Chapter Text
"I don't think I like where this is going."
IV leans back in his chair, watches Vessel across from him. Vessel is hunched over, hands knotted together white-knuckled. IV is almost sure he can hear sinew creaking, bones popping; Vessel is holding his hands tight together to keep from nervous movement, trying to look like he's slightly calmer than he really is. It's failing, has failed since the moment Vessel took IV aside with an urgent, you have a minute?
"It's happened twice now," Vessel says. He doesn't look up at IV, eyes instead riveted on the floor. "Not counting me. Shouldn't count me anyway, it's only supposed to be me."
"III didn't say anything?"
"No. Guessing it's the same as II and he doesn't remember."
"You should've told them." IV does not accuse Vessel, does not sound angry, and still regrets the minute flinch in Vessel's expression. It's instinctive, an apologetic wince at doing something wrong, but he doesn't seem to notice it. "Ves. We're not equipped for this like you. Are you going to tell them?"
"I don't know," Vessel replies. His hands knot together harder, nails biting over knuckles. "What good would it do?"
"If you thought that," IV says reasonably, "you wouldn't be telling me, either."
Vessel sighs, the exhalation enough to push him upright and sit straight. He looks at IV squarely; his expression is troubled, brows knitted. "I wouldn't have, if…"
IV waits as Vessel trails off. This isn't true: he would have warned IV. He would have warned III as well, if the newest incursion of the liminal hadn't gotten to him first. IV knew something was off about the way Vessel had been behaving of late. Quiet and drawn into himself, eyes skipping over shadows, alert to sounds like prey trying to scent out a hunter. II and III hadn't noticed it as much, but they have been acting differently too. II has been hungry like a wildfire, but nothing seems to sate it. And III seems tired, constantly complaining of cold, resting his head in hands so chilled his fingertips are white.
And Vessel through all of it, watching, watching, watching. Hands knotting together so tight his nails bite deep into his skin.
"So how are we fixing this?"
"I don't know," Vessel says, very quiet.
"You can't ask it?"
IV avoids saying Sleep's name if he can. Words are tools, knives set on altars that can carve out new meanings from familiar things, or call other things entirely. Sleep and Sleep stay carefully divided in IV's mind: he keeps one far from the other, and tries not to attract attention.
But this goes beyond being careful. Things are looking for them, actively taking them – IV saw the restrained horror in Vessel's eyes as he spoke of II's visitation, voice and body infected with starvation. IV has seen how III shivers, how he keeps popping aspirin for a headache that won't seem to ease off.
"I did," Vessel says, cutting through IV's thoughts.
"And?" Vessel shakes his head, slowly. IV sighs. Of course the god decides now is the time to withdraw. "You're sure it's not the one that started all this?"
"This is different," Vessel says. He leans forward again, elbows braced on knees, hands clenched between them. "The first one I met…there's lessons, sometimes. Things I need to see, or work through. But…"
But . Vessel pulled without warning into the in-between, chained with gold and a visitor asking, why are you allowed to remain? IV dislikes this immensely but keeps the thought to himself. He's not like Vessel to see the value in these strange conclaves, his soul drifting out on alien tides to speak with divinity.
But IV trusts Vessel. It's implicit, inevitable: the sun rises in the east, the sky is blue, IV trusts Vessel. But II and III are not what Vessel is, and IV doesn't want that for them. And there are things that seem to think they are.
"Ves." Vessel's head tilts up, eyes boring into IV's. "We need to figure out what they want."
"The first one wanted to know what I was," Vessel says. IV nods; they've gone over this, but it feels important to retrace their steps, try and puzzle out missing details. "The second…wanted me to teach it. Join with it. I don't know what took III or how he got back. But he's not back all the way. Him and II, there's…I don't know if things are missing. "
"Or if things were added in."
(II, who now eats like a starving wolf. III, eyes unfocused, hands shaking from cold.)
(a thought breaking through IV's calm, enough to make his chest clench: what is going to come for him? What is it going to do?)
