Chapter Text
Siffrin wakes up in the field South of Dormont.
They look to the sky, dotted with gentle clouds.
Birds call out through the trees.
Just like they always do.
A small fly crawls along the brim of their hat.
Just like it always does.
The dry grass pricks at his skin.
Just like it always does.
Siffrin wakes up in the field South of Dormont... after beating the King. After WINNING. After killing him with their own hands!
He wakes up in the field when he should be celebrating their victory with his friends atop the house!
They won!
So WHY!?
They're frozen, frozen—the biting cold digs even deeper than the King's tears. He can't even force his lungs to move.
Why are they back here? Why? They did it! The King was dead! That's what they suffered years in the time loops for! They finally did it and now they're still back here?
"Huh??" a voice calls out.
Enter the Housem—Mirabelle.
Mirabelle.
Mirabelle. MIRA! Her name is MIRABELLE!
Siffrin can barely remember any blinding thing before the third floor or even her name, but Mirabelle's first words to them upon awakening in the field are etched into their mind.
(Siffrin, were you... were you...)
"Siffrin, were you... were you..."
They crush a clump of grass in their hand. Something sharp pokes their palm. They squeeze tighter.
(TAKING A NAP????!??!)
"TAKING A N—"
Her words are cut short by the harsh shattering of wood and leaves that echo out from the forest South of them. Birds cry out and explode from the treetops in every direction, and Mirabelle looks as if she would join them in flight had she even a single feather on her body.
"WHAT WAS THAT!?" she squeals and jumps again as another, quieter rustle rumbles from the thicket.
Siffrin can only manage a head tilt toward the origin of the commotion.
A break in the script? Something different?
Or maybe their last bout of loops eroded their brain enough to forget this, too.
They let their head roll back to its original position, staring listlessly into the sky with their dark, sunken eye.
Mirabelle lets out a small whimper. "It sounded like a tree fell over or something, or something worse! W-we should probably check to see." She's already wringing her hands and picking at a loose string on her glove.
He probably should care more—should react more, but...
...
They roll to their side and throw the grass clump over their corpse body. Dirt and tiny insects splatter on their cloak. A clouded part of their mind begs them to do something about the small animals scuttling under their clothes. But the weight of reality shoves those worries into the deepest parts of their mind.
"Siffrin? Are you okay?" Mirabelle's eyes flash between them and the trees.
"Huh? Yeah, fine. Just had a bad sleep vision thing. I'm fine!" The smile that grows across their face fools no one, yet they find no better option.
"A nightmare?" she frowns, looking them up and down.
Is it all pointless?
He nods. "Yeah, that. Hey, what if we had a sleepover at the Clocktower tonight?" A corner of their lips twitch.
Am I stuck here forever?
"A sleepover? That's a great idea, but..." she takes a few steps toward the source of the crash. "I think we should probably check out this noise. Someone could be hurt or it could be a sadness...or an assassin!"
It takes them a moment to process her words. "Oh, right, yeah." They grab their dagger and approach Mirabelle, not quite close enough to touch but enough for the echoes of her hands cupping his face to replay in his mind. Palms, warm and callused, trembling slightly with her icy fingertips brushing against their horrible scar.
Together they approach the trees.
Why?
I don't understand.
We did it!
THAT SHOULD BE IT!
Mirabelle pushes through some branches and steps into the forest. A recoiling branch thwaps Siffrin's face as he follows close behind. They don't even react outside of a blink.
Mirabelle stops when the brush thins, and she slowly scans the area.
"Hello?" she calls out in a shaky voice. She grips a nearby branch until it starts to crackle. Her other hand hovers over the hilt of her rapier.
It's pointless.
It's pointless.
It's pointless.
"Can you see anything, Siffrin?" She motions for him to stand beside her.
Ah, right, he's the trap finder, after all. And that duty encompasses finding the source of strange noises in the forest.
He blinks a few times and scans his surroundings. None of the trees, rocks, or underbrush that crowd the area spark any sort of recognition in them. It's a place just meters from where they wake, yet it's completely unfamiliar. Something in the back of their mind tingles as they try to pull some familiarity out of it. Have they even tried to check outside of Dormont before? Their own mind is such a thrilling mystery.
There are only trees, trees, and more trees. Oh, and the slightly swaying tips of some broken branches that poke out in front of some rocks. They probably should check behind the pile, but eh, if whatever broke those branches was a threat, it would have already caused some sort of commotion on any of the thousand previous loops.
