Before

A puff of air stirred Nick’s eyelashes and he grimaced, letting out a groan and pressing the side of his head deeper into the pillow. Hazy tendrils of exhaustion pulled him back toward the throes of unconsciousness as sleep prepared to take him once more.

Another puff, lower. He wrinkled his nose and blindly seized a pillow, placing it over his head.

A thread of merry laughter banished the haziness in his mind. He blinked away the sleep, a pair of deep-blue eyes slowly shifting into focus. Jinny stretched forward, and soft lips kissed his forehead.

“Good morning, sweet prince.”

Nick blinked several times, memories of the last day slowly coming back to him. “… Hi.”

Jinny snorted. “Hi, he says.”

The more the memories came into focus, the less sense they made. “Sorry.” Nick pushed himself up onto one elbow and looked around. They were at his aunt’s house, which lined up with the last thing he remembered. But… “Uh. I’m a little disoriented.”

“Sure,” Jinny said. Nick had always thought she was beautiful, but it was her presence—her wisdom, the way she talked to you like you were the only other person in the world—that utterly enthralled him. And now that presence was close enough that it was making his head spin.

Well, it was going to sound stupid no matter how he phrased it.

“Are you a wizard?”

Jinny laughed, and despite his confusion, Nick chuckled with her. “Did we really go out for ice cream, wake up in some dingy maintenance tunnels and fight actual goblins with fantasy weapons, come back here and call everyone we knew, only for them to call us insane, then passionately consummate our relationship? Or did I get a serious concussion somewhere down the line?”

“Wow.” Jinny cushioned her face with a hand. “I can’t believe ice cream and passionate consummation ranks higher than the obvious.” She pointed toward the foot of the bed.

“Obvious what?” Nick asked. He peeked under the covers. “Welp. I’m definitely naked.”

“Your leg.”

Oh. Oh. Nick shuffled off the covers in a hurry and gaped at what had once been a source of never-ending hardship. The muscles of his bad leg were no longer atrophied and shriveled. The only remaining evidence was several patches of scar tissue, the badges of several surgeries. He took a deep breath.

And stood.

No pain. Not completely convinced, he walked in a small circle. Again, it didn’t hurt. He hopped in place several times, waiting for the telltale ache.

Nothing.

“It’s real. It actually happened. And—what?” he asked. Jinny had covered all but a single eye with one hand, her face and neck flushing increasingly red. Her one visible eye flicked down.

Nick snatched the duvet from where it fell on the ground, quickly wrapping it around his waist. He rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine. I’m fine.” Jinny fell back into the mattress, staring at the ceiling. “We had… quite the day.”

“Yes we did.” Nick sat on the edge of the bed, his mind sputtering to take it all in. It was easier than the previous day, but there was still a part of him that wondered if he was going insane. He glanced at Jinny, uncharacteristically at a loss for words. “Did you, uh, hear from anyone?”

Jinny shook her head. “No. Caught up on a few of my group chats this morning, but the meteor’s still all anyone’s talking about. Nothing about goblins or lizard people. And…” She wrinkled her nose.

“What?” Nick asked.

“It’s stupid.”

“It’s not stupid if it’s bothering you.”

“Yes, you’re very smooth.” Jinny tilted her head and gave him the most sultry look he’d ever seen in his life. Nick caught himself just shy of falling off the edge. “But it feels petty to talk about in the wake of everything going on.”

Nick shrugged. “Considering how batshit insane the last twenty-four hours have been, I feel like we could probably use some normalcy. Even if it is petty.”

“Fine.” Jinny sighed. “We were spotted leaving school together, yesterday.”

“Even a comet doesn’t stop the rumor mill, huh?” Nick joked, but the joke fell short. He was worried. Jinny was one of his oldest friends and one of the few who remained. And they’d crossed the line last night in a big way. There were mitigating factors, of course. Neither of them were in a good state of mind by the time they’d worked through their contact lists, and after she’d kissed him, everything that followed was frantic and primal, two people desperately trying to make sense of a world that had gone completely off the rails.

These things happened. But in Nick’s experience, that excuse didn’t prevent previously functional relationships from being altered or sometimes damaged when sex was involved.

