Ring the bell.
Close the book.
Snuff the candle.
-- Traditional manner of excommunication from the Roman Catholic Church

Robin has lost track of places, but not of dates. She feels she must have a knack for retaining all the wrong sorts of information-- the bus timetables make sense but the names on the maps do not; she recalls the price of bread, but not the currency with which it was bought.

Amon knows where they are. She knows he would tell her, but the last time she asked wasn't all that long ago, and he was very patient to detail the whole month's itinerary. She's not in a hurry to admit she's gotten confused already.

With the obscure and difficult path they've been taking, there's no one else to ask for direction-- and one northern European tongue sounds very much like another to her ears, anyway. Not that it matters. A year ago, she might have been surprised that he speaks the language here, too, but she takes it for granted now. He speaks Japanese when they're alone, but he's taken to Italian, in public places.

She wonders if he knows how grateful she is for that.

Tonight her eyes are tired and something like a headache burns at the base of her neck. There is fresh snow on the ground, dusting the trees and the rooftops alike, but none falling. And of course they're on the rooftops, threading their silent way across the skyline. The dusting of snow makes their footing treacherous, but Amon is careful not to walk too fast, and she plants her boots in the center of his larger footprints.

Robin walks a little slower than she ought to, trying to memorize the pattern of the skyline so that she might later be able to identify the town. Though it's not late, the season is; the sun has long since set and each building's windows wink with lights.

City children are busy lighting luminarias along the sidewalk below. She knows she shouldn't, but Robin plays a little game with them and their matchbooks. If they were less engrossed in their chatter and the race to get the candles lit, they might notice that each wick flickers to fire the instant before it's touched by the match.

The feel of the flame right behind her eyes, the instant it leaps to life on each tiny wick, is keeping her focused. It's been another long day of travelling. She tells itself that it's harmless. She doesn't notice that Amon has been watching her for the past fifteen minutes.

"You're only making things more difficult, you know."

She blinks; a young boy lights his candle unassisted. "Sorry."

The broad, red-brick side of a building looms in front of them: another fire escape, another long way up and around. Robin tries to remember the last time she walked into a building by its front door.

Amon treads catlike on the wrought metal, barely making a sound. She has learned to imitate him in that, at least. Surely he has a hundred ways to make her feel young and awkward, but she refuses to be an embarrassment when she can help it.

They out-quiet each other so intently that sometimes they go for days without conversation. Robin wordlessly dares him to break silence first; she can't tell if he's thinking the same, or if he doesn't notice.

Now Amon sighs through his nose; she knows she's hesitated behind him too long. She thinks that he just hates to speak aloud when they both know what he'll say. "We have to go."

Her eyes follow him, but her feet don't move. Beyond the brick house there is a church, its spire lifting towards the clouded, heavy night. The luminarias are leading in an artless trail to its open doors, althought it's probably her imagination conjuring the scent of incense and of pinesap, the shapes of cruet and chalice. Do they even have those here?

The words spill out in spite of herself; it's something she promised herself she wouldn't say. "Amon, it's Christmas Eve."

She thinks that he's too far ahead to hear her, or that he won't answer. Another luminaria lit; another tiny point of light doing little to dispel the darkness. She struggles with her thoughts. Her second Christmas away from the convent: just another empty winter night. She's cross with herself for mentioning it, for letting herself think of it at all. It shouldn't mean anything. They've eaten; they have planned shelter for the night. The date shouldn't matter.

Not when this is the path she's chosen, the book she closed herself.

They spoke of it just once, closer to summer's solstice than to winter's. The memory is hazy with heat and distance: somewhere in Russia, maybe? It's been a long year. Making their way slowly across the continent, too many hours sleepless and too many miles traversed, they sat side by side-- the only ones in the train car-- their heads close together and their voices at a whisper.

She admitted that she felt guilty no longer going to Mass, though she knew full well why she mustn't be caught in a church.

He, for his part, said that he'd never been in a church but to Hunt. And she couldn't explain to him why that thought tightened her throat, made her eyes sting with tears.

The subject was not broached again.

Amon's still standing on the stairs, one foot up and hesitating, something thoughtful in the tilt of his head as he watches the people below. She can't read his expression. But then, when has she ever been able to? Maybe he's remembering Russia and wishing the words unsaid, as she is.

The churchbells sound out: bright and brass, sending deep echoes scattering into the corners of the cold night. Robin's feet are tingling, the shingles beneath her boots humming with vibration. The chimneys and gables around them catch each tone and give it back threefold. Beneath them, the children abandon their fire-games and race for the doors.

She shivers. The cold here is more like Japan than like Italy, but nowhere in Shinjuku did she ever hear churchbells like that.

"It looks like the place is pretty crowded."

It takes her a heartbeat to realize that Amon's holding out his hand to her, that he's speaking Italiano. The fire escape ladders lead down, as well as upwards.

She's beside him so quickly that she nearly slips in the snow. "Amon?"

He steadies her with a hand on her arm, leans down until their forehead nearly touch. "If we're careful, we won't be seen."

A fire leaps to life in her heart.

The evening wind spills down the street, but not a single candleflame wavers.

- fin -

tiny author's note: WHR's final episode was aired on Christmas Eve, 2002.