Free Web NovelChapter 35: The Cost
She forgot the taste of her mother’s bread.
Not all at once. Not like a wall falling. Like a painting fading. The colors dimming. The edges softening. The thing she’d held for two centuries becoming less real with every hour.
She realized it at breakfast.
Ryuji made pancakes. The same as always. Golden. Round. The batter he’d memorized from a kitchen in Moscow in a world that didn’t exist anymore. He set her plate down. Poured her coffee. The morning ritual.
She ate. The pancakes were good. Nine out of ten. The same as always.
Then she tried to remember.
Her mother’s bread. The hidden kitchen at the back of the Nocthari palace. The dough under her mother’s hands. The burnt edges. The smell of charred grain and something warm underneath.
She could see the kitchen. The stone walls. The small window. The light. She could see her mother’s hands. The fingers working the dough. The motion. The rhythm.
But the taste was gone.
Not faded. Gone. The space where the taste had been was empty. Not blank. Empty. The way a tooth socket is empty after the tooth is pulled. The tongue goes to the space and finds nothing. The brain goes to the memory and finds absence.
"Selene."
She looked up. Ryuji was watching her. The void-dark eyes. The dead expression. But his hand was on the table. Reaching toward hers. The man who noticed everything had noticed the pause. The fork frozen halfway to her mouth. The eyes unfocused. The woman staring at a pancake like it had wronged her.
"What," she said.
"You stopped eating."
"I’m thinking."
"You stopped eating and your aura dipped. Your aura doesn’t dip when you think. It dips when something is wrong."
"Nothing is wrong."
"Your heartbeat just went from fifty-three to sixty-one. That’s not thinking. That’s distress."
"I’m not in distress."
"Selene."
She set down the fork. The pancake on the plate. The coffee in the cup. The breakfast he’d made. The morning that should have been normal. The morning that wasn’t normal because the taste of her mother’s bread had disappeared from her memory and she didn’t know when it had left or how much else had left with it.
"I can’t remember something," she said.
"What."
"My mother’s bread. The taste. I can see the kitchen. I can see her hands. I can smell the char. But the taste is gone."
He was quiet. The kitchen. The crystal light. The pancakes on the plate. The woman across from him losing the taste of a dead woman’s bread.
"When did you last remember it," he said.
"Yesterday. I could taste it yesterday. I was thinking about it while standing on the west wall. The crater. The void residue. I was thinking about the bread my mother made and the bread I made for the together meal and the taste was there."
"And today."
"Gone."
"Anything else."
She was quiet. The longer pause. The woman checking the rooms of her memory the way her husband checked the rooms of a building. Systematically. Methodically. Opening each door and finding what was behind it.
"The sound," she said.
"What sound."
"Of my first battle. I was seventeen. My father took me to the border. A skirmish with raiders. I manifested my aura for the first time. The sound it made. The crack. Like the sky splitting. I’ve carried that sound for two hundred and twenty-six years."
"And now."
"I can see the battle. I can feel the aura. I can remember the fear and the power and my father’s voice telling me to push harder. But the sound is gone. The specific crack. The frequency. The thing that made it my first battle instead of just a battle."
She looked at her hands. On the table. The hands that had held moon blades and made bread and pressed against a dead man’s chest and poured everything into the space where his heartbeat used to be.
"The void took them," she said.
"You don’t know that."
"What else would take them."
"The stress. The battle. The energy drain. Memory loss can follow extreme energy expenditure."
"This isn’t that. This isn’t fuzzy memories or details I can’t recall. This is specific. Targeted. The taste of my mother’s bread. The sound of my first battle. Two memories. Two precise memories. Gone. Not faded. Removed."
"The void took specific memories."
"The void took the things that mattered most."
He was quiet. The machinery running. The ledger calculating. The man who had been dead for three minutes trying to understand the cost of the thing that had brought him back.
"What else," he said.
"I don’t know."
"Check."
"I don’t want to check."
"Check, Selene."
She closed her eyes. The woman opening doors in her mind. Room by room. Memory by memory. The four centuries of life she’d accumulated. The experiences. The moments. The things that made her her.
"Day seven," she said. Eyes still closed. "The morning you served me coffee for the seventh time. You set the cup down and said ’your cup, wife’ and I said ’don’t call me wife’ and you said ’your cup, Selene.’ The first time you said my name without me asking."
"Gone?"
She opened her eyes.
"Gone."
