Experience Tumblr like never before
a/n: so uh, my hand slipped. i saw this post about time-traveling essek helping bren and i just... it all kinda wrote itself. @kurosmind i hope you enjoy this little ficlet and the pain this concept has cause me, bc i just love it so much.
he figures it out accidentally. late at night in the library, frumpkin nestled in her basket nearby, Dancing Lights illuminating his scrawling. he should be sleeping; a group of far-too-green adventurers came by to pester him today and he's exhausted.
but then he scribbles a formula and stops.
a memory flashes. a mess of red hair; sobs upon his chest. a room full of ash; his mantle heavy with disintegrated secrets.
he tucks away the writings hastily. no. he promised he wouldn't, and there's never a promise to caleb he's ever broken, not even now, hundreds of years later.
he won't use the spell.
it's been years. another adventuring party has come and gone; this one included a halfing who giddily hugged him, rambling about her great-grandmother's wild stories. she's not the first one he's met; there are many out in the world who come to him with echos of the mighty nein. if only the rest of them could see the ripple they've created...
he finds that spell when he's looking for something else. it brings him pause. he feels a great weight in his bones these days, an aching, ever-present coldness. soon he will be the final grave in the grove, he knows, buried by clarabelle clay or perhaps one of her children.
he looks at the portrait by his bedside, small and fading. he gives frumpkin an absentminded pat.
he gathers the components, letting them sit on the kitchen table for days, gathering courage.
what does he have to lose? he knows he can't alter anything, but if only he could see him-- see them, all of them-- one more time...
it would be worth it.
it will be worth it.
Afficher davantage