"And you could have saved them." He turned to him, eye to eye. His, that pool of light-darkness, more misty than black. Odd that this was the first time he had noticed it. Yet, his words broke the perception.
"I saved them," Merrin said, confused.
"Some of them." Moeash scoffed. "You were slow."
"What?"
He sighed… "For so long, I looked away from it. Gave it a name to mask it, but… It just keeps glaring at me. Like the very darkness of Eastos. I lived with it, and I think it slowly began living with me. Always, always standing beside me as I watched you fumble with the lives of those people. My people."
"They are also my people."
"No, they are not." Moeash snapped. "You are not theirs. You use them like things. For pride. For desire. For want? That is all they are to you. Just means to boost some plan of yours. They are not that. They are the purest of humanity. Unlike the BrightCrowns. Never like them. But you? You are exactly like that filth."
"I don't understand—"
"I thought your kind were intelligent."
"My kind?"
Moeash stood abruptly. "I think you have perfected your mask now. Look at those eyes of yours, so sincere, so ready to cry as my people turn to bloody paste. Do you know how many humans I have seen like that, just today? Roughly the same number as a normal brightCrown kills in a day. You know something interesting? My father was killed by casters." He turned to him. "He once said darkCrowns should never learn of the power they truly have. With numbers alone, they would beat any army. Caster, Excubitors, Venomtitans. Doesn't matter. But look at you culling their numbers." He chuckled. "I prefer them to the brightCrowns."
"I'm not a brightCrown."
"No." He said. "You're a caster." A step closer. "Worse, you have learned that tactic, haven't you?"
Merrin was stunned into speechlessness, mumbling sounds.
"You make the darkCrowns into weapons. A tool for your means. Why not simply kill them all? Why not butcher them instead of making them slaughter themselves in your name? You make them dangerous. You made me dangerous. Maybe that's what you want. To mock them with their ignorance. To flash about power and watch the insect squabble. To take their children, mothers, and fathers away. That's what you want!"
That's a lie!
Is it?
This was a dream world; such things should not exist, yet before him, Moeash sweat. Fluid dripping over sunken features. Was he aware in this place—his dream? The likely explanation.
Moeash roared, "That is what you do! You use their naivety to make miracles. Spilling force as a show of some Divinity. All lies. You are just another caster, doing what casters do best."
Merrin wanted to plead. Please stop. That's not true. That's not what I want. A need. A desire for consolation that battered within. Screaming. He felt like a lowly thing. A heretical criminal. Please stop, Moeash.
Moeash spat to the ground, but it didn't sizzle. "How dare you?" His shoulders trembled. Like a child, urging a need to hold him. "How dare you come here even after what your kind has done to me?"
"I'm not like them," Merrin said weakly. "You saw it, didn't you, the moment I became a caster?"
"The moment you snapped," Moeash interjected. "The instant I decided to accept the lie. To want a savior, but you're not it. You're a lie. A fraud. Just another distraction before I inevitably learn my lesson. You know, when I cleaned you up, I wondered about the possibility. The coincidence that in the same mine where I was taken, some power was born in it. But it wasn't, was it? You were sent by the fool's clan. Maybe some Acolyte caster brought to torture me. To make a fool out of me. To kill all my people before my very eyes. That is why I did it. Broke the floor. Fool unto you. But then you did it again."
"But I kept them… kept you safe?"
"THAT'S NOT ALL YOU SHOULD BE!" The world quivered. "YOU'RE MEANT TO SAVE THEM ALL. NOT SOME. NOT A FEW. ALL OF THEM."
"I try…" Merrin looked down, noting his hands within this world. How strangely weak, dry they looked to him. How ineffective… Am I really this? Am I what Moeash thinks of me?
The man-child cast a shadow over him, looming. "The sunBringer… An exaggerated caster." He said slowly, "You are a liar. A fool sent to hunt me. But no. I damn you, before you damn me."
"No."
"You are nothing but the same rot that festers in the world of man. The mutant. The caster."
