Myriad Maia

Welcome to the new weekly serial!

If you are not familiar with Myriad Maia, please take a moment to read about the purpose of this page here.

The Current Project:

The Key Breakers will likely end up being novel length, though I cannot say exactly how long until it's finished.

It is a contemporary/urban fantasy that takes place in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. (Go ESO! ... I'm not really into sports but I would totally be into competative symphony-ing.)

All I will say about the plot for now: When Emily, a tone->colour synestete, agrees to take part in a medical study, she discovers that her particular abilities and challenges may be beyond medical understanding or help.

I hope you enjoy it!

Bricks

• Brick 1
• Brick 2
• Brick 3
• Brick 4
• Brick 5
• Brick 6
• Brick 7
• Brick 8
• Brick 9
• Brick 10
• Brick 11
• Brick 12
• Brick 13
• Brick 14
• Brick 15
• Brick 16
• Brick 17
• Brick 18
• Brick 19
• Brick 20
• Brick 21
• Brick 22
• Brick 23
• Brick 24

Brick 1

Prologue

On April 5, 2005, the Arlington Apartments in Downtown Edmonton suffered a catastrophic fire. Though it was first thought that the nearly hundred year old building could be saved, or at the very least, its character conserved through reconstruction efforts, it was not to be. Nearly three and a half years later, the demolition order was given.

The Edwardian building had been built from floor to cornice in red brick. In a city known for its box-like architecture, this box was somehow unique.

Like any building that has stood for any length of time, the Arlington Apartments had both good and bad history. From early upscale apartments for the wealthy later to run-down accommodations for those on one of society's lower rungs, the Arlington Apartments had seen the entire range in its short century. A serial killer and those wielding black magic had called it home as much as the bankers and artists who lived amongst them.

But through all its ghost sightings and neglected stories, the most important of its histories would not be discovered until long after the last brick had been removed.

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Brick 2

Emily's fingers moved rapidly along the fingerboard of her violin. Her wrist flicked the bow with the fast notes. Bright colours danced upon the wave of the tones escaping her instrument, creating pastel ribbons that would put the aurora borealis to shame.

She watched as the colours of previous notes faded only to be replaced by the light of new greens, blues, pinks and purples. It was the colours that helped her play. When the colours were right, there was perfection of tone.

The last note, long and high, shot a ribbon of yellow. She watched it as she lowered her bow slowly. After a moment, it flew away and faded into nothing.

There were no ribbons of colours anymore. There never were when the music stopped.

Her tiny studio was bland. The walls were white. The only colour was the purple door that matched all the doors in the Alberta College. She had placed a mirror on the back of it. There was little furniture: a few music stands, a shelf where she kept her music, an old brown upright the college had provided, and a lone folding chair in one corner where her student's placed their belongings. The studio hadn't changed in ten years.

She looked at the sheets of Mozart on the music stand. She hadn't used it but she looked over it to confirm her assumption. Not a single mistake. As it should be.

There was a knock at the door.

She set her violin down in the case that rested on the top of the piano and walked the few steps to the door. When she placed her hand upon the handle, she saw her reflection.

She had been playing more vigorously that even she had thought. Half of her frizzy blond hair was flipped over to the wrong side, making her look quite crazed. Her pale blue cardigan, which had always been too big, sat lop-sided on her bony shoulders.

There was another knock.

"Just a second," she called, having a fairly good idea who it was.

She used her fingers to comb through her hair and straightened her sweater. With everything back in place, she paused as her eyes focused upon her face. Her cheeks were looking drawn. Her blue eyes were the brightest and youngest thing about her appearance. They sparkled like the ribbons of her music.

With a sigh, she opened the door.

As she stepped aside, the tall, thin man entered the room carrying a large cello case. His name was Liam and he had short brown hair and brown eyes. She had known him longer than she had had her studio.

"I keep telling you to upgrade to a studio with windows," he said without greeting.

She closed the door and turned to him. "Do you ever listen to anything I say?" she asked.

"Yeah, yeah, the colours," he said. "But it's nearly midnight. At least get a clock or something. You're looking pale. You need sleep!"

She folded her arms across her chest. "And what are you doing here if it's so late?"

He waved a hand dismissively in the air. "Concert at the Winspear tomorrow, had to practice."

"Need any help?" she offered.

He shook his head. "No," he said. "It's going really well. I think it will be fine. We've got a final rehearsal tomorrow morning anyway."

He looked around her tiny studio. "I think this may have been a broom closet before they gave it to you," he said.

"And now it's my broom closet," she replied as she first noticed her exhaustion. Her arms felt much weaker than they had a moment earlier. Her head started to pound; weakly at first, then stronger and stronger. She rubbed her forehead with her fingers.

"Another headache?" Liam asked, any playful teasing that had been in his voice had dissipated.

She nodded.

"You should really get those checked out."

She shook her head. "Everyone gets headaches," she said.

He would not be deterred. "Not all of a sudden after a lifetime of never having a single one. You are taking this way too calmly."

"I've just been working too hard. I just need some rest," she reasoned.

He smiled. "A perfect excuse for me to give you a ride home," he said. "You'll never get home on ETS at this hour anyway."

Her head now hurt too much to argue and he was probably right. The Edmonton Transit System did not exactly have a reputation for convenience, especially at late hours.

She packed up her violin and the two of them walked down to the parking lot. As they left the building, the warmth of the summer night caressed her face. Stopping for a breath, she looked around at the tall downtown buildings. Despite the late hour, the lights in several offices in several buildings were still on. The only building that was completely dark was McDougall Church.

Liam was already at his black mini and waving to her to hurry up. Unsurprisingly, his car wasn't the only one in the lot. As much teasing as he gave her, she was by far not the worst offender for late nights.

As they drove down Jasper Avenue, the main route through the downtown, Emily's headache worsened.

She tried closing her eyes but it made no difference so she tried focusing on the people walking to and from the bars and restaurants. Jasper Avenue in summer rarely went quiet.

Faint dark ribbons of browns and reds danced out the doors of the night clubs.

She opened the window and let the breeze brush over her face. It gave little relief. As they neared their turn to the High Level Bridge, her headache worsened. She focused on her breath. It didn't help.

As they passed a narrow street, she saw a long faint ribbon of black. Her breath caught as she whipped her head around quickly. It went down a full block before turning. Though it had been faint, it had no doubt been black. She had never seen any greys. There was always some hue to the ribbons. Bland greys did not happen and especially not black.

They were out of range of it before she could get a closer look. Maybe her headache was interfering and it had simply been a very dark red or green. She could not possibly have seen black.

Her head continued to throb and she rubbed it again as she straightened in her seat.

"Anything wrong?" Liam asked.

"No," she said. "I just need some sleep."

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Brick 3

"Why do you still insist upon living in this dilapidated wreck?" Liam asked.

With his nose scrunched, he surveyed the damp hall leading to her apartment. He made exaggerated gestures with his eyes as he looked up at a brown stain in the corner and then down to a stain of a different brown on the floor.

"You can afford much better than this," he added.

Emily ignored him. The insulting comments were routine when he drove her home. She lived in a basement bachelor suite in a poorly tended building a block north of Whyte Ave, which was known as the partying street of Edmonton. The rent was cheap and she was barely ever there anyway.

Usually only those fresh from their parents' home but eager to be close to the bars and trendy night life accepted such conditions. Emily did not see why she should pay more for a place that served as little more than a rest stop.

She turned the key in her door, gave it a great tug and kick, and pushed it open. She turned on the light.

Like her studio, the walls of her apartment were featureless and white. The faint brown and red ribbons from the nightclubs' music tumbled slowly through the windows and faded within a foot.

She noticed the laundry basket in the corner. A pale green and blue mound peaked out over the rim. Hadn't she just washed it all the other day?

The queen bed with its iron rung headboard and a low, white bookshelf next to the laundry basket were the only other fixtures in the room. The bookshelf was a further reminder of the state of her laundry. She kept her clothes there and at the moment it was completely bare.

She set her violin down on the floor at the end of the bed and walked over to the laundry to sort it.

Liam closed the door and walked around the corner to the kitchen. It was more of a fridge and a cupboard set in an alcove than a kitchen. He opened the fridge and tutted.

"Don't start, Liam," she warned. "My headache hasn't gone away and I'm not in the mood."

"You need to come to my place and eat some real food. At least let me get you some groceries," he said. "No wonder you're looking so thin."

"Yes, mom," she mocked as she held up a pale green cardigan and inspected it for stains.

Liam shut the fridge and leaned against it to watch her. "You need to take life more seriously," he said. "You can't just live off colours."

"It seems to be working so far," she replied as she threw the cardigan into her 'wash immediately' pile on the floor.

She was just about to add to her retort when movement flickered in the corner of her eye. She looked up at the door. A dark ribbon of colour was poking from underneath it. It was moving slowly and entirely unlike music. It moved like a snake, searching and sniffing the ground ahead.

There was no sound with the colour. She couldn't hear anything. Concentrating, she still couldn't hear anything, though that could partly have been because her ears had started to ring with the pounding of her headache. She forced her face and her mind to relax. The pounding eased only enough to dull the edge.

She watched the poking, black ribbon a moment more. She hesitated, then walked to the door and ripped it open. The ribbon faded.

She looked both ways down the hall. There was nothing inside. She could see the stairs leading to the glass main door of the building. There was laughter. She walked down the hall until she could see outside. Several university students were chatting as they smoked. Could the ribbon have come from them? She doubted it.

Her head pounded harder. She needed sleep before it drove her crazy.

As she walked back to her apartment, Liam stuck his head out the door.

"What happened?" he asked.

She waved his question away. "Just imagining things," she said. "I need sleep."

For once in his blessed life, Liam took the hint. He gave her a quick one-armed hug around her shoulders and a quick kiss on her forehead before saying good-bye and leaving.

She did not watch him leave. She closed her apartment door immediately and shut off the light. Wishing there was some kind of pill that could dent these new migraines, she climbed into bed and tried to sleep.

Twenty minutes later, she had gotten out of bed to search for ear plugs in her medicine cabinet. Fifteen minutes after that, she tried pressing her pillow against her ears. Were the bars getting even louder than usual? The ribbons of colour assaulting the windows were getting brighter, that was for sure.

A half hour later, she threw her pillow across the room and groped at the end of her bed for her violin case. When she found it, she unzipped the cover pocket and felt for her cell phone. The screen turned on, making her jump with the sudden brightness.

Scrolling her phone book, which did not take long, she found her doctor's number. She nearly sent her phone the way of her pillow when the clinic answering machine refused to take messages.

She looked at the door again. The light from the hall glowed at the bottom but there was no black ribbon this time. Looking up at the windows, she saw the ribbons of bass had gone too.

She looked down at her phone again. 2:30 am. The nightclubs were closing but her head still pounded its own rhythm. She dropped the phone onto the bed and pulled her blanket up over her head, desperate to find any semblance of rest.

The next morning, she did not wait to get out of bed to phone the clinic. She found her phone not far from her left foot.

By an unusual stroke of luck, she got an appointment for that same morning. With great relief, tempered by the still present thumping in her brain, she got out of bed in search of clothes that had not been slept in.

After finding a white tank top, a blue cardigan, and khakis in the "clean next week" pile, Emily was able to dress and rush to the downtown clinic.

Dr. Whitmore had been her doctor for ten years. He treated people out of an old house that seemed to be perched precariously over the drop off into the river valley. It had once been a restaurant and still looked as it had then, with a dark brown wood exterior and dark green awning over the entrance.

When Emily walked in, the tiny waiting room was full of business people who looked irritated at having their day so inconvenienced. A petite woman sat behind the desk at the computer. She had brown hair with drastically blond streaks, 'fake n' bake' tan, and a french manicure on fake nails. She wore a bright pink shirt that was so vibrant, it aggrevated Emily's headache.

Emily waited for the woman to get off the phone. She was talking very fast to convince a man that he did not want the appointment he was requesting because he should be calling 911 for the heart attack he was quite assuredly having. After several minutes, it sounded like the man was finally taking her seriously though still not quite thinking right. The woman was now trying to explain to him that it would be unsafe to drive to the hospital. Eventually, she was able to confirm that his wife was present and would help ensure he got medical care. She wished him luck and hung up.

After letting out a very deep breath, the woman turned back to Emily. "Can I help you?" she asked.

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Brick 4

"Yes," Emily said. "I have a 10:30 appointment."

The secretary looked at her computer screen and moved the mouse. She paused then looked back at Emily.

"Emily?" she asked.

Emily nodded.

"Please have a seat," she said. "He's running behind today. It will be a while."

Emily nodded again and turned to face the other waiting patients. The tiny waiting room held only ten chairs. Upon her re-inspection of the room, it was not as full as she had first thought. There were at least three seats she could use but the others waiting had placed their bags on them. She looked at the owners, trying to discern those who would be the most amenable to a request for the seat.

None looked particularly friendly.

There was a dark haired business woman with her hair tightly pulled back into a pony-tail. She was wearing a plum suit and was busy typing on her laptop and taking breaks only to wipe her running nose. Emily did not much like the idea of a cold.

The next option was a middle-aged man, also a businessman. He was balding and heavy set. His arms were crossed and resting on his large belly. He was not in the middle of work, nor did he look particularly sick. However, he also looked quite annoyed with his current wait and Emily noticed he had the kind of jowls from a life time of frowning.

Compared with the first two, the third option looked much more inviting. He appeared to be of university age. He had sandy brown hair tied into a frizzy pony tail and a goatee. More importantly, he had a backpack on the desired seat. He was tapping away on his smartphone as he listened to music on his headphones. She could see tiny, faint ribbons of maroon and blue jerking from them; some kind of rock or techno.

She approached him and coughed politely. When the boy did not respond, she reached out and tapped on his shoulder lightly. He jumped nearly a foot.

"Sorry," she said, as he removed his headphones and looked at her.

His cheeks reddened and he stammered his own apology. Then he stopped and looked at her. "Ms. Gordon?"

This was unexpected. She did not recognize him but he seemed to know her.

"Do I know you?" she asked.

He laughed. "Only for five fruitless years," he said. "Until my mother came to her senses and let me switch from violin to guitar."

"Oh my god," she said, realing who he was. As she looked at the frizzy hair and the beard again, she could not believe the boy sitting before her. "Michael?"

He nodded vigorously and reached over to move his bag to the floor between his feet. He offered her the seat.

She sat down at an angle so that she could keep processing the unbelievable. The last time she had seen Michael ten years before, he was fifteen years old, quiet, and looked like his mother had dressed him. He wore polo shirts tucked into khaki pants with a brown belt every single week. He was the last person she ever expected to be wearing an Iron Maiden t-shirt and looking like he might own a tattoo parlor.

"How have you been?" she asked.

He shrugged. "Alright I guess, but just got some bad news this morning," he said.

"Oh?"

"Their tearing down my building," he said. He paused and shook his head before correcting himself, "Sorry, my old building, but it's hard not to think of it as still my building."

"Good memories?" she asked.

He flipped his smartphone around nervously in his hands, staring at it as he did so. "Transformative would be a better way to describe my time there. It was a rundown old building and not very well kept but it was amazing. It had character and so did everyone who lived there. It changed my life."

He let out a long breath. "I just can't believe it will be gone for good," he said. "It had a huge fire a few years ago, right after I moved out. They were going to restore it but I guess that isn't going to happen now. I didn't even know they had decided to tear it down."

He held up his smartphone and waved it. "Just got a text from my buddy," he said. "He walked by there today and said there's only a wall left and by the end of the day, that will be gone too. I'm thinking of walking by there after my appointment."

"Where is it?" she asked, trying to recall any building being demolished nearby.

He pointed to the northeast and said, "Just a few blocks that way, a block south of Jasper and a few east of 109."

As she tried to triangulate the location in her mind, she paused. That was the same street she had seen the black ribbon the night before. Did it have something to do with the demolition?

"Michael," the secretary called.

He looked up. When he saw her with his file card in her hand, he said a hasty good-bye to Emily, scooped his things up messily into his arms and followed.

Emily had a long wait before her turn. Michael had finished and left, saying a cordial good-bye as he did so. The plum-suit woman had gone in and left in a grumble. Several others had gone through and several more had come in and were now taking up the freed seats. The middle-aged businessman was currently in with the doctor.

As Emily watched the other patients come and go, she could not stop dwelling on what Michael had told her. His news seemed far too coincidental with the events of the previous night. She too planned to pay a visit to the demolition site after her appointment.

Finally, at noon, the secretary called her in. She led her to a main floor room in the opposite side of the tiny building.

Emily walked into the room with its cabinets full of medical supplies on one side and its windows overlooking the river valley on the other. She heard the secretary place her file card in the slot on the door as she pulled the door shut.

The river sparkled beautifully on this sunny day. It almost rivalled ribbons of music. Almost.

The door opened and Emily turned to see a beleaguered Dr. Whitmore enter. He was a middle-aged man and very tall. People say everything is big in Texas. Some people even further say that Alberta is the Texas of Canada. Emily never agreed with that but there was one thing in Alberta that was bigger than anywhere else and that was its doctors. For some reason, every time she had met a doctor, especially a male doctor, he would be a minimum of 6' 3". Whitmore was a contributor to the stereotype at 6' 5".

He had dark brown hair and skin that more resembled the beach than a face.

"Sorry about the wait," he said. "There was a communication problem with my secretary."

"It's alright," she replied, though the fact that her headache had still not lessened did not make her reply entirely genuine.

At Dr. Whitmore's prompting, she explained her recent migraines, the intensity of the pain, how unusual they were normally and how frequent they had become. Though she was sure she had once told him before, she reminded him that she was a synestete.

"Are the headaches worse with the music?" he asked, then added, "What I mean is, do they seem to get worse the more you are stimulated by a trigger for your synesthesia?"

She thought for a moment and remembered her desperation the night before with the nightclub music.

"Music seems to get louder and so do the ribbons of colour," she explained.

He nodded but his eyes were focused on some distant spot on the floor. Finally, he looked up at her.

"I have very little experience with synesthesia," he said. "And it sounds like the two are very much related." He pulled out his prescription pad and began to scribble on it. "I can give you a prescription for Tylenol 3s for the pain," he said, "But that is only a temporary measure to get you through."

He pulled out one of his cards from his lab coat pocket and turned it over so that he could write on the back. "I have a friend who is involved in a synesthesia study at the University Hospital. His name is Dr. Watanabe. If you are alright with it, he might want to include you in his study. At the very least, he might have more insights than I can offer."

He handed her the prescription and the card. She looked at the name on the card. Beneath it was an office number and phone number.

"I'll call him myself this afternoon," he added. "Just to let him know I'm sending you his way."

Dr. Whitmore said good-bye and left for the next room and the next patient.

Emily kept staring at the card. Maybe he hadn't meant it that way, but she couldn't help feeling like he was saying there was something wrong with her synesthesia, like it needed fixing. She didn't much like that idea. It had been the best part of her life. Maybe the headaches weren't so bad after all.

She winced when she focused upon the pounding.

She put the card in her pocket. She would call Dr. Watanabe in a few days. For the moment, she needed to pay a visit to a demolition on her way to the pharmacy and the college.

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Brick 5

With her trip to the pharmacy out of the way, Emily walked as she waited for the medication to start working. With the strap of her violin case over one shoulder, she took her detour on the way to the college. It took only a few minutes to find the demolition site.

Large boards had been erected to create a covered walkway for pedestrians to circumvent the work safely. They offered no view except for the graffiti upon them.

