the forest. But instead I feel a little twinge of bitterness that I cannot always be like this—present, and calm, and healthy enough.
The path I walk is a narrow one. Really, it is little more than a deer-track pressed into the soft, dark dirt of the forest; a tiny, winding road of small consequence, at least in the grand scheme of the forest, which presses in on both sides of it. Pinecones litter the trail. Mushrooms sprout out from the dirt, or from cracks in the bark of so many trees. In a few places there are even beehives hanging in high spots, invisible but for the omniscient buzz of the insects inside. There are still birds awake and chirping in the comfort of their trees. There are still squirrels scurrying back and forth across the trail, swishing their bushy tails behind them like so many white flags of surrender. Even now, almost in the middle of the night, Delumine is alive and bustling with the lives of all its little animals. I look at them with admiration. I wonder if they don’t have it better than we do; if I would not be happier knowing nothing but the urge to eat and sleep and explore.
It does not matter.
Finally the forest breaks into a field. From horizon to horizon I see an ocean of grass gone pale-yellow in the moonlight, swaying and rippling as the wind blows through. It is a cool, calm night, and for a moment I hear nothing but the whoosh of wind, the sound of little scurrying feet, the call of birds to one another back and forth.
Then: “Good evening, Ms. Katerina.”
I start a little, unable to repress my surprise entirely. But it is not a jolt of fear; somehow, for a reason I cannot explain, I know who it will be even before I turn.
And I am right. He stands at the edge of the meadow, half-shadowed in the place where the trees meet the tall grass, and looks just as I remember him—handsomely built, perfectly black and white, his eyes the bright blue of moonstones.
“Mister Pravda,” I call back, dropping into the faint suggestion of a bow. My voice, I think, is kind—sheepish, even. “I'm not sure there is a reason, except that I’m very fond of walking.”
I press down a smile. “Although—sir—I could ask you the same thing.”
Things are sweeter when they're lost. I know--because once I wanted something and got it. It was the only thing I ever wanted badly, and when I got it it turned to dust in my hand.
F
or no reason should we belong there; for no reason should our meeting evoke idyllic images of the countryside, or poetry, or anything aside from happenstance.
Nevertheless, we do. We do evoke the romantic images of paintings, and the imagery of poetry. A man and woman meet at midnight in a clearing; the man stands at the fringes of the trees and the woman walks waist-deep into the grasses, which kiss her as she moves.
Mister Pravda, I’m not sure there is a reason, except that I’m very fond of walking.
I am not a man prone to expressions. I reciprocate her formal politeness, however, but dipping my own head into a bow.
(And yet, I wear the slightest of smiles; the upward turn of my lips adds warmth to typically austere demeanor). I think of remaining apart from her, as I so often do from others—but there is something in her kindness that warrants my approach. So I step from the trees, into the grass. Although—sir—I could ask you the same thing.
In a cliche, I might warn her of all the dangers the forest holds.
(Somehow—I think it must be the tragedy behind her eyes, the weight of her gaze—I understand that she must already know).
“Unfortunately, my reasoning is hardly as romantic. I simply grow restless at night. Sleep does not come easy to me.”
There is a long, almost awkward silence after that. I realize I am speechless by her presence alone.
Perhaps it is due to all of the sidelong glances shared in the library. Where others had left to partake in the joys of spring, she and I had remained to our private aisles; reading in sunlit corridors; always separate and yet… always there.
I swallow. “Perhaps—perhaps, I could join you in your walk, tonight, Ms. Katerina?”
I do not smile, because my nerves are an explosion beneath the surface. I cannot say why. Only that the jitters themselves make me feel not myself, and yet I cannot resist asking.
I have read enough fiction to know that I should laugh at this; him and I, just so happening to come across one another in a field as flowery as this one, under the sweet, pale light of the moon. I should laugh. It is ridiculous, this setup; ridiculously romantic, that is, for a pair who have done nothing more than glance at one another sidelong from between the aisles of the library.
I do wonder, often, why that is all we do. We are like schoolchildren who have not quite learned how to socialize. Sometimes the movements, mine included, feel inorganic—like we are following a script written by someone with absolutely archaic notions of propriety.
I know I should be more forthcoming. I know he is shyer than I am, and thus the burden rests upon me. But on the few occasions I dared to try, I have felt—I think the word is rebuffed. Not exactly, but something very close.
That is: there have been times I smile at him and he looks away, and I am rarely brave enough to push my luck further than that.