"Please stop," Merrin muttered. "I'm not part of the fools or anything. I just want to—"
"I damn you. Liar. Blasphemer. Heretic!"
It was enough to break him, and Merrin screamed, and the world turned white, pushed away by the sudden self-radiance. A swift hue drowning. All was gone, burned by the abrupt luminance. Alone, he knelt within the whiteness, pale-faced, liquid streaming down his cheeks.
Moeash has damned me?
It felt like a dream, but it was not. Moeash had damned him!
Almighty, please, make this a dream! Not Moeash. Never Moeash. Please…
And it came, the memories. He stood in a cave, Ron and Moeash at the mouth, the shorter one carrying a bowl of food. The man-child was timid, muttering half-words in intervals. But he was sweet, pure—and then the darkness sank into the image, twisting. Moeash curled a spiteful smile, said, "They died because of you!"
Merrin trembled, and the memory shattered. Another ensued from the rubble. A chaos of flesh; men battling against themselves. The witnesses and the mine slaves. Centered was him, Moeash, blade in hand, a man screaming, armless. And it was corroded by the veiling darkness, morphed. Moeash turned, rage-filled. "You made me into this!"
It was terrifying to see this. Dread, like cold fingers, gripped his heart. How damning. Is this really what I do? Is this what I make people into? Am I this person?
"What an annoying thing you are!" The voice struck awareness like thunder, shattering the screaming memories. A revolution of sensations. The world was replaced by the stark whiteness, a monster looming high above him. A dark thing, like a human, clothed in a dark iron-plated robe, each segment a piece fitted into a harmonious structure. A dark fabric, headed by a beaked creature. Eyes, round orbs of crystalline clear hues.
"You?" Merrin stuttered the words.
"Yes, me." The bird said, its wings glistening around the fragment edges. "I suppose it is impressive that you can achieve something like this."
"What?"
"Pushing away every symbol around you." It responded, "What force you have… It's almost ironic that this relates."
Merrin cared little for its words. "Moeash has left me."
He heard something akin to a sigh—a soft blow of breeze. "Over and over. The wheel continues. But…" It shrank, pressing compactly into a smaller creature. The familiar bird form. "This state of yours is not something I greatly want. No, not it. So I suppose I should give you something for that. A symbol that follows humans like a pet of sorts."
Tears blurred Merrin's vision, the bird, a simple dot floating in a watery white world. What was it talking about? Did it matter? Why should I care about what it says? Not once has the damned creature truly helped me. If it did, maybe I would have had the strength to save them all. Knowledge to grow as a caster. Not this. Not resorting to highBorns for information about the caster.
He hated it.
He hated himself.
He despised the weakness.
What a curse it was. To be boasted as a being of immense power; an El'shadie of prevalent futures. Yet this, this failure of an existence made itself the outcome. What God could not save less than 50 people? What was he? What bravado he had to claim godhead!
The myth deepens… The lie he had told himself.
Merrin wanted to go back. To the Ash mountains, swinging across the sky, wind whistling past his ears. That seemed a universe away. A lie stolen from him. He could have had it. Not this… Moeash hated him. Ron would too. Someday, when the consequence of the change reared, he would damn him. Catelyn already did.
Was there anyone close who hasn't been lost?
The bird did something he didn't care to observe. What was needed was the silent, painful contemplation. Just him and the internal hate. Like how it was in the beginning of the mines, days before he met his sunWitnesses.
A cycle, he recalled the bird's words. It moved back into a circle. His life. A wheel of endless repetition.
To break out of it—that was the creature's advice… How? How could he forgive himself for weakness? How could he make Moeash see his words wrong? Never once did he mock the ignorance of the darkCrowns. Never did he believe himself greater than them. Never.
But I used them… Regardless of the reasons, I used them… But what could I do? Something needed to be done, so I did. Without me, they would have all died. Can't he understand that? Can't he see me not as the enemy?
Please…
I'm weak, yes… But, can't he see I try?