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Chapter 41 - Survival

Nim returned to the temple of Anahita after he had finished with the Oracle in Tyre. He needed to move quickly or he wouldn’t be able to make it to Babylon in time, whoever had Yusef had at least several hours on him. When he made it to the temple, a woman stood in his way. “Back just to leave I take it?” Abela said her voice derisive, a nasty edge to it.

“Yusef has been taken. I just came from the Oracle. If they aren’t stopped, there is going to be serious trouble,” Nim said trying to side step around her, trying to get in to grab his stuff. No matter if he stepped left or right, Abela matched him step for step, blocking his way with her arms crossed.

“So you are just going to leave again? What makes you think I am ok with that?” She demanded, meeting his eyes defiantly. Nim sighed impatiently and tried once again to get around her, and once again being blocked.

“If you let me in, I was going to ask you to come with me. I can’t do it alone. I need you” he said at last, he hadn’t planned to say it in such a frustrated tone but she had a way of really getting to him. Her shock was enough to slip past her and he immediately went into the room he was in to pack his things.

Abela followed him in and packed her things as well. “What is the plan?” She asked as they were finishing up, her mind racing. She had not woke up this morning expecting to go all the way back to Babylon. The thought of returning there after finally being freed from both Poura and the Tower seemed overwhelming in the moment.

“Plan? Don’t get killed,” Nim muttered to himself in disbelief and asked one of the servants in the temple to find two fresh horses and a donkey. When the servant left he looked over at Abela, her eyes narrowed as if she was waiting for an explanation. “Yusef knows where this loom of fate that everyone wants is. Or at least he knows part of the riddle involved. Khannah also gave me a hint that someone I know, knows where it is. I don’t have anything else to go on.”

Abela listened patiently as they carried their bags out of the temple and started tying the bags to the donkey. “So this loom is what? A magical artifact? Whose?”

Nim fastened the last of the bags and then turned to prepare his horse, a white Arabian mare. “Zurvan. Apparently not as dead as Babylon thinks. His priests keep his only know artifact away from the powers that be probably for good reason. From what I’ve been able to learn, it gives the wielder the ability to change the flow of history. Changing the past, reshaping the present, and influencing the future.”

“Such a thing exists?” Abela asked as they mounted their horses and trotted down the road trying to wrap her head around how such a thing could be so powerful.

Nim shrugged, “Apparently. So Yusef has been abducted and unless we do something, then we are all in trouble. At least, that’s what I’ve been told.” Abela wanted to laugh at this. She half hoped that Artexerxes did get his hands on such a tool. It would serve Ishtar right for everything she’s put them all through, especially Nim. Hell, if it would change things for them, she’d kill this Yusef herself and hand deliver the loom to the king. She quickly shook the thought from her head as they hit the road. First they needed to get to Babylon.

Instead of heading to Babylon, they travelled north and along the Euphrates. They were hoping that this way, avoiding the royal road, they might be able to either make better timing or at least catch up to whoever took Yusef prisoner.

The first few days were nostalgic. They passed the time reminiscing about what life was like when they were last on the road between Babylon and Tyre, how different everything looked now. On one of the first nights, Abela was sitting by the fire, Nim holding her as they both stared into the flames.

“Why does it have to be you?” She asked. It was a question they had been dancing around, neither really being able to vocalize their concern that this really didn’t need to happen, why, as Abela had phrased it all that time ago in Damascus, could they not just run off and live quietly. Nim thought for a moment. He didn’t have a great answer for her then and he only had a slightly better understanding now.

“In every timeline,” he started. He realized he spoke and also didn’t know where he was going with this. He only had the slightest clue himself. She looked up at him with a quizzical look. Right. “Anahita told me that we have been doing this since she could remember. She would find me, and we would end up at the loom. Something would happen, and it would start all over again.” Abela frowned at this and turned back to the glow of their campfire, still not saying anything. “I don’t think we are in the right timeline to live a quiet life,” he said at last. He couldn’t shake the feeling, as the other him said before, that this time was different. Somehow whatever he did seemed to have broke the cycle. Even Anahita was surprised. But he couldn’t very well tell the woman he was holding that he heard multiple voices in his head.

“Part of me hopes we never make it to Babylon,” she said quietly wrapping his arms around her tighter. “Do you think there is a timeline were we ended up together and happy?” It felt so stupid for her to ask. After everything she did to him as he was growing up, after everything he left her with in Tyre, there was no way they would ever be happy. Not in this timeline or in any other. Her sour mood, though, broke when she realized he hadn’t said anything for quite some time.