I think I see him smile. It is only the slightest change in his expression, the faintest and quietest upturn of his lips. But on him—he who is so severe not only in coloring, not only in countenance, but in build, as if Oriens sculpted him to look like truth itself—on him it is as notable as anyone else’s full grin.
Grass sways in the wind, tickling my ribs. I shift just a little. As if he knows that I am wondering what it means, as if he knows that I am debating whether I should take that smile seriously, he steps forward. An awkward, choppy, sudden movement. (For one fleeting moment I have to suppress a laugh. But I recognize that this, too, is an admission of interest on his part, and so instead I gaze at him with renewed warmth.)
I am still thinking of what to say, how to tease him, when Pravda clears his throat and says meekly: Perhaps I could join you.
So perhaps this night is romantic. Perhaps there is—as embarrassed as I am to admit it—some special quality inherent to the freckle of stars overhead; the gentle glow of the moon; the whoosh of the wind in the grass, and how the gentle rustle of it fills the air between us.
I know deep inside me that there is some magic, muted but stubbornly alive, in the way the world has unfolded around us in response to just those few words. Perhaps I could join you.
“Of course,” I respond warmly. “I would appreciate the company. You can tell me what you’ve been reading, since we so often seem to split custody of the library's contents.”
His face has grown suddenly and completely serious. I see the straight line of his mouth, his brow almost furrowing in nervous concentration; and I wonder, half-guilty and half-bemused, what I have done to make him so anxious.
Things are sweeter when they're lost. I know--because once I wanted something and got it. It was the only thing I ever wanted badly, and when I got it it turned to dust in my hand.
I
f I could hear her thoughts, I might argue that nothing can prelude romance more effectively than sidelong glances shared between golden slants of light. The way one eye catches another—the hot flush of excitement, hidden by an equal rush of timidity. That is romance, at the pinnacle; that is how every love affair starts, with those too-long, too-quiet, too-chaste stares.
I suppose my shyness—my inability to talk to her—stems from the eerie familiarity she possesses. It makes no sense for her to remind me of someone I cannot remember. And yet, she does remind me of someone. That may very well be the reason I stand a little too long, a little too awkwardly, away from her. That might be why my eyes linger in a way that is not possessive but borderline analytic. Where have I seen her? My other life had been drawn out and long. I had met many men and women—
But my body is responding more quickly than my thoughts, for once, and I am already beside her. Of course. I would appreciate the company. You can tell me what you’ve been reading, since we so often seem to split custody of the library’s contents.
Again, that almost imperceptible twitching of my lips. What have I been reading? The question puts me at ease, and together we begin to walk the same direction she had been going.
“Les Misérables, has been my most recent choice.” It is silent a moment, as I remember the readings; love, and justice, and injustice. The subject matter is close to heart, but I will not go into such complexities. I clear my throat and add, “But I have juggled that alongside some less academic literature. Scarab, the Shattered Isle for one, and The Night Order for another. Truly, fascinating histories, as pertaining to Novus and beyond. The Diary of Oresziah is another, although that is a fragmented document, and—”
I find myself rambling more than I would like. I pause, glancing at her sidelong—and when I catch myself in my own shyness, I turn to look at her fully. “And you, Ms. Katerina? What has captured your recent interest?”
The night is a chorus of crickets and cicadas. I have always expected the dark to be a time of silence; but as we walk, I discover that the forest around us is as alive as my chest feels.
If he could hear my thoughts, he would know that I have no interest in arguing with him. The fact is—he’s right. I have read enough poetry and romance, had enough childhood crushes to understand that a sidelong glance is infinitely more weighted than a long stare; that the mere brush of one shoulder against another often says more than a thousand kisses.
I am a girl, after all. I know things.
But none of this comes to pass. There is no argument; instead I am silent, watching him closely as he wades through the knee-high sea of grass, my gaze focused through a thicket of red lashes.
For a moment, as he comes to meet me, we are silent. Like statues. Or paintings. Just one heartbeat of pure, lucid noiselessness.
But then the world pours in to fill the empty space. I hear the rustle of his footsteps in the field; the song of birds, becoming drowsy, overhead; the wind, gushing through the branches of trees that are still afraid to unstiffen after the way winter has treated them. Somewhere far away, a little creek gurgles over rocks. Cicadas sing. I even think I can hear what the scholars say is the music of the spheres; the harmony of celestial bodies—the sun, the moon, the stars—as they slide into the right places. (This is a fantasy. How much simpler would life be if the universe really were, as that theory suggests, nothing more than a musical puzzle?)
