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Caleb sits across from Essek in the threshold vault, the dark chalk circle between them and the crystal sitting in the center. There are thoughts racing through his mind every second, and it’s hard to count to ten whilst everyone is staring him and Essek down.
Essek is beautiful, Caleb thinks, as he draws intricate ruins across the ground with his delicate, powerful hands. His fingers, bejeweled with rings and bands, dances across the doughy floor of this horrible chamber in this horrible city. Caleb’s throat feels tight. His blood thrums in his ears, the steady tha-dunk, tha-dunk, of his heart crawling its way up his throat.
Adrenaline is pumping as he thinks of how this could go, all the ways they could split time into shards of diamond, send themselves careening through the centuries at each others’ sides—but that is a theory. For all Caleb knows, they could end up flying past one another, barely managing eye contact as one plummets into another century, another forward a millennia.
Instead, he looks at Essek. Takes in his deep plum skin, his mussed white hair, and desperately wants to be touching him. The rest of the Nein are circled around them, watching with bated breath as Essek prepares the ritual. Caleb curls his hand around the residuum coated crystal hanging about his neck and takes a breath. Essek lifts his head, bright eyes catching his, and there’s a hint of a smile curling at his lips.
This...this is what he and Essek live for. The question, the answer. Reality itself stands before them, the thin thread of time tying the nine of them, including Sprinkle, together.
“Ready?” Essek murmurs. His hair is falling in his eyes.
Caleb vibrates with energy, magic sparking at his fingertips. “Take it away, Herr Thelyss.”
Together, they focus. The circle flares between them, deep purple energy sparking up the runes. Caleb hears Fjord let out a quiet huff as Jester no doubt grips his hand too hard. Essek closes his eyes, sits up straight, and brings his hands together.
Delicate fingers begin sketching through the air, bending time to his will. Caleb watches as Essek’s brow furrows. He separates his fingers, and a tear in reality splits before them.
Caleb watches all these different realities flash by, like the beacon, possibilities spinning and spinning around them. Time itself is reflected in Essek’s eyes.
Essek curls his fingers, draws reality around the crystal before them. It creates a loop.
The crystal shatters.
Everything goes dark, and Caleb can’t breathe. He feels his lungs straining against nothing. He wants to tear his clothes off, get into his chest and force his lungs to start breathing again. But, he trusts Essek.
Caleb opens his eyes, and his lungs fill with air. The rest of the Nein are gasping around him.
Essek’s hair is floating about his head, as if he’s suspended in time. He blinks slowly at Caleb and grins. The crystal shards are floating about their heads like tiny diamonds. Before long, they disappear into dust and Essek’s hair settles. Everyone is speaking, a slow echo to their words that’s a result of the bending of spacetime, but Caleb is staring at Essek.
He feels as if he has never slept better in his life. The chalk between them has dissipated, and with not a care in the world Caleb throws himself across the space, cups Essek’s face in his hands, and kisses him.