A very special thanks to The Allusive Man for beta-reading this chapter!

Chapter 9: La Farce Est Jouée

The emptiness of the courtyard of Vigil's Keep held no tranquility, rather the absence of bustle and activity left a tension that drove itself ever higher, ready to snap and tear through the air like a slave-master's whip. The sound of boots on cobbles came ever so slightly delayed as Hawke and Kameron made their way across the yard.

In reality, the open portcullis might be inviting, a sign of the Keep's share in the social and cultural life of the arling it guarded, but here the perspective was threatening in its way, a maw ready to snap closed the moment unwary prey dared to cross its threshold.

"The black truth of your deep lusts?" Hawke chuckled. "Or was it true depth of your black lusts?"

"It's not so complicated," Kameron replied unimpressed.

"I hope it's not so melodramatic, either," Hawke added, grinning.

The moment they stepped into the Keep proper, it was night. The late afternoon light that had flooded the courtyard and accompanied them thus far was gone without transition. The air cooled rapidly, scratching like a too-rough caress over skin. The leather and metal of armour creaked, acquiescing to an unspoken expectation from the mortal minds wearing both.

"Tell me about the Wardens," Hawke said and his voice held a rare, gentle note.

"Are you asking because of Bethany?"

"Because of Bethany, because of Anders, because of you, take your pick."

Kameron stopped in front of the wooden gate to the main hall. Firelight flickered invitingly through the gap at the floor, painting dancing shadows on the stone and they had the exact same shape as flames in a misunderstanding that equated firelight with darkness.

"I couldn't, actually. I have only met a handful of them, not enough to tell you about Wardens. I like to think of us as the last bastion of equality in the world, but I might be biased. Bethany could have done worse than the Wardens."

"What about the Taint?"

"We are none of us going to live forever."

Kameron turned back and began to put his weight against the heavy door, but before it had a chance to give, Hawke laid his hand on Kameron's shoulder. One could be forgiven to believe part of Hawke's reason was to see the instant, raw flinch in the Warden as proof the trust issues went both ways.

"Wait," Hawke said and took his hand away, quite deliberately as it seemed, took a half-step back in a concession. "Anything else I should know about this? What do I do?"

Kameron let go of the door, turned back to face Hawke and smiled ever so slightly. "Now you ask?"

"I could go for my most educated guess," Hawke offered.

"That was my idea, as it were. Trust your instincts. The trouble you get yourself into notwithstanding, your instincts are good."

"Considering I also get out of said trouble… yeah, you might be onto something there," Hawke shrugged. "Of course, it's only a question of time until that goes pear-shaped."

"Not today, though."

"No, not today."

The scene had never happened in this way. For one, the light was all wrong. It came from different angles, from above as if it were a bright day and yet the shadows lingered in the corners in the way of when the night has grown old. The great fire at the centre was burning only in three quarters of the hearth.

The Wardens who Kameron recruited during his days at Vigil's Keep were scattered about the room and while each individual moment must have taken place, they would not have done so in just one single night or day. An elf and a tall human occupied a corner, sitting on cushioned benches. She held herself oddly turned away from him even as she seemed to be listening to what he was saying, scribbling in a notebook resting in her lap. An amused glint lingered in his dark eyes as he talked, minimal gestures of hands to supplant his story, as if she were a deer he feared to frighten away.

A dwarf was not too far from them, wrapped in a layer of blankets and her face hidden behind an open book and other books were piled on both sides of her, ready to be devoured.

Quiet snoring came from the side, where a red-haired dwarf was sleeping huddled to a barrel, clutching an oversized mug close to his chest.

Hawke let Kameron precede him and let his gaze wander through the room, rest on the sleeping dwarf and the three further along the hall. There was something cosy about the scene, the perceived — though absent in actuality — warmth of the hearth's fire and the peace of the people assembled. You could be let to forget about the true fate of all Wardens, of the burden bestowed on them and the terrible price it would in the end demand of them.

While Kameron kept walking, with the casual confidence of one who found himself in a familiar place, Hawke stopped.

Right in front of the hearth, Anders was sleeping sprawled out on three chairs. At some point, he had had a blanket, but it had fallen away to gather on the floor under him, burying a cup under it. An oversized cat was curled up on his stomach and one of his hands was nestled in the fur, still absently stroking it.

