Big thanks to the various internet friends who helped me decide on a title for this one, and also for putting up with me going on and on (and on and on and on...) about this fic for all this time! This chapter is for all of you.

Antelucan: Before dawn or daybreak

I live my life in widening circles
that reach out across the world.
I may not complete this last one
but I give myself to it.

-from Widening Circles, from Rilke's Book of Hours: Love Poems to God by Rainer Maria Rilke

It is the beginning of the end.

The gauntlet has been thrown down; the tapestry's final stitches are being put in. The eclipse is nearing and after then, the end will come. There is a time for everything to end, after all, but Hades and Cher, they never pictured it would be like this. They hadn't the colours or the brushes to picture the end like this. Nonetheless it is here, and it is coming. The end is coming.

The truth is coming, too.

It has been seeping out of the cracks of every shield they have tried to put up, every measure they have put into place. All the things they have tried to do and it has turned out to be so very, very useless. Whether it is because they have been looking in the wrong places for the answers, whether it is because everything they knew about themselves has been turned inside out and set alight, whether it is because of events they could not have controlled anyway…well, who is to say? Certainly, it does not help that Cher knew more than he was telling all along, more than could ever truly be realised. Some of this is beyond the truths he had spent this past three hundred years hiding-that much is clear to her. But in the end she supposes it doesn't really matter why things are cracking, just that they are. This is the truth that has become clear to Cher and Hades, that is becoming clear to their beloveds.

(It is likely that by now, the truth has reached the students too, a sure sign of control trickling further away.)

But here is another clear truth: That they still have hope, a hope that is waiting to be set into motion.

Before that can happen though, the girl has to wake up.

That is why they are sitting here, in the little cottage in the Floating Gardens, the one they built together brick by brick as below them, the school was built. The girl lies on the bed, the shine of the spell making her skin glow as she sleeps, while Hades sits at the foot of the bed and watches over her and Cher sits in an armchair in the corner of the room, struggling to hold himself together worse than he had done when he'd had the fever. Feeling less like a person and more like who he has secretly been all this time. Battling the pain that the corruption causes as it begins to take root, the way Kagami's pain and resentment took root once. The guilt of this realisation comes with its own exhaustions, Hades knows. She carries her own too.

If there had been a chance to save the boy, too, they both would have. Despite the fact saving the girl has taken everything they have and then more besides that, if it had been possible to save the boy too then neither of them would have hesitated. The time for their role in this, the chance for their atonement, it is slipping away-sand through their fingers. None of it can be wasted, and the anxiety of feeling it slip away eats at them. But from the moment they sensed the distress emanating from the forest remains on the outskirts of Aeternum, there was no way they could do anything different. Not really, not truly.

So now, despite everything they are here. Watching and waiting to see if this one bright hope is still worth putting their faith in.

And finally, eventually, she awakens.

Holding her breath, Hades watches as with the slowness of sleep, the girl blinks and slowly sits up. She keeps blinking, pressing a hand slowly over her chest, clearly realising that though it hurts, there is no wound. She looks down at her clothes-a deep red tunic, black leggings. Then she looks up and notices the gold cloak flung over one of the bedposts before then noticing the two of them. As the girl's eyes widen in shock, Hades looks at Cher, and Cher looks at Hades, but they both know who will have to speak.

"Oh, good, you are awake…Cookie."

Cookie stares suspiciously at the two of them, particularly her.

"What is…this is…I'm alive?"

"You both are and you are not."

"And what is that meant to mean? And where are we anyway? And what has happened to the headmaster-why's he like that?"

Hades hides her smile. There is something reassuring about how quickly Cookie's lips have curled and how quickly the questions have rattled out of her, faster than bullets. Than light, even. Despite what she has gone through, the girl's quickness and recklessness have not abated and this is good, no matter how it vexes her. It means that she will ferret out the truths, be a part of the efforts that restore the balance. A piece of the small bright hope that is starting to bloom, preparing for Hades to pluck it and cast it out, setting it into motion. So, she gets on with it:

"It means that you are alive for now, but you will still die eventually. And I do not mean in the way of all those who still have their mortality. What I mean is that we have bought you time. The knife that was plunged into you was enhanced with a Death Enchantment. It was intended to kill, no matter how shallow the wound it may have caused. And yours was not so bad, in itself. Your friend did a good job with her attempts to heal the injury, but against a Death Enchantment it would have always been a losing battle."

