by D. T. Kane
In response, Devan looked up to the sky. Jenzara followed his eyes, letting out a gasp at what she saw.
“It’s so... blue,” she said. The heavens shown azure, like an ocean over their heads. So long had the sky been the color of rust and worse, she hadn’t even thought to look before now. Though, as her eyes overcame the initial shock, she realized the sky wasn’t entirely untarnished. Here floated a cloud the color of roses, another pink like dusk, though it was the middle of the day.
Devan was nodding. “Yes, the angry fires of the Path have been quelled, yet not entirely extinguished. The paradox is resolved. Once more, there is but one Taul Bladesorrow, as it should be. But the Path is not completely healed. Overcoming the paradox extolled a great trauma upon it. Disturbances remain, like jagged rocks jutting from a river. They don’t divert the Path like a true rogue strand, but they alter its normal flow nonetheless. Time is near healed, but not quite. Not yet.”
“So what happens now?” Ferrin asked.
“Now?” Devan said, raising his eyebrows. “That’s such a relative term. Now.”
“Angel,” the Grand Master gruffed.
“Sorry. Sorry.” Devan raised his hands in placation. “What will happen is, once you leave this clearing, the Path with resolve you back into your proper places, beginning before Val altered the timeline by attacking the Grand Master at Riverdale. Let’s see, that was fifteen years ago, your time.” Devan angled his eyes upward, counting on his fingers. “So for Ferrin, Jenzara, your earliest childhood should remain unchanged. Grand Master, your years from before the Dales should similarly remain unaffected.”
The Angel spoke so casually she almost just accepted his words without question. But the implications quickly dawned on her. She turned quickly to Ferrin, an ache in her heart. From the look in his eyes, she knew he had the same thoughts as she.
“All we’ve gone through together since Riverdale will be gone? Like it never happened? We’ll forget everything we’ve done for all of our current lives as we know it?”
“No,” Devan said. “Well yes. And no.”
The Grand Master made that sound at the back of his throat. Ferrin pulled her close. She shuddered against him, searching for his hand to grasp, making sure he was still there. If what the Angel said was true, there was no guarantee he’d like her, even know her, once they stepped out of this clearing. Everything they’d ever lived through together would be lost. The Angel might as well be telling them they’d die when they left this clearing.
“You can’t just rob us of our lives, Angel,” Ferrin said, voice iron hard.
“It’s not like that,” Devan said, tone somewhere between exasperation and dismay. “Let me explain. You’re right in that the strand—the one in which you’d been living what you believe to have been most of your lives—is gone. Like a rivulet that’s been filled in. So once you leave this glade, you’ll enter a new strand, as that’s the only possible option—the strand in which you previously resided literally no longer exists. And once you enter the new strand, it will be as if you always lived there. Because you will have. At least, that version of you will have. You’ll have a new set of past memories and all the knowledge that goes along with them. Well, new in the sense that they’ll be different from the ones you have right now. But it will be as if you’d always lived that life. Because, again, you will have.”
“You’re not making things any clearer, or me feel any better,” Ferrin growled. The glower on Taul’s face showed he agreed. Even the dwarf was pulling at his mustaches. Jenzara felt like she’d hit her head, in a daze of reality. Yet somehow a part of her also understood the Angel’s explanation.
“But,” Devan said, holding up a hand to stem further comments, “you won’t forget everything. That would be terribly inconvenient for me, as I’ve previously explained to Ferrin. Oh, and inconvenient for you, too,” he added quickly at a glare from Taul. “You’ve been exposed to peregrination. All of you.” He took each of them in with a look. “Once you’ve gone through that, well, it’s like unlocking a door in your mind. One that remains forever locked in most. Your metaphysical will seep into your physical. And since your metaphysical self remembers all events, no matter where they occurred, so too will your physical self in the new strand.”
Jenzara’s head was spinning even more now. But in the short term she could at least hold onto the knowledge that she wasn’t about to forfeit the memory of her entire life.