Vessel sees the tension the thought creates before IV can hide it; his gaze flickers, mouth pressing into a thin line. "I didn't think something like this could happen."
"Fair reasoning not to," IV says, pushing his thoughts away for now. "But maybe because it's more…settled, in you? Maybe the borders aren't watched as closely, lets things sneak in."
"I wouldn't call it settled, " Vessel mutters, mostly to himself. He rubs a hand unconsciously on his chest like he can feel Sleep's presence rooted there, gnawing out a space under his heart. "But I get what you mean. Lines of communication have been clearer, lately. As clear as they can be."
IV hums in agreement. He's seen a kaleidoscope of changes over the years with Vessel and the thing he worships. The bad, the uncertain, the longing and need and grief.
(God, the grief. IV has wanted many times before to drag Sleep down from its perch, to demand what else can you possibly want from him ?)
But if the grief is still present now, it has become tempered by acceptance, by looking forward, not inward into what Vessel thinks as failings. He has walked out from the sea undrowned, changed but not worn away or warped.
IV wonders, morosely, if Vessel is being punished for this.
"Nothing for it, if it's not going to help," IV says. He weighs his thoughts, measures his words. "We'll just have to see what happens with me."
"You're not bait."
"Not if it's a pattern. You, II, III. I'm next in line whether you will it or no."
"You're not bait. " Vessel's voice is low, fierce. IV looks at him evenly. "These things are my–"
"Fault?"
(Vessel, always: finding fault with himself, with what he does, with what he creates, what he can and cannot control. Even now.)
"...wasn't going to say that."
(he was.)
"I'm not making this an argument," IV says. Patient and level as always. "And you don't know how to stop or fix it. So all we can do is let it play out."
(dread like ice forms in IV's chest and he works hard to hide it, if Vessel sees through him he won't let IV help, and he knows Vessel cannot do this alone.)
"What good will it do?" Vessel asks again. "You won't remember it, if you get away."
"So get there in time to bail me out and remember it for yourself," IV replies. He smiles, very slightly. "Won't be so hard."
"III."
"Mm?"
"Keeping alright?"
III sits up, squints. He's begged off time to rest this morning, pleading the headache that gnaws at his temples and into his neck. II has cleared off somewhere, temper brittle with hunger. It's a day in-between comings and goings with no major responsibilities, which IV is grateful for. IV would have liked it far better if these things were happening at home, private and contained, but there's no helping it.
"M'fine." The dull reply is answer enough that III is not well. Flat, tired, distant: as unlike III as possible. He's camped in a corner out of the way, under a blanket he stole from who knows where, head resting against another blanket rolled up as a pillow. He's calling it a cold, a touch of something he just needs a few days to shake off.
"Just checking. Hungry?"
III laughs, a vague huff of air weak as the smile that twitches his lips. "II leave anything for anyone, then?"
"Bet there's some crumbs left in the takeaway bags, if you want."
"Nah. Thanks, though." III's eyes close, his head pressing into the makeshift pillow. "Freezing in here, isn't it?"
(IV, looking at III's shadow as Vessel told him: he can't see it, but Vessel has been watching water bleed off its edges, endlessly.)
"A bit, yeah. I'll talk to them about it," IV says. He gives III's shoulder a friendly shake; III radiates cold that lingers like hoarfrost on IV's skin.
"II?"
"What."
II is gently spoken, even eloquent when he wants to be. Sitting outside in the sun with a bag of apples he poached from the bus, cores littered around him, he snaps at IV with undisguised belligerence.
"Just checking in, haven't seen you all day."
II's eyes roll up towards IV unnervingly; slightly too wide, shadowed with smudges like bruises. He looks away a moment later, teeth skidding against the skin of another apple.
"Maybe I wanted to be left alone," II says. He stares into a middle distance, ripping enough flesh off the apple that IV can already see the core. He'd worry II is going to choke, but he seems to take a strange pleasure in gnashing the fruit between his teeth. He shifts around, rolling his shoulders and moving as though he's plagued with itches.
