“I don’t understand,” I whispered. “What are you saying?”
“This… end. This sa
crifice. Your vision.”
Ryan.
I hadn’t even—
I could.
Oh my gods, I could—
“No,” he snapped, suddenly leaning forward, placing his gnarled hands on my knees, squeezing tightly. My Grimoire fell off his lap onto the ground. “You cannot, Sam. If that is to be his ending, then it must be the end. Should the Knight Commander fall, he will have had his shackles removed and he will be free. You cannot bind him to this life again. You cannot bring him back. The amount of energy for a bird destroyed part of the forest for good. What would it take to bring back a human with all his memories and all his thoughts, if that were even possible? What would the cost be?”
Worth it, a little voice whispered. Any price. I would pay any price.
“You can say that,” I said hoarsely. “You can say what I can and can’t do, because you’re not me. You can sit there and tell me what to do, resting easy in the knowledge that I am the one paying for your mistakes. That I have to be the one to kill Myrin or have him take everything. Not you. Yes, he’ll die. But I think for you, he died a long time ago. This man, he’s nothing but a shadow of what he once was. But Ryan… he—” My breath hitched in my chest. “—he would pay for your mistakes too. Only with his life. You can’t tell me that I can’t do anything to—”
His fingers dug into my knees. I was sure there’d be bruises there tomorrow. “I am sorry for what we’ve done, for all the mistakes that we have made. But Sam, you must heed my warning. It would change him. He would not be the same person he was before.”
“How do you know?” I asked. “You said that this was only ever theory before me. You don’t know what could happen.”
“Think about it! A bird, the smallest of birds, burned the life out of the earth. If this were to be a human, if this were Ryan, what would the end result be? If it were to work, what would you burn in order to save him? Your parents? The King? Gary and Tiggy?”
I recoiled away from him in shock. “Stop.”
“Stone crumbles, Sam. A path may be set, but stone crumbles. Zero was right to tell you this. Vadoma can say what she will. The damn gods can write the future in the stars, but I am telling you right here and now that stone crumbles, and we will do everything we can to help you, to help all of us.”
“But what if it’s not enough?”
He slumped back into his chair. “You have to have hope.”
Gods, that sounded so fucking trite. “Do you?” I retorted.
“I have to,” he said tiredly. “It’s all I have left. This hope. This belief that one day, the mistakes that I have made as a man who loved another will be washed clean and forgiven. That the world will continue to exist in the light long after my own candle has been snuffed out and I am but a wisp of smoke. I have made mistakes, Sam. So many mistakes. I am sorry for them. That you and yours have to live with the actions of an old man who thought he was doing the right thing. If I could relieve you of this burden, I would. More than anything else, that is what I wish when I look upon the stars. That you would be free from all of this, able to live the life you deserve. I have been… harsh with you, only because I see myself in you. Your strength, your attitude, rough though it may be, reminds me of how I acted for a very long time. And that’s not to say that you’re doing anything wrong. You’re not; you are living your life just as well as you should. Or at least you were before all of this.”
“Did you know?” I asked him quietly. “When Kevin came. That all of this was beginning?”
He nodded slowly. “It was a sign.”
“And you said you didn’t know it would be Myrin.”
“No.”
“The bird.”
“What you’re really asking is if I planned on using you all this time.”
I stared straight at him. “Yes.”
“At first.”
I swallowed thickly. “What changed your mind?”
“You did. You were me. And even if you weren’t, Sam, I’d like to think that I wouldn’t have done anything. When I say at first, I mean that it was the briefest of thoughts, done so in passing. Something considered in the dead of night when I couldn’t sleep. It was… dark. It was dark, but I am not.”
“How did you stop him the first time?”