He cupped her chin with his finger, turning her toward him. This could be the last week they had together. He had always fumbled at the key moment and let whatever woman he had in his life walk away. He was done with that. He would make the decision he should have made all those times before. "If there hasn't been, there is now,” he said softly as he kissed her. She pressed into him and they toppled to the ground.

That night and many more ended in much the same way, passionate exhaustion, and every morning after felt like a dream they were running out of time in. The closer they got to Babylon the more desperate they were to make every moment count. Toward the last half of their journey as the towns and villages drew closer together as they neared their destination, they could almost full themselves into thinking they were truly a family on a trip of their own choosing, returning home to see family. It was a lie, and a fantasy, but for a few days they were happy together and at peace.

As all dreams do, though, it came to an end. Their end was an inn at the gates of Babylon. They had decided that it was better not to announce themselves by staying within the city, which increased their chances of being noticed. In the sequence of events, Ishtar and Vash had been in the city planning the rescue of her father for several days and the pair now were only a day ahead of the others. Even though they were alone and took a faster route, and avoided a stop in Damascus, they had spent their time liberally avoiding their destination until they felt they could no longer sustain the leisurely pace.

They figured they had a day to make preparations, and they needed a plan. Neither of them had the ability to waltz into a jail and simply free a prisoner, they would need someone with authority at the very least. They needed an escape route once they had the man and they were split on returning to Tyre, possibly back into the clutches of the empire, or continuing south to take their chances with a boat. They spent most of the arrival going back and forth between the two options and without settling on a final plan, decided they would go to the Tower the next day. Whoever had Yusef would surely take him there.

The next day, the pair made their way into the city. They were not questioned and seeing their robes of the order of Anahita the guards dismissively let them in. Quickly they made their way to the center. In they went and slipping through the throng of worshippers and beggars, they arrived at the 4th floor being greeted by both Korinna and Hercules. Abela motioned for them both to join them in the Grand Temple of Anahita. As Nim cleared space in one of the many rooms, Abela quickly caught them up on what had happened. In returned the two High Priests shared what they knew. Esfandiar was sick and desperate to get his hand on both a cure and the loom. He was bringing in someone in the morning that had information.

“Prince Siyavash and his wife also seem keen on an audience,” Korinna said carefully, the mere thought of that unworthy soul left a bad taste in her mouth.

Abela and Nim looked at each other. They couldn’t free a prisoner but a prince could! It was late afternoon and Abela and Nim were making some last minute decisions when a servant from the level before rushed in and told them the the prince and his wife were on their way now to see Esfandiar. Nim got up but Hercules waved him back down. He and Korinna would bring them into the fold here. They left leaving the couple to prepare to put their plan in place. However, in a moment the High Priests both came back empty handed and shaking their head.

“Ok, new plan,” Nim said unperturbed by the change of direction the evening was taken. “Let’s go still a prince,” Nim said with a smirk as he slid on the rings he got from Soli, and tied the emerald into a crude necklace around his neck. “I will distract Esfandiar. Abela you get them out of there. Korinna and Hercules, you wait here,” he said but pushed forward when they were about to protest, “You get them out of the Tower and to safety.” He looked to Abela and said, “We rendezvous at the spot and then go from there.” She nodded and they walked out of the temple. Abela caught him and spun him around, kissing him one last time. It might be the last time she sees him again. No one cheats death a third time.

Climbing up the stairs, Nim heard Esfandiar give his ultimatum and in response yelled up the stairs as he climbed the last flight, “I prefer the third option.” All heads turned to the stairs as Nim and Abela crested the landing.

Nim ignored the bewildered and shocked faces of his former friends and stood between them and the now fuming Esfandiar. “You free the prisoner, and I don’t kill you.” Abela made quick work of dragging the prince and the priestess back down the stairs, cursing them to get their asses moving.

Esfandiar screamed in frustration, threw out his hand and a fire ball came whirling at Nim’s head. The young priest caught it easily with his left hand and extinguished it closing his hand. A ring he was wearing shattered as it was overwhelmed with nullifying the magic. “We only finally just met,” Nim said, keeping his voice casual. “Is this how you treat guests now?” Another fireball, and another ring disintegrated.

