Anonoei was in sole possession of the body. It was now her uterus that held the baby. Her hands now clutched herself with a fervent mix of gratitude and unworthiness. Why am I being given such a chance to live?

“You’ll have to speak aloud now,” said Danny. “I could only communicate with you that directly because you weren’t fully in the body. Now I sense that you’re asking something, but I don’t understand it.”

That disappointed Anonoei more deeply than she could have expected. It had only been a few minutes that she had felt such a deep connection and communion with Danny North—but she missed it already.

“I miss it too,” said Danny. “With you. With Pat—the woman I love.”

“I know who she is to you,” whispered Anonoei.

“I miss it with This One.”

It took Anonoei scarcely a heartbeat to understand whom he meant.

“‘This One’?” It was how she had thought of him, too.

“It’s what he called himself when we first met. I have no other name for him. But ‘This One’ is name enough for him, when dealing with us. Maybe we’re not capable of understanding his real name.”

“Does he come to everyone who dies?” asked Wad.

“I don’t know the rules of Duat,” said Danny. “But when I die, I’d be so … grateful. Honored. If he came for me.”

“I was grateful that he didn’t notice me,” murmured Wad.

“He noticed you,” said Anonoei. “He noticed everything.”

“I know,” said Wad. “But he didn’t make me answer him. I’m not ready to answer him.”

“Yes, you are,” said Danny. “Answering him is easy, because he already knows.”

After months of darkness, Anonoei realized that she did not have to remain blind. The eyes were hers now, and she opened them for the first time in months. She had felt so many other sensations in these minutes since the body became truly her own, but now at last she was ready to join the world again, ready for sight.

Wad was closer to her than she had thought. And he was kneeling beside the bed. Seeing that she could see him now, he reached out a hand to touch her cheek. She welcomed the touch, though it made her tremble, having been so long without sensations of such intensity and power.

“I know what happened here,” said Wad. “I don’t know how, but I understood it as it happened. And yet when I look at you, it’s still the face of Bexoi.”

“But not the heart,” said Anonoei.

“Well,” said Danny, “organically speaking, it is.”

“Not the mind. Not the will,” said Anonoei.