Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

"You are not my father. I don't like you, I don't care about you, and I won't obey you."

Yes, it seems that was where it all began.

Agott said this the moment the door slammed shut behind her mother. She stared absently after her, clutching the gathers of her brand-new skirt with terrible force. But she did not even think of crying. Agott turned out to be an extremely interesting child: she never cried at all.

"Noted."

Olruggio folded his hands over his exhausted, stubble-covered face with a doomed expression.

That year in Sicily, the heat was so intense that Olruggio suffered heatstroke twice. In Palermo and the suburb where they lived, car tires melted and flip-flops left distinctive rubber marks on the asphalt.

The man did not immediately realize that he was under no obligation to endure the inferno unfolding around him. However, once the realization struck and the lightbulb triumphantly flashed above his head, the suitcases were packed, and the very next day, he and Agott were sitting on a plane to Ravenna. The choice was spontaneous, they had little money, the girl still treated him with hostility, but Olruggio would not have been himself had he not approached everything with the utmost responsibility.

Upon arrival, they were met by Utowin, an old friend with whom he had gotten along remarkably poorly in school. Utowin was a noble and fair man, a little sly, occasionally eccentric, but who proved kind enough to take in those fleeing the scorching Sicilian sun.

They found entertainment for themselves fairly quickly: Agott was placed in a summer equivalent of a school, something like a day camp for children whose parents were forced to languish at work until evening. The man, for his part, found a place in a small family workshop specializing in "repairing everything under the sun," for which he was unspeakably glad. The place was wonderful: air conditioning, two fans, no electricity bills. And with a view of the Adriatic, no less. The clientele were calm, mostly bringing watches and jewelry for repair, occasionally electronics, and a couple of times they stopped by for the restoration of broken vases.

At moments like these, you feel you are in your rightful place: he had long ceased to be tempted by young women and money, had exited the corporate rat race in which he had spent nearly ten years. He had moved from Rome to Sicily, found the woman of his dreams, and when he ended up abandoned by her, having acquired a child from her, he was not even particularly upset.

Agott was not his daughter.

And he was not her father.

She was nothing to him, neither by blood nor by documents.

Adina came into his life with a child, and as it happened, she left without one. She had never loved Agott particularly. She fed her, clothed her, read her books from time to time, did not hit or scold her. But nothing more. Adina was as cold as a glacier and as disillusioned with life as an old woman. Day after day, a yearning consumed her. Or rather, not even yearning, but something she could never clearly explain to him in a language foreign to her. She knew Italian poorly, and Olruggio, for his part, spoke no German at all.

She called it... What was it again? Ah, yes, something like "das Fernweh." If translated literally, it means "a longing for travel," and she explained the feeling as follows:

"I know there's no equivalent in Italian; otherwise, I could express myself far more simply. I don't expect you to understand me, to be honest. To put it plainly, it's an irrational longing for places you've never been and perhaps never will be. I ran away from my family to finally feel free. I thought that by ridding myself of their oppression, I would finally be able to feel happy. But all I feel is that, with this child, I'm just walking in circles."

In just such circles, she eventually walked right out of his life. And Agott remained. Something for which she was utterly unenthused.

The girl was quite consistent in her promises and indeed did not give a damn about him from a great height: being a fairly calm child, closed-off to the extreme, she drove her stepfather to the brink, and with such profound disregard as even her mother could not boast.

On the whole, he understood her, accepted her, and was not the least bit angry.

After all, there is no such thing as other people's children. And despite the fact that she was not his daughter, despite the fact that she was nothing to him, the silent void named Agott, the girl turned out to be his everything.

Before the move to Ravenna, back when the scorching heat had not yet begun to melt his exhausted brain, he kept thinking about what to do next. There were three main difficulties in his life that, perhaps, could have been solved far more easily if he had not put them off until he was blue in the face.

The first and foremost, c-u-s-t-o-d-y.

Five letters, two syllables, but so many problems dragged behind that accursed word! Olruggio had already worn out every threshold at the local town hall! He had pestered every aunt sitting there! He went there as regularly as if it were his job, receiving equally regular rejections.

When you are a somewhat odd, rough-looking, bearded man with Italian citizenship, a French education, doing who-knows-what, the last thing the local municipality wants is to grant you custody of a foreign child who has ended up with you, who knows how.

To top it off, this child speaks exclusively German, answers no questions in any format, and, moreover, to any inquiries about her mother, hurls at the staff a curt:

"Sie ist tot."

And her mother was anything but tot! Only, the man could not prove it, which turned the whole process into such a circus that whenever they appeared within the municipality's field of vision, the female employees nearly fought for the right not to serve them. In short, the whole department suffered terribly with them. And so that Olruggio would never appear before them again, they threw papers at him for temporary custody.

The remaining problems paled greatly against this one. And when everything was settled, the man packed two suitcases and they set off for the north of the country as soon as it grew dark in that Sicilian oven.

When Utowin returned from his shift, Olruggio had already been sitting at home for an hour, stupidly flicking through the channels of an old box. No one had used it in ages, and by all appearances, it was not even worth starting.

"I've been wanting to ask you something..."

"Olruggio, not now, I'm so damn tired."

The policeman, without even taking off his boots, threw himself face-first onto the sofa, taking a running start on approach.

"Just hold on. So, you've been living alone all this time?"

"Well, yes, who else would I be living with?"

The voice from under the pillow sounded doomed.

"But you moved here for someone from your academy."

"Ah. For Easthis, yes, he was appointed captain here. He lives here too, a couple of blocks away. We work together. His daughter is my partner. She just got back from Milan, graduated from the academy with honors. I haven't been that happy for anyone in a long time."

"Daughter? But aren't you two... Uh. Or did I misunderstand something?"

"If I can put it briefly, then yes, but I never quite worked up the courage to ask him on a date."

Creaking his neck, Olruggio stared at his friend in horror.

"You've known each other for almost thirty-five years, Utowin! Are you kidding me?!"

"Let's change the subject. Better tell me, have you learned to fight procrastination? Or are you still the same slacker? I remember it like it was yesterday, how you always begged everyone to extend your deadlines and still never did anything on time."

"No comment."

"Somehow, I thought so."

"Oh, come on, listen, actually, everything has gotten much better. There was a precedent, you see. Once, the municipality wouldn't accept my documents because I brought them three weeks late. They almost took Agott away from me then. Since that moment, I've honestly started getting paranoid. Badly. So now I try to meet my deadlines."

"Does she even talk? Agott, I mean. I've never heard a word. And you don't say anything to her either; what's going on, anyway?"

Olruggio knocked his head against the table.

"Well, to simplify things entirely, both yes and no. She still thinks I'm going to abandon her. And she doesn't see the point in talking to me. She thinks that since her mother left her, a man who's a stranger to her will definitely abandon her to the mercy of fate. To be perfectly frank, I did think about it. You know me, I've always been afraid to take responsibility for anything. And here's a child. But you know, I couldn't do it. She didn't cry when Adina left. And that's when I understood how prepared she was for loneliness. In short, it got to me. Oh, and she doesn't really speak Italian; I try to say something to her in German from time to time, of course, but she still stays silent."

"And what are you going to do about it? Look, I'm no expert, but she's fourteen, she doesn't talk to anyone, and in my opinion, that's just awful."

"I don't know what to do about it."

"Even roughly."

"Roughly, then, I was thinking about finalizing the adoption process and moving her somewhere to Germany or Austria, I don't know. At least she'd be able to talk to kids her age in the same language."

"I see. And what are you going to do there?"

"Same as here. As if that's a problem. The language, well, yes, that's a problem. I can't even string two words together in French, even though I studied there for so long. And I don't really want to leave here. It's peaceful: sun, sea, and water; I like it here. This is the place where I want to be. How many years have passed where I was climbing the walls, simply because something was always bothering me! But you know, I want Agott to live a normal life so much. Even if she's never grateful to me for it and never calls me father."

"Hmm, my friend, a tough case. When does she get back from that school of hers, anyway?"

"In about two hours, I think; it always varies, though."

"We could hit the beach in the meantime. Grab a beer, maybe we'll figure something out."

The beach is noisy in the evenings. The wind pelts the friends with sand while the waves also touch Utowin's feet, threatening to tear off his blue flip-flops.

"You know, I have this friend here. His name's Dagda, and he's got an adopted kid too. With special needs, disabled, in short. He limps badly on both legs. He's raising him alone as well. Honestly, I look at them and I want to tear up. Dagda was recently transferred to an office job due to professional unfitness. Some heart problems; he didn't really go into detail, and I didn't press. Anyway, he started seriously worrying about what would become of his son if he unexpectedly kicked the bucket. And you know what?"

"What?"

"He went and took this straight to Easthis! Well, and Easthis, he's only a grouch on the outside, you know. He said he couldn't promise anything, but maybe he'd think about it. And then he cried so hard on the phone that I felt sick in the moment myself! Oh, life didn't prepare me for this, in my old age, it didn't prepare me... And that's probably why I love him. On the surface, just a block of stone! Inside, though, well, he really worries about everyone. But this stays between us, alright?"

"Oh, spare me; I'd be glad not to lay eyes on him for another hundred years."

"Are you still angry that he ratted you out to the superintendent?"

"He got me evicted!"

"Ahem, I'm sure he's very sorry."

"He's not sorry at all! That was the first time I'd ever seen that he could smile."

"Oh, fine, I don't have the strength anymore to defend him to my acquaintances."

How long ago that had been. He remembered he was in his third year then, and Easthis was working part-time as an assistant to the superintendent in their dormitory while finishing the police academy. That prudish blockhead didn't care that Olruggio was writing a term paper while simultaneously preparing the defense of a project that also involved engineering work. The prudish fool saw trash, a couple of energy drink cans, and scattered blueprints. And when his vision switches on, his hearing switches off completely! He wouldn't listen to any persuasion, any excuses, or explanations.