“Plus, I gave you each a ring, made of wood from those very trees.” He motioned to the two willoaks—she wasn’t entirely sure how she knew that’s what they were called—that grew beside Taul’s house, both mature but one taller than the other. “That’s allowed you to take your memories from the now-resolved strand to here, a point not directly on the Path. So your memories didn’t die with the rest of the rogue strand. You’ll remember.”
“And what about us?” Ferrin said, drawing her closer. Jenzara felt her face heat, but it was a question she wanted answered as well. Needed answered.
Devan frowned and, unless she was greatly mistaken, nearly rolled his eyes.
“After what you’ve been through together, I don’t think you’ve anything to worry over. Your fates on the Path are linked. You’ll find one another again.”
“But we’ll have to start our relationship over,” she blurted without thinking, then clapped a hand over her mouth.
The Angel smiled. Grinned more like it. “Well, yes and no. It won’t be starting over, as you will remember what you’ve gone through to this point. But yes, you will grow up together, again. Think of it as a second chance at childhood.”
He said this as if it were some grand pronouncement. When they didn’t react as such, his smile faltered. “Perhaps you’re too young to appreciate the gift in that,” he muttered. “You’ll still have each other, that’s the important thing.” His face grew solemn. “I don’t mean to ever ruin another’s true love again if I can manage it.”
Her face heated again, hearing another characterize her relationship with Ferrin. But the Angel’s words had loosened the knot in her stomach. Even Ferrin gave the Angel a nod, the anger in his face easing.
“And there’s more to be thankful over!” the Angel blurted, rushing on to a new topic. “Those who were dead will not necessarily be so once you leave this clearing. The events that caused their deaths have been rinsed away.”
Realization exploded in her mind.
“My parents! They’ll be alive?”
Taul made a sound she didn’t quite understand, but it must have been surprise at the knowledge his dead friends might once more live. Devan considered before responding.
“Well, I can’t say for sure. Rogue strands are unpredictable, even for me. But in the new strand I can say with confidence that Val will not have killed Master Raldon. And your mother will not have died at the hands of his plot at Riverdale.”
Her cheeks ached with the breadth of her smile. She looked first to Taul, but he didn’t meet her gaze, so she turned the other way to Ferrin, hugging him once more.
“Perhaps I’ll find myself with parents too,” Ferrin said, returning her embrace. Jenzara smiled at him, then looked to the Angel, seeking confirmation.
“Yes. Perhaps,” Devan said, though his voice trailed off. He was staring at the girl, Autumn, who had run off to chase some butterflies around the clearing. Jenzara studied Devan’s face. He was smiling, but it held as much regret as it did joy. She’d barely spent any time with the Angel, but after some of the visions she’d seen, she felt as if she had some innate understanding of him. The pressures and tragedy of his life. But she also knew he held unexplained motives that were not always in the best interests of those around him.
“She’s the woman Valdin spoke of,” Taul said.
The smile on Devan’s face didn’t exactly depart. But it faded somehow, as if becoming a memory before her eyes.
“Yes,” he said. “As a child, obviously. But yes. She is Valdin’s Autumn. His lov
er. My greatest student.”
“The woman I saw?” Jenzara asked. “When you touched me? That was her,” she motioned to Autumn, “as an adult?”
Devan nodded, his face a study in twisted emotion, like the thorns of a rosebush. Jenzara looked from the Angel to the frolicking girl then back. It was difficult to comprehend. But why not after everything else that had happened? They all looked to Autumn for a time, not daring to speak and interrupt her innocent display of childish delight.
“Why here?” Taul finally asked. “And why would you be so cruel as to not tell him? Valdin?”
Now the smile did leave Devan’s face.
“I was ordered to annihilate her. Do you understand? Not just kill her. Eliminate her from the Path completely. As if she never existed.”
“Like Ral Falar,” Taul murmured.
“Yes,” Devan said, the anger that had momentarily colored his voice tempered by the understanding in the Grand Master’s tone. “I had done all I could think of to save her. All had failed. The Conclave would grant me no more time, no further reprieve. And the fact is that she truly was a threat to the Path, after what had been foreseen. The killing of a Constant. Just as bad as what Val attempted with you, Grand Master. So I had to carry out the sentence.