As she walked along this created path, she searched for some sign. There was nothing, not even the slightest ribbon from any nearby music. The loud thumps and crashes of the work taking place behind drowned out all other sounds.

She stopped and looked up and down the walkway, hoping to see some form of black ribbon that she could investigate. She had not heard any sounds related to it the last two times but perhaps the sounds of the machinery were interfering.

She stared at the bright pink and blue graffiti in front of her, trying to make sense of it. She was learning nothing standing there and becoming only more frustrated. She turned east, planning to give up for now and go to the college.

When she saw the small black ribbon poking through a crack near the end of the boards, she blinked. It looked like an animal sniffing the air as the tip of it bobbed up and down with its movements. She blinked again.

She watched for a moment more until almost two feet of it had come through the crack. Then, she walked towards it to observe it more closely.

As she approached, it acted as though it sensed her. It turned and began extending in her direction. She had never seen ribbons act like that. They had no sentience. They were simply carried where the notes took them. This ribbon had no notes and yet it existed and moved as if it had awareness and purpose.

She stopped. This was not natural.

It continued to approach. She considered turning around. If she ran, she would not find out more than she already knew so she stayed and kept watching.

As it came within a foot of her, she inwardly cringed but, like dealing with an unpredictable wild animal, forced herself to remain outwardly calm. There were the rhythmic taps of footsteps behind her. They did not worry her but the black ribbon poking at her foot did.

As a tall business man wearing a taupe fedora walked passed, the ribbon shot forward and wrapped itself around her ankle. Instinctively, she jumped back but the ribbon holding her tightly did not move. The contrary forces caused her to fall backwards. Her violin case fell from her shoulder onto the ground. She followed and hit hard herself.

The noise of her fall onto the boards alerted the businessman. He turned around. Seeing her upon the ground, he rushed over to help her.

"I'm sorry," he said. "Did I knock you over?"

As she took his offered hand, she looked down at her foot. The ribbon was gone. There was no sign of it anywhere.

She shook her head. "No," she replied. "I think I just slipped."

"You alright?" he asked.

She nodded. "Thank you."

The man shrugged and continued on his way.

She looked down at her violin case and cringed. She was afraid of what the impact may have done to the contents.

She picked up the case and carried it to the college where she could get a good look at it in her studio.

Her suspicions had been nothing compared to the actual damage. She was surprised at how such a small fall had done. The back had a long crack, the sound post had been knocked loose, and the bridge had fallen over. It could be fixed but it would be while before she got it back and it would be expensive.

Ribbons were turning on her. Her own music was now taken from her when she needed it most. Her headache roared back to life in defiance of the prescription drugs. She hugged her violin case and cried.

 

Chapter 2

Three days later, she sat with Liam in a full waiting room in the University of Alberta Hospital. It was more of a gathering a chairs at a bloated curve in the hallway than a room. The pale pink walls and fluorescent lighting did little too comfort her nerves.

With his skill for perfect timing, Liam had shown up at her studio only moments after the start of her breakdown. She told him everything that had happened both at the doctor's and at the demolition site. He had become so worried about her neurological health that he insisted she call Dr. Watanabe right then.

Dr. Whitmore had not had a chance to call him yet so she went through the entire explanation of why she was seeking help. She even described the black ribbon though she left out the attack, not wanting him to think she was that crazy.

Dr. Watanabe had been so excited by what she had told him that he insisted she come to see him that same week. The man sounded like he very much enjoyed the subject of his research.

With the appointment set, Liam insisted upon driving her to make sure she would not be late. Though she suspected that he did not really believe she would go if left alone, she did not call him on it. Liam was a wonderful friend but could sometimes feel like a babysitter.

A Japanese man with large bags under his eyes walked into the waiting room. He was about her height and had thick, black hair that had been cut short in the back and parted on the left. He was wearing a white with brown pinstripes business shirt tucked into khaki pants. His sleeves were rolled up to just below his elbows.

"Emily Gordon?" he called to the room at large.

She stood and Liam followed.

The man smiled and held out a hand. "I'm Dr. Watanabe," he said.

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Brick 6

After their introductions, Dr. Watanabe led Emily and Liam down a long corridor and into what Emily suspected might once have been a janitor's closet.

It had no windows and was furnished simply by a small table with an office chair on one side and two folding chairs on the others. A stack of files and papers lay neatly in the corner and a laptop remained open on the desk.

"Sorry about the cramped quarters," Dr. Watanabe said. "All the grant money goes to life saving research. Mine is regarded as a mild curiosity."

"Neurological studies aren't respected?" Liam asked with a raised brow.

As Dr. Watanabe squeezed behind his desk, he said, "Nothing like that. Plenty of the doctors around here are interested in my work. Government committees giving out grant money, however, want to see 'cancer' somewhere in the proposal. Luckily, several of the doctors on such projects are also interested in my research. They have been helping me out when our interests overlap."

The three of them sat down and Dr. Watanabe went over the details of Emily's condition with her again. The only things he found confusing were the same characteristics that had begun to worry her: the headaches and the black ribbon. Though she had still left out the attack, she had explained how the black moved differently and how there were no identifying sounds with it.

The doctor squeezed out from around the desk and began to perform some basic neurological tests. He started by having her follow his finger and let him examine her eyes. After a series of several more minor tasks, he returned to his chair and said she showed no obvious signs of problems with her brain. He found the black ribbon particularly confusing. The fact that the very specialist she hoped would help her was so unsure himself was not comforting.

"I think we need to schedule an MRI," he said finally. "Given your headaches and your referral from Dr. Whitmore, it will be covered by Alberta Health. We need to see what is going on in your brain during these episodes."

"How do we know I will have one while in the machine?" she asked.

Dr. Watanabe pursed his lips and began to stroke his chin. "First, we'll do a normal scan with no stimulus. Then, we will do one with music," he said, still stroking his chin in thought and focusing somewhere in the middle of his desk. "The black ribbon has no known trigger," he added and looked at her.

She nodded.

"Then all we can hope for is that the other two scans give us enough information. Perhaps there is something going on in the brain and the black ribbon is a false firing caused by another problem."

"Like a tumour?" Liam asked.

Emily looked at him. His jaw was tense and he was focusing on Dr. Watanabe.

The doctor gave a nervous smile. "That is one possibility," he said slowly. He leaned forward and focused his eyes upon Emily's.

"It is more likely that some other factor has influenced this change," he said. "It could be anything. It could be stress. It could be the result of some kind of diet change. We are still trying to understand the normal brain. Synesthesia adds another variable to an already complicated system. There are differences with every synestete and every person's body reacts differently to change. Try not to worry too much."

"If I weren't worried, I wouldn't be here," she said.

He nodded. "I understand but these things take time. I'll look into getting your MRI scheduled right away but it will likely be a month or two before we can get you in. They will call you with the appointment time once it's set."

He leaned back in his chair. "There is one more thing," he said. "Sometimes the synestetes I deal with have had trouble relating to non synestetes. It isn't common, but it happens."

Emily could feel Liam watching her. He knew the doctor was on to something with her. She refused to admit her minimalist life was a problem even if a doctor thought so.

"There is a group of my patients who meet once a week," Dr. Watanabe continued. "If you would agree to it, I would like you to try meeting with them. It's a small group but you might find it helps."

Emily stared back at him as her mind raced through all the possible replies in an effort to find the most polite of rejections. Finally, she fell back on the old Canadian standby. "That sounds interesting," she said but did not elaborate.

Dr. Watanabe turned in his chair to the stack of folders in the corner. He ran his fingers down the corners, stopping it at the folder third from the top. After pulling it out and opening it, he removed a business card and began writing on the back.

"Here is the time and place they usually meet," he said as he scribbled the letters and numbers. "No commitments, just give it a try."

He held out the card. She took it, stuffed it in her pocket, and stood to leave. To her irritation, Liam spoke up.

"Can I get one of those too?" he said.

Dr. Watanabe looked confused. "Are you a synestete as well?" he asked.

Shaking his head, Liam replied, "No, just her nursemaid."

Further to her irritation, Dr. Watanabe actually nodded in complete understanding!

Though she said nothing more than a polite good-bye to the doctor, her blood was increasing in temperature rapidly. By the time she and Liam left the hospital and were in the parking lot, her body was nearly whistling with steam.

"To the College or home?" Liam asked as he looked for the right key on his keychain.

"I'll take the train," she said as she switched direction to walk to the transit station on the university campus.

Liam jogged to catch up. "Why?" he asked. "I'm headed to the college myself. Just let me give you a ride."

There were too many things she wanted to yell but she did not want to resort to the silent treatment like some kid. "I think you've helped enough for one day," she said. "I really don't like you right now."

Liam's face scrunched just enough to form the crease between his eyebrows. "What did I do?" he asked.

"We'll talk about it later," she said. All she needed was some time. Could he not see that?

"Just tell me!" he asked as he struggled to keep pace with her.

Luck was not on her side. The walk light turned against her just as she arrived at the road. She had to stop.

"Tell me!" Liam repeated.

Walking had helped her hold it in. Stopped in the heat, it came out as involuntarily as vomit.

"You are such an arrogant ass!" she yelled. "Who made you my mother? Always making sure I don't work too late. Telling me how to eat. Driving me to my doctor's appointments to make sure I go. Now you want to arrange my social life too. Stop treating me like a damn child, Liam. I've managed to keep myself alive this long. Can't you give me even the tiniest little bit of credit? Even once?"

Now that it was out, Liam's cheeks flushed and he pulled back. At first he said nothing. She wanted him to apologize, to tell him she was totally right and he would never do it again.

Another moment went by when he said nothing. Now she wanted him to scream back at her. She was a horrible person and he only cared about her. He was just trying to help.

The white outline of the walk light turned on. They stood where they were. The students, doctors, and others dodged around them.

It was too late to take it back. Maybe it wasn't too late to apologize. Did she want to apologize?

She had just begun to evaluate the possibility when Liam turned around and walked back towards the hospital parking lot.

"Wait, Liam," she called. "Wait. I'm sorry. Wait!"

He refused to turn around and she could not move. Her regret had punched her heart down passed her guts so that it weighed heavily and tingling in her feet, holding them in place.

"I'm sorry!" she called again but he was too far to hear her.

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Brick 7

Chapter 3

For the first time in nearly ten years, Emily went home right after her last lesson for the day.

Her violin was still being fixed and the one they had given her on loan did not create the smooth and flowing ribbons of colour she enjoyed so much. It had a rougher tone, creating a fuzzy edge and darker colours. After her fight with Liam, she wanted the familiar. The temporary violin was far from it. She left the instrument in her studio and made the slow journey home on the bus.

When she got to her apartment, she shut the door and looked around. It was too early for the nightclubs to be turning up their music. There was no violin to set at the end of the bed. She had done her laundry the day before so there was no pile to sort.

She pulled her cell out of her pocket and checked the time: 8:52. She looked back up at her apartment. She looked back down at her phone.

Liam would still be teaching for another eight minutes. She dialed anyway. The voice mail picked up like she hoped. She took a deep breath and left her message.

"Hi, Liam. I'm really sorry about earlier. Maybe it's just all these headaches making me cranky. I shouldn't have said what I did. Give me a call back so I can grovel a bit more. Anyway, thanks for putting up with me. I'll talk to you later."

She hung up and waited. Clutching the phone in her hand, she stretched out on her bed without bothering to remove her shoes.

Nine o'clock came and went. Maybe his lesson ran late.

Nine fifteen. He might be packing up.

Nine thirty. Maybe he was heading over to talk to her?

When ten o'clock came and went, she had to face reality. Liam was not calling her back.

She considered hiding under her blanket and crying. It would not be enough. She needed escape.

She jumped to her feet and left her apartment, slamming the door shut behind her. She would go to one of the bars and order something that would have caused Liam's pretention about food the most offense.

* * *

The morning after her junk food binge, Emily had woken feeling hung-over. She had thought it was just the food but as the days passed, the feeling did not dissipate.

Liam had refused to answer or return any of her calls. She had even gone by his condo but if he had been home, he had refused to answer the buzzer.

As she rode the bus to return once again to her apartment without anything for solace, she realized her life was not working.

Her music had been taken from her; her only friend hated her; and her headaches were constant. Even her MRI was a fantasy with no appointment yet given to her. No one knew what was wrong. No one could help her. She needed someone.

Her stomach twisted and her guilt amplified as her brain made the connections. The synestete group might know. Liam would be laughing at her with his own 'I told you so' if he could read her mind. If she could help it, she would never let him know.

She reached into her jacket pocket. It had become her new dumping ground for her cards, keys, money, and phone ever since she had to take her violin in to be fixed. Her fingers groped for anything resembling a paper card. After finding several, she pulled them out and sifted through the club cards until she found the business card Dr. Watanabe had given her. She flipped it over.

Tuesdays, 8:00 pm, Coffee Shop on 124 Street and 102 Avenue.

It was Monday. Could she wait another day?

Apparently she could. The next night, after rescheduling two of her students for the first time in her history as a teacher, she stood in the coffee shop scanning the tables for a group of synestetes.

It was a moderately sized shop in the corner of a building. It had windows looking out onto the street and a fireplace in the middle. Small ribbons of yellows, pinks, and reds danced from speakers in the ceiling as smooth jazz played quietly.

Unfortunately, there did not appear to be a large group and of all the tables with people, there was nothing remarkable to point her in the right direction.

"Can I help you?" asked the barista.

Emily was just about to ask if she could point out a group that met there every week when a familiar searching movement caught her eye.

From under the door, squeezed the black ribbon. It poked around as if searching.

At first, Emily stepped back towards the counter, trying to get away from her before it attacked her again. When it moved by her, seemingly not interested, her fear turned to confusion.

"Can I help you?" asked the barista again, more annoyed this time.

"I'm still deciding," Emily said, trying to pretend she was going to make an order.

The ribbon continued to push along the floor like a snake pushing through prairie grass.

She did not move.

It found its way across the floor to a table by the fireplace. There were three women sitting there as they chatted over cappuccino and pastries.

Two of the women were blond. The older of the two blonds looked as though her hair had not seen a natural day in decades. Her skin was a celebrity orange and her make-up overdone. She was wearing a pink tank top and jeans. The other blond looked to be student age, possibly in university. Her hair was in a dishevelled bun. She was heavy set and wearing a sweatshirt with the head of a roaring panda painted in green upon it. The third woman had short, straight auburn hair pulled back into a neat ponytail. Even though she was sitting, she looked short. She was wearing a red t-shirt, white capris, a dark jean jacket and brown sandals.

All three women seemed happy and unaware of the approaching black ribbon.

It travelled towards the foot of the auburn-haired woman. Emily considered intervening as its motion looked very similar to just before it had grabbed her.

She stepped forward but stopped when she saw that it was poking at the woman's leg like a begging pet. Without stumbling or pausing on her words, the auburn-haired woman reached down and batted the ribbon away gently. It poked at her again and she batted it away again.

When the ribbon poked at her a third time, the woman reached down and wrapped her fingers around it gently.

Emily thought maybe she was imagining it at first but the blackness of the ribbon began to fade. Just when she thought it might be disappearing, she realized it was changing colour. The edges of it began to change to gold. When the gold began to get brighter, the ribbon jerked away and returned the way it had come.

The auburn-haired woman continued to talk as if nothing had happened and the two women with her appeared equally unconcerned.

With the ribbon gone, Emily walked over to them. When they looked up at her, she said, "Excuse me, this might sound a bit strange but are you synestetes?"

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Brick 8

"Yes, we are," the redhead said. "Are you a patient of Dr. Watanabe's?"

Emily nodded, which dislodged a lock of her wavy hair and caused it to fall in front of her face. As she tucked it behind her ear, the bottled blond offered her the empty seat at the table.

"Thanks," Emily replied, sitting. The bottled blond looked at least a decade older than Emily had first though. The numerous tiny wrinkles that had been obscured by distance made Emily think the woman was in her fifties.

"Luanne," the bottled blond said. "Smell-colour."

The university student introduced herself next without missing a beat. Emily wondered how many times they had done this routine.

"Robin, tone-colour," the girl said.

"And I'm Mary," said the red-head. She added, "movement-colour," as an afterthought.

"I'm Emily," Emily replied. "Tone-colour." She fidgeted with her fingers in her lap. She began to wonder if Alcoholics Anonymous meetings felt the same way.

"I've never met another tone-colour person before," said Robin.

Unsure of what to say to this, Emily gave a weak smile in reply. What on Earth had made her think coming here was a good idea? These were strangers. Senses in common or not, she did not know them and they were no substitute for Liam.

She had just come to the conclusion that she should leave when Mary spoke to her.

"How did you know we are synestetes?" she asked.

Emily had been so wrapped up in her inner deliberation over leaving, that it took a moment for the memory to come back to her. "Oh that," she said. "I saw you get rid of that ribbon of colour. I've never seen anyone do that before."

Mary looked directly into her eyes even as she pulled her cappuccino to her lips. "Are you sure you are a synestete and not just someone who suffers from hallucinations?" she said before taking a sip.

Emily felt her face get hot. This woman who had no idea she existed even a minute before was insulting her to her face. She knew what she had seen. Even if what Mary said spoke to Emily's deepest fears, she knew it wasn't a hallucination.

"I saw you grab it," Emily insisted. "No one has ever interacted with a ribbon I could see before and you just did."

Mary set her cappuccino down on the table and looked at Luanne and Robin. "New arrivals always make our meetings weird," she said.

Robin looked back and forth between Emily and Mary but said nothing. Luanne seemed to want to defuse the situation.

"Not as bad as the time the movement-tone guy stopped by and started arguing with you about the barista," she said.

Robin latched onto the opportunity to switch the subject. "He was convinced the tones he was hearing meant the barista was into him," she explained. "When Mary said the colours she saw indicated constipation, he... um... didn't take it as well as one might hope."

Luanne laughed loud enough that several people at other tables glared at her. "He called Mary a cranky old spinster," she added. "I've never seen you turn that red before."

Robin leaned away from Mary. "Except for maybe right now," she said as she regarded her friend.

"Have you two had enough fun," Mary whispered through tight lips.

Emily stood. If she wanted awkward rebuke and lack of support, she could just renew her efforts to speak to Liam. At least she understood him most of the time.

Before she could leave or even say good-bye, Luanne reached out to grab her wrist with the speed and accuracy of a fighter in a Kung-Fu movie.

"Sit down, hun," she said but she was glaring at Mary. "We are here to help each other get through life not make it more difficult."

As Emily lowered herself back into the chair, she examined all of the women's faces. Luanne and Mary were glaring daggers at each other while Robin stared at the table between them.

Luanne said, "And maybe one of these days, Mary will stop treating Robin and I as if we're morons. We know there is something more to your condition than you've told us. We've respected your privacy but if you start scaring people off because you're too pig headed to admit when they've noticed it too, then we won't let you keep it private any longer."

Luanne refused to look away from Mary. Though the women were no longer saying anything, their tension was evident enough that the other patrons were staring again. Luanne still had a vice grip on Emily's wrist.

After another moment, Mary finally nodded at Luanne. Was she agreeing to drop the issue? To tell them the truth? Emily wasn't sure but Luanne's grip loosened as she reached for the remaining half of a cinnamon bun on the plate next to her cappuccino.

"So what do you do for a living?" Luanne asked, finally turning to Emily when speaking to her. She ripped off a piece of the bun and popped it into her mouth.