And the very next day, Olruggio was standing on the street with a suitcase. Where he might have remained, had it not been for a first-year student named Hihart, who took him in.

"How's work?"

Olruggio asked this sincerely; he always thought that police work implied something interesting.

"Do you really think anything happens in our district? It's you lot in Sicily where the eternal lawlessness goes on. Here, everything's quiet. Well, except for the latest: some old woman kicked me out of the wine shop. How are you doing here yourself, anyway?"

"Fine. Not as hot as in Palermo, and I don't need much more. I like that no one really rushes you with work."

"Yeah, right."

"No, seriously, I already adore the local old folks. They don't care at all when I finish their things."

"I'm sure they've just misplaced their hopes in your diligence."

"I am, I'll have you know, very diligent."

How hard it can be when uncertainty clouds your eyes. How frightening to throw yourself blindly into raging waters. How unfair life can sometimes be. Olruggio tried not to be too gloomy or to complain. He loved this life: from its sunrise to its sunset, from its hardships to its triumphs, he loved his angry little silent one and his few friends, loved them too.

After all, when you understand that many people aren't with you forever, you begin to treasure those who stay a little longer.

When some of his friends learned that their comrade was planning to flee the branch of the Sicilian Hell without looking back, no one stood aside. Hihart very actively tried to lure him to France, promising mountains of gold; Mia cast a line for him to come visit her in London. Only Utowin showed no particular interest in Olruggio appearing in his field of vision and was thus chosen as the primary victim. After all, he had no desire to return to France, and crashing at the home of a newly married female friend he considered a little odd.

The flight to Ravenna took an hour and a half.

"What do you want for dinner, my friend? You sit here for now, think, zone out, ponder, while I go get groceries."

"Get Agott some sweet soda and ice cream. And me too, probably. And for normal food, chicken, vegetables, but no tomatoes; Agott's allergic to them, and I just hate them. Take the money from the house; I left fifty euros on the nightstand. I thought she'd take it and buy something for herself or maybe for friends. But as I understand it, she has no intention of taking it."

"Okay, okay. Don't fall apart."

"Whatever you say."

"And don't stay up too late."

"Whatever you say."

"And shave off that horrible beard."

"Just go already! And my beard is perfectly fine."

"You can keep thinking that!"

"You're lucky I don't take you seriously."

"If Easthis were in my place, he'd have arrested you long ago! For exceeding the degree of scruffiness."

"Ah. As if. You're still walking free."

"And that's because I'm his dear friend. There'll be no leniency for you."

He was no friend to Easthis. And certainly not "dear," for that matter. The district prosecutor had no friends, nor any particular enemies; at least, he classified no one as such. He was law in the body of a man, and no acquaintance of a modest thirty-five years of knee-bent reverence would change that. When a person is lonely even within a family circle, even in a crowd of colleagues and passersby, when by his own perception he does not exist, even in the life of his only child, he begins to perniciously influence those around him. Utowin had never suffered from fatalism; being a man not one bit angry or envious, he had begun, with some trepidation, to ponder what had troubled him for years.

Who is he to others?

And not finding the right answer, not even deeming it necessary to clarify, he preemptively wrote everyone into the "dear friend" column, without a shred of shame. Without worrying about what a naive fool he made himself look.

After all, the worst thing you can do to a person is to make them believe they are dear and loved by no one. His former classmate had no intention of taking such a sin upon himself. And when, after graduation, they both ended up in the same Neapolitan language school for a year, having fled Normandy in fear (in truth, they were simply already sick of the cold), Utowin nobly buried the hatchet of his dislike and offered friendship.

And Olruggio, who had already considered them friends before that, did not even think to ask for clarification.

On the shore of the Adriatic Sea, it is quiet and calm. The wind tickles your face and makes you think of good things, drowning all your anxieties in the mirror-smooth surface of the water. He had thought so much about problems that he had stopped noticing the small joys left to him. After all, after forty, you begin to fill up with pessimism.

Well, on the bright side, if he tried to recall, Agott's birthday was soon. In about a week, she would turn fifteen. He still had not figured out what to give her. And he understood that she would most likely not accept anything. He thought the best option would be to write her some kind of sappy letter. Something short, something she could not throw away without reading.

One succinct sentence that, flashing before her eyes for just a second, would be imprinted in her memory.

Or at least would not go unnoticed.

The waves break against the stones; some old man sprawled a couple of dozen meters away tossed a cheerful "Bella ciao!" to a passing beauty and was promptly sent off by her. The sunset painted the sky crimson. And tomorrow was a day off.

"Listen, can I take your car?"

Olruggio asked this without turning around, as he heard the rustle of grocery bags from the nearest Lidl behind him.

"And what for?"

"I forgot some papers at home. I think I want to try to resolve the adoption question here. And without them, it's impossible. Besides, it's kind of a birthday present for Agott."

How could he have forgotten them? It didn't fit in his head.

"I don't recall you having a license."

"Ah. And you also forgot how we nearly ran over Beldarut on campus."

"Now I'm not sure about anything at all."

"I'll be back tomorrow afternoon. Closer to five, probably. I'll grab the papers, take a walk, maybe drop into a few vintage shops. Adina told me that back in Germany, Agott was into all sorts of old things. You've got a day off tomorrow anyway. Spend some time with her."

"Actually, I have a meeting with Easthis and Luluchi tomorrow."

"I'm begging you, you see them every single blessed day! So then, you'll hang out with Easthis and Luluchi too. What a delight of a day."

"Just try bringing it back without a full tank."

The keys flew through the air into his hands.

"You'll be thanking me if I even bring it back at all."

Scooping up sand with his flip-flops, he shamelessly flung it at Utowin as he turned toward the exit from the beach.

"Hey, give me back the keys! Olruggio!"

"Agott will be here in half an hour at most! Try to tell her I'll be back soon."

Utowin bit his cheek in offense, knitting his frowning brows.

"Ah, go ahead and hope. Now I rule over this child for the next fifteen hours. Whatever trauma I feel like, I'll inflict!"

"I'll kill you, and you know it!"

"Drive safe, my friend!"

"Whatever you say."

The journey ahead was not a short one: diagonally and across the whole country, like in the good old days when he was only trying to find his place under the sun. What a slacker he had to be! Olruggio was simply shocked at his own stupidity! To pack in such a rush and forget the very thing for which he had been wearing out the thresholds of the local municipality for weeks! He must be nothing short of cursed!

However, he decided not to get too upset about it. And jumping behind the wheel of a brand-new Subaru, he drove out of the city fairly quickly. Some strange Balkan turbo-folk was playing on the radio, which he fairly quickly switched to jazz, but soon turned the music off altogether.

He was a music lover, to put it mildly. Good music was something like the Bhagavad Gita to a Krishnaite for him. To be perfectly honest, once upon a time, he and a friend, in their school years, had secretly fled the country to catch the last concert of Freddie Mercury! And despite the fact that they ended that day in a detention cell and subsequently in an immigration jail, they did make it to the concert.

He was fifteen then. He was young and prone to all sorts of adventures.

He was simply mad about British rock, and no rules, no private boarding school could stop him from that leap of faith.

With that friend, they lived through a lot: shared griefs and joys, an imaginary moon landing for which they stole Beldarut's lead boots (though in reality, simple silver boots). His friend was a real astronaut, right off a magazine cover, and he was just an ordinary scientist from Earth.

In truth, if it weren't for his friend, Olruggio would have been eaten long ago by all those bloodthirsty lunar beasts. Though, why would they need him? He was a scrawny, pale child, and not particularly edible, to be honest.

And in fantasies, games, and mischief, the first five years of their acquaintance flew by. His friend was a sad child, as if he had tasted all the grief of this world as a ten-year-old boy.

Olruggio used to think of him often: wondered where he was and how he was? Had life treated him well? Was he healthy? Happy?

Now, he still asks himself this question from time to time, but nowhere near as often as back then.

They met in deepest childhood: so far back that the man cannot recall a single day of his youth without him. And they parted as friends are never supposed to part. It seemed that Olruggio had then believed in himself a little too much. And his friend had left, abandoning him alone on graduation night. Standing foolishly amid the crowd, staring after him.

Piano Man cut sharply through his ears. And Olruggio squeezed his eyelids tightly shut, trying to rid himself of the lived-through shame.

They never saw each other again.

Chasing away the nostalgia, the man pulled over at a gas station to grab a bite.

The hot dog at the local joint turned out to be cheap and tasteless, and despite his request to hold the ketchup, they had doused it with all their heart. He spent about five minutes just trying to wipe the ketchup off the hot dog with a napkin. It looked disgusting and pathetic. But three euros had been paid, and the dinner was swallowed.

For a while, Olruggio pondered one of the interesting orders brought in by an elderly señora: no more, no less than an entire wardrobe from before the war. Huge and carved, dreadfully heavy. The señora had told him even more about it than he wanted to know. Told him its whole history: from which master in the north her great-grandfather had commissioned it, to how many partisans her mother had hidden inside it. The wardrobe was five times older than the man, and the moment the signora left, one of its doors came off its hinges and knocked him out cold.

A bill for a measly hundred was issued, and one couldn't scrape more for the repair. All that was needed was to mend the doors and patch two bullet holes on the back of the wardrobe. Half of it, he'd probably give back to the old lady. By the feel of it, this wardrobe was her only joy. And he had blurted out the price without thinking. Got greedy under the influence of the lump from the oak corner of that monstrosity.

Agott, ketchup, and the wardrobe twisted Olruggio's brain into a veritable pretzel. He realized he had taken a wrong turn only when he drove into the true boondocks.

Stopping, he got out of the car right in the middle of the road. There was no one there but him. And the man considered this an excellent excuse to rest, have a smoke, and look at the stars that had already scattered above his head. Crickets chirped all around, a warm wind blew through to the bone, yet it was not cold. He thought he would just stand like this for about five minutes and then drive back. After all, the navigator showed that he had missed his turn only a couple of kilometers back. Nothing critical. But a moment like this was an interesting one. A feeling as if there was no one left in the world but him, and if he were to close his heavy eyelids, he himself would cease to exist.