The way Cookie narrows her eyes makes it clear that she notices the lack of answers for her other questions. She scrutinises Cher for a moment, faltering at the blankness of his seeing-nothing gaze before returning her attention to Hades, her hand momentarily rising to her chest and briefly touching the place where she had been stabbed.

"And you cannot heal me properly, either."

"No," Hades replies simply. "We cannot."

Cookie is initially silent, and Hades holds back on the temptation to peer into her mind, to see which way the thoughts are meshing. It is not just because the girl would notice and object vehemently, or so she tells herself. Thankfully though, Cookie soon replies:

"So instead you have simply…delayed my death?"

Hades simply nods.

"Why?"

"We need you."

She cannot help but smirk by how this response catches the girl off guard. There is a part of her still irritated by the words that the girl threw at her in Shippa's personal library, the way they landed and stung. She wants to tease in a way that is unfair for a girl in her situation, let alone for a headmistress talking to a student. The directness she is considering is also inappropriate and yet she decides to go with it anyway. Despite the irritation there is a part of her who likes the girl, feels that in another life they could have been something approaching equals. Nothing like her and Cher, or even like the beloved ones but still something close to respect. And so it is this she tries to keep in mind as she continues the conversation:

"Not just you. But this is a desperate situation, and your cohort are special and the circumstances we are in are…also special, shall we say? We have found ourselves in a bind and quite frankly your help is needed. "

The girl has sat up straighter, raising an eyebrow. The colour is returning to her underneath the permanent glow the spell has cast across her. It stirs a deep feeling in Hades, one she tries to hold onto.

"Oh, you're admitting your responsibility at last?"

"Yes. Not all of the fault is ours, and you shall see it soon enough. But plenty of it is and…well. What I told you is true. We would do anything for Kawaakari, and it is the students that make Kawaakari. And this cohort in this year particularly capture the essence of what we hoped this school would be. But there is more than that at stake now. There are things that have come to light that change everything, and the balance of the world itself is in danger of tipping the wrong way. There are things we have to do, but there are things that you can do too. So we have reached deep into the untamed magics to remember the spell to bring you time and we have bought you some time. It may not be much more than months, or even as little as weeks. But it will be something and it may be precisely what is needed to avert disaster."

Again, there is a pause as Cookie considers this. Experimentally, she pushes aside the covers and swings her legs around, shuffling forward slightly so she too is sitting on the same edge of the bed as Hades is herself. With a sceptical frown, the girl sizes her up, clearly trying to discern if this is something to believe in or whether she should dismiss it as nonsense the way she had dismissed the existence of the Goddesses. That irreverence is as baffling as it is infuriating, but now more than ever Hades can understand it.

After all, this girl has been hurt and hurt again. Not just by things that one would expect to hurt, but by the things in the world that were supposed to be good. They themselves have been hurt and hurt again by those things, too. Hades herself is being inflicted with new wounds now with every passing moment. It is a miracle that her own faith still stands while the girl's does not but then again, she is so very old and this girl little more than a blink.

Hades sighs a little as she waits, and she feels Cher reach out in her mind, sending a comforting pulse despite his state. It is as much a prod as it is a tender touch, a reminder that they do not have much time. Nonetheless she allows herself to soak in the solace of it because it tells her something important. It tells her that it does not matter if he has actually been Goddess Akari all this time, he will also still be Cher. That they will be Cher and Hades, Hades and Cher, no matter how this ending plays out.

(Oh, if only the hope of that was enough to fix things. If only.)

"Listen, this is time that can help you, too. If there is anything else left you want to tell your friends or any things you want to try and do in the meantime. If we are lucky then a way to undo the Death Enchantment may be found but if not, then at least you can fulfil some of your wishes."

Cookie gives a sideways glance and her eyes flash.

"What, like being able to find my sister? To change my name?"