“But I couldn’t abandon her completely. So I hedged. I started by killing her, stopping any immediate chance she could carry out the future crime of which the Conclave had convicted her. But killing isn’t permanent. Not when you’re Aldur, at least. It’s just like taking a rock out of a river—you can always add it back in later. Or, more to the point, Val could have added her back if all I’d done was kill her. Gone back and altered events. That’s why the Conclave handed down a sentence of annihilation.
“So I had to remove her from the Path completely. But I didn’t annihilate her. Instead I created this,” he motioned around at the clearing. “A time loop. It has no direct connection to the Path, so when I brought her here, it was as if she was utterly gone. The others had no reason to question what I’d done. But this way a door to her salvation remains open. If I ever find a way to save her, prevent the crime she is doomed to commit in the future, I can take her from the time loop and she’ll live again.”
Ferrin let out an angry growl.
“Liar. You said we couldn’t change time once it’s already been done.”
“I said no such thing,” Devan snapped. “It’s Motus, the sheer, brute-force reversal of time, that doesn’t work. It’s like trying to mend a broken chair by simply jamming the pieces back together. It will all fall apart in the end.”
The look Devan cast at Jenzara as he said this sent a shiver down her spine, but he quickly went on.
“This isn’t the same thing. The Autumn I’ve brought here is from just before I met her. I couldn’t go any older without crossing my own timeline. She,” he motioned at the girl still chasing the butterfly, “hasn’t been infected yet by the terrible thoughts that forced the Conclave to pass its judgment on her. But somewhere between her present state and adulthood, she gets this, this—” he had to pause to clear his throat. “This idea in her head. For most it would have been irrelevant. But she had... has... will have.... Sorry, it’s difficult even for me to speak of someone who I first knew as an adult, then as a child. She had, and will have, the power to actually carry out the thought. And the consequences would have been—would be—just as dire as if the Seven had succeeded in possessing the Andstaed and returning to the Path. But so long as she’s preserved as is in this time loop, I’m free to search for what set her on that road to destruction. And if I could undo the underlying cause of that, well, there’s a chance the Path could be bent in a way that would save her.”
“But why not tell Valdin?” Jenzara asked. “He was so... angry. It drove him to such terrible things.”
Devan shook his head. “I couldn’t risk anyone knowing. I was already flaunting the Conclave’s command. They would have recognized if Val was anything other than utterly distraught at her death.
“But even more than that,” he went on, “I’m not sure telling him would have been a mercy. How would you feel if I robbed you of the one you love and replaced him with a version that was forever ten years old? Never growing or changing?”
The Angel’s eyes passed over Ferrin as he spoke. This brought on a fresh wave of embarrassment, having her feelings so publicly exposed. But with it also came understanding. The tragedy of the situation was staggering. Devan was right. Autumn lived, but was forever out of Valdin’s reach. Despite all the wrongs Valdin had committed, her heart mourned for him.
“And after recent developments,” Devan said, voice growing quiet, “it’s doubly good he doesn’t know. He’d burn the Path, using every last one of us for tinder, if he knew she still lived.”
“Recent developments?” she asked. “What do you mean?
It was Taul who spoke, with closed eyes, putting a hand to his forehead. “So it’s as I suspected? Valdin has regained his powers?”
Jenzara stared wide eyed at the man. How could that be?
“Yes,” Devan replied. “My chronometre once more shows two of my kind living. It was the ebon dagger, the shadow Link, wasn’t it?”
Taul nodded. “I threw it at him. Thought I’d killed him, too. But instead he stole the dagger’s power, then peregrinated.”
“Harvested, yes,” Devan murmured. “I should have considered that possibility.” He fiddled with his timepiece, flipping it open, them shutting it, then opening it again, as if they weren’t there. Finally, he looked up.
“He’s more dangerous than ever, now. And he won’t rest. He doesn’t know what I’ve done with Autumn, but he’s still convinced he can do something to save her. He may very well come for you again, Grand Master. Threaten all you care about. I will continue to watch over you, but you must be vigilant.”