Hawke stood and watched him and the Fade seemed to hold its breath around them, seemed to draw away from them in an unexpected show of piety, giving them a moment of quiet and peace and timelessness. The expression on Hawke's face was perfectly even, revealing nothing of his history and inner workings, nothing of his feelings and longings. The Fade might know, but refrained from snatching it from his mind and making it come true.

Insecurity, if such there was, never seeped into his movement as he started forward, crossing the open space to Anders. Something in step held the rhythm of inevitability, a path set before him and he could do nothing but follow only to stop again abruptly, just before he would be close enough to touch.

For some reason, he lifted his gaze away from Anders and found Kameron obscured through the fire of the hearth. The Warden stood facing the throne at the other end of the hall, facing the figure seated on the throne there.

Hawke flexed his hand, once, and walked away as if it was nothing. Circled the hearth and crossed to stand by Kameron's side and followed his gaze up the dais to the throne and to the figure there.

It was a man, or at least, it had once been. Now it was a rotting corpse, although one dressed in magnificent gilded armour with the Warden's griffon crest emblazoned on his chest. In contrast and complement, the sword leaning by his side was simple, a soldier's blade, made for fighting and not representation. Old and worn and more faithful than any hound could ever be.

Tiny tatters of loose skin fluttered along his cheek as the corpse snapped his head around at Hawke's approach, away from Kameron as if he was forgotten.

Only a part of his lips remained and the sudden, angry scowl that appeared was made gruesome by the expanse of uncovered teeth and the voice did not quite match, the words should not have been as clearly enunciated, when the lips were gone and the tongue, it turned out, was a bloated slap of greying meat.

"You!" the corpse greeted him. "You are the corrupter! You dragged him away from his path with your laughter and your lies." He looked back at Kameron. "I do not understand the farce you intend to play."

"You are Justice?" Hawke asked evenly.

"I am Justice," he said and seemed to calm, though he kept a sparkling eye on Hawke.

"I never lied to Anders," Hawke said. "And without laughter, you would have lost him long ago."

"You did not?" Justice asked, his head snapped back suddenly, the jerky movements of someone whose muscles were too far degraded to allow for subtlety. It would have made sense, such a shortcoming, but it had failed to hamper his speech, but this was the Fade and its rules were arbitrary.

"And yet you did spend nights with Isabela and one with Fenris."

"Normally, I would ask you to grow a sense of proportion, but if you could do that, I don't think we would be here."

"Do you think I did not smell the ambition in you?" Justice demanded. "The desire to possess him? The need to exalt yourself above others? You are no better than a demon, even if it is merely flesh you wear." He paused for only a moment. "Perhaps it is a blessing you have forced me into the Fade, for only here can I see you for what you truly are. Here, the vile magic of your father still clings to you. And do you think I cannot sense the power of your ill-begotten sister in the currents of this place? Maybe she is the best of you all, but she is only beginning to learn the ways of the world."

He gave Kameron a sharp look. "The Wardens will corrupt her yet and teach her how to hold nothing sacred."

"We have to live in that world, you know," Hawke said, cutting off Kameron before he had a chance to speak. The Warden narrowed his eyes, patience wearing thin, but he held his silence.

"There is only death or compromise. I thought you understood it," he shrugged. "At least, shouldn't justice be fair? We are weak, but we struggle."

Justice nodded his head slowly. "Yes, you are weak."

His hands curled around the sides of the throne, long and bony, pieces of dry skin fluttered like butterfly wings and cracked like ancient leather, revealing bleached bone beneath. He picked up the sword from his side and took a slow, menacing step down from the dais. He walked like an avalanche, slow and unstoppable.

Hawke took a step back, both hands going for his weapons, but he didn't draw them. He could afford it, of course, nothing would be faster than him in this place, unless Kameron had lied or been wrong about how far the Fade would bend to a mortal's will.

"You asked for fairness," Justice said, pointed the sword at Hawke's chest, then brought it around to aim at Kameron. "I remember you," he said and for the first time something like other than scathing hatred came into his voice. "You fought with me, you stood beside me when I.. when I nearly broke Aura's heart. Everything about your existence contradicts itself. You cannot be merciful and cruel at the same time, you cannot care and abuse. I saw you set Amaranthine ablaze and bow to the Architect!"

The fire in the hearth flared to sudden, unnatural life, flames licking up at the rafters of the hall. Heat spread from it, hit the backs of Hawke and Kameron like a furnace and yet, the light actually dimmed hiding the other Wardens from view as they were nothing but fading figures on a worn tapestry, long forgotten by the march of history.

