Chapter 9: Chapter 9: Precipice

Ananke jolts awake with a start, her head lifting from where it had been resting on her folded arms.

She's surrounded by towering stacks of books, papers from archives, old tomes, and countless documents that create a fortress of knowledge around her workspace. The empty teacup beside her elbow rattles slightly as she moves, the porcelain clicking against its saucer. Quickly, with tired movements, she looks around the dimly lit space, trying to orient herself.

She's still in the library in Skrosocivo, surrounded by the familiar scent of old paper and leather bindings. She must have fallen asleep while researching.

Ananke rubs her tired eyes with the backs of her hands, then turns to look out the nearest window. The glass is dark, reflecting her own face back at her rather than showing the world outside. It's late, much later than she realised. Her master still hasn't returned from whatever urgent investigation drew him away.

Slowly, she pushes herself up from the chair, her muscles stiff from hours of hunching over texts. The library feels different in the darkness, larger somehow, filled with shadows that seem to shift when she's not looking directly at them. She makes her way to one of the tall windows that overlooks the little back-pocket city square and peers through the frost-touched glass. Outside, the port city sleeps under a blanket of winter darkness. The lanterns that normally illuminate the streets have all burnt out or been extinguished, leaving the world wrapped in deep shadows.

Ananke stares at them, wondering why they aren’t lit with emergency crystals like the ones in Hafen.

All lanterns there emit a dull, low-level magical radiance to help light the area when the oil runs out.

“Where are you?” she mutters to herself quietly, her breath fogging the cold glass. Her eyes study the square below, hoping to see the familiar tuft of a wide-brimmed hat.

“Oh, you're awake,” says a soft voice behind her, causing Ananke to startle and spin around. It's the librarian again, the kind elf who had helped her earlier in the day. He had spent considerable time assisting her in locating relevant materials about the plague, even bringing her tea when he noticed Ananke growing frustrated. He nods toward the scattered books and documents. “Did you find anything useful in all of that?”

Ananke glances back at the research materials she's accumulated throughout the day. Honestly, she isn't sure whether her discoveries are useful or not. She found information about everything related to the plague, its symptoms, its spread patterns, and historical precedents, but whether any of it will prove valuable is for her master to determine when he returns.

“Wait,” Ananke says, suddenly realising something important. “Why are you still here?”

“…Ah, well,” the librarian begins, looking slightly embarrassed as he pulls on the ends of his cardigan’s sleeves. “We actually closed hours ago,” he replies. “But I couldn't lock up with you still inside. I tried to wake you a few times, but I wasn’t able to.”

Ananke feels heat rise in her cheeks as the full implications hit her. “I'm so sorry!” she exclaims, quickly scanning the area for her belongings as the librarian waves his hands at her in a defusing manner. The poor man has been trapped here because of her thoughtlessness, unable to go home after completing his shift. Perhaps all the intensive training back at the Crux has been more draining than Ananke realised. “I'll leave immediately. I'm really, really sorry.” She hurriedly grabs her coat and pulls it on, then reaches for a stack of books to help return them to their proper places. “Did anyone come looking for me?” asks Ananke quickly as she hurries to help put everything back.

The librarian approaches and gently takes the books from Ananke's hands. “That's -” He stops, covering her own mouth to dry cough. “- perfectly alright,” he assures her with a warmth to his tone. His movements are careful and deliberate, as if conserving energy. “No one asked for you, no.”

Ananke nods gratefully and heads toward the library's main entrance, but something feels subtly wrong. The sensation is difficult to define. But she can feel it in her guts as a cold, little needle’s sting in her intestines.

“Ah, by the way,” calls the librarian after her as Ananke reaches the threshold of the doorway. “Do you dance too?”

Ananke pauses, confused, and looks back over her shoulder. She's not sure she heard the question correctly.

Seeing her expression, the librarian goes on. “You mentioned your master was a performer,” he explains, his curiosity genuine and innocent. “Do you also dance with him in his shows?” asks the elf. “I'd really enjoy seeing a performance if you're planning to stay in the city for a while.”

Ananke stares for a moment, then feels flustered heat creep up her neck as her half-truth catches up with her. “I- I'm too shy for that sort of thing,” she deflects immediately. “I just… help out,” she stammers awkwardly, the lie feeling clumsy on her tongue.

He studies her with those large, perceptive eyes for a moment. “I see. Well, it was lovely meeting you…“

“- Ananke,” she supplies, suddenly realising they've spent the entire day together without properly introducing themselves.

“Frey,” the librarian replies.

Ananke stands there somewhat awkwardly, uncertain whether she should say something more meaningful or simply make her exit. Nothing else comes to mind. “Okay, bye,” is all that she says before quickly making her escape into the cold night air, before Frey can even reply.

