we are not truly immortal

[dark_light]

After Glass's party is over with, Amariah and Kas go home.

Amariah fetches down their alethiometers.

"It's about time I took care of Alethia's afterlife, whatever it may be," she says quietly. "What can the alethiometer tell you about what I'll find?"

Comments

[arenaria]

"It doesn't matter," mumbles Shell Bell.

"Put her down, let us go," says the smew, "forget about us."

[sicaria]

"Absolutely not. It is obvious that you intend this abandonment to benefit me. It will not. I refuse to allow you to make that choice on my behalf. Tell me what happened."

[arenaria]

"She screamed," Shell Bell whispers, "and I remembered, everything bad I ever did, ever thought, and I felt it, and I still do, and it's terrible, and I'm - so - selfish I still don't know what to do -"

[sicaria]

"The harpy hurt you," says Sherlock. "Understand what she did, and then fix it."

[arenaria]

"She didn't lie."

[sicaria]

"If she made you think that leaving me was some kind of moral duty, then she told one of the worst lies I can imagine, whether or not she did it using the selective application of individual truths."

[arenaria]

"She didn't say that. I figured it out."

[sicaria]

"It is false."

[arenaria]

"I wished you dead, I did, I wished you dead - and hurt and away from Tony - just because I wanted you where I was," sobs Shell Bell. "And when I told you before all I said was please still love me like that made any sense -"

[sicaria]

"But I do still love you," she says. "And if I had known where you were I would have wished the same."

[arenaria]

Shell Bell sobs, and shivers, and mumbles something unintelligible.

[sicaria]

"What is it?"

[arenaria]

"I don't know what to do," murmurs Shell Bell, "I always just do whatever makes me feel better but I shouldn't feel better and I want to do something that - but then it's about what I want again - I don't know how to do anything else, I'm so, so self-centered, I can't even be guilty right."

[sicaria]

"I want you to feel better," says Sherlock. "Your suffering helps no one but that harpy."

[arenaria]

"No," whimpers the smew, and Shell Bell is silent.

[sicaria]

"Does it then have some practical benefit which I fail to understand?"

[arenaria]

Shell Bell shakes her head, slowly.

[sicaria]

"So you are in pain, and I am in pain, and nothing good is coming of either," she says. "This is not optimal."

[arenaria]

"But," says Shell Bell, "I should be and you shouldn't care."

[sicaria]

"You should not be, and I do care, and I will go on caring. Your suffering does not help me. Your recovery will."

[arenaria]

Shell Bell has no rebuttal. She weeps.

[sicaria]

Sherlock hugs her.

[arenaria]

The smew squirms under the gyrfalcon's wings, whimpering, and makes a tentative escape attempt.

[sicaria]

There is really no practical way for the gyrfalcon to keep hold of him. So he doesn't.

[arenaria]

Shell Bell and smew regard each other.

She reaches down and picks him up and holds him, not deliberately bringing him into contact with Sherlock but not going far out of her way to avoid it either.