Silver: The Lost Royal

18 | Justice

THE first time she saw Kara, there was nothing but absolute silence. She'd woken up on a random weekend with nothing but children's movies to watch when she froze on her bed. How could she stare back at herself without a mirror, and why was she shining?

Silence had engulfed them as both observed each other with keen eyes. She raised her hands, but Kara didn't follow. If it was a mirror or a trick of light, it should have raised its hands as well. Then Kara spoke, and she didn't stop. She rambled on and on, and it reduced the silence that surrounded them to a distant memory. There was never silence whenever she was with Kara. Until now.

Now Kara didn't ramble or zoom around, leaving trails of light that reflected off every nearby surface behind her. And her cackles no longer bounced off her ears. Despite having heard Kara's teasing taunts all her life, not even one replayed in her head.

The absolute silence was back. An unwelcome respite from the constant chatter she had grown accustomed to. No questions, no foreign terms, just silence.

Her eyes were now dry, having exhausted her lacrimal glands of tears. The emptiness she felt had ravaged her like fire gnawing away at the land, leaving nothing but ashes in its place, like the dust that remained of her sister. Dust she couldn't just part ways with.

With determination in her stride, she sought out something much better than the purse she had made on the spur of the moment. It wasn't a worthy resting place for her most cherished companion. So, she immersed herself amidst a collection of intricate objects, their shapes and designs captivating her senses. Nothing fit and nothing was perfect until her hands and mind grew weary.

Reluctantly, she settled on a cylindrical jar made of shimmering silver glass, carefully placing the dust within. Hoping beyond measure, she prayed Kara would cherish this gift from the depths of her heart.

A knock on the door didn't elicit any reaction from her until the person tried to open the door and it didn't budge. That was what forced her eyes to it and what the door had become. Sealed shut by silver fibers.

Her next thought came easily, and by the time she had reached the door, her hands had already crafted a knife.

Silver knife cuts silver fibers.

"One minute," she said, but before she could get to cutting, the fibers rushed back into her fingertips and up her arm before softening into her skin. She didn't have to use the knife, so the same thing happened to the knife and it melded back into her before she knew it.

She marveled at the ability she didn't know she had until days ago but opened the door and shifted when she saw it was Zack. When she closed it, she turned to find Zack rooted in his spot, his stunned gaze absorbing every detail of the room and the various objects littered around.

"I uh, got carried away," she said and ambled back to the bed. "I did this for Kara. Do you think she'll love it? Not like you would know the answer to that, you didn't know her or—"

"It's beautiful. She would have loved it," his words cut her growing rambling before he joined her on the bed.

With her eyes on the jar, she started. "She was like my diary. My living diary as we would say. So many times I wished she was real, that she could offload to me too, that we could go to school together, and do things together. I wanted to talk to her outside without whispering or making it seem like I wasn't talking to someone because other people couldn't see her."

Every inch of her body screamed for a release only tears could give, but her eyes remained dry.

"You know, there were two things she hated about me. One was the fact that I let my uncle and aunt walk over me all the time. She always told me to stand up for myself and I often wondered why that was so hard to do. At school, I could talk to anyone, and stand up to anyone. Heck, I even spoke up for other people."