The Grand Master’s face transitioned from exasperation to pain to a familiar granite hardness, the expression he’d worn so often since Jenzara had first met him. Jenzara couldn’t let him go back to that place.
“But it will be different this time,” she said, placing a hand on Taul’s arm. “This time you’ll have us to support you.”
“Aye,” Nellis chipped in. “We’ll all be wit’ ye, Grand Master.”
A smile returned to the Angel’s face. “You’ll likely even all be in Tragnè City with him.”
She hadn’t thought of that, and the idea brightened her nearly as much as the thought of her parents living once more. Without the disaster at Riverdale, there’d be no reason for father to be exiled to Ral Mok. Tragnè City would be her home.
“Perhaps you can give me some more of your lessons, Taul,” she said. “I learned much from you during our short time in Falume, though I may not have wanted to admit it at the time.”
A smile broached the man’s face, cracking the stony façade he’d been building up.
“It would be my honor, Jenzara.” He gave her a low bow.
“What of me?” Ferrin broke in, quickly sapping the brief happiness. “Valdin said he had to kill me, too. And not just over my shadow power. He spoke of some sort of foretelling that marked me as a threat to the Aldur.”
Devan looked surprised, then troubled. “He said that to you?” Then in a much lower voice, added, “So it wasn’t just a lie just to justify his killings to me.”
“What?” Ferrin said.
Devan waved the question away. “It’s not important. I don’t know what Val is talking about. The emotional trauma he’s experienced has done things to him. He’s not as he once was. The bottom line is that he’s a danger to us all. One we’ll all need to worry about once we depart this clearing.”
There was sadness in the Angel’s voice. He carried the guilt of what he’d done to Valdin with him like a great burden, Jenzara realized.
“But with a little work,” Devan said, voice lightening, “We’ll have another Aldur on the Path before long. Val will have a much harder time succeeding in his p
lots once we’ve accomplished that. So don’t think you’re getting off, lad. I’ll be coming for you. There’s much you need to learn yet if you’re to become the next Aldur.”
“Time Smith,” Ferrin said. “I’m not one of you, Angel.”
Devan arched an eyebrow, then grinned.
“Very well. It’s as good a name as any. But if I’m to call you that, then you’re to stop calling me ‘Angel.’”
Ferrin returned Devan’s grin with a glare, but eventually gave him a nod. Jenzara took Ferrin’s hand in her own and gave it a squeeze. His eyes warmed as he turned a smile upon her.
“Well, I see no point in waiting further,” the Grand Master said. “The immediate threat may be gone, but it sounds like my—” he glanced around at the four of them, “—our work is far from concluded. Before long we’ll be answering the Angel’s—” he stopped again, smiled, then amended, “—Devan’s call again. We might as well get to it. And, for the first time in quite a long while, I’m actually eager to see Tragnè City.”
Taul’s eyes scanned the clearing, as if taking it in for a final time. Jenzara watched as his gaze stopped on Autumn. She’d channeled a flower out of the ground and was laughing at a butterfly that had landed on it.
“She will be taken care of after we leave, Devan?” Taul asked.
Devan nodded. “Of course. She’s always at the top of my mind. And you’ll be able to return for visits, if you wish.”
“Yes,” Taul said. “I’d like that.”
Jenzara stepped up next to the Grand Master. “If you’re going, then I’m leaving, too. No use in dawdling now, when I know there’s a new life ahead of me, fifteen years of new experiences.”
She didn’t feel as confident as those words might imply. The unknown ahead was a scary thing. But she’d learned a few things about fear. Face it head on, friends at your side, and it can never defeat you.
Ferrin voiced his readiness as well, taking her hand. The dwarf followed, muttering something about bloody Angels in his thick Northern dialect, but also giving the Grand Master a reassuring nod. The pair briefly clasped hands. An odd couple the two of them made. But true friendship does not discriminate, she supposed. Jenzara found herself smiling at nothing in particular.