“Uh.” He rubbed his shoulder, suddenly cold, searching for words beneath Jinny’s insightful gaze. “Everything… got a little crazy. We were both freaking out. All things considered, I wouldn’t blame you at all if you—you know—wanted to forget that this happened.”

Jinny blinked. “I set a giant centipede on fire with my mind. Not sure there’s any forgetting that.”

“I meant… the naked bits.”

“Oh,” Jinny said. An awkward silence swelled up between them until it was almost too much for Nick to bear. “I’m alright with it being a one-time thing.”

“Of course,” Nick said automatically, doing everything he could to hide the disappointment that crashed over him.

“I’ve always thought we were pretty compatible. But you started dodging me after your injury, then I met someone…”

“Definitely compatible. Wait. What?”

“And now there’s meteors and magic out of nowhere—”

“—when did I dodge you?” Nick interjected, struggling to keep up.

“—and if you look at everything altogether, it seems like a decent chance this is the start of something big. Hopefully not bad, but big, so it’s probably not a good time to start a relationship,” Jinny finished thoughtfully. “Not to mention, my mom would kill me.”

Again, the awkward silence. But this time, Nick understood why. He’d done the same thing dozens of times. She was giving him an out. In case it really was a one-time thing, or he got caught up in the moment and regretted it after.

Only, he didn’t regret it. Not even a little.

Feeling slightly manic, Nick laid back down beside her, taking care to make sure his blanket-wrapped waist stayed covered. “Counterpoint?”

“Go ahead.” Jinny hid a small smile.

“If we both think we’re compatible, and this is the start of something big… wouldn’t it be great if we started it together?” Nick asked, floating the idea as casually as he could manage.

For a moment, Jinny said nothing. “As much as I’d like that… I’ve got some baggage.”

“Same.”

Her voice took on a serious air. “I mean it, Nick. This might not end well.”

“And won’t you tell me what it is? The baggage?”

Jinny shook her head.

“That’s fair.” Nick thought about it. “What sort of damage could it do? To us?”

“Let’s…” Jinny blew air out through her teeth. “Let’s just say—hypothetically—”

Nick nodded.

“—I had some sort of health condition. And I could be fine and live forever or be a complete dumpster fire and die tomorrow. Would you… still want me? Even knowing what I might put you through?” Jinny looked down, a curtain of hair obscuring her face.

A surge of worry shot through Nick. She just looked so unsure and crestfallen. He wasn’t worried for himself, of course. More concerned about her, mainly because whatever she was hinting at seemed serious, nothing like what he expected from these sorts of conversations. He remembered her visits to the rehab center, and to his aunt’s house after. Long nights of hanging out in the living room watching movies and being comfortable in her presence, no expectations, no self-consciousness, no anxiety.

“Girl.” Nick sighed. “I’d swipe right on you if you were pushing a hundred and I had to break you out of the retirement home every go-round.”

Jinny choked a laugh. “You can’t mean that.”

“Damn straight I can.” Nick took her hand. “Hell, even if we just had tomorrow, that’d still be worth it. Every day I get after that, I might as well be winning the lottery.”

Nick wrapped his arms around her as Jinny pressed her head into his neck and kissed him lightly on the collarbone. “Promise you won’t regret it?”

He promised.

/////

Nick started awake, the pain in his chest seizing. He grimaced, grasping at his shirt, rocking back and forth until it receded. They’d thrown him in here days ago. A bare stone room with a slot at the base of the door, where his food was delivered. He’d refused to eat and drank as little as possible, though despite the austere nature of the prison, the food itself smelled quite good. That worked for a while, because the pain in his stomach distracted him from the hole in his chest, the near-literal manifestation of loss.

His surroundings shifted and blurred. When they came back into focus, his prison was cylindrical, rather than square, a circle of desiccated soil beneath him, decrepit, crumbling bricks formed the rounded surface that rose all the way to the open top.

He was in the well again. The same well he fell into as a child, when his parents had moved from Oregon to Dallas, shortly before their divorce. He’d found his way out on his own back in middle-school, only to fall back in after the doctors told him he’d never walk unassisted again. The walls had been taller than the first time then, and they were even taller now.

