Chronias

[Anastasia]

The song is unreal, otherworldly. A song in a language surely not spoken anywhere but here.

Yet as you listen, you see it ahead. A great bier of gold and other metals yet, unknown to you. It shines with a radiance, as a familiar figure lies there aslumber. Eblis rests there, his face is calm. The hate and fury so familiar to him is gone.

A blink.

A great field of biers around him. Other fallen celestials lie at rest here - other creatures yet. Female efreet, erinyes and dozens of other females are there, as well as various warriors both solar and many others. They sleep as he sleeps.

"Eblis?" Amaryl asks ever so softly, a hand to her mouth.

"He rests. My son grapples with his sin, renewed in his struggle, as do all of his that he cares for."

The voice of Zaphkiel is as radiant as ever, and yet it seems to blend in here, rather than dominating and standing out.

A blink.

Fields.

Great fields where no sun is needed. Fields where countless babies rest. Babies of all races and species, untouched and at peace. On occasion, one awakens - and in that instant is a full adult, a great tome archon that takes to the air and vanishes deeper into the light.

"The innocent rest. Innocent, they sleep until they wish to awaken, be it in a moment or in an eternity."

A blink.

The Seventh of the Hebdomad stands before you, a figure of gold, hairless and aglow with light.

"Moore," he speaks, "Come to me."

[Corwin]

"Antenora hoped to have a chance to talk to Eblis again, when he is ready to receive visitors," Seira tells Zaphkiel, since her old friend isn't here to make the request in person.

[Nephrite]

Moore has some hesitation for a brief moment, before it is conquered and he flies forward with 21.

[Anastasia]

"When the time is right," Zaphkiel agrees, as Moore brings forth 21. Two golden hands reach out and take 21. In that moment all is still, "It is done. The first part is concluded and this question is answered."

With the book in both hands, "You gave so much," the Seventh of the Hebdomad speaks to the book, "It was never my plan for Sylvie to bear 21 long. It would leave her in Aurora, in a better place where she could heal and make friends. Where a few of her friends would find the way to her as well, to bridge those worlds and allow her to return home one day."

A hand goes to gently pat the cover of the book, "But we are both constrained by the people we work through. Sometimes, one of them does something neither of us expects and our Competition goes awry. Sylvie's own free will and choices made this path for her. Choices big and small. An argument with Aurora's leadership over 21, when she vowed to keep it. A trip to Beyond, where she momentarily grasped secrets far greater than herself. The examples of sacrifice and heroism that touched her heart, that ultimately inspired her to sacrifice herself so that Creation would have a better chance to survive."

Meanwhile Latha turns her head up and listens, tears slowing.

Bastian at least has the good graces to stay silent in matters he's not familiar enough with to speak on.

Amaryl is quiet until, "She said the same thing, that she was meant to destroy the Child of Lifasa and no more."

[Nephrite]

Moore takes in a breath and lets it out.

"No matter what happens, there is always hope. I don't think the Incarnations could understand that." His voice is quiet, yet it carries the gravity of the situation they find themselves in.

[Anastasia]

"Hope is the one virtue I believe will triumph," Zaphkiel agrees, "Hell only offers empty promises and dead dreams."

Another pat of 21's cover before the Lord of Chronias continues. "Sylvie's path was to be a reward for her role with 21. She chose another path instead, with the same talent she lamented once she had the insight of 21 to guide her. When the time was right, I had planned for Alicia and Seira to bring me 21. Then Io returned and Sylvie had invested herself deeper in 21, she had learned its secrets."

"Hope doesn't die with one's choices, foolish and well meaning as they were." Gently Zaphkiel lowers 21 to the ground. As he does, a raised altar rises for the book, met halfway and placed there.

RETURN.

The voice of Zaphkiel echos from firmament to heavens, a command enough to shake the world. A moment and then another before...

"Return." A voice that is meaning as much as words, yet speaking with absolute conviction. Again Zaphkiel speaks, and this time from 21 a phantasm of light emerges. Before your eyes Sylvie reforms on the ground, lying there as she was when she left Aurora.

