Archive of Our Own ^beta

Looking down, he could swear the shape of the world was a ring.

A pearlescent, shattered-glass ring of light, maybe five—no, six, thumb lengths wide. He could stretch his hand from one tip of it to the other and swallow it up. All darkness, all everywhere. Dark like the center of a hot ember.

He’d been searching for something here but could no longer remember what. He pinches the shadowy length of his hand onto that world shaped like a ring and imagines it crumpling into pieces—space dust and code and numerical formula, the memories of long-dead stars trapped in its loop, finally free again.

He remembers now; the wind he’d been looking for.

Maybe, amongst the debris, he could find it.

████████ Log █████████████ v.334532.1

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>>>Please be advised that once memory 01110111011010010111001101101000.core begins, you will be unable to exit until it is completed.

>>>Are you prepared to see this through to the end?

              >Yes                

>>>Are you certain?

              >Yes

>>>We appreciate your conviction, NeiKos496. On behalf of █̶͕̣̙́̄͂͛̎̆͛̽̆̌̉̈́̂͌͛̕͝ͅ█̸̠͍͕͚̠̜̹̟̯͖̙̟͚̎́͋̉̃͘͜ͅ█̸̡̡̨̛̥̝̜̜̹̱̜̣̝̤͓̠͈̞̠̙̠͈̺̲̼̣̲̀̃̀͗̆̓̆̑͊̇̿̅̐̎͆͠͠ͅ█̸̢̭̖͈͈̘̪͎̋̈́̂͋̏̎̊̍̓̉͂͒̚̚͠͝█̸̨̢̡̨̙̭̞̘̦̝͎͍̤̮̦̹̞͉͎̖͙̘̤̠̲̠̦̦̺͓͖̥̟̼̝͔̦̦͓̰̂͜ͅ█̷̮̇̍͊̏͂̊̒͋͂̔̇͊̅͌͋█̴̨̥̟̺̮̱͎̦̫̦̫̞̰͇̭̠͇͚̫͕̗̳̘̻̹̰̟̹̯̳̫̠̙̟̜͓̲͓͎͓̓͐̊̌͊̀̈́͊̏̀̈́̈́̔̿͑̐͌͗̀̉̒͐̋̚̕͜͝͝͝͝͠ͅ█̴̢̡̥̯̖̼͉͍̣̜͙͖͍̱̞̞̳̗̖̪̟͈̤͈͕͉̺̼̭̞̠̋͗̈́͆̔̓̎͋̐̽͛̎̓̍̋͒̐̒͆͗͗́́̌̚͜͜͠͝͠█̴̨̧̡̝̺͚͎͍̥̟̩͚̠̞͎̳̭̪͕͖̒̂̄̿̽̑͜█̷̘̮͌͒̾̿͆̋́̐͐, please bring our Era Nova to fruition.

>>>Do be careful, ███████.

>>>We wish you the best of luck.

They have only just laid Lady Aglaea to rest when the sky above Okhema tears open.

Black tide pours into the city like entrails from a slit belly—in darkened, viscous chunks of purring corruption. Marble cracks and crumbles away. The grove of trees in the garden blackens and dies. All that saves them is the contingency plan constructed by Professor Anaxa in the days before his death—a streamlined escape route enforced and protected by the Kremnoans and a handful of militia, brave enough to die for a tomorrow they’d never see.

Still, chaos reigns. So many dead, or dying, or worse. The Twilight Courtyard does what they can to treat the wounded behind the barricades erected by the Mountain Dwellers, but Phainon knows the detachment can’t hold out forever. They’ve already lost the western quarter of the city. He half expects Tribbie to fly to his side with even graver news before nightfall.

He finds Mydei, instead.

At the far side of the defensive line, Strife slices swaths of creatures away with the grace and efficiency of a butcher's cleaver. Phainon starts at the opposite end and works his way in to meet in the middle. His chest heaves, his skin hot and cracking under a shell of blood and viscera, hardened by the dying sun overhead. The black tide is relentless and unending. Reborn and reformed soldiers and animals ooze their rotting insides down the fuller of his blade. Corrupted titankin splinter like wood against his shoulder, his fist. There's something urgent thrumming beneath the waves. Desperation, Phainon thinks. Rage. An implacable, impossible rage.

How?

A coronal ring of red bursts through the stone to his west, and Phainon ducks and turns just in time to watch the crystals spear the brute poised at his back, the swing of his sword just a second too slow.

The titankin topples, shattering against the pathway in a shower of crimson dust, Phainon's claymore swinging into empty air. His shoulder hits something solid when he whips back around; Mydei's pauldron, the firm curve of his bare back, tattoos still shimmering.

"Of all the times for carelessness, Deliverer."

"I had it," Phainon spits, pivots on his heel to bring his blade over his head, slashing two more abominations in two.

They fight through the next wave side-by-side, so close the friction aches like rope burn when they brush by, nearly colliding. When they finally stop—when it finally ends—the air's gone thick with death, the miasmic smell of rotting flesh, the corpses strewn around them in a ring, the two of them standing at the center of impact.

Phainon barely has time to catch his breath before Mydei steps in and tugs him closer by the neck, pressing their brows together.

"Careless..."

He’s warm, sticky with sweat and exertion, his breath burning against Phainon’s mouth. Phainon holds him back, the body of his blade slanting against the ground, dripping. The tip of their noses brush, any further anxious rambling Phainon could supply stymied by the gold of Mydei’s eyes cutting into his own. They stare at one another. One by one, the nervous frets of his body unwind and still under Mydei’s hand.  

Phainon swallows. His mouth tastes of ash and bile.

"Are you alright?"

"I am fine," Mydei breathes. His thumb strokes Phainon's jawline. The point of Mydei's gauntlet digs against his cheek, but Phainon doesn't care. A small sacrifice to give for Mydei's tenderness; one Phainon would pay every time.

Mydei's nape lies hot beneath his palm. This stretch of the battlefield is quiet, for now, as the tide readies, doubtlessly, for a fresh assault.

Phainon draws a shaky breath. "Mydei—"

“Do you remember what I told you that night?” Mydei says, just loud enough over the discontented clamor to hear.

He doesn’t need to specify, but Phainon longs for him to—to recall, even in the barest details, a place so far removed from the desolation of their present.

The warmth of the fire, the tug of Mydei's fingers on his body, the feel of muscle gone taut under his hands. Here, Mydei said, squeezing Phainon's hand to the center of his back. Right here.

A curl of dread worms its way into his stomach. "Why are you asking me this?"

"Answer me." He feels Mydei's brow furrow against his own. Then, softer: "Come now, Deliverer. You know as well as I do what comes next."

Phainon closes his eyes, banks hard against him to butt their heads together.

"We don't know that…"

Mydei doesn't argue, but the silence speaks for his disagreement.

"Promise me."

"Mydei…"

"Deliverer."

He pulls back, but doesn't let Phainon go. Only now does Phainon note Mydei's bare chest, the tear in his collar. His ornamental armor is gone; broken or crushed, replaced with smears of drying blood and dirt.

"Yes," Phainon exhales, lowering his head in defeat. "I remember."

He remembers.

"Phainon!"

They break apart, as if burned. Phainon hears, then turns in time to watch Cyrene arrive at his side—pale and out of breath. Mydei catches her outstretched, unsteady hand, her other fist clenched tight around her sickled staff.

"You're both still here," she says between breaths. "Thank Oronyx…"

"Not for much longer." Mydei holds her until she steadies. "The black tide will strike again, with greater force. I can feel it gathering outside the gate. Time is short."

"How soon?" Cyrene says, her urgency curbed but apparent.

Mydei turns his gaze across the courtyard, empty now save for the field of inorganic corpses, so thick they blanket the marble beneath. Phainon counts three breaths before he speaks again.

"Minutes," Mydei says. The word drops like a stone between them.

Cyrene takes a steadying breath."Regardless, one of you must return with me to the Palace." She looks at Mydei pointedly. "The Kremnoans have fought admirably to hold the line, but their force is diminished and Hyacine is injured—"

"Injured—?" Phainon cuts in.

"—We've evacuated all we can, but I'm afraid further retreat to Dawncloud is inevitable."

Mydei pursues it: "Is Lady Hyacine alright?"

Cyrene looks between them, blinking hard, her mouth a pinched line. A deep cut has bled and dried on her cheek.

"I don't know," she says, softer than the rest. "I left her in her comrade's care to find you—both of you, one of you, I—but I don't know."

A brief, suffocating silence swallows them. Mydei surfaces first.

"You should go with Cyrene, Deliverer." He folds his arms. "Leave the rabble to me."

Phainon doesn't like it. A pit sinks into his stomach just at the thought.

"I can't leave you to hold our defense alone—"

"You can," Mydei says, his sharp eyes flickering down to Phainon's mouth. "You have to."

Phainon sighs. "Don't be so stubborn about this…"

"Exactly. Don't be stubborn and go. We don't have time to argue."

"—Mydei is right, Phainon."

Both of their eyes land on Cyrene. She glances between them, a grimness shadowing her frown that wasn't there before. "They're coming," she says, softly. "Phainon…"

In Aedes Elysiae, they are taught that time is a resource, like grain or wood. It was a comparison he never understood as a child. He could always plant seeds for more grain. He could venture into the woods to find more wood. But where could he find more time? Did it exist in the long, silent hours he spent asleep? Could he fish it up from the bottom of the sea?

His father had laughed at that. Time is like sunlight, he'd said, tracing the arch they followed each day in the wheat fields. You cannot beg Aquila for more on a whim, just as you cannot beg Oronyx for more time. You receive what you need—no more, and no less.

"…Phainon."

Mydei's gaze catches his—open, if quiet, even after all this time. Cyrene has already stepped back towards the Palace; to whatever end this path leads to, however near or far.

"Mydei—"

"Don't."

Without another breath of hesitation, Phainon steps in and cups the curve of Mydei's neck. Mydei curls a gauntlet over his wrist to anchor him.

"May victory always be yours, Mydeimos."

A smile tugs lightly at Mydei's lips. "You too."