The muscles in Hawke's neck tensed with the effort of not looking for Anders behind the barrier of fire.

"Or you could have watched me doom the Vigil and destroy our only chance for peace with the Darkspawn," Kameron countered forcefully. The cold from Vigilance beat against the heat of the fire, causing thin rivulets of condensation to run down the length of the sword and drip to the floor like tears.

"A good man would have found a way!" Justice snarled.

"I watched you destroy the Chantry in Kirkwall," Hawke said. His voice had gone rough and it grated in the stifling air. "I watched you kill innocents to force all nations into a senseless war."

"That was necessary!" Justice took another step and both Hawke and Kameron retreated, each to one side, making it difficult for Justice to keep them both in his sight at the same time. "A necessary sacrifice! There was no other way!"

"If you were a true Spirit of Justice, you would have found a way," Hawke said, knowing how cruel an echo it was. "But you are not," he finished. "You are a Demon of Vengeance."

Justice howled and it wasn't the sound a mortal would make, no human or elf, nor any other living creature, because mere flesh would not withstand the force of it. The flames danced to the rhythm of it, crawling along the roof.

Hawke had been wrong. Justice, whether spirit or demon, was native to this place, he was wrought of the same fabric and even if this was a vision made of lyrium and blood magic and willpower, it was a threadbare web, easily ripped and discarded, leaving no trace of its existence behind.

Justice attacked viciously, a hard stab with the sword, executed so fast, Hawke had no time to draw his weapons. He had barely begun to move, arms out in a sudden, desperate attempt to block or at least avert the stroke. He caught the blade in his hands, blood spurting as the edge cut deep through the leather of his gloves and into his flesh.

Hawke held onto the blade and threw his body to the side, only letting go when Justice's own momentum, leaning into Hawke, dragged him past. Justice growled like an animal and threw himself around after his escaped prey again, faster than he should have been able. He should have stumbled, lost his footing if only for the briefest of moments, but such a respite never came.

Panting hard, Hawke retreated, wrapping his bleeding hands around the hilts of his shivs, though the look in his eyes had became both intense and haunted, unable to hide the pain in his hands and the worry of the slippery grip.

But Justice could not finish the kill, because by then Kameron had cleared Vigilance, the longer and heavier blade having drawn out his reaction time. Vigilance sang in a frosty hiss as it clashed with Justice's sword and smashed the second attack before it came close to Hawke.

Justice reacted immediately, let Vigilance drag his sword down and lunged for Kameron's wrist with his free hand, steely fingers strong enough to break bones. But Kameron only bared his teeth against the pain, used the leverage to throw his shoulder into Justice's chest. He hit hard, the chain-mail of his own armour scraping across the chest-plate as the metal screamed like a living thing.

The impact jolted Kameron's wrist free again and he twisted his blade in an attempt to dislodge the sword from Justice's grip. All he succeeded in doing, however, was to allow Justice to snap the sword up and bring it around in a sharp arc and catch Hawke's downward stroke before the shivs could bury themselves in his back.

Justice tightened his hold on Kameron's wrist momentarily, just long enough to force the Warden to react, shifting his stance and then Justice hurled him bodily into Hawke, who just barely snatched the shivs aside so Kameron didn't spear himself as they collided.

They jumped apart again immediately, fanning out again and keeping a safe distance between themselves and Justice.

"I came here to talk to you!" Kameron said, circling Justice in counterpoint with Hawke.

"I know the power of your words," Justice replied. He stood still and tall between them, only turning with them with minimal movements. The tip of his sword pointed down, but there was no doubting now how fast he would be, when he decided to press the attack.

"I fell for them," Justice added. "All those years ago in Amaranthine. You used my confusion against me, to control me and to blind me to the vileness of your magic. You were better at hiding your hubris, then."

The fire had spread to the entire roof by then, the flames crawling along, a sea of flames that somehow failed to consume the wood of the rafters and bring the roof down on them. Tiny, glowing sparks danced in the heated air like falling stars.

One fell on Hawke's cheek and turned to a fleck of ashes before it could burn his skin. He wiped at it with the back of his hand, smearing blood from his palms in the process. He grimaced, adjusted his grip on the shiv.