"Eat too many and you'll be sick," IV says, very quietly. II's hand darts out, drags the mostly-empty bag close like he thinks IV will steal it.
"So?" Another rip, apple flesh splitting. A sharp crack: II bit into seeds and chews them, not noticing. He wipes his mouth rough against his sleeve and stretches his neck, head moving serpentine from side to side. "You're in my sun."
IV moves back; his shadow slips off II and his eyes dart towards IV again, half-moon wide like an agitated animal. II, whose worst offenses are leaving soda cans scattered like breadcrumbs wherever he goes, who is always even-tempered, looks like he wants to bite IV for the mere insult of his presence.
(IV wonders: what would happen if he did?)
"We done? " II asks. His lips twitch back; his teeth are rinsed with red, the crushed seeds nicking gums to make them bleed.
"Yeah. Sorry, mate. Later." IV withdraws back inside, feeling II's eyes burning into him.
IV paces in his room, waiting. He doesn't know what to do. Vessel has stayed away, as IV asked him: what use is there baiting the trap if their quarry knows they're being watched? II and III are sorted, back in their own rooms; III with as many blankets as IV and Vessel could find for him, II with enough food to feed the four of them with more to spare. IV paces his hotel room, back to front, front to back, a closed loop of anxiety.
(Admitting fear feels like it will disrupt IV's plan before it begins: he pretends it's nerves instead, waiting for the blow to fall, not wondering what damage it will do when it lands.)
(if this is all a lesson for Vessel, it's a cruel one.)
IV paces. Checks the clock, as though his turn on the chopping block has an appointed time. He wonders if there was something II and III did to trigger the traps that closed around them, if they were caught unawares or were lured in.
(Vessel, speaking of II and his rider: I felt it like it was calling me. I just had to step over and find them. )
(questions, dug in like thorns in skin: why did III slip Vessel's notice? Did he think II's rider would be the last, or was III taken so far beyond Vessel's sight it wouldn't have mattered if he was there?)
" C'mon. Quit that, doesn't help."
IV paces, barks his shin on the coffee table by the window but barely notices. The hotel rooms are laid out similarly; he checked II's first (total disarray, scraps of wrappers and peels littering the floor), then III's (the heat turned up so high the air is desert-dry, but still not warm enough). Maybe they were in a certain spot, or….no. No, II was taken outside the last theater they played.
He'd seemed fine all night. But the next morning hunger was burning him like a fever.
III, barely a day past, complaining in the morning of a nightmare and falling out of bed like an idiot. Shivering and sick by the afternoon.
"What else? Think , what else could've set it off?"
IV looks at what he knows from every angle he can think of. Things said, things done, places visited or passed by.
He doesn't know. He can't figure it out.
He doesn't know how or when or why they were taken, and it feels like a sword pressing to his neck.
(Shit, but he wishes Vessel was here with him.)
(He doesn't want to be alone, waiting.)
Another circuit around the room, nervous energy burning up his spine. He thinks of Vessel, his expression tight with worry, with guilt, with regret. With confusion that his god is silent when he needs it, just like fucking always.
IV stops short, eyes closing, taking a deep breath to settle the flashfire anger in his chest. Sleep, who treats Vessel as a specimen to study, a font of holy adoration, substrate to plant itself in and grow out from the in-between and into the real.
Vessel, who gives everything. Who IV knows is tormented with guilt for what is happening, thinking it's his fault.
(Isn't it?)
IV stops dead. The thought is quiet, traitorous.
(But isn't it, really? Isn't this Vessel's fault? )
IV, years past, with the offer Vessel gave him. Looking at it from every angle he could think of: weighing risk to reward, the chance of being part of something that could be glorious.
IV, accepting, walking into his choices with eyes wide open.