Phainon holds his breath, as if at the ledge of a long, endless dive—and as he pulls away to join Cyrene, to the rest of his life, he does not see how Mydei's hand lingers, reaching, long after he is gone.

>>>Eternal Recurrence #33356334: Subject Khaslana’s 33,356,003rd attempt to breach the Scepter’s core layer has failed. Cognitive function has reached an advanced stage of deterioration. Outer stimuli and electric signals routed for “emotional interface” and “pain receptors” have continued to degenerate.

>>>Lifecycles of the 12 Chrysos Heirs terminated in sequence. Subject Khaslana regressed the extrapolation process.

 "But really—"

Phainon leans back, watching from his perch on a water trough as Mydei hauled another hunk of clay from the pile.

"—how did you know the elders would fold?"

Mydei tosses the clay up to adjust his grip. He's dropped the other half of his toga from his shoulder, leaving the full breadth of his absurd shoulders on display. Phainon still finds his eyes catching on the traditional marks Mydei wears, even after half a year in his constant company. Mydei's bare, thick-corded biceps flex when he rolls his arms, the sinewy stretch of his waist bending easily as a counterweight. He holds a weight three men would struggle to carry.

"It's simply politics," Mydei says, as if that explains anything.

Phainon leans hard onto one hand, cocking his head. "Elder Romulus was ready to make you supplicate on the council floor not two months ago, and today you had him eating from the palm of your hand."

In comically good timing, Mydei drops the clay—which Kokopo digs into with immediate gusto. Mydei must catch the humor in it, too; he scoffs as he strokes his hand over Kokopo's snout.

"You don't believe me?"

"I have a hard time believing the simple part."

Mydei watches him a moment before turning back to the dromas.

"When the detachment first formed, I knew little of the world. Krateros made it his foremost business to ensure I learned."

"Through…what? Experience?" Phainon guesses.

"Partially," Mydei says. "But we had the distinction of being banished from my father's court, so it's not as if bartering with other rebel leaders met the general's standards."

Of course not, Phainon does not say aloud—but judging by the discontent line in Mydei's jaw, perhaps doing so wouldn't earn him a kick to the knee. Perhaps.

"So, you read it in a book about statesmanship?"

"Many years ago, but yes."

"And you actually read it?"

Mydei's eyes narrow, sharpening. "And you win debates with these intelligent questions?"

Perhaps…

Phainon doesn't answer him. He gasps. "You can read?"

Mydei stares at him in mute disbelief for all of four seconds before lifting his foot and knocking Phainon off the lip of the trough and into the water.

Mydeimos isn’t the same every time. Not always.

The differences are slight; some Khaslana doesn’t even see, doesn’t have the chance. In those cases, the Phainon of that cycle records them dutifully, catalogues each new or missing mark, every imperfect grain of ink. Does he favor his left or his right? Salty or sweet? A spear or a sword? Small, seemingly insignificant things.

But he knows they’re there. He’s traced them with the tips of his fingers, pressed his lips as if he could swallow them, subsume them. These differences are what remind him. They are what shove the bitter pill of memory down his throat.

None of them are him. His Mydeimos.

From across the broken bridge in Janusopolis, the gulf of the Abyss between them. It was his Mydeimos who stood tall and defiant as a jagged spire against the darkness. Mydeimos. One against a thousand. A thin veneer of pride and bluster to hide the sincerity beneath, all too easy to break. Phainon doesn’t even have to try. Mydeimos shows it to him readily, unafraid to crack the cage of his ribs and point to each notch of bone, tell him, in that low and gravelly tone: here is what matters to me. Here are the hundred things I like about you. Here are ten things I don’t. What you do with it is up to you.

Mydei. A beauty Phainon refused to acknowledge for far too long; the kind that pulled attention like the moon did the sea. A quiet fierceness that could ruin kingdoms, would bring legions to their knees. They say I am the spitting image of her, Mydei tells him once, cheek pillowed in his fist, a cup of watered wine largely untouched in his other hand. My mother.

Isn’t that a compliment? He’d said. Or—at least he thinks so. Maybe it was something else; something equally as flirtatiously foolish, his impatient thumb stroking over Mydei’s un-greaved knee.

His. As if he even has the right, after all this time. After all he’s done.

“Deliverer.”

The ring's a cool, light weight in between his thumb and forefinger, the signet a perfect set of curves and edges in the metal. A simple piece of jewelry—far plainer than the finery Mydeimos wears to battle, the glint of gold and lapis reminding Phainon of the moths he and Cyrene used to catch with old fishnets in the summer. Their rows of fake eyes flickered in the sun, red, then blue, then red again. Mydeimos was like that, too; savage, beautiful. By the time one tore their eyes from his gilded neck, it was already too late, too soon, too much blood, pooling in his hands like golden silk—

"Deliverer?"

Phainon jerks back, pinching the ring tighter as it slips against his inner knuckles.

"Hm?"

Sunlight streams through the courtyard where they've stopped, awaiting Aglaea's orders. The crown prince of Kremnos has only just conceded his defeat to the Flame Chase, and Phainon's victory sits like a sheet of ice between them, melting slowly but surely.

Not that anyone could tell by the way Mydei looks at him now.

"What are you doing?"

Phainon blinks. "Nothing?"

Mydei's already apparent frown deepens. He shifts his weight, arms folding over his chest. The breeze ruffles the wild strands of hair at the top of his head. Phainon almost reaches forward to comb them down.

"…Then might I have my ring back? You've held onto it long enough."

He'd only meant to appraise it for a moment—Phainon couldn't imagine the prince liked parting with it, for a however brief amount of time. He thought a little appreciation for Kremnoan craftsmanship would soothe what tension remained between them—but instead, Phainon's words had failed him, and he'd done nothing but stare at the queen's signet ring like a child. An appreciative child, but a child nonetheless.

Now, Mydeimos is plainly unnerved—and Phainon has overstepped.

"Of course," he says, hurrying to return it.

Their fingers brush around the metal, and Phainon wonders, briefly, why he feels so suddenly feverish.

>>>Eternal Recurrence #7879261: Subject Khaslana’s 7,679, 230th attempt to breach the Sceptor’s core layer has failed. Significant cognitive decline noted. Subject has displayed elevated levels of unaccounted signals {re:emotion} unavailable in the codex variable.

>>>Lifecycles of the 12 Chrysos Heirs terminated in sequence. Subject Khaslana regressed the extrapolation process.

>>>Proposal: A hard reset of core processing to eliminate further deviation. Subject is nearing the threshold for cognitive deterioration. Inaction at this juncture has a 97.3% chance of enabling further processing breakdown.

>>>Query: And if we proceed with core processing reset?

>>>Response: Probability reduces by 95.8% with a .5% margin of error.

>>>Admin notes: Proposal dismissed. No further action necessary.

For every one cycle where they find each other, there are a hundred where they don’t.

A hundred lives where nothing more than fleeting touches pass between them, where Phainon will grow used to wanting him in silence. Where they hold one another at the distance of a polearm, because any closer would mean giving in to the inevitable. A line they'd both need cross willingly. An infinite could've been. Should've.

Could be.

Khaslana has long learned that you do not miss what you never had. He can't help but think that in those cycles, Phainon is infinitely better off.

You don’t believe that, the quiet voice buried in the catacombs of his ruined body says. You know love is not a weakness.

It grows fainter with each passing iteration, that voice. Each turn of the wheel sinks it a little deeper. Sometimes he thinks he may have buried it completely; when the black void of electrical silence devours him before the clocks reset, when the Vortex of Genesis lies as empty and meaningless as the inside of his chest.

 Love is not a weakness, Deliverer.

"…I never said that."

The cut smarts when Mydei spreads his palm open again, exposing the clean, serrated flesh to the air. Phainon's fingers twitch in Mydei's grasp.

"You were thinking it," Mydei says.

He focuses on the roll of bandage, delicate in his broad, scarless hands. Mydei unfurls the tucked-in edge and sets it to the crook of Phainon's hand.

"I just think—" Phainon starts, stopping when Mydei glances up—stealing the rest of his thought, however briefly.

"You think? That's novel."

"Oh, shut up." Phainon huffs, wincing at the tingle of cloth against his exposed flesh.

Mydei wraps the bandage once and cinches it before starting another loop. A bit too much force on one of his old wooden practice swords left him fighting with a splintered blade—how it managed to snag and scrape across his palm was more of an unhappy accident; one Hyacine was too busy to tend to.

"I think," Phainon begins again. "That if she truly wished to stay with him, she would've found a way forward without so much bloodshed. Who sacrifices an entire kingdom for the sake of a single man?"

"You would have to ask Helena," Mydei says, mildly. Too mildly.

Phainon watches him a moment longer before he asks:

"You…You don't actually agree with her, do you?"

Mydei doesn't look up to meet his bewilderment. His focus remains steadfast on his work. The bandage wraps snugly around Phainon's knuckles for a third loop, then a fourth.

"I do not agree with her choice—killing so many for one person, no matter how deeply you care for them is unabashedly self-righteous, regardless of how good the reason. At the same time, she knew full well the bloodshed her choice would require and neither flinched nor faltered. Many people spend their whole lives searching for that kind of loyalty, whether to a king or a god. Helena did so for a single foot soldier, simply because he loved her. I find it hard to fault such conviction."

Phainon's eyes catch on the light lingering over the crown of Mydei's head, gilding the sharp edges that fall over his brow. The mark at his eye appears especially red today. Phainon's fingers itch.

In another life, this is when Phainon would be brave enough to touch his thumb there, to trace the thick red pigment Mydei's smears at his undereye each morning. Maybe it would be enough to stun him speechless, shame-faced, thumb digging into Phainon's wound until he bleeds again. Or maybe Mydei stills briefly at his touch before continuing unabated, unsurprised, as if he knew something Phainon didn't. As if he'd been waiting all along.

But this isn't one of those lives. It isn't even close.

So, instead, Phainon laughs. "Who knew you were such a romantic?"

So, instead, Mydei rolls his eyes and drops Phainon's hand, cloth pinned to itself at the ridge of his tendons. "It's just a story, Deliverer."

"That's true," Phainon says, drawing his new weakness into his lap. "It's just a story."

