A slow, blackened-red spin into vertigo and oblivion. Silence. Not even the sound of breathing. Of course there wouldn't be breathing...

Not again...

Silence no more. In a mere sparkling of hazy, colorful images and blurring of light and sound, the past invades. Her own, and that of others. Memories. Of her enemies, of her friends, of those she barely knew...

A piano recital. Sitting on a glossy stage before a darkened audience, delicate white gloved hands upon polished ivory keys...

My first recital.

A woman behind a the curtain of the stage, smiling, transforming an aging face into pride's image. Crying as music slides through the stagnant air...

She's not my mother... she would never have watched me play. It can't be my memory...

It stops.

I can keep up with the difference, I KNOW my life. I KNOW what is mine. I will not forget, I will not forget myself...

'Poor, poor Memoria. Mem. Do you know your real name still?'

It's him--it's him! Bastard, bastard, bastard!

'I know it! I know it as well as I know you!'

'Indulge me--what is it?'

Styx. River of woe, river of sorrow, river of forgetfulness, the very gate of the underworld. Him. So he said. But his name--his name, what was it?

Speaking, eyes closed, even after the rush of history fades. She opens her eyes, nails clawing at the cool ash, the only ground in this realm. Its keeper sits upon his throne, blackened bone, and eyes his captive. He leans forward, blood-red locks falling over a firm, green gaze.

'My name... dear Memoria?' He smiles. No warmth. Thin, unyielding, but amused. Damnably amused.

'Styx.' She spits out, lifting her head to meet his eyes evenly.

Disappointed, he falls back against the ribcage, the throne's backing. 'Only an image. A metaphor. Not a name--about as substantial as--well, Memoria. A rather ironic name, isn't it, my dear--not remembering much at all of value anymore these nights, are you?'

'Katrina.' Why did it hurt so much to say her name? She felt as though she were tugging it away from a stronger force--away from him. 'Katrina... Anne... Lyone. THAT is my name.'

He applauds. The sound seemed to travel no further than the hands he put together, so gradually he might not have bothered...

'Well. I'm proud of you. You deserve a reward, I think.'

Please don't.

'But you couldn't manage to conjure mine--so, after enlightening you, I'm afraid I'll be forced to reprimand you...'

Her teeth clench together. Against her lip, her fangs dig with dangerous pressure into the skin.

'What would you take from me now?'

'Take? You make me sound like a thief. I'm merely a merchant--and you must pay for necessary goods.'

Her voice breaks into little more than a shrill screech. Eyes, murky green, glow with raging depth..

'Necessary? Necessary?'

'Silence!' He matches her. He matches, and surpasses. She is quieted.

He rises out of his throne, red robes, tattered, ashen, falling about his tall, slender form as he raises his hands. As he lowers them, a long mirror appears before her.

Her reflection. Seventeen forever. The black velvet dress worn the night... the long, endlessly long brown hair she had the night... the flashing, red-blue, lightning sky in the background, her dream world since the night. Always here. Always.

He steps out from behind the mirror. He snaps his fingers. Her reflection fades. The mirror is black for a moment as he speaks.

'You forgot my name--me, practically your father for God's sake! How could you forget your father? Hmm. I suppose you'll find out.'

The mirror fades into a scene. A sturdy, well-muscled young man holding onto a brown-haired toddler girl's hand. He looks down on her, smoothly combed brown hair and neatly shaped goatee and smiles, full of joy and laughing. He tugs her gently across the street as she stoops to investigate every little thing...

Papa..

The same man, a few years later, his large, heavy hands atop the girl's slender ones, guiding her fingers across a piano. False starts, missed notes, cries of frustration, he smiles patiently and murmurs into her ear for her to calm. Always confident...

Papa.

The man, aged, gray in his hair and beginning to stoop just slightly, waving good bye as a youthful girl on a motorcycle roars out of the driveway, her hair wild as her dreams... her last sight of home being that of...

Papa!

More memories, rushing, of birthdays, holidays, Father's day--skinned knees, barbeques, math homework, new boyfriends--broken cars, oil, old movies--piano recitals, acting rehearsals, historical debates, questioning the enigmas of the universe--then they stop. Then as in a rewind, back through them again, but they're gone, one after the other, gone, and she can't keep hold. Finally, she sees a little girl letting go of a man's hand--like she would a stranger. Then nothing. She lays her forehead against the ash, bloody sobs absorbed into the powder.

'How can you take away my father?'

Unimpressed, unmoved, impassionate, he resumes his position upon his throne.

'Does he matter? You're dead now, the only family that matters now is the one you left...'

'Shut up! Just shut up!' She sits up, fangs bared, eyes broiling with deep, hating, fury...

'Send me back now! I don't want any of your 'gifts' or whatever you call them!'

He rises again, still as stone.

'Unfortunate you don't have a choice in the matter--here!'

One motion. His hand against the back of the mirror. It falls, and shatters, shards leaving gashes in his reality that repair by the next night. Shards opening gates in the passages of time, all leading to her...

A rose garden, roses, thorns, red roses--no, white roses, stained with blood.

A corpse, a woman, a nun, hanging from a tree limb, habit bloody and ripped, body manged, torn, gone, how could anyone know what it was...

A knife in the tree trunk, bloodied, bent, glove still wrapped around it, but no hand for it...

A figure, torn by thorns, running, quickly, out of the garden gates, rose petals still on its jacket...

But no one will know. Why do you show me this?

No answer. Not this time. Not ever...

****

Katrina, or Memoria as she is sometimes called, awakens, her eyes opening as soon as the sun sinks below the horizon. With the vague discomfort of awakening from a nightmare, she pulls herself out of her satin-covered bed and walks to her dresser to look in the mirror.

Mirror. Yes, mirror, why is that significant?

She shakes her head and picks up a brush to smooth down her knee-length brown hair and then started tying it back with green ribbon. While doing so, she glances down and notices two objects simultaneously.

First, a picture frame, holding the black-and-white image of a young, sturdy man with smooth brown hair--close to the color of Memoria's--and a neatly shaped goatee. No stirrings of recognition existed in her mind.

Hmm. Probably just a picture that comes with the frames--did I buy one recently?--I don't really remember... odd. Ah, well, I must have...

Then a rose--a white rose, resting a thin vase. Memoria finished tying back her hair and lightly touched the petals.

That's right! There was a murder in some garden--a nun? I remember hearing something about that. The murderer was never caught...

Still musing over the news tidbit that had popped into her brain, Memoria absent-mindedly took the picture of the unknown man out of the frame and let it fall from her grasp.

Slower than it should have been. Defying every law of physics... the photo landed in the trash can beside the vanity table, and the man's eyes--shimmering with depth even without the benefit of color--staring out as his daughter walks past, seeming to glimmer with the tears that were never shed when she left six years ago, when all he could do was watch and wave good-bye.