Her face is red as the door closes behind her. She fumbled that and she’s not even sure why. She’s so awkward sometimes. She hates it.

Embarrassed, Ananke holds her head and mutters to herself as she hurries down the flight of stairs that leads down to the ground level and makes her way out through the large, dark doors. “Okay, bye…“ she repeats to herself, annoyed at her own weirdness. What was that?

Outside, a gust of icy cold sea air hits her immediately, its icy bite immediately dispelling any notions of security she had still been carrying with her.

It’s dark out here.

Ananke eyes the dead streetlights, missing Hafen for a moment, before quickly making her way down the back square and alleyway, out toward the harbour as she retraces their steps, trying to find out where her master is.

Worse, it’s quiet.

She can’t hear his humming.

image [https://i.imgur.com/pUoDcs0.png]

She couldn't find him anywhere.

Ananke had walked the shadowy streets until the sun crested the horizon, feeling more unsafe than she had since her earliest days on Hafen's streets. Even back home, she had known to keep to her familiar corner when darkness fell and the city guards reduced their patrols. Here in the rough port city full of sailors and drunks, every alley felt like a potential trap for someone like her.

Now she sits on a weathered bench overlooking the harbour, staring out at the grey expanse of ocean that stretches endlessly toward the horizon.

Her stomach growls with increasing urgency, a hollow ache that reminds her she hasn't eaten since they left the Crux. She doesn't have any money of her own. Her master had carried all their provisions and handled all their expenses. She hadn't needed to think about such concerns before, ever since her apprenticeship began.

She sighs deeply, wondering what she should do next. Should she somehow find her way back to the Crux and wait there for word of his return?

Ananke blinks as a cold realisation hits her like a physical blow. She doesn't even know how to return to the Crux, even if she wanted to. She lifts her eyes toward the sky, scanning for any trace of the massive temporal construct. There isn't a hint of it anywhere in the heavens above. The elevated transportation they had taken to reach the city is long gone, leaving no trail to follow back.

Dread begins to grow in her chest, but then she seizes on another idea. She could summon copies of herself from other times. They could carry a message to the Crux or at least help her search every corner of the city for her master.

Ananke stands up with renewed purpose, ready to call upon her temporal abilities. But then she stops as a quiet realisation dawns on her.

She doesn't actually know how to actively summon her duplicates. She doesn’t have control over her magic at will yet.

The ability has always manifested spontaneously, her other selves appearing when needed without conscious direction on her part. She looks around at the ordinary people going about their morning routines, none of them showing any signs of temporal distortion.

…What if her master has abandoned her?

The thought creeps into her mind like poison. What if this was an elaborate deception, and the Twelve had held another vote in her absence, deciding she wasn't worth the continued effort? Perhaps she hadn't performed well enough in her studies or training. Maybe they've simply discarded her here, left her by the roadside like an unwanted animal cast from a carriage.

Panic rises in Ananke's chest as she realises she might be completely alone in the world once again. First her family, taken by war, and now this new life snatched away just as cruelly.

She clutches her chest, forcing herself to exhale slowly. No. That's complete nonsense. That's not what happened. Surely her master is simply occupied with urgent business. Perhaps he became lost somehow. Can chronomancers even get lost? She's not entirely sure, but her master wouldn't abandon her like a stray.

Someone had been following them when they entered the city. Maybe her master is in danger. Maybe whoever was tracking them managed to overpower him. What should she do?

The library.

He had said he would meet her there when his investigation concluded. Maybe he’s there now, wondering where she ran off to and is just as worried about her?

Ananke hurries back through the winding streets, wondering if perhaps she and her master had simply missed each other, passing by on parallel routes without either noticing. Eagerly, she makes her way to the familiar building and approaches the large wooden doors. She grasps the handle and pulls.

They don't budge. Locked.

She turns her head to read a sign posted beside the entrance. 'Closed due to staff illness.'

Ananke turns to look back at the busy city stretching out behind her, filled with people who don't know her name or care about her existence.

She stares quietly at the locked library, then out at the indifferent city. Some passersby are looking at her with curiosity or concern, noting her dishevelled appearance and obvious distress.

She wraps her arms around herself and quickly walks away from their scrutiny.

image [https://i.imgur.com/pUoDcs0.png]

Late that night, Ananke lies on the hard ground behind the library.

She has spent the entire day searching every street, every building she could access, but found no trace of her master. She has decided to shelter in the small garden Frey had mentioned, the impromptu memorial space for the poisoned butterflies.

After observing the area for hours to ensure it's rarely used, she climbed over the low wall in the back and found a hidden nook between the building's exterior and the garden boundary. It provides just enough protection from the elements and prying eyes, though it's still dark and bitterly cold.

She stares up at the night sky, finding the stars dimmer than usual, obscured by the city's smoky haze.

