chapter 4. A whisper in the twilight

The silence that had fallen over the workshop after their lesson was broken by a sharp, insistent knock on the door. It wasn't the dull thud of a guard's fist, nor the light tap of a delivery man. Instead, it was a nervous, staccato rhythm, as if someone were tapping out a morse code of their own anxiety.

Hugh startled, looking up from his contemplation of Gray's drawing. His face was momentarily wary, professionally closed, but it softened as he listened to the rhythm.

“That’s to be expected,” he muttered, more to himself, as he headed for the door.

Gray was on his guard. He’d learned to read his father not only by the shades of gray, but also by the sound of his footsteps. Now, it wasn’t just caution, but… anticipation.

Hugh opened the door.In the doorway, shrouded in evening twilight, stood a girl. She looked about sixteen years old. To Gray, she was a composition of movement and texture: her sharp shoulders hunched under the thin fabric of her raincoat, her wet dark hair plastered to her cheeks from the rain, and the quick, jerky movements of her head, as if she were constantly looking around.

"Lyra," said Hugh, and there was relief in his voice. "Come in. Quickly."

The girl slipped inside like a frightened animal, and immediately pressed her back against the door, closing it. Her breath was quick and shallow.

"He's completely mad, your former mentor," she blurted out, not seeing Gray in the dim light. "At the Colorist Council... he demanded that the 'sanitation' begin immediately." His words! "Sanitation of the gray zones." He said that the "contagion" was spreading, that it threatened the very Core of the Prism!

Hugh's face turned pale. For Gray, this manifested itself in his father's skin taking on a lighter, duller hue.

"Calm down, Lyra. Speak more slowly. Which zones specifically?"

"All the outskirts!" It's mostly..." Her gaze finally fell on Gray, who was standing by the workbench. She paused, her lips pressed together in embarrassment.

"This is my son,— Hugh said firmly. — Gray. He can. More than that, he needs to hear it.

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Lyra slowly straightened up. Her eyes, a cool gray-green shade (which for Gray was just a special, slightly more moist and deep gray), slid over the boy inquisitively. There was no usual pity or disgust in her gaze. I was curious.

"So this is him," she whispered. "The one who's causing all the fuss."

"Nothing because of him," Hugh's voice hardened. — Vivan has been moving towards this for years.

Lyra shrugged, turning back into a nervous, impetuous girl.

—It doesn't matter. The bottom line is that the majority did not support him. They called him an alarmist. But..." she paused, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. "But I saw the way he looked at them. He didn't give up. He just realized that he couldn't act openly. He left with a strange smile, Hugh. I didn't like it."

The workshop fell silent again, this time with a heavy weight of unspoken fears.

And then Gray broke it. He took a step forward, his boot squeaking loudly on the floor.

"Do you see colors?" he asked the girl quietly.

Lyra snorted. It was a sharp, disarmingly sincere sound.

"I do. But not all of them, if that's what you're asking. I confuse red with green. To me, the world is a constant battle between dull blue and obnoxious yellow." There was a familiar, old-fashioned bitterness in her voice. "Not broken enough for yours, not whole enough for theirs. The golden mean that everyone hates.

Gray was looking at her. He didn't understand the meaning of the words "red" or "yellow," but he understood the tone. The tone of loneliness. The tone of a man who doesn't fit in. And in that tone, he recognized the echo of his own feelings.

"I'm not like everyone else either,— he said simply.

Lyra froze, staring at him again. This time, her searching gaze softened. She nodded, briefly and sharply.

— It seems so. So we're in the same boat, greyness.

Hugh watched this dialogue, and a complex struggle of emotions took place on his face. Fear for my son. Anger at Vivan. And some new, fragile hope, sparked by this strange union of two outcasts.

"He's up to something, Lyra," Hugh said softly. "Something dangerous."

—Obviously,— she sniffed again. "I'll be listening." My father has a meeting of like-minded people today. If I find out something... I'll find a way to warn you.

She looked at Gray, then at Hugh, and her sharp shoulders finally relaxed.

“In the meantime… show me what you’re doing here. That one,” she nodded at Gray’s drawing, “looks interesting. Is there something written on it? Or are those just scratches?”

Gray smiled. For the first time, someone with "color" vision had asked him about it, not with condescension, but with genuine curiosity.

"Those aren't scratches," he said. "That's a path. It leads to an old oak tree. Do you want me to show you?"

Lyra nodded hesitantly. And as Gray began tracing his finger across the paper, explaining the pattern of shadows, and Hugh watched silently, something new emerged in the workshop. Not just an ally. Not just an informant. A friend had appeared. And a fragile bridge across the chasm between their worlds had finally been built.