"The first one is admittedly impossible, but the second…I admit, you will not ever come of age, there will be no legal change to your name in your lifetime. But there is no reason why you cannot think of something yourself in the time you have left. Give it to the ones you will leave behind, who will be willing to remember you with that name. It will live on that way, and it will at least be something."

"Elly."

Hades blinks, not expecting the response nor the memories it brings back. It reminds her, reminds them both that their beloved ones, the ones they call staff and once called comrades-in-arms, it reminds her that they will be knocked sideways by all of this. That despite their power the two of them have put quite the heavy weight on their collective shoulders. They are more than capable, beyond capable, but that is not the issue. Regret, there is just so much regret, and she does not know if Cher in particular deserves to be forgiven. If she can forgive him for the lies and the deceit and the way it has made a mockery of everything she knew.

And if even she doesn't know this, despite everything that he is to her, how can she expect the others to? If their beloved ones do forgive them though, she will bring them here if the world is saved and once everything is over. If she and Cher have been able to bring the girl, then surely now the beloved ones can join them. In the meantime though, she clears her throat to answer Cookie:

"Ah, yes, I forget that you know about her. I can understand why you feel a kinship, though it is technically Arianna whose story you mirror more than hers. She would not mind you borrowing her sister's nickname for your own. But what of a family name?"

"…"

In this pause, Hades turns around all the new truths in her mind, over and over, and then twists around to meet Cher's eyes. By the seconds he is fading as the entity claws its way across his very being, but despite that he still returns the gaze as an old truth passes between them. One of the many, many hurts that they have shared over their long, twisting history. His side of the pains they've shared have taken on new hues now, but still the memories are recognisable as the precious shared things that they are. So the matter of forgiveness, or a lack of it-perhaps the two of them are beyond such things now. Despite all the secrets they know each other too well for that. They know every inch, inside out, from beginning to now.

And from now, until the end (now that they know that there is an ending).

So forgiveness doesn't matter, not as long as they can remain Cher and Hades, Hades and Cher until that end. And it is because of this she is thinking of that one particular hurt from near the beginning of who they were, when they were both still young and mortal. Why despite the urgent, more recent pains lurking around the corner she suddenly feels the need to get this story out into the open, an opportunity for it to be carried down and out into the world. It has no relevance, it is not knowledge that the girl needs but Hades needs this, she needs to hear it in words for a brief moment. But she does not need words to convey this to Cher, for him to realise her need. So he give permission with a single weary nod.

But be quick, his eyes plead. Be quick.

Hades swallows. Despite her strange fondness for Cookie, she does not want to cry in front of her and so she struggles to clamp down on her feelings, actively stirs ice into her voice as she speaks:

"We almost had children."

Cookie's eyes widen at this and she sits up straight.

"Wait, you two have that kind of relationship?"

Hades laughs and laughs at the unexpected predictability, for a moment swept away by amusement. For a moment, she thinks she hears Cher's laughter too because he always laughs whenever they overhear anyone speculating over the nature of what they are. But then she realises that he is not actually laughing, that this is just the memory of laughter. It is enough to make her own laughter wither and die away and once again she has to fight to keep herself cold. She gives Cookie a look not unlike the one she has perfected from centuries in the classroom, one that is meant to daunt students but only serves to make Cookie narrow her eyes suspiciously.

"You ask that as if it is a question with one single answer," Hades informs her. "There is no one answer. We are many things, and have been many things. But, as I said, we almost had children, once."

A pause, a breath. Remembering.

"Twins. Twin daughters. We knew it right from the beginning and knew that we would have to be careful. This was an age where it was still considered safer to kill both, after all. So we were careful. But not enough. It was found out and suffice to say, those children did not have a chance to even be born, let alone take any breaths in this world. Despite that though, they were loved and they were named. Eun and Aranka."

"I am sorry."

"We are, too."

So simple and direct. Small words that somehow neatly capture such big hurts. They aren't enough to heal the wounds of them, and never will be. Yet despite this it is a comfort when Cookie then asks:

"Then…how does Elly Aranka sound as a name?"

"No affix?"

"Why should I?" Cookie snorts, all her own hurt written across her face. "I am nobody's child, not really, and now nobody will ever be my child."

