Interlude II
The Conclave gathered in the lowest chamber, the one that did not even bear inscriptions. There the walls were smooth, black, as if they had been torn from an absolute void and placed there by mistake. There were no braziers and no smoke this time. Only a circular table of white stone, polished to delirium, upon which rested an immense bowl filled with motionless water.
No one spoke.
No one prayed.
The ritual began when Akrtrup barely touched the surface of the water with a finger. It was not a solemn gesture. It was a casual brush, like someone testing the temperature before drinking. The water reacted with silent violence. It did not ripple. Instead, it folded inward, creating an impossible hollow, as if the center of the bowl had decided to withdraw from the rest.
One by one, the members of the Conclave extended their hands over that concavity. They did not touch the water. They let the cold air that emerged pass through them. It was a cold that was not thermal. It was a void that slipped into the bones, as if each finger had stretched a thousand years backward.
Rheda did the same. He felt his skin bristle and his blood retreat. Each time he took part, he wondered whether his body would endure one more cycle.
The water contracted again. And in that contraction a reflection appeared. Not of their faces, but of possible futures. Wars. Anonymous faces. Cities exploding and rebuilding themselves. It was impossible to hold one’s gaze steady. The reflection shifted faster than the mind could register.
Akrtrup spoke then, without raising his voice, as if he were merely describing the obvious.
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“The wheel continues its course. The point of convergence draws near.”
The water became water again. Everyone withdrew their hands at the same time, synchronized not by discipline, but because that was how it was written.
The ritual had ended.
But Rheda did not move. He had seen something different. Not a clear future, not a memory. He had tried to look further, to advance along the wheel as he had so many times before, and this time he had found a wall. A total blind. As if the water had closed his eyes from within.
He waited for the others to leave and then approached Akrtrup. The leader still stood before the empty bowl, his hands clasped behind his back.
“Master,” Rheda said in a low voice. “There is a point I can no longer look toward. Before, I could at least sense it, even if only fragments, echoes. But now nothing. It is as if time refuses to be seen.”
Akrtrup did not look at him. His eyes remained fixed on the calm water.
“Then we have arrived.”
Rheda felt a chill.
“What does that mean?”
The leader inclined his head slightly, without letting the solemnity of his voice break.
“It means we are standing at the edge of purpose. That is why we do all of this. To open our eyes beyond what time allows us to see.”
There was a brief silence, dense, almost unbearable. Finally, Akrtrup turned toward him. His expression was serene, but his words carried a clear direction.
“Forgive me, Rheda, but now I must attend to another link in the wheel. Larton Devouir is waiting for me.”
He did not say it as an order or as an explanation. He said it as one states an inevitable fact, another step in a process no one could stop.
Rheda lowered his head, accepting. It was no secret that Akrtrup spoke with the leader of the separatist confederation.
The water in the bowl remained calm, but in his memory the void still echoed, that dark point he could no longer see.
