Brave Story (72 page)

“You okay?”

“Maybe not,” Wataru said. “I think I’ll go for a walk along the beach. Some fresh air will do me good.”

Walking down the outside steps, Wataru had to step over clumps of waterkin drinking and laughing. Alone at last, he let himself relax and flopped down onto the sand.

A soft sea wind brushed his cheeks. The night was anything but dark. Twinkling stars shone like silver sand spread on the deep navy blue cloth of the sky. Wataru enjoyed the feel of the sand beneath his fingertips and let the rhythm of the waves wash over him.

Vision was beautiful. Lying back like this, the night sky seemed even closer than when he had been sitting up. He felt like he could reach out and touch the heavens. The lilting sound of Meena singing reached his ears.

It was a ballad—a beautiful thing, with a shifting melody. Her sweet voice trembled sorrowfully, matching the rhythm of the waves.

So far away, the one I love.

What sky are you under tonight?

What wind will my song ride…

To carry my voice to you?

Tell me, winds,

Where he may be.

Tell me, winds,

What star he looks upon.

My ears are like two white seashells,

Listening for dawn to come.

It was a song about long-distance lovers. Or maybe it was a one-sided love. He closed his eyes and let his heart fill with happiness.

“Wataru, you’re not sleeping, are you?”

“Huh?!” he said jumping to his feet. “I haven’t heard from you since the hospital,”

“No, no, we talked after that too. Have you forgotten? Remember when that meek little starseer saved you by the Swamp of Grief? I spoke to you in your dream, while you slept. Don’t you remember?”

Wataru racked his foggy head, trying to remember. His memories were vague. He remembered Shin Suxin’s concerned look when his eyes first opened…

“Tsk. I’m disappointed. But no matter. We’ve met again, after all,” the sweet voice said cheerfully.

“I’m sorry, the poison from the swamp was making me hallucinate.”

“Oh? You weren’t seeing things. Everything really happened.”

Wataru froze.
What? It wasn’t an illusion—a nightmare?

“You…” he began.

“It’s okay, what you did. Really. Forget that now. What you need to focus on is what you’re
about
to do.”

“What I’m about to do?”

“You plan to go to the Goddess and ask her to stop the sacrifices, no? Do you really think you can do that?”

Wataru rubbed his eyes, and sat down on the sand. “How do you know that?”

“Your thoughts are easy enough to read,” she said with a chuckle. “I’m worried, though. I don’t think you know what it is you’re trying to do. I don’t think you’re fully aware.”

“Aware?”

“Oh, to be sure, it’s your choice if you want to go meet the Goddess and ask her to stop the sacrifices. She grants a wish to every Traveler who reaches the Tower of Destiny on his own. That is how it has been for ages. But I think you’re forgetting something. The Goddess may grant each Traveler only one wish. You don’t get two or three. If you ask her to stop the sacrifices, what will happen to your own destiny? Isn’t that why you came to Vision in the first place, to change your own fate?”

The sea breeze that blew gently through his hair suddenly turned cold. He could practically hear his body temperature drop.

The Goddess grants only one wish.

“I think you’ve remembered,” the sweet voice said, sounding satisfied. “You are too nice for your own good, Wataru. Who cares about the people here in Vision? You have to go back to the real world someday, and once you do you’ll never meet the people here again. What does it matter to you who’s chosen for the sacrifice?”

Wataru wrapped his arms around his shoulders.
It’s true. I forgot. I was having so much fun here in Vision, I forgot why I came in the first place.

I forgot about my mother.

“But, but I…” Wataru began, his voice choked. “How can I let the sacrifices continue if I have a choice?”

“Even if it has nothing to do with you?”

“It does have something to do with me!” he said, suddenly shouting. “I’ve been through a lot since I came here. I’ve seen a lot. Some things have been scary, and some cruel, but I’ve also met lots of kind, gentle people. They’re my friends! What goes on here in Vision does have something to do with me!”

“More than your mother does?” the voice said, her words like tiny needles on Wataru’s skin. “You have a choice, but you can choose only one. What will you do? Can you just tell your mother sorry, you can’t help? Can you tell her to just accept her fate?”

“I…”

“Would you sacrifice your mother’s happiness for people you’ll never meet again in a world you’ll never visit twice? Would that make you happy? Would that make your mother happy? Would she be proud to have you as a son?”

Wataru clapped his hands over his ears. “Stop! Don’t say those things.”

“But you have to hear them,” the syrupy voice echoed in his mind just as loud as before. She sounded almost happy at the consternation she was causing Wataru. “You either choose Vision, or you choose your mother. Choose Vision, and you must go back home and apologize to your mother. I think I know what she’ll say. She’ll say she’s happy she raised you to be so kind, that you would help others before you help yourself. Of course, she’d be lying. You know how she really feels…”

“Shut up!”

The sweet voice continued: “Inside, she’ll be torn to pieces. All that time I spent raising you, oh, what a cold, cold son, she’ll say. Never thinking of his mother’s happiness, always wanting to please the crowd, and secretly never reaching out to the one who needs his help most—when it was so easy. He had a chance!”

“I said shut up! My mom’s not like that! You’re wrong!”

“Oh? Are you so sure? Your father just betrayed you, didn’t he? You didn’t think he was capable of doing that, and yet he did. Just. Like. That. You were discarded, Wataru. Tossed aside—baggage, unwanted litter. That’s how people are and your mother’s no different.”

Wataru could no longer hear the whispering of the waves. That horrible sweet voice echoed in his ears, lodging itself in his head.

“Think about it. You’re the same too,” the voice said. Wataru swore he could hear her grinning.

