Hurmond popped up behind her.  Melony jumped, grabbed her shirt over her pounding heart, bunching the material as she pulled back from the end of the wagon.   She watched the old man.  He looked over the gear she’d stowed, making sure everything was exactly as he liked.  Apparently he was satisfied because he gave her a thin grunt of praise.
      His appraising gaze swung to her.  “We’re doin’ one more sweep around the thornwood before heading back.”
     “We?”  She dared to hope he was going to train her a bit.
     “We.  Got your gloves?”
      After all these weeks, she still felt awkward in boy’s clothing, though they were best for the wasteland.  If she still had her old life, she’d be wearing expensive dresses, living in luxury, preparing for a career as a magic-user, and fending off suitors.  But all that brightness had faded, just tarnish on the silver, and here she was, apprenticed to a glass monger. 
      She reached into the front right pocket of her pants and pulled out a pair of leather gloves.  They weren’t ladies’ gloves.  These were hand-me-downs from the old man, patched and scratched by years of digging in rubble.
      “Put them on,” he said.
      She hurriedly jammed her fingers into the ill-fitting gloves and reached into the wagon for the straw hat that would keep the day’s glare off her face.  It was still cool, but the waste would be broiling soon.  The great crimson orb of the sun on the horizon promised a punishing day.  Her eyes scanned the tarnished-copper sky, looking for clouds.  They were ever so far away.  Just my usual luck.
      Hurmond said, “If we find any bottles intact, don’t touch.  I’ll defuse them.  Same goes for gemstones.”
      A lot of the glass they found was melted slag, rounded, smooth, but sometimes they turned up better preserved, broken glass with cutting edges.  This type, too, could hold traces of the magic from the mage-war that had created the waste years ago.  Lower-level charms could be made from glass.  Higher-level magic needed the crystalline depths of actual jewels for storage.   Any jewels found in the waste might well be weapons.
      The old man walked away, heading for the thornwood stand.  He stomped through scrub brush and slid once in a while in the loose powdery soil.  Melony ran to catch up.  A dark green shadow joined her, ambling along at her side.  She glanced down to see her new friend.  He’d apparently decided he wasn’t going to be left out of things.  Leaping, he caught her arm, swinging up to hang himself around her neck.  Her left arm caught him, adding support.
      He stared at her with butter-amber eyes.  “X’on.”
      She smiled.  “Yes, I know.  Can you say my name?  Can you say Mel-o-ny?”
      “X’on.”
      “I suppose not.”
      She caught up to Hurmond, finding him on a different side of the thornwood and the tumbled stones than he’d already dug around.  He sniffed the air, letting his talented nose guide him to glass.  Melony wondered if he’d been born that way, or if it was a gift of the waste.  She was about to ask when the old man stopped to turn over a medium-sized rock.  Underneath was a pocket watch, the glass face cracked.  Slivers of glass lay near the ruined mechanism.  Ivory thorns surrounded the watch.
      The old man produced a brush and carefully swept aside the soil.  The ivory thorns became the fingertips of a skeletal hand.  He nodded to himself, and replaced the stone, muttering a prayer for the dead.
      “We’re not taking the glass?” Melony asked.  “I don’t think he’d begrudge us the pieces.”
      “Perhaps not,” Hurmond said.  “But it’s my personal rule to let the dead keep what is theirs.”  He pointed away at a clump of boulders.  “Go look over there.  Let your heart guide your eyes.”
      She stared at him.  What he said made no kinda sense.
      He shooed her off.  “Get on, with you.”
      She went.  There were three boulders leaning against one another, forming a point.  It had the look of a deliberately placed marker.  Circling the rocks, she sniffed, feeling stupid for doing so.  All she smelled was dust.
      X’on climbed down and scampered to the pile.  He reached inside and pulled out a many-legged, ropy thing the color of cream, with a red pair of pincers fore and aft, like two top halves of something stuck together and brought to life.  The middle body was palm sized and segmented.
      “Careful,” she warned X’on.  “It could bite you.”
      Ignoring her, X’on dashed it against a small rock, picked up another rock, and pulverized the bug at either end, taking out both heads.  He gathered up the remains, tore off the pinchers, and stuck the rest of the thing in his mouth, crunching through its outer shell.  Half of it gone, he extended the rest to Melony.
