"The first cutoff came in the middle of summer. The day was warm and bright… It could have been one of the most wonderful days," the man said, his cheeks flushing like a young man's, though he did not take his eyes off the woman, "if it had not become one of the most terrible." Only now did he look away. "We were in the garden, each reading our own book, sometimes sharing whatever thoughts came to mind. We did that often."
The boy and the girl were sitting on a low stone wall dividing the terraced garden, which stepped down in ledges and held the upper soil in place; they leaned back against each other. The weather was unexpectedly fine: no clouds in the sky; the sun warmed the scattered clumps of herbs, releasing a light, pleasant fragrance; voices of a dozen different birds carried from the forest beyond the meadow. She drew a slow, deep breath and, resting the back of her head on his shoulder, gazed into the pale blue above. Carefully, without shifting, he tilted his head and looked at her from the corner of his eye — her face calm but serious, her gaze fixed somewhere far away.
"What are you thinking about?" he asked.
"About time," she answered softly.
Time echoed in his mind.
"Oh!" she exclaimed suddenly, lifting her head from his shoulder. "Something dripped on me. From where?"
A light rain had begun out of nowhere. They ran toward the house and took shelter beneath the dense green canopy of the terrace roof. The shower strengthened, then stopped as abruptly as it had begun. A rainbow unfurled across the sky, stretching from the house over the garden, the meadow, and the forest beyond.
"It leads to the tree," the girl declared. "Let's run! First one there gets the leprechaun's gold!"
"What? Eve, no — it's too far. Come back!"
"Not a chance!"
Laughing, she dashed toward the forest. Several times she glanced back and saw him following. Then he vanished from sight — only to reappear about twelve feet ahead on the forest path. Annoyed at the unfairness, she left the track and cut through a narrow passage between the boulders. By the time she reached the edge of the clearing, she caught hold of the first low branch she could reach, breathless. The young man, not even winded, was leaning against the trunk of the tree at its centre, arms folded, smiling with open mischief.
"That's not fair," she called.
"First one there — your rule." He spread his hands. "What did you expect? Don't worry — the leprechaun's gone."
"That's because you cheated. You scared him off."
"Perhaps not all is lost yet…" His eyes flashed for a moment, then shifted aside in sudden alertness. He vanished at once, and bushes rustled somewhere nearby.
"I know it's you. Who do you think you're fooling?"
The rustling stopped. All sound stopped with it — every movement that might have made one. He knew her weak spot. She understood perfectly what he was doing, yet the unease remained: sensing someone close and not being able to see or hear them. She stepped out into the open clearing and, scanning the space, backed slowly toward the tree. Suddenly something moved toward her from the undergrowth — visible only by the grass bending in quick, uneven bursts, like a small animal forcing its way through. She quickened her pace. Just as her feet began to catch on the roots, the movement halted — then darted sideways, circling the trunk and vanishing behind it. She followed more cautiously, still trying to track every sign around her. It was useless — he appeared out of nowhere and, with a cheerful, "Got one!" blocked her path, bracing both hands against the wide trunk on either side of her. A short, sharp squeal broke the air.
"So I did catch a leprechaun after all." She accompanied his words with a light punch to his chest. Ignoring the protest, he went on with a victor's grin: "Now then — where's the treasure I was promised?"
The sparkles in the girl's eyes shifted from ice to flame. She was irritated that she couldn't meet him on equal terms and that he used that to his advantage — and yet she was glad he had entered her game, and done so with imagination. He even caught the matching theme of her outfit: today she wore a light dark-green dress scattered with small flowers, cinched with a thin tan leather strap, and ankle boots of the same leather. In the end, flame won.
"Here it is."
She brushed her palm along his cheek and, rising onto her toes, touched his lips with hers. Then she traced his other cheek with her other hand and kissed him again, more deliberately. He tried to respond, but she slipped away, feigning pride. He read the signal correctly and did not wait for permission: gently but firmly he drew her back and took the lead. When she answered, heat surged through him — his pulse quickened, his body seemed to melt, while his hands only grew surer, gathering her closer, as if to pull her fully into that shared blaze. She fully supported this. Her body arched to meet most of his; her hands moved from his face into his hair, then tightened at his neck and shoulders. His hands ranged freely; his mouth traced a slow path downward. She felt something squeeze her breast tightly.
