Chapter 195: Fracture II
The silhouettes of people passed me by. They were shadows, barely definable by form, featureless and empty. Their faces were indecipherable and alien, as if someone had harshly sketched them in the background of some grander image.
There was something I was supposed to be doing. Something important. The simple act of drawing the directive up from the blackness of my mind felt plodding and cumbersome, brimming with primal forewarning, not unlike the feeling that precedes plunging ones hand into fire. On some level, I knew what was happening to me. My mind was untethered, battered by the turn of events. If I could just find a focal point, something to home in on, I could bring myself back from it. The results would be temporary, and eventually Id return here, useless in the dark, but at least it would be something. At least I would be useful.
Lillian had been that to me once. My anchor. Even in the darkest moments, when I was discouraged or gravely hurt and dying, and all I wanted was to run away. Id think of the promise I made. And how much happier shed be in the safer, better world I was trying to create.
A fools dream, perhaps. But it comforted me. Grounded me.
That was all gone now.The source of this content nov(el)bi((n))
There was a cruel cackle somewhere in the background. I spun, searching for a golden eye in the sea of endless faces.
Finding none.
Perhaps therein laid the point. Shed both set the framework and carried it out flawlessly almost half-a-decade earlier. Thoth didnt have to be here, ready to mock me and throw salt in the wound. Because this spoke for itself.
I laughed, remembering the way my image of her had shifted during our encounters in the Sanctum. Up to that point, she was more of a force of nature than a person in my mind. A natural disaster to be defended against and opposed, with little granularity otherwise. Discovering that she was working to purify the prime ley line, and despite her clear hatred of me still carrying out her original mission to subvert Ragnarok, and that at one point during her many loops we had been allies, completely muddied the waters.
And perhaps, on some level, Id empathized. While I had no simple method for keeping track of the time Id spent in various loops, it probably added up to less than four or five additional years. By comparison, shed been doing this for at least a thousand. Maybe more.
I thought wed found a span-wide island of common ground. That during our duel, and the clash that preceded it, Id discovered some small sliver of humanity in her.
That perhaps despite our enmity, we could become allies once again, foes aligned towards a greater evil.
But there was no evil greater than this.
Lillian was a gentle soul. A cooling balm on an incendiary world. She wasnt a miracle worker, or a grand leader, or a prodigy. But she put in the work. She avoided arguments, judgment, and enjoyed helping people. Lillian and Gunther both went out of their way to aid the needy, sometimes digging into their own coffers to help those who couldnt help themselves.
Before me, shed lived a perfectly ordinary, inoffensive life.
And Thoth had shattered it, dredging spite and pettiness from a place so low and base I could barely even imagine it.
No. Whatever I thought Id seen in the Sanctum, I was wrong. There was no good in my enemy. Whatever humanity shed held was eroded long before Id met her. And when the next opportunity arose, there would be no quarter given. I wouldnt hesitate, the way I had in the Sepulcher.
No matter what it took.
Regardless of what her motives were, or the still unrevealed mystery of what Id done in past lives to incite such hatred. Using every method, cruel trick, and power at my disposal.
Id finish it.
Airn. Someone was grabbing my shoulder, shaking me.
I pulled my shoulder away, retreating from the touch.
Cairn. Maya said again, expression conveying barely suppressed hurt.
Finally, I came back to myself. The indecipherable faces passing on the cramped throughway regained clarity and detail. We were still on the street, though wed moved several blocks down, moving with the small groups of Mari and Sevrans banner as they canvassed the area, asking if anyone remembered the fate of the people who once ran the dilapidated apothecary down the street.
What? I said, trying to banish the irritation from my voice.
They found someone. Maya said, inclining her head in front of us.
A soldier from my regiment, dressed in the generic grays of a Topside denizen, was waiting patiently with a nervous-looking farmer in tow. The man shod a wide-brimmed hat and apron, and had likely been pulled away from one of the many produce stalls that lined the street.
