Chapter 23

Somewhere in the east The Old Merchant drew heavily on his pipe as a gust of wind crisp and playful danced through the chimes that hung from the front of his shop. The light of dawn was just stretching across the horizon, morning dew beading and falling in their last bounds from the leaves from the trees. The Old Merchant had been worried only seconds before but now he could see that there had been no need for his worries. He could feel the change in the air and he could tell that he wasn't the only one, even if he knew the cause of this joy that seemed to hum through the land, the other townsfolk seemed to be enjoying it without a care in the world.

Sitting by the open window, the Old Merchant enjoyed the serenity in his silence until the sun was high above the horizon and the town was wide awake.

Putting out his pipe and turning out the ashes in a small ashtray by his window sill with a smile he couldn't stifle even if he tried he stood to head behind the counter to the spare rooms he had around back.

Walking soundlessly through the halls crowded with books he stopped by the door he had left open only a night before, looking on in the semi darkness of the room at the unlit lamp and the closet book that nestled beside it on the sole table in the room that had been host to a being of legend only a few hours ago. Stepping inside the room prompting the sleeping candle on the table to flicker sleepily to life he bridged the distance between the table and the door slowly to stand before the closed but.

With hesitant hands he sought to reaffirm what he already knew to be true, flipping open the book to the last chapter that had been left blank for centuries only to find the blank page brimming with freshly ascribed words down in the same hand writing and script as it had been since it had first been written centuries ago in a language that was eternally lost to all of humanity.

It had finally been completed, the last chapter in the story that had been left untold had finally been written for all the world to see and behold even if they would never truly understand it.

Closing the book that lacked space for even a word beyond was that there now, the Old Merchant ran a hand over the leather bound cover reverently before he picked up the book carefully and drifted to a low hanging shelf on the wall that had been filled with dozens of the same book from the many times before when the Mad Hero had found himself at the place where it all began and had been unable to face the truth.

Slipping the leather clad book into the last vacant slot that was at the end of the shelf, the Old Merchant watched in wander as the other volumes that were all copies at one another blurred, wavered and vanished in wisps of whispering shadows leaving the last book, the one he had just added, the complete and final volume to stand alone on the long wooden shelf.

So it was truly over…

The Old Merchant gave a heavy sigh smiling still as he stepped away from the book shelf mounted the wall and drifted across the room and out the door. Closing the door behind him, again he watched in silence as the door before him seemed to fade before his very eyes leaving only the smooth slab of wall that was yet to become a host for his many books in his wake.

His father had told him, as his father's father before had said and so on, that the door here was a fragment of a time that was not of their own. They had existed to guard it and keep it safe until the day came when the last loop had been broken and they had either recovered the pieces of lives that had been shattered centuries ago or it had all fallen to ruin.

Like his father and his father before him, the Old Merchant had never thought he would have seen the day that this all came to an end but against all the odds it would seem that his work and the life's work of his entire family had finally come to fruition.

His job here was finally over.

In peaceful silence the Old Merchant turned away from the vacant wall were the door used to be to continue down the hall to the spare bedroom that he had often used during the days when the worst of the weather kept him at work or when going home failed to appeal to him.

The Old Merchant couldn't help the smile that warmed him as his eyes settled upon the familiar figure that filled the small bed smack in the middle of the spare room. Still fast asleep laid the King of their world who at the moment was little more than a man who had finally been able to acknowledge and put his demons to rest.

Sion Altar laid unmoving in the middle of the bed, in the exact position the Old Merchant had almost thrown out his back trying to get him in. After the emotional chaos that Sion had been through the Old Merchant couldn't very well leave him in that room sleeping by the leather clad book. Sighing heavily the Old Merchant took in the lengthy white hair that had been braided back and now a bit frazzled as it spilled over his pillow and dangled over the edge the of bed. His face held no expression and had a slight difference to it that could easily have passed unnoticed.

The Old Merchant could see both beings that were one and the same in the man now, see the King of the world and the Savior that had lost his sanity to protect humanity at the cost of his own merged together as it rightfully should be in the skin of this one man. From his wrist, dangling soundlessly was a light green bracelet that had a small thimble sized bell attached to it. The Old Merchant knew that bracelet, knew it well enough to know that that was a trinket that had been lost in the sands of time since the fall of the Mad Hero. As to where the man got it the Old Merchant would never know but he had learnt long ago to not question such things, all that mattered was that that trinket, that charmed bracelet, a gift from the Goddess of Life herself, was back where it should be and for once since it's creation was in the hands of its rightful owner.

Briefing in fond curiosity the Old Merchant wandered as he drifted across the room if the same could be said of the Lonesome devil. Pulling open the window at was perched high on the wall across the room, The Old Merchant allowed the warmth of the light of a new day to flush away the darkness and the chill of the fading night.

Wishing not to disturb him or risk waking him, the Old Merchant left Sion to his slumber, more so when the man woke he would have a whole new life to look forward to a head of him.

In the far west in the heart of an eternally vibrant market place, the empty wooden stall once occupied by an old woman, with a gentle smile and grey unseeing eyes, went unnoticed as a bumbling drunkard almost lost his balance when he staggered into it.

Looking on a young bartender who worked in a neighboring shop, Lora, a young woman of average beauty glanced at the vacant stall thoughtfully.

"Hey didn't that old Vendor usually sell there?" Lora questioned a random by passer who was heading in the opposite direction.

"Who that old Trinket peddler," a red haired freckle face youth queried as he glanced over uncaringly to the worn down vacant old stall that was the worst for wear and almost in tatters, "yeah but who cares, changes acummin' and this world's movin' on from all she had to sell anyway, guess the old bat's finally movin' on with it."