“Honestly,” he quipped, the acolytes that had surrounded the High Priest now stepped forward as if they were going to fight. “I come here to find you sick, and you send people who probably don’t even know how to hold a blade properly to defend you?” Esfandiar though had already escaped to his study, no doubt looking for some sort to artifact to ward off the newcomer. Nim took a ring off his finger, crushed it and slapped the ground as the disciples moved forward. No sooner had the first one launched at the African than his feet were rooted to the ground. In fact, all of them were. Nim gripped his side, which promised to start opening if he pushed himself further. He ignored the pain and stalked past the now struggling peons.

Blades whirled in his hands as he entered the office. “Were you expecting me to cut them down? Probably save you the hassle of throwing them off the tower when you are done with them.” Nim’s next quip was caught in his throat though as Esfandiar produced an amulet, a similar one that Vash used to use that nullified Ishtar’s powers. He then swallowed and stepped forward. For ever step toward the priest, the old man took one step back. “I don’t need magic to cut you down you old fool.” Nim threw a knife at Esfandiar’s hand, missing him, but it was enough for him to drop the talisman to the floor.

They were in the garden now. “This is the end of the line for you, Bahman Farhad,” the old man sneered. Before Nim could get his next cheeky one liner out, a forced grabbed him. A ring broke and he was freed. He only had one more left, he needed to make this next one count. They should be out of the Tower by now and safe, at least for the moment.

“For someone famous for throwing people off a ledge, you sure are having great difficulty,” Nim taunted, he was so close that if he reached out he could probably cut the priest where he stood but if he did that, then his friends would be in danger.

“Don’t be so sure it’s difficult. I just need you closer!” He growled and reached out with both hands. Nim felt the grip again but this time gave himself over to it. He felt his feet leave the ground for a moment. And then it was over, Nim was sailing over the ledge and down toward the ground. Esfandiar could have sworn he saw Nim smirk at him and a bright green light glowing from his chest.

Nim landed on his feet outside the Tower, somersaulting in the air. The ring and the emerald that had been slowly siphoning off the magic from the old priest’s attacks shattering with the impact. He bit down on his lip to stifle a gasp though as it seemed it required quite a bit of his own magic to soften the impact and his wound opened slightly slowly soaking into his robes.

Nim stumbled away from the Tower and into the nearest alley going the direction he needed to go. It wasn’t long until he rounded a corner and found the 3 of them arguing amongst themselves. Vash suddenly growing valiant wanting to go back and rescue Nim after he rescued them. Abela nearly had knife to the prince’s throat by the time he came into view.

“What would you do once you were there?” Nim demanded. He would have been happy to never ever see the pair of them ever again. Ishtar was about to saw something but he shot her a glance. “Don’t get used to me cleaning up your messes,” he said as he shouldered past the couple and over to Abela.

“We only have one shot at this. But it means you will most likely be on the run for the rest of your life. Are you ok with that? You can still go back and pretend like you were just following orders from Hercules.” She wasn’t hearing any of it though and after a whispered argument, Nim motioned for the other two to draw closer.

“Here is the plan,” he said, he was no longer the student the two had remember or the sincere but bumbling young man who was smitten with Ishtar. He was a commander in every right and held himself accordingly. If there had been any doubt that Ishtar felt like she chose wrong it was this moment. “You two are going to demand the release of the hostage. And then, before anyone is the wiser, we are getting out of here.”

It was so simple. Vash and Ishtar looked at each other sheepishly. Nim blinked at them confused. “You are a prince, aren't you? The guards will listen to you.” Again the couple exchanged glances looking foolish. Vash nodded at how stupid he had been that he didn’t come up with that himself. Nim nodded as if that was final and they quickly filed out of the ally and toward the prison. Abela caught Nim who was now stumbling clutching his side. She gave him a stern look and nodded toward Ishtar.

“What are you two doing? We aren’t going to convince them if you two look like a bunch of crippled hags,” Vash hissed, back tracking to see what was taking them so long. Ishtar tried to make him stop but it was too late.

“If your wife hadn’t stabbed me, I wouldn’t be bending over in pain right now. Talk to her. Now go. We will be right behind you,” Nim snapped and, being put in his place, Vash went ahead with Ishtar at his heels. Abela did the best she could with a salve she had just in case something like this happened. It wouldn’t hold but it was enough that Nim could stand upright.

They made it into the prison. Vash demanded to see the prisoner Yusef. When they got to his cell, Yusef gave them both a hard look and spat at the prince. “Release him to me,” Vash said trying to keep the urgency out of his voice. The guards looked at each other but neither willing to contradict royalty. They opened the gate and Yusef stood their defiantly, not even moving for his daughter whom he looked at now as if she were a traitor. It wasn’t until Abela and Nim came into view that his expression softened.