Not worth the effort to take even a step forward.
"Looks fine to me," they smile at Mirabelle. They manage to relax their face enough for the strain on their cheeks to dampen. "There are still—" His thoughts hit a wall, and they bite their lip.
"...Still?" Mirabelle tilts her head. "Still what, Siffrin?"
"Uhhhh..." Siffrin blinks and puts their hands at the top of their head in scissors signs pointing upward.
"Deer?"
"Yeah, those. I saw some earlier," they lie.
"Oh, okay, haha." Mirabelle's shoulders lower just a bit. "That's a relief, I shouldn't let the stress of tomorrow let me get scared by some cute little deer." She still picks at her fingernails.
"Pff, I saw the—Isabeau get spooked by a squirrel once," he lies—probably. It sounds like something that could happen, so there's no harm in telling.
Mirabelle bites back a snort. "Hehe, I can't blame him for that, squirrels are vicious!" She lets out a long sigh and retreats from the forest.
Okay, okay, get back on track. Don't let her know how pointless pointless pointless it all is!
Siffrin takes one more glance at the boulders and can almost swear they see a massive, lightless feather poking out through the leaves of the fallen branches. Or maybe it's just a weirdly angled leaf. It twists slightly and falls out of view.
They blink.
"Siffrin?" Mirabelle's voice jolts them back to their senses.
"Huh? Oh, yeah, coming." He scrambles out through the grasping branches of uncaring trees.
They flinch as a branch rips off their hat and exposes them to the harsh sun. He swipes it back, silently cursing the tree as he shoves the hat as far down on their head as possible. Something tickles the back of their neck, and they flick away whatever creepy crawly is responsible.
Mirabelle seems similarly afflicted by the forest; she brushes a few leaves from her hair and pulls off a shiny, fat beetle. She turns it in her fingers for a moment, watching the sun glint off its carapace, before she sets it on a flower. She turns back to Siffrin.
"Thank you for checking with me, Siffrin. I feel a lot better now," She gives him a warm smile. He returns it with an unknown-temperature smile of his own, which only causes her smile to waver. "Are you sure you're okay?"
Nope! Nope! Absolutely not!
"Yeah! Like I said, weird nightmare."
She pauses and brushes a spider off Siffrin's hat. "Do you want to talk about it?"
"Nope! I'll be fine, I just need some uhhh..." They pat themself down until their hands come to rest on their belly. "I'm hungry."
"Oh!" she perks up again. "Well, Bonnie I'm sure has plenty of snacks."
"Yeah! Yeah, I'll go talk to them. Just give me a minute. I'll see you soon." They wave her away.
"Oh, okay, yes I'll see you at the Clocktower," Mirabelle half-frowns at the dismissal but says nothing more. She gives Siffrin another glance before weaving her way through the thick grasses.
"Oh!" She whips around and rushes back to them with a piece of paper in her hand. Siffrin has to quickly throw his smiling facade back on.
Ah, yeah, the directions to each of their friends. It's not like they could forget the locations already etched into their mind. He nods along as Mirabelle explains the paper to him and waves her goodbye as she leaves again.
Siffrin holds his smile just a bit longer and—ah—just as he expects, Mirabelle turns to give one last glance at him before disappearing around the path.
His smile falls, and so does his whole body. Their knees hit the ground.
It hurts. It hurts so much.
It's not over. It'll never be over. They're stuck in this hell forever, aren't they?
He lets out a pained scream into his hands. And then another one, wanting—wishing—to be somewhere far, far away where the wind whips at their face and carries their screams into the sky. Somewhere where the ocean meets the cliffs and smashes into the rocks with such force that they can't even hear themself shred their throat until it bleeds.
But! The ocean is, in fact, far, far away, and the breeze in Dormont is so gentle it can't even make the pitiful flame of a candle flicker!
So into their hands, it is!
They scream deeper into their throat and relish in the pain that still rips through it. Ugh. It hurts! But not as bad as the all-consuming emptiness eating him from the inside!
A single, choked sob escapes them.
They can feel tears welling up in their eye; even what remains of their left eye hurts from the building pressure.
But they don't fall.
They can't. They blink, and they still can't force out enough to actually cry.
...I don't understand.
Why?
Why?
Why?
Why? Why why why why why why why why why why?