But now he has come to stand beside me, and there is no music in existence that could overshadow the way my heart races at it.
I feel my pulse clench like a fist inside my chest. Next to me, he is taller than I had pictured it; my head reaches just above his shoulder, yet I don’t feel small at all. Instead the shadow of his figure falls over me like a blanket—it is a comfort. And as we walk I find myself leaning oh-so-slightly closer and closer to him with each stride, unconsciously seeking the heat of his body as the night grows longer and colder and darker.
I focus my gaze on the deer-track as we walk, placing my steps carefully. I don’t know if it’s that I’m trying not to look at him (this is what the writers would say), or merely being careful that I don’t scrape my legs on the thorny bushes that line our path. It doesn’t matter, anyway: I can still see him out of the corner of my eye, tall and dark and regal. My ear twists toward him as he talks.
“Ah! The Night Order,” I repeat, so enthusiastically it’s almost—almost—an interruption. “I’ve read of them. I was browsing through foreign stories the other day, and—well, isn’t it interesting? Some cultures think the moon chased out the sun, that night only came to follow day; and some think the sun chased out the moon, and day is but an interruption of the night. Sort of like—well, is your skin black spots on white or white on black?”
I turn to look at him, and I am half-grinning, my face lit silver by the moon. I expect I will catch him off guard.
But he is looking at me already. My gaze widens and my smile freezes: not in disappointment, but in pure surprise.
Things are sweeter when they're lost. I know--because once I wanted something and got it. It was the only thing I ever wanted badly, and when I got it it turned to dust in my hand.
P
ravda should not be surprised when he hears she has read of the Night Order. She spends as much time in Delumine’s library as he, and one of the many reasons she has captured his interest is due to the way she can be found in any aisle. She does not discriminate between fiction or nonfiction, history or science, poetry or romance. There are some, he has noticed, that she might favor—but when she says, I’ve read of them Pravda is, somehow, surprised.
But he is not so surprised that he misses a beat in the conversation. He only keeps his eyes on the trail ahead, the stars above, the way the nighttime sings in a way more lively than some days. Sort of like—well, is your skin black spots on white or white on black?
Pravda glances at her. He is not prone to humor; but then again, he is not prone to starting moonlit walks with girls, either. “Black on white, if you must ask such personal questions.”
He wonders if the commentary—humorous as it may be—reflects something deeper of himself. Pravda does not tell her, but as they walk he senses Prigovora on the fringes of the night. He keeps to trees and the long, long grass and moves as quietly as death might, when a good humor strikes him. And Prigovora is a piece of Pravda.
Black, on white.
“But tell me, what do you think, Katerina? Did the moon chase out the sun, or the sun the moon?” Pravda turns to her, smiling slightly. The conversation has put him at ease and her own expression lightens him in a way he is unfamiliar with. Certainly, these emotions—the slight raising of his pulse, the flush that colors his cheeks with a kind of nervousness—certainly they must mean something.
Perhaps only that he is a fool.
Perhaps only that he is a fool, for wanting to reach out with a telepathic hand and brush back the hair from her eyes. Perhaps only that he is a fool, for wanting the stars and the night and the moon to stretch on endlessly above them, so that they might remain in that quiet moment long enough that nothing else may interrupt.
The world, Pravda knows, waits; it waits to come with some inevitable truth he has yet to learn. Happiness—happiness, blooming in his heart like a bird too quick to flight—has no place in truth.
Black on white, if you must ask such personal questions.
How funny he is! And funny only because he doesn’t know he’s being funny. He doesn’t know (at least, I think he doesn’t) that I can see how unused he is to humor—how carefully he speaks, contorting his words as he wanders his way into making a joke. He even glances at me like he’s gauging my seriousness. The way his expression almost flickers as he thinks it out, weighing options: do I answer truthfully? Or play along?
I watch all this out of the corner of my eye, and despite myself I feel my mouth twisting into a little helpless smile, my chest warm and filled with real affection.
“Forgive me, Mister Pravda.” I let out a dramatic Victorian sigh; my head falls back, and my hair tumbles out of its loose knot and down my shoulders in a pearl-white sheet. A rose petal finds its way out, too. I watch it drift out on the faint breeze, turning circles over itself, before it coasts down to rest on the deer-track in front of us. I am careful to step over it in my next stride so it will not be crushed.