“I promised your wife I would bring you back alive. Now let’s move it old man,” Nim said in a whisper only for him as he roughly handled him out of his cage. A bit of theatrics for the guards. He obliged and they thought they were free when they made it out the city gate. It was almost too easy. Their convoluted plan was working!

“Halt!” Came the command as they were just about to get on horseback from the inn Nim and Abela were staying at. Heart sank as they slowly turned around to see Maz and Azar standing there. Nim did a quick calculation of whether they could make it out before they caught them but remembered how fierce the two of them were and they looked well armed. Unfortunately, he didn’t think he could take them both on and guarantee everyone’s safety.

He stepped out of the shadow of the stable, hand still clutching his side. Maz gave a start and almost dropped to a knee before Azar pulled him to his feet. “This isn’t the commander you know. Get up. I said get up!” She growled, Maz looking confused. “I heard everything in Tyre. He was alive and well and has been plotting to use us for whatever it is he wanted.”

“Azar, please,” Nim pleaded, looking nervously to the group desperately trying to get on horse back while he bought them even more time. She pulled out a dagger which stared at. If she wanted his attention, she certainly got it now.

She smiled wickedly. “Oh, yes. Now I have one too and my aim is better.” Her free hand moved in a blur to throw something, but it flew wide of Nim. His gaze was fixed on the dagger and he didn’t register what happened until he heard screams. The throwing knife had stuck in Yusef’s leg who seemed to have tried to make a break for it. Ishtar followed and fell at her father’s side screaming and sobbing. His carefully laid plan was falling apart. “Maz round up the others,” she ordered, and Maz hesitantly stepped forward.

Nim’s sword and dagger were in his hand now. “I can’t let you do that,” he growled as he stepped in-between Maz and the others. “We are getting out of here and you are letting us go.”

“I think not!” Azar screamed as she barked another order at Maz who obeyed this time. Nim launched into an attack on Maz though, catching him off guard. Part of the Immortal thought his old commander wouldn’t actually defy them. He was caught back on his heels as he barely parried the blows meant to kill. Nim was not playing around. However, neither was Azar. Another throwing knife hit Yusef, this time in the throat and he was dead where he lay.

“Can’t save them all!” Azar spat, she was going to enjoy killing every last one of them and make him pay like she felt he made her pay. All her comrades dead because of him. She closed the gap between them faster than he thought, he was still locked in position by Maz’s defense. She had the blade above her head now, striking downward with all her might.

The magic welled inside Nim, ready to strike out but it was too late. The dagger met flesh and stuck deep inside the chest…of Abela who threw herself in front of Nim. In a fury, Nim knocked Maz off balance and sliced him open before catching Abela who fell against him. With a hand out Nim sent a blast knocking Azar into a tree and out cold. He was not bleeding out and all over the woman who laid dying in his arms.

“No no no. I can heal you. I can heal you!” He said shaking her. Magic left him, flooding into her searching for the wound but the dagger’s curse made closing the wound impossible. More magic, more. He needed more.

“I love you, Nim,” Abela whispered with her last breath and went limp in his arms.

Vash was on him in that moment, dragging him to his feet and then over to Ishtar. “We need to get out of here now!” Nim scrabbled, bleeding the dirt from the road mingling with his soiled robes, back to Abela. He wouldn’t leave her. “Fine, but we have to go!” Vash called after him and got the horses. With help, Nim and Vash got Abela on a horse and Yusef on the other. They then rode off down the road, heading south into the wilderness.

They made camp at night fall, refusing to use any campfire, afraid to lure unwanted attention to their position. Vash and Nim dug graves for Abela and Yusef and said prayers ushering their souls into the next life. They were all silent for long moments. Nim was against a tree mending his wound. Between the rest of Abela’s supplies and his own magic, he was able to close the wound again. He shot dirty looks at the couple throughout the process.

Vash and Ishtar whispered among themselves for a long while before Ishtar came over and knelt beside the wounded Nim. She tried to place a comforting hand on his arm but he knocked it away. If he had the strength he would cut these two down himself, but he hated the fact he couldn’t. How many more people was he going to have to watch die before it was over?

