The area was depopulated. Luoth had fought his way across the bridge, running against the current, just to get to the buildings, catching scraps of excited conversation and angry grumbling. He had encountered not only the gentlemen, but a large, incredibly diverse crowd, as if in these moments of destabilization, people wandered about at random, doing unusual things, talking to any stranger.

  “They said we don't have more than a day!” he heard older women cackle, tossing the grim prophecy back and forth.

  “They've been saying that for days,” objected an impassive young man, backed by a weeping husband.

  Maybe they were wrong, yes, completely wrong, and nothing would happen at all. But in the meantime, the alarm sirens were screaming, a boisterous bellowing that rose in waves until it caused palpitations and rattled the crystals in the houses.

  Did they really want to make sure that no one would be left? That the population, if they had not already moved to save themselves from the cataclysm, would flee in desperation from the unbearable noise?

  “They should go from house to house!” suggested a burly man walking slowly with his hands in his pockets.

  Luoth heard but did not listen, did not want to think or consider their words. Let it be what they wanted. What use was it to worry about what Faspath would do? Even the monks had no answer after studying the Rift all their lives.

  There was no point in worrying so much. When it happened, he would notice, that was all.

  He had closed the bank branch, sent the last employees away, mailed the documents, the little money left in the safe, the securities and certificates. Everything he could recover and save for the investors. That was the only responsibility he felt. Enough. Seluma, if she was still alive, could only have returned to the Coneshell. Even if she had closed it, she had certainly retired there to wait.

  Just go there and see if she was around. It was only a matter of changing direction.

  But his legs disobeyed him. They were heading home, inexorably. They did not even slow down when they saw the front door, but came to a sudden, painful stop just one step from the threshold, when he already had the keys in his hand.

  Ala Lapui had pulled herself up sharply, pulled her shawl more tightly around her shoulders, and forced a smile. She had waited huddled on the step like a beggar for how many hours? Her face was wasted with fatigue, her beautiful burning eyes swollen with tears.

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  “I beg your pardon,” she murmured, her full contralto voice a little arrogant. “My... my aunt...”

  She was unable to continue. Luoth offered her support as he hurried to open the door. And he nodded.

  “I saw her.”

  “I couldn't stop her, she was mad!”

  New tears gushed out, leaving clear streaks on the now ruined makeup. “I'm glad at least you...”

  Luoth held the door open for her to pass, but the woman would not make up her mind. She looked shaky on her legs, not quite sure where she was. Had she been running, lost in the city, looking for her aunt? She clung to his arm now, clutching his fingers for a moment, but immediately pulled away as if she had lost all interest.

  “Why are you here, Ala?” he asked her. “Go, hurry while you can.”

  The young widow manhandled the black shawl, wrapped herself in it, and immediately tore it off.

  “Where, what can I do?” she sobbed. “There is nothing left for me!”

  “You are joking! You are young, beautiful, and rich. All you have to do is pick a destination on the map and go to start your new life. In a way, it's an opportunity.”

  He had turned on the lights in the antechamber and she had finally entered, dabbing her eyes and reddened nose with a blue handkerchief. But at those words, the submissive, languid demeanor vanished in an instant. She turned on him like a fury.

  “That's what everyone thinks of me! She's rich, why does she care if her husband is dead? She will choose a nicer one! In fact, she can have fun with anyone without choosing; there is nothing she cannot buy! She is rich and young, she cannot have feelings, dreams of a normal family and affection! Do you think this too?”

  “But no, I didn't mean... Calm down, let's sit here, shall we?”

  He led her to the living room sofa, a comfortable upholstered sofa that could easily seat three people, and held her hand as she sat down in the middle. He sat down as well, careful not to wrinkle his jacket.

  “Forgive me, I thought you wanted advice. Instead, you just need to vent. Go ahead, I won't interrupt you anymore,” he told her meekly.

  Her dark eyes, bright and shining with tears, were a hypnotic fire. Her other hand closed on his as well.

  “I came in the hope of spending my last hours in pleasant company,” she confessed, her cheeks flushed with a new blush under the half-worn makeup. “You are the first person I thought of. Contrary to society's image of me, I don't have any real friends.”

  He gasped for air.

  “I'm really flattered, Ala, but...”

  He froze in mid-sentence, breathless, voiceless.

  How many times had he said “but”? How many times had it happened that the wonderful warmth of a woman's smile, a discreet caress, the smoothness of a perfumed body ignited inside him had not really reached his deepest part, to fill the emptiness in his chest where his heart should have been beating? When had he refused? The beautiful Ala watched him pleadingly with an open-lipped smile, her skin seeming to glow like mother-of-pearl. And he didn't care.

  Apathetic and inert, a withered plant, a stranger in a scene that did not concern him. The earring...

  He could no longer feel it in his ear, could no longer feel its weight!

  He searched for it with his touch, haunted by the absurd fear that he had lost it who knows where. Although, of course, that was impossible if he was still there, if he was breathing and alive. For there it was, in its place, the sharp edges of the little gem, the metal embedded in his flesh.

  But why was it so cold?