With what had just happened, the mundane question was such a surprise that it took Emily a moment to remember. "A violin teacher," she said finally.

Luanne nodded. "Nice," she said. "I was never good with music myself. Being completely tone deaf doesn't help. I can cook better than anyone but almost killed myself with the stress in chef school. Instead, I've been everything from a vet tech to a rig pig. Right now I'm helping out with a no-kill cat shelter though it's not helping much with the bills. Do you like what you do?"

Emily nodded. "It's the only thing I can do," she said, thinking of how Liam would agree. He thought she was incapable of living without his help. Part of her had once wondered if he was right but without his presence she had managed to survive so far.

"What do you do?" Emily asked Robin who seemed nervous to be asked but also thankful the conversation was returning to normal.

"Phys Ed," she replied.

Despite Robin's attire, her body shape did not really look like that of an athlete. Emily wondered if she was just being judgemental but something about Robin's tone when she answered made her doubt it.

"Do you like it?" she asked the girl.

Robin shook her head. "My dad's a coach. He's been pushing me for years. I prefer working on my YouTube channel. I've got some friends trying to make it into the music industry so I do their sound editing. My dad doesn't know though. He's not exactly the listening type."

"I keep telling you to come stay with me," Luanne said.

"He'd probably come after you," Robin replied as she looked down at her lap. "Or call the cops."

Luanne scoffed. "I survived the men in the oil patch. He doesn't scare me."

Sensing another awkward silence, Emily took the initiative. The night had been stressful enough already.

"What do you do, Mary?" she asked.

Mary had been sipping her drink. She stopped and looked at Emily over the rim of the cup. Was she evaluating her?

"I'm a Reiki Healer," she said. "At least, that's what the certificate on my wall says. There's no certificate for 'synestete using colour from motion to diagnose ailments'."

Emily was impressed. She had never heard of anyone doing such a thing before. "Does it work?" she asked.

"My clients say so," she said. "As for the medical community, Dr. Watanabe is the only doctor I've met who believes I can even do it. You'd think as scientists, more of them would be interested."

The women began to talk about how different people had regarded their abilities. As soon as Emily had learned at a young age that no one else could see what she could, she had kept it to herself. No one had been particularly harsh to her but she instinctively knew no one would understand. Liam had been the only exception.

From the stories these women told, Emily was thankful she had never openly discussed it. Luanne had been ridiculed horribly as a teenager, being told she was making it up to get attention. Robin's father also thought she was lying, trying to come up with random health excuses to get out of practice. He'd never heard of synesthesia before and even when Dr. Watanabe had explained to him what it was, he had treated it like a nuisance. She had learned to keep it to herself.

Mary had not been ridiculed. She had experienced the opposite. People thought that what she could do was so interesting, they wanted her to 'perform' for them all the time. Social functions became a chore. She finally got to the point that she refused to discuss it outside her clinic or the synestete group.

Emily had never before admitted that her self-imposed seclusion was due to this feeling of being 'other' that these women were now describing. Hearing them put it into words, she could no longer deny it.

Though she felt some relief from this realization, it was hampered by the strong regret of having been so alone. One person had chosen to shun her and her entire support network in her life was gone.

The women talked until the coffee shop closed. Outside, Luanne offered to give Robin a ride to the university so that she could pretend she had been working out. The two of them said good-bye and left Mary and Emily on the sidewalk.

Emily pulled out her phone to check the time. She had just missed the bus and would have to wait another fifteen minutes. Though she hadn't said it out loud, Mary seemed to sense an issue.

"Want a ride?" she offered.

Though Emily instinctively wanted to decline, she accepted once her sense got the better of her.

Mary led her to the nearby parking lot and to an old car that was teal except for the large circles of rust on the fenders. Once they were in the car and leaving the parking lot, Mary spoke.

"I'm sorry about earlier," she said. "The girls don't know I'm a Key Breaker."

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Brick 9

Emily stared at her for several moments, thinking that maybe she had just misheard. The words that Mary had spoken had surely been quite different and much more understandable. Unintentionally, her fingers, which had been resting on the door, began to trace the outline of the handle.

When she did not say anything, Mary continued. "How long have you been a Key Breaker?" she asked.

Any hope that the previous words had simply been gibberish was replaced by a somersaulting gut. Not knowing what else to do, Emily asked, "What is a Key Breaker?"

Mary took her eyes off the road long enough to stare wide-eyed at her.

"You don't know?" she asked.

Emily shook her head.

"Marcus never found you?" Mary continued to interrogate, flicking her focus between the road and Emily.

Emily shook her head again, feeling like she was turning into a bobble head doll that would soon become a permanent fixture upon the dash board.

"How did you see the seeking strand then?" Mary asked.

"It has been following me around," Emily replied. "I thought I was just hallucinating until it attacked me the other day."

With Emily's answer, Mary stared at the steering wheel and whispered to herself, "Attacked?"

"I guess it doesn't like me as much as it does you," Emily said.

Mary came back to herself and focused on the road once more. When she spoke again, her voice was steady but Emily noticed how tightly Mary was gripping the wheel.

Emily looked down the road. Though there was still traffic due to those heading to the restaurants and bars, it was light. Only two cars were within a block of them. One was nearly half a block ahead of them and the other, travelling in the opposite direction, had just turned down a side street.

"This hasn't really happened before," she said. "I will have to talk to Marcus."

"About what? Who is Marcus?" Emily's stomach was still doing back flips and now her face was feeling tight and hot.

Mary did not look at her. "I've never had to recruit before. I'm not trained for it. I'll screw it all up," she said.

Emily's initial dislike of Mary had returned. First she was confrontational and insulting and now she was unfairly keeping secrets. "Recruit? Me? Does this have to do with the Key Breakers? What are they?" Emily demanded.

"I can't tell you," Mary said. She was now refusing to look at Emily altogether. "It is Marcus' job to explain."

Emily had had enough. "Pull over," she said.

Out of surprise, Mary's resolve to stare forward broke. She looked at Emily long and intently enough that she seemed to have forgotten what she was doing. As the restaurant signs flew by Mary's window, Emily realized they had missed the turn to the bridge, not that it mattered now that she just wanted to flee.

"Pull over," she said again.

"Why?" Mary asked. "I'm taking you home."

"You missed the turn," Emily pointed out. "I'm not going home now anyway. Let me out."

Mary gave a snort. "I'm not dropping you in the middle of downtown, alone, at night."

Though Mary's concern would otherwise have been reasonable, it was too similar to something Emily's only friend would have said. Now she wanted to punch Mary in the face as much as she wanted to scream at Liam.

"Stop the car," she said with forced evenness of tone.

"No," Mary said. "You'll run away and who knows if I'll ever find you again. If Marcus hasn't been able to find you, there's no way I can."

Mary just did not seem to understand that her riddles made Emily want to run even more not stay and follow her orders. "Mary," she began slowly, "If you do not stop this car and let me out, I will call the cops and tell them you've kidnapped me."

She pulled her phone from her pocket, dialed the number and held her thumb over the send button. She watched Mary's face for some sign of whether she should press it.

Mary's eyes were shifting all over the place: to the road, to the side streets, to Emily's face, to Emily's phone. Finally, her hand reached down and turned on her signal. When she had pulled over, she tried to say something more but Emily was already climbing out of the car and slamming the door.

Emily walked quickly down the street, heading for the college. When she had gone half a block, she looked back.

Mary's car was still parked and inside she looked to be talking on the phone.

What was wrong with that woman? What was all her insane rambling about? Recruiting for what?

Decade old images from news stories about suicide cults and the sex trade all flew through Emily's mind. Maybe she had managed to escape just in time. With someone like Mary around, Emily would take her chances with the drunks on the streets.

Without slowing, she looked down at her phone. The numbers 9-1-1 were still displayed brightly. She cleared them and dialed Liam's number. She had already pressed send and put it to her ear before she realized what she was doing. Feeling committed to the act, she kept it pressed against her ear.

After the sixth ring, she took the hint. He still wasn't talking to her.

She shoved the phone into her pocket. She was only a couple of blocks from the college now anyway.

She glanced back. Where Mary had dropped her off was quite distant now but she could tell the car was gone. Giving a quick look at her surroundings, her chest relaxed as she realized Mary appeared to have given up and left her alone.

The rest of the walk to the college fell into her familiar rhythm and by the time she got to the door, her stomach had stopped flipping and her muscles had relaxed.

As she reached up to grab the handle, a homeless man in pristine white sneakers, worn jeans, a black t-shirt, and a black baseball cap asked her for some change.

"Sorry," she said as she began to pull the door open.

He turned to walk away from the building and brushed her arm in the process. The touch felt familiar and sent her nerves firing through her body but that same familiarity did not come with wanted feelings. She wanted to hide. Even the trail her stimulated nerves traced felt as though it was trying to retreat into her core. It tingled the entire way and did not stop tingling even once it had entrenched itself behind her navel.

"Have a nice night, Emily," he said.

She froze. Should she run inside and make sure to pass the security guard at the desk? Should she ask him who he was? Who had Mary called?

"Call me Marcus," he said even as he continued to walk away. "We can talk later. I'll give you tonight."

She could not move. She watched him walk towards a black car in the nearest parking stall. As he opened the door to get inside it, she found her voice again.

"What do you want with me?" she asked.

He did not look up. "I'll give you tonight," he said again before getting in his car and driving away.

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Brick 10

Chapter 4

The next morning, Emily awoke cramped and exhausted. The encounters of the previous night had been so disconcerting that she dared not go home.

After Marcus had left, she had rushed up to Liam's studio and banged on the door. He was not there. She had tried calling again but even she realized there was no point. She hung up after two rings and shut the phone off to avoid any creepy calls.

With no one she trusted to escort her home, she stayed hidden in her studio. Her hands shook too much for her to play to calm herself. After several hours of sitting on the piano bench and staring at the carpet, she stretched out on the floor and tried to rest.

Though she technically slept, it had been too broken and restless to be of much help.

She tried to sit up and pulled her knees into her chest.

There was no way of knowing what time it was in the windowless room. She pulled out her cell and turned it on.

The moment it had started up, it buzzed at her with a note on the screen saying there were three unchecked messages. Vibrating with exhaustion and the thought that maybe Liam had finally chosen to call her back, she entered her code and listened to the messages.

She did not recognize the male voice on the other end but she recognized the name. Her chest tightened, her fingers when rigid and cold, and she nearly dropped the phone.

"Emily, it's Marcus. It's 7:30. I gave you what I promised; now it is time for us to meet properly, call me back at... "

She was too busy trying to figure out how Marcus found her number so quickly to pay attention to his.

The next message started.

"Emily, it's 8:00. I know this is strange but you cannot handle what will come alone. I will call again."

The third message was even less encouraging than the first two.

"Emily. I am in the lobby. When you've finally woken up, we can talk."

She looked at the lock on her studio door and wondered if it was strong enough.

Mary had thought Marcus would be less creepy in his explanations?

Emily decided she needed to be more assertive in staying away from Marcus. She dialed the security desk number to inform them of the stalker waiting for her in the lobby.

As she put the phone up to her ear and listened to the rings, she glanced back at the door.

A green ribbon of colour was coming through the bottom. At first she thought nothing of it, thinking someone was simply practicing nearby. As she instinctively tried to pick out the tune, she realized there was no sound.

She stared at the ribbon again. The movement was not that of music but that of the black ribbon. This ribbon was very clearly moss green. It poked its way through the room, slithering towards her.

She scrambled backwards, being reminded too vividly of what had happened at the demolition site.

It got closer and her back was now pressed against the piano. It was near her foot and if it had been a dog, she would have sworn it was sniffing her. The end lifted towards her. She braced.

It did not attack. It pushed up along her leg, causing her nerves to tingle and tickle as it continued to climb. It poked at the wrist of her hand still holding the phone in her lap. Only then did she realize someone on the other end was calling to her; asking if anyone was there; asking if she was in trouble.

Was she in trouble?

The ribbon nudged at the phone, causing it to fall to the floor. Somehow, the contact it had made with the device had also turned it off.

It began to advance again, sliding up her arm and onto her shoulder. She kept still, hoping not to provoke it.

It pressed against her cheek. It felt cool and made her cheek tingle in the same way as her legs.

When she did not respond to it, it lowered down to her lap once more where the end of the colour curled up like a kitten taking a nap.

She waited. There was still no sound in the room. The ribbon was completely without audible vibrations.

She waited. Her legs were beginning to fall asleep. The ribbon remained coiled in her lap.

She waited. It really did seem like a kitten.

She reached out and touched it with her fingers. It did not move. She began to stroke it, her fingers tingling everywhere they touched the colour. She continued to pet it.

After a few moments, it stretched out across her lap.

"What are you?" she whispered.

With her words, the end curled up as if it were looking at her. After a moment, it began to retreat, pulling back through the tiny crack under the door.

With great pain and difficulty, nearly falling and coming within an inch of cracking her face on the piano keys, she climbed to her feet. Considering each step before taking it, she walked to the door. She placed her hand upon the lever and paused. She suddenly knew what she would find on the other side but somehow her fear was impotent.

Consciously, she tried to revive it. The only sensible thing to be in the situation was afraid. The fear remained dormant. Her heart did not race and her fingers did not tremble. She turned the lever and opened the door.

The ribbon had just arrived at Marcus' shoulders and coiled around his neck like a scarf where it stopped and disappeared.

"I'm sorry I scared you," Marcus said. "You are not the only one who is shocked by the events of last night."

She stared at him and said nothing.

The clothing, the cap, and the asking for change the night before had given her entirely the wrong impression about his looks. She had been convinced he was shorter than she was, but he was at least as tall as Liam.

He had tanned skin, dark brown eyes, and black hair that was just long enough to fall loosely on either side of his forehead. He was wearing a loose, black t-shirt. She could not tell much about his build except that he had broad shoulders and toned forearms.

"Will you listen to me now?" he asked.

She looked back at his neck. Where had the ribbon gone?

"Please," he asked again.

She looked at him and then said the most insane thing she had ever uttered. "Come in."

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Brick 11

Marcus entered the tiny studio but did not sit down. Emily crossed her arms and waited.

"Before I can tell you anything, I need to know two things," he said.

She raised an eyebrow but said nothing. The calm that coaxed her into opening the door was beginning to weaken. Her shoulder muscles were already feeling tighter.

"How long have you been a synestete?" he asked.

She did not see why that mattered but with her renewed curiosity, she did not have the desire to argue. It felt as though such an action would take too much energy.

"All my life," she replied.

His head bobbed a millimeter as he seemed to acknowledge the answer. Then he asked, "How long have you lived in Edmonton?"

She found this even less relevant than the last question but continued to cooperate.

"As long as I can remember," she said. "I think I was two when my family moved here."

Though Marcus did not say anything at first, his jaw clenched in response.

"I've answered your questions. Now explain yourself," she demanded, beginning to wonder why she had let him in the room. At least he hadn't attacked her yet.

"Are you sure of the answers you just gave me?" he asked, giving no acknowledgement of her own forceful request.

She was beginning to feel a frustration normally reserved for Liam. Already, she could feel the tightness between her eyebrows that indicated what could have been called the 'Liam Crease.' Her fingers clenched involuntarily as she wondered if he would ever be the cause of it again.

"Of course I'm sure," she said, her voice failing to remain even. If he was not going to believe her, why did he bother asking any questions at all?

For the first time in their brief knowledge of each other, she saw Marcus' brow furrow with confusion. The added twitch of his lips and the fidgeting of his fingers made her wonder if he did not experience that particular emotion very often.

"Sorry," he said. "I just don't understand how that could be true. I should have known about you long ago."

"Don't take it too hard," she said. "I'm a bit reclusive. Since my parents died, my friend Liam is the only one who really knows me."

"I should have known," he insisted.

"Why do you even care?" she asked as she gave up standing by the door and returned to her piano bench. If yet another man in her life was going to drive her insane, she might as well be comfortable.

She lowered herself onto the bench and reached out to press the C5 key softly. The pale blue note shimmied outward from the piano. She watched its shuddering dance and felt her irritation ebb. She felt warm.

As the pale colour faded out of existence, she felt a soft touch on her shoulder. She looked up into Marcus' face.

"I want you to trust me," he said. "Usually, I can gain trust without effort. It is a skill. You are different. You confuse me as much as I confuse you."

She scoffed.

"You're the one with the answers," she said.

"Fewer than I thought I had," he replied as he withdrew his hand.

She watched him turn and pace the tiny room.

"I'm still waiting for what you do have," she said.

He stopped and locked his eyes onto hers. He said nothing at first. His chest rose slowly as his lungs filled with air.

Finally, he said, "I am called a Compass."

Though she had not meant to, she snorted. With a quick and mumbled apology, she indicated for him to continue.

"Since birth, I have had the ability to seek two things: Keys and Key Breakers. That black ribbon you saw was the Seeking Strand of something that has been locked away by a Key. Key Breakers are those with the abilities required to remove Keys."

Emily stared.

Marcus stared back. "Do you understand so far?" he asked.

"Not even a clue," she replied. "What are Keys? What things do they lock away?"

"Every case is different," he explained vaguely. "Sometimes Keys are spells, sometimes demons acting as sentry. What they usually lock away are minor muses and guardians."

She blinked.

"Benevolent spirits," he added. "Muses and guardians are benevolent spirits. Things that create keys are malevolent."

She said nothing.

"Key Breakers are everywhere," he continued. "As are the keys that need to be broken. We think you are one of us. You must be a Key Breaker to have seen the Seeking Strand."

She looked back at the piano keys and pressed the C5 again. Taking a deep breath, she watched the ribbon's movements.

"So synestetes are Key Breakers," she said.

"No," Marcus replied. "Many Key Breakers appear to be synestetes at first but it is not the same thing. Most synestetes are not."

She pressed the key once more but she found herself less focused upon the result. She thought of how ten years before she had needed someone to believe her. The recollection faded with the ribbon.

"I'll trust you for now," she said. "But I do not believe you."

She looked up at him.

"You really will trust me?" he asked.

His shock shown by his creased forehead, wide eyes, and slightly open mouth were too comedic. She laughed.

"Yes," she answered.

She gave a start as he lunged forward abruptly and grabbed her hand.

"Then come with me," he said. "I have something I need to show you."

His palm felt warm and it caused hers to tingle. The sensation did not end where their skin touched. It continued to tickle its way up her arm. As he guided her from the studio and to the elevators, she laughed. She had never felt this impulsive and carefree in her life.

The elevator doors opened. Marcus moved to enter and stopped short.

"Sorry," he said to the man exiting with a large cello case.

"No prob..." Liam paused in mid step as well as mid word.

He looked at Emily and back at Marcus, then down at their linked hands. His eyes narrowed.

"Who's your new friend, Emily?" he asked.

"M-marcus," she replied. "We met through Dr. Watanabe's synestete group," she stretched.

Liam looked back at Marcus.

"I'm Emily's best friend, Liam," he said. He made no friendly gesture such as offering a hand. "So, you're a synestete?"

Marcus said nothing but Emily could not help but think he looked taller all of a sudden.

Liam turned back to Emily. "We need to talk when you get a chance. Give me a call when you're free."

Well, that was sudden. He refused to give the slightest acknowledgement for weeks and suddenly he wanted to talk? He did not care about being there for her when she needed him most. Her annoyance returned as did the Liam Crease. Her face became hot.

"Will you answer this time?" she asked.

Her annoyance grew and churned her insides into a tight knot.

"I've got rehearsal in half an hour," he said. "But after that, I'm free."

