Thereby hangs a tale

Chapter 4 - Lost stories

Ting Williams was in the library, the place even more quiet than usual, if that was possible. The few faces she saw with any regularity were likely busy with the election stuff; even Kevin wasn't here, only his junior assistant Lillian. Well, at least Lillian was a neutral presence, so much so she was more furniture than person, but it was still an improvement on Mr. Lee. That man was just an inconvenience.

It wasn't as if there was anything she hadn't already read; especially since Leo started helping find anything interesting. Still, there was always a chance she'd missed something. That damn story though, it was as if it had never existed. Despite it being one of the most famous legends in the history of the empire, she couldn't even find mention of it. That was just weird, and it was increasingly confirming her suspicion that it was the key. Yes, this was just one provincial library, but with limited resources she'd expect the bigger, more famous works to be represented in favour of the avantgarde.

Huifen was the most famous person who ever lived; yet the most famous account of her life was entirely missing. What remained barely amounted to trivia and the most inane of songs. The woman who brought the empire into being, who freed their ancestors from centuries of oppression. The woman who had inspired generations of poets and songs; songs that it seemed lived on only in the minds of an elder generation now. This woman was reduced to a series of facts. It didn't make any sense. What could actually be so wrong with an ancient story that it must be excised from public awareness entirely?

More people would have noticed but for that plague of deaths throughout the provinces. It was that memory which made it so easy for people to stop thinking about it, to throw it away.

She'd exhausted her options, only one remained, and she really didn't like it. She liked Miss McFoster, she thought she could trust her; but what if she were wrong? Her last chance would vanish.

She was about to give up for the day, when Leo wandered in, Brown hair tousled even more than usual. He brushed it roughly off his face, looking up and finding her with his eyes. Those green eyes looked tired, the circles dark about them. He came over, "We have to talk." he tried to whisper.

"Quiet in the library," came Lillian's sparrow-like tones.

"Outside," Ting said, not questioning the urgency in his face.

She ushered Leo before her, and they walked out into a bright day. A little off to the side of the door, she turned him around and studied him.

"What's wrong Leo?"

He gazed at her, eyes almost level, "I had the dream again."

She sighed, understanding, "Oh Leo, I'm so sorry, I thought you'd stopped having those."

"I have!" he uttered urgently, "or I thought I had. It was different this time though."

She cocked her head, "different?"

He turned his face away, "Yeah, I heard something. I heard it when I saw her there. It's just like you said, like what you saw."

She didn't say anything then, giving him space to go on. Eventually he did, "That hissing noise, it was there, I heard it at the tree. I'd forgotten I think."

She couldn't speak, her own mind staring into the shadowed recesses of a barn, and the hissing song it sang to her. Finally she managed, "You did?"

He looked back at her, nodding his head, "I heard it twice. I think it was seeing Martina yesterday coming back to visit her mum. It ... triggered something."

"Tell me it all, leave nothing out " Ting almost ordered the younger boy; and he did.

She heard more in the tale than Leo did, his mind dominated by the horror of his sister's corpse. He didn't know, couldn't know that she'd heard the noise again, far more recently. The coincidences were too many, the implications too dire. Every day she delayed now, she would do so knowing it placed the answers they both needed further away. Answers to horrors she felt, with mounting terror, were stalking their shadows once more.

"Leo," she said, lifting his sunken chin, "it has to be tonight."

He looked into her eyes, and after little thought, said "I'm in."