Lilith's Arc

Chapter 11 of 40

Lilith woke before dawn with a cold thought. The spell had already taken Gabe's swim. It would take more, and she could not see which memory would go next. Any morning, one of her children might wake with a hole in their mind. She had bound them together. She did not know how to watch the wound. She found Gabe at the kitchen table. He held a photo of himself in the water, small and laughing. "I know it happened," he said. "I just can't feel it." He set the photo down and looked at her. He had always watched before he spoke. Now he watched her like she might break something else. "How do I know which one goes next?" "You don't," Lilith said. "Neither do I." That was the whole problem. She could not guard a door with no lock. Novalee wandered in, rubbing her eyes. She climbed onto Lilith's lap. "Draw the day with me," she said. She meant a game they played, listing what happened so nothing got lost. Lilith understood then. She could not stop the theft. But she could keep a record. That night Nyx came. She stepped out of the dark corner without a sound. The goddess of night watched over children who walked home alone. She had watched Lilith's house since the binding, saying little. "You look tired," Nyx said. Flat. No pity. "I can't tell which memory the spell will take," Lilith said. "I can't protect them from a thief I can't see." Nyx looked at the sleeping baby, then at Gabe's photo on the table. "Then don't hide it," she said. "Write it down. All of it. When one goes, you'll know what's missing. You can tell them the story back." "That isn't the same," Lilith said. "No," Nyx said. "It's what you have." Lilith did not sleep. She lit a lamp and took a clean book. She wrote Gabe's first swim as she remembered it, every splash. She wrote Novalee's first word. She wrote how Hadley gripped a finger. Page after page, she caught what the spell might steal. She could not lock the door. She could stand beside it with a pen. By morning her hand ached. Gabe found her still writing. He read over her shoulder and did not stop her. "So when it's gone," he said slowly, "you read it to me." "Yes," Lilith said. "Every time." He nodded. It was not a cure. It was a watch. Lilith closed the book. She had answered the question that woke her. She could not see which memory would vanish next, and she never would. But now nothing would vanish unnoticed. She had traded blindness for a ledger. It was less than she wanted. It was more than she'd had. And she knew, holding the book, that the losses were not done coming.