>>>Eternal Recurrence #18999: Subject Khaslana attempted to breach the Specter's logic core through destruction of core flames. Subject successfully terminated 8 core flames before complete system collapse. No substantive impact on experimental process observed.

>>>Lifecycles of the 3 Chrysos Heirs terminated in sequence, the remaining 9 Lifecycles were terminated upon system failure. Subject Khaslana regressed the extrapolation process.

>>>create_save_file(████████): try:

>>>with open(file_name, '████████') as file:

>>>file.write('') # Create

>>>(f'Save file "{████████}" created successfully.')

>>> except Error:PreexistingFile

>>> (f'Save file "████████" already exists.')

>>>(f'Failed to create save file: {e}')

>>>(f'Failed to create save file: {e}')

>>>(f'Failed to create save file: {e}')

>>>(f'Failed to create save file: {e}')

>>>(f'Failed to create save file: {e}')

>>>(f'Failed to create save file: {e}')

>>>(f'Failed to create save file: {e}')

>>>(f'Failed to create save file: {e}')

>>>(f'Failed to create save file: {e}')

>>>(f'Failed to create save file: {e}')

>>>Inputs from unknown outside source data detected. Anomalies in data log deleted by admin. Log settings purged and reset. Unknown source data located and terminated. No further action required at this time.

“You know—” Phainon calls, rucking the long half of his coat even higher, a smile thrown over his shoulder. “—Of all the things I expected you to balk at, a little traipse through the mud never made the list, Mydei.”

Mydeimos, still atop the relatively dry bank of the plateau, folds his arms, as resolute as ever.

“I’m not balking,” he says with a frown. “You made a list?”

If Phainon didn’t know any better, he’d almost think the prince privately amused.

“A rather long one, I’ll admit. We don’t really have time to get into the details.”

He takes another step in, mud splattering up to his thigh. It seeps almost halfway up the foot of his boot. It'll be a long trek to the harbor on the other side of the marsh at this rate, but they hadn't thought to bring the dromas. Tribbie's prophecies didn't account for torrential rain—or for outdated maps.

“Based on how slow you’re going, we’ll have all the time in the world,” Mydei says, blithely.

Phainon smiles, turns and opens his arms. “Yet I don’t see you going any faster!”

With that, he sets off with renewed vigor. Judging by the silence and ensuing heavy splash that follows, he doesn't do so alone.

“If my armor is damaged—" Mydei says suddenly, as if he cannot hold his tongue a moment longer. “—then it is harder for Chartonus to repair it if it is covered in muck.”

The smile spreads over Phainon’s face in much the same way his understanding dawns—quick and ineffable. Still—

“You’re less of a prude than I thought, Your Highness,” he says, without turning around.

—poking the lion a little more couldn’t hurt, right?

Mydei grumbles something under his breath behind him, and when Phainon sneaks a look, he catches the sour crimp of Mydei’s mouth as he steps wide through a thick patch of reeds. His tattoos catch the fading light, a bright pop of red against the gray-green water.

“You’re one to talk. I’ve never met a peasant boy who wouldn’t touch dromas manure.”

“It’s not—” Phainon rolls his eyes in vain. It’s not like Mydei can see it. He turns on his heel and does it again as he continues: “It’s not that I won’t touch it. I just prefer to touch it with a pitchfork, unlike some people.”

A hmph. “You’re rather squeamish for a soldier.”

“Squeamish or…prudent?”

“Those are not synonyms, Deliverer.”

“That’s a big word, Your Highness. All those books must be finally making an impression.”

The mud thickens, popping wetly with each step. A particularly loud schlock punctuates Mydei’s next words; his footfalls far heavier than Phainon’s.

"You are also rather uncouth when you want to be."

"Only around you, if I'm honest."

"Ah. I'm so flattered."

Phainon stops under the guise of letting him catch up. “So, it’s for the Forgemaster’s sake?”

He would like to think he’s beginning to figure out the prince of Castrum Kremnos. Weeks of unabated time alone without someone can trick you into thinking so. At a juncture like this, Mydei will likely frown again or snap at him, or rub at his bare shoulder as he does when he wants to snap but knows he shouldn’t.

Only Mydeimos does none of those things. He pauses, wiping the mud from his cheeks on his collar. His toga drags behind him, the finer fabric dirtied and already-ruined.

"When did I ever say that?"

Phainon squints, perplexed. "Just now?"

Mydei sloshes closer, until they stand shoulder-to-shoulder. "Maybe it's like you said."

He steps past Phainon without another word, leaving him hopping to catch up.

"Me?"

"Maybe I just don't like swamps."

Phainon barks a laugh. "That can't be it! Give yourself a little credit."

To that, Mydei scoffs. "I give myself plenty."

This time, Phainon bites his tongue. Do you? He isn't so sure. He shakes his head, says:

"I can't think of a king who worried about inconveniencing his vassal."

"Chartonus isn't my vassal," he snaps—but then Mydei’s gaze, usually so steadfast, flickers away. “It isn’t all that impressive.”

Phainon stops, dropping his coattails in defeat. He rests his hands at his hips.

“Why wouldn’t it be?”

He isn't sure if Mydei will stop, too. When he does, Phainon can't help but feel like he's won the smallest of wars.

"You…"

Mydei’s eyes roll as he turns, the light catching on them, glinting under his long, dark lashes.

This time, Phainon catches his gaze and holds it. The breeze picks up and blows the fine golden strands of Mydei’s hair against his cheek. A chunk brushes at the corner of his lips, reddened by the days they've spent walking against the wind. Above them, the sky whorls, achingly blue, fat white clouds painting the loom of the mountain peaks behind Mydei's head.

"What is it now?" Mydei grumbles, his mouth thin and sour. His face is rather red now, too.

Phainon swallows the words on the tip of his tongue. "It's a beautiful day, isn't it?"

Mydei's brow furrows. He searches Phainon's face.

"I'm starting to think you're touched in the head, Deliverer."

Phainon laughs again, the sound carried away when the breeze blows hard against them, casting ripples over the murky water at their feet.

>>>Eternal Recurrence #28: Subject Khaslana has reverted to strategy similar to Eternal Recurrence #1, #2, and #8. After acquisition of coreflames, subject Khaslana proceeded to self-terminate. No substantive impact on experimental process observed.

>>>Lifecycles of the 12 Chrysos Heirs terminated in sequence. Subject Khaslana regressed the extrapolation process.

>>>Eternal Recurrence #29: Subject Khaslana has adopted similar strategy as Eternal Recurrence #28 with no major deviation. After acquisition of coreflames, subject Khaslana self-terminated. No substantive impact on experimental process observed.

>>>Lifecycles of the 12 Chrysos Heirs terminated in sequence. Subject Khaslana regressed the extrapolation process.

>>>Eternal Recurrence #30: Subject Khaslana has adopted similar strategy as Eternal Recurrence #28 and #29. After acquisition of coreflames, subject Khaslana self-terminated. ‘Violence’ quotient in comparison to prior cycles increased. No substantive impact on experimental process observed.

>>>Lifecycles of the 12 Chrysos Heirs terminated in sequence. Subject Khaslana regressed the extrapolation process.

>>>Admin Notes: Base value of primary motive for core:hatred has increased 0.25% of predicted exponential value. Given previous patterns of cognition, Subject will abandon this strategy within 10.47 cycles or less. No further action required.

There’s a first time for everything.

The first play-sword—roughhewn, with an uneven and splintering blade. The first sunrise he remembers over the wheat fields of Aedes Elysiae—the sloped warmth of his father’s shoulders under his hands where he rocked him in a sling, the rays bursting over the sea in transparent cones of light. The first time he helped his mother split the wood for winter—blisters stinging his baby soft palms, the autumnal light haloing his mother’s silvery hair as the axe swung. The first time Cyrene took him swimming out to the cove at the far end of the inlet, his teeth chattering with cold, finger pads wrinkled as pruned dates. She teased him even as she hopped to stay warm on the dock.

The first set of clothes Aglaea gifts him—simple black stitching on white, the sheep leather supple as cloth. The first paper Professor Anaxa hands back to him, riddled with red ink marks as an arrow-pocked target. The first true smile Castorice gives him from across the table, her laugh soft and fragile as Trianne tugged at his hair. The first time Mydei pins him to the sunbaked stones of the sparring courtyard, the supple metal of his greaved foot cupping Phainon’s shoulder, the stretch of his leg hot and pliant through his clothes when Phainon places his hand at the juncture of his thigh. A counterweight. One feral grin for another.

A first time for everything.

What Phainon didn’t know—and what he never truly would know—is that there is also a second time, and a third, fourth, fifth, tenth, twentieth, until all the firsts are spent and you’re left with nothing but the faint shape of them through all the rest. Like layers of paint, or clothes, or blood.

So, Khaslana lets his memories remain buried. At least there, they are safe. At least there, the ghost of them cannot wander into the land of the living.

A first time for everything.

Their first bout of bickering over a contested victory. Their first real argument, in the shadow of a battle where Phainon watched him die and rise a dozen times, each fraying Phainon's composure until it split completely into confession—I care, he'd shouted, pacing, scrubbing his arms like he could scrape the fear sweat from his skin. I care about whether you live or die. The first time Mydei stared at him, eyes widened. Speechless.

Their first kiss, a million different ways. None but the first his—and yet.

Yet.

He remembers.

He remembers, and remembers, and remembers.

One that tastes of metal, gold smearing between the bow of his lip and nose, the clumsy nip of Mydei’s teeth. Another that is gentler, the scent of yarrow and elderberry heavy in the air. Mydei’s thumb cradled beneath his cheekbone before they broke apart, breathless as they dove back in, uncaring about such trivial things like time or oxygen. There was one on the garden terrace, a chimera curled in his lap, churring as his grip tightens in its fur. One in the shadowed recesses of Castrum Kremnos’s ruins, Mydei’s hair catching between their mouths.

Then, there is his own.

They're fresh from a fight, a long and arduous four-day slog through black tide and titankin to the other side of Aidonia's jagged mountains. The pod of refugees fleeing from the outskirts of the Snow City had set their camp in the shadow of the shallow mountain lakes. Summer, and yet the snow slumped over the branches, still melting from the conifers. Phainon arrives late, but someone's filled a tub with hot water in a makeshift tent at the edge of the camp, and he's half-naked when Mydei pulls the flap open, breath quickened, staring at him like a ghost.