“I’m the same?”

“Yes. You came here to change your destiny, no? You wanted your father to abandon his lover, abandon the child she would bear for him, to come back to you and your mother.”

That’s true.
What he had done was wrong. Wataru just wanted to set it straight again.

“But what about his lover then? Have you thought about her? Or the child? If you had your way, they’d be the ones abandoned. Or would you try to change things earlier, so she’d never met your father in the first place, perhaps? That still wouldn’t change how he felt. It wouldn’t fill that hole in his heart that cried out because he’d never met the one he truly loved. Would you ask him to make that sacrifice just so you and your mother could be happy? Would that be true happiness?”

Wataru felt his strength—his will—draining into the sand on the beach. He couldn’t stand. He couldn’t even lift his head. It was all he could do to slouch there, pummeled by the sweet voice’s words over and over again.

“You’re just as selfish as he is,” she said crisply.

“So…what are you telling me to do then?” Wataru asked, his voice weak.

“Ah hah! I’ve been waiting for you to ask me that. Destroy the Goddess. Then you can become Lord of Vision. I don’t know what foolishness Wayfinder Lau told you, but I know the truth. The real world and Vision are like two sides of the same coin. How else could the Goddess affect the destinies of people in your world, Wataru?”

Two sides of the same coin.

“You could go to the Goddess on bended knee and beg to change your little meaningless destiny…or you could grasp all of Vision and your world in your hands. All would bow to you, and do exactly as you say. If you told your father not to carry emptiness in his heart, he would not. He could not. If you told your mother to love you she would, dutifully. And if you told your father’s lover she wasn’t needed in the world, she would simply cease to be. If you said that her baby never existed, it never did. The whole world would change as you see fit, and you wouldn’t feel a shred of guilt. You will be enlightened.”

The world would exist for you alone.

“What happiness, what joy! What a beautiful way for the world to be. Don’t you think so, Wataru?”

For a moment there was silence—an utter absence of sound.

Wataru slowly shook his head. “I won’t do it,” he whispered. “I won’t.” The trembling faded from his voice.

I like Kee Keema and Meena because of who they are. Their kindness,
their gentleness touches me—that’s why we’re friends.

And Togoto—he carried me through the sky not because I willed him to do it but because he respected the station of a Highlander. And Kutz, when she followed me into Meena’s hospital room, she did it out of a sense of duty.

Their actions have meaning because they act of their own free will. What would be the point if everything happened as I wished it? I don’t think that would be beautiful at all.

“You’re wrong,” he said quietly. “What are you, really? Why are you telling me these things?”

The whispering of the waves. More silence.

“You really disappoint me, you know that?” the sweet voice answered in a low tone. “But, fine. Do whatever you like, my little goody-two-shoes Brave. You still have time to reconsider. I have a feeling you’ll end up following my advice.”

“Never!”

“Now you’re shouting. Here, let me tell you something. You’ve been duped, right from the very start.

“That young starseer doesn’t know all there is to know about the Great Barrier of Light, or the sacrifice necessary to maintain it. In fact, he was unaware of the most important part. Not only him, but most of the people here in Vision don’t know.”

“Don’t know what?!”

“Not only one person is sacrificed,” the sweet voice said slowly. “To rebuild the Great Barrier requires two sacrifices: one from Vision, and another, a Traveler from the real world. Each of these…is called the Half.”

Wataru had trouble understanding what he was hearing.

“It’s like I said. Vision and the real world are two sides of the same coin. How could something as great and powerful as the Barrier be built from only one side? A sacrifice from the real world is necessary too.”

Once every ten years, the Porta Nectere opens, and a lone Traveler comes from the real world burning with a passion to change their destiny.

“The Porta lets in a Traveler and delivers them to the Goddess—a sort of sharing of blood between Vision and your world. But, once in a thousand years, when it comes time for the Mending, things are different. Two Travelers come to Vision and one of them, the Half, must give himself up as a sacrifice. If he does not, both the real world and Vision will be plunged into chaos forever.”

Duped. Tricked.

“And Wayfinder Lau saw fit to tell you nothing of this, did he? What was your friend’s name—Mitsuru? You are the two Travelers. One of you has been chosen to be the Half already…and that old coot didn’t tell you a thing, did he? Be sure of it, he knows the truth. He just didn’t want you to become frightened and try to go back to the real world. Of course, Mitsuru doesn’t know what’s going to happen, either. Though, he’s much, much smarter than you are. I should think he’s gotten an inkling of the truth by now.”

Wataru heard bubbling laughter in his ears. Who could be laughing?

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” the voice apologized. “It’s just, you looked so cute there, staring at the sea, frightened out of your wits. You don’t have to be so worried. We don’t know that you are the Half yet. But be warned: Mitsuru is a stronger Traveler than you, and he did come here first. Perhaps he will beat you to the Tower of Destiny, have his wish, and go home to the real world. Two minus one is one, Wataru. That would leave only you here in Vision to become the Half. So sorry.”

Lies! All of it, lies!
The words rose in Wataru’s throat, but there they stopped.
She’s mocking me.

“You don’t believe me?”

How does she know what I’m thinking all the time?!

“It’s okay, you don’t have to believe me if you don’t want to. Soon you won’t be left with any choice but to accept the truth of what I’ve told you. Of course, by then, it will already be too late,” the voice giggled. “I think I’ll be leaving now. See you soon.”

Oh, and don’t forget…

“Destroy the Goddess. No matter which way you turn, there’s no other path for you to take.”

Chapter 28
The Elder of Sakawa