The field starts to narrow ahead of us. The grasses become sparser and sparser, turning from long ribbons of wheat into scrubby bluegrass and camellia bushes, and then the forest rises up again. One cedar appears, surrounded by flowers; then a second one pops up, then a third; and within a few heartbeats we are absorbed in the Viride once more, the stars blotted out by its thick canopy, moonlight streaming only through the finest spaces in the leaves.
“Hm,” I say. My voice is earnest and thoughtful, a little musing hum as I turn the question over in my mind. “Perhaps neither. It might be that the Earth is chasing them both. Ah, and that would be why we only see one at a time—the moon rests while the sun is pursued, and vice versa.”
I shrug then, and tease him in a voice that rings with suppressed laughter: “I wonder if you think I am more well-read than I am. Do you believe I might decide the universe, Mister Pravda?”
Things are sweeter when they're lost. I know--because once I wanted something and got it. It was the only thing I ever wanted badly, and when I got it it turned to dust in my hand.
E
ven with an attempt of humor, Pravda’s mind revolves around the moral implications—around what it means, the symbolism of his own color. But she rewards him with a small smile, warm and genuine, and then something far more grand: he watches as she theatrically tosses her head back and sighs, and watches in awe as her hair cascades down her shoulders and neck. Pravda is warm. He is warm all over, and all he can do is smile, a smile that is shy and a little awkward and wants nothing more than to make her smile that way again and again.
“Already forgiven, Ms. Katerina.” Pravda remarks, but now he is serious. Now he studies her with a quiet, nearly analytic eye. The itching of her familiarity bothers him. And yet, speaking with her, meeting her eyes, Pravda still cannot discern why he feels as if he knows her. The small clearing gives way again to the thickness of the Viride. Pravda has walked it at nights when the moonlight does not penetrate the canopy, and the forest screams with creatures unseen and unknown.
Tonight, he hears only crickets and the grass and leaves breaking underfoot. The sweet, sweet smell of the crushed foliage, and her voice soft in the moonlight. Hm. Perhaps neither. It might be that the Earth is chasing them both.
She surprises him a second time in one night. He does not expect her answer, and when she adds, playfully: I wonder if you think I am more well-read than I am.
“That answer would solve many debates, wouldn’t it?” He smiles, briefly. “Would you like to decide the universe, Ms. Katerina? I think you would likely be a benevolent god, with good taste in literature.” This Pravda says with the utmost seriousness, however.
He is staring at me. He has been staring ever since he found me, and I don’t know if he means to be obvious or not—but his gaze follows me like a hungry dog. I feel its weight; the intensity with which he looks at me, his eyes sharp and blue as a blade made of sapphire.
I know it won’t be visible under the dark-red satin of my skin, so it doesn’t embarrass me as much as it normally would. But it’s still unlike me—the fact that he makes me blush. My face grows tingly and warm, and I feel the heat rise into my cheeks. I duck my head to my chest for a moment. The crisp, cold air comes in to nip at me, and the contrast of it against my now-fiery face sends a little shiver through me, from my flickering ears down to the wave of my tail.
Crickets sing around us. Their voices are shrill and clear and sweet over the sound of the rustling grass; the whispering leaves; the beating wings of birds.
Would you like to decide the universe, Ms. Katerina?
Instantly, unthinkingly, a smile flashes over my lips. My steps slow. I fall almost to a standstill, and tilt my head up, almost defiantly, to meet his eyes as evenly as I can. I see moonlight pour like silver over the fine lines of his face; I see the curl of his dark lashes, the line of his mouth in a brief smile, the ice-blue flash of his eyes when they catch the light.
For a moment I forget what I am going to say. I lapse into a quiet stare, calm and still as a deer, turning the thoughts over in my mind.
“If I were a god,” I tell him with a coy smile, “I would have seen to it that we went on a walk much before this.”
And I am serious. It should be visible in the way I look at him—my eyes wide and earnest, my mouth just faintly curled upward, my expression solemn but not cold.
“It’s late, Mister Pravda.” I swallow against the knot in my throat; my face is growing hot again, and this time I worry it will show. My gaze drops shyly. “Goodnight.”
I press my nose against his shoulder, just for a moment. His skin is warm and soft; he smells like the forest, and like the library: cedar smoke and book-binding glue and something dusty and sweet. I recognize it. I recognize it so strongly, so instantly, and so alarmingly that I jerk back like I've been shocked.
Then I pass him a smile as an apology and turn back towards home.