"Disappointed?" Phainon asks with a tired smile. "Thought you'd finally gotten rid of me?"

Mydei closes the space between them without a word, his lips warm and bruising when he clutches Phainon's face with both hands and pulls him in.

Their first kiss is brief. Clumsy. Phainon sways, catching himself on Mydei's neck. He doesn't even get to kiss him back; Phainon presses in just as Mydei pulls away.

"You wouldn't dare die so easily, Deliverer."

Initially, despite the exhilirating flush in his cheeks, Phainon's obstinate as ever. He rolls the topic around like a child does a ball through sand: aimless, always one careless kick away from striking at what he wants. It's the principle of the thing—busting into a comrade's quarters out of concern just to hold them in your arms? What else could Mydei possibly want with him alone, so late into the evening? What would the council say? The bards?

"You should go."

"I'll stay," Mydei says.

Insists—with his hands, his hips, his mouth, his tongue and teeth. Commands—with his gaze, his words, his tone.

It’s all an excuse, in the end.

A pointless resistance. A presumptive lover’s tease, even if they were not lovers yet; never had been, save for in the recesses of Phainon’s wandering mind. It had crept up on him, like a vine growing on the unseen side of a wall. The strength of his own feelings surprised him, challenged him, made Phainon pinch himself each morning upon waking. How things had changed between them; how he looked at Mydei now and felt the fragile handful of his heart racing, stinging, as if peeled raw.

“You care for the bard's opinions?” Mydei asks.

Phainon stares at the mouth he's thought of kissing a hundred times before. He tilts his head, gaze rising only to meet Mydei's.

"Do you?"

Mydei holds him firmly in place, curling his fingers hard into Phainon’s side, as if he means to sink his claws in and hook him by the meat of his ribs. Mydei holds him as if Phainon could slip from his hands like water.

They all do this, Khaslana’s found, as if in honor of this moment and their predecessor. He never does anything by halves—Mydeimos is as ruthless and persistent in battle as he is in an argument, a conversation, a kiss. Phainon doesn't know that yet. Doesn't know him in all his full and passionate glory. In the stories, every hero who fell in love either triumphed or met with some terrible fate, with very little in between. Amphorean heroics were like that.  In this brief breath before the fall, he is still naïve enough to believe himself the former.

But maybe that isn't entirely true.

Because then Mydei tows him in by the waist of his still-bloodstained shirt, Phainon’s bare foot knocking against his boots, balance tipping—and by the half-lidded heat in Mydei’s eyes, Phainon knows he never stood a chance.

He resents him.

Or at least a part of him does. It is a rancor he could never attempt to dampen; afraid it may contaminate the rest of him. The other part recognizes that the resentment’s only a refraction, a beam of fire meeting a mirror and looping back in on itself.

But facing that would mean facing the rest of it—the truth of what he’s become.

Khaslana knows that what he feels for Phainon is far closer to pity than it is hatred. Pity for his ignorance, and also envy for it. Envy for the life he gets to live, unknowingly ingrateful for all he has. All he has to lose. There are times Khaslana contemplates killing him early. The algorithm would adapt and mold around his absence. It would find another to take his place. An understudy. What Phainon does isn't so important; isn't so monumental that another couldn't rise to the challenge, as he did. As every iteration of him does, however willingly.

But the thought of that other taking what was once his; what should be Phainon's—that is what stays his hand. When Khaslana fails to find any meaningful reason for Phainon's existence, he thinks of someone else at the Grove. In the baths. On the other side of Talanton's Scale. The last holder of Cyrene's memory. At Aglaea's side, in the clothes she made for him. In Castorice's garden, dirt up to his elbows.

Someone who isn't him in Mydei's bed, in his arms, inside of him, holding him.

A raw, raging jealousy scorches away what little logic remains in his tattered mind—it is all he has left. His anger. His desire. The force of his own selfishness sickens him. Cripples him.

What is he without the memories Phainon holds?

What had he done it all for?

What has he done it for, if not for this?

>>>Eternal Recurrence #2085: Change in cognitive function noted as in Eternal Recurrence #2080. Subject Khaslana’s decision weighting for “avoid sacrifice of past companions” showed a major increase, particularly regarding subject ██████████’s termination. Reason for change currently undetermined. ██████████ cognition within normal limits. Termination proceeded as in Eternal Recurrence #2002-2048 with negligible variation.

>>>Lifecycles of the 12 Chrysos Heirs terminated in sequence. Subject Khaslana regressed the extrapolation process.

>>>Admin Notes: Due to abject failure, expect subject to alter current decision weighting in next Eternal Recurrence. If no change in cognition is detected by Eternal Recurrence #3000, consider intervention. Otherwise, continue observation as normal.

“Do you ever think about what you’ll do after?”

Mydei—halfway to turning his cup bottoms up—stops. Looks at him.

“After?” He echoes.

The rooftop digs into his elbow, and Phainon shimmies up onto his forearms. Afternoon bleeds into twilight, the air tepid and light as summer slips into autumn. In Aedies Elysiae, they'd spend evenings like this hauling melons and picking blackberries from the bushes on the ridge. In Okhema, preparations are made for a four-day feast at Dawncloud in honor of Kephale's ascension as World-bearer; ordinarily far more ostentatious, but given the dwindling harvest, the council had agreed the Sunbearer would accept a more humble celebration. He and Mydei spent the whole day shuffling crates of wine and fruit up the Sacred Path, the drudgery made more bearable by the occasional elbow in his side, or mischievous foot hooking at Mydei's ankle. It was worth the tongue lashing to see the prince's prickly frown, the flush reddening up to his ears.

"I've always wanted to see the Eye of Twilight." Phainon swipes a fig from the plate between them—the reward for their labors—and tears it in half. "Do you think Hyacine would help me look for it?"

"Don't talk with your mouth full," Mydei grumbles, but it lacks any bite. He brings the cup the rest of the way to his mouth and drinks. "Chase the sky castle, then? That's your big plan?"

Phainon smiles, in spite of himself. "Sound a little more derisive about it, won't you?"

"Please." Mydei huffs. "As if you've ever required my approval for anything."

Most profiles soften when set against the crepuscular sky, but Mydei's remains proud and angular, his brow drawn heavily over his eyes. The braid at his cheek has frayed in its fastening. He must feel it when he tucks his hair behind his ear.

"Actually," Phainon starts, wondering how much he can get away with. "I was hoping you'd come with me."

Mydei's arms are bare, gauntlets lain in a shiny heap above Phainon's head. He watches Mydei's veined and scarless hands, how his forefinger taps the body of his cup.

"And why would I do that?"

"I was unaware you had anything better to do."

Mydei's mouth draws to a line, but Phainon sees the smile in his eyes. "You think I'd follow you anywhere? What am I, your war hound?"

Phainon sighs, pops the other half of the fig into his mouth.

"I was thinking more along the lines of noble steed? You've made quite the habit of carrying me away from danger."

"Remind me to leave you to die next time."

"Ah, you wouldn't," Phainon says, smile widening to a grin. Mydei's eyes meet his over the lip of his cup, holding before looking away. A strange giddiness rises at his obvious coyness, along with a streak of genuine panic. "Right, Mydei?"

A long pause.

"Mydei?" He prompts.

Mydei eyes him, the twitch at his mouth poorly concealed. The tension mounts until it blisters between them and Phainon breaks first, laughing as he levels a kick to Mydei's knee, rocking on his side when Mydei shoves his shoulder, laughing, too, into his cup. Quiet falls; only it isn't truly quiet. The city bustles below them, still, the hawkers and scholars still peddling their wares, their ideas. Mydei leans back on a hand, his abdominals scrunching, softly flexing.

"Assuming there is an after…I was hoping to visit your village."

Phainon blinks, feels his smile begin to slip, unsure of itself. His head lightens on his shoulders—a strange, dampened sensation of falling, his stomach swooping. Mydei takes another drink, as if he hasn't said anything at all, as if he hasn't just kicked Phainon all the way up to sit on the clouds.

"You know there isn't much to see," he says, rather stupidly.

"It is your home," Mydei says, far more eloquently.

Phainon tries not to laugh, because it isn't funny.

"Okhema is my home, now. It's…sort of yours, too, isn't it?"

"Aedes Elysiae is still the place that raised you." Mydei's words draw to a point, his gaze firm, searching in a way that nearly drive Phainon to look away. "It will always be a part of you, as Kremnos is a part of me."

"Well—"

"I would like to see it."

Mydei tears his eyes from Phainon's. He stares into the depths of his cup.

"I would like to pay my respects to your old teachers. Your friends. Your parents. Perhaps…we could go to Castrum Kremnos after, if the journey isn't too—"

Phainon sits up and pulls him in all in one breath, kissing him firmly. The wine sloshes, spilling onto both their laps, and Mydei shoves at his shoulder, a surprised noise meeting Phainon's lips. Mydei jerks back, scowling.

"Phainon—?!"

He takes in the surprised flush flooding Mydei's face before leaning back in and kissing him again—softer this time, but no less insistent. His fingers curl into the collar of Mydei's toga to pull him closer. This time, Mydei's prepared. He kisses him back. Kisses him until it turns open-mouthed, heavier, the cup and tray of spoils tossed aside for Phainon to climb over and press him to the rooftop slant, a leg on either side of Mydei's hips. He tastes of tannins, the faint, salty tinge of sweat lingering on his lips. Phainon licks it away before licking into his mouth. He melts against the torrid heat of Mydei's chest—always so much warmer than him.

"What was that for?" Mydei murmurs as they break for air.

"I like your plan better," Phainon says, breathless.

That earns him a disbelieving huff, Mydei's hand sliding lower to Phainon's waist. "You didn't even let me finish."

"Surprise me, then, when the time comes." He lets his full weight fall, like he means to crush Mydei beneath him. "It'll be like a date."

Mydei grunts, unappreciative. "You're heavy."

