THE WITNESS (EPILOGUE)
Years later. A child sits at the feet of an old woman.
The child’s name is Elara — named after the grandmother she never knew. The old woman’s name is Remy. Her hair is white. Her hands are gnarled. Her eyes are still sharp.
“Tell me about the old days,” Elara says.
Remy looks at the child. At her dark eyes. Her curious face.
“Which old days?”
“Before the peace. When you were the Memory Thief.”
Remy laughs. It is a weak laugh, but a real one.
“I wasn’t a thief. I was a witness. I saw things. I remembered them. I wrote them down.”
“Tell me about the Devourer.”
“The Devourer was hungry. But not evil. It was lonely. It had been alone for so long that it forgot what connection felt like.”
“Did you kill it?”
“I set it free.”
Elara tilts her head. “Is that the same thing?”
Remy thinks about the question.
“Yes,” she says. “Sometimes setting free is the only way to kill something without destroying it.”
Elara nods, though she doesn’t fully understand.
“Tell me about Hope.”
Remy looks at the sky. The brightest star is still bright.
“Hope was a child. A child made of light and memory and the dreams of the dead. It came to me when I needed it most. And it left when I was strong enough to stand alone.”
“Where did it go?”
“It became a star. To watch over us. To remind us that even in the darkest night, there is light.”
Elara looks at the sky.
“I want to be a star someday.”
Remy touches the child’s hair.
“You already are.”
THE STARS
Remy died on a spring morning, with Juno holding her hand and Cassian reading her favorite poem.
The city mourned.
The Memory Den was filled with flowers and candles and photographs. People came from every corner of Mars to say goodbye.
The sleepers sang a song that had not been heard in ten thousand years.
Hope’s star burned brighter than ever.
And Remy’s memories — the ones she had preserved, the ones she had written, the ones she had shared — lived on.
In the Memory Den. In the hearts of the Witnesses. In the dreams of children like Elara.
She was not forgotten.
She had made sure of that.
The Memory Thief of Mars
End