A sharp thread of cold wind cut through the warmth. She ignored it and let the tension escape in a broken breath.
Her back met the rough trunk of the tree — for a split second, a sheer rock face. She dismissed the image and answered his unspoken question with a soundless go on. He closed over her like a wave.
A blinding sun flared in her mind; the cliff unfurled into distance, half-dry grass along its rim, water shattering into light below. She pushed him away — not roughly, but with finality — and her gaze turned inward. He tried again, but the second wave met the same immovable rock.
"Do you know anything about a cliff?" she asked, eyes fixed on emptiness.
"What?" The word came out unevenly. "What on earth kind of cliff?" He was still standing very close, still holding her in his arms. His breathing had not yet steadied — and showed no sign of doing so.
"A tall black rock above the sea, running out on both sides…"
"Into the horizon…"
"You know it?"
"I do," he said, reluctant. "Why?"
"I need to get there."
"Now? You can't be serious."
The fragile hope in her eyes said she wasn't.
"No… no, no…" Understanding struck him all at once. "Oh God. Eve — already? No!"
The world lurched. In his sight he stood at the edge of a precipice: surf thundering below, white sun overhead, wind tearing the air between them. No one else anywhere.
"Evelyn! Where are you?"
"Here," came the answer — from everywhere.
He turned in a full circle and saw no one.
"Don't go. Please — don't go." Silence answered. Anger rose, fierce and helpless. "I won't give her to you!"
The vision broke. He seized her hand and pressed it against his chest.
"Evelyn, listen to me. Do you hear my heart beating? You're the one who makes it beat like this — do you understand what that means? I love you."
He lifted her other hand and placed it over her heart.
"Yours is beating the same way. When I kiss you—" he pressed his lips against hers, "—when you're this close to me—" he drew her nearer, "—you feel it. Don't tell me you don't — even I can feel it. Doesn't it mean anything to you? Think whatever you like, but your heart knows the answer. It doesn't lie — it can't. I will never break it, I swear. I'm ready to take a vow. If that's what you're afraid of — don't be. Do you really not need any of this?"
"I need to get to that cliff…" She was already far away again, and her heart had quietened once more.
The young man lost. He let go of the girl and slowly sank onto one of the stones edging the spring that gushed from beneath the tree's roots. He lowered his head into his hands, hiding the tears gathering in his eyes. It was impossible not to see the pain she had caused him, and she forced herself back from that inward distance. She sat down behind him, wrapped her arms across his chest, and rested her forehead against his hunched back.
"Please forgive me," she said quietly. "I don't know why this is happening — I truly don't. Sometimes, when I feel especially happy, a strange longing comes with it, and the cliff appears in my mind. Before, it was only fragments of a landscape. Today it was as if I was there in person. I know there's not much comfort in such an explanation for what I felt today… what you made me feel today…" She paused. "You said you know this place…"
He stiffened and began to turn towards her as he spoke.
"I only know what it looks like, not where it is. You showed it to me yourself — told me how you found it."
"Me?" Genuine surprise crossed her face.
"Yes. In the room-garden — a year and a half ago. Don't you remember?"
"The room-garden?" Skepticism edged her voice.
"Yes — the one I made for you with its help. You don't remember… Eve? Tell me — what do you remember at all?" Now she was confused, and he, in turn, was frightened. "Do you remember how you got here?"
"Of course. I ran here after the rainbow — from your house, through the forest."
"How did you get into my house?" he asked gently, but the question only made her bristle.
"Well, isn't it obvious? We grew close at school and decided that after graduation I'd spend the summer with you." She guessed blindly — and missed.
"After graduation?"
She frowned, nostrils flaring, shot him a sharp look, then turned away — not from anger, but so he would not see her fear and grow more alarmed still. Fighting the rising panic, she searched for any memory — at least about school — but found nothing. Then she noticed the pendant on her chest and began to study it. It was solid, though clearly woven from a feather; a glossy black core showed through the fine pale filaments. It stirred something faint in her mind.
"Oh. Right. I think I almost died. How did that happen?" The silence behind her grew heavier, so she went on. "Does the pendant have something to do with it?… Strange. I know I mustn't take it off. Ever. I know you told me that." She turned and met his eyes. "And I do not — I swear to you. Not when I sleep, not even when I bathe. But I don't remember why."