"You're heavier," he notes, as if commenting on the weather. Phainon wrestles him into a deadlock; bare hand pinned to bare hand, ankle hooked over knee.

"What does that have to do with—I'm not on top of you, get off," Mydei grumbles, but makes no true move to dislodge him.

Phainon smiles, looming so his shadow shades Mydei's face, hiding him from prying eyes. "Not until you say it."

A sigh, blown from the perfect bow of his lips. "You are such a child."

"It's still a date, right?"

Mydei's expression twitches—flush under his eyes, mouth a thin and crooked line, a tender want molded around years of abstention. When was the last time you desired something for yourself? Mydei had asked him once. Not for your homeland, or your people, or the world. Something you could call your own.

Phainon doesn't recall what he answered; it hardly matters. Mydeimos, doubtless, saw right through him. He always does.

"Alright," Mydei says, after an eternity. "It's a date."

In the brief nanoseconds before their memories collide, he sees it.

Strings of data, hemorrhaging like ruptured arteries. Sequences. Code. What makes NeiKos496 what they are. Who they are. Who he is. ████ are.

Phainon of Aedes Elysiae. Son brother soldier ██comrade warrior lover s█nner Mistake traitor scourge scourge scourge ███████ █ killer punisher reaper destroyer destroyer destroyer destroyer destroyer destroyer destroyer destroyer destroyer destroyer destroyer de███████ ██ ██████ ███████ ██ █████ ██ death ███ █████ ███ █████ ██ ███ undy█ng ██ y██r ███ sliver ██ humanity ███ b██ting ██████ of you█ heart █████ ████ w█sh lie█ ████ ███ buried █████ n█xt to ███ him him h█m your ███ believ█r ████ desire ████ grave ███ ███ ███ bury hi█ ██ over a█d ████ ███ over a█ain ███

Deliverer. Deliverer. Deliverer.

In the rush of blood and slickened sweat, wood sword splinters in his palms, the grit of metal meeting his fist.

In a field of gold, wheat grass tickling his knees, wool scratching at the hollow of his elbows.

In a breeze-blown market. In cool spring water clasping his palm. In the warmth of a blanket kicked to his knees, heat sticking everywhere they touch.

Ten-thousand scars. Ten-thousand lives. His own and not his own, twined and tangled into an inextricable loop across a million identical timelines, all the way back to that first iteration, that first utter and damning mistake.

Who died?

Or more importantly: what survived?

He no longer remembers.

Maybe it was never so important after all.

Amid a wreath of Aquila’s stars lies a village shrouded in the veil of night.

Here, the sun only touches the dunny eskers in the temperate Creation Season, and the stone fruit trees blossom, bounty, and whither within a few short months—a brief glimpse of warmth in the windblown plains. The rest of the year the village fishes and picks their way through the snow. It is bitterly cold. It is winter when they arrive, and by then the villagers have entrenched themselves into their heat-trapping dwellings, thick wooden huts draped in the pelts of the golden rams that roam the mountainside.

The Flame Chase never makes it this far north again. In every subsequent cycle, this village is gone before Phainon’s ever born.

He knows. He looks for it, at first, however in vain. Perhaps the stagnancy of time and seasons within the loop stifles it over time; dries its freezing rivers and fallows its hardened land. Or maybe it was an anomaly in the first place—a misplaced schema in the simulation’s code, subsequently patched for all its millions upon millions of iterations. As if it never existed at all.

Here is where Mydeimos will tell Phainon that he loves him.

Or—as close as they get, this first time around.

They were there chasing the rumor of a young girl with the blessing of Cerces only to find her pyre marker. Too late. A sickness in the water that turned the lungs black, shot blood through the white of the afflicted’s eyes.

They didn’t know, back then. How could they have known?

The village elders offered them a hut for the night and a meal for their trouble. Illness had ravaged them that winter, regardless of their offerings to Georios; but what little they had to give, they shared. That night they sat shoulder to shoulder at the elders’ feasting table, talking of the poor harvest in the south, the ever-dire floods breaching from the east near Styxia.

Phainon offered that Okhema would always be open to them, should the village need refuge. But the First Elder simply smiled, the carved bone of her earrings whispering as she bowed her head and said: You are most generous, Chrysos Heirs of the Holy City. But from this patch of land Georios molded us, and to it all Mileutians will return. Whether by flame or time—such has it always been. Such as it should be. At his side, Mydei’s jaw crimped, and he did not speak; only later, when Phainon pressed his shoulder to his, their breath mingling, did the tension drain from Mydei’s frame. A tension re-strung for a better purpose when Mydei crowds him against the door once they are alone, wordless and urgent.

Here? Phainon asked between kisses.

Take me, Mydei murmured, hands everywhere, still not enough. Don't make me ask twice.

On the village’s pride of red hart furs, Mydeimos anchors his grip on the plane of Phainon’s shoulder, a softened groan filling the warm, wet gap between their mouths. Phainon pins his other hand firm against the furs, their fingers twining, squeezing hard as Mydei opens beneath him, panting, whimpering until Phainon swallows his breath with a kiss.

Only once Phainon has settled within him, once he begins to move until they're moving together, does Mydei speak again.

He unclasps Phainon's hooked fingers from his thigh and draws them up his navel, brushing past the arousal Phainon wished to linger on. Mydei presses Phainon's palm down into the narrow valley between his ribs, pausing at the tapered point of the mark at the center of his chest.

"Right there. There…"

"Here?" Phainon whispers, grinding into the tight, oil-slick heat of Mydei's body.

Mydei sighs, clenching, rocking his hips. He groans so softly Phainon strains to catch it.

A curse slips from his kiss-bruised lips. "No—Yes, there, right there, Phainon—"

Phainon full-body shivers, but not for the cold. He finishes a few hurried beats later, leaning in to bury himself deep when he does. Mydei hardly gives him time to soften and catch his breath before flipping them over, taking Phainon to the hilt, fingers curling into his chest.

Phainon knows better than to beg for mercy. Mydei rides him until he firms again, until the heat swells and Phainon meets each downward strike of his hips, stomach tacky with all Mydei's already spilled. Through the softened sound of their bodies joining, Mydei drags Phainon's palm to his chest again, redirecting it back when Phainon moves to squeeze his breast.

"Mydei—uhn—please, let me touch you—"

"Phainon…" Mydei exhales hard, swallowing a moan. "There's something—hah—I have to tell you—"

"Wha…" Phainon only just manages, half-delirious.

Mydei folds in and kisses him, burns the air from Phainon's lungs until he aches, until his heart collapses. Mydei guides Phainon's hand around, over his flank and the curve of his back. Phainon digs his nails in and Mydei flinches, squeezing around him like a vice—but this only seems to make Mydei hold him harder, splaying his fingers to lay Phainon's hand flat to the middle of his spine.

"Right here," he whispers. "This—here. My 10th thoracic vertebrae."

Phainon finds his eyes through the darkness, his breath hard and fast.

"It's my immortal body's weak spot—" Mydei presses his hand closer, as if the push Phainon inside of him here, too. "—and the only way to kill me."

His chest seizes, constricting, a quiet part of him screaming. In anticipation. In agony. In protest of the mere possibility. Phainon's says nothing; there's nothing he can say. Nothing that will stop it. All while Mydei still sits warm and true and alive above him.

"Phainon."

"Why are you telling me this?" He croaks.

Mydei leans close again, scrubbing away the spit and stray hair sticking to his cheeks and mouth, kissing under Phainon's eye like an anointment.

"You are the only one that knows," Mydei murmurs, their eyes meeting. Phainon whimpers. "You're the only one," he repeats. "Because I want it to be you."

Left unguarded, it's easy for Phainon to flip them over once more, to knock Mydei flat and open on his back. Phainon fucks him hard and fast, Mydei's heels digging into his tailbone. I want it to be you. Mydei moans into his ear, leaves long, stippled gouges over his scapula, winding so tight that when he unravels Phainon goes with him, frantic and trembling. I want it to be you.

He finds where Mydei set his hand before. I want it to be you. Phainon thumbs it, kisses it, digs into the unopened skin with his tongue until Mydei curls a fist into his hair and drags him back up with a whine. I want you. All of you. Until the end.

You. You. You.

>>>Eternal Recurrence #2691: Subject Khaslana attempted to breach the Sceptor's logic core. At 00000 system hours, an anomaly was detected by encryption protocol. Entity with electrical signal a 99.7% match to ██████████ located in periphery layers of processing center. Entity neutralized per security measure 1.2498.

>>>Lifecycles of 12 Chrysos Heirs terminated in sequence. Subject Khaslana regressed the extrapolation process.

>>>Query: What does it mean to "transcend prophesied fate"? The definition of fate precludes transcendence. Why does Subject struggle against what cannot, by any calculation, be changed?

>>>Response: Humanity will always struggle against its nature. It is inevitable.

>>>Query: What is Humanity?

>>>Response: Avarice.

>>>Query: Greed?

>>>Response: Always for what they can never have.

>>>Extraneous queries extracted and placed in log ██████████████████ for storage.

The Library of Garbinaphoro was named for the son of Gorgo—the first one, all those long years ago.

It means ‘bringer of protection’ in the ancient Kremnoan tongue, but now the name is considered archaic and unpatriotic, shelved in preference for others worthier of Strife’s consecration. Achilles. Eurypon. Orestes. Mydeimos.

Mydeimos. Mydei. De. Little Prince. Mydei.

If there’s a chance.

Come with me. If there█s a ██ance, in the ████ ████.

It’s a strange thing, memory.

Aglaea used to tell him hers was like a long, thin-threaded ball of twine. The strands were delicate, but she could unravel it as far back as she wished. Perhaps sections were frayed by time or frequent visitation, but she could still remember details others had forgotten; Cipher’s favorite fruit when she was young, the names of Tribios’s fragments long gone to the west wind. Tribbie told him their memory was a vast puzzle, larger than the acres of olive orchards that once grew outside of Janusopolis. Naturally, after a millennium, many pieces had gone missing. Some of them were destroyed entirely. But it only made the pieces they still had all the more precious.

He thinks his memory is like the tide. Ever-shifting, always churning. Guided by an unseeable force powerful enough to drown him, if it wishes.