She felt a squeeze in her hand, which caused her to look up at Marcus.

"We need to go," he said.

"Sorry, I kept you," Liam interrupted before walking down the hall.

She wanted to throttle him. How dare he act like such a brat. Even a few hours before, she still wanted to beg for his forgiveness. Now, she felt assured that everything she had yelled at him was warranted.

Her head pierced with pain. She rubbed her temple with her free hand as Marcus led her onto the elevator.

As they descended to the main floor, the tingling in her arm spread to her shoulder and up her neck. Her muscles began to relax but her head continued to pound. She closed her eyes.

The tingling climbed to the top of her head. It felt cool like ice wrapped in a cloth pressed against her forehead. As the pain dissipated, she let out a long breath. Her strain escaped with it.

Opening her eyes, she looked over at Marcus. There was a barely discernible crease between his brows. Was Liam now having the same effect on others as well?

"You need Mary to take a look at you for those headaches," he said.

"I'll be fine," she replied. "Besides, Dr. Watanabe is trying to get me in for an MRI."

"It won't find anything," he said.

The elevator doors opened and they walked into the lobby.

"How do you know?" she asked, looking down at their still clasped hands.

Why was he still holding hers? Why had she not pulled away?

"Let Mary look at you," he said again. "Trust me."

He guided her into the parking lot and to his black car. With a button on his key, he unlocked the door for her but he did not let go of her hand right away. She looked down at his fingers wrapped around hers and back up at him but he was not looking at her. His eyes were focused on something in the west.

She turned to see what he was looking at but there was nothing remarkable, just the usual flow of traffic and pedestrians along the main road.

"What did you want to show me?" she asked.

He looked back at her and released her hand.

"That will have to wait," he said. "You need to see Mary first."

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Brick 12

Chapter 5

Emily was not looking forward to seeing Mary again but Marcus would not be deterred. She hoped Mary would be more pleasant now that Marcus had shared the truth of who they were.

He pulled into a small strip mall parking lot and parked in front of a store. Above the door and windows was a blue sign with white text: Homeopathic Clinic.

"Is this where Mary works?" Emily asked.

Marcus turned off the car as he nodded.

They got out and walked into the tiny waiting room. There were only four chairs but all of them were taken. Between the waiting room and the front desk, there was a narrow and dimly lit hallway leading into the back of the clinic. There were four doors, two on each side, lining the hallway.

A brunette sitting at the front desk was typing something into the computer. Emily was sure the girl could not have even been 18. She was slender in a not-fully developed kind of way. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail and she had several braided-thread bracelets on one wrist.

The girl looked up as Marcus approached. She straightened abruptly in her chair and smiled.

"Hi Marcus," she said. "She's in the middle of a treatment right now but should be done in a minute."

Emily looked around the room, unsure of what to do while the two talked.

The room was painted a pale pink and there were pale green ivy patterns stenciled in a border along the ceiling.

"Thanks, Shelley," Marcus said. "I just need to slip in for a minute. It's a bit urgent."

As he said this, one of those waiting, a large woman with short gray hair, seemed to realize what he meant. She looked at her gold watch, which looked strained to be fastened around her thick wrist, then glared at Marcus' back.

Emily felt her face go hot.

She reached over and placed her hand on Marcus' arm.

"It's alright," she said. "We can come back later."

The last thing she wanted was to be a pain to someone else.

He looked into her eyes the same way he had when she opened her studio door.

"Trust me," he said. "This can't wait."

When she said nothing, he added, "It will be alright."

A door near the end of the hallway opened and a gray-haired man wearing a blue suit that barely hid his rounded gut walked out of the room. Mary followed him.

"Let me know if there isn't any change," she was saying as they walked to the front desk. "And speak with Shelley about booking a follow up for two weeks from now."

As they emerged into the waiting room, Mary walked out from behind the man to set his file down on the front desk and grab a new one. When she looked up and saw Marcus, she paused then set the file back down.

"Come on back," she said, not failing to look at Emily for a moment before turning around and walking back to the room she had just left.

Marcus led Emily down the hall, standing aside when they arrived at the room so that she could go in first.

"Thanks," she muttered.

It was a tiny room, just large enough for a cupboard by the door, an examination table along one wall, and a short wheeled stool. There was a large window almost the entire width of the room on the far wall.

Mary had already sat herself on the stool, crossing one leg over the other knee. The light coming through the window behind her made her glow like an angel.

As he entered the room, Marcus gestured for Emily to sit down on the examination table. Not sure what else she would do, she complied.

"I didn't expect you to bring her here," Mary said once Marcus had closed the door.

Emily was thinking her initial assessment of Mary had been correct. She was a bitch. They had not been in the room five seconds and she was already talking about Emily as if she wasn't even there.

"You didn't tell me about her headaches," Marcus replied.

Mary raised an eyebrow. "Why would I have known about her headaches?" she asked.

Marcus scoffed at her. "I guess this is proof of what I've been claiming for years," he said. "You're losing your touch. Too many sprained knees and not enough key breaking."

Mary's lips pursed but she otherwise remained motionless as she glared at him. Emily looked at Marcus. She could have sworn there was a gleam in his eyes. Was he enjoying this?

"If I could kick you out of my clinic, I would," Mary said. "Now, stop making me want to hit you and tell me what's going on."

"Look for it," he said. "You will find it."

Mary finally turned to Emily.

"Could you turn you head to the right, please?" she asked.

Emily obeyed.

"Now the left," she instructed.

Emily complied again.

Mary got up from the stool and walked over to her. "Do you mind if I touch you?" she asked, not giving the slightest indication that she would proceed without an answer.

Emily nodded. She found it strange how kind and soft Mary could make her requests. Was this her "healer" mode?

Mary placed her hands on either side of Emily's chin. Her touch was so gentle that it nearly tickled. Mary tilted her chin upward, then rubbed her fingers down the left side of Emily's neck, then the right side. She paused before following the same path down the left, this time with enough pressure that it no longer tickled. Her fingers went further this time, trailing over Emily's collar bone. When they began to trace down the left side of Emily's chest, Emily jumped.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

Mary smiled. "Sorry, I should have warned you." She let out a deep breath as she stood back.

"How long have these headaches been happening?" she asked.

"A couple of months, maybe," Emily replied.

"Are they always the same?" Mary pressed.

Emily nodded.

Mary looked back at Marcus. "Why do you think it goes from the head to the heart?" she asked.

"What? What goes from my head to my heart?" Emily asked, annoyed that Mary had reverted to pretending like she was not there.

Marcus put his hand on her shoulder. "Someone has been trying to put a key on you," he said.

Emily blinked. Her brain ran through their previous conversation. Though it technically made sense, she was having trouble understanding how that could be the case.

"Why... how would someone do that?" she asked.

"Depends on who is doing it," he replied. "There are many ways to make keys. Each one is as unique as its creator." He looked back at Mary. "Any ideas?" he asked.

She shook her head. "It's not one I can break even if it is only partially formed," she said. "Find who's doing it and you might get somewhere."

Emily looked at both of them. "I don't know anyone who would try something like that on me," she said. Marcus rubbed her shoulder. "You may not even be aware this person exists," he said. Turning back to Mary, he added, "I think I'll contact Valerie and Philip before I give up on removing it outright."

"Or maybe you should contact your Elder," Mary replied.

"Contacting Elders is my business and mine alone," he said, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

Emily could see the muscle in his jaw clench.

Mary turned and seemed in sudden need of moving her stool back into the corner. "Don't get all angry at me," she said as she rolled the stool into place. "It was just a suggestion."

"One you can keep to yourself," he replied. He looked down at Emily. "Let's get going," he said. "We still have more to do today."

Emily pulled out her phone and checked the time.

"I've got to head back to the college soon," she said. "I've got classes to teach."

"Fine," he said. "I'll drop you off and go talk to Valerie and Philip on my own for now but we really can't put this off."

"Why?" Emily asked. "If it isn't even fully formed, why does it matter?"

"Because a key can be built in stages," he said. "Just because it isn't finished doesn't mean the maker can't or won't."

His voice sounded rough as he spoke and he did not meet her eyes.

"Can't we just find a key breaker to break it then?" she asked. "Now that you've found me, that should be easy, shouldn't it?"

Marcus did not reply but Mary did. "Not all keys can be broken," she said. "There are some keys that we have never been able to remove. The fact that just any key breaker cannot remove it despite it being incomplete should tell you, this is no simple case."

"What happens if we can't break it and they complete it?" she asked.

Marcus cleared his throat. "We don't know."

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Brick 13

Emily had wanted to join Marcus as he investigated the incomplete key. Unfortunately, she also knew that the realities of life would not wait for when she was willing to attend to them. If she began to make cancellations of her lessons routine, she doubted she would retain any students.

Marcus pulled to a stop in front of the college.

"I'll figure this out," he promised.

She smiled even as her fingers twisted together in her lap. Should she thank him?

He placed his hand upon her forearm. "I'll be back later and I'll tell you anything I find out," he said.

The contact caused her arm to feel goosy. It did not quite tingle but she wanted to shake away the sensation. Even as she thought this, the energy she felt shifted to comfort. She trusted him.

She looked at his hand. Was that a green ribbon wrapped around it? It was so faint.

She looked up at him again.

"How do you do that?" she asked.

"It's a gift, like the ribbons you can see," he said.

"You can manipulate emotions?" she asked. The logic behind this jumped at her.

Looking at the doors into the college, she remembered how scared she had been that morning. She had only known Marcus a few hours and yet now she trusted him completely. She had gotten into the car of a someone she had not known for more than five minutes. If he had murdered her and dumped her body in a field, all the news stations would pull out their common sense safety tips to plaster on the screen, the worst of public 'I told you so's.

How was he able to manipulate her like that?

"It's not manipulation," he insisted as he withdrew his hand. "I can share my intent with others. It helps getting people to be at ease with me because they know what I want. You trust me because I showed you in my own way that you have no reason not to."

She said nothing.

"Have I done anything to violate that?" he asked.

She shook her head.

"I'll come back to your studio after I talk to Valerie and Phillip," he said.

She tried to speak but her voice cracked. With a forced cough, she cleared her throat and tried again. "Thanks, Marcus," she said. "I think Mary just makes me so uneasy. She terrified me last night and she wasn't exactly pleasant today."

He shrugged. "Mary can be hard to take but don't let her get to you. Don't take her crap and you'll learn to get along."

"Do I have to get along with her?" she asked.

He laughed. "Unfortunately," he said, "Key Breakers often have to get along."

Her fingers twisted in her lap again. "Thanks, Marcus." She reached over to pull the door handle.

"I'll try to be quick," he said as she pushed the door open.

"No need," she replied. "I teach until nine. Come after that."

He nodded and she said good-bye. He did not wait once she was out of the car. He drove off immediately.

She turned around and faced the college. It was different. It did not call to her and welcome her as it had always done. She was not eager to go inside.

The afternoon was warm and sunny. A light breeze that had been diving between the office buildings played at her hair.

When was the last time she had brushed it? She must have looked horrible in her day old clothes, rumpled from her naps on the floor of her studio. Marcus had been kind enough not to notice or at least not to say anything. She doubted the mothers of her younger students would be so unobservant.

She pulled out her phone again. It was too close to her first lesson. She would just have to live with the silent ridicule.

The air in the elevator was stuffy compared to the lightness of the breezes outside. Her mind twisted over everything Marcus had told her. Logically, she should have distrusted the entire thing and dismissed it as snake oil, but there was nothing inside her physically or emotionally that agreed.

She did trust Marcus, even if any sane person would not.

The doors opened and she walked to her studio. The rainbows of music from all the rooms she walked by danced in quickly fading ribbons on the doors. The colours, even those that clashed and fought each other in the overlapping tunes, had always comforted her. They had caused her shoulders to relax in the past.

The nostalgia remained. The appreciation of the beauty which caused birds to flutter in her chest remained. The comfort, the wanting to curl up and hide amongst the colours, did not.

As she placed her hand upon the handle to her studio, she heard her name called. She looked up.

Liam was walking towards her. His step was so light he looked as though he would break into a skip at any moment.

"I thought you had rehearsal," she said.

"Cut short," he replied. "Scheduling conflict with the room," he added.

"What has you so happy?" she asked, thinking back to their previous cold encounter and the silent treatment before that.

"I'm always happy," he said. "You're the one who's always sullen."

She opened the door and walked inside, leaving it open for him to follow.

"Yet you are the one who refused to speak to me," she said as she walked over to the stack of sheet music in the corner. She knelt down and began to sift through it, looking for the music for her first student of the day.

Liam scoffed. "Can you blame me?" he said. "You were completely ungrateful."

She slammed down the handful of music she had gathered.

"What I said to you was completely fair, Liam," she yelled. She could not look at him. She yelled to her knees. "I am not a child and I can manage my life with or without your help."

He snorted. That was the button to the fuel of her confidence. She jumped up and stomped the two steps it took to be in his face.

"Have you not noticed that I am still here and still perfectly fine?" she said. "I haven't listened to a damn word you've said in years and somehow I'm still not dying of malnourishment, I'm not being locked up for insanity, and I manage to pay my bills. Hell, I've even started making new friends without you!"

His eyes narrowed. "Is that all he is then?" he asked, his jaw taught even as he spoke.

She stepped back, then she laughed. "Is all of this really because of jealousy?" she asked. "Is that the only reason you're talking to me again? You're afraid you won't be the only man in my life?"

He said nothing.

"Get out, Liam," she ordered. "You've known for years I don't feel that way about you. If you can't let it go, I want you out."

He did not move. "Can you trust him, Emily?" he asked. "How long have you known him? A few days? How long have you known me? Years!"

"How long I have known someone is irrelevant," she said. "You taught me that when you stopped returning my calls. One insult and you ran. Get out, Liam."

He still refused to move.

"Get out!" she yelled.

They stared at each other. Neither moved. Neither talked.

There was a soft knock on the door. She hadn't realized it had been ajar but even the soft tap caused it to swing open.

Her first student, a blond five year old girl with pigtails, and the girl's mother were standing in the doorway. The girl was wide-eyed. The mother's eyes narrow and appraising. The woman looked Liam up and down but her expression remained the same.

Emily forced a large smile. "Hi! Come on in. We can get started right away," she said with feigned enthusiasm.

"Good-bye, Liam," she added quietly out of the corner of her mouth.

He turned and stormed from the room without a word.

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Brick 14

During the lesson, Emily acted as though the embarrassing scene had never happened. This denial was made more difficult by the fact that the encounter had also left her with a renewed headache.

Her small student played through her scales. The ribbons moved with nearly imperceptible jerks from the instrument. The girl was very good for her age but even the minor errors were major irritations to Emily's head.

She had the girl move onto a rondo by Oscar Reiding, hoping a more lyrical succession of notes might help. They did not.

Each note pushed her head further and further into pain. Her breathing became shallow as she tried to cope. The ribbons got fainter but the music had not quieted.

Was that ribbon blue? Green? Yellow?

The music stopped.

Emily's body was rocking. It was not rhythmic. There were random stops and starts. Did she fall asleep on the bus again? It was too bright out to be on the bus but there were so many people talking around her. It must have been the bus.

Had it been that long of a day? She did feel exhausted. Her bed would feel so good. As soon as she got home, she would get in it and ignore everything else.

The bus made another stop.

The voices were getting louder. Someone was yelling at someone else. What was he saying? There was a soft mumble in reply.

"I'm the only person she's got!" he yelled.

"Sir, I will not tell you again," replied the calm voice. "You need to wait here and if you keep refusing to listen to me, I will have security remove you."

There was a pause. "Where will you be taking her after?" he asked, much more calm. At its normal volume, the voice was familiar. She knew someone with that same timbre. She knew him well.

"I promise we will let you know," the other replied.

The bus started to move again.

Something brushed by her cheek.

"I will be waiting for you, Emily. I promise," the man said.

Liam? Where was Liam?

She tried opening her eyes but she felt too exhausted. Her limbs must have been anchored in concrete. She would have panicked or fought but her eyes and her brain seemed equally weighted. She would ask Liam why he was on the bus later.

She stopped resisting. The noise from the nightclubs would wake her at her stop.

Giving in had been the best decision. Every muscle relaxed. She could have been floating in water.

The bus stopped again but the force against her body felt wrong. Was she lying down? Why would she be lying down on the bus?

This time, her confusion overcame her exhaustion. She tried to open her eyes. They were so heavy that they fought against her efforts. She nearly got them open but they were too strong. The exhaustion was too strong.

The movement restarted and she was floating again. It did not feel as welcoming as it had before. She knew she was not on the bus but she had no idea what had happened. She wanted to know. Where was she? Where was Liam? What was going to happen?

A megalith could not have held her back. She was going to find out. She tried again to force her eyes open. As she looked around, she was not sure she had succeeded. She was surrounded by undulating, grey atmosphere.

The resistence against her body as she tried to move felt even more like water than it had before. Instinctively, she began to move her arms and legs to keep herself afloat. After a moment, she stopped. It made no difference.

There was nothing but grey.

She squinted. Was there movement ahead of her? It was difficult to tell. There might have been the dark silhouette of something. It moved again. It was getting closer and darker. She had not imagined it.

Out of the ether pushed the black ribbon. It moved like it always did, poking and searching.

She tried to get away from it but her limbs could not move fast enough. She knew she could run. She had run at some point before in her life and she had been faster than this.

The ribbon was within an arm's length. She could not escape. It lunged at her abdomen and latched on.

The moment it did, her heart calmed. She felt as though a saviour had just grabbed her hand. There was nothing to fear. There was nothing that could hurt her. The strand moved up her body towards her heart.

It was then that she noticed another ribbon, one that was dark red. It was already latched onto her chest, just above her heart. Though she could not see the other end, the shaft rested on her shoulder.

The black ribbon lunged at it. The moment it made contact, she felt as though she had been scalded. She gasped and her eyes flew open. Her last vision was the black strand retreating, the edges glowing as if it were smoldering.

Her body was no longer moving. There were no more noises.

She looked around. She was in a bed in a hospital room.

"You're awake!"

She looked over to see Liam perched on the edge of a chair.

"What happened?" she asked.

"They aren't sure," he said. "They think you might have had a seizure but I think they are just saying that because they don't have any other ideas. You collapsed during your lesson. The mother called 911."

"How did you know I was here?"

"It caused a huge commotion on the whole floor. Once I realized it was over you, I insisted on coming," he explained. "How are you feeling?"

Her headache lay growling in the corner of her consciousness and she felt like her body had been run over. "Not bad," she said.

"I told the nurses about Dr. Watanabe," he said. "They told me they would page him. Given that you've been seeing him, I figured it would be a good idea."

"He won't find anything," she said.

The crease between Liam's eyebrows appeared. "Why do you say that?" he asked.

She couldn't bring herself to tell him about her visit to Mary's clinic. Her own conviction about what Mary and Marcus had told her had not even been cemented until the vision that had awoken her in that hospital room.

"Just a hunch," she replied.

His crease did not disappear. "Let them take care of you," he said. "We can figure this out."

"It's alright," she insisted.

Liam took a deep breath. "I'm sorry for everything," he blurted. "I'm sorry I was such an ass. I'm sorry I didn't take your calls. I'm sorry I acted jealous. I am sorry about all of it. I've been the biggest ass in the world."

She stared at him.

"They've told you I'm dying," she whispered finally.

The crease deepened. "No," he said tartly. "I am genuinely sorry because I was wrong. Thanks for being so respectful of my groveling."