"I probably wasn't," Kameron said. Vigilance was trailing a frostwhite mist behind it, a sliver of cold in the blaze, if Kameron and Hawke had walked faster, the circle might have been completed before it evaporated. It would have held no power even then, only symbolism.

"But you still understood your own ideal," Kameron added. "You are killing Anders. Is he another necessary sacrifice? And what if he dies?"

He drew a random pattern into the air with the tip of his sword as he spoke. "What if it was all a ruse? I could leave right now and return to the real world to slit Anders' throat while Hawke is powerless to stop me."

Nothing gave away the lie, if indeed it was, no quick glance to make sure of Hawke or assuage his suspicions. Vigilance kept dancing, slicing the heat. And all the while, a second circle kept forming around Justice, from the blood that ran from Hawke's fingers and trailed down his blades.

"It would only reveal your true face to the others," Justice observed.

"That's not what I asked. What would you have if Anders died?"

And just like that, Hawke picked up the thread and said, "Would you try to find another mage? You know, promise him revenge and freedom in exchange for a place in his body? I heard demons do it that way, too. A tried and true method, you could say. "

Justice put his head to the side, a curious gesture and in calm contrast to his earlier outburst.

"Tell me, Hawke," he spoke the name like a curse and an insult. "What would you have if I abandoned Anders?"

"He would live," Hawke said.

Justice shook his head and the gesture seemed almost sympathetic. "He would be a stranger to you, even if he remembered he loved you."

"He would live," Hawke said again.

The fire was eating its way down the walls in a slow creep, perhaps suspecting it wasn't supposed to feast on stone. The roof was slowly shrinking away to reveal the sky above. It was an oddly tinted blue, too bright to be a nighttime sky, but strewn with sparkling stars nonetheless. Wild clouds were chasing across it, trying to form coherent shapes before they were blown apart.

"But you would lose him," Justice countered.

Hawke placed one foot deliberately in front of the other, careful to avoid the slippery lines of blood he had left behind. He seemed to have control of the pain and though his grip on the hilts of his shivs kept shifting, it was merely because his hold was thrown off.

Then he stopped. "I can accept that," he said. "If you can."

Kameron had stopped as well and Justice put his head back, suddenly alerted to their changing rhythm and the building tension. The dance of Vigilance's tip ended and in the wavering heat, the cold suddenly took shape, the cold fog collapsing and thickening, following a different pattern than the one dictated by mere airflow. The white flared into blue and the Glyph of Paralysis peeled itself from the cold. It shivered in the heat and stood upright for a moment, then it tipped and fell over Justice, sprawling itself on the ground around him. Hawke's blood writhed like worms before it rewrote itself into the perfect links of a chain.

The spell had got hold of Justice in mid-movement, ready to leap at his enemies with the threat of his sword and the impeccable shield of his righteousness.

The floor of the hall shook, a slow vibration that kept on mounting until Hawke spread his legs for a better stance and Kameron gave the burning walls a critical look. And under this scrutiny, the wall began to fold away, succumbing to the flames or some greater force. With a slow rumble that joined the earthquake of the ground under their feet, the walls collapsed back upon themselves to reveal the raw Fade around them. Undefined, shapeless mounds of what might be dirt stretched to a harsh cliff's edge at the horizon. Veins of lyrium cut through the landscape, pulsing like living arteries, breaking through the surface and seemingly ready to burst.

The outline of the hall kept burning around them. It was a feeble barrier against the demons advancing across the Fade from all directions. Small, translucent Shades and slinking, sensual demons of Desire alongside the towering shapes of demons of Pride, swatting the weaker ones aside even as they went.

Hawke watched them without taking his attention off Justice entirely. "Something tells me this isn't going according to plan."

Past the grim set of his face, Kameron spared him a wild grin. "You know what they say about plans and enemy contact."

"Yeah, but what now?"

Kameron watched him across the glow of the glyph as if trying to read not only his face but the secret twists and turns of his heart. "We could still kill Justice."

"Wouldn't that damage Anders' mind?"

"Damage? Yes. Destroy? Not necessarily."

Kameron had lowered Vigilance and stood in a posture more suited to a statue than a man in the middle of battle. His entire body was tense, every muscle straining and one must remember that while it was Merrill who held their vision of the Fade in place, he was the mage who had shaped it in the first place. The Vigil had not faltered into nothing but a narrow line of fire because he willed it to. The power had to have come from somewhere.

