The Truth

drink no more is zer—”
    “Tuppence is tuppence, that’s all I’m saying!”
    “Look, he’s starting to twitch! ” said Sacharissa.
    “And he can’t sing, either,” said Gowdie. “All right, all right, I’m going, I’m going…”
    Sacharissa patted Otto’s clammy hand.
    “You can beat it!” she said urgently. “We’re all here for you! Aren’t we, everyone? Aren’t we? ” Under her baleful gaze the dwarfs responded with a chorus of half-hearted “yesses,” even though Boddony’s expression suggested that he wasn’t certain what Otto was here for.
    Gowdie came back with a small package. She snatched it out of his hand and held it out to Otto, who reared back.
    “No, it’s just rat!” said Sacharissa. “Perfectly okay! You’re allowed rat, right?”
    Otto froze for a moment, and then snatched up the packet.
    He bit into it.
    In the sudden silence Sacharissa wondered if she wasn’t hearing a very faint sound, like the straw at the bottom of a milkshake.
    After a few seconds Otto opened his eyes, and then looked sidelong at the dwarfs. He dropped the packet.
    “Oh, vot shame! Vere can I put my face? Oh, vot must you zink of me…”
    Sacharissa clapped with desperate enthusiasm.
    “No, no! We’re all very impressed! Aren’t we, everyone?” Out of Otto’s sight, she waved one hand very deliberately at the dwarfs. There was another ragged chorus of agreement.
    “I mean, I haf been going through ‘cold bat’ now for more zan three months,” muttered Otto. “It is such a disgusting thing to break down now and—”
    “Oh, raw meat’s nothing, ” said Sacharissa. “That’s allowed, isn’t it?”
    “Yes, but for a second zere I nearly—”
    “Yes, but you didn’t, ” said Sacharissa. “That’s what’s important. You wanted to and didn’t.” She turned to the dwarfs. “You can all go back to what you were doing,” she said. “Otto is perfectly all right now.”
    “Are you sure—” Boddony began, and then nodded. He’d rather have argued with a wild vampire than Sacharissa at this moment. “Right you are, miss.”
    Otto sat down, wiping his forehead, as the dwarfs filed out. Sacharissa patted his hand. “Do you want a drink—”
    “Oh!”
    “—of water, Otto?” said Sacharissa.
    “No, no, everyzink is okay, I think…Uh. Oh dear. My goodness. I am zo sorry. You zink you are on top of it, and zen suddenly it all comes back to you. Vot a day…”
    “Otto?”
    “Yes, miss?”
    “What actually happened when I grabbed the eel, Otto?”
    He winced.
    “I zink zis is maybe not the time—”
    “Otto, I saw things. There were…flames. And people. And noise. Just for a moment. It was like watching a whole day go past in a second! What happened? ”
    “Vell,” Otto said reluctantly, “you know how salamanders absorb light?”
    “Yes, of course.”
    “Vell, zer eels absorb dark light. Not darkness, exactly, but zer light vithin darkness. Dark light…you see, dark light…vell, it has not been properly studied. It is heavier than normal light, you see, so most of it is under zer sea or in zer really deep caves in Ubervald, but zere is always a little of it even in normal darkness. It really is very fascinating—”
    “It’s a kind of magical light. Right. Could we just get more towards the point a bit?”
    “I haf heard it said that dark light is zer original light from which all other types of light came—”
    “Otto!”
    He held up a pale hand. “I haf to tell you zese things! Haf you heard the theory zat zere is no such thing as zer present? Because if it is divisible, zen it cannot be zer present, and if it is not divisible, zen it cannot have a beginning which connects to zer past and an end zat connects to zer future? Zer philosopher Heidehollen tells us zat the universe is just a cold soup of time, all time mixed up together, and vot we call zer passage of time is merely qvantum fluctuations in zer fabric of space-time.”
    “You have very long winter evenings in Uberwald, don’t you?”
    “You see, dark light is held to be zer proof of zis,” Otto went on, ignoring her. “It is a light without time. Vot it illuminates, you see…is not necessarily now .”
    He paused, as if waiting for something.
    “Are you saying it takes pictures of the past? ” said Sacharissa.
    “Or zer future. Or somevhere else. Of course, in reality zere is no difference.”
    “And all this you point at people’s heads?”
    Otto looked worried. “I am