“Well,” a voice said from nowhere. Nick started, turning to take in a thin, well-dressed man with a ponytail. He was wearing dark dress-pants and a black button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up, accented by a light-purple vest. His head tilted upward, and he studied the opening of the hole with detached interest. “A little on the nose, but accurate enough.”

“Who are you?” Nick licked his parched lips. They felt like sandpaper against his tongue.

“Have you ever tried just… climbing out?” the man mused, continuing on as if he hadn’t heard. “In your head, I mean. Wonder if that would work.”

“No. Sometimes I get close. Sometimes I can hang on, close to the top, but I always fall, eventually.”

The man turned to Nick with a quizzical look, pointing upward. “You know there’s medication for this.”

Nick shook his head. Everything he’d tried either didn’t work, worked for a little while and stopped working, or had side effects worse than the symptoms.

The man inclined his head. “Okay. Fine. Then what’s the plan, Stan? You’re too stubborn to kill yourself, but if you keep refusing food, that’s gonna happen anyway.”

Something about how casually the man was talking about this rubbed Nick the wrong way, though he couldn’t explain why. And just as quickly, any irritation he felt ebbed away to nothing. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered here.

“I’m tired,” Nick said, hoping the man would take a hint and leave him alone.

“I know.” The man looked at him with sympathy. Not pity. Sympathy.

“Who are you?” Nick asked again.

“You’re not gonna like it,” the man warned.

“Who are you?”

“The Retainer in Violet. Or Hastur, if you prefer. The de facto patron of the Order of Parcae. You… know them as the suits.”

Nick breathed in sharply. He hadn’t minded the man’s presence before, but now that he knew, a numb stab of anger grew within him like a sliver under a fingernail. “Get out.”

“See, this is why I didn’t want to tell you.”

“GET OUT,” Nick bellowed, the sudden harshness of his voice echoing, bouncing upward toward the opening. Rather than move, or react, or argue, Hastur shoved his hands in his pockets and waited.

Hours passed, dragging into what felt like days. Any anger Nick felt slowly drained away into numbness, and he felt the slightest tinge of spite.

“Do you enjoy this—”

“—No,” Hastur interjected.

“Lording over some pathetic fuck, reveling in your own superiority?”

“Think you’ve got me confused with your patron, but I’ll let that go—”

“Fuck. You.” Nick spat, a glob of saliva that landed at Hastur’s feet.

“What happened to your friend, shouldn’t have happened,” Hastur said. Wary, Nick searched his expression for any glibness or condescension, finding none. “And if I could bring her back right now, I would.”

“Coulda woulda shoulda.” Nick laughed. It was a harsh sound.

“Fair enough.” Hastur extended his hands to his sides and let them drop. “Good intentions mean little in the grand scheme. And I should know. After all, my intention was to derail the entire initiative before it got this far.” Regret played across his face.

“Before your people started murdering innocent people in tunnels?” Nick snarled.

Hastur blinked several times. “Well, yes. But not what I’m referring to. Right, we brought you in before the first event even started.” The god snapped his fingers and suddenly the well disappeared.

The walls of the well were replaced with a blood-red skyline. They were levitating hundreds of feet in the air, and below them was absolute chaos. Nick gawked, trying to parse it all. Below them, a dozen Users were fighting a giant with all the effectiveness of ants taking on an elephant, their blows and attacks just as effective. The giant stomped down, flattening four of them in an instant. Beyond them, other Users were scuffling with smaller monsters, a few of them fighting amongst themselves. There were so many bodies.

“What is this?” Nick whispered, fearing the answer.

“Not a vision, or a potential future, if that’s what you’re thinking.” Hastur shook his head. “This is happening as we speak. It’s barbaric. Sickening.”

“If my friend’s still alive—”

“Who, Matt?” Hastur nodded. “He’s still out there. Doing his thing.”

Nick closed his mouth, trying not to give anything away.

“But he won’t last much longer on his own. And no matter how bad this looks, it’s nothing compared to the second event. As hard as it might be to believe in your current state, the purpose of the Order is to instate the Court—and as a side effect, stop all this from happening.”

