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The day things change, dawn floods Eret’s bedroom with light, drenching it in gold and rose; even half-awake, she shivers. Something is not quite as it has been, she thinks. Memory flickers at the back of her mind, that translucent inaccessible thing that slips through the fingers like so many darting fish; she is used to its tantalising passage, and pays it no mind.
She aches for company, she thinks, and glances out the window, its curtains artfully tied back to expose the dawn - funny that she doesn’t quite remember opening them, but it makes sense that they are open. She’d been in one of those moods yesterday evening, that version of herself that loves to arrange, to neaten, to make beautiful. The distant dawn reminds her of Foolish, and even thinking of the Totem stirs that strange longing again, the one intertwined with some bygone age she cannot place, that deep wellspring of memory she cannot access but knows is just out of reach - this is how she is, after all. It’s the only reason she believes Foolish when he calls her old friend. Eret is long accustomed to never quite having all the pieces.
(When she arrived to this server, something had slammed into place, some barrier. She had had nothing, felt callously alone, could not place why. It had only seemed to abate when Foolish, months later, had found her and treated like a long-lost beloved one, like she was worth knowing, not hollow, not empty. She still doesn’t quite understand why.)
Something is ever-so-slightly different, Eret thinks, gazing out towards the dawn. Like somebody has moved her furniture imperceptibly to the left, or she’s grown four inches in her sleep, or she has been sleeping for months, her life a form of sleepwalking. Foolish - no, Totem, she thinks, and then furrows her own brow, confused at herself - is some gold warm-bright-close-real beacon, amidst the distant grey swathes of cool memory that are the last year and a half since her arrival.
I lived that, she thinks, frowning, and for a moment it swells into brief focus - she is a little more anxious, now, a little more wary, she imagines her voice would be more clipped and less resounding, and she is a king and a traitor and can almost taste L’Manberg’s ashes on her tongue. Almost distressingly so. One breath shudders in her lungs, and then another, and then comes a thought that must be her own, not-quite-words, let yourself be distant, sweetheart, the day is young yet. You’re young yet. Eret shivers, and stares, and - settles.
Chill sweeps across her skin. She is not bothered by it. Strangely she is almost separated from her own body, and yet she controls it, must control it; that deep-rooted ache begins murmuring again, her mind feels unsettled, like a windstorm has swept through and left everything rearranged.
I’d like company, she tells herself, or thinks to herself, or thinks to nobody, and dresses in a sort of quiet vagueness, time melting into itself, candle wax or sticky honey on her fingers. Like she’s swimming through it. This time of morning he’ll still be at his temple, and she makes the journey quietly, distantly, not quite herself in a way she can’t explain. Sand sprawls around her before she realises she’s left. She remembers the journey crisply, brightly, knows the precise route she took. Somehow, they coexist.
Her boots - oh, she’s wearing those boots today? - give neat, clear clicks against the polished floor. “Hello?” she calls, grinning. It is easy to summon cheer in Foolish’s presence - she can’t quite see him but some part of her knows as well as breathing how to recognise him, is certain of his position in the next room and is proved right a second later as she draws level with the archway. Foolish, posture a light strange stillness that is almost imperceptibly different to what she knows and yet achingly familiar, turns to greet her; his smile isn’t his, but she knows it still.
No she doesn’t. Something is different, today. Eret blinks, hard, and leans out to steady herself against a column.
“Eret?” Foolish asks, voice soft, smooth, quiet but fiercely concerned. “Are you alright?” She knows and doesn’t know the voice. He moves closer but it isn’t him, she knows it isn’t, doesn’t know anything of the sort. The world tilts, ever so slightly, and Eret closes her eyes for a long, long moment, something tugging, insistent, in the back of her mind, some creeping sensation of warmth and presence and gold, like the sunrise, like the Eret that walked here.
She fights for clarity and feels, suddenly, a little queasy. Can’t place why. “Sorry, give me a - give me a second,” she manages through teeth that are gritted against nothing in particular. Oh, something is terribly different, some strange - Something - She has no answers. Cracks one eye open to squint at Foolish, who wears an expression she’s never seen on him before, who holds himself like an entirely different being. At the eye contact, Foolish - even the name feels wrong, but at that thought her own wrongness swells and she loses focus while squeezing it away - Foolish seems to balk, to rearrange his face in a way that might, plausibly, pass for normal if Eret hadn’t already been watching so closely.
Grief rises thick and choking in her throat for a memory she does not hold. Abruptly, the presence swells up and through her. She says, in a voice more resonant than her own, distanced from her own lips, “Amaranth?”
Foolish stills. Eret, within herself, pauses. The strange presence, this dawn-flavoured rose-gold thing, laughs through her lips as Eret watches. “Oh, I remember,” they promise, and sag forwards into the gold form before them, laughing, an old loving joy suffusing them and filtering through to Eret as though it’s too much to be contained in just one - in - in whatever this presence is, this sensation she knows too well, like her moods but closer, more visceral, here with her rather than nudging her gently out of the way.
“It’s Eos,” someone murmurs into Foolish’s chest, using Eret’s lips, head bowed, smile broad. “I think the others are mostly dormant, everyone just calls themself Eret now - I’ve been gone awhile, too.”
Eret flinches, and feels herself flinch, drags herself back into her body, begins to shiver again. There are arms around her. Foolish - no, not at all, corrects that sensation, and you’d be wise not to assume - someone sharing with Foolish holds Eret close as she begins shaking in earnest, head a mess, utterly confused, the edges of her identity frayed and whispering in the wind like a torn scrap of fabric.
