Suddenly, her words are real.
The Lightbringer shall rise, that the sky might fall.
And she believes everything will somehow be reborn. Maybe eventually some kind of plant will take root again, but the idea that the world itself could ever …
My blood unlocked the scroll just as if it were a DNA lock in the palace. That means our tech is here, all over the place, mixed in with faith and magic and ancient prophecy. The scroll could hold the key to bringing down the sky-islands. If that’s true, the end of the world is no metaphorical idea—Nimhcoulddo it.
“What will it be like? After?” I ask, still hoping for a loophole and stalling for time.
“No one can say with absolute certainty,” she replies. “No one in this age could have witnessed anything before its beginning. But there have been many, many remakings before. Infinite worlds, an unbroken chain of life and death and rebirth. There will be beauty again. There will be people, just as there are people now—but the world will be full of life and hope and bounty, and the people will no longer be starving or sick or huddled against the mist-storms.”
I want to crawl away from her. I want to throw up. I know I’m not concealing my expression—she must see the horror and the disgust I’m feeling. She takes a deep, bracing breath. “This world was meant to end centuries ago, North—that is why these lands are so sick, their people so full of suffering. We had a Lightbringer once, and he fled to the skies with the rest of the gods, leaving us with no hope, no end to the infinite decline of our home. Until now.” Her eyes are burning with a kind of dark fire, hope and certainty and pleading all at once.
“But there are ways to fix your problems,” I say, hearing the desperation in my own voice. “If I am the Star, I can show youso manythings! In Alciel, we have technology that could help feed your people. We can turn bad water to fresh, we grow large amounts of food on small stretches of land. We probably have sky-steel all over the place without realizing it—maybe enough to shield everyone here from the mist! Maybe with the changes my people could bring to this place, it would be as if the old worldhadended and a new one had come. After all, if nobody’s ever seen this cycle happen, how can we know?Thatis what I could show you. That’s how I could light your way.”
“You sound like the Graycloaks!” she blurts. “Trying to postpone what is already a thousand years too late. We have suffered for centuries, North—we have starved and died and pitted brother against brother in wars over clean water to drink and a safe place to live, because we had no choice. But the world still falters, and my people are still dying, and the ones who live still do so in agony. You have seen only a fraction of our suffering, and only for a few days. I have witnessed it my entirelife. My people have lived it for generations.”
There are tears in her eyes now, but she doesn’t bother to wipe them away. The dawn light catches them, making them diamonds as she continues speaking. “All my life, I have wanted nothing more than to find a way to help my people, and all my life, I have had to watch, powerless, with no hope of change.Thisis our hope.Iam our hope. If I am the one destined to bring this gift to my people, how can I not do so?”
“How can you do it at the expense ofmypeople?” I demand. “They don’t want to die. They don’t want to be reborn. You don’t get to decide this on your own, Nimh!”
“I am deciding nothing,” she replies, her voice rising to match mine. “This is not some foolish belief. Have you not seen all that has happened to bring us here, to this moment? The Star fell, the empty one found it, together they brought forth the Lightbringer … None of it is happening the way I thought it would, but still, here we stand!”
“Coincidence,” I mutter, dizzy and sick.
“Destiny,” she retorts. “Where do you think these prophecies come from? Do you think they are just pretty stories, written by delusional fools? Delusional fools like me?”
I wish I could deny it—I wish I could tell her I don’t think she’s delusional and I don’t think she’s a fool. The Nimh I know is clever and caring and resourceful and brave beyond anything I’ve ever had to imagine.
But maybe my idea of her was never real. My voice shaking, I try one last appeal. “All those people, Nimh. Yours and mine. They would alldie. How can that be something you want to happen?”
“What choice do I have?” she cries.
“There is always a choice!” I snap in reply.
She exhales slowly, her eyes wet with unshed tears. “I don’t want anyone to die. But everything,everything, is part of the cycle of death and rebirth. Even the most beautiful, massive hirta tree in the forest-sea cannot live forever. When it dies, it decomposes, returning its life to the earth, and clearing a space for the sun, and a hundred new plants spring up from its grave. The old must make way for the young—it is the way of life itself.” She pauses, then adds with a hint of frustrated venom, “Or has your ‘technology’ conquered death itself?”
“Of course not,” I say quietly. “One day my grandfather will die to make way for my mother, and she will die to make way for me. But there’s a difference between that natural cycle of death and rebirth, and simply killing everyone in both our worlds.”
“Life is precious to me, North, more precious than you can possibly …” Her voice cracks, and she passes a hand over her face, regathering herself. “Why do you think we call our destroyer the Lightbringer? It is because he—because I—amlight, for a people living in darkness. I am hope.”
“But it’s not just you, is it?” I ask quietly. “I’m the Last Star. And I’m supposed to play some role in this. Well, I won’t do it.”
I push to my feet, my muscles aching.
“North,” she says, voice aching with appeal.
I shake my head and take a step back. A shiver runs through me in the early light, and … andwait.
The shiver continues down at my wrist.
It’s my chrono. My chrono isvibrating.
I yank my wrist up with a gasp, and Nimh scrambles to her feet to try to see what I see. The same display I’ve been seeing since I touched down is still there:
CALCULATOR TIME/DATE BIO-FEEDS SCAN PICS NOTES MESSAGE ARCHIVE
But beneath it, there’s a new icon. One I’ve seen thousands of times, but never with a leap of my heart like I’m feeling now.