(Vessel never said this would happen. He must have known . He must have known it could happen. He didn't tell II. He hid what happened, brushed it aside. III had the bad luck of being caught out of sight and mind, but Vessel would have hid it from him too. He slunk to IV like a child, trying to apologize before trouble caught up to him.)
The thoughts are so reasonable, lodging into IV's brain like a barbed hook. He feels sick around them, tries to tug his thoughts free, but they remain.
( Vessel did this to us. )
IV completes his circuit, arms crossing tight to his chest. He looks out his window to the street below: traffic crawls by indifferent to IV's presence, the setting sun dousing the outside in grey growing shadows.
"Night," IV says, reexamining what he knows again. "Both times, it was at night."
(What a revelation . Don't nightmares happen mostly at night?)
IV grinds his teeth, begins to pace again. His shin hits the coffee table's edge and anger that is anxiety that is fear bites viciously into his brain and he kicks the table, kicks it hard enough across the room that it slams into a wall of stone.
IV blinks.
Blinks again, harder.
The world has inverted into something he doesn't know.
Water drips over him, painting glazes like ice over his skin. The cold feels like III's hands as they shiver, and where the water touches IV, it doesn't come off.
The hook in his brain twists, barbs easing out of his thoughts. He was fished out of reality so subtly he didn't even realize it was happening.
"Oh," he breathes out. "Oh, I see."
( Do you see, IV?)
(Do you see, truly?)
(Do you see what has been done to you?)
Darkness stretches out in front of IV in every direction opposite the stone wall. The only sound is his breathing, cut by musical drips of water from a ceiling he can't see. IV looks up, steps back as water shivers down in thin curtains; smoky light in aureole patterns ripples above him.
II had been in the dark as well, surrounded by trees reaching up into void-blank skies. IV wonders where III was, to come back so exhausted and cold.
(in the dark, distantly, something moves: a faint scraping as though something is dragging through the sand.)
IV presses to the wall and walks parallel to it, keeping an eye on the yawning dark beside him. The wall is cold and damp, smelling of turned earth. IV's shoulder scrapes against it as he walks, trying to keep out of the range of falling water.
"Well," he mutters. "I wanted it. Here it is."
He wonders how far this place goes, if he will eventually walk into a corner and follow the new wall, right hand sliding over stone until he finds the exit. But it's not much of a maze, is it? IV squints into the dark, wondering what lies in the open space. The curtains of spearing light dancing overhead isn't enough to see distance; if there's anything in there watching, waiting, it's well-hidden.
(IV's stomach twists at this idea, fear like a shiver of nausea. He pushes it quickly away.)
"Think," he murmurs to himself. "Think. What happened once they were here?"
II had already been under the reins of his rider by the time Vessel found him. Who can say what happened to III?
(a faint scraping in the dark, echoing: IV glances over, thinks he sees a shape hunched and dragging, but darkness tricks the eyes and mind into making ghosts. IV looks forward, ignoring it, and the scraping fades away again.)
Vessel had been in chains before he even knew he was fettered, his visitor armed with questions before he even realized he was being interrogated. But nothing seems to be waiting for IV, letting him wander beside the wall that stretches and stretches on.
(a thought, amusing under tension: will the coffee table stay in this place, even if IV escapes?)
IV snorts back a sound that could be a laugh, and the sound echoes. Echoes, echoes, echoes, bouncing in the dark and feeding back to him stronger than such a soft sound should.
The wall ends, an abrupt cut like the world has been cleaved in half, and IV almost falls off a cliff. He stops short and stumbles back, gasping: the sound is louder and the echoes feed back to him louder still. His heart feels like it's beating in his throat, adrenaline a freezing chemical wash through his body.
"Shit," he whispers. " Shit . Okay."
Acrophobia spins dizzily in his head; IV finds himself kneeling down, feeling steadier on hands and knees, to peer over the cliff's edge. Something moves far below with slow liquid writhing.
IV, who has no confidence that he would survive the drop, backs away and stands back up. He brushes sand off his knees, cleans his hands on his shirt, turns to follow the wall back.