“I can’t bring her back, Nim,” she said softly, her voice thick with her own loss. “I can’t bring my father back. But they don’t have to die in vain.” What did she know about dying in vain? Nothing was going to bring them back and their rescue plan was a complete failure. Azar would be out looking for them soon, he bought them at most a day and he couldn’t walk let alone hobble. He wanted more than anything to snap her neck, but his hands wouldn’t obey his heart.

“We’ve been trying to figure out how to end this. Find the loom and change history. Set things back to the way they ought to be,” she continued in hushed tones. “But we can’t do anything with the pieces we have. Maybe they will help you,” she offered hopefully. So now she wanted to divulge information that could have saved them all this trouble? Ishtar was really a piece of work.

“I only have a phrase and it means nothing to me.” She paused a moment before continuing, The wise choose to survive.”

Word Count - 4211

Chapter 42 - Escape

“The wise choose to survive.”

Nim had heard that before but through the exhaustion and grief of burying loved ones in the dead of night, he couldn’t quite place how he knew what that meant. Ishtar took his look of confusion to mean he also didn’t understand the expression. Vash sat thoughtfully considering the link between this dead man, the phrase, and how his father might use it. He felt bad for thinking about how he could use the new knowledge to his own ends but tragedy affected everyone in different ways. Perhaps, he thought, counseling himself, he was just trying to make something good out of a bad situation.

When no one said anything for a long time, Ishtar was the first to stand and she stomped her foot in frustration as the two others continued to just stare into the dirt. “If we stay here much longer we are going to be in trouble. Our only hope is that…that…” she took a deep breath, “demon of a woman didn’t clearly see Vash and I.” Nim blinked at her without understanding. Then it dawned on him, she was once again trying to leave him alone and in the dirt to save her own skin.

Vash got up too and looked around nervously. “Our best chances of escape are splitting up.” They were clearly in full damage control mode now. That base need to survive that drove everyone in a crisis.

Nim, however, had been here a time too many for his liking. He had lost the only person in his life that he realized really cared about him. Abela was vicious, cunning, and dangerous but most of all she was never duplicitous. She always did what she said she would do and set out to accomplish her goals with clarity. He grieved that it wasn’t these two dead in the ground and not her as he stumbled to his feet, his wound still seeping and neither of his “friends” moving to help him up. He was, as he had been from the beginning, alone and feeling misused. A spark at that thought ignited something. He didn’t fully get it, but realization was coming. He looked at the two now cowering and wishing to say something they didn’t want to say.

“You two go. Don’t tell me where you are going. I don’t care. I don’t care about this loom. I don’t care about what happens next,” Nim groaned, exhausted and wanting nothing but sleep but shuffled over to his horse.

“Where will you go?” Vash asked, his voice concerned, but Nim could detect by now that he was more curious about the response than concerned for any safety.

“South. I will get on a boat and disappear. It’s over. Goodbye, Vash. Goodbye, Ishtar.” He got to his horse and somehow, with great difficulty, mounted it in a very undignified way. “I mean this. I wish I never met either of you,” he said looking vaguely in their direction but not wasting anymore of the precious little time they had, and kicked his mare into motion. His only goal now was to hope he could put as much distance between Azar, Ishtar, and Vash as possible.

The wise choose to survive. Nim kept rolling that phrase in his mind as he found a trail and followed it to a small village. He decided not to stop. As much as his body begged for sleep, and the would in his side screamed at him with every lope of his mare’s gallop, he needed to go further. He didn’t stop, in fact, until he had put more than a days ride between him and Babylon to the very shores of the Persian Gulf by the crack of the new dawn. There he found an inn and before he even made it to his mat, he fell on the floor and passed out.

He fell into a deep sleep and dreamt of a woman’s voice. A woman he hadn’t heard since he was a child. He saw Poura, still in his mind a magnificent city on the outskirts of the Empire. He felt the way he felt when he first laid eyes on it.

Nim wokę up in a pool of his own drool. He hadn’t dreamt of home in so many years. Maybe he was just shell shocked by the last 24 hours and just wanted to go home. Still that voice. Why did that voice sound so familiar. He almost could feel the pull back to Poura. The dream, the woman, the phrase. It was right there, just out of his grasp. He got off the floor. When he exited his room, realizing he never actually unpacked or got comfortable, he just picked everything back up. There was no time to waste.

