God of Discovery [high fantasy, slow build, mlm]

Arc 3 - 10. God of Time

D'Argen sat staring at his hands as he waited for the meeting at the great hall to end. His feet were wide apart as he hunched over with his elbows on his thighs, so that he could see the trampled earth and focus on its dark soil whenever he saw flashes of red on his fingers. At one point, he noticed dried blood in the fold between skin and nail and he started digging at it to try and get it out. It only made the skin there bleed and then he stared at that in fascination instead.

The mahee should not allow him to harm himself, even something as small as this. Yet he felt no resistance at all other than a pounding in his finger as he dug his nail deeper into the wound.

It was that thought that kept him focused because the other thoughts running through his head were terrifying.

There was a shuffle in the dirt and a pair of golden sandals appeared in his view. The dark skin of the owner's feet almost matched the earth in colour. It was the colour of life.

"I have been looking for you," Abbot said but D'Argen refused to look up from the man's feet.

Abbot was alive. His blood never stained D'Argen's hands, and his breath never faded away as D'Argen tried to carry him off to safety. In fact, the revolts that brought Abbot down and made him lose his title had not happened at all.

Yet.

And D'Argen did not feel Abbot's mahee leave. That horrible pain that he knew would come when one of them died. He remembered the pain when Tassikar died – he was the first of them, not Abbot. He remembered the pain of every single one of them that died afterwards. He remembered their names. He remembered the reason why they died.

"—and was hoping you had some advice."

"I'm sorry, what?" D'Argen finally tuned into Abbot's words and craned his head back to look at him. Abbot had yet to become known as the artist, even though he dabbled in chalks and stains.

Abbot rolled his eyes, but he was smiling. "Mind if I?" He did not finish the question and motioned to the bench beside D'Argen.

D'Argen nodded and straightened his back. The wound on his finger healed over in moments and he forgot about it. Abbot sat beside him, straddling the bench to face D'Argen.

"I said," Abbot started, "that I was wondering if you could help me with something. You run all over the place and talk to a lot of people, both us and mortals alike, and I was hoping you can give me some advice."

"About what?" D'Argen asked, surprised. In this set of memories, Abbot never looked to him for advice. It was too reminiscent of their times millennia from now when Abbot wanted reassurances or directions, wanted someone to give him orders and tell him what to do. D'Argen never thought he deserved the position, but he had taken it up anyway for all three of his friends.

D'Argen missed travelling with them even though they had not travelled together even once. He missed Abbot's habit of making him stop to enjoy the views he would have breezed past otherwise so the artist could paint them or write a new poem of their beauty. He missed it when Yaling, who loved to talk almost as much as D'Argen himself, was able to start a conversation even in the most awkward of silences. And he missed Lilian... Lilian was his first and closest friend, the one who always reminded him where Evadia was and the one to take him back home.

Lilian was not the same here.

"Are you even here?" Abbot asked, startling D'Argen out of his thoughts.

"Yes! Yes, sorry. I was thinking about something. Not sure how much I can help, but what is troubling you?"

Abbot smiled wide, shuffled close enough for D'Argen's skin to prickle, then started talking.