He glances between them again.
The Sage shows no reaction to the accusation. They watch us the way they have always watched me. Not at us, but through us, as if the surface of a person is only a thin layer over whatever truly interests them.
I turn my attention to Thalia.
She studies me right back.
There’s something different in the way she holds herself. Not the calm, cryptic composure I’m used to from her. Something closer to nerves.
She’s been playing the role of a mysterious guide for as long as I’ve known her. Appearing at the right moment, delivering a line that sounds important, then disappearing before anyone can ask questions.
Standing here in a quiet clearing, she looks younger.
Less certain.
“Where are we?” I ask. Might as well start with the basics, since nobody here seems inclined to volunteer information without a direct question.
The Sage gestures. A slow sweep of their moss-draped arm that takes in the grove, the beach behind us, the impossible sky above.
“A pocket,” they say. “A fold in the fabric between places. You might think of it as a room inside the walls of a house. Not part ofany one room, but reachable from all of them if you know where the door is.”
“The Void Between Stars,” Kaelren says.
“Within it, yes.”
The Sage’s amber eyes move between us.
“No time passes here. No iteration can claim this space. It is the only place in existence where all of you could meet without tearing a hole in what remains of reality.”
They pause.
“Our window is brief. The pocket is already degrading.”
Their gaze sharpens.
“So I will be direct.”
I glance at Kaelren.
He gives the smallest nod. The kind that says he doesn’t like this either, but the Sage isn’t wrong.
Peeble, still tucked against my collarbone, goes unusually quiet.
“You are going to Iteration Nine,” the Sage says.
“Iteration Nine is where the cycle broke,” the Sage says, voice calm. “The first nine iterations were linear. One after another. Each one failed and reset.”
Kaelren’s brow tightens slightly.
“Nine didn’t?”
“Correct.” The Sage inclines their head. “And in refusing to collapse, it cracked reality. Every parallel branch you have walked through since then is a fragment. Pieces thrown outward by the force of Iteration Nine holding on when it should have ended.”
Before I can ask the question forming in my head, Thalia steps forward.
“You were moving through the natural progression of the timelines.”
She nods toward Kaelren.
