Sohna and Vivian - My Brother's Keeper

She lay motionless on a bed, white sheets draped over her, matching the whitewash of the walls, making her pale complexion look even paler by comparison, her breathing shallow. No IVs protruded from her arms, no feeding tube or catheter was necessary in this abode of magic. Yet while his ears took in the sound of seagulls and of waves crashing on the jagged rocks beneath the open window and his eyes had long since examined every minute detail of the rough-walled, pie-shaped wedge of room high in a pinnacle of tower, none of it hid the fact that he sat in a hospital at the bedside of a woman in a coma.

But even that was not strictly true, he thought sadly. Samantha - the part of her that made her unique - was not present at all. The face that lay in repose upon the pillow, cheeks flaccid and sallow, limp dishwater blonde hair sprinkled with strands of gray, was almost the face of a stranger. Until he had seen her like this, he had never realized exactly how much of herself she projected into her appearance. If asked before she had gone to fight the witch in the Deadly Swamp, he would have described her as striking and vibrant. Here, as nothing but an empty shell, she was merely plain. And although he didn’t want to, he couldn’t help but compare her to Christine, who had been beautiful even in death. Not that that was a desirable thing to be, he reasoned. Some obscure quote he’d heard his old man say popped unexpectedly into his mind: “Live fast, die young, leave a good-looking corpse.” What was the purpose in that anyway?

Guiltily, he realized he’d been comparing Samantha to the dead and mentally berated himself. But he wondered, sadly, if she wouldn’t be better off that way. It had been nearly two months now. From what he recalled - which admittedly wasn’t much - he didn’t think there was a whole lot of hope that she’d somehow wake up - at least not as the person he had too briefly known.

He coughed and looked away - down at the pile of books they - the other wizards - had brought for him to read, and selected one at random. The Enchantment of Eglantine, he read. That was a new one, he thought. Good. He’d been getting tired of re-reading the things Grimm had written down for his world; even the newness of discovering the differences between the versions had worn off. He sat back, opened the book and began to read it aloud, for no other reason than he’d once read somewhere that it was good for a person in a coma to be talked to.

Darkness lay thickly around her. She sat up on the dry, bare earth of the floor, squinting, trying to focus, but it was like peering into the heart of a cave. Momentary panic seized her, but she fought it down, forcing herself to analyze the facts she had at hand.

What was the last thing she remembered? she asked herself. Wendell’s castle? No. She’d been going somewhere, somewhere with a group of women. Where?

As if in answer, a humid, mildewy odor wafted through the cave (for lack of a better thing to call her location) past her nose and triggered a memory. The swamp, she thought? Perhaps, but ...

She was suddenly aware of another presence beside her; mock-exasperation seemed to emanate from a place just off to her left. As she sensed it, wry amusement took its place.

Have you forgotten your teachings? she seemed to hear. Common sight won’t work on this plane.

Plane? she echoed, confused. What plane am I on and how did I get here?

But the voice did not answer. She could tell it was waiting.

All right; my teachings, she acknowledged. I’m not on the material plane; that’s all that’s necessary for me to know. Concentrating, which was surprisingly easy here where she could see nothing anyway (make a mental note to take students into a cave for instruction), she focused her inner eye - and abruptly took a step backwards as her surroundings snapped to life.

Focus a little harder, came the continuing advice. Taking it was another matter entirely. Its source towered high over her, dead black head lost in the cavernous darkness of the cavern ceiling except for the twin amber orbs of its eyes, whirling in hypnotic cadence. Her companion was a dragon.

She blinked in awe at its sheer immensity, then again as it seemed to disappear before her eyes. Am I just not focusing hard enough? she wondered, although the glistening stone of the cavern walls remained faintly visible in the distance.

“It also helps if you know what you’re looking for,” the same voice informed her, this time not inside her head. It sounded vaguely amused. Samantha’s eyes dropped to its source. Less than ten feet in front of her a black-clad man sat on a pile of jumbled boulders, regarding her with eyes of such a pale hazel they appeared to be amber. She gasped and stared. “Do you know what you’re looking for?” he asked pointedly.