Nick’s attention snapped to him. “You’re right. I don’t believe you.”

Hastur studied him briefly, then looked away. “Would you like to know why the walls keep getting higher?”

“What walls?” Nick asked, confused by the sudden shift in conversation.

“You’re already aware of this on some level, but since humans are uniquely adept at ignoring things they know to be true, I’ll do you the courtesy of spelling it out,” Hastur mused, his calm voice radiating authority. “It’s a defect. Most beings are products of their environment. Their circumstances. You touch a hot stove, it burns you, you pull your hand back. Next time you’ll avoid touching the stove at all. Action, reaction, acclimation.”

He chuckled and rubbed at the scruff lining his jaw. “You should have learned, very early on, that the world is not a kind place. Or a fair one. Your father imparted that lesson well.”

Nick froze, a needle of fear worming its way into the base of his neck. “Don’t—”

“Relax.” Hastur shifted his head back and forth. “Point is, you should have learned then. Most people would have. But instead of accepting that the wall was just a wall, a natural boundary that simply was, you kept throwing yourself against it. Slicing yourself open and bleeding love and kindness into a world that wouldn’t give a rat-fuck if you disappeared tomorrow.”

“So. I only have myself to blame.” Nick laughed. If he was understanding this so-called god correctly, the sentiment was crueler than anything he could have imagined.

Hastur shook his head. “To reiterate. It’s a defect. One that I’m willing to address as part of your compensation.”

A burgeoning silence grew between them. Hastur had to know he wanted to ask. And Nick had spent enough time around manipulators to know when he was being baited.

It was Nick who broke first. “Compensation?”

Hastur smiled and reached out to take Nick’s arm. The pain in his chest ceased, like his emotions were sound waves strangled with an anechoic chamber. Nick pulled his arm free and stepped back. He was feeling panic, but it was more muted than usual, less sharp and distracting. “What the hell did you do to me?”

The god put out a soothing hand, palm out. “Alleviated your pain. And presented a modicum of what it would feel like, if you let the ungrounded optimism and idealism go.”

Nick tried to ignore it. The voice in his head that told him this was the first time, possibly ever, he’d felt grounded. Unflappable. Even thinking about Jinny didn’t hurt as much as it had. The pain was still there, but there was more anger than anything else. It felt…

Good.

“You’re still human, of course. Tragedy will still hurt you. The highs will be lower, but the lows will be higher. And you’ll never have to scale the walls again.”

As much as he hated himself for his own weakness, Nick wanted it. He was tired of being let down, disappointed, going through the agony of piecing himself back together for it to happen all over again.

“What’s the purpose of the Order?” Nick asked.

“In the long term, to achieve a perfect future,” Hastur answered easily. “In the short term, to end the initiative before the second Transposition event.”

Ending the “initiative” wasn’t an issue in Nick’s opinion, but the second part gave him pause. “Perfect by what metric?”

“Perfect to each individual human, for most of their lifetimes.”

“That’s impossible.” Nick shook his head.

“It’s unlikely,” Hastur agreed. “That’s where I come in. Along with the Order, until they’re superseded by the Court. In the meantime, I’ll need to clean house. There are tensions within the order, which has led to aggressive, dangerous mandates. That’s part of what I’d like your help with. Reforming the order into a kinder, more benevolent version of itself.”

“Thought that was a bad thing.” Nick’s lip curled.

Hastur shook his head. “I don’t think kindness and benevolence are aspects of weakness in the grand scheme, Nick. But they’re destroying you from the inside. They always have. And if you take advantage of my offer, some part of you would still keep them. They would just be… tempered. Manageable.”

Nick thought for a long time. “And if I told you to take your offer and shove it up your ass? That I’m not interested in joining your little cult, and if you’re doling out compensation, all I want is Jinny back and nothing else?”

“Then I will respect your wishes,” Hastur said. A moment later, the feeling of despair flooded back, full force, and Nick clutched at his chest, gasping at the pain. “With a warning.”

“What… warning,” Nick asked through gritted teeth.

