Chapter 239: Why I Came Back

Logan did not remember falling asleep, but he woke on the shingle with Alice’s head on his shoulder.

The old man was still sitting where he had been, against the black rock. Vina was asleep across his knees with both hands round his fist. Link still stood guard over them, and nothing about the three of them had changed.

’He did not sleep,’ Logan thought. ’He watched the cave the whole time.’

He looked inside himself for holes and found none that mattered. Everything he had told Alice was still there. Everything she had told him was there too.

One by one, the others woke.

Martha brought the pot. Nobody touched it.

They sat in a loose half circle on the shingle facing Rishin, the way they might have sat round a fire. The units stood behind them. Billy rolled in close behind Logan and went still, and Hob lay down with his chin on the stones beside Daniel.

Vina woke last. She sat up on the old man’s knees, rubbed her eyes and saw everyone looking at him.

She climbed down and sat at his feet, facing the others, with her back against his shins.

"I am here," she said. "You can start."

Rishin looked down at the top of her head.

"Before I ever came to your world," he said, "I had a world. Garen and Isolde know that much. So does the boy. I told you on the mountain how it ended."

"The Abyss overflowed," said Logan.

"Yes." The old man’s voice was dry and level. "Someone had to reach the bottom before the time ran out. I reached it. I was too late."

He opened his fist.

The two stones sat in the hollow of his hand. He did not look at them. He looked at the family.

"When I went in," he said, "I did not go in alone."

Helen’s hand went to her mouth.

"I had a wife," said Rishin. "Her name was Saya. I had a daughter. Her name was Nell." He stopped, and then went on in the same flat voice. "Nell was eleven when the Abyss pulled her in after me."

Vina turned round to stare up at him.

"Eleven," she said. "Like me?"

"Like you, little one."

His hand closed partway over the stones, and then opened again.

"On the mountain, you would not stop pestering me through the whole meal. You talked to me as if you had known me all your life." The corner of his mouth lifted. "Nell talked to everyone like that."

Nobody interrupted him. Logan could hear the faint lap of the Mere behind them on the shingle.

"We went down together," said Rishin. "Every layer. The three of us, and the others who came with us. Some of the layers were the same as the ones you have walked. Some were not."

"Were they like ours?" asked Garen. "The blessings? The curses?"

"Love," said the old man. "Always love. It took different shapes."

His eyes dropped to the stones.

"They did not reach the bottom," he said. "They gave themselves so that I would. I will not tell you how. Not here. You will understand enough of it when you see where we are going."

Isolde had her hand pressed flat against her chest.

"Senior," she said. Her voice shook. "We did not know. In all the time we have known you, we never knew."

"I did not tell anyone." Rishin turned the stones over with his thumb. "I reached the bottom alone and ascended, and when I looked back, my world was gone. There was nobody left to tell."

Logan thought of the mountain and the hut and the pond. He remembered Rishin ladling soup into stone bowls for strangers. He thought of how gently he had always talked to Vina, from that first meal on.

’He was talking to her,’ he thought. ’Every time, he was talking to Nell.’

"They are not dead," said Rishin.

Helen made a small, broken sound.

"Not in the way you mean. The Abyss keeps what is given to it in love. That is what it longs for. That is what it is for." He closed his fist on the stones. "Saya and Nell gave themselves to it, for me. It kept them. They are down there."

He nodded once at the dark mouth of the cave.

"At the bottom. They have been waiting there since my world ended."

Logan understood all of it at once.

He saw the two flat candles on the Second Layer, pointing straight down and never moving. He saw the half of the old man’s cut on the Sixth Layer, running down a thread into the dark. He saw the old promise on the Eighth that had pulled Rishin toward the pit when nothing else could.

He saw the cairn on the Ninth Layer, and the two stones nobody could lift.

He saw the Tenth, where Rishin had lost nothing because two people far below remembered all of it with him.

"The candles," Alice said. She had worked it out too. "On the Second Layer. They pointed down because they were pointing at them."

"Yes."

"And the stones," said Vina.

She was still sitting at his feet. She had turned all the way round now, kneeling, and her eyes were on the closed fist.

"Those are theirs," she said. "Like the pebble was mine. They are cross with you."

"They have not forgiven me." Rishin looked at the stones in his hand. "Or I have not let them. I do not know which. I will not know until I stand in front of them."

"For what?" Vina’s voice wobbled. "What did you do?"

"I lived, little one," said the old man. "I went on without them. I reached the bottom, and it was not enough, and I lived anyway."

Edda had gone white.

She was gripping her father’s arm in both hands, and she was not looking at Rishin. She was looking at the cave.

"Grandmother," she said. "The warden on the Second Layer took her down. My candle pointed down the stair. It still pointed down, every time I looked."

Bram’s face had gone still.

"Is she," Edda began, and stopped. "Did it keep her?"

Rishin studied her white face.

"I do not know," he said gently. "I know only about mine. I will not tell you yes, girl, when I do not know it."

Edda nodded. She pressed her face into her father’s shoulder, and Bram stroked her hair with one broad hand.

Daniel cleared his throat.

"Senior," he said. "When you find them. What then?"

Everyone looked at the old man.

Rishin did not answer straight away. He looked out across the shingle at the white Mere, and then back at the girl kneeling in front of him.

"I promised Nell I would come back for her," he said. "That is the thread you saw on the Eighth Layer, boy. I am keeping it."

"That is not an answer," said Daniel.

"It is the one I have."

Vina got up.

She stood in front of him with her fists clenched at her sides, and Logan thought she was going to cry. She did not.

She reached into his coat pocket, drew out the bark strip and unfolded it. Then she held it up so that he could see the last line.

IF HE FALLS DOWN I FALL DOWN WITH HIM.

"I wrote it," she said. "Every word. I promised on the Eighth Layer, and you said I could not give that one back."

Rishin looked at the words.

"Then I am coming down with you," said Vina. "All the way. I am going to meet Nell."