Her mind flew immediately to the obvious, A way out of here, off this plane, but she knew inherently that wasn’t what he’d meant. He smiled, his eyes sparkling as they crinkled at the corners and she realized he could still read her thoughts.

“You’re one of the Guardians,” she blurted.

His dark eyebrows flew up, losing themselves amidst the mop of unruly black hair as he looked around the empty cavern speculatively. “The term ‘Guardian’ implies something which needs guarding,” he commented.

A test, she thought. I should have known. Of course he would speak only in riddles.

He leaned back his head and laughed, a clear, joyous sound. “Oh, dear, I hope not,” he declared, still smiling, showing even, white, very un-dragon-like teeth. “I’m terrible at riddles. I always have been.”

Something in his statement struck her as wrong. But she knew she was on the wrong track as soon as she’d said, “But you have to be good at riddles. You’re a dr ...”

He’d only stared kindly at her. “Guardian?” he asked, and then she knew.

“‘Always,’” she said. “You said ‘always.’ But how could you have ‘always’ been or done anything? The word itself implies a passage of time and for you there isn’t any.”

“There isn’t?”

Confused, she shook her head, then said, “I’d always assumed that was how it would be for a Guardian of Time - that you’d have to be outside of time in order to guard it properly.”

He leaned his head forward somewhat conspiratorially. “Tell me,” he said, “Why would time need to be guarded? Is it likely to be stolen?”

Taken aback, she retorted, “You are telling riddles after all.”

He shook his head in dismissal, his eyes dancing. “No, I absolutely am not. I’m not saying anything like ‘it’s a slipper on a foot that walks through grass on the moon,’ am I?”

She blinked, turning the statement over in her mind. “No,” she murmured as the rest of her brain desperately tried to piece together the solution.

“There is no solution to that,” he told her, mildly exasperated. “And I just made the thing up, and I doubt there’s some accidental answer to it either. I told you I was terrible at it.”

“Well then, why all the mystery about it?” she demanded. “Why not just come out and say what you mean?”

“Because it doesn’t work that way,” he said. “It’s not about me or what I think. It’s you. What do you want? What are you looking for? And this time don’t limit yourself to such an unimaginative perspective. I’d think being a necromancer would make it easy.”

Easy? she thought. How would being a necromancer help? Unless ... “Perspective,” she murmured, hearing once again in her memory the voice of her teacher as he expostulated on the nature of magic, death and the dead: “It’s merely another frame of reference; a difference in perspective.”

She looked up. “You’re dead, aren’t you?”

He smiled. “From which point of view?”

“Mine.”

“Then yes, I suppose I am.”

A chill ran through her. All the dragons ... gone. Was that how ... the Guardians ...

She didn’t notice him approaching her, but he was suddenly holding her in his arms like a child, wiping away her tears.

“No,” he said. “There’s nothing to be sad about. Not really. Not ever. The trick in the search is just to be looking for the right thing. Don’t wait like I did, to be happy here. You can reach it now, see?”

In front of her the floor seemed to fall away, but safely tucked within his arms she felt no fear at its sudden disappearance. As she watched, the space far below resolved itself into the black-and-white tiles of King Wendell’s ballroom, lit by candlelight. Slowly, five figures appeared in a circle. Each wore a crown and Samantha could see they were all women: A black-haired woman in a white dress with a black corset, three blondes, one in a red cloak, one in braids and a dirndl skirt, and the last with hair so long and thick it obscured her costume. The fifth was a redhead in a long blue-green dress. Each raised her right hand and she saw they all wore rings. They pointed at the tile on the center of the floor between them and lines of visible power shot forth, momentarily blinding her. When she looked again, a window had opened where the tile had once been, revealing a land of verdant beauty overlooked by a golden castle with snapping pennants. Four of the queens - all but the redhead whose back was to her - raised their eyes to Samantha and winked. Then the scene went out and the floor of the cavern rushed back to fill the void.

“Did you never wonder what made them great?” the dragon asked. “They were all simply looking for the right thing: Happy ever after is only a matter of perspective.” He released her and stood up, then seemed to momentarily go out of focus. Like this, she heard in her head and realized she was looking at his dragon form again, the scaly, black-beribboned head far above her. Then the cavern went dark.

