Free Soundless by Richelle Mead Page A

respectful distance.
    What bold little girl?
I ask, puzzled.
    He hesitates.
The one who climbed the rotten shed even though she knew it was dangerous. Just to prove she could. I thought you were so brave back then. Brave and bold and beautiful. I always believed that over the years until . . . well, you’ve changed.
    My heart lurches at all the misunderstandings that have arisen between us.
I haven’t
, I say.
Look, I thought about what you said, about how it isn’t enough to just keep getting by day after day as we are. I saw my sister . . . and she’s exactly like that. Not happy with her life but convinced there’s nothing more. I can’tlet her go on like that, with nothing else to hope for. I want to help you. I want to talk to the keeper too and see if there’s a way to change things.
    It all comes out in a jumble, not nearly as eloquent as I’d hoped. Li Wei studies me for several long moments. The earlier rain clouds have passed. With the sun down and the moon still rising, torches light the paths around the village, casting flickering light and shadows, but I can see well enough to know he’s trying to decide if I’m speaking the truth. Unless I’m mistaken, I even see a flash of hope in his eyes, as though he too wonders if there might be a way to repair our past.
    At last, he shakes his head again.
No. It’s too dangerous, Fei. You wouldn’t be able to handle it. I’m already going to have my work cut out for me keeping myself alive. I can’t allow myself to worry about you the whole time.
    I won’t be a burden!
I insist.
I can help you.
    Now he looks amused.
How? Will you win the line keeper over by drawing him a picture?
    I sigh in irritation.
Clap your hands
, I tell him.
    He stares in understandable confusion. I gesture impatiently, and with a shrug, he claps three times. The sounds are short and loud.
    Now do it again
, I say, just before turning around. I wait and hear nothing. After several seconds pass, I look back and glare.
You didn’t clap.
    He looks a little surprised but shrugs.
What’s the point?
    Just do it
, I insist. I turn my back to him, and this time heclaps. I face him once more.
You just clapped three times.
    His face is understandably puzzled at this exercise, but he doesn’t yet seem to grasp that anything unusual is happening.
So? That’s what I did before.
    Then clap a different number of times, and I’ll tell you the amount.
Seeing his baffled look, I add,
Do it
.
    He claps four times, and I tell him the number. Then two. Then seven. The last time, he doesn’t clap at all, and when I turn around, his eyes are impossibly wide.
    You didn’t clap that time
, I say.
    How are you doing this?
he asks.
    I steel myself, working up the courage to state what I can barely believe myself.
I can hear the sounds—they’re caused when you clap. I don’t understand it, but somehow my hearing has returned. I hear this. I hear all sorts of things.
    The idea is so ludicrous, so beyond our everyday experience, that Li Wei can’t even try to take it seriously. He looks at me like we’re children again, caught up in a game.
It’s some kind of trick. Come on, Fei. Tell me how you’re really doing it.
    It’s not a trick!
I tell him.
It’s been going on for almost two days, and I don’t understand it. That’s why I was so distracted earlier when your father died. Li Wei . . . you’re the first person I’ve told. You must believe me.
    He scrutinizes me intently.
It’s impossible
, he says, though his expression isn’t so certain.
Hearing is gone for us.
    Not for me
, I say.
    Why just you then?
    I wish I knew. . . . You can’t even begin to imagine what this has been like.
The burden of carrying this secret is catching up with me, and I think Li Wei is beginning to realize this. His expression softens, filling with an affection