Midsummer’s day was always a painful day for Lyra. In the same why that she broke her mother, Will broke Lyra. Thier impossible love had dashed poor Lyra’s heart on the rocks and it shattered as the Subtle Knife had shattered. It seemed that she lived day by day just waiting for that one day.

She had tried going to Dame Hannah’s boarding school but it didin’t work out. She always seemed distracted and none of the other girls like her. The private Alethiometer lessons didn’t work out either. She always got frustrated that the meanings didn’t come to her. She had always had it easy but she just couldn’t do it by knowledge and books. She kept on trying but it only made her feel worse. Pantalaimon had tried to comfort her and encourage her but he was making little headway. She would never be the same.

So it is 11:30 on Midsummer’s day and 15 yera old Lyra Belacqua is walking down the street towards the Botanical Gardens in Oxford with her Pine Marten Daemon on her sholder, softly sobbing.

“C’mon Lyra! Pull yourself together! We are almost there and Will wouldn’t want you like this, would he?” The Pine Marten said.

“That’s the problem, Pan! He is not here! Oh how I wish he was, but he en’t. He never will be...” Lyra responded.

Just then the reached the Botanical Gardens. The sound of water quietly lapping in the psuedo-pond greeted them. Lyra slowed her walk to a turtle pace and tried but failed to look like nothing was wrong with her. Pantalaimon jumped off her sholder and ran ahead to the bench.

Lyra, sob-wracked and teary-eyed, failed to notice a stone lying in her path and fell with a grunt. People started to rush over. A scrap of sense took Lyra back to reality; All these people will soon she that she is not with a daemon. Lyra whispered for Pan to come back and he heard her, but too late. The first bystander, a girl about Lyra’s age had reached her. She slowly tried to drag Lyra up from the ground and Lyra resisted. But this girl was much stronger. With a heave she dragged Lyra up. Then she stopped. She looked left and right, up and down. Her couger daemon uttered a small gasp, and the girl dropped Lyra. With a small, high- pitched squeal she backed away and then broke into a run out of the Gardens, with her Daemon close on her heels.

Lyra yelled after the girl, “Wait! It’s not what you see!”

The other people then reached her. Lukily, Pan had scrambled back and jumped on he sholder just as the first, “Are you all right?”’s and, “What happened?”’s started to pour in. Lyra had enough wits back then to lie expertly to every question asked. After a time they backed away. It made Lyra fell a little better to know that through all her turmoil, she still had it in her

“Oh, Pan. That girl saw me without you...What? What is it, Pan” Lyra whispered to Pantalaimon.

“I hope I am wrong, Lyra. But I am pretty sure that couger was Hiraoth.” Pan whispered back.

“Hiraoth? But the only couger daemon named Hiraoth we know is...” Lyra asked with a confused tone in her voice. Her heart nearly stopped right there. She felt she couldn’t breath.

No! NO!!! It can’t be!

“...Susan Liaprer’s Daemon.” Pan finished.

Susan Liaprer was one of Lyra’s boarding mates in the school. She was a bully and liked to torment all the younger persons at the boarding school. She mostly left Lyra alone, and Lyra really never noticed her. But the scary thing was that she was in the same house as Lyra! Soon she would be at the school telling everyone that Lyra was strange.

“No...Pan, it can’t be! It has to be some other girl! Some other couger! Pan...”Lyra whimpered

“We have to go and stop her. You know that...” Pan said anxiously

“We can’t Pan! Will! It is midsummers day! We made a promise and that is one promise I can’t break!” Lyra near shouted.

Some people started to take intrest in this conversation as Pantailamon saw. He flashed her a thought and even in her incresing pace of thoughts she knew what to do. in the same way Will had did, she made herself uninteresting. She casualy walked with Pan down the small path. Soon people lost intrest. They continued.

“Will loves you, right?” Pan said. And nearly before he finished, Lyra jumped on top of him in a rage. She pinned so hard that not even he could escape her grasp. Lukily enough for him, he had expected this result and wasn’t hurt.

“Of coarse he loves me! He loves me with all his heart! And I love him too! Who do you think you are?” Lyra said between clenched teeth. She shook him and then let go of him and got up.

“Then he would understand. He loves you Lyra and he will understand if you have to break that promise once for an important reason. You must know that. If you don’t do something, then worse things may happen. You may even die. And what would that do for Will?” Pantalaimon said calmly.

With her rage subsided, she felt empty. She had attacked her own daemon. She had tried to stop her own soul. She knew that was wrong. And she knew Pan was right. like always.

“Oh, Pan. Please forgive me. I guess you are right.” Lyra sobbed. “Please, Will. Please understand. I’m sorry...”

Lyra cried a bit next to the tree. It is only 11:55. She slowly and reluctantly walks away. pan stays right next to her and is silent. They reach the threshold of the Garden. She hesitates and Pantalaimon whimpers and nuzzels her ankle.

“This is it, Pan. Like all those other times, yet like none of them. I feel worse than when I left you and went to the world of the dead. It hurts so much...Will...” Lyra sobbed.

“But you always made it through, Lyra. Always. And now won’t be diffrent. We have to hurry, Lyra. They got a big headstart.” Pan said.

“Yes. We had better hurry. We en’t going to lose now.” Lya stated. Then she took off at a run with Pantalaimon right in back of her.

---

In a world too far away, a world too unbearably close. Will’s world

“I can’t understand it. Something is wrong, Kirjava. I can feel it...They...they aren’t there.” Will said, trying to hold back tears and failing.

Kirjava nuzzled his hand with her head and said nothing. If cats could cry, she would be with Will.

“It must be improtant. Something is wrong. Lyra would never break her promise. Something is terrbily wrong...and we can’t do a thing about it.” Will half-cried.

As the pair walked out of the garden, they could faintly see what looked like a ghost. It looked like...It looked like Lyra! But as Will rubbed his eyes, the faint image disappeared as quickly and mysteriously as it appeared. But will could swore he heard something. He got dizzy as he thought he heard Lyra’s dear voice faintly whisper, “...and we en’t going to lose now.”

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