"So you wouldn't forget," the young man said after a few seconds of silence, his shoulders sinking. "A useless trinket. I know why it doesn't work — because I didn't let you taste the blood. But there was no other way. None." He was speaking more to himself than to her. Still muttering under his breath, he drifted back towards the house.
She followed him in silence, sometimes watching his back, sometimes studying the object hanging at her throat, trying to make sense of his words. They did not leave the main forest track — a broad path worn deep into the ground, with tree roots sliding down its sides like the bedlines of a dried river. The fading light of the setting sun filtered through the canopy, thickened by ivy and fern climbing boldly up the trunks, yet still catching on smoother surfaces.
At the next bend, something inside the pendant flashed red. For the next few minutes she kept worrying at it with the nail of her little finger, trying to dislodge whatever was caught there.
"Look — there's still blood on it. Is that what you meant? If you want, I'll taste…"
She didn't finish. Her hand was jerked away from her face so sharply it nearly wrenched her shoulder.
"Don't you dare." The words struck her along with his breath. "Don't you dare. Promise me you will never do that — and that you won't forget the promise." He was still gripping her wrist — hard. Painfully hard. But not as painful as the sight of his face, twisted with fear and anger. "Promise."
"I promise."
"Promise what?"
"I promise I'll never taste the blood from this pendant — and I won't forget… I'll try."
It did not seem to reassure him. Before long the path led them out of the forest and into the meadow, at the far end of which stood the large stone house. His mother met them at the back entrance and immediately sensed the discord in their moods.
"What's happened, sweetheart?" He did not even glance at her, disappearing into the corridors of the house at once. She turned instead to the girl, who remained on the steps, looking uneasy. "Evelyn? Oh — what's happened to your arm?"
Red finger-shaped marks were already rising on her pale skin.
"Um… it's nothing. It'll fade."
"My son did that?"
It was fortunate that the other traces were less visible in the deepening twilight — traces whose origin still caused pleasant cramps in her abdomen.
"Please don't be angry with him — he had his reasons. I upset him badly. I was about to do something foolish — he had to…"
"Don't excuse him. There is no reason for this. I apologise for him." The fair-haired witch drew her wand and touched the girl's wrist; the pain and redness vanished at once. The girl's eyes widened.
"That wasn't necessary," she murmured, startled. "Thank you. I think I'll go to my room." She hesitated on the stairs, then chose her direction and went.
He was already in his room and did not avoid his mother when she followed.
"She's forgotten, Mum. She's forgotten."
"Forgotten what?"
"Everything. Do you understand?"
"Oh… I see."
He released her shoulders and began pacing the room, unable to be still.
"It was all for nothing. She's forgotten — school, this house, how she died, what she did for me — me. What am I supposed to do now? What do I do? She doesn't know who she is."
"It must be terrifying — to lose yourself." Her voice was very steady, and yet oddly distant. The tone — and the words — made him stop.
"What an idiot I've been." He kissed his mother's hands and rushed out of the room.
The girl lay curled up on the bed, holding the pendant before her, studying it as she tried to think something through. When there came a knock at the door, her name was called, and a voice asked whether it could come in, it took her a moment to understand that the sound belonged to the present moment.
"I…" someone began.
"It's open."
The door opened.
"Eve, I… how are you?"
"I'm fine." She did not move; her gaze returned to the pendant.
"I wanted to apologise. Forgive me — I behaved like a complete egoist. Feeling sorry for myself when you must be far more…"
"I'm not angry with you."
Several long seconds passed in heavy silence. It would have been easier if she were angry. Easier if she had raised her voice, let something out. Then he could have listened, tried to steady her. Then it would at least have become a conversation. But she did not need soothing — and seemed to feel nothing at all.
"I'm glad to hear it," he said dully. "Well… then I suppose I should go."
"Stay with me. Please." A gift of fate — or one of its crueller jokes. "It's even more frightening than drinking poison. The trinket isn't entirely useless. I remember everything that's happened since I put it on — and absolutely nothing from before."
Without a word, the young man lay down beside her and, matching the curve of her body, wrapped an arm gently around her, resting his face against her hair. Minutes of quiet closeness passed. Outside the window, everything was still. The sun slipped below the horizon.
Her voice sounded in the darkness.
"Tell me about the room with the garden."
He paused, gathering his thoughts.
