The Will-Breaker

That had been an utter disaster. Gods, what an idiot she'd been to even try it! She should have known there'd be some sort of spell on Godran. After all, she'd been through the same sort of thing herself. With a snarl, she kicked the wall under the window. It didn't help.

The strange Isyar approached her. "The man has died anyway. I'm sorry I couldn't be of more help. I got there too late."

Akna glared at the Isyar. "Who the hell are you?"

The Isyar's eyes widened. "You don't know?" Then her jaw lowered. "Oh. Oh no." She turned away, her wings twitching and one nearly batting Akna. "I've come back too soon. I'm sorry, I must go."

As the Isyar started to retreat, Akna reached out and grabbed her. "Oh no, you don't. You owe me."

The Isyar cried out in pain. Without thinking, Akna had simply grabbed for the nearest part she could, and that had turned out to be the Isyar's wing. She let go immediately. "Sorry about that. But...please don't go."

The Isyar turned around slowly. "You are right. I do owe you, though you don't know for what yet." She wiped a tear from her eye. "But I've made a mess of things. I should have...that is…" She looked away again. "I'm sorry, I…"

Akna leaned to the side a little to remake eye contact. "It's all right. I'm not angry or anything." That was a bit of a lie. She was definitely angry, but more at herself, and any anger she might hold for this Isyar she should keep hidden. This Isyar was not only incredibly powerful, but also young. "I just want to understand who you are and why you're here."

The Isyar nodded and looked back at Akna. Despite plastering a smile on her face, it was clear she was barely keeping from bursting into tears.

Akna held out her hand. "Look, why don't we go somewhere...I don't know, somewhere else? Somebody's bound to come along here, even at this time of night, and Lucas will probably raise the alarm eventually once he's gotten over the shock."

A few tears dripped down the Isyar's face as she took Akna's hand.

"How did you get in here unseen anyway?" Akna asked. Of course, the answer was obvious: magic. Though going unseen was usually a mentalism thing, wasn't it? This Isyar somehow didn't seem like a mentalist, though Akna had no idea what kind of wizard she might be.

"It's a bit complicated to explain," the Isyar said.

"For that matter, how are we going to move through the palace without you being seen?"

With a smile, the Isyar tugged lightly on Akna's hand. "I'll show you. Come closer."

Akna stepped up closer to the Isyar.

"Closer."

Akna hesitated. Much closer and she'd be making herself vulnerable. Hell, she was vulnerable even this close.

"Please, trust me," the Isyar said. "You're the last person I'd want to hurt."

Taking a deep breath, Akna moved closer again, so that her face and chest were almost touching the Isyar's. At least this close, the Isyar was making herself just as vulnerable to Akna as Akna was to her.

The Isyar looked up at Akna. This close, Akna could now see that her eyes were yellow like Feviona's, though maybe a bit darker.

Something brushed against Akna's shoulders. It was the Isyar's wings wrapping around her. Instinctively, she tried to step back, but the Isyar gently squeezed her hand.

"This will only take a moment. Trust me." The Isyar pressed herself close against Akna, her wings wrapping tightly against Akna's back, her forehead resting against Akna's lips almost like Akna was kissing her. "I am not very powerful and can only do this with another person if we are uncomfortably close to each other."

A shiver passed through Akna. Had it gotten darker? She couldn't see the hall any longer.

"Normally, I would only do this with my diare or gliare, and maybe my fomase if I knew him yet. Though hopefully, I will be more powerful by the time I meet him."

Was that a wind blowing against them? It had definitely gotten colder. Akna pulled her head back and looked around. The pitch blackness that had momentarily surrounded them had brightened to the normal darkness of night.

They were in the grounds outside the palace, and yes, there was definitely a cold wind blowing. She wasn't dressed to be outside.

"Don't move away yet," the Isyar said. "One more thing needs to be done, or it will draw too much energy from me."

The Isyar gently squeezed Akna's hand again, and ran her other hand along Akna's bare arm, sending a shiver through Akna. Then the Isyar let go, removing her wings, and stepping back.

Akna rubbed her arms in the cold and shivered some more. Since coming to Quorge, she had learned to always take a shawl with her. Except, it had been the middle of the night and there was no reason why she might go outside and the shawl might get in the way and… She sighed. The short it was, she'd decided to go without on this one occasion.

"Oh my, forgive me," the Isyar said. "I forgot humans don't like these temperatures."

"It's fine. I'll be fine. Let's just move over by those trees where there'll be some shelter from the wind." She didn't wait for the Isyar's response, and just headed straight in that direction. Hopefully, the Isyar would follow. If she didn't...well, there was nothing Akna could do about that.

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The Isyar did follow her, and once they were under the shelter of the trees, Akna pressed up against one of the larger trunks. It wasn't a lot better, but it did reduce the wind a little. "Now, please, tell me what the hell is going on."

The Isyar bowed her head. "There is not much I can say. I'm not sure where to start."

"You could start with your name."

The Isyar grinned sheepishly. "Right, of course. My name is Lisanacora. I'm...um...I'm part of an organisation called the Hgirrh."

Wasn't that the organisation Feviona was part of? That explained the similar uniform. The darker colour had to indicate a different division or rank or something. "You said you owed me, and you seemed to think I should know you. Can you explain that?"