Yet it is not done. Zaphkiel kneels before Sylvie, this time his hand rests on her chest, over her heart. This time he utters it softly, akin to a prayer. "Awaken."

"...mmm..." Sylvie murmurs, the barest noise from her.

"You never let go of your hope that she would return," Zaphkiel turns to Moore, "Today, that hope is realized. Worry not of her eyes here, for one who has seen 21 to as she has sees not as a mortal sees, not entirely. She will not be at risk from the glories, not this time. I have given her what she lost and more." The Lord of Chronias looks at you with a calm expression, serene. "Know that she even prepared for this, for she took secrets and lore from 21 to benefit herself, should she ever have a chance to act on them. She believed in you, even if she could not bring herself to say it."

[Nephrite]

Moore had stopped breathing and he didn't realize it.

He simply sags slightly, then runs over to grab Sylvie's hand and just sit down with her.

"I know." He says quietly. "She took so much upon herself and wouldn't ever say anything. She saw 21's truth and tried her best to deny it."

He squeezes her hand and just sits quietly after that.

"Thank you."

[Anastasia]

"...blast." Sylvie murmurs that, voice groggy and dazed. "Did that...cost you as much as I feared?"

"It cost me a price that was worth it. Worry not," Zaphkiel agrees. "Go with Moore and join him and his. You understand what your penance will be?"

"...It was my own choices is what you're saying, so it's only right I make good on Calley. I left him, ignored him and then gave him so much that he should never have had. I accept it." At last her eyes open. "Moore. We meet again." The faintest smile graces Sylvie's features. "It's been a long time."

[Nephrite]

"...Would a divine seed help?" Moore asks.

[Iron Dragoon]

"I think, perhaps, letting her remain mortal with her new perspective will help her make amends better than jumping from one power to the next immediately. For a while, at least."

[Corwin]

Helping raise your kid is a grand penance? Well, the kid will probably be happy, so there's that.

"Please stop talking in riddles," Seira tells Zaphkiel and Sylvie. "If there was a cost, share it with the class. All this hoarding of information to a ridiculous degree and letting it out piecemeal is good for operational security, but we are way past that. We're not some throwaway cells you can compartmentalize, but the actual leaders of this rebellion, so how about starting to treat us like it?"

[Iron Dragoon]

"A strong point. And one I back. How are we to coordinate and plan like this? How many things could we have helped with and finished faster without these divisions?"

[Anastasia]

"No, not for this," Zaphkiel says, and then after Seira's words, "I agree. There is much for you to learn and more truths for you to hear. To answer this question, more context is required."

A blink.

You stand on air and vapor, clouds and light overwhelmingly bright here.

'In the name of Sealtiel, I will...'

'Holy Ilmater, I take on...'

'Wise Moradin, we ask that you bless...'

From below they come. Countless prayers, millions of them each moment heard without being heard. It is like rain rising instead of falling, a cascade that never ends. Your blindfolds grow hot as you stand here, yet this heat fades after several moments. "The Apex of Prayer," Zaphkiel explains, "Every prayer directed to those who stand with Celestia is echoed here. No matter how dark and faraway they are, they will be heard here. Here is where the hopes of the righteous in Creation come to be heard."

The Last of the Hebdomad turns now, "It is in this place of hope that I wish to explain everything, and lay my hopes out, for my hope is to save the Creation I helped forge and grew to love. Before Ao's machinations broke us into three, I stood as one, as the Incarnation of Law."

[Iron Dragoon]

"Which handily explains why you and Lord Io know so much and can shield your places of power from Ao's view... who are the other two? Io seems an obvious answer, but that doesn't quite add up with him having to go into the Beyond to learn, unless he was searching for help?"

[Ebiris]

Alicia has been silent for a while, the whole thing with Sylvie wasn't her quest after all. But now they're here, and a suspicion she's held has been answered.

"The arbiter said: Three is the answer, three into two and one into three."

Even behind her blindfold she looks at Zaphkiel. "You are one into three. Are Asmodeus and Primus also parts of the Incarnation of Law?"