Her stomach growls loudly, and she curls into a tight ball for warmth.

After weeks of regular meals at the Crux, she's lost her tolerance for hunger. She closes her eyes tightly. Tomorrow she'll find him for certain. Someone from the Crux will realise something is wrong and come searching for them. For her.

They have to.

image [https://i.imgur.com/pUoDcs0.png]

Another day passes.

Ananke wanders the streets with the slightest hints of increasingly worsening posture, her eyes struggling to meet those of strangers, her head hanging lower with each hour. The transformation she had undergone from desperate beggar to proud apprentice seems to be unravelling itself thread by thread. She's reverting to her old self, the invisible girl who haunted Hafen's alleys.

She stops on a footbridge spanning one of the harbour channels, staring down at the water far below. The height is dizzying. The dark water hypnotises her, its surface rippling with patterns that seem to beckon. The wind plays with her unwashed hair like ghostly fingers, raising goosebumps along her neck.

She lifts her gaze to look across the water toward a parallel bridge in the distance. People walk back and forth across it in their daily routines. But one figure stands motionless in the centre. Ananke narrows her eyes, trying to make out details. The person wears dark robes, their face hidden. A thin, wide white shawl wraps around their mouth and nose, fluttering in the ocean breeze. Their hair is wild and unkempt, forming a frizzy silhouette around their shoulders.

They're staring directly at her.

Ananke blinks, and the figure vanishes. She looks around frantically but sees no trace of whoever had been watching her.

Disturbed, she hurries away from the bridge.

image [https://i.imgur.com/pUoDcs0.png]

The inevitable becomes unavoidable. She's going to have to beg again. There's no other option.

She hasn't eaten in days, surviving only on water from a strange public well near her hiding place. It’s quite the spectacle to see. Even she can notice all the threads coming out of it. But water alone won't sustain her much longer.

Yet when she tries to assume the familiar posture, to hold out her hand with practised humility, she finds she can't do it anymore.

Something has broken inside her. Or, maybe it’s just been replaced with something else, rather.

So she sits by the harbour, staring out at the endless water, then returns to her makeshift shelter behind the library.

image [https://i.imgur.com/pUoDcs0.png]

A full week has passed.

She lies in the darkness, having scavenged some hard bread from refuse bins and gathered berries from a small park. There were nuts too, but she had to avoid those since she didn’t want to die from her allergies. The truth has become inescapable.

Nobody is coming for her.

It was all just a beautiful dream. Her magic, her training, her sense of finally belonging to something. All of it was temporary. Now she's back in reality.

At first, her face reflects only sadness. But then her expression hardens, her eyes narrowing as anger displaces despair. Her fists clench with renewed determination. She'll show them. There’s still a plague here. There are still people suffering.

She’ll figure something out. By herself.

Ananke closes her eyes.

image [https://i.imgur.com/pUoDcs0.png]

“Oh? You're back,” says Frey, sounding genuinely surprised as Ananke enters the library a week later. “He-”

“- Why aren't there any streetlights outside at night?” Ananke interrupts, cutting off whatever the librarian was about to say.

“…I'm sorry?” Frey asks, clearly confused by the abrupt question. “Street lights?” He adjusts his pastel yellow scarf to sit higher on his neck. Ananke nods. “Well,” Frey begins, leaning closer conspiratorially. “It's because of the war. This is a port city, you see,” explains the librarian. “An Arkonian frigate attacked under cover of darkness, using the city's own lights to guide their bombardment. Surprisingly, they missed most everyone and hit only empty houses,” he says. “There were no dead. Nonetheless, after that terrible night, the city council ordered that all lights be extinguished after sunset. Now, even though the war has ended and there's no immediate danger, people have grown accustomed to feeling safer in darkness.”

“What happened to the attacking ship?” Ananke asks with intense focus.

“It vanished,” Frey replies, studying Ananke with growing concern. “Presumably sunk during the battle, I suppose.” Ananke begins pacing frantically, her eyes wild and manic. “Are you feeling quite alright?” Frey asks gently. “You seem rather dishevelled.” The observation is an understatement. After a week of sleeping rough, Ananke still wears the same clothes from their first meeting. She hasn't properly bathed, and her hair is a greasy, tangled mess. “Wait a minute. Have you been sheltering properly, Ananke?” asks the librarian. “Where is your master?” Frey's concern is evident as he recognises something is seriously wrong.

But Ananke doesn't answer. Instead, she rushes to a large bay window overlooking the city and stares intently through the glass. From this elevated position, the window provides a clear view over the central square, down the main thoroughfares, and directly toward the open harbour. There's something visible from this vantage point that can't be seen from street level, something even her master had missed during his investigation.

She then turns to examine the building itself, studying the dust particles floating in the air with intense concentration.