      She held up a hand, waving off the gift.  “That’s all right.  It’s all yours.  Enjoy.”
      The rest of the meal vanished into X’on’s mouth.
      She looked at him.  “I don’t suppose you know where I can find something good?  Glass, I mean.”
      He ambled a dozen paces and studied the ground as if he could see clean through it.  Turning toward her, he gave a little jump, as if that settled something.
      She lifted an eyebrow.  “Really?  There?”
      His serious eyes peered into hers.  “X’on.”
      “Well, all right, I’ll give it a try.”  She strolled over and knelt in the dust.  Her gloved hands scooped the soil, pulling it aside.  A lot of the dirt flowed back into the hole, but she kept at it until a greenish-blue sparkle appeared in the smooth curve of unbroken glass, a bottle untouched by the fires of ancient war.  She couldn’t look away.  The deep, rich color sang to her, a promise of wealth, of power.   Her hands trembled.  Without thinking, she pulled off her gloves and reached into the hole.
      X’on growled.
      She paused, pulled from distraction, back to her senses.  She put her gloves back on.  What am I doing?  I know better.
      She looked back at the area where the old man was poking around.  She called out his name.  “Hurmond, come over here.  Hurry!”
      He turned on his haunches to see her.  “What’cha got?”
      “Glass,” she called.  “I think it’s a bottle.”
      His white, shaggy brows lifted.  He climbed to his feet and shambled over, kneeling next to her.  His little handbroom came out again and more of the glass was revealed.  “Right you are.”  He gave her a considering glance.  “How’d you know this was here?  It’s not where I told you to look.”
      She shrugged.  “Maybe I smelled something.”
      “Or maybe you just got lucky.  Good either way; luck and talent, both have their uses.”  He dug away more of the dirt and stared.
      “Is there magic in it?” Melony asked.
      He took a deep sniff.  “I’d say so, and more.”
      “More?”  The bottle had no cork.  Through the sides, she saw no liquid remained.  The bottle was empty except for the magic imbued in the glass.
      Hurmond nodded.  “Sometimes emotions and memories emerge when the magic is called forth.   That watch back there might well have had the feelings of its owner’s last moments.  Think of mage-fire falling on this place, of the people screaming, their houses and their bodies assailed, dissolving in unbearable pain, leaving bare bone behind.  Barely time to scream.  The dyin’ want to live, want it bad.  That desire can burn itself into the glass.  Those memories can take over the soul of the unwary.  It’s why I’m always tellin’ you not to touch such things until I’ve tested them.”
      Melony felt her face heat with embarrassment.  She’d almost broken his rule.  Something bad could have happened.  X’on had saved her, again.
      “How are you going to test it?” Melony asked.
      Hurmond put hands on opposite sides of the hole, leaning down for a better look. “Well…”
      X’on screeched and leaped away, yanking his tail tip out from under the old man’s right hand.  The little monster landed, snatched up his tail, and growled back at Hurmond.  He didn’t care, having fallen face-first into the hole.
      Melony held her breath, trying to remember if she’d heard the sound of breaking glass or not.
      Hurmond shuddered, pushing himself up again.
      Melony stared into the hole.  The bottle was there, unbroken, but with a few drops of blood on it.  She peered at the old man’s face.  He clutched his nose, cursing under his breath.  His words ran down like a watch.  He stayed silent, his stare going off into the distance.  Only his thin chest moved as he drew slow breaths.
      Oh my, oh my, oh my, oh my…
      Her voice bled out, a bare whisper, “Master Hurmond?  Are you well?”
      He ignored her, his eyes widening, his hungry gaze falling into the hole.  “My memories, I want them all!”  He reached out, his hand a claw.
      Melony grabbed his wrist, pulling the old man to the side.   “No, that’s dangerous.”
      Hurmond sprawled in the dirt, his scowl finding her.  “It’s mine!  Don’t get in the way, boy.”
      “Boy?”  Seized by suspicion, she glared back.  “You know my name.  Use it.”
      X’on straddled the hole, baring fangs.  His growl lashed out.  His tail wagged behind him, energetic, agitated.