WHY ? W H Y? WH Y? WHY WHY WHY!!?
WHY? why ??
WHY W HY WHYWHYWHYWHYWHY???
W H Y W HY WH Y?
WHY?????????????
WE KILLED THE KING!
THAT'S IT! THAT'S SUPPOSED TO BE THE END!
WHY AM I BACK IN DORMONT?
AFTER EVERYTHING I DID?
After everything...
It still wasn't enough.
It's not enough it's not enough it's never enough. NEVER ENOUGH!
Never never never never enough.
Why?
I don't understand.
Is this a curse?
Or some kind of punishment?
The Change God? The Resea—Odile's Expressions? The Universe? What if I killed them all?
Kill them, rip them, destroy, kill kill kill.
They don't care they don't care! Why are they here? What is their point even?
They can't even help one blinding idiot get out of a time loop?
Or did they put me here?
They put me here as some sort of cosmic joke?
Why?
Is it just hilarious?
Does it make them laugh?
Just a perpetual punchline.
Just...a joke.
A little comedy bit.
Nothing but a little cosmic joke.
...
I'm not laughing.
I'm not laughing, it's not funny!
I can't do this anymore!
I can't.
I can't...
But...
With great effort, Siffrin pushes themself up to a sitting position. He pulls the brim of his hat over his eye, and the late summer sun quickly sears the bit of exposed skin on his neck.
I gotta...
They press their palms into the damp grass and push up. One leg slides under them. It shakes violently and gives out. They hit the ground with a sharp wheeze.
They breathe in. And out.
They try the other leg.
Everything is so heavy.
Like their cloak—their entire body has turned to lead.
Not an unusual feeling, but never this oppressive.
Breathe in. And out.
They push up and stumble to their feet.
One foot in front of the other.
They pause and look back at their napping spot.
They blink slowly.
Maybe if they hid well enough, they could just sleep this entire loop. It wouldn't change much, though—it's not like the extra sleep would carry over.
They sigh and stumble forward.
Just get back into character.
The show must go on.
And on.
...
As they reach the bridge, they have a vague sensation of eyes upon them, but they don't even have the energy to turn around.
Okay, the Fighte—Isabeau, Isabeau. Isabeau is up ahead.
They trudge forward, ignoring all the sidelong glances the villagers throw at him. Is their smile really that broken that even random strangers can tell?
Oh well! Their opinions don't matter in the slightest!
He smacks his cheeks and clambers up the steps to where Isabeau is...not? The foreboding House looms in the distance with the old one staring at it from their place on the bench, but Isabeau is nowhere to be found.
Huh? But...he...
They dig through their pocket for Mirabelle's map and stare at the words that dance across the page for a long moment.
Oh, right. He's by the Favor Tree. Stupid. Stupid.
They turn around and head that way, massaging their face back into a smile.
As they round the corner, they’re again hit with a sense of…something. They’re very briefly pulled out of their stupor as the snapping of a small branch hits their ears.
But they slide back into it the moment they remember…
It doesn’t blinding matter what it is. Bird. Sadness. Assassin. Who cares?
He kicks a rock and trudges on toward Isabeau.
They thought they were doing a good enough job at masking, but their allies' reactions proved otherwise.
"Whoa, Sif, you okay?"
"Siffrin, is something the matter?"
"Heyfrin—whoa you look like crab."
"I'm fine! Just a bad nap, is all!" Their grin grows wider.
You're failing already everyone, Siffrin. Put on the happy act. They can't worry! They can't know it's futile!
Don't ruin dinner, at least, let them have fun! Let them have the last fun they'll ever have!
As they watch Bonnie scamper off toward the Clocktower, Siffrin lets themself fall against a tree. He closes his eye and lets his mind blur, and by the time he opens it again, he's sitting in his chair at the dinner table with a heaping plate of food stacked in front of him.
Everyone's looking at him.
Isabeau. Isa.
Mirabelle. Mira.
Bonnie. Bonbon.
Odile. Just Odile. Madame?
He smiles. Again. Of course. And takes a bite of...something savory and surrounded by crispy fried bread.
Smells like nothing.
Tastes like less than nothing.
He gives a thumbs up and pays his compliments to the best chef cooker. None of their expressions seem eased, so they play their best part to put their party's fears to rest.
They all begin to speak; their voices blur together.