Frey watches these strange behaviours from a safe distance. Suddenly, Ananke rushes back toward him, causing the librarian to flinch in a startled jolt, as if he were about to be jumped. “Thank you, Frey!” exclaims Ananke enthusiastically, grabbing the elf's frail hand and clasping it between both of her palms. “You've helped me a lot!” The manic gleam in her eyes softens slightly.

“I- I have?” Frey asks, completely bewildered.

Ananke releases her hand and turns toward the door. “Oh, and I'm glad you're feeling better now. I guess taking a week off really helped your recovery.”

“Excuse me?” Frey asks in confusion, seemingly ten steps behind Ananke in their conversation.

“Your cough,” Ananke explains, nodding emphatically. “You haven't coughed once since I arrived.”

“Oh, yes!” Frey realises suddenly. Something shifts in her posture. “Good bed rest and a nice book truly do work wonders.” He smiles brightly, letting out an awkward laugh. “But please wait a moment. Let me prepare some tea and -”

“Sorry! I have to run!” Ananke interrupts, waving as she heads for the exit.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

“- Some biscuits?” Frey finishes hopefully, clapping his hands together lightly and staring out past his fingers.

Ananke stops dead in her tracks, turning to look over her shoulder.

Her stomach produces an audible growl that echoes across the entire room.

image [https://i.imgur.com/pUoDcs0.png]

Ananke runs through the harbour district, chewing enthusiastically on a biscuit while her pockets bulge with cookies from Frey's personal tin, which she had filled like a desperate animal hoarding food in preparation for winter.

Frey probably thinks she's completely mad, but Ananke has finally figured out what's been happening in Skrosocivo.

She runs to the water by the harbour, her heart pounding with desperate purpose. But she doesn't look at the ocean or the distant horizon like any normal observer would. Instead, Ananke slows her breathing and focuses with the intensity of someone whose life depends on what she might discover. She stares intently at the space between spaces.

She sees them, the threads.

They're much clearer for her now than they used to be, more defined, and more numerous. Her training at the Crux has sharpened her perception considerably.

And one thread stands out like no other now that she knows precisely where to look. She can see it as clearly as if it were a physical rope, as tangible and real as any of the people filling the market around her. It runs from the depths of the ocean as a thick temporal cable, but its presence isn't obvious from ground level. The colour and shape are hidden by the ordinary light and activity of daily life.

You'd only notice it if you looked from above, from exactly the vantage point the library window had provided.

Ananke follows the massive thread with her eyes the other way back behind her as it sneaks through an inlet into the harbour, diving deeper toward what appears to be some kind of drainage grate. From there, it spreads outward like a vast spider web, splitting into thousands of smaller strands that crisscross over the entire city, connecting to every well, every water source, and every place where people drink.

She reaches toward the thick temporal rope, then pauses for a moment, understanding the magnitude of what she's about to attempt.

After taking a deep breath, she grasps it tightly with both hands.

This is why.

A pulse flashes over the world. Everything freezes. Nobody moves anymore as the wave washes over them and time stops entirely. The bustling harbour becomes a still-life painting of human activity suspended mid-motion. Behind her, the world transforms, painted with the colours and shapes of a gloom that occurred years in the past. A frozen tableau of the city being bombarded during the war manifests itself around Ananke as time reverts.

The day vanishes. The night falls. Fires fill the air.

She is in the maws of the old war.

She’s travelled back in time.

And there, out on the open water, emerging from the core of the temporal thread, a ship of war crashes into the waves with violent force as the most significant movement in the world around her. Water surges in all directions, sending phantom spray toward the shorelines. It's the Arkonian frigate that had vanished during the siege.

But now she understands what happened to it.

The vessel exists in temporal suspension, its sails rippling in an unfelt wind from another time entirely. It was never sunk.

It was lost in time.

Staring down at her from the ship's deck is a figure in dark robes, a vibrantly white shawl covering their mouth and nose, billowing dramatically in the otherworldly breeze. It's the same person she glimpsed on the bridge, the one who had been watching her with such unsettling intensity days ago. They look just like the others she saw watching her back in Hafen.

Behind the figure, the crew of the frigate move as if trapped in thick syrup, their forms faded and translucent as they ready cannons for firing, entirely unaware of their situation as they repeat the past they are trapped inside of over and over again.

And there, bound among them by a complicated weave of temporal threads, she sees him. Her master. He's been captured, wrapped in strands of time magic.

Ananke's blood boils. She clenches her fists, her eyes narrowing with an anger that burns away the last traces of her bubbling self-doubt and despair. She had been so sad, so consumed by self-loathing, that she almost surrendered to the darkness inside herself again. But now she understands. The suffering plaguing this city isn't caused by a normal disease.