      “Your name isn’t important,” Hurmond said.  “Only the bottle.”
      Melony’s eyes narrowed in thought.  “You don’t know my name.  You’re not even you right now.”
      Pushing himself back to sitting, there were blue-green clouds in Hurmond’s eyes.   “Of course I’m me.  This is all mine.   We Kullerans have been on this land for generations, tending the trees.”  He grabbed a handful of powdery earth, letting it fall from his fist like sand in an hourglass.   This is my home.  My family has … has…”  He stared around at the barren waste as if seeing it for the first time.  His stare swept past the pointing rocks, across the broken ruins of what had once been a house.  “No, what is this cursed place.   Where is my house, my family…?”
      Melony’s throat tightened.  Her heart felt heavy as lead.  Tears blurred her vision.  “Gone,” she said, “along with your life.”
      “My … life?  My life!”  His stare stabbed into forever.  “My Anja and Aylice, they’re dead?  But everyone said the war wouldn’t come this far, that it would burn itself out in a season and the world would go on as before.”
      X’on no longer growled.  His eyes were warm pools of gold.  Staring into them, Melony thought she saw a hunger equal to the ghost’s, maybe greater, for X’on's world was farther lost than the past this spirit sought.  The little monster blinked solemnly, sighing.   “Xxxxxx’on.”
      They’ve both lost a lot more than me.  I at least have a chance to get back all I’ve lost.
      X’on backed away as Melony scrambled on her knees to approach the hole.  With a loosely gloved hand, she lifted the bottle out of the hole, turning toward her possessed master.   Disturbed from the bottle, fresh dust fell across her pants. 
      How do I undo this?  I need Hurmond back, or I don’t get paid.
      His eyes were on the bottle. 
      Melony knew about being adrift in a changed world, her hopes and dreams passing on to others, leaving nothing but pain.  Pain that made you want to run and hide, afraid you’ll never be whole.  She felt her pulse slow, her heartbeat dragging her into the future, moment by moment.
      “Do you still want this?” she asked.
      He reached toward her.
      She said, “This bottle holds the rest of your memories.   A lot of good ones, probably.  But if you take them back, you will feel the death of your family again.  Their pain and suffering will be real again.  Do you really want their screams echoing inside you?  Do you think that will make them happy?”
      His hand came closer, stopped, and withdrew.  “No, no.  Let them rest in the silence of death.   Ah, life is cruel.  I’m back just to suffer.”
      Melony drew a deep breath and released it, hardening her resolve.  “No, I can’t free myself, but I can free you.”  She smashed the bottle over a head-sized rock.  Shimmering shards of blue-green scattered across the stone and the surrounding dust.  She let go of the bottle’s neck.  It fell amid the glittering ruin.  “Your memories are gone.  Hurry up and follow them.  Your family is waiting.”
      Mine isn’t.
      The greenish-blue clouds in Hurmond’s eyes brightened and condensed into star-points.  His head flopped back.   He stared into the brightening sky.  The cool light beamed up from his face.  The beams narrowed, weakened, and then snapped out.   Hurmond collapsed backwards, his legs folding under him.   He lay still as a corpse.  
      Melony watched as moments fused together, taking her toward new dreams that were barely defined.  She tasted the bitterness of hope as a soft wind stirred and snatched her hat, casting it off so that it rolled free.   Her tears dried.  X’on came over and hung himself on her, his tail lightly brushing the glass fragments of lives lost.
      At least we’re in this together.
      Finally, the old man groaned and rolled over.  He pushed off the ground, looking around, a little bit of blood still marking his face.  His confused eyes found Melony.  “What happened?”
      “You knocked yourself out,” she said.
      His eyes gleamed with excitement.  “The bottle!  Where?”  He looked at the ground near her.  “Oh, it’s all right!  Splendid.”
      Splendid?  She stared down and saw X’on’s tail withdrawing.  The pieces were back together again.  The bottle was whole.  She sighed, holding the beast.  Too bad you can’t do that for you and me.  I guess we’ll just have to make the most of our pain, and our chances.
      “X’on.”  The animal hugged her back, his butter-amber eyes full of swirling mysteries.