“I didn’t think any of you were left,” murmurs Amaranth, in a soft clear voice that must be their own. Eret doesn’t understand, and does, and deep within her Eos understands, sitting back, letting Eret adjust, providing a warm closeness. Like she’s held both inside and out.
“I’m not -” Eret begins, voice breaking. “I don’t -”
Abruptly Amaranth draws back, but leaves hands on Eret’s shoulders as though they’re afraid to entirely let go, as though they think Eret will disappear. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t - This must be frightening, if you didn’t know. I could try to find Foolish for you.”
“Only if you feel like it, but I wouldn’t mind saying hi,” comes that deep, sonorous voice, and Eret blinks, coming back to herself, not even noticing she’d left, having moved ever so briefly aside - it’s difficult, but this time she restrains the flinch. Apology suffuses her mind like a cloud: Eos’s. Not her own. As though they’re separate.
Oh but we are, sweetheart, whispers rose-gold Eos … but I’ll leave you be for now.
“No,” Eret insists before she can think better of it, “no, don’t, I - don’t go.” Before her, Amaranth tilts their head (her head, Eos corrects), before her eyes soften in understanding. Within them, Eos floats a wordless acquiescence her way, no more than a thought, one that Eret needs not tease out into words to understand. (Oh. Oh.)
Preoccupied, she doesn’t notice immediately as something shifts in the figure before her; when she looks back up, something is different, she knows not what, though recognition blossoms within her mind. The feeling isn’t hers. Do you mind, Eos sends Eret’s way, and shaken, Eret can only offer an uncertain negative, no, she doesn’t mind, they’d know better than she would what to do -
“Been a while, man,” Eos says.
“Hey, hey,” Foolish says, even Eret can recognise that it’s Foolish, she knows that voice as well as breathing - he’s excited, too, a little disbelieving, voice rich but somewhat scratchy with strong feeling. “Did - did something happen? We didn’t know you were still around, we were trying to find the right moment to tell them -”
“Yeah,” Eos says, “yeah, hey.” There is a space for Eret beside them in control, one that she can tell was carefully left for her, as though she could step forwards and speak if she so desired - but listening is easier, and so she lets this stranger speak for her, sits back a little. “Foolish, right? Yeah, there’s like - five or six of us around these days, give or take, and they’re all convinced they’re the same. Something fucked up our memory, I think. Like, more than usual.”
“You can say that again,” Foolish chuckles. “How’s, uh.” His expression clouds with concern. “I shouldn’t ask, maybe. Who’s that with you? Are they doing okay?”
“One of the Erets,” Eos says, like that makes any sense, “co-con, yeah. She’s - a bit shaken up. But we’ll be alright.”
Foolish hesitates, gnawing on a lip, as though wanting to ask something but hesitant to be rude. Eos laughs - Eret knows what they’re about to say before they say it, feels them think it - and says, “I might head off. You know how to trigger me out, anyway.”
“I’m glad you’re -” Foolish begins, then hesitates, clicks his tongue. “Yeah.”
“Good talk,” Eos says appreciatively, leans forwards, claps Foolish on the shoulder like they’ve known each other for years - and then, abruptly, vanishes completely. Eret blinks. She’s never - Usually the moods, when they kick in, fade slowly. But in less than a second, Eos is just gone. Like they were never -
“Oh,” Eret says, and struggles to settle back into her body like she’s done it a thousand times. “I’m - uh - They just. They’re gone.”
Foolish chuckles briefly, warmly. “You guys always used to complain about how fast they could rage-quit.”
“Did we?” Eret says helplessly, lost. The pronoun falls effortlessly onto her tongue.
“Yeah.” Foolish takes her in, voice gentling, sympathetic. “Is it making sense at all, or do I have to explain?”
“Maybe in a bit,” Eret says huskily. Her head is spinning. “This is all - It’s a lot.”
“I can imagine,” Foolish agrees. His very presence is soothing. “You’re alright. It’s me, okay? You know me.”
“I - I do,” Eret agrees, voice shaking. “So does -”
“Eos, yeah. We’re old friends.” Eret stares. “They were your most frequent fronter, last time we lived together.”
“This doesn’t make any sense,” Eret says. It makes almost too much sense. She thinks, again, of the drawn curtains - it feels almost too right to think that wasn’t me. She imagines herself bustling around the kitchen, cheerfully cleaning, and thinks too easily, That Eret is someone else. Memory leaps before her briefly before slipping again through her fingers; a long time ago, another of the Totem (and how does she know that name?) had told her, laughing, “I can see how it’d be a bit confusing if all of you are using the same name. But no one says you have to change. You just gotta do what feels right.”
That had been … Silver. And they’d been speaking to someone named Alastair. Eret remembers that, but no more.
“It doesn’t all have to make sense right away,” Foolish promises - here, now, real. Eret’s hand is still resting on his shoulder from when Eos had used it to farewell him; she threads her fingers, these fingers, into the cloth of Foolish’s cloak. “Things will click eventually. And we’ll be here for you, the whole time.”
“Okay,” Eret murmurs, speaking for herself, separate. Her head is still spinning, but she’s alone in it - for now. Not for ever. Now that she’s aware of it, she can almost feel the expansiveness behind her eyes, the far distance, the many - but just for now, she is alone. Foolish’s here, though. And she knows him. He knows her.
“Breathe,” Foolish says quietly.
And Eret does.