Junia wore a look I recognized too well. One I had seen countless times since I left home. An expression that had crawled behind me in my travels like shadows at sunset. She was so hopeful. So desperate. So sad. But above all else, so completely innocent. She sat next to her mother’s body, completely unaware of the horror draping itself around her. Millie cried in the frozen arms of a corpse. And they were worried they would be punished. That they were already being punished. Junia’s eyes told me the story her mind couldn’t. A story of strangled understanding. Of denial, rooted deep in the soul. But not willful denial. Not the denial I wore with pride as I stabbed my sister in the back.

  No. Junia looked like every disbelieving stone I’ve ever faced. She looked forcefully unaware. Like her eyes and her ears and her heart had been bound and shackled. This was the awareness Livia had when I told her I was reliving the same day. This was the awareness every body I’d rewound to life had ever worn when I explained they had been dead. Not an unwillingness to see. Not a psychological chain. An inability.

  Junia, for all her crying, and pleading, and begging... was quiet.

  Margaret had used some strange power to control the quieted. To turn them into weapons. To save the city, as she saw it, from an undignified death. In her hands, the silent dead turned violent. They felt anger and pain as their end was denied by ill-intent. With Margaret in control, ‘Quiet’ had a meaning of its own. The bodies of the dead didn’t stay silent for long, before she took them. But their agony did. The feeling of strings moving them. Hurting them. Killing their friends with their tired fingers. When Margaret held the word, ‘Quiet’ was a command. It was a gag in a captive’s mouth.

  “Please, tell her it was you, miss,” Junia begged again, and I choked on the lump in my throat. I looked into the blank eyes of Junia’s mother. This was a different sort of quiet. A prettier type, in a way. Bloodless. Gentle. Cruel beyond belief. “Please... she’ll be so angry, and we didn’t do anything. We are really hungry. Please, tell her it was you!”

  My jaw shook as I tried to respond. “We– we need to go. It’s not safe here, Junia,” I replied. “Come with me, please. I have breakfast for you. Somewhere warm. Can you come with me?” I asked. Junia looked back at her mom for a moment, then to me again.

  “We can’t leave Momma, Miss. She’ll be so angry. She’s already so upset about the window… Please, can you tell her that you broke it, and we didn’t do anything?” Junia responded again, her jaw carrying the desperate yet determined set of a child avoiding a lecture. I wanted to plead with her more. To pull her out of that house. But she didn’t know me. I loved her, but she didn’t know me. I was the disruption. The newest malady in her life. A stranger who broke into her home and threatened trouble with her mother. No child would trust me. No child should, from her perspective. So I took a deep breath, and looked into the empty eyes of the body she clung to. My voice quivered as I spoke. Oil mixed with my soul as the implicit lie left my lips. But lying was all I could do.

  “I’m sorry, ma’am. I broke your window. I didn’t mean to, and I will fix it. Your daughters did nothing wrong. Please, forgive me,” I apologized. The room was silent. The cold creeped through the shattered window as tension tightened around all our throats. It wasn’t enough. I didn’t know if Junia perceived some answer from her mother. I didn’t know if she was waiting for one that would never come. I looked at her and she looked at her mom, her nervous teeth drawing a trickle of blood from a dry lip. I had to do more. So I turned to the window, and began to chant.

  I didn’t know if I could get these children to safety. Not without dragging them out by their hair. But I could relieve some small anxiety. I could heal at least the childlike worry I had caused. And I could make this home something closer to safety, if only a little. As the familiar blue aura cascaded across my weary body, I tried desperately to think of something I could do for them. This was worse. So much worse than the first time I found them. They were hungry. They were thirsty. They continued to stink of neglect. But this time, they didn’t understand the danger they were in. Or they did, but they couldn’t do anything about it. Junia’s poor attempts to feed her sister were missing. The glass retraced its path through the air as ‘Undone’ worked. But glass was all I could heal. I didn’t know how to help.

  Shard after shard found its way back to its place. I closed my eyes and focused. ‘I can do this. I can do this.’ I insisted to myself, over and over. I pictured my sister with her arms around me. Of course I forgive you’ she had said. It was just a fantasy. Something I invented for myself. Even so it sang through my veins like a years-long promise, finally kept. I could help. I just had to calm down. I loved these girls. I cherished them. And I would help them. Every loop. Every single time. Finally the last shard slid into place and the window was whole again, like I’d never touched it. Junia looked at me with the whole world in her eyes, but she didn’t leave her mother’s side.