How good it feels.

Just as he was pulling out of that dead end, at the very turn, at the junction of the federal highway and that vague little gut that was supposed to lead him straight to Palermo, he saw a man.

The man was standing on the shoulder, calmly leaning against a road sign pointing the direction. He seemed to be searching his pockets and was about to step off that shoulder, as if he had wandered onto it from the bushes by accident.

When he slowed down with the intention of asking whether the man needed help, and Olruggio recognized the man as Qifrey, his engine stalled from the shock.

"Son of a bitch!"

Olruggio rarely restrained his emotions. He didn't consider it necessary.

Being a critical and level-headed man, he rarely succumbed to unbridled delight, or rage, or even sorrow, preferring to convert it all into rolled eyes and a smirk of varying sarcasm. But what he saw before him now converted exclusively into trembling hands and rather foolish stammering. He had better not scream now, not laugh until he had a fit, and not burst into tears all at once. He was too close to it and did not think about how feigned his calm truly was from the outside.

The meeting, he was certainly surprised, thoroughly so.

He studied Qifrey for a minute while a foreign hand, slightly awkwardly, touched his shoulder, as if to say, snap out of it, you idiot. He probably looked mentally ill. And for a second, he felt terribly ashamed of himself.

"You know, so much time has passed... I wasn't even sure you were alive, to be honest."

Qifrey ran a slightly embarrassed palm over his neck, hiding a light smile, averting his eyes in some awkwardness.

They were still standing on the shoulder, not entirely sure how to behave. In the end, Qifrey hadn't expected to run into him either. Perhaps he had already even forgotten about his existence; who could say.

"And I, to be honest, am simply glad to see you."

So he hadn't forgotten, then.

A car stopped nearby; a pleasant-looking plump man peered out of the slightly lowered window. In the back seat, covered by a blanket, a woman slept. His wife, probably.

"Something wrong with the car, fellas? Need a hand?"

Olruggio reacted first, raising an open palm and waving it a little.

"No, no, everything's fine; we stopped to rest a bit. Thanks."

"Phew, I thought something had happened; you've pulled over in a really bad spot. Safe travels, fellas."

"Safe travels to you."

Olruggio gestured for Qifrey to get into the car, pointing meaningfully at the front seat. The next moment, they were moving the car to a more suitable spot than an interchange on a federal highway. They had to pull back into that dead end he'd just driven out of. No one in the night traffic flow was headed east. The dead end was still quiet, though the road in that direction was torn up. There, on the shoulder, he cut the engine.

"Perhaps I'd be asking you now why you left back then and where you disappeared to afterwards, without even deeming it necessary to explain yourself, but you're lucky that I, too, am immensely glad to see you. What are you even doing here?"

"In Italy, or...?"

The blond arched his neck meaningfully, clarifying such a vague question.

"In Italy, at the very least, and at most on a highway in the middle of the night! Have you lost your mind, Qifrey! I get it, there's trouble with work, but surely not this bad!"

It looked, of course... Strange. Who could have imagined that after parting ways almost twenty-five years ago, in the far north of France, with no way of knowing anything about each other, they would meet again here. In the dead of night, on a highway, in a different country, for crying out loud, one that neither of them had ever dreamed of.

Is such a thing even possible? Or had Olruggio foolishly fallen asleep at the gas station? Or died, poisoned by that hot dog?

It was like he'd landed in a movie. Some kind of social experiment! Otherwise, nothing added up at all!

"Very funny."

And still, he smiled, covering his mouth a little with his palm.

The full moon lit the empty highway, making Qifrey look even paler than he was. And his single eye, not hidden beneath a strange bandage, glimmered with something magical.

"Well, I wouldn't say so."

It truly wasn't funny. He felt utterly lost.

"You're still such a grump, my friend."

Friend.

F-r-i-e-n-d.

What a wonderful word, if you think about it. Friends are ready to do so much for each other. And he said it so kindly that you don't even want to hurl an accusatory tirade at him. But can he really deny himself the pleasure of dumping on this man everything that had been marinating his insides for years?

"Now, let's not have any of that. I'm no friend of yours, you idiot." Yet how wounded it sounded; it would have been better if he'd just stayed silent. "Friends don't behave the way you did. Of course, I'm not offended at you; I'm not five." An important clarification, by the way. "Things happen in life; I know that firsthand. But damn it, Qifrey! We were friends for almost twelve years! Twelve goddamn years! I can't believe you did this to me. I kept waiting for you to come back, at least to put a final end to things between us. But you didn't even pick up your things from the dorm! You just disappeared. Just walked out and... That was it. I haven't heard a thing about you since!"

The events of the past years did not fit in his head. What happened between them was something that should never happen between friends. And Olruggio could persuade the whole world as much as he wanted that he wasn't the least bit offended. But in truth, all he lacked was stamping his foot and turning away. All his professional retraining into a gruff, life-beaten man had gone to dust the moment he recalled that schoolboy hurt. And here he was, a little girl whose ice cream had been taken away.

"It wasn't very nice, of course, how it turned out."

Qifrey tossed this out so casually, as if in passing. Well, of course, "not very nice," nothing more. Everything was clear with him. Olruggio rested his forehead against the steering wheel, almost disappointed. He wasn't going to yell at him, demanding apologies, was he? After all, they really had become nothing to each other; Qifrey owed him nothing.

"I hope you're very ashamed."

As if he were once again teaching Agott not to throw the dinner he had made out the window.

"Absolutely."

Absolutely, Olruggio could go take a hike. To bring up this topic after all this time was a frank disgrace, and he understood that perfectly. Yet one's sense of self-worth doesn't always align with one's sense of justice and the desire to wring an answer from an offender at any cost!

"What happened to your eye?"

The eye was covered by a bandage, and Qifrey looked like a pirate king. Though, for some unclear reason, he had been hiding that eye back in school; the bandage raised no fewer questions now. At least before he hid it behind glasses, and now behind some nonsense.

"An old, wicked witch stole it."

And the witch had tentacles, three legs, and lived not just anywhere, but in Middle-earth. It even made him uneasy that to sincere concern, he received this kind of joke. He had to digest all his indignation again; not wishing to seem intrusive, he simply changed the subject, driving the final nail into the coffin of this conversation.

He had no strength left. He was starting to feel like a pathetic whiner.

"And you're still cracking jokes. Well, keep cracking them. I can't believe you never grew up. Where do you even need to go? I'll give you a lift."

"Still as kind and obliging."

Qifrey smiled at him, warmly, with a squint. He ran his palm over his shoulder, tilted his head slightly, exhaling. He looked exactly the way he remembered him. As if twenty years hadn't passed. As if they had fallen asleep in their room after yet another reading of The Lord of the Rings.

It was Olruggio who'd been battered by life: the beard and the bruises under his eyes, the skin scorched by the sun. Though here, it was less from a bad life than from a very tolerable one: in recent days, he and Utowin hadn't crawled off the beach in the evenings. His friend, though he worked himself to zero, always managed to crawl down to the sand, not forgetting to bring some wine.

"I just don't want anything to happen to you. It's dangerous, you fool. What exactly kept you from traveling during the day?..." He adds this more for himself. "So where do you need to go?"

Meanwhile, he started the engine, turning back toward the federal highway.

"A place you, alas, don't know. Actually, how about you just drop me off, and I'll walk there myself."

As if he expected anything else?

Another mystery, shrouded in darkness.

"The nearest settlement is almost forty kilometers away! Where are you even going? You don't even have any things with you. Don't be a fool, if you please; you know I won't let you go like this."

"Then just northeast, and straight on till the end."

"What?"

"I need to go to the coast. Just drive along the main road; I'll tell you where and when to turn."

Olruggio, to put it mildly, was taken aback by such a route, but he didn't press for details.

"You know, I'm living in Ravenna right now with my daughter, at Utowin's place... If you're not looking for something specific, I can take you there. Well, we're on the coast, sort of."

"Olruggio, I can't believe it! You have a daughter?!"

Qifrey clutched at him so hard he nearly swerved into a ditch. He was genuinely stunned by the news. As if he believed that his acquaintance could never, in any way, under any circumstances, manage even responsibility for himself. And now, some child, no less.

Miracles, nothing less.

"Adopted," he deemed it important to clarify.

"And still, I'm amazed! And why are you living at Utowin's? He, if I recall, hated your guts in school. That idiot ratted us out to Buldarut when we ran away to see Queen. I'll never forgive him for that. What's your daughter's name?"

"Agott. She's my ex-girlfriend's daughter."

"Was your ex a lousy mother?"

He didn't like such phrasing. Adina was an unhappy woman, and Olruggio had always had a tremendous weakness for them.

"No. She was fine. Maybe even better than my own mother. But she had a violent dislike for children. And she left. I don't really like talking about this topic, to be honest."

"Well, fine. You know, I need to go to one very specific place. So, I'm afraid I won't be able to take you up on your invitation. Even with all my desire."

"Will you leave me your number? I think I'd like to know how you are from time to time. What became of you is not at all a matter of indifference to me, you know. I understand that you crossed me out of your life long ago. And I, forgive the bluntness, did the same to you. But I would very much like... You know, twenty years is a rather long time."

For some, an entire life lived in vain.

"I never crossed you out of my life. But unfortunately, that's out of the question. I won't leave you my number."

Piano Man played in his head again. And here he was again, in the crowd, on that ill-fated evening, when everyone around was jumping, alcoholic spray flying in his face, and he, like a fool, stared after his first and only friend, behind whom the doors were closing. Olruggio, to be honest, was so bewildered that he couldn't even find a reply.

"And you won't tell me where you went and what happened to you?"

"I won't," his tone was playful, yet impossibly sobering.