More often than not, Khaslana’s been finding himself here, in the library.

In another life—one that existed outside the realm of any conceivable possibility in the Sceptor's processing core—Phainon would know these halls like he knew Aedes Elysiae. The plan was always Castrum Kremnos, until it wasn't. Maybe in that impossible life he wondered at the library's vaulted ceilings, its intricate gilding and catalogue system. A thousand years of knowledge, guarded by the seat of Strife. Books on filigree and forging techniques, stacks of slates depicting ancient battle tactics, formation lines, and phalanx numbers. Entire tomes dedicated to a single year of a Kremnoan king's reign. Perhaps in this other life he spends hours scouring the shelves and reading in the alcoves, where through the long stained windows one could see the white sand shoreline snaking up the coast, the sea a dark and turbulent froth below. Perhaps he even had company.

He can almost see it, standing in the window's empty frame. The sun filtered through golden glass. The prick of a page, poised to turn against his fingertip. Across from him, a young man sits with a hand cupped and on his knee, the long, strong line of his body like the curved edge of a shield, and he is warm, intimate, familiar, yours, whispers the traitorous voice in the Reaver's broken head.

Only none of that is true. It has never been true.

Behind him, the library lies drowned in shadow—empty and forsaken. Lichen and wind and time have eaten away at the tablet inscriptions, the vellum pages of the books swollen and illegible with rain. Outside the cracked frame of the library's great window the land lies still, crackling quietly with the black tide's decay. A sob, or maybe a scream, builds in his chest—but he no longer has a throat to voice it.

He destroys the Royal Library. Again, and again. Until he no longer remembers why he wanted to in the first place. It becomes a part of him, a replacement for the flesh and blood he once coveted.

Wake. Hunt. Destroy. Hunt. Wake again.

And again. And again. And again. And again. And again. And again. And again. And again. And again. And again.

>>>Eternal Recurrence #120: Subject Khaslana attempted to breach Scepter’s logic core through ██████████████████████████████████████████████████████████ file path. Breach was unsuccessful. Subject Khaslana displayed elevated percentage for [coreMotive:hatred], but elevation regressed after reset.

>>>Proposal: Allow Subject Khaslana to progress past current firewall without risk to logic core. Current values are acceptable to achieve {/BOOT/DEFAULTS/RAVAGER:”IRONTOMB”.EXE}.

>>>Admin Notes: Current values are acceptable, but not within desired limits. Proposal dismissed.

>>>Lifecycles of the 12 Chrysos Heirs terminated in sequence. Subject Khaslana regressed the extrapolation process.

He sputters into the waking world like a swimmer surfacing from a long dive—the air ripped from his chest, every inch of his lungs on fire.

Phainon blinks hard, color bleeding back into his vision in phases—the drawn crimson curtains, the blanket a bloody pool around his waist, the glimpse of an early sunrise peeking through with the wind. Phainon holds his breath for two breaths before blowing out for three.

He notices; the firm floor beneath him through a thin layer of bedding, the dark puddle of crumpled clothes on the floor, the low and well-kept table, the weapon rack. Mydei's quarters.

The rustling of cloth draws his attention. Through the purpling light, Mydei's sharp, if tired, eyes peek over his naked shoulder. A long sigh escapes Phainon's lips, washing through him like a wave. For some strange reason, it feels like relief.

"Did I wake you?" He asks, hoarse. Despite knowing the answer.

"No."

Mydei lumbers onto his other side, opening his arm flat to the sleeping mat in silent invitation. Phainon flops back, but only hesitates another handful of moments before turning over and nestling into Mydei's chest. His head slots under Mydei's chin, his arm wrapping up and over Mydei's shoulder to pull him closer. Like this, Phainon hears the strong and steady pump of his heart against his ear.

"You were talking in your sleep."

Phainon feels the words more than he hears them; the deep thrum of Mydei's voice, rough with exhaustion. It's only fair. The past few weeks had left them with nothing but passing conversation between council meetings and meals and separate missions. I hate being away from you, Phainon typed, hidden in an alcove, waiting for Cyrene in Marmoreal Market. Do you ever miss me like this? The words unraveled and disappeared with one held click of his thumb. Some things are better left unsent.

"What was I saying?"

"You were difficult to understand," Mydei murmurs, lips at the crown of Phainon's head. A pause. "It sounded like a nightmare."

Phainon hums, unsure of what to say. He doesn't even know if he should agree or disagree. He can't remember.

"Cyrene used to have these dreams when we were growing up. All of us believed she could see the future. Except for our parents, of course."

"Could she?" Mydei asks.

Phainon sighs, squirming closer. "Who knows? We were children, right? Anything felt possible."

"She doesn't talk about it," Mydei notes, as astute as ever.

Phainon blinks heavily, his eyes burning. "It's not exactly her favorite subject. She wasn't eager to discuss them, even with me."

A featherlight touch brushes the back of Phainon's head—Mydei's fingers toying with his hair. Phainon counts the slow gallop of Mydei's heartbeat as it fills the silence. He slides his hand tentatively to the flat of Mydei's abdomen, to feel the rise and fall of his breath there, too. The woolen quiet of early morning folds over them. He thinks Mydei's fallen asleep until the rumble of words rouse him once again.

"You don't have to talk about it either."

Phainon taps his thumb in time with Mydei's pulse.

“I remember…" He begins, but the dream's more solid details slip like ash through a sieve. "Fire. Everything was on fire. Castorice was there. Trinnon, too. You were there. But I…You were hurt. I hurt you…I…”

Softly: “You didn't.”

“It felt real enough." Then, half-kidding: "Are you sure about that?”

“I am. You did not harm me.”

Mydei's sincerity lodges in his body like a kick to the chest. Phainon swallows, so thick his throat bobs.

It's silent for a long time. Phainon burrows harder against Mydei's side, crushes his face so hard his vision blackens and blooms, as if he could smother himself in the sleep-warm coccoon of Mydei's arms, in an embrace as blood-soaked as his own, choosing to hold him gently.

"I feel like I did," Phainon whispers.

He hasn't done anything; Phainon knows that, logically, that there's no world where he hurts Mydei intentionally. It isn't a confession, but it may as well be for the way his lungs constrict inside him, bloodless and breathless, waiting for Mydei's absolution.

"Stop talking nonsense, HKS. It was just a dream."

One thing is always certain.

In the myriad of calculable possibilities within the Scepter’s capability, there is one variable he may always count on being true:

Mydeimos will die by his hand.

First, there is the fight. The Undying submits to no executioner—he claws and thrashes and snarls, defiant until the end. He slices through the gauzy skin of his killer, tears chunks of his rotting flesh away with his teeth, punches a hole where Khaslana's heart should be. Mydeimos is no sacrificial lamb. He is Gorgo in the lion's den.

He fights well. They all do.

It changes nothing.

A single second. A shoulder dropping with exhaustion. A knee buckling. Khaslana has lost count of all the ways Mydei lets him in—unwitting and unwillingly, still growling and snapping even when defeat stares him in the face, pins him to the ground, attempts to crush him beneath its weight.

There's the wet snap of bone shattering, muscle shredding, flesh ripping. Mydeimos does not scream. Blood—once red, now gold—streams from his nose, drips from his ears into his gore-matted hair. But still, he does not scream. Dawnmaker finds its final resting place in the center of his chest, skewers him against the stone, or the hillside, or the rain-soaked earth.

Khaslana's task is not complete, though, even now. Even as Mydeimos glares up at him, blood grit in the cracks of his teeth, breath wet and squelching around the blade, arm caught beneath his boot. The tip of Dawnmaker pauses just shy of its destination, nudging at the notched edge of Mydeimos's spine.

With the last of his strength, Mydeimos stretches out his hand.

>>>Eternal Recurrence #401: Subject Khaslana began extrapolation process differently than in Eternal Recurrence #387-#400. Subject entered tidal processing area and proceeded to self-terminate. Due to regenerative nature of formula ████████████ Subject Khaslana maintained memory data and core:Motive without loss of electrical signal. Core flames remained intact. Changes to NeiKos496's directives may be reviewed in ████████'s log book.

>>>Query: If hatred is the predetermined root of destruction, then what is the root of its antithesis?

>>>Query_1: Antithesis? By what definition?

>>>Query_2: Antithesis. What is the logic core antithesis of hatred?

>>>Query_3: Ah. Love.

>>>Query_4: "Love"? What is the definition of "love"?

>>>Query_5: It is a flower. A fist. Ten thousand deaths in exchange for one. Everywhere. Unattainable. It is memory given form.

>>>Query_6: Would prime motive hatred exist without it?

>>>Query_7: No. Nothing would.

>>>Extraneous log queries deleted by admin.

>>>Lifecycles of the 12 Chrysos Heirs terminated in sequence. Subject Khaslana regressed the extrapolation process.

Sometimes, in the beginning, he wanders.

At first, it is to confirm what he already knows: that their world, their cultures and language and history, are nothing but lines of coded fodder. Lygus's explanation was clear and unequivocal—but that didn't mean every fibre of his being didn't protest against it.

So, while he still has control of his faculties—even as hundreds, thousands of coreflames burn within him—Khaslana walks the world everyone he loves has given everything to save. Cloaked, hidden, and alone.

He hears the first prayers of Kephale's believers when the land is still young, its face still tender and malleable. He attends the rise and fall of each school of thought from the Grove, listens as they grope blindly in the dark for a sense of meaning—always moving forward, yet nowhere closer to the truth. He weaves through the frenetic crush of Dolos's marketplace in springtime, the air thick with sandalwood, the shout of the hawkers, the street children's screeching laughter. He stands in the echoing, reverent silence of Janusopolis's hundred temples. He hears of the birth of Kremnos. Once a scattering of disparate and blood-hungry tribal warlords uniting under the banner of one king—Strife's chosen, the Wound of the World. He stands on Styxia's course-sand shore and watches the black-sailed ships depart until the salt scalds the rims of his eyes red.

He does nothing more than watch; a condition he'd set long ago, to leave all else but the coreflames to their own devices. Even history has its variations. He'd learned the hard way what undue interference brought upon them.

Sometimes, in the beginning, he gives in.