It's Desynchronisation, just like she learnt about in Chronomancer Jandal’s classes. It’s seeping into the water supply from the lingering temporal distortion of a ship trapped between moments for far too long.

A rogue chronomancer had manipulated the events of the past and the ship being stuck here for so long has affected time, which has slowly been poisoning the entire population of Skrosocivo. That’s why the city is such a patchwork of impossibly stable houses in the middle of bombed ruins.

Those undestroyed houses have been saved by someone manipulating the events of that night.

The distant figure makes eye contact with her across the impossible space and raises their hands lightly in a mocking shrug, as if to say she can't do anything about it anyway, even now that she's discovered their scheme.

Ananke wouldn’t even mind in part, certainly even finding it noble for the stranger to have saved these people with their magic. But she can’t balance that good thing out with the sight of her master tied up there either.

Audible, crackling pops sound next to Ananke as copies of herself manifest, dropping and landing beside her in various ready poses. They share quick glances, communicating without words.

Out on the ship, the sailors move, adjusting and aiming the cannons toward the shoreline.

There's only one plan. It’s stupid and dumb, and it will never work. All of them understand it instinctively.

“Ananke! Run!” her master's voice calls out across the water as he spots her.

There's an audible crack in the world as the cannons fire out.

The blast waves distort and swirl in the strange time-space they occupy, the ground exploding where Ananke had been standing as the barrage strikes the shoreline. But she's already gone, having leapt onto the walkway-thick temporal rope and begun running across it like a sagging rope bridge. The world behind her erupts in fire and debris. She stumbles, losing her footing on the metaphysical surface as clouds of sand and broken shells fly past her as shrapnel. A copy of her appears instantly at her side, shoving her back into proper balance before falling into the churning water below and vanishing.

The enemy chronomancer raises their hand with obvious irritation, snapping their raised finger, held over their narrowed eye. Immediately, the crew behind them move with supernatural speed, reloading and reaiming the cannons with inhuman efficiency as they’re sped up.

Behind Ananke, a dozen versions of herself pop into existence, grabbing the massive rope from the shoreline and swinging it upward in unison just as the cannons fire directly at her position. The coordinated action sends a wave through the rope out toward the sea, sending Ananke flying up through the air as she’s flung, the wave of motion along the temporal thread launching her skyward. A swarm of flaming steel meteors blazes only inches past her like a star shower. The smell of singed hair fills the air. The cannon blasts crash into the ocean below as she yelps, flailing helplessly through empty space.

Ananke cries out, flailing helplessly as she plummets back toward the water. She’ll never land back on the swinging rope in a million years.

A second later, strong hands grab her mid-flight and she finds herself securely held by someone who does, however, land on the rope with perfect precision. It's Larry, her colourful makeup slightly smudged but her circus performer's grace intact.

“Larry!” Ananke exclaims in amazement as she looks at the dark elf who continues running, holding her in her arms. “Why are you here?!”

Her heart blazes with relief and joy at seeing the familiar face. She hasn't been abandoned after all. How could she have doubted them?

“A little bird chirped in my ear,” Larry says with characteristic nonchalance as she maintains their precarious sprint. One of Ananke's copies, popping in and out of existence for only a brief second, winks and gives a little salute before vanishing back into time.

The enemy chronomancer seems more than annoyed by this development and twists their hand in a complex gesture, pulling on a thread in the air and twisting it. But instead of affecting the ship, the ocean itself responds to their manipulation. A massive wave from years past is summoned back into existence, rising like a towering wall of water between the two of them and the vessel. Ananke lets out a chirping cry. “Larry!” she yells.

But the wave freezes solid, transforming into ice as if winter itself had claimed it. Ananke spots Chronomancer Vorskaya, holding a thread between two of her fingers, as if they were a pair of scissors. “Go,” the hard woman commands without emotion, standing atop a crooked pillar of ice that shoots from the ocean like a serpent as she stands atop a resurrected section of winter-ocean ice. Cannon fire streaks past her position as the ship of war turns. The thick temporal rope that anchors it to the coast bends outward in a living bulge as if Larry were running along the back of a dragon.

The dark elf, still clutching Ananke, leaps from the time-rope and through a gap in the ice wall, spinning once for momentum as she holds her charge protectively. As they break through to the other side, Larry releases her, throwing Ananke forward with considerable force toward the ship's edge.

Ananke tumbles onto the deck, landing roughly but managing to sit upright just as the figure with the white shawl turns toward her. Every cannon aboard the vessel rotates inward with unnatural, synchronised movement, their fuses already lit and ready to fire.

“You are making a terrible mistake, Ananke,” the voice beneath the shawl snaps, sounding strangely familiar despite the muffling fabric. It’s a woman’s voice. Ananke can tell now that she’s closer. “No matter… I can fix this too.”

