Chapter Text
Prologue: The Waves Have Come
The sun goes down and everything
Begins to fade away. The waves have come
And taken you to sea,
Never to return to me.
To lose time is to lose much. The Time Keeper hadn’t been joking.
The sudden surge of bitterness surprised Rowan, though only a little. He’d realized the pattern his life was sure to take well over a year ago, when he’d been thrown into the Heliodor dungeons for having a birthmark on the back of his hand, the truth was suddenly stark in its clarity.
His life would never truly be his own, so what did he really have to lose?
A lot, as it turned out.
He cut his eyes away from the warm glow of Time’s Sphere to glance back at his companions and felt his throat burn. They all watched him, a familiar mix of wariness and concern, as they’d done every day since Yggdrasil fell. The day the Luminary sought his destiny and failed spectacularly.
They’d won in the end. Mordegon was gone, his fortress no longer casting a black, ominous shadow on what remained of the world below, but failure still had its consequences, he knew all too well. He saw it every day, or rather, he saw what was missing - the giant World Tree, and the fearless sage who’d fought so desperately to save it.
Rowan took a deep breath. His friends were waiting for him to make his decision, but it had already been made, the moment the Time Keeper spoke of going back.
He could stop Yggdrasil from ever falling in the first place, could prevent Veronica’s death and hundreds of others. It wasn’t much of a choice at all.
Rowan wondered - not for the first time - if this was what the Seer had meant when she’d told him to wait for the tug on the line to know when it was time. He wondered too if there would ever come a day when he no longer felt paralyzed at the moment of change, caught between the need to act and the fear that always tried to keep him from taking the first step.
It wouldn’t stop him this time. If the pleas of those he loved most couldn’t change his mind, nothing would.
They cared for him, and he for them, but he was the Luminary, and his love and theirs could not outweigh the needs of the world.
Besides, he thought, with a twist in his stomach and a weight on his heart, in mere moments they would no longer know he was missing at all.
He knew what he needed to save, but as Rowan turned away from the raised dais and turned to face those he had to leave behind, he saw too what he would ruin.
Jade had tears on her cheeks, silent and resolved. Hendrik met his gaze, his expression grim as he pressed a hand to the princess’s back - a soft, tentative touch from an age-old affection blooming into something new. There would be a line in the sand between them when he returned, Rowan knew, with Hendrik on the opposing side.
His grandfather too seemed to already know what he had to do. His shoulders were slumped forward, his face twisted with a sadness that ran bone deep. He was the last of his kingdom, all that remained of the blood he hailed from, and had lost too much already.
Sylvando had a mothering arm around Serena, ever-present smile in place despite the sadness in his eyes. Serena’s hands were pressed together, a resilient hope in her eyes. She wanted him to change his mind, despite the fact that if he could save her sister, she’d never have to know the world without her.
They wouldn’t miss him long, he reminded himself, but he’d miss them as they were now for the rest of his days.
Erik had his arms crossed over his chest, his gaze on the floor. He could see the knot between his brows, and Rowan felt the overwhelming urge to wrap the other boy up in his arms and hold on tight, to tuck his nose against the thief’s neck, where he was always warm and smelled like sunshine, but the Luminary’s life was not his own, so he stayed rooted where he was planted.
When Rowan’s eyes touched on him, Erik looked up as though he’d felt it. He didn’t miss the anguish that flashed across Erik’s face, but he stared back, steadfast. He took a step closer, and Rowan gratefully laced his fingers through his when the other offered his hand.
“I know better than to try and stop you,” Erik started, his voice low, “but are you sure you want to do this?”
Rowan looked down at their tangled fingers. He turned his hand over, looking from the smooth skin of Erik’s hand, coupled with the marked back of his own. “I have to,” he admitted. “This - this could be all we - I can do. To fix it, to save everyone. How often do you get a chance to redo the fall of the world?”
He tried to smile. When Erik’s expression tightened, he knew he’d failed.
“You’ve lost so much,” Erik whispered, “I-”
“I’ll fix it,” Rowan said quickly. He had to go, now, or he knew he wouldn’t . “Veronica, Yggdrasil, I’ll bring them back. And we’ll be better off.”
They had to be.
Rowan took a decisive step backward, towards the Sphere. His hands started to shake, and Erik clung tighter to the one he held as Rowan dropped the other to the hilt of the legendary sword at his hip.
He could hear Serena start to cry softly behind him. He tried to force his face into some semblance of calm, a hero’s mask to hide the face of a boy who’d already failed the world once before.
Jade darted forward and offered a small, strained smile. “You can do this. The usses of the past will be there for you, whenever you need us.”
“Don’t look down now, laddie. We’ll only be apart a wee while.” Rab added, folding his hands over the handle of his cane.
Rowan bit down on his bottom lip. He took another step away, a fish caught in a current, and felt his fingers slide away from Erik’s grip as the other boy let him go.
His eyes started to burn, and he tried to convince himself it was only from the light that shined ahead.
He wished the Seer would have been kind enough to warn him about this, about feeling the tug on the line in both directions - the compulsion to leap warring with the desperation to stay .
Rowan, Luminary, Last Crown Prince of Dundrasil lifted the Sword of Light high overhead and brought it crashing down onto Time’s Sphere. The resounding shatter echoed through the tower as the orb exploded and the shards of the sword clattered to his feet.
Numbness came and went, and he felt searching fingers slide back into his own and clutched the offered hand tightly.
“This isn’t goodbye,” Erik insisted, his voice bordering on desperate as he squinted against the harsh white glow. “Not by a long shot.”
It was though, in a way that mattered only to the two of them.
Suddenly, Rowan remembered the Golden Palace, watching helplessly as Erik slowly changed to gold before him, and wondered if turning to stone didn’t have its merits.
He squeezed Erik’s fingers between his own as the fog closed in, and he knew what it was to leave his heart behind.
“I love you,” Rowan whispered, “you should know that.”
He saw blue eyes fly wide, lips parting on words lost to the space between them.
Rowan blinked, and the world fell away.