Corvis Eralith
I was gagged. The rough cloth tasted of dust and something unpleasantly sour, shoved deep enough to make my jaw ache and threaten my airway.
I was blindfolded—a scratchy darkness pressing down, amplifying every creak of the carriage, every jolt that slammed my bound body against the unforgiving wooden floor.
I was tied, wrists and ankles raw where the coarse rope bit through my stolen clothes. Thrown. Like discarded cargo. The impact rattled my teeth, reigniting the constellation of bruises already painting my small frame from days of desperate flight.
Bastards.
The word echoed in the hollow space of my mind, too feeble for the cold fury simmering beneath the pain. Horrifying job, yes. But the casual, unnecessary cruelty? That was a special brand of madness. I had surrendered for fuck sake. Completely. Offered no struggle. And still, they'd handled me like a sack of grain, stealing the meager supplies I had risked so much to gather—my pathetic lifeline.
Now? Nothing. Just pain, darkness, and the rhythmic, nauseating sway of the carriage.
Yet… amidst the throbbing agony and the taste of filthy cloth… a grim certainty settled. It was done. The pieces were forcibly moved. I was the bait now, trussed and helpless in the belly of the beast Tessia was meant to occupy.
The plot would realign. Arthur would come. This cage, this degradation… it was the crucible where my mistake would be burned away. For the greater good.
The phrase felt cold, clinical, echoing in the void left by fear. A sociopath's rationale? A masochist's embrace? Perhaps, but I didn't care in the slightest. The alternative was far worse—a world unraveled because I had dared to exist, dared to care—was unthinkable. This suffering wasn't just inflicted; it was earned.
A fitting punishment from a universe furious at my clumsy interference. Every bruise was a reminder. Every jolt of pain, my punishment.
Exhaustion, deeper than bone, finally began to drag me under the waves of pain. I really wanted to sleep. A temporary oblivion. A stolen reprieve before… whatever came next.
Just find me soon, Arthur, I pleaded silently into the suffocating blackness, the thought fragile as a spider's thread. Please. Before this carriage becomes my tomb, and my sacrifice becomes just another one of my endless failures.
I am starting to miss my fam—no! They are not your family, you are an anomaly who is risking to send this world to ruin, I reminded myself. I finally managed to close my eyes and get some sleep.
Tessia Eralith
I miss my brother.
The words were a quiet drumbeat in my chest, softer now than the frantic sobs of the first few days, but just as constant. For the hundredth time, maybe the thousandth, the ache bloomed behind my ribs, sharp and familiar. Corvis. My other half. My quiet shadow.
The palace felt too big, too echoey, without him padding silently down the halls like a ghost or sitting with his drawings in his sunlit room. I missed the way he would sometimes look at me with those serious eyes, like he knew a secret no one else knew. I missed trying to make him smile.
Why? The question was a thorn I kept pricking myself on. Had someone been mean? But Corvis barely saw anyone, just like me. He stayed in his room, his world small and safe. Was it too small? Had the walls he built felt like a cage instead of a fort? I didn't understand.
My own loneliness felt like a heavy coat I could sometimes shrug off, especially when I was with my family. His felt… different. Deeper. A well I couldn't see the bottom of.
I had cried. Oh, how I had cried when Grampa's voice had cracked confirming me Corvis was gone, when Mama's hugs felt too tight, when Papa's face looked like storm clouds.
But I am five now. I am a big girl. So, after those first awful days where everything felt wet and grey, I made the tears stop. Mostly. They still threatened sometimes, hot behind my eyes when I saw his empty chair or found a crayon he'd dropped, but I swallowed them down. Big girls didn't cry forever. Big girls waited. Big girls… sometimes wanted to run right out the palace gates and into the big, scary forest to find him myself.
The thought made my stomach flip-flop. What if I got lost? What if Mama and Papa and Grampa, already so worried and sad, had to worry about me too? I couldn't do that to them. I couldn't be another weight.
So I waited. In the sun-warmed heart of the palace gardens, where the air smelled green and alive. A kind handmaid had shown me how to gently coax the leaves, to feel the slow, sleepy pulse of the plants. It was better than just playing. It was tending. Helping something grow. It felt important. And when I did it, focusing on the velvety softness of a petal or the tiny unfurling of a new leaf, the ache for Corvis softened, just a little.
When he comes back, I promised the little blue flower I was carefully stroking, because he will be back, he HAS to be back, I'll show him how the roses listen if you hum softly. And I won't let go of his hand. Not ever. Not for anything.
"Little One, how are you doing?"
Grampa's voice, warm but carrying a thread of worry I knew too well now, came from behind me. I didn't turn immediately, finishing a careful trace along a fern frond. Tending, not playing.
"Hi, Grampa," I said, my voice quieter than usual. My thoughts were still half with Corvis, imagining the scolding I would give him (gently!) for making us worry, mixed with the fierce hug I would save just for him.
"Are you playing with the flowers?" he asked gently, coming to stand beside me, his shadow long on the path.
No. The correction sprang instantly into my mind, clear and firm. I'm not playing. I'm taking care of them. Like I wish someone could take care of Corvis out there. But saying that would make Grampa's eyes get that sad, heavy look again. He already carried enough worry. I didn't want to add mine, not out loud. Not now. So I just looked up at him, mustering a small, wobbly smile that didn't quite reach my eyes.
"Yes," I whispered. But inside, a tiny spark of defiance flickered. When Corvis is home, Grampa, I'll make you tell him I wasn't just playing. I was waiting. And tending. Waiting and tending. For him.
Wherever Corvis was I knew he still thought about us—about his family. He wasn't the type to show it, but I knew my dear brother was just a teddybear behind that shell of his.