Qifrey had never particularly trusted him and had never told him anything about himself. As a child, he was closed-off and kept apart from everyone, from the very first day to the last graduation night. When Beldarut first brought him in, when he first dragged Qifrey into the classroom, Olruggio thought him the unhappiest child in the world, with whom he urgently needed to become friends. However, Qifrey himself did not appreciate his unrestrained desire for friendship at all and spent the next few weeks hiding from him in storage rooms and bathrooms.

"As you wish. I didn't expect anything else."

"Don't hold a grudge against me. Our paths simply don't align. Though, who knows, who knows. After all, all roads lead to Amber. And perhaps someday, we shall meet again."

Lead where?

"Ah. Of course. You know, I always tried to understand you. Why you were the way you are. Why you didn't trust me. But, to be honest, I never understood a thing. And for many years, I probably even held a grudge. I looked for problems everywhere: in you and in myself, in the time when we met, in the place where it happened. But in the end, I still never understood you. And you know, the only conclusion I came to is the one where I'm the one to blame. Perhaps I offended you. And if that's the case, I want you to know, Qifrey, that whatever I may have done in the past, whatever I may have said, if it hurt you, I am sincerely sorry. In the end, good people aren't just cast aside for no reason."

Qifrey said nothing in reply.

The night darkens just before dawn, and the lamps along the highway begin to blind his tired eyes. If things keep going like this, he definitely won't make it back by tomorrow. Agott kept turning in his head. How was she there? Had Utowin fed her? Was she sleeping well? What would she do tomorrow? Would they go out for a walk, as he had asked?

Such small things always made his heart clench involuntarily.

And he still had that wardrobe to repair... He had work planned for tomorrow too. And if not the wardrobe, then at least the leather belt brought to him three days ago, he was simply obligated to fix! The elderly signora would definitely drag him by the ears if he delayed it yet another day.

"Turn here."

"N-uhh..."

"Left."

"Okay, one moment."

"I don't want to discuss the past. In the end, time is nonlinear and it no longer exists. Even with all my desire, I can't explain everything. And I don't even want to justify myself; you are too good to listen to my pitiful attempts to tell you what pushed me to this. You are not to blame for anything. I was never worthy of you, and how I acted wholly proves it. There's nothing here to discuss."

Just as a river invariably flows into the sea, so certain things are simply fated to happen. The meeting with Qifrey was something he had long ceased to count on and even in his boldest days had not dreamed of. Everything was as it always was. "You are a good person, Olruggio, it's just that our paths don't align." Adina had said that to him, and now Qifrey was telling him the same thing. Perhaps someone could honestly tell him what exactly was wrong with him? Why was simply being "a good person" never enough for anyone? Sooner or later, everyone slammed the door in his face.

It was sad.

But Olruggio didn't like sentimentality.

If you leave, then leave. And be so kind as never to return into his life again.

They fell silent once more for a time.

"Turn again here. Left again."

"But there's no road. Just an embankment."

"Well, yes, that's where I need to go."

"I don't know what you're planning, Qifrey, but if you've decided to kill me, know that I will scream loudly and resist."

After all, he had things to lose.

"Where do you get such thoughts?! A fool through and through; you always loved to raise a panic! Aren't you ashamed, accusing me of such a thing? I, after all, am a tender soul; I might just take offense."

"Just be quiet already."

Well, Olruggio hadn't exactly gone to pieces over this conversation. But its weight had been pulling him toward the earth the entire time. He'd even had to lie a little. "I understand that you crossed me out of your life long ago. And I, forgive the bluntness, did the same to you." There may have been some truth hidden in those words. But there was as much of it as Agott's desire to speak with him. An attempt not to lose face, an attempt to preserve dignity when you are not even remotely as dear to a person as they are to you. In reality, he was not the least bit offended at Qifrey. All his feelings: resentments, anxieties, and worries, had been roasted in such an internal flame that they'd become smoldering coals at the end.

After all, Olruggio had never been particularly good at holding grudges.

"Beautiful, isn't it? Stop here."

There was only a tree here and a cliff. An endless starry sky. And there it was again, that same feeling of irreplaceable emptiness in this vast world. The ocean below crashed against the rocks where seabirds slept. It was so high up that it was terrifying even to look down.

His passenger got out of the car without further conversation, walking closer to the tree at the very edge. Suspecting something amiss, he unbuckled himself, opening the door slightly.

"Qifrey, this isn't the coast. The coast is much lower."

"Well, yes."

He merely stepped away from the apple tree melancholically, gazing down at the very bottom, where the raging black waters splashed.

"Hey, stop."

The man slowly rose from his seat, stretching out his hand toward the white silhouette that at that very moment seemed so close and yet so far at once. Panic rose in his throat when Qifrey was just one step away from the cliff edge.

"Thanks for the ride, friend!"

"Qifrey, for fuck's sake, you're not about to jump, are you?!"

Olruggio sprang from the car as fast as he could, smacking his side against the door.

"Qifrey, what are you doing, don't you dare!"

The man opposite leaped, practically without even a running start. Olruggio was so terrified that he swore filthily, not even grasping how exactly: mentally or out loud.

Grabbing him by the sleeve, Olruggio didn't immediately realize how far his feet had actually lifted off the ground. When he tried to yank him back, he understood how poorly, in truth, he knew physics. They were pulled downward so abruptly it wrenched his neck. Tightly clutching the other's arm and pressing into Qifrey with all his might, the man, from sheer horror, couldn't even scream. Squeezing his eyes shut and readying to smash against the rocks, he didn't immediately feel that the sensation of free fall was lasting impossibly long.

In the darkness, he sees only his daughter.

"You're an idiot, Olruggio."

The first thing he hears from Qifrey when he opens his eyes. His gaze, surely, is a little wild from terror. Qifrey is holding him in his arms, and they are falling endlessly somewhere. He still wants to panic. The feeling that in just a second, his song is about to be sung.

But no. They aren't even falling. They descend through the air far more slowly than they should.

"Is this a pre-death dream or something?"

He presses himself against Qifrey as if for the last time, locking his hands around his neck.

"No. But it might well have become that for you! Why did you grab onto me?! Are you tired of living?"

He says this loudly and with sincere indignation. As if he could have acted otherwise, watching his acquaintance about to take a dive off a massive sheer cliff! It felt as if, along with his eye, the old, wicked witch had taken his empathy too!

"And what about you?! What is even happening here? What the..."

He tried to look down, but Qifrey quickly pressed a palm to his cheek, turning his face back toward him.

"Sh-sh-sh, don't look down. Everything is fine. Just don't look." He tries so hard to calm him down, understanding perfectly that he knows what's going on, while Olruggio himself does not.

Whatever was happening here, it seemed he had actually died.

"And what's down there?"

"The height."

In the gap between Qifrey, the distant clouds, and all the rest of the world, Olruggio saw something impossibly wondrous. A castle of incredible size, amber and glimmering in the light, like a huge, yellowish-orange diamond.

The wind lifts his hair and clothing.

"Qifrey, what's happening?"

"Don't look down."

What was he, Orpheus? If he looked down to behold the mystery of what was happening, would his Eurydice vanish irrevocably? And would Easthis and Utowin find his corpse splayed across the rocks?

Green clouds floating above them, a golden dawn emerging from behind mountains that so resembled his native Alps. And a palace whose amber reflections strained to blind him.

"If I'm not actually dead, which I seriously doubt, Qifrey, be so kind, tell me, where are we?"

"Have you ever heard the legends of the Amber Kingdom?"

No, he was definitely dead.

Olruggio emerged from the water heavily, just like an old tractor hauling years of useless cargo behind it. They had fallen into the water straight from the goddamn sky! No, they hadn't even fallen, but descended, slowly, like two autumn leaves.

Inconceivable.

The river of some "Amber," oily and thick, reluctantly released him, dripping from his shirt in heavy, almost mercury drops. Every step through the shallows was laborious: the pebbles underfoot were unnaturally smooth, as if polished for centuries not by waves, but by polishing machines!

He scrambled onto the shore and froze, breathing heavily. The water did not evaporate from his clothes like ordinary moisture, but slowly soaked into the fabric's nap, making it stiff, as if starched. Then Olruggio turned around.

Qifrey followed after him, easily, barely disturbing the surface of the flow. He did not fight the current; he simply transferred himself from water to land, and not a single dark spot remained on his white shirt. He looked as if he'd taken a stroll under a light mushroom rain, and not just taken a leap through the underbelly of creation.

"Well, there we are," Qifrey said quietly, stopping beside him.

Olruggio was silent. He slowly raised his head. There was no sun above them, but light was everywhere: even, amber, pouring from the very air. The sky, the color of an overripe emerald, pressed on his shoulders with its density. Around them stood a forest that Olruggio had initially taken for a pile of scrap metal: thin, perfectly straight trunks gleamed with a cold steely sheen, and instead of leaves, thousands of embossed golden plates trembled on them.

The man looked at his hands. Against the backdrop of this gleaming splendor, his fingers, with the perennial dirt under the nails and a scar on his thumb from a slipped wrench, seemed something provocatively indecent.

"Fuck, this isn't even a hallucination," Olruggio said this to himself, tasting the words. They sounded muffled, giving no familiar echo. "I couldn't have come up with this."

"No, not a hallucination."

Olruggio took a tentative step on the grass. It did not bend but merely clinked softly, like thin wire. The sensation of the reality of what was happening crashed down on him not with fear, but with some infinite, exhausting weariness. He remembered how he had closed the workshop yesterday morning, how he had grumbled about the rising price of machine oil, how he had thought he needed to buy Agott new paints. All of that now seemed not just distant, but fundamentally impossible. As if his whole life he had been reading a picture book, and now he had been dragged by the scruff of his neck inside the printing house itself.

He felt heavy. Every bone, every gram of fat, and every drop of blood weighed three times more in this world. He felt how fear pulled him toward this strange earth. As if in some delirium, he began patting his soaked pockets.

"Cigarettes... Where are they? Soaked to hell, probably," he muttered under his breath while his fingers trembled as if in delirium.