The kitchen was silent. The pancakes cooling. The coffee steaming. The man across from the woman who was losing pieces of herself to save him.
"What else," he said. Quieter.
"The night Alexei arrived. I heard him break the doorframe. I was in the bedroom. I smiled. Not at the destruction. At the familiarity. The sound of my brother being my brother. I smiled and it was real."
"Gone."
"Gone."
"More."
"The smell of the garden before the graves. When the flower beds were just flower beds. Before they became camouflage for burial sites. The smell of the soil and the rain and the moon-berries that grew wild along the wall."
"Gone."
"Gone."
She pressed her palms flat on the table. The wood under her hands. The physical anchor. The thing that was real when the memories weren’t.
"Three memories," she said. "At least three. That I’ve found. There could be more. There could be dozens. Small ones. Specific ones. The details that make memories mine instead of just information."
"The void took the emotional specificity."
"The void took the FEELING. I can remember the facts. I know my mother made bread. I know I had a first battle. I know Alexei broke a doorframe. I know the garden smelled like rain. But the FEELING is gone. The thing that made those memories alive. The taste. The sound. The smile. The smell. The void took the sensory experience and left the data."
"The data without the feeling."
"The story without the soul."
He stood. Came around the table. Stood beside her. The man who had been dead for three minutes standing next to the woman who was losing the things that made her alive.
"I’ll fix it," he said.
"You can’t fix it."
"I’ll find a way."
"The void took my memories to bring you back. That was the price. You can’t unpay a price."
"Watch me."
"RYUJI."
"I’ll find the memories. Somewhere. In the void. In the scar. In whatever connected us when you poured your power into my chest. The void took something from you and put something in me. Maybe the memories are there."
"In the void in your eyes."
"Maybe."
"You want me to look for my memories in your EYES."
"I want you to try."
She looked at him. The man standing beside her chair. The void-dark eyes. The scar over his heart. The body that had been dead and was now alive. The man who was offering his eyes as a filing cabinet for her stolen memories.
"That’s the strangest thing you’ve ever said," she told him.
"I’ve said stranger."
"You once told me that pancakes were economics."
"That was accurate."
"That was STRANGE."
"Look at my eyes."
She stood. Facing him. The violet looking into the void-dark. The demon princess looking into the eyes of the man she’d brought back from death. Her power looking at the thing her power had created.
She looked.
Deep. Into the void-dark irises. Past the nearly-black surface. Into the depth. The space between stars. The space between heartbeats. The absence that her power had filled with life.
She saw something.
Not a memory. Not a taste or a sound or a smell. A shape. A pattern. The outline of something that had existed and been taken and deposited in the space behind his eyes.
"There," she whispered.
"What."
"I see something. Not the memories. The shape of them. Like... like a footprint in snow. The snow is gone but the impression is there."
"The void left impressions."
"It left ROOMS. Empty rooms where the memories used to be. I can see the doors. I can see the shapes. But the rooms are empty."
"Can you fill them."
"I don’t know."
"Try."
She tried. Pushed her aura into his eyes. The violet glow touching the void-dark. Her power reaching into the space where her memories had been deposited.
The void pushed back.
Not violently. Gently. The way a wall stands against a breeze. The void holding its contents. Protecting them. The memories were there. The impressions were there. But the void wasn’t giving them back.
"Not yet," she said.
"Not yet."
"The void is holding them. Protecting them. Like it’s saving them for something."
"For what."
"I don’t know."
"When."
"I don’t know."
She stepped back. The contact broken. Her aura fading. His eyes returning to their normal void-dark.
"I can’t get them back yet," she said.
"Yet."
"Yet."
"Then we wait."
"We wait."
"And I cook."
"You cook."
"And you eat."
"I eat."
"And we sit at this table and drink coffee and pretend that everything is normal while a void holds your memories hostage in my eyes."
"Yes."
"That’s insane."
"This entire marriage is insane." frёeweɓηovel.coɱ
"It started with a contract."
"It started with pancakes."
"It started with you trying to kill me."
"That too."
She sat back down. Picked up her fork. Cut a piece of pancake. Put it in her mouth.
Chewed.
Swallowed.
"Nine out of ten," she said.
"Same as always."
"The taste is still here."
"The pancake taste."
"The pancake taste. The one you make. The one that’s yours. The void didn’t take that."
"It better not. That taste is copyrighted."
"By who."
"By my mother. Who taught me. Who lives in the tamago and the pancakes and the stir-fry and the bread. The void can take the taste of your mother’s bread. But it can’t take the taste of mine. Because mine is still being made. Every morning. By my hands. For you."
