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Love what if I told you I've been sinking in my sleep?
Still lost in that moment
Just a fading memory
Lucas opened his eyes in a thick twilight, broken only by a dim lamp swaying under the ceiling of the cabin. He had long been accustomed to falling asleep to the sound of a ship running over the waves, and the noise, breaking the even melody of creaking sides and fluttering sails, instantly woke him up.
“Amicia?”
In the faint warm light he could recognize her back and long, crumbling braid lingering to it. She sat in bed, curled up and buried her face in her knees, and in a moment Lucas heard a long, stifled moan, turning into inconsolable sobs. Amicia's shoulders heaved as if in a spasm; shoulder blades stuck out sharply under the white fabric of the shirt.
Entangled in the blanket and almost falling to the swinging floor, Lucas rushed to her.
“Amicia, I’m begging you…”
He grabbed her shoulders, feeling painfully how much they were trembling. Amicia didn't react to the touch, just shrunk even more, as if she was in unbearable pain.
“Look at me, please!” he screamed desperately and shook her, forcing Amicia to straighten up.
Amicia's face was wet and hot, tears were streaming down her cheeks uncontrollably. She wept, apparently seeing nothing and hardly realizing where she was; Lucas assumed that was a nightmare that’d woke her up, but now he was almost sure that it could be something else, something worse. Bad dreams had bothered her before, but never have Lucas seen her this broken.
“Hugo... Hugo…” he distinguished among the sobs and groans. His heart sank down and didn't break only because this abyss had no bottom.
That’s bad. So, so bad.
Almost ten years have passed since the worst day of their lives. Lucas and Amicia spent seven of them on a road that had no end in sight, looking for other Carriers, or at least traces of them, but all was in vain. The Order kept its secrets too carefully; or maybe there were no more secrets left, just as there were none of those who could protect them from alien eyes. The clues led them on a false trail, the questions were not answered, and the coincidences turned out to be just coincidences. Now they sailed across the sea, to the land of sand and yellow stone, looking for an ancient knowledge, but their hope was weak to the point of dying.
And I would do anything just to feel close to you
And I would give everything just to rewrite the truth
Lucas saw how tired Amicia was. In past few weeks she had almost stopped sleeping, barely ate and rarely spoke, for the hundredth time studying her journals, which she’d never let go with even for a second. She was haggard, her eyes, always so bright and passionate, dimmed, purple shadows lay under them. Lucas would be happy to do something for her to help her sleep; but they were on the ship, he was out of herbs for months already, and there was a month of journey ahead, which now seemed endless.
He hoped it would pass. Almost forced himself to believe it every time Amicia startled at any loud sound or recoiled at any touch of his. She just needs a little time, he was saying to himself when he noticed Amicia in a frightening stillness with her eyes drew to the void. What did she see in those moments? What dark waters of her own memory did she explore? He didn’t know. He didn’t want to know, and hated himself for it.
I've been silently trying to hold on to fractions of images
And light as a feather
The sound of your breathing clouds my mind
An unbearably long minute passed before something sensible flashed in Amicia's cloudy eyes; something like recognition. She clutched at Lucas, her fingers tightening around the shirt at his chest; he felt his collar pulled down, cutting into his neck.
“Amicia, it's me, I'm here,” Lucas whispered, stroking her face, hair, shoulders with quick, smooth movements, distracting, returning to reality. “Talk to me, sweetheart. Don't keep it inside, don't do that to yourself, please.”
Is this a dream?
Her eyebrows twitched, her face contorted; she took another deep, convulsive breath before exhaling - and her breath tangled with words that kicked the ground from under his feet.
“I can't remember his face anymore.”
Not a cry - a bitter, heart-rending wail tore from her chest.
It was a scream of a dying deer with a crossbow bolt sticking out its neck; it was the cry of a mother who has lost her child in the rubble of a ruined house; it was the sound of grief a mortal man can escape only in another world. Lucas held Amicia tightly to him, and let his own tears flow, unwitnessed.
He couldn't remember either.