"You did a great deal for me that year, and I wanted to give you something in return. I didn't know whether you liked gardens, but I knew you loved long walks — through the woods, around the lake — and I noticed how, in the greenhouse, you always leaned in to smell whatever was in bloom that day." On potions lessons too she tried to judge everything by scent, by sound, by sight — and the professor kept reminding her they were not cooking soup. "It was winter, so it seemed like a good idea. There is — or was — I'm not sure it still exists — a room that can become whatever you need it to be at the moment. Inside it, I recreated a garden that once belonged to a friend of my father's — a place where I played often as a child."
"Describe it to me."
She rolled onto her back and draped her legs over his. With one hand he stroked the thick dark curls of her hair. With the other, he did not pull away when she caught it and held it beneath her chin, their fingers interlaced.
"As soon as you step inside, you're plunged into an abyss of scents and a chaos of birdsong. Only if you listen carefully do you begin to hear the murmur of a stream somewhere, or the wind moving through the leaves. Only when you surrender completely to the mood of a particular corner do the unnecessary things fall away, and you start to grasp — to feel — the uniqueness of its design, the fineness of its making. Visual, auditory, olfactory.
Only a small part of the garden can be seen from the house terrace. To discover its most interesting places, to learn its secrets, you have to set out on a journey. Some things reveal themselves quickly, as if trying to persuade you there is no need to go any further — a pond with turtles and their own little palace, for instance. Or a great carved swing that lifts you almost into the clouds. Or the copse beyond the stream, more like the lofty, spacious halls of a Gothic castle, flooded with light — sometimes green, sometimes gold — from the leaf-stained glass above.
Other places demand more patience. That's how we had discovered an otter with her cubs living beneath the bridge over the stream. And one of the castle corridors leads to a weeping willow whose branches can be woven into anything — from a magnificent throne to a small shelter.
But the most extraordinary place in the garden is the maze. Its dense green walls rise towards the sky and shut out the whole world — everything your mind and your feelings can produce. It works on the same principle as the room, but requires far more involvement from those inside, and can change as you move through it… The stronger spirit prevails. You walked into the room without hesitation, not knowing what awaited you there. You weren't afraid to enter the maze, even knowing it might be dangerous. And it proved beautiful."
The young man fell silent and closed his eyes, bitterly aware that these memories would never again be shared in the same way.
("Who did you use to play there with?"
"The man who owned it had a son." He lowered his head, then cast an uneasy glance towards the green walls. She placed her hand lightly against his chest. There was no need to press for details. He drew a slow, steady breath. "Do you like it?"
"Very much."
They walked slowly along the stone path. Beyond the bend, the iridescent border — rich in texture but restrained in colour — gave way to lush flowerbeds divided by short brick buttresses. In the shade of a pergola stood an ornate bench, and opposite it lay a shallow pond with turtles. Gradually, they drew nearer to the maze. Its entrances were sealed by heavy doors set deep into the greenery, with neither locks nor handles. The girl paused before one of them for a few seconds, then gently pressed it open with both palms and stepped inside.)
She too closed her eyes and wandered the maze all night — along its paths, sometimes stone-paved, sometimes swallowed by grass; through its gardens, at times trimmed to precision, at times left to their own will — small clearings filled with a single kind of flower; long avenues of whimsically twisting coloured ribbons; a spare rock garden; a lush rosarium set in a carpet of aromatic herbs; a reed-choked marsh loud with a chorus of frogs; a blossoming apple orchard threaded with layered birdsong. She looked into every corner — out of curiosity, or in search of someone… or perhaps something.
(How long they wandered those paths together, telling one another stories from childhood — hours, perhaps. Childhood held much happiness, despite everything, and it was much the same for all who had been loved. At last they came to a green meadow so vast it seemed they had left the maze entirely. A mighty old tree stood over an open, level space, its heavy knotted limbs cast wide in every direction. They lay beneath its gently stirring canopy and rested in silence.
Time passed. A sudden gust of wind and the drawn-out cry of a seagull broke their stillness. The air turned damp; the scent of salt reached them.
"What's that?" the boy asked.
"Sorry — I think that's me," she said quietly, thinking. "Do you want to see my favourite place?"
She led him quickly back through the maze to the same door they had entered by, noticing that the pattern of its passages had not changed — only their scale. Distances had shrunk; they reached the exit within minutes. Crossing the bridge beyond the stream, she left the path and turned into the open field. They moved into the steady drone of bees, bumblebees, dragonflies.