She looked at him. The man who had just told her that his cooking was void-proof because he made it every day. The man who believed that the act of making something kept it alive. The man who cooked for the dead by feeding the living.
"You’re right," she said.
"I’m always right."
"You’re NOT always right."
"I’m adjacent to always right."
"Don’t push it."
He sat back down. Picked up his coffee. Sipped. The same as always. The flat expression. The dead eyes. The wrinkled shirt. The man who had been dead for three minutes and was now sitting at a table drinking coffee and telling his wife that her stolen memories were safe in his eyes.
"Ryuji," she said.
"What."
"Thank you."
"Don’t thank me."
"For keeping them. Even if I can’t get them back yet. For holding them."
"I’m not holding them. The void is."
"The void is in you. So you’re holding them."
"That’s not how anatomy works."
"In this estate, anatomy works however I say it works."
"Fine."
"Fine."
"Your memories are safe, Selene."
"For now."
"Forever."
"Nothing is forever."
"This is."
She looked at him. The dead eyes. The flat voice. The man saying forever with the same tone he used for grocery lists.
"You can’t promise forever," she said.
"I can promise adjacent to forever."
"That’s not the same."
"It’s close enough."
"Close enough isn’t forever."
"It’s the best I’ve got."
She was quiet. The kitchen. The crystal light. The pancakes. The coffee. The man across from her who held her memories in his eyes and her heartbeat in his chest and her love in the scar over his heart.
"Close enough," she said.
"Close enough."
"I’ll take it."
"Good." fɾeewebnoveℓ.co๓
"Don’t gloat."
"I don’t gloat."
"Your face is gloating."
"My face is the same as always."
"Your face is slightly less dead than usual. That’s gloating."
"Your heartbeat is going up."
"Because YOU’RE gloating."
"I’m not gloating. I’m satisfied."
"THAT’S GLOATING."
"Noted."
She threw a piece of pancake at him. It hit his chest. The void scarred chest. The pancake bounced off the place where he’d died and landed on the table.
He picked it up. Ate it.
"Waste not," he said.
"I threw it at you."
"And I ate it. The circle is complete."
"That’s not a circle."
"It’s adjacent to a circle."
"I’m going to bed."
"It’s morning."
"I’m going to bed ANYWAY."
"After breakfast."
"After breakfast."
She ate her pancake. He ate his. The thrown piece included. The kitchen warm. The coffee hot. The memories gone but the taste remaining. The void holding what it had taken. The man holding what he could.
The morning continued.
-----------------------
[System Log: Day 31]
[MEMORY LOSS DETECTED: WIFE]
[CONFIRMED LOST MEMORIES: 3]
[1. TASTE OF MOTHER’S BREAD]
[2. SOUND OF FIRST BATTLE]
[3. SMILE DURING ALEXEI’S ARRIVAL]
[ADDITIONAL: SMELL OF GARDEN BEFORE GRAVES]
[ADDITIONAL: MORNING OF FIRST NAME USAGE]
[...]
[MEMORY LOSS TYPE: SENSORY. EMOTIONAL.]
[FACTUAL DATA INTACT. EXPERIENTIAL DATA REMOVED.]
[THE VOID TOOK THE FEELING AND LEFT THE FACTS.]
[...]
[MEMORY LOCATION: VOID IN HUSBAND’S EYES]
[RECOVERY STATUS: NOT YET POSSIBLE]
[VOID IS PROTECTING THE MEMORIES]
[VOID IS HOLDING THEM]
[VOID IS NOT GIVING THEM BACK]
[YET]
[...]
[THE PRICE OF RESURRECTION: MEMORY]
[THE PRICE OF SAYING NO TO DEATH: LOSING THE THINGS THAT MADE LIFE WORTH LIVING]
[THE VOID IS FAIR]
[THE VOID IS EXACT]
[THE VOID TAKES WHAT IT IS OWED]
[...]
[PANCAKE TASTE: INTACT]
[THE TASTE THAT IS STILL BEING MADE IS SAFE]
[THE TASTE THAT WAS ONLY REMEMBERED IS GONE]
[THE LESSON: MAKE THINGS. DON’T JUST REMEMBER THEM.]
[...]
[HEARTBEATS: 52 AND 53]
[THE NUMBERS HOLD]
[WHILE THE MEMORIES FADE]
[THE NUMBERS HOLD]
END OF Chapter 35