He shuts his eye for a moment, and in the next, he's shocked back to reality by frigid water spilling on the back of his neck. They're at the bathroom sink with their head under the faucet.
The icy water soaks through their tangled hair. It takes all too long to sink through to his scalp, but when it does, it snakes across his skin and drips into his eye.
Maybe he can cry a bit here. Nobody can tell the difference.
They stand there.
Nothing.
Nothing.
Nothing.
They can feel it in their throat, in their clenched jaw, pushing from behind their eyes, but—
There's a murmur from the dining area, and he quits trying.
They can't risk worrying them anymore.
He fumbles for the faucet and shuts it off.
They stand.
Trails of frigid water spill down their neck, into their cloak.
It's not even enough to shock any more awareness into them.
His head turns to the rack of towels.
Which one is his again?
They blink. The grungiest one, they assume.
The only one that's not a solid shade. The one that smells faintly of mildew.
Of course, they can still smell that, but not Bonnie's cooking, or Mirabelle's fruity perfume.
He leans his head up against the towel and stands there until it stops dripping.
They close their eye. If they concentrate, maybe they can convince themself they're leaning up against someone's chest. Maybe they could trick themself into feeling strong arms wrap around them and pull them closer.
But they can't concentrate. They can't think. So they don't try.
They bury their face in the musty towel, and when they pull away, they're lying down in bed next to Isabeau, fully clothed down to their shoes.
Isabeau is watching him.
He's not smiling. He doesn't have that strange expression he does whenever he's about to try and fail to tell them whatever it is he's tried hundreds of times to.
"Sif?" His voice manages to catch them off guard.
"Yeah, Isa?" They try to hide their unease with, of course, a smile.
"Are you okay? Is something wrong?" Soft and gentle, just like his hands.
"I'm fine, Isa," they hum. "Just a little tired. I had a really weird dream earlier, is all."
His hand slides forward almost an inch, but he stops and curls his fingers in. "If a dream's enough to shake you this much, it's probably not nothing. You can talk to me about it if you want. I'm here to listen."
"It's okay, it's..." He chews on his cheek. "Hard to describe. Just one of those weird ones that don't make sense but are still pretty freaky."
Isabeau's lip curls slightly down. "Sif, if you really don't want to talk about it, it's okay. But really, I'm here. I didn't want to bring it up at dinner and put you on the spot, but we all noticed you were a bit off."
Of course, they did.
"Just need a bit of sleep," he lets his head sink into the pillow and shuts his eye tightly.
They can hear Isabeau let out a muffled whimper. "Okay, well. You might want to take your shoes off first."
His eye snaps open.
Right, shoes.
They spend the next minute or so struggling to kick them off. He buries his face into the pillow to ignore the very likely growing concern plastered on Isabeau's face.
When he finally manages to get them both off and kicked to the floor, they flash a thumbs up. They don't move their face from that position until the burning in their lungs forces them to.
"Good night, Isa."
Isabeau is silent for a long moment.
"Good night, Sif."
They don't think.
They don't think about it.
He refuses.
He refuses!
He...can't NOT think about it.
How can he NOT let his mind wander to the futility of their quest the moment they're left alone with their thoughts?
They can't—they can't do it anymore. They can't even quit—can't even take one day off.
Can't give up. Can't even share the burden.
The room is stifling, and not even because their face is still partly buried in their pillow.
There has to be another way...
Another way to quit—to give up.
They can't go back. Can't go forward. Can't stay here for one blinding moment longer.
Their thoughts spiral around and around in their skull until the tell-tale sighs of Isabeau's soft snoring catch their attention.
Everything in their body screams at them to leap up right then and there and tear out of the room, but they force themself to wait just a little longer.
He turns to face Isabeau.
Yep. He's asleep. His face is squished against his forearm, and his mouth is cracked open with a thin line of drool trailing down.
Despite all that, he looks...peaceful.
No.
Siffrin blinks a few times and peers closer.
He is tense; his arm is pulled too close to him, his hand is curled into a fist, and there are small creases radiating from the corners of his eyes.
Your fault.
Siffrin very carefully rolls over to his other side. It takes longer than he would like to untangle the blanket from under him, but at least it's something to distract him for a brief moment.
He takes his time sitting up and sliding out of bed, but the moment his feet hit the floor, he scoops up his shoes and almost glides out of the room.
He squeezes his eye shut and...
They're in front of the Favor Tree.