He left the inn and went to the harbor. There he found a boat and a captain willing to take him as far as Harmozeia in Carmania. It didn’t escape him that it was close to Poura. When asked if they could go farther into Arabia or India, they captain just laughed and shook his head. The ship was bound for Harmozeia and he could take it or leave it. He only thought for a moment. Azar would have had enough time to pick up on his trail. She could have gone after the royalty but that would not have made sense. Far better for her to kill Nim and claim he was a turncoat. After all, he did kill Mazdak. He hadn’t even been able to process the fact he killed the one man who always stood by him in a fit of terror and rage. He didn’t have any time to consider that now either as the captain of the boat was turning around, set to leave.

Nim shoved all that guilt and despair deep inside him and traded safe passage for work on the boat. He had, after all, been a commander in the royal fleet, might as well put the skills to good use! The voyage was simple enough. It was a merchant ship that made the trip every other day, transporting valuable goods from that region and beyond to Babylon and then onto the west and vice versa. The gulf was busy with an active patrol from the Persian military as it had invested interest in the Arabian peninsula. Even though it wasn’t the king’s active obsession, didn’t mean that it wasn’t a sought after collection. At some point the whole world would need to be put in order, after all.

The trip was overnight since the ship left late, and that just meant Nim had to be extra careful any time they were to pass within a stones throw of a military vessel. Persia had a rather advanced postal system and he didn’t know what Azar’s next move would be. The vengeful thing to do would be to track Nim down, and hope she caught him before he made a clean escape. The smart thing to do would be to double back to the barracks and send as many notices as possible to notify command of any sightings.

As an Immortal, as well, Nim was cursing he desertion he could be an immortal now too, she might have access to other means to track him that he wasn’t aware of. Best to get as far away as possible in a way that would take days to track and buy him some time. What he was certain of was the fact that she would find him. No matter where he ran, or how fast he got there, Azar would eventually get him.

They were in Harmozeia before Nim really figured out what his next move would be. The crew kicked him off quickly so they could offload their cargo and the busyness of the harbor here was mad dash. Merchants and crowds were yelling for any bit of space left on a ship before it set sail. Nim pushed through the people feeling for the first time safe in a long time. An abundance of bodies meant anonymity. In the cries at the city gates there came a shout for guards needed for a caravan headed to, and Nim couldn’t believe his ears, Poura. He thought it was a bad idea to go to the one place people might look for him, but there was an undeniable pull to attach himself to the traveller. He got himself hired straight away and he was out of the port city before anyone could recognize him.

Word Count - 1429

Disclaimer - No one Nim loves is allowed to live. Viewer Discretion Advised.

Chapter 43 - The Choices We Make

Poura, he realized, was not like he remembered. It seemed far smaller than his memories of it. The giant bluff he had to climb to get to the Temple of Ahura Mazda to wash floors for Raza seemed now like a small hill. The city itself also seemed to be a village compared to the metropolises he had lived in. He can certainly see why Abela was so upset to be stationed here right after training at Babylon. It had never occurred to him just how much of a demotion Poura would have been to someone from a bigger city. It seemed almost sad by comparison. The rows of buildings had ample space between them and as they walked down the well planned roads, he could see nearly from one end of the town to the other. The temples, too, were quite small and quaint. Just sandstone and mudbrick. How grand he thought that was when he came here from his fishing village.

The trip was overnight as they stayed roughly halfway between the two cities. The caravan left him off at the city gate and he spent some time revisiting some of his old areas. The temples, the school, the palace, though he didn’t dare go in, in case news travelled faster. It was a matter of time before word got around that a black man was walking around the streets and he’d either get arrested or harassed by guards. Neither of these things happened as he turned from the palace he came face to face with Jameshi. She was older now, or was he just taller? It was hard to tell but no matter she was as formidable and fierce as he remembered her being. He wasn’t sure whether to be happy to see her or fearful and her expression gave nothing away so he just stood there and waited.

It took awhile, too for Jameshi to wrap her head around seeing Nim again. He was taller, stronger, and bore more scars than she remembered. His eyes were hard like he had seen real war and loss. He carried himself with dignity and strength. His weapons no longer clattered around but seemed to be where they belonged. He still war the robes of a healer though they were torn, tattered, and if she wasn’t mistaken, dark with dried blood. She wasn’t sure what she would say to him as she saw him stroll past her temple but followed him nonetheless.

“Is Abela with you?” She asked at last it was as much of a greeting as she was able to muster.

“She’s dead. She died protecting me,” he said, his voice hard. He wasn’t expecting to have to talk about his slain partner so soon and he would not falter, not in front of Jameshi. All those days training him, he knew to show weakness now would be to lose her respect.

