Out of the Black - Lee Doty [166]
There would be no later. If he was going to act, it had to be now. He knew from his experience with Dek that he could sever this woman from the Loom. He knew from harsh experience why he might need to. To give another power is to be responsible for their use of it.
Issak was sure about Ivo's prodigy because Ivo had been sure. He was sure about the policeman who now carried Roy's blade because he trusted Dek. But what about this unlikely heroine who now stood before him? Dek had given her this gift, but the gift had been out of desperation.
Could she be trusted with this power? Would she use it when she needed to? Would she use it well?
***
Awkward.
Beneath the curly wreckage of her first and only permanent, Anne fidgeted in a brown and orange holiday dress that, though it was the largest in the store, was still a size too small. More than usual, she felt fat. Here, surrounded by family, she felt most alone. Here where she should feel most safe, she felt most inadequate.
Around her at the portable table, children older and younger spoke of their interests: acting, music, sports- the rest of her family was talented and engaged in the unknowable dream of life.
Sometimes as she hid in the mechanics of eating, she tried to lose herself in their words like she would in a good book: here's Anne scoring the big goal, here's Anne bouncing lightly on the shoulders of the jubilant team, here's Anne upside down and perfectly poised on the balance beam. She imagined she lived with their courage. She dreamed that she could dream like them, but she was awake and blinking into the morning sunlight of her limitations.
Since this year's gathering was at Aunt Simone's, the kids' table was within earshot of the adult's table. There, up in the big leagues, she could hear her mom badgering Clara, the oldest of the three Kelley girls. Today's topic was the kind and quantity of food on Clara's plate. Mom had stopped badgering Anne about the same thing two years ago when she was six.
She was right in the middle of the warm feeling of gratitude when her mother managed to reach across the five meters separating them, around the corner from the dining room, and punch Anne straight through the heart. "It's too late for her."
In frustration, Clara had said that Anne already had seconds. "It's too late for her.", her mother snapped back.
At first Anne had interpreted the change in her mother's strategy as reverse psychology, or perhaps the tardy but needed onslaught of parental compassion. But now, listening to the familiar stream of fear and warning that poured from mother to sister, Anne had an epiphany. Her mother hadn't changed her tactics- she'd changed her opinion. Anne's mother had given up on her. She would always be fat and useless- she'd always lose life's game.
This realization was a big burden for an eight-year-old to carry, especially since it felt like it had been dropped on her from the tenth floor balcony. At eight years old, her mom already knew it was too late for her.
Around her, the Thanksgiving revelers laughed and talked and ate, but before Anne was a plate of ashes. Fragile hope crumbled and fell, but no tears.
***
His icy-blue eyes hadn't moved. His stare was that of a statue... the statue of a surgeon deciding where to make the first cut.
In the back of her mind, Anne heard Ol' God Fear yammering something about immanent destruction and how she probably deserved it anyway.
Whatever. She had questions... Kaspari better have answers. "How could you?" she said, maintaining her stare. Issak didn't flinch, but Anne thought something subtle changed. Perhaps there was a thawing, a softening of the eyes.
"He trusted you." She said, trying to keep most of the fury out of her voice.
"What do you know of me?" Issak asked in measured tones.
"Enough. He told me about you."
He looked skeptical. "Told you?"
"Through whatever you did to him- however that bound us- we were together in my head. He told me about the devil and your deal with