He let himself fall against the back of the chair and linked his hands over his stomach. "It's clear I won't bother apologizing to you again," he added. His tone was serious but the crease disappeared quickly. He was kidding.

"Thanks, Liam," she said and gave him a smile.

Her muscles felt more relaxed again. His apology really had made a difference. She wanted to be friends with him. As mad as she had been, a life spent hating him seemed wrong.

She laughed. "You are right though," she said.

"About what?" he asked.

"You are an ass."

He laughed too.

It seemed like it had been years since they had just been silly with one another, picking on each other without venom.

Liam's laughing cut short.

She looked at him. He was looking at the doorway. She turned to follow his gaze.

Marcus, Mary, and two other people were squeezed in the opening.

There was a young looking Chinese man, maybe in his mid-twenties. He was dressed in a snug black t-shirt, showing he worked out, and jeans. His hair looked full of gel as it formed spikes in all directions.

The other person was a woman who looked to be around the same age as the Chinese man. She had green eyes and brown hair secured into short pig-tails. Despite the season, her skin was extremely pale. She was wearing a pale blue dress with spaghetti straps. Her bare legs looked almost as thin as Emily's.

Marcus and Mary looked just as they had when Emily had last seen them.

Marcus and Liam were glaring at each other again.

"Can we help you?" Liam asked.

To Emily's surprise, Mary stepped forward.

"You can get away from Emily," she said with all the force to which Emily had become accustomed.

Liam looked as if he had choked upon his own saliva. "Excuse me?" he said.

Mary looked at Emily. "That key on you has something to do with him," she said. "I can see it. It's linked to him somehow."

With these words, Marcus pulled himself up taller and crossed his arms over his chest, never once removing his eyes from Liam.

Emily looked at Liam, then back at Mary.

Marcus and Mary had said the key could have been made by anyone. Her headaches happened most often when Liam was around. Her stomach twisted into a tight knot.

She looked into Liam's eyes. Her body felt cold. Her fingers shook in her lap. "Please, please tell me it wasn't you."

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Brick 15

"Wasn't me what?" Liam demanded as he jumped to his feet. "Have you all lost your minds? Who are these people, Emily? Are they in a cult or something? Have they been hurting you?"

"Get out, Liam," Marcus boomed.

Liam turned on him, eager for the excuse. He walked up until his nose was within inches of Marcus'. "No," he replied with equal force. "I don't know who you people are. I have no idea what gibberish you're selling but Emily is my best friend. I've looked out for her for years and I will keep doing it no matter what tinfoil hat you've given her."

"You haven't been caring for her," Mary said. "You've been binding her. Who are you really?"

Emily could not see his face from her bed but his head turned towards Mary. "You don't know anything," he said.

Mary was not intimidated. She said, "I know what I can see on her and I can see that the closer you are to her, the stronger it gets."

"Did you escape from the Alberta Hospital or something?" Liam asked. "They might be looking for you. They don't need another lost patient on their hands."

"Liam," Emily said through a tense jaw. "Come here."

He looked over his shoulder at her then back at Mary and Marcus. A moment later he turned and did as she asked.

He braced his hands on the edge of the bed and bent over so that his face was close to hers. He did not give her a chance to speak.

"What the Hell have you gotten yourself into?" he asked. "I don't hang out with you for a week and you've attracted a bunch of crazy people!"

Her cheeks were hot and she felt she would have been justified in yelling at him again but she also saw his point of view. In fact, his reaction comforted her. The idea that he was somehow involved was absurd and even the suggestion had felt so threatening she had been sure she would be crushed under its weight. If he had been involved, surely he would not seem so confused now. His confrontational response also made sense given how protective he could be and how he had been less than eager to see her spending time with Marcus even when he thought the man completely normal.

Instead of yelling or telling him to mind his own business, she placed her hand over his. She looked into his eyes. There was the crease between his brows. Whatever Mary thought she saw, she was wrong.

"I know they seem a little odd," she whispered to him. "I don't expect you to understand any of this, at least not yet. I am still trying to figure it out myself. Please, despite all of that, I am begging you to trust me for now."

The crease deepened.

"Please, Liam."

He leaned forward and kissed her on the head. He lingered and she realized it was so that he could whisper without the others knowing he was saying anything to her.

"I will," he said, "But there is no way I am letting you out of my sight with that behemoth around."

He pulled back just as they heard a quiet, "Excuse me."

Someone had arrived behind the group that was still lodged in the doorway. The two behind Marcus moved to allow him entrance.

Dr. Watanabe squeezed around Marcus. When his eyes fell upon Mary in his efforts, he smiled and said hello. She nodded with a quick smirk in reply. He then looked deliberately at the bed and smiled once more when he saw Emily.

"Given the events of today," he said, now ignoring the others, "I've managed to get you in for an MRI right away."

Two nurses pushed into the room with a stretcher, forcing the others to move in the process.

"Sorry to cut your visiting short," the doctor added, "But we're going to be taking you down there right now."

The nurses helped her onto the stretcher and began to wheel her out of the room.

"How long will it take?" Liam asked.

Dr. Watanabe considered. "By the time we get her down there, do the scan, and get her back, probably an hour or more. You're all welcome to wait here if you like."

Liam nodded. "I'll be here," he said.

Emily saw Marcus' nostrils flair.

Dr. Watanabe accompanied her down to the MRI.

"How are you feeling now?" he asked as they made their way through the fluorescent-lit corridors.

"Like nothing happened," she said. "I don't even remember it. Any of it."

He nodded. "That's why we're going to take a look," he said. "I'm sure we can figure this out."

She said nothing.

As they waited at the elevator, he looked down at her. He seemed to be in a good mood. "I see you've met Mary," he said. "You went to the synestete group then?"

She nodded.

"Do you find their company helpful?" he asked.

His question made her mind go over the last day. It had been absolutely crazy.

"I don't know," she said.

He shrugged.

The elevator doors opened and the nurses wheeled her inside. Getting to MRI took only a few minutes. She thought she would be taken right inside but she had to spend several minutes filling out a form involving questions about piercings, tattoos, and previous surgeries.

The steady stream of patients requiring scans meant that even when she was taken beyond the check-in desk, she had to wait much longer. Dr. Watanabe scurried off almost immediately. She had no idea where he had gone. The nurses had also left to retrieve another patient.

She could not see any clocks from where she was but she was sure she must have been waiting nearly an hour. There was no music to entertain her. She simply stared at the ceiling tiles.

Finally, a young lab assistant with shoulder-length black hair approached and began to wheel her into the room, all the while asking the same questions about piercings and tattoos that Emily had already answered on the questionnaire.

"Can you get off the gurney or do you have trouble walking?" the girl asked.

Emily said she could get up so the girl stopped just outside the room and lowered the side. She then led her to the MRI and helped her lie down on the bench.

"Normally we would offer you music to listen to," the girl said. "But Dr. Watanabe has requested we do something a little different this time given the nature of your condition."

Emily raised an eyebrow.

The girl explained, "We will be doing the scan three times: once without music, once with classical music, and once with rock music. Is that alright with you?"

Emily nodded.

The girl put the large headphones over Emily's ears. She then secured the head restraint and finally placed a call button in Emily's hand.

"Use this if at any point you have a problem," the girl called so that her voice carried through the thick headphones.

She left the room and within moments, the bench that held Emily moved into the machine.

Over the headphones, Emily heard the girl say, "We're going to start, please keep as still as you can."

Emily had not been prepared for the blast of noise that started with the machine. Even if she had not already been prone to headaches, she would have gotten one. There was no quality to the sound that she could even pretend to appreciate. She endured the repetitive blasts and thumps.

They stopped suddenly and over the headphones, the girl's voice came again. "Please stop moving," she said. "You have to be still to produce a clear image."

Emily's eyes moved rapidly around. She was trying to think of how she had moved. She had not even indulged a cringe at the noise.

The blasting started again and continued in the same fashion as it had the first time. Just as before, it stopped and was followed by the girl telling her to stay still.

"I am!" Emily yelled angrily.

There was silence for several minutes.

Finally, the girl said over the headphones, "We are going to try one more time."

The machine started up again but the noise was not nearly as irritating. Emily was too angry that the technicians thought she was the reason they could not get a good image.

As she grumbled in her mind, movement caught her eye. She dared not move her head to see what it was but it had been down near her stomach, so she did her best with just her eyes to look down.

The black ribbon was pushing its way up her stomach and towards her head. Its movements seemed sluggish. It was no longer like the searching dog but like an aged and dying coyote. Despite its struggle, it would not stop.

It neared her heart. The end lifted up a few inches and waivered. Then it plunged itself into her chest.

Her eyes were blinded. She opened and closed them rapidly, trying to see something. She was no longer in the MRI. It was the same dream as she had had before. She tried to look down at her chest again, this time ignoring the order to immobilise her head. Something prevented it from moving more than a centimetre but she could see the black ribbon and she could see the red ribbon.

The black ribbon refused to let go even as its edges began to smolder like before. It pressed harder into her chest. Its edges were burning away. The red ribbon appeared unscathed.

Emily wanted to help it. She wanted to do something but she had no idea what to do. Then she thought of Mary. She thought of what she had witnessed her do in the coffee shop.

She reached down and grabbed the black ribbon. She wanted to soothe it. She wanted to fix it. It looked so weary. Its movements were slow but it continued to try. It was going to sacrifice itself.

"Please," she begged. "Not for me."

The black ribbon had lost too much strength. It tried to hang on. It had twitched with one last effort to push towards her again. It was too much. It went limp and slid off her body.

As the mist around her began to swallow it, she heard a voice. It was weak and faint. "I will never give you to it," it said.

The black ribbon was gone.

The mist disappeared. The blasting of the MRI brought her back to reality.

The noise stopped and the familiar voice came over the headphones. "We're really sorry about this," she said. "We think there might be something wrong with the machine."

The girl came back into the room and unfastened the head restraints. Dr. Watanabe followed.

"Of all the horrible luck," he said. "There's another machine on another floor but with one out of commission until it can be looked at, I'm not sure how long it will be before I can get you in. They will have to put all the emergencies first. It might even be another day."

"It's alright," Emily said. She knew Marcus had been right. It would not find anything and she knew it would never be able to help her understand the black ribbon.

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Brick 16

Chapter 6

As with all things in the Canadian healthcare system, Emily's failed adventure at MRI took much longer than expected. By the time she was taken back up to her room, visiting hours had ended and Liam and the others had long since been sent on their way.

She did not mind the opportunity for peace, though she very much wished she had access to some good music. Her mind churned over what had happened with the black and red ribbons, but no matter how much she went over what she had seen and heard, it made no more sense. She flopped onto her side and looked out the window. With no one to talk to, little to do, and her mind finally paralyzed by frustration, she fell asleep.

The next morning, she learned immediately that Liam was determined to make amends. When she opened her eyes, she saw him sitting in the chair next to her bed and holding her violin case with a large orange bow on it.

At first, she thought she was dreaming. Her sight was still slightly blurry from sleep. After rubbing them to clear away the fog, he was still there and still holding her case.

"I had to go by the violin shop to get a new string for my cello. He recognized me and said he had been trying to get hold of you all day yesterday to let you know it was ready," he explained. "When I told him what happened, he said I could bring it to you."

Her smile spread so wide, she thought she might pull a muscle. She pushed herself up into a sitting position and reached for the case.

"Thank you so much," she said as he handed it to her.

He added, "You owe me $600."

"He said it would be half that. Why so much?" she asked, not really concerned. She could afford it. She had nothing else to spend her money on and she was just thankful to have it back. The loaner had been a complete disaster.

"He said the crack was worse than he first thought," he replied. "He had to take the back off and reattach it on top of all the other repairs."

She groaned. No wonder it had taken so long for him to fix it. She did not like the idea of her poor instrument in pieces.

She unzipped the case. She was so happy to have it back that her fingers shook slightly as she pushed open the lid. The now pristine violin was waiting to be played. She could not refuse it. Immediately she tugged on the Velcro strap that secured it around the fingerboard. Simultaneously she removed the bow from the case.

Within moments, she was bouncing out the Dance of the Goblins. Ribbons of all colours skipped happily from her instrument. They were old friends enjoying their homecoming. When she finished the short piece, she set the violin back in its case but did not secure it. She caressed the fingerboard and the strings. Out of all the insanity, the music still made sense. The music did not try to pick a fight with Liam or Marcus. The music demanded nothing of her.

Liam laughed.

"What?" she said as she looked at him. He had leaned back in the chair and placed his hands over his stomach just like he had the night before.

"I know why you always shot me down," he said.

She raised a brow.

"I could never compete with your first love," he explained as he indicated the violin with a jut of his chin.

He leaned forward to stand. He was still smiling.

"Why does realizing that make you so happy?" she asked.

He laughed again. "Because it means he doesn't have any chance either," he answered.

"Really, Liam. Are you going to bring this..."

He cut her off. "Sorry," he said but he showed no remorse. He was still grinning like a fool. "I have a make-up rehearsal at 11:00 so I'm going to get out of here for now. You going to be alright alone?"

She rolled her eyes. "I might have to fight off some wolves but I can use my bow for that."

"Good to hear," he said before leaning over and kissing her on the forehead. "I'll try to be back later today," he added.

He closed the door to her room on his way out. He knew her better than anyone.

She lifted her violin once more and played Bach's Chaconne.

The ribbons jumped and stretched from the violin. They expanded and vibrated. They carried her heart with them as they danced. They were security and comfort. They were everything that she wanted.

The colours changed from bold blues and greens to lighter purples and yellows. A few reds emerged and began to intertwine and twist around each other like a helix. As the notes continued and other colours joined them, the helix began to follow the path of a spiral. It turned back towards her. The blues and greens blended. The purples and yellows popped one after the other and then faded. The red remained. It reached back to her and slid itself around her shoulders. It was warm. The other notes continued their dance but always faded. The helix remained. It snuggled into her neck and rested.

She continued to play. The purples and yellows returned in long broad ribbons. More faintly the blues and greens began a conversation with their return. The red helix remained draped over her shoulder. It was all the security she had ever wanted. It was all the love she had ever wanted.

This was who she was. This was the music of her soul; the only thing she could not live without.

As she began to reign in the notes, bringing the melody to its conclusion, the red helix warmed and held her more tightly. She welcomed it.

With the final notes, the ribbon moved one last time. It pushed just far enough to press its end into her heart.

As the last note faded away, she pressed the back of the violin against her chest and held it close. They had been apart far too long.

"What the hell was that?"

She looked up abruptly to see Marcus, Mary, and the two others from the previous night in the doorway. Marcus looked like he was grinding his teeth. The two she did not know looked frightened. Mary's mouth was slack. She was the one who had spoken.

"What do you mean?" Emily asked.

"Did you not see what just happened?" Mary shouted. "Did you not see how that ribbon formed? Liam was right. I was wrong. He was not the one who put that key on you."

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Brick 17

"So you are saying I am doing it to myself?" Emily asked, clutching her violin closer to her chest. She felt safe behind it. Its music had gotten her through life and now it felt like her shield.

"That's exactly how it looks," Mary replied. "You played and it formed."

Emily scoffed. "I doubt this is the same thing as the key. You must be mistaken. I knew nothing of keys or key breakers until I met you. How would I have done any of it?"

Mary glared but before she could reply, Marcus interrupted.

"That is a very good question," he said. He walked up to her until he was standing right next to her bed. His eyes did not waver from hers. "We have been in new territory ever since we met you," he continued. "I never would have thought it possible for a key breaker to be able to be a key maker. I also never would have thought it possible for a key breaker to stay hidden from me."

Emily looked back at Mary who had crossed her arms tightly in front of her chest and was still glaring. The two unnamed companions were looking at each other with furrowed brows. She looked back at Marcus. He had none of the malice in his eyes that Mary's held.

"I think Mary's dislike of me has grown if that is possible," Emily said to him. "And you?"

Marcus' expression did not change. "Mary is unsure if we can trust you," he said. "I trust your intentions. I cannot trust your abilities until I know more." He turned back to the others. "Philip, Valerie, I need you to check out the source of that black ribbon," he ordered. "I had hoped to take Emily but it may not be wise. See if you can break the key on it. If not, find out as much as you can." He turned to Mary and said, "For the time being, you can go back to your clinic. I'll come by when I know more."

"You actually want me to leave you alone with her?" she asked. "Seriously?"

Marcus was unmoved. "The elders have not allowed you an audience with them yet," he explained.

Mary pointed at Emily. "And they have with her?" she demanded.

"I trust them completely," he said.

Emily found their exchange very curious. She found the entire situation insane. Perhaps Liam had been right about them. She found the distrust of her first meetings with them had returned and was growing. The safety and comfort she had felt with Marcus was faint.

"Perhaps you have all forgotten," she said, "I am in the hospital and under the care of competent doctors who are still trying to figure out what is wrong with me. If you think I am going to leave now, you are out of your minds."

Marcus turned back to her. The intensity of his gaze was uncomfortable. She shifted a few millimeters in her bed.

"If you think I am letting you out of my sight after what I just witnessed, then you are out of your mind," he said.

She tried her best to look back at him defiantly. She pulled herself up as tall as she could. She tried to set her jaw. She made every effort to cement herself to her physical and mental position. Despite this, she felt less confident than she had a moment ago. The situation of the last few days kept shifting beneath her feet. Getting a secure position, even in her own mind, was proving increasingly difficult with all the new developments.

Marcus gently pulled her hand away from her violin and pressed it against the bed. He set his hand over hers. She wanted to pull away but somehow felt too weak to engage the muscles necessary.

The same warmth she had felt from him before began to climb her arm, but she was aware of this game. The purring mass over her shoulder stirred. The purr changed. It felt like a growl and with it her headache emerged once more. Marcus would not be deterred. His efforts continued and the growling became stronger. Marcus pressed even more. The mass expanded and lunged at his green ribbon. The pain in her head spread out with a burst like a firework.

She saw Marcus flinch and his fingers gripped hers tightly but he refused to let go.

"Marcus, stop!" Mary yelled. "You can't defeat it like this."

Marcus ignored her. He kept his eyes upon Emily's. His muscles were tense. He looked to be enduring horrible pain but would not give in to it. He would not give up.

Emily looked down at her tingling forearm. The green ribbon was trying to push against its attacker but it was still being driven back. Marcus held her fingers even more tightly. It was the black ribbon all over again. She had seen what had happened when it refused to give up. There was no winning against the red.

She looked back up at Marcus. Her head was pounding.

"Please," she whispered. "Not for me. Please."

And just as with the black ribbon, she heard the same response, this time spoken from the man before her. "I will never give you to it," he said.

She stared at him for several moments but in those moments, he was deteriorating. The ribbon had been pushed back to her wrist. His brow was covered in sweat and he had slumped as though he were about to collapse. His eyes remained focused upon hers.

She set her violin and bow in her lap and placed her newly freed hand on top of his. "For now," she said. "You must."

He hesitated. Finally, he let go and withdrew his hand. He stumbled backwards and collapsed into the chair Liam had left empty. He was breathing heavily.

She did not know what was going on. She did not know what this red helix really was. She did not know how it was formed, whether by her or some other means. She understood very little about the situation but there was one recurring theme she had noticed. Others seemed to be trying to save her from it and their own lives appeared at risk in the process. She could not withstand that kind of sacrifice.

"Marcus," she whispered. "Please go. Just forget you ever met me and go."

