Day Three hundred and forty four - Don't want to know if you are lonely

And so it is that I find myself in this desolate, windswept stretch of land, its shoreline stretching as far as the eye can see. The air here is biting cold, and though I'm wearing very warm clothes, I can still feel the chill running down my spine. I know this cold, I have felt it before, right here. Though not now, and though I am iteration of that soul, it was me without being me. The wind tugs at me, waving my hair across my face, a fury of tendrils. I watch the rolling waves in front of me, the sea raging and tossing them with frightening might onto the shore. I look at my watch, and think to myself that it's not going to take long. I hear a voice calling out to me (had I heard that voice before?) and I turn my head to where I thought the sound was coming, and I see her trudging slowly through the wet sand. I have not seen that face before, and yet a part of me knows it intimately. It's the part of me that exists where there's no time. Where there's everything without a time. As she approaches, I see a radiant smile, in a freckled sunny face. We exchange pleasantries, and then start talking about what had brought me here. I tell her what I am looking for, and she knows where to take me. Do I have the correct tribute, she asks, and I say I do. I do.

We walk on, for long minutes, in silence. The sighing wind sings a song, a song to say goodbye. We are not far, now, she says. I nod. She tells me it has been her family's duty, lo these many centuries, to keep it safe. To keep it secret to all but to those who would pay tribute. I understand, I say. I had travelled far and wide to finally reach here, I had to travel north before I could travel south. I had to go far away before I got close. And now, only by staying here could I go far away again. My hope... my hope is my enemy, but I hope nonetheless. I pray the tribute proves enough.

We arrive at what seems a ramshackle hut, weathered and beaten, and she motions me inside. It's unassuming, spartan, and yet homely. She points to where a hearth hisses merrily, and with a wave of her hand the glamour is lifted. Here I am, after all these years, my God, here I am. The Lares shrine, she says, and I stand in awe of it. The time to pay tribute is now, she says, and from my pocket I remove a small handkerchief that's neatly tied. Blood seeps from it, drippety-drop on the floor, and I kneel before this god of old. I open up the handkerchief and remove its contents, and then lay them at the statue's feet. It is good, she says, he is pleased, and praises you for your sacrifice, she says. May I ask what it is, she asks. And I say a name, and this name is a sacrifice. She nods. And your boon, what did you ask for, she asks. And I tell her it is the boon of remembrance. Ah, she says. You wish to remember something, to forget something, or that someone else might remember something, she says. A wise choice, Mnemosyne would have extracted too great a toll from you, she says. I understand, I say. Will you ask for it, she says. I will. I must. Then ask and it shall be yours, she says. And I say but one word to her, as our eyes lock in an instant that lasts infinities. Remember, I say.

Her eyes dance through the centuries, and through the Pleiades - oh look, as they are loosed in the winter night sky that is her eyes! I bare my chest, and she draws closer to me. I nod, and the places a hand on my chest. She feels my heart beat. My hand on your heart, she says. My hand on your heart. This is it. This is forever. Listen to my heart beat, I say, listen to the song it sings, it sings in time with the universe, ever searching for its soul, entwined now. And she dances. She dances.