"In this world, nothing gets truly soaked unless you yourself wish it to," Qifrey gently touched his elbow. "Let's go. We need to make a fire. I think you're terribly frozen."

Olruggio looked at his former friend. Qifrey looked right here. His pallor, his single eye, his strange grace: all of it at last made sense; he did not look like an elephant in the middle of the room. He was a piece that had finally fitted into its puzzle, while Olruggio was an extraneous bolt tossed by mistake into a box of jewels!

He felt as though at any moment he might lose the ground beneath his feet.

"A fire," Olruggio echoed, feeling the first true chill run down his spine. "Alright."

And nothing more. In such shock, he had probably never been before.

Having rolled his eyes deeply and crossed his arms over his chest, the man looked at Qifrey as if the latter had only and ever tried to make an idiot out of him.

"Alright, let me repeat this once more, and you stop me if I've misunderstood something. Our world is..." He couldn't even formulate it so that it wouldn't sound ridiculous. "Er. A kind of reflection? A reflection of the 'original' world called Amber? Like, a parallel universe that exists as long as the sun shines on the amber castle and it casts shadows?"

"Yeah, it really sounds like crap from the outside." The blond, in an instant, also felt awkward; his own explanation from the outside had sounded just dreadfully stupid.

"Qifrey! This is just insane! This is all nonsense! I don't know what's going on here, but I'm simply demanding that you take me back... Home, damn it!"

"I already told you I can't do that!"

"But I don't care! You got here somehow."

"Yes, but right now it's... Well... Impossible. The only way back is through the main hall in the Amber Palace. Before, it was possible, because the king was Deanreldy. Well, in short, he was a good man and didn't prevent our worlds from colliding. Now the situation is different, and the Hatters hold power. And they are categorically against any migration. They don't want to see people from the shadows here, they don't want anyone leaving into the shadows. Getting into Amber isn't hard, if you know how. Getting out is exclusively through the main hall."

"And what do you expect me to do? I can't hang around here forever! Are you kidding me? I have my own life; in the end, I'm not going to swap it for this stinking fantasy! Do whatever you want, Qifrey."

"Take a breath, friend."

"How can I take a breath?! I promised Utowin I'd come back... Well, I'm actually supposed to be home already! Do you even understand how this looks for them? And what will happen to Agott? She'll think she's been abandoned again! And what will happen to Agott? She'll be taken to an orphanage. Utowin is a slacker; he can't and won't take care of her; it's not his problem at all. Fuck, for the first time in my life, I tried to take responsibility for someone! Made myself believe I'm good for something, besides tightening bolts. For what? To end up in a cheap version of dungeons and dragons! Unsure that it's not even a pre-death dream... What a life... And in general, don't call me friend, you blockhead."

"I understand your resentment toward me and your deep confusion."

"I'm not resentful. And I'm not shirking my responsibility. And I'm not blaming you for anything; what happened is madness. But don't think that I think badly of you."

"It's absolutely not necessary..."

"Silence. Better yet, tell me this, purely theoretically, what would your 'Hatters' do to me if I went to them and said I ended up here by mistake?"

"Most likely, they'd erase my memories. And send me to the Island of Oblivion."

"Listen, but what's the point? If they don't want our worlds crossing, why don't they just let me out?"

But to this, Qifrey gave him no answer.

Olruggio sat on his haunches, desperately trying to coax a spark into a pile of dry kindling. His hands were trembling, whether from the cold or from the shock he'd endured. His clothes, soaked with the silvery water of the river that churned five steps away, clung to his body like a heavy shell.

At last, the fire caught. The flame was strange: it did not burn yellow but glimmered a piercing lemon color, and its smoke smelled not of pine, but of something cloying, reminiscent of burnt caramel.

Around them stretched a forest that had nothing in common with the nature of Italy. The trees here were tall and straight as masts, with bark resembling smooth, polished metal. The foliage above did not rustle but tinkled softly, like thousands of glass pendants. The sky overhead was a deep emerald color, and there was not a single familiar star upon it.

"So, Amber," Olruggio finally straightened up, feeling his back respond with a sharp pain. "The Amber Castle. Shadows. Listen, Qifrey, I've seen a lot of things in my life, of course. But this... this is too much even for me."

Qifrey sat opposite, hugging his knees. His wet white shirt was becoming translucent; the bandage over his eye had shifted, revealing a gleaming emptiness. He did not look like a powerful mage living in a fantasy world, but like a student soaked to the bone after a failed camping trip.

"I warned you that you didn't know this place," Qifrey said quietly, gazing into the lemon flame. "You shouldn't have jumped, Olruggio. This... this isn't a tour."

"Go to hell," Olruggio snapped without malice. "You took a dive off a cliff. My instincts kicked in before my brains did. I thought you decided to drown yourself, you moron. And now I'm sitting in a forest made of foil under a green sky, listening to fairy tales about Hatters. Tell me honestly: are we dead?"

Qifrey raised his single eye to him. Strange sparks from the campfire danced within it. The gleam nearly blinded.

"No. We are alive. As far as that is even possible in the center of creation. Everything you knew about your world is merely a distorted reflection of what stands there, on the mountain."

He nodded toward the horizon where the castle rose above the forest. It did not seem fairytale-like. It looked massive, heavy, and frighteningly real. A hulk of polished stone, glowing with an inner, warm light. Reflecting rays like a yellow diamond, looking like a set piece for yet another Middle-earth film.

"Alright," Olruggio tossed another branch onto the fire, which, instead of burning, began slowly melting like wax. "The foundation of creation. Reflections, parallel worlds. Let's say I accept that. God, what horrors I'm spouting. But I need to go back. I have Agott there. I have work there. I have, in the end, Utowin's car sitting on the shoulder with the ignition on! Do you even realize how much gas it'll guzzle by morning?"

"Olruggio," Qifrey leaned forward, his voice grew harder; he touched his palm to the other's chest and looked at him so penetratingly that for a second it took his breath away. "Forget the gas. And the car. Time passes differently here. We could spend a day here, and a month might pass in your city. Or the other way around. The Hatters who are currently guarding the castle are terrible people! They don't like strangers from the Shadows."

Olruggio froze, holding yet another branch. The local branches burned as if he had soaked them in oil beforehand. The meaning of what was said slowly began to dawn on him.

"Wait. Are you telling me that while I'm sitting here drying my pants with you, Agott... she could be left alone there for weeks?"

"She could," Qifrey nodded. "That's why we can't linger here. But we can't just walk out, either. We have to wait for the Changing of the Guard. The Hatters are on edge right now; they sense any 'intrusion.' You are too... material for this world. You're bleeding radiation, Olruggio, and very, very strongly at that."

Olruggio looked at his palms. They were covered in soot and salt. He felt absurd in this sterile, ringing forest.

"So what now? Sit and wait for your little Hatters to kick the bucket?"

"Sit and warm up," Qifrey leaned back again. "In a couple of hours, the forest will start to sing. That means the sluices at the castle will open. Then we'll try to sneak in. In the meantime... I'm sorry for dragging you into this."

Olruggio looked at his former friend. The man looked deathly tired. All that mysteriousness from the highway, in the car, and on the shore had evaporated, leaving only a man who had tripped over the shackles of his own mistakes.

"You know, Qifrey, I won't be offended if we fail. Just try to get me out of here."

Qifrey smiled almost imperceptibly.

"I'll try."

They fell silent. The silence around was unnatural: no crickets, no sound of wind. Only the measured crackle of the fire and the strange, melodic clinking of the foliage somewhere high above. Olruggio closed his eyes, trying to picture Agott's face, but saw only the endless amber corridors they would have to traverse.

Olruggio tossed another "glass" branch into the fire. It did not flare up but began slowly melting in the heat, turning into a viscous lilac substance. The man followed it with his gaze and shivered. Olruggio sat on his haunches, motionlessly staring at the flames, which gave off no familiar warmth. The fire was poisonously lemon-colored, almost chemical; it did not crackle but emitted a steady, barely perceptible hiss, as if burning not brushwood but some inert gas. His clothes, still heavy with Italian sea salt, unpleasantly chilled his skin, reminding him that just a few hours ago, the world had been comprehensible, tangible, and obeyed the laws of gravity, not someone's deranged fantasy.

Around them stretched a landscape that made his eyes sting. The forest of Amber knew no autumn or withering. Trees with bark of dull, polished metal rose into the emerald sky in perfect verticals. The foliage, thin plates resembling embossed gold, did not rustle in the wind but melancholically clinked, creating a backdrop of an endless, high-pitched B-flat. There was no smell of rotting earth or pine needles here. The air was sterile, oversaturated with ozone and sweetness, like an operating room, like an expensive confectionery.

Olruggio felt not just like a stranger here; he felt no less than dead. His calloused palms, smeared with soot, seemed against the backdrop of this radiance like dirty stains on antique silk. He was seized by a sticky, suffocating confusion. He tried to summon in his memory the image of his workshop in Ravenna: the smell of old leather, the dust, the eternal chaos on the workbench, but these memories faded under the aggressive onslaught of the amber light.

His thoughts inevitably returned to Agott. He imagined her alone in Utowin's house, her habitual silence, which now, probably, had turned into an icy wall. He was burned not so much by guilt as by a primordial fear: what if time here truly flowed differently? What if, in that very minute while he studied this unnatural tree, days were passing in Italy, and his girl was once again reliving that very moment when the door in front of her face closed forever? He almost physically felt how his connection to reality was thinning, how the sole thread of responsibility that he had so clumsily tried to weave was snapping.

He looked at Qifrey. The blond in this light seemed almost transparent, stripped of that earthly roughness that had once united them in the classroom. Back then, they had been two boys united by foolishness, courage, and daring, but now a chasm of twenty years and this mad, gilded world lay between them. Olruggio remembered their shared dreams of escape, but he had never thought that another world would prove so soulless in its perfection. He missed rust. He missed the creak of old swings. Normandy, for a second, seemed to him the tenderest memory in the whole wide world.