Perspective, she thought. Her heart lurched. Was it possible? She’d never really dared to think that someone like her - a peasant-faced woman from a peasant background ... No, does that imply time? Or only nonexistent limitations? In her mind’s eye she saw the dragon’s grin, disembodied, as if only that part of him remained. And then she knew. What she’d been looking for had been right in front of her. She simply hadn’t seen it. No perspective.

Tony put the book down without finishing it. It was getting late and the light was starting to fail. He knew he could have lit some candles but it somehow didn’t seem worth it - even the book was a disappointment, nothing but Sleeping Beauty with a different title. And it wasn’t as if Samantha could hear it anyway, he thought dejectedly. I’m only deceiving myself with that ‘read to her and she’ll be fine’ crap anyway, he thought. And haven’t I done enough of that ‘head in the sand’ stuff with Christine already?

He swallowed, surprised at the comparison he’d just made, but the lump in his throat didn’t go away. Oh, well that’s just dandy, he thought sarcastically. Is that what I’m doing here? Some kind of atonement for previous guilt? So what did she do to deserve that, huh? He wiped the wetness away from his eyes and glanced around, frantically searching for something to take his mind away from its present train of thought. His eyes landed on the book he’d been reading.

“Oh, that’s no help!” he exclaimed out loud. In fact, he thought it was a damned insult. He hadn’t finished this version, but he knew how it would end: Some prince was gonna come by a hundred years later who’d never even met Eglantine, kiss her awake and they’d live Happy Ever After. It made him want to puke. So the stupid princess was beautiful. So what? Physical beauty - the kind that made a good-looking corpse - meant nothing. He should know. A woman with real beauty - that shone from the inside - would never have a chance in hell of someone saving her, because in that kind of stasis it just flat wouldn’t show up. It would be invisible to anyone who didn’t personally know her.

Sleeping.

He blinked, then tried to shake the idea away. No, he told himself firmly. It’d never work. But his glance traveled to Samantha’s inert form and stayed there. Only suppose ...

His heart began to race. No, stop,You’re just getting your hopes up over nothing. It’s not possible. To his chagrin, he found himself arguing: Tony, you’re in a pie-shaped room in a magical tower. Is that possible? followed by: You’re setting yourself up for failure just like you did with the bouncy castles when Virginia was little. Keep your feet on the ground where they belong.

“No,” he said out loud. “No, it’s not me. It’s not about whether I will be disappointed or am being realistic. It’s not about me at all.”

He got up and sat down on the bed beside her. She slept quietly on, as unresponsive to the hand he touched to her cheek as she was to his sudden nearness. Feeling foolish, as his rational voice had told him he would, he glanced up at the door. It remained firmly shut. But strangely, it wouldn’t have mattered if a crowd had appeared. He simply couldn’t not try.

Slowly he bent down and pressed his lips to hers.

He didn’t know what he thought would happen. Something magical, reminiscent of the ending to Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, maybe; a ripple that would spread through everything - or at least the two of them - and her eyes would flutter open. But it seemed all too sordid and real: although her lips were warm, they didn’t kiss him back, just passively took the pressure from his and went on, unchanging. Not a muscle in her face reacted. Tony sat up and sighed sadly.

“Oh, well,” he murmured. “It was worth a try.” He groped for her hand and held it. “I’m only sorry I didn’t think of that sooner - like before all this happened, for instance. You’d think I’d learn by now that not everything lasts forever.”

In his hand, he felt hers move slightly and he looked down at it in disbelief. Had he imagined it, he wondered, until he felt it again - her fingers had definitely moved. He glanced from her hand to her face, noticing then that her breathing had subtly changed. Laying her hand at her side, he took her gently by the shoulders.

“Samantha?” he whispered, his voice caught in his throat. Was it possible? Had his kiss really awakened her after all? His stomach twisted and he felt light-headed; both giddy and terrified at the same time, until she opened her eyes and looked at him.

For a moment neither of them moved, then Samantha’s brow furrowed and she gasped and clutched at him. Without thought, his arms slid beneath her and he drew her tightly to him.