“Ananke!” her master shouts as she reaches toward him desperately. Multiple screams fill the air, including her own voice echoing from several directions.

There's a deafening crack as all the cannons fire simultaneously, blasting a massive hole in the deck and the ship’s core. Splinters fly everywhere, piercing through the sails and soaring off toward the open sea. Ananke avoids obliteration only because something grabs her hands at the crucial moment. She looks up to see a terrified, yelling, uncoordinated daisy chain of her own copies swinging from the rigging above, the lowest one having caught her wrists. They all cry out in terror as the momentum carries them to the end of their arc, launching the real Ananke through the air before they all vanish with quick temporal pops as the chain breaks and they fall.

She lands on her feet this time, stumbling, breathing hard as she faces the enemy chronomancer directly, but with her back pressed to the back mast.

A second later, Larry and Vorskaya drop onto the deck in front of her with heavy thuds. “Witching Hour,” Vorskaya identifies grimly.

Ananke lets them engage the threat while she turns to help her master. “Master,” she says urgently, beginning to untangle the temporal bindings around him. They're actual time-threads, woven into complex knots.

“Don't!” he begins to warn, but she's already touched one of the strands. Immediately, a building on the distant shoreline explodes in a burst of flame and debris. “If you touch any of this, everything that has been preserved here will undo itself, Ananke,” he explains quickly. Ananke stumbles backward, understanding flooding through her as her eyes look at the city. The threads connect to places and people that weren't destroyed because the ship never completed its original attack, having vanished mid-siege instead.

There are places there right now, people, who only exist because of that.

She looks between her master and the city, weighing impossible choices. “Ananke, let them handle her,” he pleads. “Leave and hide yourself.”

She hisses through her teeth, torn between his safety and the city's fate. “In what reality do you see that happening?!” she demands, grabbing another thread without hesitation and pulling it free.

Another frozen harbour building erupts in flames. But that’s not even what catches her eyes. Rather, it’s the flashes of light. Magic. Ananke grits her teeth, freezing as she looks at it and then back at her master. She looks to the side. Larry and Vorskaya are out there, fighting for their lives.

These people died long ago. They simply don't know it yet.

The timeline is fundamentally corrupted here. If they leave things like this, it’ll be worse down the line. If she doesn’t fix this, then they’ll have ten people die to save one.

She can't save everyone, always. She’s had to learn to accept that. That's an unavoidable truth, even for someone with their powers.

But she can save him now.

Ananke pulls the last binding free, refusing to not look as more explosions bloom across the shoreline. Her master collapses against her, weak from his imprisonment. “Are you alright, Ananke?” he asks with concern. She glances sideways at the three chronomancers battling with powers that bend space and time itself, their movements too fast and complex for her to follow.

“I should be asking you that!” she exclaims, struggling to support his weight as he finds his footing. “Where’s your hat?!” she asks, looking around them for it.

A massive blast fills the air. Larry tumbles down beside them, rolling and groaning as she holds her head. “Larry!” her master calls out in worry.

“This is really bad, Bumbles. Really bad,” Larry mutters, unable to sit up properly. She looks at him with dazed eyes, a strand of her hair smouldering before she smothers it out. “We got a full cuckoo clock here,” she says.

A moment later, Vorskaya is sent flying off the ship entirely, vanishing with a splash into the churning ocean.

The three of them turn back toward the enemy chronomancer, who stands completely unharmed, without so much as a scratch visible. Her white shawl billows in wind from a different era entirely.

She extends her hand toward them, crackling energy building around her fingers. “Humboldt. Larry,” she says, her woman's voice carrying intimate knowledge of their names. Ananke recognises something familiar in the tone. “I suppose you didn't tell her why it's called ‘the Witching Hour’,” she continues with quiet accusation, preparing to unleash whatever destructive force she's gathering. “How like you both.”

“Back off!” Ananke shouts, stepping protectively in front of her wounded mentors. “I know who you are.”

The woman stares at her intently, then after a moment of silence, uses her free hand to pull down her concealing shawl, revealing her familiar face.

She is the same person Ananke encountered in Hafen, the one who gave her a coin and saved her life when she was walking toward the bridge with intent to end it all right then and there.

Ananke slowly lifts her hands to try and defuse this. “You saved me, so I think you must be a good person,” she starts. “But you can't change what happened here too,” Ananke proclaims with desperate conviction. “You're making everything worse by trying to stop what really happened here,” She gestures toward the burning city. “More people are suffering and dying from your intervention than you're saving from the original attack.”