When invisible gears turned beneath the earth and the forest answered with a low, visceral hum, Olruggio felt something inside him fracture. The white fog that began creeping between the golden trunks smelled of freshness. Olruggio clenched his fists, digging his nails into his palms, in order to hold onto the face of his adopted daughter through a sharp flash of pain.

Olruggio closed his eyes, trying to latch onto something dirty and earthly in this sterile paradise. In his memory, contrary to logic, it was not Amber, which Qifrey had raved about, that surfaced, but the smell of cheap instant coffee and old copy paper in their little dorm room on the outskirts of Rouen.

Twenty years ago, Qifrey had been different, or at least, so it had seemed to Olruggio then. Qifrey had always been too light, too fluid. While Olruggio busied himself with the engines of old Peugeots, soiling himself in fuel oil up to his elbows, Qifrey managed to emerge dry from any downpour, as if raindrops deliberately avoided his figure.

Once in Normandy, they stole an old boat from some tipsy fisherman. Olruggio had been scared to death when the engine stalled in the middle of the bay in a fog as thick as whipped cream. He remembered the cold trembling in his knees and how Qifrey had suddenly fallen silent, staring into the void with his single eye. Back then, Olruggio thought his friend had simply fallen into a stupor from fear, but now, looking at the amber glow of the castle, he realized: Qifrey had seen the path even then. He had searched for it in the rustle of waves and in the curves of the fog, while Olruggio furiously yanked the starter cord, cursing everything under the sun.

In those years, Qifrey had seemed to him a brilliant swindler and an unrecognized artist. He knew how to sweet-talk police officers so thoroughly that they forgot why they had stopped them. Olruggio had always been his "grounding wire": the one who paid the bills, who found lodging, and who pulled him out of yet another mess smelling of absinthe and cheap perfume. He liked this role. He liked feeling needed by a creature that seemed about to fly away if not nailed to the ground with lead boots.

Now, sitting by the lemon fire, Olruggio understood how badly he had been mistaken. It was not he who had been saving Qifrey. It was Qifrey who had allowed him to stay close, using his compassion and anxiety as ballast so as not to drop out of the race ahead of time.

He remembered their last night before Qifrey disappeared. The dormitory in Reims, empty wine bottles, and a strange blueprint that Olruggio had left on the table. Qifrey had looked at his scribbles with such piercing sadness that Olruggio had felt uneasy. The next morning, the bed opposite had not been made, and on the pillow lay a silver franc: all that remained of twelve years of friendship.

Olruggio swallowed the bitter saliva. The fear that Qifrey would disappear again the moment they crossed the castle threshold was stronger than the fear of these so-called Hatters.

He was suddenly seized by a painful longing to smell home, even someone else's: that specific aroma of children's shampoo and pencil shavings. He recalled how once, just a week ago, Agott had accidentally brushed his sleeve while he was fixing the kitchen faucet. It was a fleeting, almost accidental movement, but for Olruggio, it meant more than all the amber palaces in this tattered universe!

Here, in Amber, everything was eternal, and therefore, dead. In Ravenna, everything was dying, and therefore, alive. Longing for imperfection descended upon him with renewed force. He feared that if he stayed here too long, the memory of how comically Utowin snored on the desk after the station office party would be erased, replaced by the flawless, cold silence of this place.

The rising fog began to lick at the soles of his boots. Olruggio felt how, along with the cold, indifference began to seep into his consciousness.

He sank his teeth into his own lip. The taste of blood, salty, warm, real, was the final signal to act. While that pain still lived within him, while he still remembered the bitterness of Qifrey's betrayal and the weight of responsibility for Agott, he was alive. He was Olruggio. And he had no intention of becoming just another shadow in this gilded herbarium.

Olruggio spat blood into the lemon flame and, not wiping his lips, looked at Qifrey. The pain from the bitten lip worked better than any caffeine: it returned him to his own body, tearing him out of the viscous stupor.

"Alright," Olruggio's voice sounded hoarse, breaking the sterile silence of the forest like a stone thrown against glass. "I'm not moving from this goddamn spot until you spill everything. I've had enough of mysterious looks and 'you wouldn't understand.' I jumped after you into a hole between worlds, Qifrey. What the fuck! I deserve the truth, however rotten it may be."

Qifrey flinched. His single eye slowly focused on Olruggio, and for an instant, it reflected not the grandeur of Amber, but that very same frightened boy from the dormitory who always hid his hands in long sleeves.

"Who are you, really?" Olruggio leaned forward, ignoring how the metallic grass chilled his knees. "You're not just some 'refugee.' You left back then, in Reims, without even taking your jacket. Just walked out and vanished. I searched for you in every morgue and den in France. And it turns out, you've been bouncing between realities all this time?"

Qifrey sighed heavily, and this sound seemed too normal to Olruggio for the world around them.

His head ached from derealization.

"I wasn't bouncing, Olruggio. I was running. And Amber was the last place I wanted to return to. You asked who I am..." He smiled tenderly, as if a pride in his own words filled him. As if for the first time in many years, he had found the answer to the question posed. "I don't really know myself."

Olruggio frowned, trying to digest what he had heard. Before his eyes floated details of their past: how Qifrey would sometimes freeze in the middle of a busy street, listening to something Olruggio couldn't hear. How he would unerringly find the way in unfamiliar cities, without even glancing at a map.

"Did you ever really consider us friends?"

This is life, Olruggio; come to terms with it already, in your fifth decade, and remember: not everyone you lose your mind over loses their mind over you. But... If the feeling of hurt exists, then something really was there. Meaning they had been friends, at least fifty percent. Even if someone completely failed to value it.

Even if he never thought of you. Could twelve years really just be raised to the power of zero, just like that?

"Of course!" The blond before him moved much closer, grasping his hand with both of his. "You were my first and only friend. I treasured you very, very much. And I would give anything for our lives to have turned out differently."

The fire from the campfire began burning to the bone. It seemed to Olruggio that nothing in this world could move him. But his heart gave such a pang that, under the sway of emotion, he even had to turn away.

"But you left," he reminded him. "Left without saying a word."

"I threw myself into the Shadows, tangling my tracks, changing faces, countries, eras... I lived in the Italy of the fifties, in Berlin during the time of the Wall, in some godforsaken wastelands. I was an alchemist at the close of the Middle Ages, I was a poet, I saw the Eiffel Tower being built. I watched your daughter grow up. I tried to come back to you, Olruggio. A thousand times I tried."

Qifrey touched his bandage.

"But every time I drew near to your Reflection, the castle pulled me back. The longer you stay outside Amber, the stronger it wants to devour you. My eye... that was the price for... Never mind. You know, I didn't lie one bit about the wicked witch. The grey gatekeeper really did take it. And I wouldn't mind getting it back."

Olruggio was silent. He watched as the white fog slowly swallowed the lower branches of the trees. All his rage, accumulated over decades, suddenly began to give way to bitter understanding. Qifrey hadn't been a traitor in the usual sense. He had been a hostage of fate itself, so it seemed.

But if fate only exists when we believe in it, could he think that? The man did not believe in fate. He believed only in what he saw with his own eyes.

"And how did you end up on that highway?" he asked, now more gently.

"I grew tired of running," Qifrey answered simply. "I just wanted to look at your world one last time."

"I see." Olruggio's voice sounded cracked, but steady.

Qifrey did not flinch. On the contrary, he leaned forward slowly, almost fluidly. In this lemon light, he seemed frighteningly graceful. His hand, slender, devoid of calluses, not at all like Olruggio's, softly came to rest on his knee. This touch was almost weightless, like the fall of a leaf.

"You were always so noisy," Qifrey whispered, and in his voice slipped that very tenderness at which Olruggio's hands always dropped in school.

He reached his other hand toward Olruggio's face, carefully, and with the pad of his thumb wiped a drop of blood from his lip. His fingers smelled of something cold and pure, like ice in a glass.

"Qifrey, don't sweet-talk me," Olruggio tried to pull away but froze. In his former friend's single eye there was so much unspoken sadness that the rage inside began treacherously to settle, turning into a heavy lump of lead.

The blond smiled almost imperceptibly, gazing at him from below, and in that gaze there was such a disarming tenderness that the mechanic forgot his next question for a second. Qifrey had a knack for it: enveloping, diverting, turning a serious conversation into something ethereal and unsteady.

"How did you get back onto the highway? From those shadows of yours."

"All roads lead to Amber, friend," Qifrey answered evasively, his fingers now barely touching the stubble on the other's cheek, as if studying his face anew. "And sometimes roads cross in the most unsuitable places."

"You're mocking me," Olruggio exhaled, feeling how his own body betrayed him, relaxing under this tender, almost hypnotic pressure. "You're doing it again. Avoiding the answer."

"Everything happened all at once," Qifrey pressed his forehead to Olruggio's shoulder, breathing deeply. "And nothing has changed. Look at this fog. It doesn't ask who we are; it simply takes away the excess from our sight. Let me take away your anxiety, just for a minute."

Olruggio could smell the ozone and the subtle scent of that very soap Qifrey had used back in France. This was madness. To sit in a forest of metallic foil and feel your heart burning inside you.

"You're still the same secretive idiot."

Qifrey merely laughed quietly, and the sound was akin to the clinking of crystal in an empty room.

The hum beneath the earth became unbearably loud, vibrating in the very bones.

"I have a house on the outskirts. We need to rest, eat, and think over a plan."

Qifrey stood up and offered him his hand.

"You know, Qifrey, I've never had a friend like you."

He truly never had.

Olruggio feels bad. The white nights, which Qifrey had not bothered to warn him about in advance, turned him into a slug, and his head split in two the next morning. When the rapture of contemplating everything new passes, it is replaced by such hopelessness that the moment the man pried his eyes open, panic struck him.

In a place where the sun never goes out, sleeping proved so unpleasant that first he tossed and turned with a pillow on his face, then with the blanket, and when it finally became too hot, he unthinkingly crawled under the bed. There, he was subsequently found by Qifrey, who came to wake him for breakfast.