He was beginning to get a handle on his breathing. After a particularly large intake and exhale, he said, "Sorry, Emily, that's not going to happen. You're stuck with me."

He leaned back and closed his eyes.

"Look what you've done!" Mary yelled. "You've attacked Marcus now. What are you going to do next?"

"Calm down," Marcus said without opening his eyes. "I'll be fine in a few minutes."

"Why would you do anything that stupid?" she asked as she stormed up to him. "What were you thinking?"

"I would do it again," he said, "And I fully intend to when I recover."

Mary was exasperated. "Idiot," she said.

She turned to Philip and Valerie who were staring at Marcus. "Didn't he tell you two to look into that black ribbon? Get going!" she barked.

They looked at each other and scurried out of the room.

She turned back to Marcus. "Maybe they will find something more than idiotic brute force to get rid of this thing. I will be staying with you until you come back to your senses," she said.

"Then you can get him out of here and make sure he never comes back," Emily added.

Mary glared at her again. It seemed that was all the effort she felt Emily deserved.

"I am not an invalid," Marcus said. "I will be fine in a few moments and I am not leaving until Emily agrees to come with me. I will fight that key over and over again until she agrees."

Emily looked around the room. She was not sure why. The medical equipment and doors held no answers for her and yet she was trying to find anything that might convince him not to do that again.

She had no other ideas. "I will go with you," she said, "After the doctors here have agreed to discharge me."

Mary scoffed. "These doctors know nothing about keys. They study the physical world. This is beyond their capabilities to understand."

"And your world is beyond mine," she said.

"Will you let me stay until the doctors release you?" Marcus asked.

"Not if Mary insists on staying with you," she replied.

Just as Mary was about to protest, he said, "Agreed. Mary, get out of here."

Mary did not agree. "What the hell, Marcus. Do you want to die?"

"Go," he ordered. "You aren't my nursemaid."

"Perhaps you need one," she shot back angrily though she did turn and walk towards the door.

"I'll call you later," he called as if they had been having a friendly chat.

"Bite me," she called back before disappearing into the hallway.

Emily and Marcus said nothing to each other for a very long time. It might have been hours.

He still had his eyes closed. At one point, she even wondered if he had fallen asleep. One thing she was sure of was that he had been hurt far more than he had admitted. She felt it best to let him have the rest he needed so she remained quiet.

Her mind was racing and she found that she was not bored during the silence. Her fingers gently caressed the body of her violin as she thought over all of it. The helix had returned to its perch and purring contentedly. Her headache had also subsided.

When the helix was happy, she felt warmth and love from it but she could not ignore what it had tried to do to others who felt they were helping her. Everyone in the situation seemed to be trying to protect her, even the helix. Protect her from what?

Late in the afternoon, Dr. Watanabe came to visit her.

Marcus did not stir and his breathing was rhythmic.

Dr. Watanabe was at a loss. The MRI machine had been thoroughly checked over. Several people had since gone in for scans and nothing was wrong with it. They planned to take her to the other machine anyway just in case.

That evening, Marcus was still asleep in the chair as she was wheeled to the other MRI. She filled out the same questionnaire as before but this time, Dr. Watanabe stayed with her. He stressed several times that she needed to put down if she had ever had surgery or any kind of metal implant at any point in her life. Once again, she affirmed that she had not.

Her wait did not seem nearly as long as it had the first time. Within a few minutes she was taken right in.

The same procedures were followed. If she had any more of these tests, she would be able to get herself ready without the technicians help at all.

It was only another minute before the bench was moving her into the machine. She braced herself for the same episode as happened before. She expected to be yelled at by the technician and even to witness another altercation between the black ribbon and the red helix.

None of that happened. The repetitive shouts of the machine did their work. The bench moved and the repetitive shouts of the machine started again. Half an hour later, the technicians were back and returning her to her gurney.

Dr. Watanabe walked up. He had a crease between his eyebrows similar to Liam's.

"I'm not sure what was going on before," he said. "We got clear scans this time and upon initial inspection, there is nothing concerning. The specialist is going to take a closer look but we should know for sure in a few hours. Unless something else happens or the specialist finds something I missed, I can't justify keeping you in the hospital. I've been pressured to discharge you as it is due to the shortage of beds."

"If you think that's safe," she said. She was only partly listening to him after he said the scans looked clean. Was it the altercation between the ribbons that had interfered before? Why would they show up then and not at all now?

"I have no idea," he replied. "Regardless, I want you to come by for a check-up next week. If you have any other strange symptoms, I want to know about them."

She agreed.

By the time she was returned to her room, Marcus was awake and Liam had returned.

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Brick 18

Chapter 7

When Emily told Liam and Marcus what had happened during her MRI, they predictably had very different reactions.

Liam was happy there was nothing wrong with her. He trusted the test fully and even that Dr. Watanabe would be releasing her. When she pointed out this still meant the headaches and her collapse remained unexplained, he brushed it aside.

"Probably the result of your starvation," he reasoned. "More evidence that you need to come to my place for dinner more often," he added.

Marcus said nothing to her news or to Liam's reaction. He was still in the seat where he had been sleeping when she left. He was watching her but otherwise giving no indication of his thoughts on the matter.

More strangely, this was the first time he and Liam were within eyesight of each other and not preparing to fight. As she waited for news from Dr. Watanabe, the atmosphere in the room was downright amicable. Marcus and Liam even began to commiserate over the city's latest planning failure that had resulted in almost every major road into the downtown being obstructed at the same time.

Their change in heart made her wonder if she had passed out again. Perhaps she was only dreaming of impossible realities.

Dr. Watanabe arrived with his news two hours later. The specialist agreed that there was nothing concerning on her scan. She would be able to go home immediately.

Fifteen minutes later, she was dressed and clutching the handle of her violin case. Liam and Marcus were standing by the door. Both offered her a ride. The result was the oddest display she had seen.

"Sorry, Marcus," Liam said with absolutely no animosity. "I'm her friend and I would feel horrible if I didn't help her."

Marcus showed none of the same desire for confrontation as was typical. His shoulders remained relaxed and there was absolutely no glaring involved. "Thanks for the offer, Liam," he said, "But we have plans. There are some people I wanted Emily to meet."

When Liam's reply was an equally cordial protest, Emily had had enough. This was worse than their open hostilities.

"What is the matter with you two? Have you both lost your minds?" she nearly yelled.

Far from looking surprised from her outburst, both men averted their eyes. A beeping followed by a commotion in the hallway filled their silence. The nurses ran by the room without paying it any heed. The beeping stopped. The men's silence remained.

"We are just trying to get along," Liam said finally.

"Why?" she asked with so much force her diaphragm gave her a twinge of pain.

"Just for your sake," Marcus said. "You have enough to worry about." He still would not look at her.

"You are both liars," she said. "You're lucky I don't slap you both and walk home."

They said nothing.

"What do you two even think you are going to accomplish?" she asked. "I'm not even involved with either of you. I have certainly made my feelings clear to you, Liam. And how could I feel much of anything for you, Marcus? We just met. Why are you two acting like you want to fight over who can drag me back to his cave?"

Marcus straightened and finally looked at her. "It isn't that," he said.

She did not know whether to feel relieved or offended. "Then what it is?" she asked.

Marcus looked at Liam who was still trying to pretend he was somehow not involved. He had taken out his phone and was pretending to check his calls.

"Come with me to the elders," Marcus said. "I can't speak for Liam but you will know my answer if you see them."

"Yeah," Liam scoffed. "Don't want to be late for the cult meeting," he said. Obviously, their views of each other had not changed.

Marcus refused to be riled. He kept his eyes on her.

Perhaps answers really could be found with these "elders." Doctors had failed to find the cause and the closest things to explanations she had were those from Mary and Marcus.

She thought of the black ribbon, of the altercation with the red in the MRI machine, of how Marcus might have killed himself trying to break it from her. As she thought of it, she could feel its presence still snuggled over her shoulder and purring. It had never attacked her. The black ribbon had. It had never lied to her or scared her. Marcus and Liam had.

She thought of the altercations again. It had attacked others. Why? Through all of it, she had only gotten more and more confused.

She looked at Liam. He had stuffed his phone into his pocket and was daring to look at her again. He had given her no answers either. He had been a pain and a jerk. He thought the entire thing was crazy and wanted to trust the doctors. She was brought back to their failure in her case. No answers were that way, only Liam's self-righteousness.

"Liam," she said, "You are such an ass."

When his brow knit and he opened his mouth to protest, she added, "But I love you anyway - as a friend. I have to do this now but I will call you tomorrow."

He inhaled to attempt another outburst but she interrupted him again. "Tomorrow," she said again. "I will call you tomorrow."

He turned to Marcus but Marcus too seemed to understand his intent and spoke first. "Yes, I know. You'll track me down and kill me or some such if she doesn't," he said.

Liam finally closed his mouth but was now looking at them both with his knitted brow and narrowed eyes. "I guess you've got it all figured out," he said. "I'll talk to you tomorrow, Emily."

She nodded and watched as he left. There were still the distant sounds of the nurses talking to each other and moving things around as they worked.

"Where are these elders?" she asked.

The edges of Marcus' mouth curved upward. "It's a short hike," he said. "Nothing too bad."

Several minutes later, they were on the road and driving South. The sun had set but the edge of its faint aura still lit the sky in the North, causing even the darkened sky ahead of them to appear absent of stars.

It was hot. Emily opened her window to get the air moving within the car but was forced to close it again when Marcus turned onto the Whitemud Freeway. They were on it for only a minute before he turned off again and headed into the thick of suburbia.

"Where are we going?" she asked.

"Terwillegar off-leash park," he said.

She raised an eyebrow. She was meeting strange people. In the forested river valley. At night. If Liam had known, he would never have relented.

Perhaps Marcus had made the connection too, for he said, "I promise I won't attack you."

"Comforting," she replied.

They turned onto a dark road that curved through the trees as it descended into the valley. At the bottom, it opened into a small parking lot at the edge of a large floodplain. In the dark, it was hard to tell where the field ended and the trees began.

Marcus parked the car and got out. She followed.

The air smelled of warm grass and warm bark. There were no sounds. She could not even hear the river.

"Follow me," Marcus called as he began to walk northeast from the car.

"Do I have a choice?" she asked even as she did as instructed.

"Sure," he called over his shoulder. "I'm not making you do anything."

They both knew she was not going to turn back.

He led her onto a well-used path that went through the trees. Along the path at regular intervals were garbage bins and baggy dispensers for the dog owners to use. Though they were in the middle of the woods, these signposts of urbanity were comforting in the dark.

After several more minutes, Marcus began to slow, allowing her to catch up.

"Not much farther," he said as they arrived at a fork in the path.

He took the left which passed below two trees that had grown arched into each other. He kept walking even as the defined path faded away and they were forced to hobble over ruts and roots and duck under branches.

He stopped abruptly and held his arm out to block her.

"Listen," he said.

In the distance, Emily thought she could see firelight. She heard whooping and laughter.

"What is it?" she asked.

"A stupid bush party," he explained. "It happens all the time."

"What do we do?"

He looked down at her and smiled. "This," he said. He then bellowed so loud she had to cover her ears, "Cops! The cops are coming!"

The laughter ceased and Emily could hear shouts and shrieks followed by the commotion of dozens of teenagers scrambling up the slope through the brush as they tried to escape capture.

Marcus started walking again. She followed close behind.

He was headed towards the firelight.

"The entrance has been here for over a hundred years," he said as he walked. "It went largely unnoticed until the suburbs made it this far south. That's when the first teenagers discovered it. Not knowing what it really is, they use it as place for their parties. They're always littering the place."

They walked into a small clearing on the slope. The fire she had seen from afar was in the remains of an old fur trader's cottage hearth. The cottage was gone. The only other evidence that it had ever been there was a deep hole in the ground where its root cellar would have been. A half-rotting plank lay over the opening. The bottom of the pit was covered with empty beer cans.

"We're here," he announced. "I just have to put out the damn fire."

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Brick 19

Marcus walked to the edge of the trees and scooped piles of earth into his hands. He walked to the side of the hearth, getting as close as possible to the fire without falling into the large hole in the ground.

He tossed the earth onto the fire. Though it diminished, it had not been extinguished. He was forced to repeat the procedure several more times before the flames were finally buried.

"We'll have to wait a few minutes until the stones cool," he said. "I've burned my hands too many times being impatient."

He brushed his hands off and sat down next to the pit, letting his legs dangle over the edge. Emily walked over to him and copied this action.

"Who are we meeting?" she asked.

"Those who brought the Key Breakers together," he said. "They know more than anyone about keys."

He looked down at his hands and slapped them against the thighs of his jeans, trying to clean off the remnants of dirt.

"Do you think I did all this to myself?" she asked.

He looked ahead into the dark forest. "I would never have brought you here if I did," he said.

She was starting to feel the same comfort and warmth she had felt from him many times. Her body even began to tingle. She looked down at his hands, expecting to see his green ribbon reaching out to her. It was not there.

The red mass over her shoulder was purring.

"Are you alright?" she asked, her hands now in her lap.

Her fingers twisted around each other. She felt stupid. She forced her palms against the earth on either side of her and looked up through the canopy at the faint stars.

"I'll be fine," he said.

She was not convinced. "That's not what I asked. You spent nearly the whole day passed out in my hospital room."

He shrugged. "The situation didn't go as I had expected," he said. "The elders will know what to do about it."

"Where's your ribbon?" she asked.

For the first time since they sat down, he looked at her. She could not read his face in the darkness. She was not even sure she would have been able to in the light.

She could hear the cracking of twigs in the distance. She was rarely in the forest. She told herself it was some small animal. Marcus did not seem distracted by it and he knew the territory.

"It's where it needs to be," he said finally. Then he put his hands on the ground, swung his legs around and stood up. "The stones might be cool enough now," he said.

He walked back to the hearth and knelt down at the edge of the pit. He reached through the opening of the fireplace and up into the chimney. Emily was not sure exactly what he was doing. It looked like he was groping for something.

A moment later, he gave a small grunt which was followed by a very loud click from further up the slope.

He pushed himself to his feet.

"Follow me," he said before turning to walk up the slope.

He walked several metres straight towards a nearly vertical incline. When he was right in front of it, he stopped and waited for her to catch up. When she was standing right next to him, he gestured at the wall of earth.

"After you," he said.

She looked again at the wall and realized what there was an opening. It had been so dark, she had not even noticed.

"I can't see where I'm going," she said.

"Just walk a few steps and stop," he said. "I have to close the door."

She did as instructed. There was not even faint light to show her a floor, walls, or ceiling. The lights of the city that had been faint through the trees were invisible within the hole. Her legs felt weak as she was not sure what she was stepping into. She stopped and turned.

They were in complete darkness but she could hear Marcus' footsteps on the soil covering of dead leaves and pine cones. Then she heared the ruffling of his clothing followed by another loud click.

The next second, she was blinded and let out an involuntary, "Gah!"

"Sorry," he said as he lowered his phone. "We have to use this for light for now. When we get into the ante-chamber, there will be light. We can't risk the teenagers seeing the light around the outer door so this hall is always dark."

"Where are we?" she asked.

"In an old coal mine," he said. "There are hundreds in the river valley. Their locations are kept quiet to prevent kids from getting lost or hurt in them. Most are collapsing and really dangerous."

She began to look around but stopped when she realized the light of Marcus' phone was only illuminating a few feet ahead of them. There was wet earth and stone all around them where she could see but the state of the structure of the tunnel was impossible to discern.

"Don't worry," he added. "This is the only one in the whole city safe enough to traverse, at least for us."

He reached out and took her hand in his. Squeezing by her in the narrow shaft, he led her along using his phone for light.

"I help the Elders keep this place together," he said. "Though they've been here longer than I have."

The path curved around a corner. Marcus kept a firm grip on her hand. Serial killer horror movies were popping into her head. Liam would be having a heart attack. The path curved again and ended abruptly at a wall.

Marcus let go of her so that he could place his hand upon it. His green ribbon appeared. It looked smaller and fainter than she remembered. She thought back to earlier that day. Was it just the darkness or what had happened that made it look different? It curled down his arm. Was it sluggish?

At his wrist, it reached out slowly to touch the wall right next to his hand. For a moment, it was brighter but that moment was short. It faded again and retreated up his arm. As it did so, the wall swung open like a door.

Over Marcus' shoulder, she could see that there was a dimly lit room just beyond the opening. The strong smell of myrrh wafted out and assaulted her nose.

He took her hand in his once more and led her inside.

Her eyes were having trouble adjusting. The light was very dim and flickering but bright enough that she could make out the shape of the room. The chamber was several meters across and twice as wide. She was surprised to see that it had a rounded ceiling nearly one and a half storeys high. The floor was still covered in soft, dark earth but the walls and ceiling were orange clay and bedrock. The random bulges and curves of the walls made the room look like a naturally formed pocket within the earth.

Hanging from the ceiling was a large shallow bowl. The material it was made from was solid. It almost looked like earth but it had splotches of green intermixed with the dirt. It did not shine but she thought it might have been metal. From the bright light reflecting off the top of the ceiling and from the crackling sound coming from the bowl, she was sure there was fire in it.

Against the walls to her left and right were two more bowls, but placed upon long poles that had been stuck into the ground. There was no light coming from them but she could see smoke.

Marcus stuffed his phone back into his pocket.

"They're just through here," he said.

He walked to the other side of the room and followed the same procedure he had done with the previous door. Just as before, a section of the wall swung open, letting through bright light. Emily's eyes were beginning to hurt with all of the changes in brightness.

He gestured for her to follow. As they entered the new chamber, she heard a shrill voice.

"I don't think so Louis," the woman said. "I gave you two twenty years ago and I have yet to get that favour returned. You even had the gall to break two more just last year. You owe me!"

The new room they were in was easily four times as large as the ante-chamber. There were several of the large bowls suspended from the ceiling in this room and several more on poles. Some on the poles contained fire; others simply gave off the smoke of more myrrh.

There were three people in the room. They were standing at two of the many tables.

The tables were not organized in an identifiable arrangement except for being clear of a central aisle that went the length of the room. Each table had something different resting on top of it.

One immediately in front of Emily had several large glass bottles. Each was of a different shape and colour and each had a cork stopper in the top. There were several flasks and spatulas strewn amongst the bottles and a large book open before them.

A white-haired man was hunched over a table a few down. He was wearing a bright yellow robe that went to his calves, grey tweed pants, and brown loafers. His back was turned to them so she could see nothing more about him. Next to where he was working on the table sat a model of the planets. The small colourful balls were stuck upon metal arms that rotated around the largest ball representing the sun. As he worked, his elbow kept knocking Neptune.

In the back of the room, a dark-haired man and a light-haired, round woman were arguing over small figures on the table between them. Both of them would have been only slightly taller than Emily and neither of them looked any older than she was. The man was wearing long black pants, a white shirt and a purple tie. His hair was short but curly. One of his curls kept trying to fall across his forehead. He would run his fingers through his hair to push it back into place. There was a large crook in his nose but from her distance, Emily could make out little more. He rubbed his chin as he looked down at the figures on the table. They looked like chess pieces but there was no board.

Emily's inspection of the pieces was interrupted by the shrill voice. She looked up to see the woman storming down the central aisle towards them.

The woman had flawless skin and green eyes. Her blond hair was pulled up in random stands and pinned to the top of her head. She was wearing a long skirt with a white under layer that went to the floor and a champagne layer on top that went to where her knees might have been. More of the champagne fabric was wrapped tightly around her body. Two more chunks of this fabric were connected to the top of her bodice and draped over her shoulders. A gold cord was tied around her waist.