Take it away
My sight or your face
I can't help but feel that I locked you away
Lucas knew it for months already. A realization, oddly mundane, came upon him as a small bronze fibula brooch caught his eye. He saw it, looking for something across Amicia's belongings, and the question flashed in his confused mind: whose is this?
It took him a few moments to remember where he'd seen this thing before. And this short, almost insignificant pause determined everything.
He couldn't remember what Hugo looked like.
Of course, Lucas remembered the feeling of a small hand in his own. Silky hair of a child, so soft under his palm. A small yellow hood, pinned up with this simple fibula. He even remembered a handful of assorted feathers, laid out in a funny order only Hugo could understand. But the face was gone.
He was looking at Amicia over and over again in an attempt to regain lost tender features. But she had already changed so much in recent years that nothing was left of her long-gone childhood. Amicia now looked so much as her mother, with her stern, stone-carved face. She was as beautiful as ever, and Lucas loved her more and more every day, even when it seemed that his heart couldn't take more of it. And yet time was as merciless to her as it was to his memory.
The path that Lucas and Amicia chose for themselves began with Hugo, every step they took was for him. But the image of Hugo eluded them, forever buried among the snow-capped peaks, inaccessible even to the sharp eye of mountain eagles. The memory of the last minutes of the cursed little boy dying of pain burned Lucas’ heart, filled it with inescapable grief, rage and purpose.
Days turn to weeks and I said that I'd try
But you've burned your way to the back of my mind
But the heart, so stupid and stubborn, still sought to be healed, even at the cost of the most precious memories.
Perhaps it was inevitable, Lucas thought once. Plague left no so long ago, and the world began to bloom again. On their mournful path, the laughter and singing of birds began to sound, sunsets and sunrises painted it, wild grasses and sea breezes filled it with freshness. They enjoyed the road, but the main joy was the connection between them, which strengthened slowly, but surely, and filled their souls with peace.
Confidently stepping into the future, they moved further and further away from the past. Hugo's grave was left so far behind that they might never return to it again. And this thought, terrible in fact, no longer frightened Lucas for some reason. He still could feel the pain, but it easily dissipated as soon as he made himself busy.
Worlds away
And slowly you fade, slowly you fade
Lucas never expected Amicia to let go of her brother's memory. But now it seemed like the time took its toll.
"I don't... Don't remember…" Amicia sobbed, panting, and Lucas felt her head pounding against his chest. Bone hit the bone, as if he was holding a skeleton in his hands, not a living person; an empty, scorched shell. “How could I?...”
“Hush, hush,” Lucas said, stroking her tangled, sweat-drenched hair.
Amicia experienced the loss of Hugo for the second time, he realized. Ten years ago, she did what she had to, with her own hand, ending the torment of the dearest person in the world. It was her most terrible deed, it shattered her soul forever; but it was still her own decision - to fulfill the last will of her younger brother. The greatest act of love; selflessness beyond reason.
But memories of Hugo left Amicia against her will. Now she was standing on the shore, watching the ship leaving the harbor right in front of her; the ship she knew would never return.
Last words don't last, and my hands are bare
Amicia's sobs gradually subsided under Lucas's touch, and finally she froze in his arms and went limp, taking deep, shaky breaths occasionally.
“How could I?” Amicia whispered, blowing her hot breath over his collarbones. “How could I?”
Her voice was muffled, empty, too calm for a person who was choking on tears only a moment ago.
Sudden weariness hit Lucas, like a huge stone lowered on his shoulders. He himself slept too little, worrying about Amicia's health; he constantly reread the notes, knowing that he wouldn't find anything new there, but still looking for at least something encouraging. He caught a cold because of the insidious surge of the night wave, and for more than a week he struggled, refusing to show his illness. Lucas felt sorry for himself, he was sick and lonely; Amicia had drifted away from him, and he missed her like crazy. But he knew himself enough to understand that there was the only way left for him to heal. To be useful to Amicia, to put his own living heart, that had not yet lost its naive warmth, into her dead chest; that was his path he was choosing every time he opened his eyes in the beginning of a new day. Looking into the past, the one that hasn’t left him yet, Lucas realized that he still had the strength to do that again.
