That was four too many “hopefullys” for my taste.
It didn’t matter. I’d been effectively neutralized. Plucked from the number set and tossed into the quantum hall of variables, none of which computed into the only equation I understood and cared about.
There were billions of mirrors around me. Billions of portals. And I had a tough time choosing between fifteen shades of pink.
After a while, I checked my watch. It was stuck at 1:14 P.M.
I slipped off my coat and began to strip, tucking the pouch containing the stones in my waistband. The Hall was too warm for the layers I was wearing. I removed my sweater and long-sleeved knit jersey, and tied them around my waist, then put my coat back on.
I performed an inventory of items on my person.
One knife—an antique Scottish dirk—that the LM hadn’t known about, pilfered from the Baubles portion of Barrons Books and strapped to my left forearm.
One baby-food jar full of wriggling Unseelie flesh in my left coat pocket.
Two protein bars tucked into an inner coat pocket, squished.
One MacHalo, still strapped beneath my chin.
One cell phone.
I took inventory of what I didn’t have.
No batteries or flashlights.
No water.
No spear.
I stopped there. That was bad enough.
I pulled my cell phone from my back pocket and punched up Barrons’ number. I’ve become so accustomed to his invincibility that I expected it to ring, and when it didn’t, I was flabbergasted. Apparently even his cell service had dead spots, and if it wasn’t going to work somewhere, I could understand it not working here. Even if I’d had V’lane’s name, I doubted it would have worked in this place.
My own mind nearly didn’t work here. The longer I sat, the odder I began to feel.
The Hall wasn’t merely the confluence of infinite doorways to alternate places and times. The many portals made the Hall live and breathe, ebb and flow. The Hall was time. It was ancient and young, past and present and future, all in one.
BB&B exuded a sense of spatial distortion from harboring a single Silver in Barrons’ study.
These billions of mirrors opening onto the same hall created an exponentially compounded effect, both spatially and temporally. Time here wasn’t linear, it was … My mind couldn’t focus on it, but I was part of it, and I didn’t get that at all. I didn’t matter. I was essential. I was a child. I was a withered old woman. I was death. I was the source of all creation. I was the Hall and the Hall was me. A tiny bit of me seemed to bleed into every doorway.
Duality didn’t begin to describe it. Like this place itself, I was all possibles. It was the most terrifying feeling I’d ever felt.
I tried IYCGM.
No service.
I stared at IYD for a long time.
Ryodan had said he’d kill me if I used it when I didn’t need it.
My first thought was, I’d like to see him get here and try. My second thought was that I wouldn’t, because then he’d be here, too, and he really might kill me.
I couldn’t begin to present a convincing argument that I was dying. I might not like my current situation, but there was no arguing that I was in perfect health, with no apparent threat to my life in the immediate vicinity. Although I seemed to be growing more … confused by the moment.
Memories from my childhood had begun to stir in my mind, seeming too vivid and tantalizing for mere memories.
I skipped lightly over them, found one I liked.
My tenth birthday: Mom and Dad had thrown a surprise party for me.
The moment I chose to focus on it, it swelled with dramatic appeal, and there were my friends, laughing and holding presents, real, so real, waiting for me to join them in the dining room, where they were having cake and ice cream. I saw it all happening, right there in the molten gold of the floor I was staring down at. I traced my fingers over the vision. The gold rippled in the wake of my fingertips, and I was touching our dining room table, about to sink into it, slip inside my ten-year-old body in the chair, laughing at something Alina said.
Alina was dead. This was not now. This was not real.
I jerked my gaze away.
In the air in front of me, a new memory took shape: my first shopping trip to Atlanta with my aunts. It had left a serious impression on me. We were in Bloomingdale’s. I was eleven. I wandered, staring up at all the pretty things, no longer seeing the gold walls and mirrors.
I closed my eyes, stood, and shoved the cell phone into my back pocket.
I had to get out of this place. It was messing with my mind.
But where?
I opened my eyes and began moving. The moment I did, the memories vanished from the air around me and my mind was clear again.
A thought occurred to me. Frowning, I walked a few yards and stopped.
The memories resumed.
My daddy was cheering at my first ever—and last—softball game. He’d bought me a pink mitt with magenta stitching. My mom had embroidered my name and flowers on it. The boys were laughing at me and my mitt. I ran to catch a ground ball to prove to them how tough I was. It popped up and slammed me in the face, bloodying my nose and chipping a tooth.
I winced.
They laughed harder, pointing.
I manipulated the memory, fast-rewound, caught the ball perfectly threw out the runner at home plate, and got it there in plenty of time for the catcher to take out the runner at third.
The boys were awed by my ball-playing prowess.
My daddy puffed with pride.
It was a lie, but an oh-so-sweet one.
I began walking again.
The memory exploded into pink-mitt dust and sprinkled the floor.
Stopping in the Hall was dangerous, perhaps even deadly.
My suspicion was confirmed a short time later when I passed a skeleton sitting cross-legged on the floor, leaning back against the gold wall between mirrors. Its posture evidenced no signs of struggle, gave no hint of agony in death. The face of the skull had—inasmuch as a skull could—a peaceful look to its bones. Had it starved to death? Or had it lived a hundred years, lost in dreams? I felt no hunger pangs, and should have, considering all I’d had since yesterday afternoon was coffee, hours ago. Did one even need to eat here, where time wasn’t what one expected at all?
I began glancing into the mirrors as I passed.
Some of the things in the mirrors glanced back, looking startled and confused. It seemed some of them could see me as clearly as I could see them.
I was going to have to make a choice, and sooner was probably wiser than later. I was beginning to think gold was the most peaceful, right, perfect color I’d ever seen. And the floor—so inviting! Warm, smooth, I could stretch out and rest my eyes a bit … gather my strength for what was certain to be an arduous journey.