The softness of her round jaw contrasted sharply with the fire in her eyes as she approached. She was glaring straight at Emily.

"What the Hell do you think you are doing here?" she demanded.

Emily was unsure how to respond. As she tried to think of an answer, the woman turned to Marcus. Emily did too. In the well lit room, she saw that he had a red burn down the length of the same arm he had used to reach into the hearth.

"Have you lost your mind," the woman yelled. "You can't bring someone like her here."

"I had to," he said. "We need your help."

The woman stopped just a meter in front of them. She looked Emily from toe to head.

"Her kind does not need our help," she said with a sneer. "We learned that long ago."

From over the woman's shoulder, Emily heard a man speak.

"Whose kind?" he asked with none of the same anger in his voice as the woman.

Emily shifted to look around the woman. It was the dark haired man and he was now walking up to join them.

"I'm sure if Marcus brought her here, there is a good reason," he said as he walked.

When he had emerged at the woman's side, he looked at Emily.

"Then again," he said, "Maybe not."

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Brick 20

Emily was very quickly wishing she had not agreed to come.

Marcus jumped to her aid. "We don't need you freaking out. We need your help," he said as he stared unwaveringly at the woman.

Her cheeks flushed and she looked like she would have murdered him with her eyes alone if she could. "How dare you speak to me that way," she said.

Louis placed a hand on her arm. "Calm down, Isabella," he said. "We cannot undo what has already been done." He turned to Marcus. "You should have asked us about this first, Marcus. This is a very displeasing way for you to handle this."

"I had no choice," Marcus replied. He held out his right hand. "See for yourself," he added.

Louis grasped Marcus' hand as if he was simply going to shake it but he did not move it and did not let go. After several heartbeats, he finally released it.

"I see why you would be concerned," Louis said, "But jeopardizing the elders to save yourself is inexcusable."

Emily was confused. Had he been hurt even more than she had guessed? "What are they talking about?" she asked. "What's wrong with you? Is it the red ribbon?"

He did not speak but nodded firmly.

It was Louis who answered. "I very much dislike dealing with your kind," he began. "You annoy me to no end, but you tend to be more annoying when confused like this. That little key on you has spread a parasite of sorts to our friend here. He cannot heal so long as it is in him and there is no way to remove it. It will kill him."

Emily's heart skipped and thunked in her chest. She gripped Marcus' hand tightly. He was going to die because of her?

She wanted to ask so many questions at once. She wanted to know why it could not be removed, why it existed at all in the first place. She wanted to know what the hell all of this was. She wanted it all to be normal and make sense. She stammered gibberish for a moment then forced herself to take a breath.

"How can I stop this thing?" she asked.

Isabella scoffed. "You need to remove it first but Marcus will be lost to us no matter what," she said.

"That is why I brought her here," Marcus said. "This happened to me because I tried to remove it."

Isabella was unmoved. She looked down her nose at him. "And your stupidity is our fault?" she asked. "It is the Key Breakers responsibility to break keys, not yours."

Marcus would not back down. "And none of them had any ideas either!" he yelled. "I am not going to leave Emily to the mercy of this thing. She's a Key Breaker and you don't even care!"

Despite his yelling, the old man hunched over his table did not even twitch. Isabella still looked furious. Louis had simply raised an eyebrow. The silence that followed Marcus' outburst was punctuated by the sounds of the fires in the suspended bowls flicking and cracking.

When Isabella replied to Marcus, her voice was more steadily controlled than before. She said, "She may be many things, Marcus, but she is not a Key Breaker and that key on her is not one we will ever risk ourselves to remove."

"What am I then?" Emily asked, stepping forward. She was sick of being spoken about as if she were not there. She was sick of Isabella's superior nature. She was sick of not knowing and being treated like a thing and not a person. Despite her inner turmoil, she too kept her voice controlled and she did not shy away from looking directly into Isabella's eyes.

"You are not welcome here," Isabella replied. "Now leave."

It was Emily's turn to stand her ground. "No," she said. "Someone might die because of me. I am not leaving until you tell me what I want to know." She was determined to get what she wanted.

Isabella turned and began to walk back to the table with the figurines on it. "Then you can sit in the corner and wait for your death. It will come sooner," she said.

Louis rested his hand on Marcus' shoulder. "I am sorry, my friend," he said. "But we cannot yield in this matter. It was decided long ago."

He too turned to walk back to the table.

Emily and Marcus looked at each other.

Marcus gestured with his head to the door. "Let's go," he said. "There is no point in staying."

They worked their way silently back through the tunnels to the outside. It was still the middle of the night when they emerged. The teenagers had not returned. The forest was quiet except for the periodic rustling of leaves in a faint breeze.

When Marcus had sealed the door in the earth, he stood straight and stared at it for a moment. Emily was unsure what he was doing. She kept waiting for a sign that he would move.

Just when she thought she might say something, he gave a guttural yell and punched the door with his hand.

"I am so sick of those bastards!" he yelled. "For years I have done everything they have asked of me. I have never questioned. I have been exactly what they wanted me to be. After all of it, they cannot offer even the slightest help? Nothing? Just a scolding and then sent on my way?"

He kicked the door several times, nearly falling down the slope in the process. "After all of it they are just going to give up? They are going to let us die?"

He punched the door again but did not renew his ranting. He was breathing heavily.

She had no idea what to say. She knew nothing of their history. She knew nothing of the depth of his anger. She only knew that he was likely right about it all given what she had just witnessed.

"Marcus..." she said. "I'm so sorry." She was sorry for what he was enduring. She was sorry for her part in it. Everything in her meant those words. With trembling fingers she tried to rub his shoulder. She wanted to show him that she was still there. He was not alone.

He rested his forehead against the door. "No," he said quietly. "I am sorry. I wanted to help and I have just made things worse."

She had no idea what to say. She looked around awkwardly at the darkness around them. There were more sounds of cracking twigs in the distance.

"Maybe we should go," she suggested. Being confront by some kind of animal did not seem a good way to end an already stressful evening.

He straightened and shook his face to sober himself. "Yeah," he said. "There is no point in hanging around here. Besides, I want to find out how it went with Philip and Valerie." He reached out and took her hand but did not begin walking immediately. "I still want to help you figure this out, whether or not anything can be done for me," he said. "If you want my help, you have it."

She nodded. "Thank you."

They began to walk back through the forest, trying their best not to trip over the roots and brush. Emily was not used to walking on anything other than flat floors and pavement and found it particularly difficult to avoid stumbling.

"Marcus!"

They both stopped.

"Did someone just call you?" she asked.

He nodded.

"Marcus!" the voice came again. Emily could not tell if it was male or female.

They stayed where they were. Marcus seemed unafraid of the voice. A loud crunching if leaves and twigs came from where they had been walking. It got louder.

"Please, Marcus," the voice called. "I must speak with you."

The sounds increased in volume. Marcus pulled out his phone and turned on the screen. He directed it through the trees.

The yellow clad old man was climbing through the brush towards them.

"Isabella and Louis won't like you talking to me," Marcus said. "You should just go back, Victor."

The old man shrugged and waved his hands dismissively. "Let me... worry about... them," he said, gasping between every two words. "They always... treat me like... I'm senile. I will just... act the part... if they ask."

When he finally made it to them and stopped, he wheezed as he tried to get back his breath.

Marcus did not press him.

When Victor seemed ready to speak, he looked directly at Emily. "Young lady," he said, "I cannot tell you everything you want to know. There are certain rules I am forbidden to break. The other problem is that we do not know all the answers you will need. Louis and Isabella would never admit that they do not know everything. However, I think I know where you can find them."

He took in a deep gulping breath and continued. "The Arlington Apartments," he said. "When you have figured that out, you will know." He looked at Marcus. "And maybe you will also learn how to save my boy here," he said, giving Marcus a pat on the arm.

"Thank you, Victor," Marcus said quietly, reaching up to squeeze the man's hand in return.

Victor nodded several times. "I better get back," he said, "Or they'll come looking for me again, thinking I've gotten lost in the tunnels on my way for a pee."

Marcus nodded back. "Thank you again, Victor. I hope to see you again."

The old man turned and hobbled back through the trees.

Marcus turned back to Emily. "Let's hope Philip and Valerie have figured something out," he said.

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Brick 21

Chapter 8

Marcus drove them to where the Arlington Apartments had once stood. He parked the car down the block intending to get out and look for Philip and Valerie. Emily refused to go with him.

The last time she had been near the place, the black ribbon had attacked her. Regardless of her experiences since, she worried it would happen again. She worried it would be even worse after what the red ribbon had done to it.

Though she said none of this to Marcus, he did not press her to join him. Perhaps he was still too upset that his efforts to help her were going to kill him. She would not even have blamed him if he hated her for it. Strangely, despite it all, he had defended her before the elders. That, she did not understand.

It was very late when Marcus shut his door and began to walk down the road. The bars they had passed to get there were packed and loud with university students on summer vacation. The music had lunged from the doorways in brightly coloured bursts. Soon, even those bars would start closing up.

She looked around at the dimly lit streets. She could see no one. They were too far from the main thoroughfare. She reached over to Marcus' door and hit the lock button. All the doors locked with a muffled thunk.

Looking down the road again, she could no longer see Marcus. She turned her head as she tried to find any sign of him.

There was no imminent threat. There was still no one in sight but the darkness and being alone was enough. Her heart began to pound.

The side of her neck tingled and became warm. She focused upon the red mass on her shoulder. It nuzzled her and purred.

Far from being comforted, she wanted to run away from it. She wanted the ability to push it out of her space. Either it did not know how she felt or was unconcerned. It continued to nuzzle and purr.

"Leave me alone," she yelled at it. Her cheeks flushed at the idea of what some random passer-by would think of her talking to herself.

The mass continued its attention.

"Please," she whispered. "I just want you to leave me alone. Stop hurting everyone."

The mass went still and silent. It did not leave.

"Why do you keep doing that?" she asked it. "What is so wrong with Marcus? Why did you have to do that to him?"

It was now ignoring her, giving her its own form of the silent treatment.

"I don't want anyone to get hurt," she pleaded.

The mass perked up and pushed at her. This was not the same affectionate nuzzling from before. It felt more like it was poking at her to her attention.

She looked at it but it continued to push at her. She looked around and saw Marcus was walking back to the car. She reached over and unlocked the doors.

The red mass poked at her faster and more forcefully. It was excited.

"Leave him alone," she said.

The mass was undeterred.

Marcus got in the car and locked his door. He put his fist in front of her and opened it. On his palm rested a violin bridge. "Any ideas?" he asked.

The mass was nearly hysterical in its movements. She feared it was going to explode and she had no idea what would happen if it did.

She reached out with her fingers and took small object from him. The red mass lunged down her arm and encased the bridge. It calmed immediately and did not move.

She did not understand what it was doing. She focused upon the bridge itself, hoping that would explain why the red mass seemed so enthralled with it.

It was unremarkable as far as she could tell. A maker's mark said "Tylluan, 1918." She had never heard of such a maker but the name seemed familiar.

"Where did you get this?" she asked.

Marcus was watching her. She could feel his eyes focused on her face.

"I found it in the rubble," he said. "How would such a delicate piece of wood survive a fire and a demolition?"

She shook her head. "I don't know."

He was still watching her. "And why did that red ribbon latch onto it just now?" he asked.

She had forgotten how much he could see too. She looked at the mass and then at him.

"I don't know."

He sighed. "Neither do I," he said as pushed his head firmly against the head rest. "Philip and Valerie have left already. I will have to track them down tomorrow."

He rubbed his eyes and then rested his forehead in his palm. His eyes were closed.

"Are you going to be alright?" she asked.

He nodded. "Just a little tired," he said.

She was not sure she believed him.

When she got home, she set her violin case down in the usual spot at the end of her bed and collapsed on top of the blankets, still clutching the violin bridge. She stared at it as it poked out from beneath her fingers. It remained encased in the red.

As her mind twisted around what it might mean but exhaustion finally caught up with her.

Late the next morning, she was awoken by her cell phone ringing in her pocket.

It was one of the parents wondering if her daughter's lesson would still be happening that day. Normal life had returned to claim her.

She assured the woman that she was feeling much better and would be able to teach. She also made a mental note to thank Liam for making sure her students were all contacted when she had her episode. She said good-bye and hung up.

She felt like she had been drinking again. She was even beginning to wonder if she had become an alcoholic and all the crazy events were an alcohol induced hallucination. She did not remember drinking but something had to explain how she felt.

She stumbled to the bathroom in search of pain killers. When she turned on the light, she jumped. She looked down at her body and back up at the mirror.

The red mass was now encasing her entire left side.

She looked down at her hand and remembered the bridge. She ran back to the bed and pushed folds and mounds of fabric aside trying to find where it had fallen. She ripped off the covers and shook them over the floor. When nothing fell, she ripped off the fitted sheet and did the same. She tossed the blankets on the bed and dropped to her knees to look under the bed.

She checked every inch of her apartment. She even looked in the freezer. The bridge was gone.

She stared at the bed in disbelief. The red was purring and calm.

A knock at the door made her jump.

When she looked through the peep hole, she saw Liam standing on the other side. He was wearing a black button up shirt and black dress pants; an outfit entirely inappropriate for the hot weather.

She opened the door.

"A bit early for you to be visiting me, isn't it?" she asked.

He snorted as he walked inside. "Not everyone sleeps until noon," he replied. "Besides, I'm playing in a quartet at some corporate function today, and I wanted to make sure you are still feeling alright."

"Yup," she said, forcing herself to sound more energetic than she felt. "Not sure what that was the other day but I'm fine now."

He raised an eyebrow but changed the subject. "I was also wondering if you would come to my place for dinner tonight," he said. "I want to hear all about your adventures with Marcus."

It was her turn to raise an eyebrow.

"Alright, fine," he said, "I miss you, ok? We haven't done anything social together in weeks." He put his hands up defensively and added, "And it has nothing with trying to get you to fall in love with me. Purely friends. I promise."

As she considered his request, she realized he was right. Their lives had been crazy. Maybe dinner with him would help her feel better, less insane.

"Bistro Praha at 9:30," she said. "You're buying me schnitzel."

He smiled broadly. "I'll pick you up at your studio," he said and turned back towards the door.

She opened it. When he walked through and said good-bye, she stopped him. "Liam," she said. "I've got question for you."

"Sure thing," he said slowly. "What is it?"

"Have you ever heard of a violin maker named Tylluan?" she asked.

He looked at her and said nothing for a moment. "Looking into a new instrument?" he asked, with the dimple between his eyebrows.

She shook her head. "Nothing like that," she said. "I've just never heard of him before. Have you?"

"Sorry," he said. "Can't help you with that one. If he didn't also make cellos, I wouldn't know of him."

She stared at the button in the middle of his shirt, trying to figure out why the name still felt familiar.

"Anything else I can help you with?" he asked.

Looking up at him, she realized she had kept him standing in the hall. "Sorry," she said. "I'll see you tonight."

"See you tonight."

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Brick 22

Emily spent the rest of her morning phoning parents to confirm lesson times. She stared at her rumpled bed the entire time.

As she forced herself to focus on her conversations, the red mass at her shoulder was singing in its usual purr. Now that she had a chance to focus on it, she noticed it was different than the previous night. It was larger and she even thought it looked more defined. She had thought of it like a small animal from near the beginning. Its behaviour resembled as much. Despite that impression, it had still been malformed. Now, she could make out a body, head, and legs, even if they were not clear enough for her to identify the animal.

There was no explaining any of it at that moment. The bridge was gone with no evidence she had ever had it. She knew Marcus had given it to her but she was sure the red had ingested it.

She wanted to call Marcus but exhaustion hung over her, making her feel too tired to make the effort. She could not turn her back on her livelihood to chase mysteries. If she called him, he would no doubt whisk her off on another search. She thought of his new condition after trying to help her. The last thing she wanted was to make it worse. Besides, she had promised Liam she would meet him for dinner and she couldn't bring herself to break that promise.

Once she hung up from talking to the last parent, she slung her violin case over her shoulder and walked to the bus stop.

The day was even hotter than she had expected. The air refused to move. It hung heavily around her body, feeling sticky against her face. She took off her cardigan and tied it around her waist. The sun roasted her as she waited at the stop.

The bus was taking too long. She and several others checked the time on their phones more than once.

Teenagers and university students walked by as she waited. Most were in pairs and groups, chatting benignly to each other. The revving of engines and squeaking of breaks randomly filled the air. Every now and then, a car would go by with open windows and faint rainbows of music would eke out.

There was a new sound: rapid foot falls on the pavement. As their succession increased speed, they sounded closer.

Just as Emily decided to turn to see what was going on, she felt a great wrench of her arm as her violin case was ripped from her shoulder. The man in his early twenties and wearing a ragged cap and a white tank top was nearly a quarter of a block away before she registered what he had done. Before she had time to react, the mass at her shoulder lunged. It ran like a cheetah after the man. Within seconds it had caught up and attacked.

He fell to the ground, his face hitting the pavement hard. Emily cringed as her violin case hit the pavement with equal force. The mass was still on top of him.

Emily ran towards him even as the heads of the crowd turned to see what was going on.

She bent down and pulled her case away from him. His hand fell limply from the strap and onto the pavement.

Emily froze. The red was sitting on his back, looking up at her. Its form was clearer than ever. It had the body of a cheetah, the head of a hyena, and the horns of a gazelle. It looked at her like a cat proud of a mouse it had caught.

"What did you do?" She whispered. She lacked the strength for anything more.

People began to gather. Some were asking what had happened.

The creature hopped of the man's body and rubbed its face against her leg. It l sat on the pavement next to her, keeping contact with her. Emily wanted to escape. She had no courage to bend down and check the man.

Within a moment, there was no need. A young man knelt down and rolled him onto his back. His eyes stared vacantly at the sky. There were several gasps from the crowd. Someone called 911. Someone else asked her what had happened. She did not know who. She was still looking at the body on the pavement in front of her.

Time passed strangely. It seemed to have stopped but the people around her were continuing to move. An ambulance arrived; a police car not long after.

Several people, including Emily, were again asked what had happened. She had managed to mumble about him trying to steal her violin. She said nothing about what she had really seen. No one seemed to have seen the animal that attacked him. They had simply seen him fall.

The police wrote down her information and said she could go. In a daze, she walked back to the bus stop. She did not remember it arriving or getting on it, but a moment later she was watching the shops pass by as it drove down the road.

She walked down the hall to her studio, the animal trotting at her side. She went inside and closed the door slowly. It barely even clicked as she shut it. Mechanically, she put her case on the piano and sat down on the bench.

The animal was sitting in the middle of the room, looking at her.

"What are you?" she asked.

It cocked its head to the side.

"Why did you do that? How did you do that?" Her voice was getting louder. She was trying to keep it quiet but her hysteria could not be completely contained.

It cocked its head to the other side.

If she could have, she would have run screaming at it. She was so confused and so frustrated, she felt she needed some form of release, but she also knew there was no point.

Defeated, she stood and turned back to her violin case, determined to see how much damage she would have to pay to repair this time.

She unzipped the case and flipped open the lid. She blinked. She blinked again. It was entirely intact but it did not look the same as the last time she had seen it. On the bridge was written "Tylluan 1918."

