The shade didn’t say a word, didn’t falter, and didn’t stare. If Shira’s movements made the air hum around her, the shade made it scream.

All abandon was lost, and the shade shrieked over the tiles, right toward Mosel.

But since the body knows more than the mind, Shira’s had crouched in preparation before her voice assailed the full-to-bursting space between the two shades like sunrise.

Mosel didn’t hear Shira’s prayer, but felt the shape of it, warm and sharp, as though it could touch her. It remained suspended for a moment, bound to Shira by strings Mosel couldn’t see, while the opposing shade took flight. The shade was almost on top of her before the letters in Shira’s prayer carved themselves into the darkness. Mosel watched the characters שִׁח appear where the shade’s heart should have been, and the shade grew still, suspended by her voice. Another two letters followed to the left: רוּ, their backs glinting gold like loops of gilded thread. These letters knocked the shade back and it fell to the ground, twitching like a capsized beetle.

Without the shade over her, Mosel could see Shira standing behind it, her feet on either side of where its head now rested. Her back was as straight as a cedar’s, the coils of her hair had raised like flames, and the hands above the shade were open, poised, and forceful as the tide. Mosel found herself stricken, but not by fear. Wonder fell over her limbs. She scrambled to her feet as Shira knelt to the ground. One last letter threaded itself into a new shape from the prayer it had been: ר.

At once, Shira bent full over the shade and placed her hands above the letters, which Mosel now saw spelled: שִׁחרוּר. She felt compelled to touch their gleaming forms, but something akin to Shira’s prayer kept her still and quiet. The other shade was silent as well, cracking and cold under the warmth of the incantation. Mosel watched, just as spellbound as the other shade.

“No more,” Shira said. Almost immediately, shards of the shade’s body fell to the ground, possessed by ringing, haunted, and hollow testimonies. They were the most beautiful sounds that Mosel had ever heard. The fallen shards of darkness melted into the tile. Soon, only the swatch of painted linen was left.

Shira picked it up and stood; Mosel remained in her position, watching her. Before Shira folded the linen, Mosel was able to make out the design painted on the fabric: a circle crossed by a vertical line. Curiosity crepitated within her chest, and yet another seed was lost.

After Shira had placed the folded linen in the pocket of her slacks, Mosel felt the weight around her words break, the intensity in the air fade. “A shade,” she said.

“That’s right,” said Shira. She paused a moment. “Are you hurt, Mosel? It went straight for you.”

“No, I don’t think so,” Mosel said. “Well, perhaps. I think I was scared…being scared hurt a little bit.” Now that she paid attention to the space she filled, she noticed that she was, in fact, still trembling. The body indeed knows more than the mind; each of Mosel’s flurrying breaths held more of the could-have-been than Mosel could fit in her limited understanding of the shade.

“Ah, there now,” Shira said softly. She extended a hand and helped Mosel to her feet. “There’s something I could try. Would it be alright if I gave you a hug?”

“What’s a hug?” Mosel asked. Even as she spoke, her voice already seemed far away from her body. However, she could still feel the tail of the words in her throat as Shira walked forward and wrapped her short arms about Mosel’s shoulders. More heat than she would have thought it ever possible to feel flooded the entirety of her being, and she was suddenly taut as the stone above the Citadel. More so even, because Mosel had seen that stone dance. Her pomegranate heart was the only dancing thing in her, capering hither and tither with pulsing exhilaration. It felt as though it were a hatching egg about to burst at the sensation of Shira’s arms about her.

“Oh,” was all Mosel said.

Shira didn’t speak, but abruptly pulled away at Mosel’s voice, uncharacteristically nervous. “I’m sorry,” she said hastily. “Did it help at all?”

To be honest, Mosel couldn’t tell at all if it had helped. She held her arms self-consciously, feeling them shiver beneath her touch. With the quaking, however, came another emotion that filled the place in her mind where words should have dwelt. It was a high sort of feeling, and she thought that she might float away if her jitters didn’t cease.

“I think it helped,” she responded carefully. “I don’t quite feel scared anymore.”

“Oh, that’s a relief,” Shira said kindly. She then sighed and glanced at where the shade had dissolved into the tile. “We should get going in any case. The Mote’s not far, and the Moors are just beyond.”

Shira led the way from the common room and through the twisting corridors beyond, where she eventually managed to thread them both out of the temple entirely. They were back under the stone and amid the green, and Mosel was content to watch the softly swaying, unlit lanterns careen within the arms of the trees. The edges of her heels skated the moss that grew over the path, which in turn, undulated between her toes. It seemed to remember Mosel’s gratitude from before.

“How do you know where we’re going if you can’t see, Shira?” asked Mosel, whose gaze had caught on a drop of pale, translucent liquid falling from the cavern ceiling. It landed to her side with a fluttering whisper against a protruding shoulder of stone; Mosel knew she had just witnessed a secret.

“I’ve lived here all my life, remember?” Shira responded. The gentle thrum of the air about her had coalesced into something dense, focused. “Forty-seven steps from the well that the shade emerged from to the Mote. We have only a small distance to cross.”

At Shira’s words, Mosel realized that she had watched the scenery pass to either side, but hadn’t looked ahead in some time. The inferred knowledge of where they were, where they had walked to, sifted shakily through her. The motion of looking forward and up from the ground felt like moving through sand. Her head was heavy as her heart even as the red she had dreamed of dripped over her upturned gaze. The Mote sprawled before them, from left to right.

Seemingly on impulse, Shira reached to her side and nestled her hand over Mosel’s. “It will be alright,” she said. “Please believe me. We simply need to cross.”

Mosel knew Shira couldn’t see, but nodded anyway. However, the fabric of her wisteria cloak murmured against itself with the small movement, which was enough for Shira to hear. Shira nodded in response, then continued toward the Mote. Mosel hadn’t noticed that she had halted in her tracks, but gathered her mettle to follow Shira toward the shifting, silent redness. Beneath her, the moss eventually gave way to barren soil, and she felt its apology and fear as it left her company.

When they were about three steps from the Mote’s body, Shira stopped, and Mosel followed suit. Not a moment later, the Mote rose. It throbbed, bled, heaved up and over them as thin, web-like roots threaded the air around them like string through a needle’s eye. Words as old and knowing as a thousand voices spoke from the sweet bitterness. They were held by invisible strings, like Shira’s prayer, but emptier than death. Shira didn’t look up – she couldn’t see. Mosel couldn’t look away.

“You have come,” the Mote’s voice said, inevitably.