The path from the ruin to the slaughterhouse takes seventeen seconds. I've counted them all.
One: the breathing starts, wet and labored, from somewhere east.
Two through four: the cracking of branches, something large moving through undergrowth.
Five: I drop the gold locket on the ground. Maybe this time—
Six through ten: the bulldozing sound grows closer. The trees shake.
Eleven: I play the flute. Holes one and six covered. The note hangs in the air, searching for resonance that isn't there.
Twelve: he enters the slaughterhouse. The walls groan.
Thirteen through fifteen: I back against the western wall of the ruin. The hook is in my hand but violence isn't the answer to this one. I know. I've tried.
Sixteen: William enters from the east. Four years old when he died except he didn't die. His mother's face in the gold locket on the ground between us. His own face in the silver locket in my pocket.
Seventeen: we look at each other.
After seventeen, the counting stops mattering.
I've hidden in the well — covered, uncovered, halfway down. I've worn both lockets, neither locket, one of each. I've played every combination of notes the flute can make. I've run east to meet him, run south to escape him, stood perfectly still.
The game waits with infinite patience for me to find the thing I haven't tried.
But some puzzles aren't puzzles. Some moments are just moments where someone who didn't die when he was four comes back to the place that failed to bury him, and someone else stands there holding the wrong lockets, playing the wrong notes, saying the wrong words or no words at all.
The breathing starts again. Wet and labored, from somewhere east.
One: I drop the silver locket this time.
Two: it makes no difference.
Three: of course it doesn't.
Four: but I have to try.