She spent a moment searching his eyes as if she were reading his heart and then said, “You are lucky to have such a one as her. May she be honored in her death.” Another sting. He couldn’t bare to tell her that they left her buried in a hole along the side of a road. As a priestess she deserved more honor and dignity than they could afford that night. “Why have you returned? Are you to take her place at the temple?”

Back to business. That was just like her. No need to waste time or energy on raw emotions. “I’m…passing through. But if there is need of a healer I can assist.” What was he doing? Maybe he could actually settle down here and that would be the end of his story. He was just prolonging the inevitable he felt. He doubt Azar would sleep until she had his head on a pike. Jameshi just nodded, turned on her heels and headed back the way she came.

Nim followed her to the Temple of Anahita. There had been priests sent to replace Abela and they seemed to be doing as well as they could. None of them were as talented as her in either the healing or fertility arts but for a small town like this, it was sufficient. They had been currently fretting over a fractured leg of a worker who was panicking that if he didn’t get back to work then he’d be dead anyway. Nim raised his hands for calm as they came in and Jameshi left him there. He asked for a clean set of robes since he was tired from the road and sat down with the man.

He asked his name, what work he did, how he got into the accident, if he had any kids or family. As he talked, Nim ran his hands gently over the bones protruding out of skin. Things started shifting back into place and as the worker talked more about his family, Nim seemed to massage the last of the bruises and scars away until there was nothing left of the accident. “Go and be careful, my child,” he said softly as the priests helped the man up and out of the temple. He forgot how good he was at this. Just simply sitting and healing people instead of fighting and losing people. Perhaps he could stay there, the other priests and priestesses of the temple seemed to agree. Since he didn’t have a clue yet as to how to solve the riddle, he figured he could spare a few more days to take care of the people here.

A few days turned into a week turned into a month. It had been so long since his flight from Babylon that he thought he almost dreamt the whole thing. He slowly fell into a habit of life and even took on more tasks for the government as the time lapsed and so did his caution. He went back to entertaining guests for the Satrap, now quite the showman. He met regularly with Jameshi and even, begrudgingly at first, Raza. They made some modifications to upcoming plans and festivals based on his time traveling the empire. Things were fitting well. Nim even found the starts of love again in one of the servants in the palace. In a month’s time his life was transformed and he barely even noticed his scar anymore, he never once had to abuse his magic in the time he was there. Part of him realized, life would have been easier had he just stayed in Poura. He would have wanted for nothing and had everything a small town Satrapy could offer! Of course the catch was he would never have realized what Poura had to offer if he didn’t first leave.

As with everything else in this tale, the good times must come to an end. It happened one evening as Nim was taking a stroll outside the city limits among a fruit grove. It was clear and silent night and on these nights he felt most connected to the people he lost. He was free to be himself and free to feel the things he had to suppress, those memories and thoughts that he wouldn’t have ever thought he missed. His wanderings though carried him much farther south than he normally went. Even on nightly walks by himself he always kept the town in sight for his own safety. But that night, forever reason, his feet wouldn’t stop moving further and further away. Perhaps he was being careless, in fact, in the next moment, he knew he was being too careless.

“I found you,” came a hiss like a viper as a shadowy figure stepped out from the cover of a nearby tree in front of him. 3 or 4 other shadows seemed to move in his peripheral. He knew he was surrounded. It was only a matter of time before he met his end and he knew it. He just wished she had waited until he lived more of his life.

“Took you long enough, Azar. Well, I don’t see why we need to prolong this,” Nim spat, his weapons in his hand in a flash. Even with the ease of life he never stopped training with Jameshi and whoever her latest proteges were. A figure launched an attack from behind him, the snaps of the underbrush sounded as if they echoed, so silent was the night. He pivoted and blocked the assault only for two others to snap into action. He danced and parried deftly in the night reaching out with his magic gently to feel wounds and cuts, a trick he had learned recently that he didn’t have to use his magic to hurt people and so long as he focused on healing actions, he could keep track of people’s locations within a certain distance. With a tree to his back, his blades whirled around him ready for the next attack.

“He’s mind. If he tries to escape, kill him,” she barked as they fanned out giving them space. He realized in that free moment that she had not come with an army but a hit squad of Immortals. This was not a fight he would win.

“Tell me why I shouldn’t just let you kill me and take the fight away from you,” Nim growled but regretted his attitude as throwing knives flew at his head. He only ducked in time that a blade cut the side of his face and his shoulder. Those were sharp and her throw was near superhuman. He healed himself easily but his guard was down and she jumped into the space provided.