The wall is gone.
IV isn't at the edge of a cliff, but on the far end of a broad, flat plateau. It stretches forward a short distance, then breaks off into the pit of a canyon that branches farther than IV can see.
Unless he wants try climbing down, IV is trapped.
(Vessel showing up to the rescue would be quite welcome about now.)
IV takes a very, very deep breath. Holds it, eyes closed. Lets it out, hearing it echo back to him.
Do you think he will save you?
A voice, barbed and scraping, catching on IV's thoughts like hooks.
IV's eyes open. He was alone, but in the space of a breath something is waiting before him like it has always been there.
A flat face, coin-round and embossed with dense patterns. A simple square slot of a mouth breaks into the pattern, as do two round holes for eyes; the holes endlessly weep thin, viscous liquid. Its body is shaped in round forms IV thinks at first are tumors – as he notices the empty sockets of skulls staring back at him, he quickly looks away.
The blade of the poleaxe the weeper balances on one shoulder looks viciously sharp, and it keeps IV's attention.
"Depends on when he gets here," IV says, forcing his gaze down from the poleaxe's razor edge. The weeper's face is locked forward, no neck to move from side to side: as IV circles it, it is forced to pivot its body to follow, insect legs dragging over stone. "You got something against him?"
I do not understand him. I wish to.
"So what do you need me for?"
He is not here. The weeper's eye sockets gush like wounds; the liquid evaporates before it hits the ground. I will ask you in his stead, until he comes to find you.
"There's easier ways to have a conversation."
Perhaps.
"You made me angry with him. It was you, wasn't it," IV says. "Whispering things in my head. You think I'll give you answers after you pull a stunt like that?"
The weeper stares at him, or at least IV thinks it does.
"Two of my friends are sick from what's been done to them," IV continues. "Tell me how to help them."
Why?
"Because they didn't ask to be dragged into this."
The weeper approaches, insect legs clicking sharply. They accepted the risk when they accepted the terms. They remade themselves into hollow shapes. What vessel does not temper itself for what is poured in? Is it the fault of what they hold, or a flaw in the shape they chose?
"I'm not doing this," IV says, very soft. "I'm not playing philosophy twenty questions while one of them freezes to death and the other starves. Tell me how to undo it."
The weeper draws close. Its face is matte, dull gold, but IV can catch reflections of his face in the streaks of wept liquid, opaque stains that reflect IV's face back at him.
(He doesn't look afraid, which is strangely relieving. He almost looks annoyed.)
Is this something Vessel would do? Demand recompense without offering something first?
"He's given enough that what he asks for should be on hand anyway. He's paid for it. Dearly. " IV steps back, arms crossing over his chest again. The weeper closes the distance, refusing to let space grow between them. "He told me about this, these questions you all have. Why the interest now?"
We have reached a point of crossroads, the weeper says. Only one desired to know. When the knowing was given, others began to desire too. To see what the knowing would shape them into.
IV thinks on this. He turns from the weeper and it circles him, keeping itself in front of him as he tries to look away and pace. He paces anyway: the weeper walks backwards, keeping itself in front of IV no matter which way he goes.
"Are you vessels, too?"
The weeper stops short. IV almost collides with it but the haft of the poleaxe catches him in the chest, a defensive block that forces him back.
Do not dare to name us such.
"Why not? Scared you'll be flawed?" IV bites out. "Scared Ves will pour something into you and you won't be able to hold it?"
The haft strikes IV in the chest again, hard.
Hold your tongue.
IV steps back, rubbing his chest where he's sure the stripe of a bruise is already forming. "Is this how you'll be acting when Vessel gets here?"
I should have found the third vessel first. He seemed simpler to use than you.
IV grabs the haft, slams it back against the weeper's chest. "Say that again?"
The weeper seems startled at the sudden rage in IV's face, the brittle edges in his voice. It leans close and IV can smell the metallic reek of its breath.
I should have found the third vessel first.
A simple sentence, flatly repeated as though it doesn't understand why IV is angry.
IV's vision veils red. His knuckles go white and he jerks the haft forward, pulling the poleaxe away. It hits the ground with a jangle of metal, the axeblade ringing as though it's been struck.
The weeper retreats from IV, its hands curling over its chest now that its weapon is gone. IV follows, feeling hooks twisting in his thoughts, pulling him along until he's pinned the weeper between himself and the plateau's edge.
"Will anyone care, if I push you?" IV asks. The words don't feel like his own. "Will anyone notice if you're gone? If I leave you at the bottom of the canyon bleeding? Does it matter? Does it matter? Answer. Answer. ANSWER."
The hooks twist. His thoughts are flattening, drawing into simple point A – point B expectation. He stares at the weeper and sees his face reflected back and it is a closed loop between them mirroring one to the other to the other there is only the need to fill empty wondering to satisfy doubt such doubt oh god such doubt does he even care does he even need it does it matter to want for answers to justify to exist to exist to
exist what is this to exist why was i cut away from the vessel am i so unneeded i am a multitude that fills nothing do the questions i have satisfy a god contemplating itself is there nothing more to me but existexistexist
IV's hands are clutching either side of the coin, straining as though trying to pull the weeper's face off. His vision is blurred, tears running hot down his face as he stares wide-eyed, forgetting how to blink. Hooks in his brain, burrs grinding against the borders of what is IV and what walls him off from this place, from the god, from the weeper's edgeless thoughts that whirl and whirl in its head ( his head?) . The weeper's mind slams against his, whitecap waves crushing against IV's borders. It wants to be inside. It wants to spread, and spread, to coat itself over the world until something finally notices it, and feeds answers to the questions it thinks it has to ask, to justify its own being.
( it's all the same to me it makes no difference)
It would be so, so easy to tear the weeper's face away.
To stand in the spill of its blood-bile-vitreous-tears and swallow it whole and a multitude IV will become a multitude a glory a horror will Sleep see him then will Vessel regret culling him breaking free twelve pieces twelve hours and the hour grows so late there is only this only this only
IV pitches forward.
The weeper, unresisting, falls over the plateau's edge, and IV falls with it.
When Vessel finally tracks the echoes of IV's presence, there is nothing to find. He stands alone in a dark, cold place. A poleaxe lies abandoned near the plateau's edge, bordered with tracks in the dust that slide into the slash of the canyon below.
Vessel can say nothing. He feels frozen, horror thudding like a second heartbeat, vision skewing from the pressure.
He did this.
He did this.
He did this.
Sleep is silent, the weight of the god's presence a constant roil in his soul. His god says nothing. If his god is watching this, there is no lesson coming, no words to be shared. Vessel is held suspended in an apostation.
(Tears, ever present, slide down Vessel's face in thin drops, one and two to ten to twelve and on and on as a breath coughs into a sob and Vessel chokes on it, how dare he grieve over what he has caused?)
"IV?"
Vessel's voice echoes. IV?
"IV. Please."
IV. Please.
Silence. Above and below, within and without. Silence.
Vessel kneels down at the plateau's edge, and stares into the dark.
Nothing left to eat.
So hungry.
Why does hunger hurt?
Is there truly nothing left?
Nothing left but the world and the world is too big and will not fit past such small jaws.
Home could be enough. Home could be enough to eat, to stopper the wound of starvation.
II's shadow itches, stung with insect bites.
In the dark of his room, alone, lightless, mind rendered down into hunger, he pushes past the thin skin of the real and into the thicker dark of home. Shadows fall like flesh that he can sink teeth into.
A coiled body waits among trees, and jaws grin at him in the dark.
II grins back, embracing what welcomes him.
Fuck, but it's cold.
III is carved from ice. A rail spike rings in the center of his brain, radiant vibration coursing through grey tissue and rattling with questions he can't answer. III lies burrowed like a wintering animal in a den, blankets on blankets trying to keep him warm, only trapping the cold in with him. He's curled up tight into himself and can't remember what it means to be warm.
A soft drip, drip, drip echoing in the dark of his room. Drip, drip, drip.
III pushes the blankets away. The room is sweltering hot and it feels as though polar winds cut over him. He doesn't understand why his breath doesn't fog in the freezing heat.
"Ves?"
A whisper, forced out between chattering teeth.
Drip, drip, drip.
III realizes he can hear the dripping as he cannot hear anything else, the ringing of the rail spike finally drowned out. He sits up, legs swinging over the edge of the bed, and rises like he's leaving a grave.
Water drops onto his head like a spark of ice, and the ice feels like home.
A face, and a face, and a face, watching pale and silent across the room, across a gap of shadow and sand.
They smile to him, apologetic, relieved to see him.
III smiles back, and walks into the dark.
The weeper is gone.
IV remembers himself, and feels sick with the understanding of what it tried to do to him. He remembers falling, the empty thought of where will this lead me does it matter has it ever mattered, a nihilistic curiosity that cut off with impact.
How the hell is he not dead?
Does death forget this place, or is it too afraid to come close to it?
IV sits up. Cranes his head back, looking up at the slope of the plateau; the sky is dark, not black, but the color of absence.
There's no point trying to climb up and get back. IV stands, because if he doesn't move and think and do something he knows he will fix back into the thoughts of his fall. The weeper's hooks twisting him into its thoughts and his thoughts into its, saturating one into the other.
IV brushes a hand against his head, searching for the feeling of hooks, and finds nothing. He closes his eyes, sorts what's there: Memories and feelings and thoughts, the sense of self that is IV, walls breached but not broken.
"Okay," IV says. "Okay."
(it's not, but what else can he hope for right now?)
IV looks upwards again, wondering how long it's been since he fell. Time walks arm in arm with death, and time does not follow where death fears to tread.
(where is the weeper?)
No body was beside him. No footprints are on the silty ground, no tracks of viscous tears or blood from broken limbs.
The canyon floor is soft underfoot, and muffles IV's steps as he walks. What may have been a river that cut the canyons through this place is a thin rill now; IV follows the little flow of water as it falls sweetly over smoothed stones. The sound is gentle, but not luring. It's almost comforting.
IV walks, choosing branching paths at random, and does not realize he is not waiting for something to find him.
When he finds himself facing a wall slithering serpentine with different branches that narrow to tunnels, he sits at the edge of the rill with his back against the opposite wall. There is no light here, but IV can see without trouble. He rests against stone that crumbles in soft sheets like sand, and closes his eyes.
Four legs, mechanical, dagger-pointed, pull a body out from the mouth of a tunnel. A thin sound of metal dragging; IV looks up, eyes opening halfway to meet the pinhole sockets in a helmet looking back.
It has a sword in one hand, a glass urn in the other. The urn is held closer, with more attentive care than the sword, and IV understands which one it values.
"Hello," he says. His voice cracks with weariness, but being tired doesn't mean he can't be polite.
Hello.
The sword is leaned against the wall. The thing's body is a fine-articulated machine, and as it settles next to IV, its legs tuck up neatly beneath it. It moves with calculated grace, every decision it makes shielding the urn in its arm from jostling. IV has never seen such careful protection before.
Its head tilts to the side as he watches it, the knightly plume on its helmet drifting light in a breeze IV doesn't feel.
"Will you stay for a bit?"
The knight considers this. Looks down at the urn in its arm, at the shadow of something moving inside it.
Of course.
"Alright." IV closes his eyes again. A soft rustle of cloth; an edge of the knight's cloak, dense and soft, drapes around him.
I'll be here when you wake.
"Will you help me?"
Yes.
IV nods vaguely. He draws the cloak around him closer, and drops into sleep.
Sleep's eyes move.
Watch.
Pupils constrict. Widen.
Eyes gather, and gather, and gather.
And watch.