"That's your solution?" Hawke asked. A gust of wind crashed down from the wildly racing clouds, picked at the tattered edges of his clothes, whipped his hair around his face. He looked up, into the wind and watched as the clouds thickened until their white seemed perfectly solid and allowed the starlight through only where they had separated. An eagle's head reared out of the thickest cluster, turning this way and that as it hatched from the firmament.

"This is the moment where you wish I were as powerful as everyone fears," Kameron concluded with gently vicious venom. "I work magic not miracles. I…"

He was cut off as the glyph flared up and then was gone without leaving any trace at all. A sharp pain, shooting through the bindings of blood and into Hawke's veins made him flinch.

Justice had already begun his attack before the magic had shackled him. All he needed to do was finish the movement.

Kameron brought Vigilance up just in time to block the descending strike, but he staggered under the power of the attack and retreated, using both hands to grip Vigilance and sacrificing whatever advantage in speed he might otherwise have had.

Justice didn't let up, drove him across what had been the length of the hall, nearly caught him in the pillars that somehow had remained standing. One of Kameron's elbows caught on the wood and he stumbled awkwardly, defending and retreating. Sometimes, for but an instant an aura of power flickered up around him, some spells that failed for lack of power or concentration or because they dissipated in the force of Justice's presence.

"I thought you were mightier," Justice observed with no hint of strain in his voice.

"Don't judge too quickly," Kameron growled through bared teeth. "Only one of us is fighting to kill."

He parried another downward stroke and used the moment to step past Justice's guard to hammer his fist into his face. The angle was poor and the blow didn't carry the strength it could have had, though it stunned Justice for a split second, long enough for Kameron to twist Vigilance free and bring it around in a tight arc. A living man would have been gutted as the blade sliced past, at the seam of the cuirass and into the weaker chain-mail underneath.

A living man.

Kameron never expected Justice to go down. Instead, he ducked away from the counter as it came and straightened behind Justice before he had time to turn and Kameron smashed the hilt of his sword in Justice's neck and stepped hard with the heel of his boot into the back of his knee.

Justice buckled in memory of a mortal's reflexes he had worn for too long.

"Hawke!" Kameron called in the brief respite. He edged away from Justice until he could dare throw a look at where his cousin had been. "You have to…" choose, he had wanted to say, only to find everything had changed.

Anders stood by the fire of the hearth, Pounce cradled in his arms. He stood facing Hawke and it seemed as if they had stood like this for an eternity — it was the Fade, maybe they had — transfixed by the bounds of love and hatred that had held them for too long.

Slowly, Anders crouched down and set the cat on the floor. It stretched languidly, then sat too close to the fire, tail wrapped around its forelegs, watching first Anders and then Hawke, as Anders walked toward him.

In some vague, remembered instinct, Hawke raised his weapons halfway and held them there, unsure of what to do, facing Anders. In the end, there was no defence, no evasion at all, because Anders had always been too close.

Anders put one hand on Hawke's neck in a feather touch, almost to light to be felt and as unbreakable as steel.

"I'm sorry," Anders said quietly. "I truly am. It turns out, life really isn't what you expect. Make one wrong turn and it's downward from there, the sort you get from a really high cliff."

He pressed his forehead against Hawke's, turned his face to look at Kameron. The sadness in his face and voice was real, but it seemed a weak thing, barely holding on as the wind flared the flames and the clouds birthed griffons in the sky.

"Even with the Wardens, I could do nothing but fall. That's what I learned." His gaze dug hard into Kameron's. "That's what you did, probably not what you wanted, but it was about freedom, like in the fairy tales. I was freed."

He took a deep breath. Above and all around them, the griffons fell on the demons. At first, they evaporated when they touched, but then the wind picked up again and brought new clouds and new griffons, each larger and more solid than the ones before.

"Anders…" Hawke began and fell silent when Anders looked back at him and placed a long finger over his lips.

"No," Anders whispered and took his hand away to kiss Hawke, just a light brush of lips against lips, open-mouthed and full of longing. "You don't have to save me. I never got lost on the way down."

Hawke had let his arms fall limp by his side, with the blood still running from his hands. The muscles in his neck twitched under Anders' hand as he leaned forward slightly, first deepened the kiss and then broke it.

"You wanted this?" he asked.

Anders smiled faintly, sadly. "Not this exactly. I didn't know what would happen and where it'd go, but yes. It was a free choice and if I could go back, I would do it again."