“Do you know how many times I tried?” the woman asks. She moves closer, her expression shifting to something almost amused. “I saved one of you, Ananke. But you’re not the first version of you that I’ve watched. You are only the first one I’ve managed to bring this far. You’re the special little grain of sand in the hourglass that I’ve been trying to get a grasp of amongst all the rest.” She clenches her fists as magic condenses around them. Ananke’s eyes widen. “How many times do you think I saw you die? In the war where you were to be vaporised and maimed with the rest of your family, I saved you.” She steps closer and Ananke finds herself stepping back a little. “On the streets where you were torn apart by the dogs of the world again and again, I came to keep you whole, or on the bridge… You don’t even remember how many times I followed you and stood by the side of that bridge, tearing my hair out as to how to keep you alive as I watched your skull crack open on the rocks again and again,” she says.

“What- What are you talking about?” asks Ananke, realising that the woman had interfered in her own past in more than just the bridge to save her so often, apparently. She gave her the coin. If it wasn’t for her, she wouldn’t be here now to face her down. But why? “Why would you even want that if I was just going to get in your way here?” she shouts, mortified.

Was any of this ever even about Skroscovio? Or was this really all a trap for her? Why?

“Because you aren’t supposed to be in my way here,” she remarks, lifting a hand to touch a string that connects to Ananke from herself. She can’t see it, but as the woman touches it, Ananke can feel the fine hairs on her neck rising on end. “Stand down, Ananke. Step aside,” she says. “I’ll teach you what they won’t. I’ll give you everything you want. I’ll bring you to your family,” she promises. Ananke’s eyes widen.

“W-Why?” stutters Ananke.

“Don’t listen to her, Ananke,” says the Humming Man, grabbing her robe. “You can’t trust them. She tried to kill you a moment ago.”

“Nonsense!” replies the chronomancer. “I would have simply undone her back to ten minutes ago. Because I need you alive and well and strong in your best form to achieve what nobody else can do for me, Ananke,” replies the strange woman, her eyes narrowing as she stares intently her way. “- Chronostasis.”

“Absurd!” shouts her master. “That’s impossible!” he snaps at her, trying to get up but not managing as he falls against Larry.

“But I’m afraid for that to happen, certain obstacles must be taken out of the way,” says the woman. “Step aside. I know you care for them now, but you’ll see that this is for the best. Besides, you owe me a debt.”

Ananke’s eyes widen at that statement.

Above them, something catastrophic happens to the sky itself. The sun and moon begin shifting rapidly, moving back and forth across the horizon with increasing speed as day and night flash in strobing cycles so fast that nausea churns in Ananke's stomach.

Two copies of Ananke pop into existence. One grabs the hostile chronomancer from behind while the other crawls across the deck to retrieve something specific. “Me!” yells one of them desperately. “Catch!”

Both duplicates are eliminated in seconds by swift counter-movements from their opponent. The second copy barely manages to throw a small object toward the real Ananke before an energy blast cuts her down and she vanishes.

Ananke catches the item, looking down to see what it is and understanding immediately.

At the last possible second, before the enemy can do whatever her plan was, Ananke holds out her hand with the silver coin presented in her palm, held between two fingers and her thumb. She flicks it lightly, feeling it spin just a quarter of a second in between her fingers. The two of them lock eyes across the small distance. The coin vibrates, still spinning, even if she’s only flicked it once.

It speeds up, spinning faster. The skin on her fingers blisters and turns raw.

The coin is caught in time, stuck in the exact moment she first began spinning it and so it perpetually adds that momentum to itself constantly, over and over again, as Ananke feels something new in herself. She’s figured out how to locally stop time in specific pockets and areas. Blood leaks from her palm. The coin spins faster, with an audible whistling in the air.

“Then let me pay you back,” insists Ananke coldly. With a flick of her wrist, the coin launches forward, moving so fast it appears as nothing more than a piercing white ray, visible just for a brief flash of a second as a singular beam of light. It cuts through the chronomancer's torso, through the ship's mast, causing the wooden beam to topple, and continues into the sky with incredible velocity.

Blood erupts from the woman as she's flung backward by the sheer kinetic force of the projectile that tore through her. The accelerated coin flies on, farther and faster, until the sky itself seems to crack as the temporal bullet cuts through countless webs and weaves of time as if it were a fractured glass pane.

Time distorts and moves around them in strange ways as the boat and waves crash in a rippling movement, half-frozen, half-active.

“You’ll… see- your mistake.” The wounded enemy clutches her core, blood seeping between her fingers. “Midnight…“ she gasps in a raspy whisper, her brown eyes fixed on Ananke as she hunches over, trying and failing to stand. “- is tonight.”

At the utterance of that, she has a flashback to Hafen.

There's a blast of temporal energy.

Other chronomancers appear, wearing the same dark robes as their fallen ally. Their faces are hidden beneath shawls of different colours. These must be members of the Witching Hour. While her scarf was white, one is nauseatingly green, and the other one is pastel yellow. They assess the situation quickly. One of them quickly studies her before they grab their wounded compatriot and vanish instantly back into time and space.