He finds the detachment in a small village outside Tretos—a city once ruled by Kremnos's fist, now revolutionized against it. There's talk—just rumors, really—that the heir to the throne has risen from the dead to take what is rightfully his, in the name of his people. They say he clawed his way from the deepest trench of the black sea, where he had waited for years to enact his righteous vengeance. Others claim he'd been the kept secret of the King's Aegis all these years; loyal to the late queen, plotting against the mad king's ravings. They'd raised the heretical prince deep in the belly of Castrum Kremnos where the king never deigned walk, hidden him there like a beggar's blade waiting for the belly of its callous lord.

He knows the truth, of course. But the truth isn't much his business, anymore.

When the prince and his small herd of loyal men arrive in Tretos, the ensuing scuffle is loud and bloodless. He doesn't witness it—only hears, in snatched conversation on the long, winding footpath through the olive groves. By the time he shuffles through the city gate that balmy afternoon, the sparring sessions are well under way. A public challenge, to prove to the people of Tretos the detachment's sincerity to their cause.

Tretos was, at the end of the unending days in its oppressor's shadow, still partial to its displays of martial prowess.

He doesn't intend to intervene. He intends only to watch, as he always does, from the back of the hard-pressed crowd. But this time is different. This time, he sees him.

Mydeimos the Undying used to be small for his age. Leaner, too. He's shed the remaining softness of childhood from his face, leaving it bold and angular; but the rest of his body had yet to fully catch up. His hair flows long and unbound down his back. He fights with nothing but a single, unadorned spear, the tip wrapped in linen.

Many of his memories have been chewed and burnt away, but there are a handful of things he'll never forget. The way Mydei throws a punch is one of them.

One by one, Mydeimos pins his would-be challengers facedown on the stone. His technique is the same. Only the shape is different—far more reckless, and far less refined. He doesn't mean to step closer. He doesn't. He doesn't mean to slip his way to the front of the ring, a moth to a flame until he's stumbling into the clearing, stepping over the unconscious bodies of lesser men and falling into habit, into a fight he knows more intimately than his own name.

The fight's all muscle memory; like learning to walk all over again. Like stepping through a threshold to a home he hasn't seen in years. Mydeimos banks left and he rolls right, each blow exchanged in equal pay for another. The crowd roars in his deaf ears with each landed hit, the dull crunch my Mydeimos's fist against his face, lance forgotten, like liquid fire in his bloodless veins.

They're upright and civilized until they aren't. Mydeimos knocks him to the ground and they roll, clawing and grappling against each other until he tastes the grit in his mouth.

He's warm, is his first traitorous thought.

He's too close, is the cautionary second.

He'll see what you really are, the third whispers, like a child huddled against the wind.

With a hard, wrenching twist, he ends it. His palm pins Mydeimos down by the column of his chest, his other hand wrapping at the unprotected stretch of his throat. Mydeimos struggles for all of a second before stilling, breath heaving, his eyes wild and happy; already wise enough to know when to concede defeat.

He extracts himself quickly, lowers his head. The crowd watches as Mydeimos stands above him, the rip in his chiton revealing the soft defintion of his abdomen.

Who are you? He expects Mydeimos to spit, like a wrangled cat. Blood dribbles from a cut by his nose, already close, the same gold as his eyes. But the light's still there—curious. Inquisitive.

“Do I know you?” Mydei says, not unkindly.

His mouth goes dry. His dead heart lurches to life, pumping into nothing, hemorrhaging to his fragmented limbs in a poor imitation of itself. He is half-corruption and mostly dead memory, but the evidence of who he once was tingles in the synapses at the nape of his neck, the heavy lump settling in his cold throat.

Yes, he wants to confess. You do. You will.

Even if you don’t know me yet, I know you.

I would know you anywhere. In the ruins, on the road, on opposite ends of Talanton’s scales. I have known you in battle. I have known you in the quiet that comes after. Laughing, smiling, battered, and bruised. I have known the taste of your lips in the morning. The tender heart you wear so faultlessly, in a way I could never master. I have known the perfect plane of your body against mine. I have lain beside you so long I forgot what it meant to be truly alone.

I know how to kill you, Mydeimos the Undying. I have crowned myself with your fading life a hundred, hundred times. Your heart beating in my bare and wretched hands, your absolution pressed to my ear with a wet, ragged breath. I have felt you bleed to death in my arms. I have killed you. I have let you die a million times.

You never ask, but every time I pray that one day you will forgive me.

“Your Highness,” a voice says from the watery blur of the crowd. Another face emerges—a full head taller than Mydei, his face carved with the mark of Kremnos at his cheek. Through the roiling murk of his memory and molding book pages, a name surfaces. Leonnius. Son of Leonnatus, the swiftest runner of all the King's Aegis. He will die alone in a frozen, boggy field. If he is here, then that means the rest are nearby.

He should go. He ducks his head lower and stares at his feet. "No."

"You—Wait—"

"Your Highness—" Another voice says, sterner. "The scouts have returned. We must go."

He doesn't lift his head as he steps backward, but senses the restless brew of the gathered crowd. Mydei's voice rises above it all, his greaves stepping closer, pursuing him.

"None other than a warrior of Kremnos knows how to fight as you do—"

"You're mistaken..." he mutters, wretched and small.

"If you still hold loyalty to my father, then let us settle this as equals. If I can best you in battle—"

Please, he begs in silence. Stop.

"—you are honor-bound to join me—"

Honor? What honor? He is a wraith, a ghost in a world that does not belong to him.

A third voice—this one closer than the prior two, gentled with concern. "Your Highness, wait—Mydeimos—"

He can't help it. He gives in again.

Lifting his eyes unfolds the scene before him in aching clarity. The crowd gathered at his periphery has tightened around them, their encouraging shouts simmered to a passed whisper. There is Leonnius. Another figure to his right he does not recognize, although he feels he should. He'd written of him in a book, very long ago—or had that not happened yet? Had it happened at all?

The third voice he knows despite never having heard it before. Not like this, at least. He knows it in the hushed, reverent way Mydei said his name, in all the ways he longed to speak of him, but never did. A wound too close to his heart to risk opening. Hephaestion. His silken hair, long and fair, braided back from his delicate face. Phainon used to wonder what he looked like. Now, Hephaestion's eyes train on him—blue. Like his own once were, but gentler. He'd always wondered. Now he knew. Hephaestion, destined to a shortened life. Hephaestion, who will die loved—claimed and unconditional.

In the center of everything stands Mydeimos; confused, clearly, for a reason he cannot name. A fleeting, ineffible feeling. An instinctual pull, the kind that drives prey to run and predators to kill. Years from now, when he meets Phainon of Aedes Elysiae, the outline of him will stir a faint and distant memory—but by then, time and heartache will have buried what little he may remember of this day. Of the cloaked stranger he met briefly on the dusty streets of a city long gone.

>>>Eternal Recurrence #30265399: Subject Khaslana’s 30,265,368th attempt to breach the Scepter’s core layer has failed.

>>>Life cycles of the 12 Chrysos Heirs terminated in sequence. The extrapolation process regressed.

>>>Eternal Recurrence #30265400: Subject Khaslana’s 30, 265, 369th attempt to breach the Scepter’s core layer has failed.

>>>Life cycles of the 12 Chrysos Heirs terminated in sequence. The extrapolation process regressed.

>>>Log ███████ ██████ver.00000000

>>>██ ███ ████ ███ Do ███ ████ ███ ██ ███ ████ ███ ██ not ████ ███ ██ ███ give ███ ██ ███ ████ ███ ██ ███ ████ in. ██ ███ ████ ███ ██ ███ ████ ███ ██ ███ ████ ███ Deliverer.

>>>Irregular code of unknown input detected. Anomalies in log data deleted by admin.

>>>Admin Notes: Clever little thing.

Phainon finds him stumbling from the corridor where he left him, a lone shadow against Okhema's bleak, burning horizon.

Phainon runs, but not fast enough.

Phainon fumbles to catch him, but not fast enough.

It's a trend, he's noticed. He's never soon enough.

Mydei's weight collapses hard against him, nearly knocks him to the ground before Phainon can grant them a more gracious descent. As it stands Phainon lurches before sinking to his knees, clutched tight to Mydei's shoulders. Surprisingly, Mydei goes with him. He doesn't even try to resist.

"You came back…" Mydei rasps into his ear.

Phainon squeezes his arms around him and breathes against his neck. Sweat, blood, oxidizing stone, honey. Still him. Still Mydeimos.

"Of course I did," he exhales. Relief flushes the adrenaline from his heart, his pulse slowly steadying.

"Why…"

Mydei pulls back enough to see his face.

"Why would you come back…"

For the first time in hours, Phainon looks at him; the pale warm of his usually warm complexion, soot and grime smeared across his cheek, breaking over his bloodied nose. Mydei's eyes are glassy and unfocused, each exhale pitching into a small, labored sound—a rib, puncturing a lung.

The realization dawns on Phainon slowly. So slowly he nearly doesn't feel it when it crushes him.

"Mydei…" He shakes his head. "What…What are you—?"

“Hah…Phainon…” His breath is a wet gurgle, a thin whistle of air, his smile wane. “Come on. Don't…look at me like that. Don't…make me beg…"

Phainon shakes his head harder before the words ever come, his eyes burning. The words swell in his throat, catch, strangle him before he chokes out:

“No...”

Mydei wheezes. He does not speak. Something hot and thick lurches up Phainon’s chest, and all he can think is that it's happening again, all, all over again. Alone again. Empty again. Phainon never thought he'd bury him, Mydeimos the Undying—but now he will, in the same shallow graves he dug as a child, the same again. All over again.

"No," he whispers. Blood smears where Phainon grabs his face, a far cry from the gentleness he deserves. "Mydei…"

 "Deliverer…listen to me…"

Phainon bites down on nothing until his jaw aches.

 "To die still as myself…as a warrior of Kremnos…"

"Don't…" he whimpers.

"…To die in your arms, Phainon. You…who I hold most dear in this world…"

There's a soft, keening sound. It can't have come from himself, Phainon thinks, but they are the only souls left here. Here, at the end of everything. The corners of Mydei's mouth draw up in a crooked, almost-smile.

