Alatar:
"You mentioned Asphodel… does she live in the Expanse? Does she know of me?"
Barachas:
(He does not answer at once. His form—an undulating silhouette of dusk-colored flame—wavers as though the very name unsettles him. When at last he speaks, it is low, reluctant, and fractured, as though words must be pried from a place of resistance.)
"No… not live. Not in the way you or I might grasp it. Asphodel is… was… a concept embodied. She birthed the Expanse from the marrow of herself and, in that act, she… departed. What she became lies outside the lattice of concepts. Beyond remembrance. Beyond knowing. Even to speak her as she is an insult to what remains of her."
(Barachas lifts his gaze, the temple around them humming faintly, as though straining against the name itself.)
"But fragments… yes. Twelve splits of her linger in the Expanse. Shadows of the Primordial of Finality, still moving through the Silent Plain. No one has found them. No one has entered to try. The Expanse consumes even memory of entry. You—" (he stops, narrowing what passes for eyes upon Alatar) "—if you truly walked there and came out bearing shards of its bounty, then you are already marked by Finality itself."
Alatar:
(quietly, pressing) "Then she knows me."
Barachas:
(voice sharp, cutting him off) "No. Or yes. Or worse—she does not need to know. If she wills, then you are already inscribed within her Quieting. If not… then your survival is your own blasphemy against inevitability."
(Barachas seems to shudder, the temple's walls groaning as though sharing his unease.)
"And listen, child of the waking void: The Expanse of Asphodel is but one Grave. One among thirteen. Together, they are the Aeonic Graves—monuments older than stars, built by hands not meant for remembrance. Asphodel's is the most known, for her act of Finality was a wound upon the Starryverse itself. But the other twelve? Unspoken. Unmapped. Their names, their keepers, their burdens… not for this age."
(He lowers his voice to a hush.)
"Do not seek them. Not yet. To glimpse the Expanse is trial enough. To imagine the others is to tempt collapse."
The temple's hush stretched long after Barachas's final words, like an aftershock of some great truth reverberating through its columns. Alatar stood taut, his breathing uneven, the echoes of Asphodel's name coiling in his mind like serpents of ice. For a moment, the young seeker seemed on the edge of spiraling—drawn deeper into the unanswerable.
But Barachas shifted. His voice lowered, not harsh this time, but warm with that ancient patience only a timeless being could possess.
Barachas:
"Peace, Alatar. Do not drown yourself in a sea that has no shore. You are your own entity. Not a shadow of Asphodel, not the pawn of her splits, not the sum of the Expanse you walked through. You are—" (he paused, searching for a word that would not diminish the boy) "—becoming. And becoming cannot be measured against Finality. Let the future hold its own secrets until it is ready to unfold them."
The words soothed more than the tone itself. The temple's restless hum softened, as though it too heeded Barachas's command. The great obsidian arches no longer creaked under strain but settled into a deep stillness, like a living thing that had exhaled tension.
Alatar lowered his shoulders. His hands—still trembling from the thought of Asphodel's twelve wandering splits—steadied against his robe. A thin smile, unpolished and small, tugged at his lips.
Alatar:
"You always speak as though the weight of the cosmos is little more than dust. I envy it."
Barachas:
(laughing, a sound like distant thunder rolling across empty plains)
"Envy the dust instead. It feels nothing, learns nothing, becomes nothing. You are alive, Alatar. That is heavier than cosmos itself, and far more precious."
The moment broke into something lighter. Alatar, his curiosity never truly dimmed, leaned forward, eyes catching the flicker of Barachas's ember-like form.
Alatar:
"Then tell me—if not Asphodel, then others. Other worlds, other skies. The Starryverse cannot be only Expanse and Temple. What lies beyond this place?"
Barachas seemed almost pleased at the shift in topic, as though guiding a child away from staring too long into a chasm. He straightened, his shape momentarily brightening until the walls themselves cast long shadows, and began weaving words that tasted of distant horizons.
Barachas:
"Other worlds… ah. The Starryverse is not a garden of one flower, but a field of endless growth. You have seen Polaris Prime, yes? A world bound in endless frost. The frozen wasteland where Auryaire's whispers linger and Ulfrimir, the Hoary King, once held dominion. That place is a graveyard of winters, yet also a crucible of endurance. To walk there and not break is to learn what survival means beneath silence and snow."
Alatar's mind flickered with memory—the white horizons, the spectral cold, the weight of Auryaire's voice within the endless drifts. He nodded, silently affirming.
Barachas:
"But beyond the frost, there are other realms. One I recall well: Erythraxis, the Vein-World. Its crust is riddled with molten arteries—rivers of metal and ember that pulse as though the planet itself were a living forge. Entire seas of liquid ore churn beneath skies blackened by perpetual ash. The people there hammer cities from cooled slag, and their temples are furnaces where prayers are sung as hammers fall. It was once lush, yes, a land of rivers and green spines of mountain… but its children cut too deep, unearthed what should have been left sleeping. Now the veins run hot, and the world itself seems always on the edge of eruption."
The temple shuddered at the memory, walls faintly glowing as though reflecting that molten light. Alatar felt heat that was not there ripple across his face, and for a moment he imagined the strange beauty of a world that bled fire instead of water.
Barachas:
"Beyond that lies Teyphora, the Shattered Garden. Picture a world split into fragments, continents that float adrift in a sea of endless auroras. There, each isle carries its own sky, its own seasons, its own strange suns. The inhabitants? Sailors of the void, with wings woven of light. They cross from isle to isle upon bridges of song, and every word they speak carries the taste of their history. Teyphora is a world that refuses silence—every fragment hums its own tune, like an orchestra of broken instruments."
Alatar's mouth parted, fascinated. His hand unconsciously pressed against his chest, where the memory of the Expanse still lingered like frost.
Alatar:
"And they… they live? In peace?"
Barachas's ember-eyes dimmed, thoughtful.
Barachas:
"Peace is a fragile lie, child. Even in beauty, there is hunger. Even in song, dissonance. The void-sailors of Teyphora squabble over fragments, and sometimes they cast one another into the auroras, where they vanish forever. Every world has its wounds."
The temple rippled again, casting pale ribbons of light that mimicked those auroras. Alatar reached a hand toward them, only for the illusion to dissolve at his touch.
Barachas (softening):
"But yes—they live. They flourish, despite their wounds. That is the nature of worlds in the Starryverse. Survival not in perfection, but in persistence."
Alatar tilted his head, lips curling into something halfway between amusement and awe.
Alatar:
"You make it sound as if the whole Starryverse is both dying and alive at once. Broken, yet still… shining."
Barachas:
(smiling, a deep resonance in his voice)
"And what else is it meant to be? The stars themselves burn only because they are dying. Every breath you take is a theft from time, and yet—what a wondrous theft it is."
Alatar chuckled, his tension easing fully for the first time since he had spoken Asphodel's name. For a while longer they lingered there, weaving tales back and forth—Barachas recounting places where rivers sang with liquid crystal, or where entire cities floated upon the backs of colossal dream-serpents; Alatar interrupting with sharp, curious questions, eager as a boy discovering maps for the first time.
The temple reshaped subtly around their conversation, not with menace but with resonance: distant worlds painted themselves in shimmering fragments upon the walls, constellations lit the ceiling as if they were standing under an alien sky. For once, the temple did not feel oppressive but alive, like a companion eavesdropping on their friendly exchange.
And in that moment, Alatar was no longer the trembling soul who had asked whether Finality itself knew him. He was something brighter—curious, alive, a spark in a Starryverse vast enough to swallow despair.