Everything is quiet.

Colour slowly returns to the world, bit by bit.

Ananke turns back to check on her injured mentors but finds them exchanging long glances that speak of knowledge she doesn't possess.

Quietly, both Larry and her master look back toward Ananke with wide, disbelieving eyes that convey far more than any words could express. In their gazes, she sees a mixture of awe, pride, and perhaps a touch of fear at what she has just accomplished.

She smiles, seeing them well.

The ship, however, vanishes for good along with its crew and the three of them plummet into the cold ocean.

image [https://i.imgur.com/pUoDcs0.png]

It is later.

Ananke stands on the shore of Skrosocivo, but the city she looks upon is no longer the same place she entered over a week ago. The timeline has been corrected, and with that correction has come devastating change. The buildings that should have been destroyed during the war now lie in ruins, replaced by entirely new structures built in the years since. The merchants she had come to recognise during her week of wandering the streets are gone, erased by the proper flow of history. In their places are different faces, different lives, and different stories.

The city is fundamentally altered.

But there are no longer coffins piling up in the harbour. There are no more ragged coughing echoes from windows and doorways. There are no more plague victims shuffling through the streets in isolation.

Death had already visited this place and taken its ordained toll years ago, as it was always meant to have done. So there is no need for it to return to collect with interest at the present day.

Ananke doesn't like this reality, but she understands it now with painful clarity. You can't save everyone. She can't save everyone. The best she can hope for is to save as many as possible within the constraints of what fate will allow.

Who knows how many people have died in this reality because of her actions?

The restoration of the proper timeline meant that all those who should have perished in the original bombardment finally met their destined ends. But, for that, thousands of others who would have slowly succumbed to temporal poisoning now get to live full, natural lives.

She doesn't know what to do with that knowledge.

How is she supposed to carry the weight of that, even when she knows what she did prevented even more suffering? What is she supposed to do with that? Is that supposed to make her feel good?

It doesn’t.

Quietly, she makes her way to a small bench on a square tucked away in the narrow alleyways behind what used to be the harbour district. She sits and looks out toward a large, empty space where the library once stood. The building where she met Frey, where she spent hours researching, and where she found the first real clues to solving this crisis.

It’s gone.

In the library's place now stands a simple stone monument in the centre of what has become a beautiful little memorial park. Trees and flowering bushes have grown up around the marker, creating a peaceful green space in the heart of the urban landscape. An inscription is carved in elegant script.

'We dedicate this park to the many lives lost during the war. May they rest forever in peace.'

She sits there quietly, absorbing the finality of those words.

A butterfly dances past Ananke's face, its delicate wings catching the afternoon sunlight. It settles gently on her wrist, resting there. She watches it, her expression rather empty.

The sea wind sweeps through the alleyways, ruffling her hair and disturbing the butterfly's perch. The small creature takes flight again, struggling against the breeze as it moves away on wings that seem too fragile for this harsh world.

It vanishes into the greenery, and she’s left there alone for only a second.

“Apprentice,” says a familiar voice from behind her. “Are you ready to go?” His hand settles gently on her shoulder, where she doesn’t mind it being at all.

Ananke sits there for a long moment, staring at the monument that marks so many endings. Finally, she slowly stands up but doesn't turn to face him. “Where to?” she asks quietly, her voice barely audible above the wind and the noises of the bustling harbour city.

“Why, home, of course,” he replies as if it were obvious as she turns to look at him. The word should bring comfort, but it feels hollow in her current state.

Before he can say anything else, she presses her face into his robe and just stands there, as frozen as the memorial behind her. “No,” she says, her voice muffled against his chest as her fingers rise to clutch at the material of his robes.

“I… uh, pardon?” he asks, standing awkwardly with his arms held out to his sides, unsure how to respond to this sudden display of vulnerability.

“No,” Ananke repeats, shaking her head but not pulling away from her refuge. “Not yet.”

He’s never seen her cry before. She’s not going to let him, because he’ll get doubts about her abilities, about her toughness and ability to handle all of this. If she lets him see her cry, he might really leave her behind for good. That’s what her head says, at least.

You don’t really unlearn those kinds of doubts, especially not so quickly.

He stands there uncertainly for several heartbeats. Then something in him softens as she refuses to let go. His hand finally moves to pat her back consolingly, the gesture tentative at first but growing more confident as he feels the trembling in her frame.

It's only then, with his acceptance of her need, that she truly begins to cry. The tears come in silent sobs that shake her entire body, releasing the grief and guilt and overwhelming complexity of emotions she's been holding inside since the first second she thought that she was abandoned. He holds her there, just standing quietly in the exact time and place where she needs him to be.

“In a little while then,” he remarks consolingly, his hand on her back as he lifts his eyes to watch a crystalline drift of snow fly through the air.