"Oi Red we going or what" off in the distance a voice yelled above the stream of travelers that were networking through the market.

"Hold your horse will yuh!" the red head yelled back stomping off to fall into the flow of life around them before he vanished in the crowd no doubt cutting through the crowd to reunite with his friends.

Changes acummin'…guess the old bat's finally movin' on…

Lora allowed a small smile to touch her lips as a rush of crisp wind danced around her and placed through her hair. Feeling the stigma in her eyes glowing softly for the once time in all her years since she had discovered she bore this curse as a child, Lora looked to the bright skies above her.

Changes acummin'

As she continued along her way, casting one final look at the Old Vendor's stall, Lora decided that she liked those words.

"Ryner"

Ferris' whispered words echoed in the darkness as Ryner's grip on her hand loosened dangerously. Of all the places to go into labor for Merlin's Sake why did it have to be a haunted dark tower that was a mile away from civilization.

"They are two days earlier than expected," the young man who had brought Ryner here commented from where he was knelt between Ryner's thighs trying for all his worth to stem the excessive bleeding.

In the silence the hushed cries and gargled murmurs too early to pass for words had Ferris glancing over at the small bundle that was cradled close to Calib's chest. As to where the man kept popping up from or how he kept finding them, Ferris would never truly know what she did know however was that she hadn't been more grateful to see another living being the way she had him in that exact moment.

"How is he?" Calib questioned with his gaze fixed on the little bundle in his grasp as other members of their little travelling merchants group that they had left in their dust days ago came filtering into the room all dressed in white rooms and carrying things that Ferris didn't care to keep track off, not right now,not when she felt as though Ryner was slipping away before her very eyes.

"We might lose him," the man Ferris had yet to put a name to whispered quietly his gaze focused and resolute never leaving Ryner's form.

"What?" Ferris found her words he same time Calib did.

"You heard me, I'm assuming that he's merging with the Lonesome devil and as you should have heard this is a being that had been mercilessly killed eons before you were even born. Of all the times for Ryner to become one with his past now couldn't be a worse time. I need him conscious if he is to deliver but I fear he is too weak even now to feel the immense pain he is even in at the moment," the man explained glancing up slightly from his work to Ryner's distant expression.

True to his observation Ryner appeared to be drifting through a haze of waking and unconsciousness, his eyes flickering with the sigils of the Stigma he bore as he fault a losing battle to remain conscious.

"At this rate we might just lose him and the little ones still inside him," the man voiced and at which point Ferris was tired of hearing the man speak.

"Mellow," before the words had even registered to everyone in the room, the man in question appeared in a curl of blinding light.

"What happened?" Mellow questioned his eyes shocking Ferris stiff when he turned from where he was in the middle of the room to look upon them.

His eyes were a wine red, the sigils in his eyes were white and shun through with a fading ethereal glow the likes of which she had never seen.

"I apologize for calling you away at such a crucial time but-," Calib began as respectful as ever but Mellow didn't appear to be in the mood for pleasantries.

"I smell death on the air," Mellow interrupted as he filling the gap between himself and the Ryner's prone form that was laid across the hard cold stone floors of the tower that had seen the light of his death once before.

"He's becoming one with the lonesome devil and just when you think he could find peace his untimel death and the death of his young may just find him first," the man stated glancing at Mellow who knelt by them.

"We can't allow that," Calib spoke up quietly as familiar face Ferris couldn't name at the moment held out a fluffy white blanket for the baby in Calib's arms to be transferred into.

"But to save him, even in the flesh of this mortal is to break one of the seven deadly sins for our kind," the man stated quietly

"Jubel, my old friend still holding fast to the rules even though it was you who created them," Mellow stated flatly as he held a hand out to Ryner his expression unreadable as he spoke.

"Those rules were in place for a reason," the young man, Jubel as it were, voiced quietly.

"Those rules are the reason why we are here. If had just let him be, if you had just over looked him just this once, none of this wouldn't have happened," Mellow stated with a silent fury that threatened to shake the very foundation beneath them.

Jubel found solace in his silence as Ferris watched Mellow's hand expel a brilliant white gold light seemed to take a life of its own as it curled around Ryner's form and laced it's way through his being.

"What are you doing?" Ferris asked concerned yet overjoyed beyond words when pain seemed to finally register in Ryner's eyes and his grip tightened brutally in her's.

"Something I should have done long ago," Mellow voiced and for a fraction of a second Ferris would have believed that she saw tears glistening in those sorrow filled eyes, "something I should have done that would have prevented all this madness."

"It was something we both should have done, but that is behind us now. What's done can't be changed and when I have seen the errors of my ways there is little I can do to change to past," Jubel stated quietly his eyes now firmly rooted on Ryner's face as his breathing came in ragged and pained breaths.

He was finally coming back around, pain though he must have been lost in being in the peak of his labour, but at least he had the strength now to push through this just a little while longer, long enough to see his young enter this world.

"Is he-," Calib voiced in a hushed whisper as a sharp cry from Ryner drew all eyes in the room.

"He'll be alright, they both will," Mellow stated as the white gold flood of light danced from his fingers in thick waves.

It was a rough hour later before Ryner's labored breathing had finally evened out and they had allowed slumber to finally take him.

Like the diehard soul that he was he had fought the bitter end, worst for wear and would be that way for weeks to come if Jubel's words were anything to run by, but he would be alright all he the same or at the very least he would be for a little while longer before the world came crashing around him again just as soon as he opened his eyes.