“I can see the threads of different worlds—though you’d probably call them timelines. Your friend. Jinny? She had little time left even if she lived through the tragedy. Two months. Three at the most, assuming Metia spared her. And while the order will eventually have the means to bring her back, it won’t be long before you’re back here. In this place.” Hastur ran the tip of his finger across a crumbling bricking, brushing his fingers together and watching the dust as it faded away. “And the walls will be ever higher.”

“You’re lying.”

“What reason do I have to lie?” Hastur asked

Nick tried desperately to hang onto the anger from before. Anything to distract him from how he was feeling now. But what Hastur was implying lined up with what Jinny hinted at a little too well to be coincidence. “Maybe… you’re right. Maybe I’ve been an idiot this whole time. Maybe the world is shit, and you’re the only way it’s ever going to get better. Fine. But I want the crossbowman gone. The one who killed Jinny. I want him fucking dead.”

Hastur’s eyes lit up. “Revenge? Certainly. You’ll do that yourself, with my blessing. He’ll see no protection from me. But first, I need to know that you’re committed. That you want what I’m offering.”

Nick hesitated. He wasn’t expecting Hastur to agree so easily. It seemed too easy somehow, like there was a trap he’d missed. “Can I think about it?”

“Certainly. But you’ll need to stay here until you decide. This isn’t a half-in, half-out situation, I’m afraid.”

With that, Hastur left him.

And he didn’t come back. As the walls grew taller and the pain metastasized, Nick slammed his head backward into the brick wall. Eventually, even the physical pain didn’t help. He screamed for Hastur and received no answer.

Finally, after what felt like eons, Hastur returned.

“I can’t.” Nick whimpered. “I can’t take it anymore.”

“Tell me what you want,” Hastur prompted. He was going to make Nick say it.

Nick’s stomach churned, and he blinked away tears. His mind turned once again toward Jinny, then to the images of the Transposition. “If… I accept your gift. In this perfect future… will it actually make a difference? Make me better at helping people? If I can just turn it all off and do what needs to be done?”

He jumped as a hand settled on his head, cold and comforting in equal measure. “My dear boy. With my help you will save more lives than you can count. I’ll hone the power within you and forge a blade sharper than any sword. A hero’s blade. And you will forge your own legend.”

“What do I have to do?” Nick asked. He’d do almost anything if he didn’t have to feel this way anymore.

Hastur’s voice was soothing, almost hypnotic. “First, you must harden your heart. Set fire to the bridge at your back and spare no thought to retreat.”

“And how do I do that? Kill the crossbowman?” Nick asked, feeling uncomfortable at the idea now that it was very real.

Hastur shook his head. “Killing the one who wronged you isn’t enough. You must even the scales. Dirty your hands in a manner that symbolizes your transformation. Only then will you be free.”

The god leaned down low and whispered into Nick’s ear. “The real threat is not your target, but his brother.”

Nick jerked in surprise and stared at Hastur. “What?”

“This initiative is far sloppier than previous iterations. That an Ordinator was assigned at all is evidence enough. But the crossbowman you loathe so dearly is kin to a User who represents a far more egregious oversight.”

“You’re saying his brother is a threat,” Nick asked, already feeling completely over his head.

“In his current form, he is harmless. Which I suspect will pose more difficulty for you than if he was a monster in human form. But the way his title interacts with certain abilities he will receive, further down the line? He will be a threat to everyone. Even the gods.” Hastur shook his head slowly.

“What’s his name?” Nick swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry.

Hastur chuckled. “You never asked the ‘crossbowman’s’ name. I wonder why that is.” When Nick didn’t respond, he gave a half-nod. “His name is Keith. As ordinary as his appearance, I’m afraid.”

“And you’re certain?” Nick asked. “That he’s as big of a threat as you think?”

Hastur’s eyes were fathomless. “The question is whether you can become the man you wish to be. Capable of abandoning your childish idealism and placing the needs of the many over the needs of the few. Dirtying your hands, for the sake of the people you care about.”

There were a million reasons to say no. There had to be. But at that moment, Nick couldn’t think of them. The pain in his chest throbbed, intensifying. And beyond Hastur’s patient gaze, he saw the walls growing ever higher.

“If you need more time…” Hastur began.

Nick answered before the words fully formed in his mind. “I’ll do it.”