Corvis Eralith
My world has become a scratchy, sour-tasting darkness. Evening? Morning? Time had dissolved into the rhythmic lurch of the carriage and the oppressive press of the blindfold.
They hadn't removed it once, not even to shove the lukewarm, lumpy gruel past the gag—a vile paste that coated my tongue and threatened rebellion in my empty stomach. Endure. Just endure a little longer. The mantra was a fragile shield against the gnawing fear and the symphony of aches singing from every bruise. Arthur had to be close. He had to strike soon. This was the moment. The pivot point I had gambled everything on.
Suddenly, the carriage jolted to a halt. My breath hitched, a sharp intake muffled by the gag. Now? Is it now? Hope, fierce and desperate, surged like a wildfire in my chest. Had he come? Was Arthur Leywin, the Paragon-to-be, the former King Grey, finally here to carve his vengeance and unwittingly save the future?
Please.
Please let it be him.
Sounds filtered through the wooden walls—sharp, wet thuds, a choked-off gurgle, the sickening crunch of something heavy hitting the forest floor. Silence. No shouts, no clash of steel. Just swift, brutal finality. Yes! The exclamation screamed silently inside my skull. Just like the novel! Efficient. Merciless. Arthur. Relief, dizzying and sweet, washed over me. It was over.
The nightmare of captivity, the gamble… it had worked! I finally fixed the timeline!
Perfect! I inwardly crowed, a hysterical edge to the thought. I could finally… No. No. Relaxing wasn't an option. My duty was just at its beginning. I had to play the part. The terrified, rescued five-year-old prince. Wide eyes. Trembling lips. Grateful babble. "Take me home p-please!" I rehearsed internally, trying to shove down the cynical survivor beneath the facade.
Be believable.
Just be a scared kid.
Soft footsteps approached the carriage door. Too soft. Almost… graceful. Not the heavy tread of a tired victorious child warrior. A sliver of ice traced my spine. The door of the carriage creaked open. Fingers, cool and precise, worked at the knots binding my wrists, then the gag. The blindfold was lifted.
Light, dim and green-tinged by the forest canopy, stabbed my eyes. I blinked, squinting through tears of disorientation. White hair, stark against the gloom. Concerned blue eyes, sharp and intelligent, framed by features I knew this person.
The future Lance Alea Triscan.
The name detonated in my mind. Code Aureate.
No. The denial was a physical blow, a silent scream that tore through every nerve ending.
No! NO! NO! It wasn't Arthur. It was her. This… this wasn't in the script! This never happened! The carefully constructed house of cards—my sacrifice, my plan to fix the timeline—collapsed in an instant, leaving only choking dust and the deafening roar of failure. Utter, catastrophic failure.
I refuse! I refuse to have failed so miserably! But the evidence was undeniable, standing right before me, her expression softening as she misinterpreted my dumbfounded horror for shock.
"Your Highness?" Her voice was gentle, laced with a warrior's urgency and a genuine, disarming worry. "Can you hear me? Are you hurt?" Her hands were efficient, carefully freeing my ankles. "I am a servant of your family. Don't be afraid. The bad men outside… they won't trouble anyone ever again."
She offered a small, reassuring smile, clearly mistaking my frozen, internal devastation for paralyzing fear.
Panic, cold and razor-sharp, sliced through the numbness. If Alea Triscan, a White Core mage, was here… Arthur wouldn't come near. If he was even watching from the shadows—a possibility that felt agonizingly real—sensing her aura would send him fleeing instantly. A mouse wouldn't approach a sleeping dragon. My bait was useless. My trap, sprung on the wrong prey. The carefully laid path to Virion, to tame Sylvia's will, to Arthur's destined power… it was severed. Obliterated by this unforeseen rescue.
Did I fail… again? The question wasn't a whisper; it was the shattering of my last, desperate hope. The crushing weight of it bowed my spine. I hadn't just stumbled; I had plunged the entire future into deeper chaos. My existence wasn't a correction; it was a cascading error.
"Your Highness!" Alea's voice cut through the spiraling void, sharp with renewed concern. Before I could react, she gathered me into her arms, pulling me against the cool, hard leather of her armor. Her hug was surprisingly soft, protective. "Shh, it's alright now. It's over. You're safe."
Her words, meant to soothe, to me were salt in the gaping wound of my despair. Safe? I was doomed. We all were.
She held me, this beacon of Dicathen's strength, radiating safety I didn't want, murmuring reassurances that felt like mockery. And I… I broke. Not for the terror endured, not for the relief of rescue, but for the sheer, abject futility of it all. For my own staggering inadequacy.
Hot, silent tears welled and spilled over, scalding tracks down my dirty cheeks. I cried for the future lost. I cried for having failed the fake family I had wronged in this world. I cried for the pathetic, arrogant fool who thought he could steer destiny. My body shook with the force of it, a silent convulsion of utter defeat against Alea's steady embrace.
"Let's get you back to Zestier, Your Highness," she murmured, her voice a low vibration against my ear. "King Alduin and Queen Merial… they've been sick with worry for you."
They shouldn't be, the thought screamed amidst the sobs trapped in my throat. They should be mourning the future I just destroyed.
As Alea lifted me, cradling my broken, useless form against her, the finality crashed down. Alea knew. She was involved. The deviation wasn't just a ripple anymore; it was a tidal wave. The damage was absolute. Irreversible.
I was being carried back to the palace cage of Zestier, not as a rescued prince, but as the architect of a ruin I had no idea how to repair. The forest, the slave traders, the carriage… they had been a crucible. Alea's arms felt like the coffin lid slamming shut on any hope of fixing what I had broken.