"Humour me."

Cookie glares darkly and mutters a swear word under her breath before then mouthing the various affixes in combination with the names before meeting Hades' eyes directly. A smile tugs at Cookie's lips, delighted and satisfied.

"How about Elly De Aranka?"

Hades nods at this. Cookie-or now, Elly-smiles wider for a moment before she blinks rapidly and glowers.

"Okay, so that was nice and all, but are you actually going to tell me anything?"

"This is not a simple matter."

"Oh, you're hiding again, are you? Trying to evade responsibility after all those lofty words about the balance of the world?"

"They are not just words. The balance of the world is at stake and it is not as simple-"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Can you not go all lofty and cryptic on me, please? Or at least tell me, was Frost telling the truth? Assuming they exist, was Goddess Kagami really betrayed by Goddess Akari, or are the scriptures true?"

Frost. That girl is yet another symbol of how badly they have handled things. If it comes down to it, they will do what needs doing where she is concerned, but this does not stop the sorrow. She is still one of their students, so that sorrow is not one that could be stopped, no matter what depths Frost's evil may plunge to. Hades wishes she could tell Elly this, and also wishes she could be there to see how she reacts when she finds out that one particular truth about Cher-she likes to think that somewhere within the pain Cher is laughing at this, too, the irony of it.

But Hades cannot dwell on that. She needs to get her down there, back into the school so that they can get started, so that hope can finally be set into motion.

"It is like the other question you asked, it is not one with a single answer. Do you really think such matters are so easily boxed?"

Elly rolls her eyes at this and Hades can see how she's formulating a snappy retort (though not what it may be) but then something makes the girl look down at her hands and she pauses, breath catching at the glow of it. She trembles, but then something settles in her and her eyes blaze as she tries to get up.

For a moment she wobbles, still slightly weak, but then she catches herself and gazes at Hades. Smug and brave, with all the arrogance of adolescence, still. Hades watches as she takes hesitant steps towards her, pausing only to reach past and grab the cloak, shrugging it on but only doing the clasp up just enough to keep it over her shoulders. Once Elly is done, she glares defiantly, placing her hands upon her hips.

"Well, whether you like it or not, I'm going to find it out myself."

(And so here, here it is at last.)

Her end, and Cher's end-why, it may end up as blood-soaked as their beginning. The tapestry may end up tangling them all by the time the end is over. But this girl…these students…the gauntlet has been thrown down, yes, but she can throw one of her own and know that they will meet it. That no matter what the truth does to them, they will fight with what little she and Cher and their other beloved ones have been able to give them. She can set this one bright hope into motion, and then leave the rest up to them.

So she meets that defiant, determined glare with her sharpest, most challenging smile. She brings the spell she needs back to her fingers, ready to return Elly to where she had been found. And then, simply, she says:

"Go on, then."

The quote that I chose to start this chapter with is the 'prayer about circles' that is mentioned briefly in 2-5 and 2-6, though it's only the verse that I've used that's the prayer, not the entire original poem. Not all prayers here necessarily have specific words to them, and indeed in certain cases what's called a prayer may be more akin to a wish or a ritual in our world. You can sort of see examples of this in the chapter 2-6-5 (PRAYER). But where prayers here do have specific words that I'll directly use, the inspiration of those will be from poems and things rather than prayers of existing religions. It wouldn't feel right to use prayers from an already existing religion after all, not just for sensitivity's sake, but because those already have the distinct flavour of where they came from and thus it wouldn't make much sense to use them. But poetry is something that can be interpreted in all sorts of different ways.

Anyway, I had a lot of fun writing this chapter (even if titling it was an absolute bloody pain), and I am really looking forward to properly beginning Part 3. I have quite a few ideas of my own about the direction the story is going to take, but I'm still going to try and incorporate as much of the relevant R3 entries' stories into it as possible. And I fully intend to start doing that as soon as I can. Of course, I'm excited for those in their own right-I can't wait to watch them :). I hope that you'll be looking forward to what happens next as well! I'd love to hear your thoughts on the story but of course, no obligation to. So, yeah, I'll leave this author's note at this, and I guess I'll see you whenever the next chapter comes out!