Steel rang through the evening, dancing between the trees as if they were cymbals clashing in a ritual tune. As they fought, Nim spent more and more time trying to patch up literal holes in his body, still trying to get a grip on anything he could use to pull her in. However, Immortal training was next level compared to the sparring he had done with Jameshi. He was cut more than he blocked and things were slowly getting away from him as the fight wore on. Finally, she got what she was waiting for. With a strike she knocked his dagger from his hand and then in a practiced grapple, disarmed him and threw him to the ground. She raised her sword for a killing strike, “This is for Kave, Badak and Mazdak. I hope you rot in hell, you bastard!”

A firm hand though gripped her in the darkness, somewhere behind her. She was startled, and with a swipe that caught only air distanced herself from the other person. “You will not hurt him,” it was a hard voice, it felt like a brick wall. Nim was panting, his mind racing to figure out who this dark figure in the shadow of the forest was.

“Fools! Get this woman!” Azar screamed into the night, looking frantically for her squad to have her back. The echoes though went unanswered. There was only the darkened figure in the middle of the grove watching them. Nim was still frozen on the ground. He couldn’t believe this was happening again. It was just like when he was a child. Something welled up inside him as he got to his feet.

“It’s over, Azar,” Nim whispered, shoulders slumped with exhaustion. He wanted her to leave. He wanted her to live and be happy and not be here right now thinking to do what he knew she was going to do. She was now cornered and outnumbered. “Please,” Nim begged, his voice weak, “save yourself.”

Again, Nim seemed to ignite her fury again. “Save myself like you saved us? How can you talk about salvation, you traitor,” she spat. She raised her weapons ready to fight and in the next instant it was her on the ground and weaponless, a single blade glistening with blood in the moonlight at her throat. Staring daggers into the menacing figure, she hissed, “Kill me.”

“As you wish,” came the reply and before Nim could move a muscle, the other figure with practiced ease slit her throat in one graceful motion. Nim wanted to scream, wanted to protest, wanted to fight. All his friends were now dead. Kave, Badak, Mazdak, Abela and now Azar. His father was dead and Yusef was dead. He felt like he was drowning. His chest hurt and his knees nearly gave out.

He was temporary stirred from these suffocating emotions by a firm hand on his shoulder pulling him into an embrace he barely recognized. “Let’s go home, child. It’s time to go home,” Bahar’s voice was soft now and felt warm. He didn’t even realize he had been crying into her dark tightly wrapped robes.

“There is something I need to do, Bahar,” Nim whispered finally as they made their way along the winding road back to Aasha.

“I know what you are looking for. The Loom is there.”

Word Count - 2163

Chapter 44 - Home

Nim couldn’t believe his eyes. The pristine ocean lapping the shore, the trees dotting the landscape of his idyllic home. So much has changed for the young man yet nothing was different here. The scattering of mud brick homes and the single avenue leading to the council seats that overlooked the harbor. It was all the same. The only one who was different was him. It was as if though he never left.

They arrived by the early morning, the sun was just peaking out at their backs, casting long shadows as they walked into town. There were the usual suspects up and about - fishermen going out to sea and people bringing produce to sell. For a long time no one seemed to notice either Bahar or Nim standing in the road. He turned to leave, this was a bad idea. He couldn’t face these people again, not after everything he’s done. Bahar caught his arm though and shook her head. They continued down past the council seat and sat on the shoreline.

It was Bahar who broke their silence. “You will need to rest for what is to come. Spend some time with your mother. You may not see her again.” In the dawn, Nim could see her clearly. When he was a child, he remembered her looking so old and weathered. However, he was only half her age and any number of boys in the village might now think that about him! Her hair had a streak of gray in it but other than that she looked younger than he remembered. Battle hardened still, sharp eyes always looking for danger, that was all the same. But either she found the fountain of youth, the laidback nature of the village, or she wasn’t quite the age he had thought, because her skin was still smooth in the dawn light. She must have been his age when he was born! She noticed him looking at her as if it was the first time he saw her and scowled.

“How is she doing?” He asked and Bahar shrugged. Of course, he would figure that out for himself. He turned his attention from his middle aged companion to the rhythm of the waves. After another moment he said mournfully, “Everyone I care about is dead. I don’t know what to do anymore.”

“And still you came here. Why?” Bahar asked but her voice wasn’t accusatory. She sounded as if she were searching for something, a test for some reason. Nim thought about this, uncertain as to what she wanted to hear. