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From the window of his apartments, he could see the haze of smoke and ashes gathering on the once-blue horizon.
A storm of blood and rage that gave no warning...save for when it was too late.
His people described a scream in their minds that rang out from everywhere and nowhere at once when he spoke of it to them, the bonds that held their magics in place slipping free like water from a broken vessel. The outlanders, the seed races, spoke of monsters of which they had never even dreamed of rampaging across the land. As strong and hardy as they were, their weapons of iron and steel did little to quell the tide of aborational monsters.
The little that was left behind after a surge was the broken, unceremonious silence of death and destruction.
The water was choked with blood, the skies covered by a hazy film of ash that blotted out the sun’s warm light. The earth could not nourish nor embrace life with its soils carved with poison and rot.
Villages and cities, once thriving with life...now nothing more than broken husks that scattered the earth. The great river of Aether that embraced their home and flowed between the stars now fair bloated at its shores with so many souls lost to them.
So much life...lives they were charged with protecting since the beginning of all.
It was swiftly becoming dust to the wind.
Yet….yet…. He clenched his teeth as fury welled up in his heart, tears flowing as he clutched at the heart of his robes with a white-knuckled grip.
Yet his brothers and sisters of the Convocation, despite all their collective knowledge and powers, did nothing but sit. Sit in the heart of their capital and debate on their future.
Debate while their people wondered if this day was going to be their last.
Oh he knew, he knew this was not an enemy that could not be bested easily...if it could be bested at all. But gods be damned if they didn’t at least try!
Instead they spoke of the Will of the Star, giving it life and the means to combat the “Terminus” as their scholars called them at the Source.
To bring into existence a being called Zodiark.
It was all well and good...if not for the price that was to be paid in turn. In exchange for their lives and the Star itself, the lives of the living both seed and stewart would be the blood price. Just the idea of it made him ill to his body, heart and soul.
Azem had pleaded, presented facts and possibilities over time, screamed at his colleagues as guards dragged him from the Councilroom of Fourteen to reconsider in some way, anyway….only for his voice to fall on fear-plugged ears as they watched him get pulled away.
To “rest”, to “rest and recover so he would be of sound mind” the next time they spoke.
Instead, the Traveler pushed away from the window and moved towards...what? He did not know.
His footsteps found him on the hilltop overlooking Amaurot not long after the fury in his mind faded, Convocation robes and mask discarded to be exchanged for comfortable travel wear. A step towards the outlands…
Only to pause and look back one last time.
One last time as the sun fell and bathed blue skies in fading crimson, its buildings and spires washed in hues of orange and yellow as the sunset turned white clouds to a grey-black hue.
Silver eyes stared as he pulled the hood of his cloak over his head, tears of...something...regret? Fear? Mayhaps sadness or a combination of all flowed freely down his face before turning away with a determined set in his jaw.
He would allow them to sit and talk. Let them debate as the darkness reached out with clawed hands.
Even if it took all he had...he would find the Source.
Either to finish it or delay it...even he could not see.
***
The stars glittering down at him from the skies did not whisper a road for him to walk this time...their choice, it seemed...was the one that he already chose.
Their light seemed to fade just a touch, to mourn mayhaps, as the sun slipped below the horizon to give way to the night’s domain. On the earth below the edge of a dark cloak fluttered as it vanished from view from all.
Inside the heart of Amaurot, tucked in the folds of robes and mask, a single carved stone of sunlit orange glittered in the moonlit before fading into a muted hue.