"My friend, what's all this? Have you decided to retrain as a dust collector in there?"

Qifrey's voice sounded far too ringing and lively for this thrice-cursed morning. Olruggio, whose face was pressed into the floor, smelling not of dust but of sterile whiteness and something distantly reminiscent of antiseptic, only groaned dully. His head did not just ache: it was as if that very Dagda from Utowin's stories had taken up residence in it and was now persistently trying to start his rusty motor right behind his eye sockets.

"Go away," Olruggio rasped, not opening his eyes. His head ached horribly; bruises had settled under his eyes like two blue-black shiners. "I can't, this light... It's awful!"

"It's called 'eternal radiance.' Get used to it. Climb out; I've made toast."

It was amazing that in this Looking-Glass world, Lord forgive him, they ate simple food, and not drops of dew gathered after the latest acid rain!

Olruggio, groaning and clutching the leg of the bed, which felt as cold as steel to the touch, began slowly scraping himself out. His movements resembled old hydraulics. His whole body was failing him after a night on the floor; his whole body ached.

When he finally assumed a vertical position, leaning his back against the bed, Qifrey was already standing by the window. In this endless, frozen day, the blond looked like a statue come to life: the sunlight of Amber did not blind him but seemed to absorb into his skin, making it glow from within.

"You look terrible," Qifrey stated, casting a fleeting glance with his single eye.

"Go to hell."

Qifrey laughed softly, and this sound struck his temples no worse than a mallet. He had a dreadful urge to take off his boot, walk over to him, and whack him soundly on the head with it. But unfortunately, his boots had not survived yesterday's swim. And one of them had come unglued.

Now the pair stood sadly by the entrance, awaiting relegation to the local magical trash can.

"Come on, before everything goes cold."

Qifrey's house on the outskirts turned out to be just as strange as everything else. From the outside, it was an elegant construction of white stone that seemed to hover above the ground, but inside, Olruggio continuously stumbled upon things that utterly contrasted with the reality surrounding them. An old copper kettle, a peeling stool, some rags suspiciously resembling a piece of who-knows-what. Something rotted and over-rotted that had come into this world along with him.

Olruggio dragged himself to the kitchen, slapping his bare feet against the cold floor. A mug steamed on the table. He clung to it as to a sacred spring, but after the very first sip, he grimaced.

"What is this, syrup?"

"It's an extract of vigor," Qifrey sat down opposite, propping his chin on his hand. "Something like that."

"I've lost the habit of nonsense," Olruggio set the mug on the table with a heavy thud. "Listen. How long has it been now...? What's going on back home, Qifrey? You promised we'd think over a plan. I'm starting to feel sick, to be honest; I really need to go home."

Qifrey darkened a little, but in an attempt to keep face, he ended up looking outright eerie. His fingers began mechanically tracing patterns on the polished surface of the table.

"Time here is nonlinear. I can't give you guarantees. Perhaps only ten minutes have passed there. Or perhaps..."

"Don't you dare," the man leaned forward angrily, his eyes, red from lack of sleep and panic, narrowing dangerously. "Don't you dare say 'perhaps years have passed.' If I find out I'm late, if I return and see Agott as a grown woman who hates me even more than she does now... I swear, I'll take your Amber Castle apart stone by stone."

Qifrey looked at him with a strange, almost maternal pity.

"Your attachment to this girl... It makes you vulnerable. Muffle it; it will hinder us."

Qifrey spoke as if he himself had never loved at all. As if he didn't know what it was like to pine from longing and anxiety. As if he didn't know how badly your legs could give way at a fleeting thought of someone who had become truly dear to you. The man wouldn't venture to assert it, but he knew perfectly well that his former friend knew how to love. Moreover: he could love passionately and tenderly, desiring nothing in return. He could give all of himself without remainder, accepting nothing back.

Burning out his heart and his soul.

"Muffle it?" Olruggio gave a bitter chuckle. "And how am I supposed to do that? Tear out my heart? And she's not just some girl; Agott is my daughter."

Dear Agott, do you believe in Papa?

Do you believe that he does nothing but think of you?

Are you waiting for his return?

Will you say something to him when he comes?

"As you say. Eat first; we'll talk after. You're so angry; I'm sure it's from hunger."

Olruggio looked at the plate of toasts, which looked suspiciously perfect: even golden squares from which there was no smell of burnt bread. In this world, even food seemed a simulation. He took one, and it crunched on his teeth with a metallic clink, dissolving in his mouth into sweetish dust.

"Angry?" The man nearly choked. "Qifrey, I'm not angry. I'm furious!"

He chewed slowly, feeling his jaw clench from the unnatural taste. His gaze wandered around the kitchen, catching on that very peeling stool.

Olruggio looked at the toast as if it might at any second pull some kind of trick: start singing or turn into a butterfly (who knows with this magical grub!). Though the bread looked too perfect, not a single crumb on the plate, ideally golden from edge to edge. The man cautiously bit off another piece. It crunched surprisingly realistically, though the taste carried something elusively floral, as if the wheat had been watered with perfume.

"Listen," he said, chewing slightly, and jabbed a finger toward the toaster, which looked more like a part from a spaceship. "Is this just regular bread?"

Qifrey, who had been frozen by the window until then, slowly detached himself from contemplating the eternal radiance. He sat opposite, and in this homey light of the kitchen, amidst plates and mugs, his unearthly grace at last dimmed a little, giving way to something human.

"Regular. I baked it myself."

"You? Baked?" He skeptically raised an eyebrow, studying the impeccable crust. "In school, you couldn't fry an egg without burning down half the dorm. Remember how we tried to make fondue in a tin can?"

Qifrey smiled almost imperceptibly, and this smile was the first truly real thing Olruggio had seen since their jump. Just a memory of a tuna can and stinky cheese that had been sent to one of their classmates by relatives from Switzerland.

"There was plenty of time," Qifrey shrugged and pushed a small bowl of something thick and dark toward his friend. "Try this. It's a jam made from blue berries that grow at the foothills. It tastes almost like your blackberries, just without the seeds."

Olruggio scooped a knifeful of the mass. It was thick, heavy, and smelled surprisingly familiar: of summer, dust, and sweetness. He spread it thickly on the toast, ignoring the suspicious, viscous syrup that still stood untouched.

"Alright. It's delicious, really. Just could use a bit more sugar."

"Everything here is sweet on its own, so pure sugar seems... superfluous. Perhaps."

They sat in silence, broken only by the measured crunch and the occasional clink of a spoon against the rim of the bowl. For a moment, it seemed to Olruggio that they were still in Ravenna, except someone had really cranked the brightness on the window and washed the floors with bleach. It was that very silence that falls between old friends when all the important words have already been spoken, or, on the contrary, it is still too early to speak them.

Olruggio reached for a second toast, feeling how the food was slowly pushing out the dull ache in the back of his head. The panic had not gone anywhere; it had simply curled up in a knot somewhere under his ribs, subdued by an ordinary breakfast.

"And the kettle?" Olruggio nodded at the old copper object on the stove, which looked like an alien from another century.

"I found it in one of the Reflections about fifty years ago. Or a hundred. There was an abandoned village in the mountains... I took a liking to it."

"Fifty years," Olruggio huffed, wiping his fingers on a napkin that felt like a cool petal to the touch. "You've become a dreadful junk dealer, Qifrey. Collecting things from rubbish heaps."

Fifty years. Sounded like nothing short of a joke.

They hadn't even lived that long.

So long, if you think about it. For some, an entire lifetime, filled with falls and rises. And for Qifrey, just the time when he picked up a kettle in some mysterious back of beyond.

Olruggio didn't develop the topic. He simply chewed, watching how the bright light played on the copper side of the pot. At that moment, he didn't want to think about Hatters or nonlinear time. He didn't want to think at all about what awaited him between this moment and the time when he would finally return home. He just wanted to finish that damn toast with blackberry jam and believe that Qifrey truly knew how to solve magical problems.

In the end, he wanted to believe Qifrey. And in him, too.

Even if yesterday it seemed that all faith in him was irretrievably lost.

Because there was no one else to believe in. He absolutely did not believe his own eyes, nor that he could escape this nightmare. Out of this multicolored prison in which his own mind had locked him.

"Would you like some more?" Qifrey nodded at the empty plate.

"Go on," Olruggio sighed, feeling a heavy, full warmth spreading through his body.

Qifrey rose to cut a few more slices. His movements were calm, almost casual, as if nothing at all were happening. As if anxiety weren't twisting Olruggio's stomach.

"You eat well. You still look poorly; should I pour you some coffee?"

"Coffee?" Olruggio froze for a second, listening to the very word, which in this surreal haze sounded like manna from heaven! "Real coffee?"

Qifrey smiled mysteriously and reached for the top shelf of the cupboard, carved directly into the rock of the wall. He took out a tin can: battered, with barely discernible letters in an unfamiliar language.

"Almost. I'd been saving it for a special occasion. The Shadow that handled coffee supplies was long ago swallowed by the darkness."

He poured a handful of dark beans into a small hand grinder. The grinding of the beans filled the kitchen, and Olruggio closed his eyes. The sound was rough and uneven. It reminded him of the workbench, of scattered bolts, and of how every morning in Ravenna, he would drink a cup of scalding espresso before opening the workshop doors.

Olruggio wrapped both hands around the mug, warming his fingers on the heavy ceramic. The coffee turned out to be remarkably lousy: over-roasted, bitter, and dusty.

"Good Lord, Qifrey," Olruggio winced, taking a large swallow. "Where did you dig up this swill? It tastes like burnt rubber."

Qifrey, who had been gathering crumbs from the table with a long, slender finger, twitched the corner of his mouth almost imperceptibly.

"I told you: from a Reflection. It seems they weren't very skilled at roasting there. Or the expiration date simply ran out about forty years ago. Is it drinkable?"