You said thered be no trouble. The farmer half-whispered, half-hissed to the soldier that accompanied him. You promised, Cestus
Cestus squinted in the sunlight. Judging from the perspiration accumulating on his forehead and his wincing-demeanor, he was still nursing a hangover like many of my regiment. Relax. The commanders not so bad, so long as youre not sporting any ribbons. Just go on and tell em what you told me.
From the Farmers derisive look, he wasnt putting stock in that.
After all, this had happened countless times before. Endless cycles that Thoth had lived through that ended badly. Every soul still living had shuffled off their mortality so many times that even most of the pantheon had lost interest and left us. That included the people I cared for. People I loved. Caught in a never-ending loop of death and rebirth, joy and tragedy, hope and despair.
The swell of fear and bitterness that rose from within and threatened to lash out at everyone around me was still there. But with that consideration in mind it felt less. Diminished.
I pushed down the fear and crippling doubt, containing and poking at it through the lens of apathy. Over the last few years, hundreds of Demi-humans had disappeared from Topside, many leaving behind family and friends who loved them.
The truth was, this only felt so monumental because it was happening to me.
I was nothing more than a grain of sand on the coastline of eternity, futilely attempting to change the tide.
The particles before me thinned, growing translucent. The transformation spread upward, translucent streaks piercing up through the tunnel of darkness, stripping away the dark.
Oh yes. I remembered how to do this.
It was a solution for a different problem, a trick Id come up with to force myself to function when the consequences for failure was a painful death. I simply told myself it didnt matter. No matter how much agony, or trauma, or disfigurement I endured, it didnt matter. Because I would endure.
Emotions are temporary and irrelevant. Shove them down. Find out what happened. Piece together why it happened. Respond accordingly. Move forward.
Every wasted day was a day ceded to Thoth. In many ways, I was already losing. If I slowed down, let the despair hobble me, it would all be over in a lightning clap. The priceless opportunity this aberration in Thoths loops granted me would be frittered away on despair and self-loathing. And when Thoth failed to stop Ragnarok, as she had countless times before, Id be returned to the noble-nothing I once was.
The funnel of ambient mana lost the last traces of its midnight blue coloring. Its outline was still visible. But far less oppressive than before.
What did you do? Maya asked, puzzled. There was another buzz of mana on my palm, and the altered vision returned to normal.
Reined it in. I responded ambivalently
Instead of relief, somehow Maya looked more concerned. Im not saying you cant feel.
I shrugged. We can test the limits later. Figure out the best applications and thresholds.
Youre not hearing
I hear you. I laced my fingers between hers and squeezed gently. Just let me do whats needed to get through this. Okay?
With that, I let go. Her hand dropped to her side, and I felt her eyes boring holes into the back of my head as I returned to the soldier and farmer, still waiting nervously on the verge of the city street.
Apologies. I gave them both a thin smile. Its been an unpleasant day.
They both looked unsettled, but seemed to relax some.
Pleasant nights often carry unpleasant mornings in their wake, Commander, Cestus joked, wincing slightly. Though this is probably a little more than unpleasant.
Indeed. I turned my focus to the farmer. Tell me anything you can about the apothecary. If it bears fruit, therell be a reward in it for you.
What kind of reward? The farmer asked.
Depends on the information. More is better, so long as its accurate. The reward will reflect that.
Enticed, and seeming to pick up from context that my previous demeanor resulted from matters that had nothing to do with him, the farmer openly scowled. You want his entire life story?
His shift in attitude surprised me. Sorry. Whose?
Him. The apothecarys The farmer pointed. Down the street, I recognized the drunk whod made a bed on the light layer of snow that covered the dirt-strewn corner beside Grays. He looked rough, even by the metric of top-side drunk, his wind-burned face lined with wrinkles and crags, a bottle held loosely in his hand. He held the look of many who fell on hard times without a clue of how they got there, shambling through the fragments of their remaining life stricken and exhausted.
And in the clear light of day, I could see the rough state of his hands, layers of burns that accumulated over a lifetime of handling various volatile and acrid ingredients.
With a clashing sensation of relief and horror, I recognized the man whod welcomed me into his home. The person whod indulged my curiosity, taught me the more complicated aspects of his craft.
The father whose daughter Id failed twice over.
Gunther.