"Hey," Lucas began softly, slowly stroking Amicia's thin back. “Do you remember how we played hide and seek in the ruins of that fortress? I was the evil sorcerer, and you and Hugo tried to conquer me.”
Amicia didn't answer, and Lucas, taking the silence as permission, continued.
“I still remember his laugh. He always laughed so loudly, you know, from the bottom of his heart, it made my ears pawned sometimes. It even annoyed me a little, until I realized that it was because I too rarely hear his laugh. I just didn’t have enough time to get used to it.”
But despite my hell
I still feel you there
Lucas went on and on, telling Amicia the smallest details about Hugo that he could get out of his mind. He reminded her of the yellow hood and the bronze fibula and the handful of feathers; about how Hugo slowly learned to read from his mother's books; how deftly he climbed trees, and then was too scared to get down on his own. How small hands skillfully plucked herbs, with a gentle but confident movement. About the flowers that he loved so much, and the frogs that he raved about, barely seeing the reflection of the water in the bushes.
Lucas did not have a single memory that was not overshadowed by the bitterness of loss. But still, these were bright memories of the childhood that they managed to give Hugo, the moments when he was happy, forgetting about the curse in his blood. It wasn't Hugo himself, but their love for Hugo, forever sealed in their hearts in the moment his own little heart stopped beating.
"I don't remember his face either," Lucas admitted quietly. “But I remember his smile. It's strange, but I still can see it. Can you?”
Amicia, who hadn’t uttered a sound all this time, freed herself from his embrace and looked at him. For a moment, Lucas thought the fire had been rekindled in her eyes, but perhaps he just wanted too much to believe it. She spoke softly, her voice hoarse.
“I can. I remember his smile too.”
And tears broke down again. Amicia's face was sad, but the grimace of deadly despair wasn't there anymore. She mourned her brother with sorrow and love, which did not leave her from the very day when she had to say goodbye to him forever. The pain returned, it always does, but now Amicia wasn’t its hostage.
“I wish I could hug him,” she murmured through her tears. “I want to see him one last time... Only once. But that will never happen again, right?”
She looked at Lucas as if she expected him to refute her words. But he only shook his head, picking up her tears with his fingers, feeling them roll down his palms and dry on his skin.
“He won’t come back, Amicia.”
I wish you could stay one more night
‘Cause I’m over the edge and I can’t hold this back
Sobbing, she pressed his hand to her cheek, leaning against it. Deep sadness and shy excitement seized Lucas at the sight of this Amicia - vulnerable, looking for support in Lucas, who was so hopelessly in love and forever engaged with her.
“I want it here,” she whispered, pressing her hand to her sunken chest, “to stop hurting so much. But pain is all I have left of him, Lucas. I feel that if I give up this pain, I will completely forget Hugo. What will I live for then? For what?”
Won't you stay one more night?
I still can't believe you're a memory to me
“For the sake of the world he left us.” Lucas gently took her tiny, thin face in his hands. “Hugo loved it so much, this world, and he sacrificed himself to save it. And you helped him. You have protected what was dear to him.”
Amicia startled suddenly, and now Lucas was sure: her eyes shone again under her brows knitted in confusion. Not expecting such response, Lucas took his hands away from her face, but she suddenly took them in her own — a rare occasion of Amicia being the first to touch him — and squeezed tightly.
“I promised Hugo this a long time ago,” she said in awe. “I promised him to never back down. To remember what he gave... so... so the world he loved would live.”
The ghost of a smile that hadn't been seen on her face for so long crossed her lips, and Lucas almost cried himself.
He loved Hugo with all his heart; the boy changed his life forever, opened him the facets of his own soul which Lucas never knew existed. But his whole being was now in the hands of Amicia, his broken, beautiful Amicia, who had just told him the most sacred thing that her heart ever kept. Lucas was ready to give her the whole world if it could heal her, but he knew that she never needed that.
“Thank you, Lucas.”
Amicia pressed his hands to her lips, dry and cool, and the simple gesture took his breath away.
"Please don't let me forget," she whispered bitterly. "There are almost no one left in this world who remember that he lived. Please don't let me forget him.”
Just a memory to me
“I promise.”