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“Cards?” This is a curse, perhaps, the ability to remember anything as if it were happening as you speak, every memory living out within your mind. A distraction at the best of times, you cannot think of much in this darkness, what were you doing? Who is calling your name? You shake yourself into focus, your eyes catching sights you never could as a human. Veils' fabric room.
“Is my work boring you?” Veils rumbles, looking deep into you as it stops its work. It was working on a new robe for you, one that would be your true robe, the one you would grow into, that would suit you, a gift.
“No no no not at all, I was just... Lost in memory.”
It would reply with a chuckle. “Of course you were, anything with good sight could have seen the violant tint in your eyes. Always thinking.”
When you came here as Master Sacks, you could never imagine seeing in this place where never light is welcome, but with all that your fellow Masters are doing, you can. You can see, and it is beautiful, the rarest, softest, most elegant bolts you can possibly imagine, and even some you cannot quite understand.
The bolts Veils is pulling from are a deep carmine, and a colour you cannot see, it almost matches... No. No. “Are you using Veils-Velvet?”
“Yes, you clearly need it. You're chafing from your robes.” You instinctively reach to cover your chafing skin as if it could see it. Foolish, you are not supposed to show weakness. “You always had sensitive skin.”
“H-how would you know that?” Better, if only just, probing without openly admitting it. Though, it was clear from your previous actions it is true. The look from Veils is all the answer you need. Of course it knows, you bought those bolts of fabrics, you acquired those specialised clothes.
“What pattern do you want?” Something about this does not feel quite right, while Veils was never directly antagonistic with you, it certainly was not pleasant to be around at the best of times. Although, it did already once make you your robe, perhaps it wishes to show off its true skill when not limited. That must be it, pride, of course.
“I certainly should invoke my trade, but a collage of cards would not be appropriate or fashionable at all. Perhaps, a roulette wheel! The skirt of the robe should be a roulette wheel!”
Before your eyes it gets to work, the speed and precision of its cuts and stitches mesmerising. You can barely believe it, every step of the process seamless and perfect, as if the carmine and midnight stripes and squares of Veils-Velvet were always meant to be in this state.
You remember the love it puts in all its work. You remember how it always denied it. You knew better then, you know better now. It moves onto accenting the end of the sleeves with the carmine, the Stygian fabric a suitable base colour. Before you have time to think further in the silence, it speaks up.
“I've heard that Pages has been keeping you busy.”
"It is playing games with me. To be honest I think it is sloppy, like it does not quite want to win, but is still giving an attempt." You look over to Veils, a look of amusement obvious under its hood. "What?”
"Oh, you think that? You do too much thinking. You must rely on your instincts. What do they say about Pages' motives?"
"It... It views me differently. It is not treating its moves against me as dealing with a threat. If it was all of my deflections would be more of a challenge."
It chuckles, continuing its stitching. "What else do your instincts tell you?"
You feel tension, you should not be here. Why are you worried? Sure you have not been alone with Veils since that moment on your trip North, but, but this is nothing it is just a gift. Wait... Masters do not give gifts. This is not a gift. "This is a trap."
"What are you going to do about it Cards?" It smiles underneath its robes and simply continues. It is playing with you, enamored by your struggling, taking in ever little movement you make to escape its hunt.
You need to focus. If it wanted to kill you, it would have attacked already. What could it want? Blackmail? Certainly in its sphere of influence, but if anything this harms its reputation and position, not yours. Was this all a test, an experiment? Perhaps to figure out how you act and function... But it already knows. It knows how you hunt, how you act, how you deflect, what else could there be for it to learn?
“More thinking, it's always thinking with you.” Its snide remark derails any train of thought you might have had, placing you firmly back in the defensive. There is something else to its mood, something you cannot quite articulate... Annoyance? “You are the Master of Games, should you not be better at them?” Oh, is that all this is? A game? You can handle that.
“There are few games you can play with only one player Veils, and this is no round of solitaire.” You let out a chittering chuckle. A slight provocation, enough to draw it in. Each move it plays is another data point to draw from. “What stops me from just leaving right now to keep you to your machinations alone?”
“The fact that I have not yet finished your robe.” Its intonation turns frigid, it seems you did not play the right move. Despite the mistake, it continues to fashion your robe, drawing from a new bolt that glints in the dark. Still Veils-Velvet, but cloth of gold as well.
“I am unsure the gold is necessary.”
“I am. You do not want to disgrace your position Bishop, correct?” Another snare, of course it would use that against you somehow, though, you are unsure as to why. The answer comes quickly as it weaves the very same gold into the edge of the hood in a pattern not unlike…
“A crown, really?” You fail to keep the disdain out of your voice, if you wished to be royalty and have a crown, you easily could have just asked for that.
“Here I assumed you would appreciate a golden wimple.” It returns to its regular tone, albeit there was something else at the edges, hidden behind the shroud it keeps itself buried under. What can you possibly be missing?
It looks back up to you as it finishes the final touches, pride emanating off of it. You look in wonder at the craftsmanship, the design, everything about it fills you with joy. You reach out a clawed hand to it, and the roulette squares flash with cosmogone, violant, and apocyan light woven deep into its strands, blinding you before symbols arrange themselves along each one, a bright candle right at the center.
You look back to Veils only to see fury and vehemence drowning you. This was the trap, and it is not happy with what it caught. Its left claw gouges into a table as it stands imposing above you. “What game are you playing ‘Cards’? Is this your reckoning?” It spits your name out acidly.
You cannot help but panic. What are you supposed to say? What can you say? “N-no! I am playing no games nor enacting any reckoning!”
“Did you really think you could get away with this? Did you really think we would not notice? We all suspect it, we all can see it! Just admit it! JUST ADMIT WHO YOU ARE! JUST ADMIT YOU ARE HIM!”
You are paralysed with fear. You remember the anger, the sacrifice, the rage and grief and despair and it takes all your strength to keep yourself above the well water. Shakily, you respond. “I do not know. I do not know if I am him, or if I was him, or if I ever will be him again…”
Veils stares in a mix of anger, grief, confusion, and shock. It does not speak.
“I do not know who I am, what defines an identity? What makes a person who they are? Is it the memories they remember? The feelings they feel? The accomplishments they earned? The thoughts they produce? It is one’s name or their body? I may have been him before, but I dreamed that I would never be again. Then again, more impossible things have happened.” You look down to your claws. The fur is coming in perfectly, just as you remember.
It sits back down, looking over you. It does not quite know what to think. Neither do you.
“But does it matter? He was not the same him in each city, and you were not either. The only thing that is guaranteed is change. Perhaps I am him changed, perhaps I am myself changed by him, or something equally as altered.”
You look into its eyes. This time, it does not run, it does not hide.
“Perhaps one day I will know, perhaps I never will, but in the end I am just me, whatever that may ever mean. It perhaps is only up to you who or what you see in me. To find a lost light in another is a miracle for those its bestows itself upon.”
It swallows as it rises, lifting the new robe with a gentleness unbecoming of its persona. It hooks your older robe with a few claws and lifts it off of you. You do not resist as it replaces it with your new one, a gift, and act of care, if not love. “Tomorrow I will show you how a true curator hunts.”
You chuckle. “I know how to hunt, you do not need to show me.”
It simply repeats itself. It looks over its workshop and back to you. “I have many things I must get done, you may leave now.”
“What if I wish to stay?”
“Then you must provide your own light, nothing Fires makes, or anything born of human hands is ever right.”
You smile, and this place where never light is welcome greets a new but familiar light.