  If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

  “How did you do that, miss?” She asked. I took a deep breath.

  “It was easy,” I explained, “I’m magic.” She opened her mouth halfway, then looked at her mom and back at me.

  “Really?” She asked hesitantly, and I nodded as energetically as I could.

  “Really really,” I promised. I picked up the muffins I had brought, magically restored along with the window, and held them up. “But not as magic as a good meal. Are you hungry?” She looked almost pleadingly at my bag of muffins before looking back at her mom again.

  “We are, but... we aren’t supposed to leave mom’s side,” she said. “We have asked again and again, but she won’t answer. She is too angry with us.” Again I looked at the corpse on the sofa. I felt sick, but I couldn’t show it. Not to Junia. So I approached them instead, holding a muffin out on offer.

  “Alright. You can’t leave, I understand,” I lied. “But you can eat, can’t you? She didn’t tell you not to eat, did she?” Junia’s eyes lit up as she shook her head.

  “Um, no,” she replied, looking back to her mom for confirmation. None came, but neither did any denial. Finally, she couldn’t resist any longer. She accepted the muffin and immediately broke a piece off. “Millie, you hungry? I got some yummy food for you!” she promised, and my heart broke all over again. There is nothing quite like the protection of an older sister. Millie didn’t respond like I would expect a child of her age. No screaming or crying. She simply accepted the food, allowing Junia to feed her as her mother’s cold arms held her. It was a scene like an ancient painting, carrying a beauty that aches to observe.

  On this morning, so many times, Junia has always made sure her sister was fed and safe before taking a single bite herself, however hungry she was. This time was no different, despite the changed circumstances. It only made me love her more. I wished she would eat as well, but I understood. Camilla would have done the same. At least they were eating. And while they did, I had to think.

  Something had definitely changed. The Quiet was behaving as it had on the first loop. Without the violence. But there was a new poison. After all the times I had seen these girls, I was certain. Junia was too perceptive for this. And even if she wasn’t, she wouldn’t care. A mother’s anger may be terrifying, especially at her age, but she would have accepted it if it meant feeding Millie. Nothing natural can compel an older sister to let her siblings hurt or ache with hunger. Not one like Junia.

  As Junia finally took a bite of her own muffin, only taking nibbles so as not to shock her empty stomach, I examined the corpse of her mother. There was some other magic in the room. Something I couldn’t see. Just like the magic that reanimated the dead at Margaret’s command. Something that lingered. Something connected to the soul. There was an obvious answer, but I didn’t like it. I wanted to know more, but I also wanted to stay with the girls. So I focused on the body in front of me.

  I didn’t notice at first, when my aura acted on its own. The same way it did the first time I cast ‘Lamentations’. Aura spilled out of me and into the fabric of the loop as I looked into the empty woman’s eyes. It would be a long time before I knew how this new spell had activated. I only now understand why.

  “We have to do something about this,” the woman behind me said. I nearly jumped out of my skin, squeaking a bit in shock and startling Junia in turn. “This death… it's no way to go. I was right about that much, at least.”

  “Um, are you alright miss?” Junia asked. She looked guiltily down at her muffin. “Um… did you want some?” She offered it to me with a flavor of heartbreak only a child can feel. I looked at her in confusion, then back at the woman behind me. Then at Junia again. I could see that Junia saw no one there. This wasn’t terribly surprising, but surreal nonetheless. Junia didn’t know her mother was dead, either. And the woman who had spoken wasn’t there at all. Instead, she was composed of an ocean of teal sparks, swirling around and forming the shape of a woman. Never still and never calm.

  “N–No, thank you, Junia. Those are all yours and Millie’s,” I promised. “Just don’t eat too fast.” I spoke out the side of my mouth, unable to take my eyes off of the new interloper.

  “Thanks miss!” Junia replied with more cheer than any child in her shoes should have. As the girl nodded in satisfaction, returning to her meal and getting crumbs all over her dress, I bit my lip and took a step back.

  “O–Of course. Um, I’ll be right back,” I replied, awkwardly dismissing myself and walking to the door. My hand shook as I undid the lock and slipped out the front door. The incorporeal woman put her hands in nonexistent pockets and followed my out. I closed the door behind me and stared at her again.

  “You’re dead,” I whispered. She looked down at herself and shrugged.

  “At least I wasn’t killed by the quiet. So what am I doing here?” I shook my head.

  “No, you can’t exist. Not even like this. Margaret, you died as a child,” I insisted.