We all go silent, considering.
“As I said,” Emrys picks up, “it is theslimmestof distinctions, but at this point, anything to narrow the field of potential correct answers is welcome, no?”
I can’t disagree with that. “Sure.”
“I could, given some time to think, assemble a corpus for you to study. Aretalogical texts from Egypt to Rome, and beyond.” Emrys rubs his chin, staring into the middle distance. “Nothing we have in original or even facsimile, I’m afraid. But I can write to the library and have them put together some holds for you, Ms. Vale.”
Beside me, Kingston tucks his Bible back into his bag and shakes out his watch from under his sleeve. “I’m sorry.” He looks up. “I need to get back to Camlann. Gwenna, of you?—”
“Go,” Emrys and I say in unison. Kingston dips his head, slips on his coat, and takes his leave.
Not, however, without one last look back at me.
The door shuts, and silence settles once again.
“He is,” Emrys says after a moment, “ardently in love with you, Ms. Vale.” His bright eyes flick to me. “They all are.”
It’s…fatherly, the way he says it, and yet still I blush. I wonder, suddenly, ifhehas ever been in love—if Myrddin Emrys, living backwards through time, had ever crossed paths with the right person, at the right juncture, for all things to align that way. It would be a miracle if he did, I’d have to think.
But then again, no more a miracle than for any other two people.
Or, you know, five.
“Do you know the story of Rabbi Zusya, Ms. Vale?”
Emrys’s voice interrupts my thoughts. I look up to him leaning on the wall beside the chalkboard, arms crossed and face thoughtful, and shake my head no.
“A wise and learned rabbi of the third Hasidic generation,” he explains. “Beloved of his students, revered by his peers. When at last, aged and infirm, he took to his deathbed, his students visited him and found him weeping. Trying to comfort him, they told him ‘But Rabbi, you are nearly as wise as Moses! Surely you will be judged favorably in the world to come.’ And do you know what the Rabbi said to them?”
Again, I shake my head.
“Zusya said, ‘In the coming world, they will not ask me, ‘Why were you not Moses?’ They will ask me ‘Why were you notZusya?’”
I stare at the surface of my desk.
“All of which is to say, Ms. Vale,” Emrys goes on. “I wonder if, perhaps, you too might consider what question you are truly being asked.”
I think about it.
Why were you not Gwenna?
Because to be Gwenna is to be…inconvenient, I think. Contradictory, inexplicable, messy, self-indulgent, inadvertently show-offy and too smart for her own good. Too much of some things and far too little of others.
But I know Emrys is trying to make me feel better. So I smile for him.
“It’s a nice idea,” I say.
Emrys lifts an eyebrow. “But?”
“But…” He isn’t letting me off the hook, I guess. “But…well, it’s just a little turn of phrase. It’s clever, but…you can’t believe that just switching a word around can change everything like that.”
Emrys gives me a look as if to sayyes, in fact, I do.
“Well, I don’t,” I say aloud.
“Don’t you?” Emrys counters. “And here I was led to believe you found the word to be the foundation of all that is and shall be.”
Chalk in hand, he writes spidery Greek letters across the blackboard:
