Work Text:
Lᴏɴɢ ᴀɢᴏ, ᴛʜᴇ ᴘᴇᴏᴘʟᴇ ᴡᴇʀᴇ ᴅʏɪɴɢ ᴀᴛ ᴛʜᴇ ᴇɴᴅ ᴏғ ᴛʜᴇ ᴡᴏʀʟᴅ.
Bᴜᴛ ʜᴏᴘᴇ ᴡᴀs ɴᴏᴛ ʏᴇᴛ ʟᴏsᴛ, ғᴏʀ ᴀ ʟᴏɴᴇ ᴛʀᴀᴠᴇʟᴇʀ sᴛɪʟʟ ʜᴇᴀʀᴅ ᴛʜᴇ sᴏɴɢ ᴏғ ᴛʜᴇ sᴛᴀʀs.
Aɴᴅ sᴏ ɪᴛ ᴡᴀs that the traveler found themself on a quiet tree-lined avenue near the gates of the City, somewhere in the early hours of the morning (there were a great many cities in those days, but only Amaurot was the City). Few walked the streets in these pale blue hours, not least because it had been scarcely a day since the Convocation's great working had set the sky to rights and quieted the panic which had seized them. Scarcely a day since the traveler had abdicated the Fourteenth Seat, to seek another way than sacrifice.
The traveler was possessed of a certain gift of prophecy, a knowledge of what was to be, that came in handy on the road. It was this same sense that told them, now, that their last chance to leave the city unimpeded was slipping away, moment by moment. There were few things on this star so pleasant to them as the idle contravention of prophecy, and they luxuriated in this small gift from the day as they sat on a bench beneath a leafy bough. The interval before the appearance of their prophesied interceptor was regrettably short, and it was only a scant few minutes before the traveler’s mentor and predecessor appeared at the end of the block.
“Azem,” she said, as though she had merely happened upon them in the marketplace.
“The Convocation wouldn’t approve of you using that name,” said the traveler.
“So the reports are true. You have resigned the Fourteenth Seat,” she said appraisingly. “Do you now seek to return to the star?”
“Were that the case, would you now seek to divert me? Suggest to me that I follow again in your footsteps, change my black robes for white and my seat for a desk?” asked the traveler, eyes and voice twinkling merrily.
“Even I am not yet grown that bold in my old age,” she said, and laughed. “No, I merely wished to be the last to see you off before your departure, to advise and encourage you. It is a habit I have never been able to shake.”
"Even now," the traveler said ("in our last meeting," they did not say), "you would play at being my teacher?"
Venat smiled. "Even now," she said. "I am your mentor, and shall be until we return to the star. And you are my beloved protégé, and so shall you be until we return to the star."
The traveler smiled too, but said, "If you came to advise me on my next steps, then you should know the answer I gave your man from Anamnesis stands."
"No," she said, and though the gentle smile remained on her face her voice was all iron. "I know you will not say yes. I am only here to see you off." The traveler did not reply, and so she sat with them in easy silence, as they often had, so that the only sounds were of morning birdsong and the city coming to life.
I know you will not say yes, thought the traveler. I know. And they understood why Venat had found them here and now, and neither before their meeting with the Convocation nor hereafter.
"I thought you had no patience for prophecy," said the traveler, "and yet you purport to know the future."
"Not once, in all our long association, have I ever ‘purported’ to know anything," she said.
"What do you know, Venat, and how," said the traveler, though they already knew the answer.
"What I know, and how I know it, I cannot say," she said. "Only that I knew you would accept neither the Convocation's decision nor my own."
The traveler laughed. "What can I say? I am greedy and cowardly. I would no sooner give up my people to save the world than I would give up the world to save my people. I want it all, Venat, I want everything. I have never been able to settle for anything less, and you all offered less."
"You have always loved to lie about yourself," she said, and for a mercy did not pursue the thought further.
"But you have always known I could never bear to pick," said the traveler. "Whatever it is you know about me that has brought you out here this morning is different."
"It is different," she agreed, and for a long moment neither said anything, for by now it was perfectly clear to them what they both knew.
After an interval, the traveler said, “I go to seek another way. I will not succeed. The visions are quite clear on that point.”
She did not say anything.
“Even so, I can do no other,” said the traveler. “I wish it were otherwise. That I could die at their sides, the three of us together against the end; or with you and your little cabal, fighting for a righteous cause. That I could avert, or at least attenuate, the conflict in which you are soon to be embroiled. That I could keep Hythlodaeus here. But none of us ever had a choice.”
“There is always a choice,” said the mentor.
“No, there isn’t,” the traveler said. “Emet-Selch could never give up on Amaurot, and you could never countenance the sacrifice required, and I could never bear to fight against either of you. And were any of those things different, this world would not be this world and we would not be ourselves. No, all of this is as it was meant to be. There is beauty in a fated end, though I know you never have agreed. Each of us walking to the end we were always destined for.”
“My walk will be far longer than yours,” she said, with no trace of resentment.
“It shall,” said the traveler. “I hope there is peace at the end of it.”
They did not speak for a moment, and could not bear to look at one another, but their hands found each other, and each was pleased to find the other’s grip firm, unshaking, and resolute.
“If it is not prophecy,” said the traveler, a long-suffering but dutiful student, “then only one possibility remains. I can only conclude you know the future.”
“I do," she said.
“Have you--have you seen them?”
“I have,” she said. “Indeed, I have met your Warrior of Light.”
Something deep within the traveler gave way and they gasped for air in great shuddering breaths, tears welling. Their visions had not erred. They had been right to choose this. To choose to die so this other might live, the one who could finally lay to rest Lahabrea and Elidibus, who would restore some measure of peace to Emet-Selch, who would return Hythlodaeus to the star and free Venat from her burden.
They live, thought the traveler, dizzied. They will live, and some vast and yawning cavern they had not even known was within them was suddenly illuminated. It was not all for nothing. There will be an end.
“They were wonderful,” she said. “And it warmed my heart to hear their joy and love as they spoke of their own world. Of the world that will be. A true traveler, in your own mold. And Argos likes them. Far more than he does you, I’d warrant.”
Something high and cold sang in the back of the traveler’s head even as their chest filled with warmth, the unerring call of the stars, and with one deep breath they returned to composure. Even now, other pursuers drew closer. It would not do to be found now, so near to departure. They smiled at their old mentor, at last meeting her eyes.
“To hear that from you, it means more to me than I could ever say. Thank you,” said the traveler. “Thank you. Thank you. Would that I could stay and hear your stories, but I fear our little conference will be interrupted if I do not depart shortly.” They rose, and she with them.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’d hoped we’d have more time. I always thought we would. I could have lived another whole lifetime discussing the world with you, seeing it through your eyes.”
They embraced as people do who know this parting to be their last, as though the fastness of their hold could ward off time itself.
“You will, Venat,” the traveler whispered. “You will.”
And they disentangled themself from her embrace, smiling. And they were still smiling when they rounded the next corner and vanished from view.
Bᴜᴛ ᴛʜᴀᴛ ᴀʟʟ ʜᴀᴘᴘᴇɴᴇᴅ ʟᴏɴɢ ᴀɢᴏ, ᴀɴᴅ ɴᴏᴡ ᴛʜᴇʀᴇ ᴀʀᴇ ɴᴏɴᴇ ᴡʜᴏ ʀᴇᴍᴇᴍʙᴇʀ ɪᴛ.