He averted his eyes briefly. "Even if it hurts you. Or me. Or anyone. Some things are too important."

"HAWKE!"

Hawke snapped his head around, but found himself unexpectedly weak in Anders' arms with a grip much stronger than he should have had. "No," Anders said and there was real power in the voice.

Kameron cursed, even if it meant wasting precious air to do it. Justice had gripped his upper arm and thrown him into a pillar before Kameron managed to shake himself free, stumble and regain his feet. He was panting hard and the last retreat had brought him close to the line of flames and the fire was lapping greedily up his legs.

Distracted, he hissed and dipped away, narrowly bringing his sword around to block a stab at his exposed side.

He sent a quick look at Hawke and Anders. It was not enough to communicate anything, there was no time — no space — and Hawke seemed utterly caught by Anders. In a moment of peace, Kameron might have used Hawke's blood to jolt him free, but there was no such moment.

Justice tripped him. Kameron had seen the move, but had been unable to avoid it and he tumbled, almost lost his hold on Vigilance. Justice rammed his sword down, where his back had been only a heartbeat's duration before. The steel grated into the stones of the ground.

Kameron rolled and pulled himself on all fours, watched as Justice tore his sword free and advanced on him.

"Know that this is not how it should have ended," Justice declared.

Kameron shifted his weight, ever so slightly. "Is that so?" he asked, quietly, because his voice had gone rough and strained.

"That's a good thing, then," Kameron continued. "Because it won't."

He launched himself from the floor and into Justice with the full weight of his body and held on until he put Justice's back into another pillar, in a slam so hard it made the wood shiver and Justice groan. Kameron withdrew and pulled his sword back and rammed it through Justice' shoulder and into the pillar.

Justice howled, more surprise than actual pain, more anger than suffering. He dropped his own sword and closed his fingers around Vigilance in an attempt to dislodge it.

Around them, the strange storm had begun to consume the demons all the way to the horizon. Either they were merely hidden by the flying, writhing bodies of imaginary griffons or they were being devoured, their essences strewn across the Fade until they had regained the power to form bodies again.

"Stop," Anders ordered and suddenly stood by Kameron's side, pushed himself in front of Justice. He spread his arms out, as if inviting another strike. "It's over."

Kameron found Hawke not far away. He sheathed his daggers, flexing his hands carefully once they were free, palms fully coated in blood, soiling his shirt and trousers. He had left a long smear on the side of Anders' face, adding a note of savagery to his expression.

"Is it?" Kameron asked.

"If you are a good man," Anders said. "I always thought you were. I don't think I ever told you."

"Hawke?"

Hawke was silent for a long time, an odd point of stillness in the rage of the storm and the fury of Justice, impaled on Vigilance, something other than the dream of a sword was holding him there, because the legend had real substance in this place.

"Take us back," Hawke said quietly.

It seemed as if Kameron would refuse, the violence lingering like a shroud around him, ready to break loose once again, to dance with the storm-wind and tame the griffons. The limits of his power, so obvious in the lines of his face and the heaving of his chest, failed to matter.

Anders turned around and wrapped both hands around the hilt of Vigilance and pulled it free with too little effort.

The borderline of fire flared up brightly, once, and then fell into darkness and ashes, to be picked up by the wind. Even the bonfire of the hearth, the last remnant of the Vigil stuttered out and died.

Justice, freed, stood looming behind Anders' shoulder, the perpetual leer still on his damaged face, but there was no rancour in his eyes and no aggression in his posture.

Anders shifted his grip on Vigilance so he could offer its hilt to Kameron. "Thank you," he said. "But we should never see each other again."

"There would be something worse than steel," Justice added.

Kameron took the sword back, cautiously, still expecting an attack — or perhaps still looking for a loophole, an escape, a last card he could play.

The ground shivered and shook, dissolving under their feet as the sky finally unravelled and the stars behind the gale winked out one by one. The griffons held for a little while longer, tethered to some half-forgotten dreams of glories past. Then they, too, tore apart and faded into nothingness.

Tensely, Kameron nodded, sheathing Vigilance and the world folded around them, then tilted.

And was gone.

Reference

Je m'en vais chercher un grand peut-être; tirez le rideau, la farce est jouée.

(I am going to seek a grand perhaps; draw the curtain, the farce is played.)

— last words of François Rabelais, according to Peter Anthony Motteux

Author's Note: Thanks for reading! Leave a message!