"Anything that doesn't dissolve your stomach is drinkable," Olruggio grumbled, settling himself more comfortably on that squeaky stool. "At least that smell finally stopped the ringing in my head. Listen, do you have here... well, I don't know. Can I wash up properly?"

"You can right here, in the sink. There's even soap, if you don't mind smelling of lavender."

"Lavender's good," Olruggio finished his coffee, feeling the familiar itch of alertness run through his veins. "Alright. Thanks for breakfast. It was really delicious."

He stood, feeling his stiff muscles protest every movement. In this kitchen, with his yesterday's stubble and rumpled shirt, he felt like a floor rag.

"Shall I do the dishes?" he asked, nodding at the empty plates.

"Leave it, I'll do it myself," Qifrey gently took the cup from him. "Go freshen up. I'll search for glue for your boots in the meantime. Try not to flood the bathroom. The water drains slowly here."

Everything was so white and ringing. Olruggio splashed icy water onto his face, and for a moment, it seemed to him that he was back in the workshop, in Ravenna, trying to wake up after a heavy shift. He looked at himself in the mirror on the other side of the room: bruises under his eyes, red whites, a wild stare.

His eyesight wasn't so good anymore, but his own crumpledness was simply incredible.

*What a mug*, he thought then. Compared to his former friend, he looked like a werewolf.

He felt around the pocket of his jacket, hanging on a hook, for a crumpled pack of cigarettes that had, after their swim, turned into papery-tobacco mush. The man angrily wadded it up and threw it in the corner, but immediately picked it up and stuffed it back. No littering in the home of an old friend, even if that friend was a suspicious jackass!

When he emerged from the kitchen ten minutes later, refreshed but just as gloomy, he found Qifrey in the hallway. He was crouching in front of his boots, thoughtfully turning a tube of glue in his hands.

"Well, how is it? Will they live?" Olruggio leaned against the doorframe.

"They will. The sole on the left one had come off completely," Qifrey carefully applied a layer of the thick, transparent substance onto the rubber.

"Great," he sat down on the floor beside him, watching the precise movements of his former friend.

And there was nothing more to say. He felt like such a fool, to be perfectly frank. He had too quickly taken everything happening around him for granted, and all he could think of now was that he shouldn't have worn the same shoes for nearly a quarter of a century! Olruggio thoughtfully nudged the floor with the toe of his right boot. The sound came out oddly hollow, as if he were knocking on a plastic box.

Twenty-five years. Unbelievable.

"You know," Olruggio coughed, trying to get rid of a stupid lump in his throat. "Don't... don't trouble yourself too much. If it holds a little, that's fine. When I get back, I'll toss them in the trash anyway. I'll buy proper ones, leather." Qifrey didn't even lift his head. He was pressing the rubber to the fabric with some fanatical precision, as if the fate of the universe depended on it. "You really think if we don't glue them, I won't make it? So they fall apart, so what?"

Qifrey finally straightened up and handed him the boot.

"You'll make it there, sure. But the stuff underfoot in the Sluices is such muck that it's better to have at least some sole."

Olruggio silently accepted the boot. It was strangely warm.

"Got it. Damn perfectionist," he grumbled, pulling on the footwear. "You know, I have a box at home in the closet. With new sneakers. Mia gave them to me for my birthday, last year. I've never even worn them once. Felt bad getting them dirty in the workshop. She brought them to me from London."

Qifrey had already risen and was wiping his hands with some rag.

"Well, there you'll have a reason. You'll go back and put them on. You'll walk in them by the sea."

"I will," Olruggio pulled the lace so tight his toes went numb. "I definitely will. The main thing is to get the hell out of here."

He stood and stomped a couple of times, testing the other's handiwork. The glue held firm.

"You should take a bath."

"While I was washing up, my hands nearly fell off! It's so cold; are you kidding me?"

"Always have to teach you, smart guy."

Qifrey took him by the sleeve and gently pulled him back, deeper into the house, toward the bathroom.

Qifrey walked ahead, and his steps on the white stone were completely soundless, while Olruggio behind him was literally dragging his feet. The hallway was too bright, and every rustle of Olruggio's clothing seemed out of place here. They stopped before a door that had harmoniously retreated into the wall. Qifrey entered first and gestured for his friend to come inside. The bathroom was just as flawless as the rest of the house, but the air here felt denser.

Olruggio froze at the threshold, looking at the deep basin of the tub, carved directly into the floor. He looked utterly disconcerted: his shoulders slumped, his hair stuck together from dampness.

"Sit down," Qifrey said quietly, pointing to a low ledge.

Olruggio obediently lowered himself, feeling his overworked muscles hum. He tried to reach the laces of his sodden boots, but his fingers wouldn't obey; they had gone numb from cold and fine trembling. In the end, he had always fled the cold and striven for the sun.

Be careful what you wish for.

Qifrey silently lowered himself onto one knee beside him. He did not offer to help with the shoes, understanding that this would wound Olruggio, but instead reached his hand toward the wall. His fingers slowly glided over the smooth surface, and from invisible openings, water gushed into the basin. At first, it was as icy as the water Olruggio had washed with in the kitchen, and the man involuntarily drew his head into his shoulders.

"Wait," Qifrey softly touched his forearm, holding him in place.

The blond closed his single eye, running his palm intently along the rim of the tub. A low, barely perceptible hum was heard, like the quiet, restrained purr of a huge cat. The water in the basin began to change color: from crystal clear, it grew veiled with a pearlescent haze. Above the surface rose the first timid curl of steam.

Olruggio carefully extended his hand and touched the stream.

"Warm..." he breathed, and in that short word was such relief that Qifrey smiled faintly.

Qifrey straightened up and walked to a cupboard built into the wall. He took out a stack of heavy towels. Walking back over, he laid them on the edge of the tub, next to Olruggio's hand. He unfolded one of them and simply draped it over the man's shoulders, pressing down with his palms so the warmth of the fabric would immediately start heating his frozen back.

Olruggio went still under that towel, watching the tub fill. The hum in his head finally began to fade.

"Take your time," Qifrey squeezed his shoulder slightly through the soft fabric. "We're not going anywhere until you're warmed up. Soap's on the shelf."

The blond turned to leave but lingered for a second at the door. He straightened the rug by the entrance.

Olruggio sat in the deep basin of the tub, knees pulled to his chest. The water was so strange that it felt merely like a dense layer of air compressing his ribs. He hadn't undressed completely; he'd only pulled off his boots and jacket, remaining in his thoroughly soaked T-shirt and trousers heavy with moisture.

In the end, his clothes were dirty and had fallen into disrepair. His former friend had mentioned yesterday that, by all rights, he ought to change them.

The bathroom was quiet. Only an occasional, heavy splash broke the sterile muteness when Olruggio tried to move his numb toes. He stared at a single point on the wall where Amber's light refracted into a perfect emerald line. His head was empty and ringing.

The door once again slid aside, almost soundlessly.

Olruggio did not turn around. He only pressed his knees tighter against his chest, feeling a coarse shiver run down his spine.

Qifrey entered just as noiselessly. He lowered himself to his knees beside the edge of the tub. His light garments softly touched the startlingly cold floor. In his hands, the blond held fresh clothes, so unlike anything worn in their world. He laid the whole stack carefully on the ledge.

Qifrey looked at the hunched back of his friend, at the protruding vertebrae beneath the wet fabric.

Something in the depths of the water changed again. Olruggio shuddered as he felt a tight coil of genuine heat begin to twist around his ankles. It didn't resemble ordinary water heating; rather, it was as if concentrated, wild fire had been injected into the liquid itself. The heat climbed higher, enveloping his thighs, his lower back, penetrating through the wet fabric directly to his skin.

Olruggio exhaled noisily. His shoulders, previously drawn up to his ears, slowly lowered. He closed his eyes, feeling the ice inside him finally begin to crack.

Qifrey remained silent. Then he placed his palm on the other's shoulder: a brief, barely perceptible press that burned more fiercely than any water.

From pleasure, the man slowly tilted his head back onto the rim of the tub. His face, still pale, was now relaxed. He looked up at his former friend. The blond looked back with his single eye, and in that gaze, he could not discern anything unambiguous.

He utterly did not understand this person.

Then Qifrey removed his hand. He rose just as smoothly as he had knelt and nodded at the stack of clothes.

"Warm up," he said, almost with his lips alone.

He left, closing the door behind him just as soundlessly. Olruggio remained alone in the enveloping steam, looking at his hands, which in the warm water had at last stopped trembling.

The water in that damn tub wasn't just warming; it was draining the will out of him. Olruggio sat, his shoulder blades pressed into the cold stone, and felt the heavy, viscous heat crawl under his skin, trying to smooth out every wrinkle there, every knot of nerves that he had been tightening for years. It was unbearable.

He looked at his hands, swollen in the water, and thought about Agott. That image gnawed at him from within. The girl who might be waking now in their empty apartment, looking at the unmade bed and not understanding where that irritating man who loomed in the background had gone. Or, what was even more frightening, understanding everything far too well.

Time is nonlinear. To hell with it.

Qifrey's words hung in the air like a poisonous fog. What if he returned and Agott was already an adult?

And he was just sitting here. The longing was so dense that it felt like a physical weight on his shoulders. It smelled of old, burnt coffee. He thought of the workshop, of the unfinished cup on the workbench, of the debts that now had no one to pay them. All his problems, which back home had seemed huge and insurmountable, here had transformed into a vague hum. And that disturbed him most of all.

If his problems disappeared, what would remain of him?

When he opened his eyes, the water was already cooling, turning into a vague, icy slush. It seemed to him that if he stood up now, he would simply crumble into a thousand grey shards that Qifrey would then scatter from his own window.

It felt so wretched in that moment that everything went dark before his eyes.

Agott's birthday was coming soon, too. The note he had written for her was burning through his anxious mind. He had thought about it for so long, after all.

"Once, you told me that you would never be able to love again.

You said your love had run out and there was never enough of it for everyone.

Alright then. Will you let me give you mine?"