Chapter 9

It had been more difficult to get through her lessons that day. The events of the bus stop and her discovery of the bridge on her own violin had been difficult enough but with the discovery also came fear. The instrument she loved most dearly, the one that she had had for over ten years, the one that had given her so much joy, now scared her.

When her first student arrived, she had zipped her case shut and claimed there was still a problem with it. Not being able to demonstrate on an adult instrument proved an additional irritation for her day. Finally, she got through all the lessons, said good-bye to her final student for the day, and collapsed on the piano bench.

The animal had stayed sitting next to the piano the entire day. She looked over at it and it cocked its head to one side as it looked back at her.

"After what happened today, I should call you 'Killer'," she said. The animal did not move.

She shook her head. That didn't seem right, but she did feel like she needed a name for the creature. Whether she wanted it there or not, she seemed to be stuck with it. She thought of the bridge and how its presence had changed the creature.

"Shall I call you Tylluan?" she asked.

When she had suggested it, she had expected the animal to show some positive recognition, to wag its tail like a dog or some other such thing. Instead, it narrowed its eyes as if in disapproval.

"Then what shall I call you?" she asked.

The animal stepped closer and rested its head on her lap. It looked up at her.

Despite what it had done to the black ribbon, to Marcus, and even to the man earlier that day, it looked as goofy and as non-threatening as she had ever seen an animal look. She reached out and tried to touch its ear with her fingers. She was surprised when her flesh met resistance. She rested her hand on its head and scratched it as they looked at each other.

"I know," she said. "I'll call you P.D."

It began to purr.

"You like that, do you?"

It nuzzled her.

"I wish I knew what the hell you are," she said, "And how to keep you on a tighter leash."

There was a knock at the door. P.D. jumped up and panted happily. Given the animal's moods with people, she wondered how to take this response.

"Come in," she called warily, hoping P.D. didn't decide to attack whoever was visiting her.

Liam walked in and smiled. "Ready to go?" he asked.

She nodded and got up to go with him. His eyebrow crease deepened.

"You aren't bringing your violin?" he asked.

She turned and looked at the case then down at P.D.

"Not this time," she said. "I'll come back and pick it up after."

P.D.'s eyes narrowed again.

"I need a break tonight," she added as she turned back to Liam and smiled. "Let's get going."

P.D. stayed by her side the entire walk to Bistro Praha. Liam could not see the animal so Emily felt no need to mention the matter. She even found herself caring less about talking to Marcus about it.

The bistro was as busy as ever. It was a staple of the arts community, especially those in music.

They were seated quickly at a small square table next to the front window. Emily opened her menu even though she knew what she was going to order. She noticed as P.D. curled up on the floor next to her feet. She had never had a pet before and wondered if this was a similar experience.

As Liam scanned the menu, he said, "Did you hear about that crazy failed mugging today?"

She had a feeling she knew the one but asked what happened anyway.

"They say a guy tried to steal a purse and dropped dead of a heart attack as he tried to run away," he explained.

"It was a violin case," she corrected.

He looked up from his menu. "Excuse me?" he asked.

"It was a violin case," she said again. "Specifically, it was my violin case."

He dropped his menu. "Why didn't you tell me? Are you alright?"

She nodded. "It was all a little strange though," she said, thinking to herself how strange it really had been.

"No kidding," he replied. "The guy was only 20 years old. Though the cops apparently said they've known him for years. There was even an active warrant for his arrest for a probation violation."

Emily looked down at P.D., then back up at Liam. "What kind of violation?" she asked.

He stared at the candle in the middle of the table as he tried to remember. After a moment, he said, "I think they said he raped some girl. He was a real violent type. It's a good thing you're alright."

Emily looked back down at P.D. who was now purring.

"Is something wrong with the table?" Liam asked.

She shook her head. "Sorry," she said, "I just thought there was something on my shoe."

Liam shrugged and turned back to his menu. "I'm thinking of trying the Steak Tartar tonight."

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Brick 23

Emily had trouble enjoying her schnitzel. She forked at it and watched the changes in the light glistening off the fried crust.

P.D. was still at her feet like a loyal hunting dog. Despite the assertion that he had caused her headaches, despite her having seen him attack the black ribbon, despite his vague involvement in hurting Marcus, she just could not be sure that he was the problem.

Her mind churned over the failed mugging. She thought of her violin and the bridge that had magically appeared on it as if it had always been there.

"I'm not going to bother buying you dinner if you're not going to eat," Liam teased before biting down on the toasted bread he had just finished piling with meat.

She looked up at him. Her vision was clearing as if she had just woken up.

"Sorry," she said. "I suddenly don't feel very well."

The crease between his eyebrows appeared. "More headaches?" he asked.

She shook her head. "Nothing like that."

Marcus set down the toast so that he could focus on her. "I am really not trying to start a fight," he said, "But I am getting worried about you. Ever since you met this Marcus guy, you've been acting very strange. It's obvious he and his friends believe in some pretty strange things. Are you sure being around them is the best thing for you?"

She blinked. Even the night before, she would have leapt on him for the accusation. Marcus had been trying to help her. The elders had shown they cared little for his life. Whatever was going on, he seemed as much a victim as she.

She looked down at P.D. and thought of the mugger and what Liam had said about the man's past.

"I don't know," she whispered.

"Maybe if you are that unsure about them, you should wait a few days before seeing them again," he suggested.

She thought of Marcus' condition. She had no way of knowing how much time he had. She doubted it would be long enough for her to take her time with anything. She did not want to be responsible for his death but she also wanted to know why P.D. felt the man worthy of such a fate.

She looked back up at Liam. Her eyes felt wet but she refused to cry.

"Marcus is dying," she said. She felt the need to cough expand in her chest. She knew it would break her ability to hold back her emotions if she released it.

"He's dying because of me," she croaked around the irritation.

Liam sat back in his chair and linked his hands over his stomach. "What happened?" he asked.

"I don't even know," she said. "He was trying to help me. It didn't work. We went to some people he knows; people that should know how to help. They didn't care. He's on his own and it's my fault."

A tear escaped and ran down her cheek. She wiped it away with the back of her hand.

P.D. stretched, pushing his back against her leg. She could have sworn he was made of flesh with the force that pressed against her.

Liam stood up and walked to the nearest server. After saying a few words, he sat back down. A moment later, the woman walked to the table and took their food away.

"It might be better if we have dinner a little later," he said.

The server returned with a bag and the bill. Emily kept fighting her emotions, trying to force them back into her gut. Liam paid quickly but it felt like an hour.

Finally, they were back in the open air and walking to the college to retrieve her violin.

"It can't be easy knowing you're going to die," Liam said as they walked. "I know I wouldn't handle it well."

P.D. was trotting at Emily's side, unconcerned with the events.

"I feel horrible for him," she replied. "I wish I could help him, but I have no idea what to do. I don't even really know what's killing him."

He put his arm around her shoulders and rubbed her arm with his thumb.

"Do you want to tell me what happened?" he asked. "Maybe I can figure it out."

"You will think I'm crazy," she said.

He laughed. "How would that be any different than normal?"

She elbowed him in the ribs.

"Why don't we play together when we get back?" he suggested. "It might help you feel better."

She thought of the violin and the strange bridge. "I'm not sure it would," she said.

"Of course it would! Trust me."

They did not talk the rest of the way back to the college. Emily's mind needed the quiet. As they turned the last corner before her studio, she saw Marcus sitting on the floor with his back against the wall. His face was tilted upward but his eyes were closed.

Liam stopped. She separated herself from him and went to Marcus, kneeling down beside him.

"Marcus?" she said quietly.

He took in a deep breath and opened his eyes. When he saw her, he smiled. "Sorry," he said.

"Are you alright?" she asked as she looked him over.

There appeared to be nothing different about him from the night before except his clothes. He was now wearing a red t-shirt and black jeans. He nodded as he tried to get up. "Just tired," he said as he gave up moving and rested against the wall again.

"I've come to tell you what I found out," he added.

She looked nervously back at Liam and was surprised to see that he was standing right next to her. She was not sure what Marcus might say and even less sure of what Liam would think of it. Surprisingly, Liam's face showed none of the usual contempt he held for the man now at his feet.

"You don't look like you have the energy to share much of anything, buddy," Liam said. "Let's take you to my studio. I've got a couch in there. You can rest while Emily and I practice for a little while. Maybe you'll be strong enough to share then."

Marcus stared at Liam but his face gave no indication of what he was thinking. After a moment, he nodded slowly.

"I can help him, Emily," Liam said. "You get your violin and catch up."

She was not in the mood to play with Marcus in such a serious condition but Liam seemed determined. Astonishingly, any of his pettiness seemed to have evaporated. She nodded and walked into her studio as Liam helped Marcus off the floor.

She walked to the piano and stared at the violin case. She unzipped it and pushed open the lid.

"Tylluan 1918" was still on the bridge.

She hesitated.

She lifted her fingers and ran them along the strings. They felt no different. She wrapped her hand around the neck and pulled it from the case to look at it. Movement to her left her caught her eye.

She looked down to see P.D. making small hops and turning in circles.

She looked back at the violin. With one finger, she plucked the A-string.

P.D. dropped the front of his body and stretched out his front paws. His cat-like tail twitched repeatedly. His mouth opened and he panted.

She thought of what had happened when she had taken the bridge from Marcus. She thought of the events of that morning. She looked back at the violin and at P.D.

With no more hesitation, she reached into her case and removed her bow. Within seconds she had tightened the hairs and had her instrument cradled under her chin.

Dance of the Goblins seemed fitting giving P.D.'s behaviour. She played the rapid notes and watched as the colourful ribbons burst forth. A particularly thick and red ribbon undulated its way towards P.D. who had begun to hop and skip and turn with the music. It was like animal play turned into dance.

The more she played, the happier P.D. became and the more she began to notice P.D. change. He looked a few inches taller, then more opaque. His paws nearly doubled in size and his snout became more refined . It was now less like a hyena and more like an arctic wolf. Then his back began to change. His shoulder blades became more pronounced. She reached the end of the piece before anything more could happen.

P.D. looked disappointed.

"What was that?" she asked.

P.D. tilted his head to one side.

"Are you..."

She felt stupid at the thought but as she stared at the strange and goofy animal before her, she figured there were plenty of other things to feel stupid about.

"Are you the violin?" she asked.

P.D. panted.

"I hope one of these times, you gain the ability to speak," she said as she turned to put the instrument into its case. "So far, you've been quite unhelpful in the answers department."

A few minutes later, she was knocking on the door to Liam's studio.

He opened it wide to allow her to enter. "I was beginning to wonder about you," he said.

"Just making sure my violin was ok," she said. "It got knocked around in the mugging today."

She walked into his large studio, P.D. trotting behind her.

Liam's studio was triple the size of hers. It had never been intended to be a storage closet.

It was a corner studio with windows that overlooked the river valley. There was little to see now that it was dark but during the day, the view was an expanse of trees dotted with far off buildings. Covering almost the entire floor was an imitation Persian rug. There was a black grand piano in one corner, several antique cupboards he used to store his music along one wall, several music stands, a chair he used for playing, Liam's cello on a stand next to the chair, and a long leather couch he would use for napping.

Marcus was lying on the couch. His eyes were closed and he had one arm draped across his forehead.

"Is he alright?" she asked.

Liam nodded. "Claims he is just resting," he replied. "Shall we get started?"

"Are you sure we should be doing this now?" she asked, thinking it might be better to let Marcus sleep.

He laughed. "You of all people should know that music soothes the soul," he said.

"Not some of the modern music I've heard," she replied as she set her case down on the floor next to the wall.

"Then we will play something a little different," he said.

He walked over to one of the cupboards and opened it. He reached up to the top shelf and pulled out a stack of ragged and brown sheet music.

By the time she had her violin ready to go again, he had pulled out a sheet and was holding it out for her. When she took it, she realized that it had not been printed. It had been drawn by hand in black ink.

"I didn't know you wrote music," she said.

He shrugged. "It's not mine," he said. "A friend gave it to me years ago."

She pulled one of his music stands into the middle of the room and placed the sheet on it. Before lifting her violin, she scanned the sheet to see where the tempo and key changed. It began Largamente, sped up to Adagio, then slowed to Largo for the last line. The key changed so many times, she was not sure she could keep track even with the slow tempo. There were also several chords that she knew would be an uncomfortable stretch.

"Can I have a few minutes to practice this before we try it together?" she asked.

"You'll get it," Liam replied as he situated his cello between his knees. "It looks worse than it is. Just start and I will follow."

She lifted her violin and did as instructed.

The first note stretched from her violin. It was dark blue and wide. The three notes that followed were deep hues of purples and greens. Liam's throaty cello added several deep violet chords with sporadic yellows intermixed.

After what she had witnessed in her studio, Emily had planned to watch P.D.'s reaction to the duet but she found herself unable to focus on much more than the music.

Her body felt as though it was being carried on the sounds of their instruments. It was comforting and warm. It felt like memories she had wanted to have forever but that had be replaced by the mundane until that moment. As the tempo increased, she felt as though she were flying through rainbows.

Her problems were gone. There was only the music dancing around her.

Her feet settled back down upon the earth as the last note faded. She lowered her violin and looked at Liam. She had intended to ask what friend had composed something so beautiful but he was looking at Marcus.

She followed his gaze to see P.D. nuzzling Marcus' hand. The large man was just as he had been when she entered the room. His eyes were still closed and he was still.

P.D. reached out his tongue and licked Marcus' fingers. Marcus twitched. He took in a deep breath. A moment later, he lowered his arm and opened his eyes.

"What happened?" he asked. His voice sounded stronger than it had in the hallway.

P.D. stepped back but continued to watch him.

Marcus sat up and looked down at himself. He looked at his arms and turned his palms over to stare at them. Within a moment, his hands were bathed in green. He clenched and relaxed his fist. The green extended out from his hands. He looked up at Emily.

The green reached out to her just as she had seen it do before. It touched her arm an she felt a shudder go through her body.

Marcus smiled.

"You're alright?" she asked.

He nodded and looked at Liam.

"How did you do it?" he asked. "How did you get rid of it? You saved me."

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Brick 24

Liam looked directly at Emily. She could not figure out why he was staring at her and ignoring Marcus' question. He seemed unwilling to look away. The intensity made her want to squirm. Even though she knew him well, it felt too intrusive.

After another moment, he finally looked away from her and stared at the side of his piano. The crease between his eyebrows deepened. The air conditioning turned on and a new whoosh and hum was added the to the room as she waited for his reply.

"It was the music that healed you," he said.

Marcus stood up.

P.D. was trying to nuzzle at his hand as the man moved. He looked like a dog hoping for a hidden treat in his master's hand. If Marcus could see the animal, he did not acknowledge it.

"Music alone can't do that," Marcus replied. "Tell me how you did it."

Liam looked back at Emily before setting his cello on its stand. "You're right," he said. "Music alone can't do that. This music is unique but even it has its limits."

He lifted his hand and stretched a single finger in the direction of P.D. The animal was still trying to find some prize that did not exist in Marcus' palm. "But he couldn't have done it either without the music," Liam said.

Marcus and Emily both looked down at P.D. The animal was oblivious to the attention. Emily turned her eyes to Marcus. He appeared to be squinting. Perhaps he was having more trouble than usual seeing her key.

"What is it?" Marcus said. He did not pull away or sound afraid. He remained completely still as he watched P.D. poke at his hand with his nose.

"Ask Emily," Liam replied. "I cannot tell you."

Emily looked back at Liam. She had no idea he could see P.D. and now he seemed to think she had any answers at all? Her face felt hot at the thought of all the possibilities he had kept from her. She wanted to hit him. Marcus was now looking at her too.

The breeze from the air conditioner brushed across her skin. Whether from the chill or how infuriated she was with both men, she shuddered. Her violin slipped an inch from her arms, enough to give her an unwanted jolt of adrenaline on top of her existing problems.

She walked to where she had left her case and carefully set the instrument inside.

"What is this thing, Emily?" Marcus asked again.

"How the hell should I know?" she said, jumping to her feet and turning on him. She clenched her hands tightly enough to feel like she was powerful in something no matter how small. "You're part of The Key Breakers," she continued.

"You know more than I do. Up until I met Mary, I didn't know anything was weird about me. Now there are keys and possessed violins. I don't know what to think anymore!"

P.D. stopped nuzzling Marcus' hand and looked up at her with his head tilted to one side.

"Don't you start too," she said back to him.

She paced the room. Why did anyone expect her to have answers about anything? She looked at Liam just as she swung around to go the other way.

"You have been lying to me," she shouted at him. "Playing ignorant and jealous and you never once gave any indication you knew about this. You even made it sound like you thought it was all crazy!"

She stopped abruptly and crossed her arms in front of her chest. "Was Mary right?" she asked. "Are you involved somehow?"

He ran his fingers through his hair and stood. While he was not averting her scrutiny directly, he was looking more at his feet than at her.

"I was really hoping not to get into this," he said. "I've kept my promise for over ten years. I can't just break it. I can't do that to you." As he spoke, his voice got louder and faster. He continued, "I didn't want all this to happen but I couldn't stay silent and let Marcus die. Those bastards would have let me die just as easily. They are nothing but selfish children. They are the ones that deserve to die!"

"Who the hell are you talking about?" Emily demanded.

He pulled up a little straighter. "The elders," he said. "They would never have helped Marcus."

As she realized just how much Liam likely knew and had kept from her all those years, her heart picked up speed once more. She was a fool.

"How could you keep this from me?" she said, her volume getting away from her. "You are supposed to be my friend!"

"I am your friend!" he yelled back as he looked into her eyes unwaveringly. "I'm the only real friend you have left."

She scoffed in reflex but as his words sunk in, her heart constricted. She looked at his cello. "If you were, then I have no friends anymore," she seethed.

She felt pressure against the outside of her thigh. She looked down to see P.D. rubbing his face against it. His eyes were still on her. He was worried. Without hesitation, she reached down and scratched his head.

"It's alright, P.D.," she said. "I'm not mad at you."

"Petey?" Marcus asked.

"Not Petey. P. D. It's short for P.D.Q. Bach," she replied. "He really is just as goofy once you get to know him."

"Him?" Marcus seemed no longer capable of stringing together entire sentences.

She looked up and felt pity. His face held as much confusion as she felt. She would set an example for Liam and share what she knew even if it was very little. She told him what had happened with the bridge. She told him about the mugger and P.D.'s response. She told him about the animal's behaviour the entire day.

As she recalled it all, she realized how much affection she felt for her new companion. She knew little about anything in the situation except that P.D. seemed to want to protect her from everyone and everything.

"P.D. is the key that was on you?" Marcus asked, pulling back slightly as he appraised the animal. "P.D. is the same key that nearly killed me?"

Emily wanted to jump to P.D.'s defense but Liam spoke first.

"P.D. also saved your life," he said with a raised voice. "It's not his fault you tried to mess with things you don't understand."

Marcus puffed out his chest and opened his mouth to speak but something Liam had said earlier came back to her.

"P.D. used the music?" she asked.

Liam looked away from Marcus to her. He nodded. "It had to be the right music," he explained. "It gave him strength enough to remove what he had placed upon Marcus. He was a barely formed baby when Marcus tried to kill him. He was only defending himself. Now that the music has made him strong again, he could remove the same energy that would otherwise have been fatal. Only that music would work."

He had said it had been given to him long ago. She looked over to the sheet still on the music stand. Her stomach flipped. She knew the answer but asked anyway.

"Who wrote it?"

He swallowed. "You did."

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