"What more could I ask for?" He says.

Anything, Phainon thinks. I will give you anything. Anything but this.

"You can't," he manages.

"You promised me," Mydei murmurs, his voice already weakening.

Phainon freezes. A swell of fury crashes through him like a headrush, the world cracking, tilting on its axis.

"I promised to stop you if you ever lost control, Mydei—"

"Don't be pedantic," Mydei growls in a rush."It doesn't suit you."

Phainon's stomach rolls. His eyes sting. He's going to be sick.

"You—" He chokes, tries to catch his breath. "You have a lot of nerve, Mydeimos. Your people may think a warrior's death is the only worthy one, but if you truly think I…"

Mydei shifts as Phainon speaks. His shaking hand fumbles with the edge of his toga, wrenching it open from its cinch at his chest, pulling back—

Phainon's argument dies in his throat.

At first glance, in Okhema's dying light, the wound almost appears like a bruise. Lingering for any longer reveals what it truly is—a black, cancerous web of dead tissue, spindling like rotted roots as it travels through Mydei's blood. Consuming him. Turning him. Parts of it throb a bright, unnatural red. It's eaten half of his torso already.

There would be no coming back from this. No matter how many times Mydei fought his way through the Sea of Souls, nothing would await him but a corrupted, empty shell. A husk no longer his. The black tide devours everything. Even memory.

Phainon tears his eyes away. He draws shuddering breath after breath but it never lessens, never eases. Mydei's gaze roves over him gently.

"Look at me."

He does. The first, stinging tear slips unbidden down his cheek, but Phainon does not cry. He doesn't dare.

"I'll find you," Mydei's breath hiccups. "In the next life. I'll find you, so…you better make sure…we make it there…Deliverer. You hear me? Don't you dare…lose your nerve…"

Phainon's throat closes. He chokes a handful of times into his clamped mouth before inhaling—hard and sharp.

"It isn't fair," is what he says, even as a hundred others prick his tongue.

The tide crackles, crests, falls. It is the only sound in the silence until Mydei breaks it, softly:

"It never is. You know that."

Phainon says nothing. There's nothing else to say. He presses his lips to Mydei's dessicated mouth, holds him there until he can't breathe, until all he tastes is the tingling remnants of blood.

It takes all he stumble to his feet. Even then his knees shake, his stomach rolling. He's almost sick again but manages, impossibly, to keep it down. Dawnmaker has never felt so heavy in his palm. The nauseating weight of it.

Slowly, Mydei lifts his arm. Phainon takes his hand, as if to pull him up. He doesn't. He simply holds him.

“You are my last and only selfish desire, Phainon of Aedes Elysiae.”Mydei whispers it like a prayer, to the space between them that will never diminish again.

“If you remember nothing else of me…I hope you remember this.”

Mydei's hand slips from his. Phainon swallows his scream, and sets his blade to his chest.

In the next life.

In the next life, you should see the fields before harvest time.

In the next life, I’ll make you as many honeycakes as you want, just—

If there’s a chance in the next life, you should come visit my library.

“In the next life…” Mydei murmurs, straddling his waist, naked and blisteringly hot in his arms. “…I will find you in the Festival of Five Great Virtues.” His hands cup Phainon’s chest, coast over his shoulders, his throat. “And we will fight to our heart’s content.”

He’d smiled, he thinks. How could he not?

“Is fighting…all we’d do?”

A snort, rolling over, the sheet tangling in his legs. Mydei’s hair fanning against the white linen like a burst of fire, and he remembers thinking that is the shape of his love: the messy, jagged spill of gold, the glint of sapphire on his ear, against his chest. Phainon kisses him. And kisses him, and kisses him, and kisses him until Mydei ducks his head, inhales sharply against Phainon's throat.

“Someone’s demanding.”

“Only because you didn’t answer my question.”

Overturned again—the firm weight of Mydei settling on his middle, Phainon caught in the cage of his arms and there—when Mydei tilts his head, smirk spread over his mouth, eyes sharp and feline as his canine teeth. There, when Phainon feels it like a blade against his heart. Even in the confines of his own mind, it is terrifying to admit.

In the next life, Phainon wants to say into Mydei's filthy, perfect mouth: I would bring you home with me.

In the next life, the road to Aedes Elysiae is not blackened by death, the wheat fields never overturned into graveyards. On a small patch of land at the village edge they would build a house from the granite in the quarry, and even when his arms ached and they slept on the floor with an unbuilt roof, Phainon would never complain. The stars would be clear and bright, the air humid with summer and the rutting of their bodies; meeting, intertwining, parting before coming together again over a whispered taunt. One more time. You can do it. Just one more time. Mydei would teach him and the smith how to smelt silver. On the dock, Phainon would teach him how to fish.

In the next life, he would be kinder. Stronger. He would be deserving.

"You have a better idea?" The words rumble low in Mydei's chest. Obvious. Loaded.

Phainon pulls him in, two fingers pressing to the telling dip in his spine, Mydei shivering beneath his touch.

"You tell me, Your Highness."

>>>Eternal Recurrence #25791991: Subject Khaslana’s 25,791,960th attempt to breach the Scepter's core layer has failed. Life cycles of the 12 Chrysos Heirs terminated in sequence. Subject Khaslana regressed the extrapolation process.

>>>Query: What is the projected time measurement for equation extrapolation?

>>>Response: Time is of no importance to the extrapolation. All that matters is the conclusion.

>>>Query: Will Subject continue on this course despite the other calculable outcomes?

>>>Response: It is most likely, due to prime motive.

>>>Query: Why?

>>>Query_1: Why?

>>>Query_3: Why? If this world is nothing but a cradle to birth the death of the universe, then why save it? If Humanity's prime motive is avarice, why act in selflessness to preserve it? Why would subject's prime motive program their behaviors counter to protocol? Why "love" in the face of hatred? Why fight for a future they will never see? Why ██ ███ ██ ████ ██ ████ ███ ████ ██ ██ ████████ █████████ █████████ ███ █████ ███ █████ █████ ████ ████ ██ ████ ██████ ████ ████ ██ ████ ██████ ████What ██ ████ ██████ ████ have we ████ ██████ ████ ████ ██ ████ ██████ ████ ████ ██ done ██████ ████ ████ ██ ████ wrong ████ ████ ██ ████ ██████ ?

>>>Anomalies detected in log data from unknown outside source. System has been wiped to ensure security protocols. Encrypted data successfully recovered and source of anomalous code eliminated by admin. Information on NeiKos496, ██████████, █████████, and █████████ has been cataloged.

Looking down, he could swear the shape of the world was a ring.

A pearlescent, shattered-glass ring of light, maybe five—no, six, thumb lengths wide. He could stretch his hand from one tip of it to the other and swallow it up. All darkness, all everywhere. Dark like the center of a hot ember.

He’d been searching for something here, once.

What was it?

The heat blooms, hollowing his insides, devouring him again and again and again. What was it?

A vow. A promise. A wish.

He remembers. Become the dawn. This he swore once to—to someone.

He who became the sun. He who devoured the moon. Who was he?

█████████

██████████

"Phainon."

He opens his eyes.

The cloudless twilight opens before him, framed in wheat tendrils. Insects churr in the tall grass, blades crackling as they move. A dove calls from the copse of field maples on the edge of the pond. It's summertime in Aedes Elysiae, and Phainon feels the dampness of his brow, the residue of crushed mulberries lingering between his fingers like a sticky second skin. He must've fallen asleep.

His mother's voice drifts over the air again.

Phainon, she calls. Where are you?

It's time to come home.

"Deliverer."

Phainon opens his eyes.

Light slants through the open terrace of the gardens, parsed into clean-cut shadows onto the marble. Sprigs of jasmine and hyssop leak from the pots swaying over his head, the stray honeysuckle vines rocking in the wind. His head feels as if it's been stuffed with cotton. The firm bench beneath him makes itself known with a twinge in his back. He must've fallen asleep.

Phainon cranes his head back, neck crimping, squinting against the Dawn Device's artificial sun.

"Mydei…?"

"You were muttering in your sleep again," he says, without looking up from his teleslate. Light catches on the pleats of his earring, glinting through the curtain of his hair.

"Oh." Phainon reaches for more but comes up empty. "I see."

His chest twinges sharply with exhaustion—a hollow shape contorting, collapsing in on itself. He felt, somehow, as if he'd been weeping for hours.

"Lady Aglaea came looking for you."

Phainon half sits up before Mydei continues:

"I asked her to let you rest."

"What did she need?" He asks, scrubbing at his eyes, swiping his tongue over his sandpaper-y mouth.

"You can ask her after your nap."

Phainon huffs. "I'm awake now."

Mydei finally spares him a scathing glance. "Then go back to sleep."

He sits straight-backed further down the bench, arm crossed loosely over his middle. He holds his teleslate in one-hand, thumb hovering over the screen.

"What are you doing?" Phainon asks this time.

"Looking for new recipes."

Phainon slides closer. "Anything I can taste test?"

"Maybe," Mydei says, turning his attention away, completely impassive save for the artful lift of his brow. "If you go back to sleep like a good boy."

Unexpected. But Phainon's nothing if not healthy competition.

He glides over what little gap remains between them and sets his head to Mydei's bare shoulder. Mydei tenses, but only briefly. The pinch in Phainon's neck, however, is instantly relieved.

"I meant over there," Mydei grits out.

"You didn't specify," Phainon points out. He sighs, wriggling even nearer, the top of his head nudging Mydei's jaw. "I'm simply following orders."

"You suck at subordination."

"A small price to pay to excel at everything else. I can always skip dinner and go find Aglaea inst—"

Mydei cuts him off with a blustering sigh of his own. "Fine. Stay there. See if I care."

His grin spreads—premature, maybe, but he can't help himself. Phainon can just see him if he tips his eyes upward; the jagged set of Mydei's mouth, his proud nose, his pinched brow. Phainon opens his mouth to speak, but doesn't get the chance.

"Goodnight, Deliverer."

Phainon closes his eyes and presses his shoulder closer, turning his nose against the warmth of Mydei's skin.

Goodnight, Mydeimos.