The garden disappeared behind them, yet they kept walking, straight towards the horizon. The ground took on a steady incline; the path climbed. Wildflowers gave way to patches of coloured moss and tangled heather. Now and then the way was broken by boulders ringed with bramble. The wind grew stronger. At last the ground levelled and the vegetation thinned. A few dozen more steps — and the rim of the earth revealed itself ahead.
There was almost nothing there: only sparse grass, half-dry and half-green, clinging to a thin layer of soil from which a hard blade of rock thrust outward over the drop. The cliff ran in a dark line to right and left, fading into water-haze. The sun burned bright above; below, the heavy surge of water struck the apathetic stone with relentless force.
She stood at the very edge and, in the uneven gusts of wind, watched the great waves — so powerful at first glance — break against the rock like glass. The fragments scattered, flashed in the sun, gathered again, and withdrew — only to return. Again. And again. Tirelessly. Without pause. Endlessly.
"Once we spent a whole summer at the house of friends of my foster family. They were leaving and asked us to look after the house, the vegetable garden, the animals. The town lay in a hollow between two hills, with a river running through the middle and dividing it in two. There was nothing remarkable about it, so I wandered along the river and climbed the slopes. One day I decided to reach the very top of one of them — and when I did, I realised it wasn't a hill at all. There was no descent on the other side. Only a cliff stretching as far as the eye could follow, with the sea striking at its base. I hadn't known we were so close to open water. There was no one there at all. The view held me completely. I kept coming back, walking along the edge for hours — watching the waves, listening to the wind, tracing the point where all the lines seemed to meet. For all the violence of the elements, I felt an extraordinary calm there."
"Did you want to jump off?" the boy asked quietly, watching where she stood.
"No, of course not. To jump off - no. But to dissolve into it, to become part of that vastness — yes. To turn to stone, to be worn down into grains by wind and water, scattered, gathered, formed again… and again."
He stood beside her for a while, looking out in silence. Then he took her hand and led her back towards the garden. They crossed the busy field once more but did not return to the bridge. Instead they entered the grove through a wooden gate, passed beneath clouds of small birds, and came out by the brook on the far side. A little upstream a weeping willow leaned over the water. They went to it, and as they stepped beneath its filigree canopy, the branches began to shift and weave themselves into two chairs.
"They'll take any shape — if you imagine it clearly enough."
She sat, and the chair lifted her at once, gliding towards the water and reshaping itself into a low couch as it moved. The second followed beside it.
She lay on her front, hands folded beneath her chin. The current moved steadily below, curling around smooth stones that broke the surface; sunlight scattered across the ripples. A soft breeze stirred the willow's long, narrow leaves. She dipped her fingers into the stream — the water felt almost like silk. The same three elements — wind, water, rock — and yet here they seemed gentler, closer, protective. "Would I want to belong to them here?" she wondered, turning towards him.
He sat upright, watching her closely. His expression was serious, composed — a rare stillness she liked in him. Then the branches shifted again, lowering them back to the ground. Her seat returned to its original form; his simply unwove itself. Without waiting for the change to finish, he stepped lightly down and came towards her with quiet resolve. Cupping her head, he kissed her as if asserting his right to her. The right itself felt beyond dispute — and with it he offered care, protection, and certainty. He meant it. It was impossible not to hear that intention in him. He could give it. It was tempting. But was it what she needed?)
The sun struck the girl's face. She turned away from the window and her nose brushed against something warm and resilient, moving almost imperceptibly with each breath.
"You're a sleepyhead," he said close by.
She smiled at the fondness in his voice. He lifted his palm to shade her eyes from the light so she could open them and look at him.
"I was exploring your garden. It's big enough."
"Did you like it?"
"Very much."
They held each other's gaze for a while. Then she spoke, almost apologetically.
"I was thinking about the past — about not remembering it. And I realised… I don't mind. I don't actually need it. You were right — the heart tells you what matters. It knows, and memory has very little say in its decisions."
Somewhere within, she knew this to be true: memory was a poor guide — especially when it could be altered. By others, to mislead you; by yourself, to keep others out. And she knew as well that the important thing was to reach the heart in time — the heart, not the memories. Because, as the teacher had once told her, memories should be hidden not as deep as possible, but as far away as possible.