The vast, open sky looms ever higher than the pitch-dark leaves that tower above every other tree.
At the base of the tree, dotting up into the lower leaves are a dozen or so crafted lanterns. Their cool lights twinkle in the faintly rustling leaves.
What would it be like to rip one from its case and swallow it whole? Would it feel like anything? Would it extinguish? Would it burn all the way down and consume him from the inside as if eating a star?
Maybe they should give it a shot—feel something new.
He tries to take a step forward but just...can't. So he just falls to his knees and looks to the sky.
They breathe in through their mouth and are choked with a hiccup.
The tears that threatened from earlier bubble their way back up, and with a violent blink, they finally fall.
It hurts. It hurts so much. It's numb. They can't feel a thing. He feels nothing, he feels everything, it claws at his chest it burns up through him tightening around his gut, and forcing his scraps of dinner up.
He grips his stomach and chokes out a sob.
"Please," they mouth. They watch with their blurry eye as the tears flow freely and stain the ground after the years-long dry spell.
Another sob wracks their body, louder this time.
They can—they can let go. They can be loud, now. Who cares if the faceless side characters in the village hear them? What are they going to do?
"I can't do this anymore," his voice wavers, and he can barely make out his own words.
A long whine escapes him as his walls begin to crumble.
His head jerks back, and he looks into the uncaring Universe.
"Please, please, no more! I've been a good actor! I’ve played this role for so long. Please!"
"I can't do this anymore!"
"I don't know what you want from me! I did it! I beat the King! It should be over! Why!? What am I doing wrong!?"
"Please, tell me what to do. Tell me or just kill me!"
"Please."
"Somebody."
"Anybody."
"Help me."
"Help me."
"HELP ME!"
CRACK!
"FUCK!"
WHAM!
The ground before them shakes as something massive crashes down. Their head snaps toward the noise, and they have half a mind to grab their dagger, but they can't even will themself to move their arm.
At the base of the Favor Tree is a massive writhing mass of dark feathers. Four gangly, bird-like legs stick out and flail in all directions. There's a pale flash as a large wing shifts, and Siffrin sees a scarred eye poking out from underneath the pile. Its head shifts and catches sight of him as its other eye comes into view. In an instant, the creature rights itself and scrambles back up the massive trunk, leaving deep pockmarks and bits of bark raining down. A fan of pure light tail feathers is the last to vanish into the leaves.
![[An illustration of the above paragraph. Drawn by lucabyte]](https://64.media.tumblr.com/913b63a33ed58b9245bc5851247d596f/7595c819f095655f-2c/s2048x3072/4a1085645d3ab2d4c8176f53647cd2f03577733a.jpg)
What the—
They drag themself to their feet and slowly pad forward.
A sadness? No, sadnesses don't run away.
And that sound. Was that a word?
Are you just forgetting native wildlife, too?
Are you going to forget what a tree is next?
The crafted lanterns sway from the disturbance and cause a million points of light to dance through the leaves and onto the ground.
His hand finally makes it to his dagger, and he steps beneath the canopy. They look up.
Sprawled across a branch, star-speckled wing stretched out to the sky, back leg dangling next to a twitching, fanned tail, is...
A creature. Of sorts.
Large, feathered, imposing.
They're not sure what to make of it. Something in him tells him to be afraid, to brandish his dagger at the beast, but he just can't find the energy to.
It’s as if someone crafted an amalgamation of animals out of clay and breathed life into it. The creature’s broad, flat, darkless snout vaguely reminded Siffrin of some mythical creature they'd seen in Ka Buan texts. Yet the structures growing out from between its ears closely resembled those of a large, ornate moth he vaguely remembers seeing flying around in the evenings. The pure light of its head feathers quickly fades to empty darkness from its shoulders to the tip of its fanned tail. Tiny specks of light dot its entire body; its broad wings, its long, almost feline body, the fan of feathers on its rump, and the fluff on its upper legs are all spotted with a living star map.
It watches Siffrin silently, head tilting every so often. It folds its wing, covering itself while flexing the talons on the ends of its long, avian legs.
Siffrin's gaze flits back to the large, mottled scar over its left eye that covers almost half of that side of its face and partway down its neck. Similar mottling covers the skin on its near-lightless hands...feet...paws? It seems to sense them staring and turns its head so that the scar is mostly out of view.
It snorts, clicks its jaws
and speaks.
[Art by Nycroshears]