199 The Reins of Winter

Chapter 199

The Reins of Winter

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!" Ryne's scream jolted him from the numbness that he had succumbed to in order to die. He'd hung himself upside down, slit his throat from one end to another as it was no longer physically possible to actually cut his head off in a single slice, and bored dozens of holes into his hearts. He was bleeding like a waterfall, pooling blood beneath him into a literal, small lake, and it still took him over twenty days to die. In order not to lose sanity, he'd numbed himself to the point he ceased feeling anything. Until now.

The scream brought him back to the starting point, one that was getting increasingly harder to return to. It took too much to end his own life, he was beginning to realise. The sheer effort it required was almost not even worth it, but it wasn't as though there was much of an alternative. The closest one he could think of was sprinting to the capital and having the King kill him. Another one, though uncertain, was to go north once again in hopes of finding the Voyager who brought him here and asking it to give him the ability to kill himself.

But the chances of finding it were likely minimal. Even still, if it gets much worse than it currently is, he saw himself getting desperate enough and trying it.

Moving through the motions of the day, he wound up at the top of the castle, upon one of its slightly slanted roofs of the towers, enjoying the brisk breeze that for most of the rest of the world was deadly and sipping wine in silence. Asha often left him alone for a couple of weeks; he didn't know whether it was because it took her that long to recall and reconfigure or because it took her that long to reach the castle.

But he liked it–the couple of weeks of solace were always welcoming, especially after a long loop. It allowed him to seethe in silence, to recalibrate back to the reality and realise himself.

Thinking back to the last few loops, he saw another wall that they encountered. They've gotten within hundred miles of the capital, actually. They were within the final push, encumbered by the last few miles. It was few, indeed. Miles were meaningless to him, as he'd long since stopped counting the years it took to cross just an extra one. All he knew was that the end was approaching and growing closer.

Suddenly, he felt a shift in the atmosphere, the haze of reality bleeding out of the edges of the world as the shapes and objects and colours began to vanish. Even at the strangest sight, one that would leave most terrified, he felt numb. He waited in silence for it all to pass, sipping wine and curiously glancing over as the world, like a painting being covered by erratic strokes of a hand gone insane, turned ebony and lightless, shadows reigning like kings.

From the darkness, a tinker of light appeared before a figure streamed in through the void, donning a light, silver gown and a rather jarring crimson cape. The face was the same as before, though no longer beholden to the body of a young girl but a much older woman. She skipped ahead with a faint hum as the world around readjusted from the darkness and slowly began to paint a new world–they were sitting beside a stirring lake, its surface rough and dancing, enshrined within the colours of the strange fish swimming within its shallows.

Surrounding them were tall mountains, peaks like blades piercing the skyhighs, their sides green with nature. As more and more came to life, beasts and creatures became the natives of the land that seemed real yet… unreal at the same time. There was something off about it, though Sylas couldn't pinpoint what. Until it was pointed out to him.

"It's a recreation from my memory," the woman said. "Of my homeworld. Every time I make it, I feel something new slip. I'm sure, at some point, it was completely normal and not at all a jarring reality."

"It's a beautiful place," Sylas said.

"I'm sure it was," the woman said. "Though, like most things, it had an ugly ending."

"What happened?"

"I'm not sure. I was gone by then, like you, elsewhere. When I returned, all there was ashes and embers and death and decay. Nary a sign that life ever was there."

"Is that what Earth's like now? Ashes and dust?"

"No," the woman replied. "It is still green, though dying. There are no oceans, no rivers, no lakes. There are potholes of water bored deep in earth, and few things suck them to live."

"... it's fucked up," Sylas said, taking a sip. "Being able to outlive something as huge as a world."

"You'll come to learn that worlds are tiny, Sylas," she said.

"I don't want to."

"Your current world, for instance. How long do you think it will last?"

"I don't know. How long?"

"I can't say."

"Then why ask?"

"No, I mean–I can't predict. Nobody can. That's the beauty of chaos and entropy. A tiny tendril otherwise invisible can coil itself around something and pull just hard enough to turn the entire thing on its head. A single mutation in an otherwise harmless insect or a virus, a stirring reaction in a supervolcano, or just a random rock from space somehow aligning perfectly with the world."

"But you can predict those things. You control time."

"... yes, but I don't."

"It's not going to make eternity easier to swallow, being fed pointless philosophy."

"I know it won't," she said. "But nothing will because the truth is very simple, Sylas. If you were going to break… you would have broken by now."

"Oh? Mighty hopeful of you."

"You've long since crossed the threshold," she said. "You have already lived an eternity."

"Why are you here?" he asked abruptly.

"Because your quest is soon coming to an end."

"See? Predicting."

"Anticipating."

"Same thing."

"You could have already reached the capital," she said. "You're delaying."

"..."

"What are you afraid of?"

"Right now? Mostly continuing this conversation, to be honest."

"Your fate is in your hands, Sylas."

"Is it?"

"What makes you think that it isn't?"

"Fucking everything?" he scoffed. "It hasn't been in my hands since coming to this world."

"It was. You long since suspected that there was a story written out that you failed to follow–and you are absolutely right. On virtually every corner, while watching you, I kept asking myself–why is he doing that? He's not supposed to be doing that! He should go there instead! Time and time and time and time again… even after we tried to nudge you, tried to guide you, it didn't make a difference. The only reason you are saying that your fate is not in your hands now… is because you are afraid. Afraid that it actually is. That it's always been. And that, come soon, you will no longer be able to squarely blame me or others on whatever happens."

"... you're poking and prodding," Sylas chuckled lightly. "Are you really a Voyager or a bored teen?"

"... the ending was always written, you're right about that," she said. "But was it not written for you in the past? Is it not written for everyone? What's the difference here?"

"It's very simple."

"How so?"

"On Earth, I knew the ending," Sylas said, taking a sip. "Here? I know fuck all."

"And not knowing is more terrifying for you than death?"

"I just need one answer, really."

"What?"

"Did you send her?" Sylas asked, looking at the woman whose somewhat blank expression suddenly shifted into a smiling one.

"I warned her," the woman said, leaning back and looking up to the sky. "I think, on some level, she wanted you to realise."

"You didn't answer."

"Because it's a stupid question, Sylas. I'm not her mother nor her king. I'm not some Voyager Overload commanding others to do my bidding. That's the perk of becoming a Voyager–nobody can command you."

"So, no?"

"Did you ever seriously even doubt it?"

"Seemed convenient, is all."

"It's time to go, Sylas," the woman said. "You can't hide in the uncertainty forever."

"That's only because you never tried it. It's quite easy."

"Life waits for no one, it turns out. Not even those who are beyond it," the woman said as the world began to burn, corner by corner, turning black and disintegrated. "You say I control time, Sylas. But you are wrong–I cannot control time. Nobody can control time. It flows like a river, on and on, except, unlike a river, it never dries out. The ultimate truth of the reality is that everything is finite… but the infinity itself. And in that infinity, all things are possible–all things, conceivable and otherwise.

"Dust off the brush and the ink, Sylas, and write out the rest of this story. I'm getting tired and I'm due for a nap. So, if not for yourself, do it for me, yes?"

"..." the world imploded in a brilliant flash of flames, and soon all was ash and soot, grey and black for as long as the eye could see. Soon, it all vanished, and Sylas was back atop the tower overlooking the glazed, white horizon. Well beyond it, there was a city. And inside that city there was a palace, and inside that palace there was a throne. And a man upon it, crowned and gallant, waiting for the story to end, just as it had begun. In a flash of thunder and death.