Lisanacora grimaced. "I came back too early. I didn't realise. I should have been more careful to make sure, but I saw you in the window and I thought you recognised me."

Akna held up her hands. "Hold on. Too early? What do you mean by that?"

Lisanacora whimpered and looked away. "I shouldn't tell you. If my diare or the Hgirrh found out…"

"Except you've kind of already told me some of it. You specifically said, 'too early'. Did you mean to come tomorrow or next week? How would that have made a difference. I've still never seen you before."

"But you will."

"Will what? See you again? Are you planning to come back at the right time?"

Lisanacora shook her head. "No. I've already been there. It's you who…" She threw up her hands and turned around. "Please, you don't understand."

"That's why I'm asking. Please explain so I do understand."

Lisanacora didn't answer right away. Instead, she raised her head and stared up at the tree branches and sky above.

"Well?"

After several more seconds, Lisanacora lowered her head and turned around. "I shouldn't tell you this, but I've messed things up enough already. In a few weeks time, a month maybe, maybe a bit longer...I'm not sure what the date now is and what the date then will be...but the point is, you will save my life. Don't ask me to go into any more specifics. I can't tell you because I can't risk your foreknowledge changing things. I'm already risking enough as it is. My diare wouldn't let me thank you at the time, so I secretly came to thank you on my own, but time travel is difficult and I still have so much to learn. I got the time wrong. There you have it. Thank you for saving my life."

Time travel? What kind of magic did that?

"You look confused. I don't blame you. It must be very confusing. I'm sorry I messed up."

With a shrug, Akna lowered herself down to sit on the ground. She hugged her knees against her chest to keep warm. "It's okay. It's not your fault. Or I suppose it is your fault, but I forgive you. I guess." She didn't understand any of this. "What kind of wizard are you?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, I don't think you're a mentalist. Are you some kind of enchanter?"

"Enchanter? No. I'm a chronomancer. I practise time magic."

Akna looked up at her. "Huh?" That wasn't a magical discipline she'd heard of.

Lisanacora grimaced. "Oh, of course. Time is a lost discipline in your...time."

"Oh, right." Now that she thought about it, she had heard something about there being lost disciplines. But then, how…? Time travel. Right.

"I should go," Lisanacora said.

Akna jumped to her feet. "No, please. You said you owe me. We could use your help. You have incredible abilities. You can bring people back from the dead. You can teleport. We have a pearl that can do that, but we don't know how to use it. With you, we wouldn't need it. Felitïa would love to meet you! Please!"

"I can't do the things you say. I can't raise the dead. I can't teleport."

"I saw you. You brought me with you."

Lisanacora shook her head. "I reversed that man's personal timeline so that he didn't die to begin with, and maybe something different could happen. But I can't manage more than a few seconds. And when you say we teleported, we actually didn't move at all."

"I'm sorry, I don't understand. We were inside and then outside."

"The world moves all the time. It spins and we move with it. I just separated us from that movement and shifted us a couple minutes forward in time. The world moved without us and we emerged in the same spot we left."

Akna stared at her for a moment. "I don't really understand, but the effect seems the same."

Lisanacora shrugged. "Perhaps, but I can only move east or west as that's the direction the world turns. I also have to move us in time. The farther you want to go, the farther in time we have to travel, but there's a limit to that as well because the world moves around the sun as well as spins, and…" She sighed. "It's not very useful as a teleporter in the way you hope for."

"I suppose not, but it's still something. At least, come meet Felitïa."

Lisanacora shook her head. "I've been here long enough already. The Hgirrh will detect me if I stay too long."

"We can help protect you from them. Feviona is a Hgirh—I mean Fevionawishtensen. And Mikranasta is a powerful mentalist."

"You don't have a Hgirrh with you, and even if you did, they would turn me in. And this Mikranasta will not be able to protect me, no matter how powerful she is. I really must go. Thank you again, and I will pay you back for what you did—will do." She turned away.

"What about the Will-Breaker? Felitïa is the Will-Breaker. Have you heard of her?"

The Isyar turned back. "You know the Will-Breaker?"

Akna nodded quickly.

"That would explain…" Lisanacora smiled meekly. "I wish I could meet her, but that is the last thing I can do right now. If I did that, a whole contingent of Hgirrh soldiers would have arrived five minutes ago to ensure I don't meet her. I could never hide such a blatant intrusion into the timelines. I might not be able to see you again either, but I will try to repay you." She placed her hand on her chest. "May the weight of time be light, Nin-Akna. I fear it will not be, but… Thank you again. Goodbye."

With a nod, Akna placed her own hand over her chest, but before she could say anything, Lisanacora was gone. She had simply vanished.

Shivering, Akna leaned against the tree trunk again. She'd almost forgotten the cold for a little while there, though she was fairly certain her shivering now was not because of the cold—at least, not entirely. This night had not gone as planned, but she could hardly have planned for any of this. Time travelling Isyar?

She had to tell Felitïa about this. She couldn't be sure Lisanacora would want her to, but the Isyar had never asked her not to, and she didn't need to follow the same rules anyway. She also needed some news to overshadow how badly she'd fucked things up with Godran.

She shivered again, this time definitely from the cold. It was time to get inside. Hugging her arms against her chest, she hurried back to the palace.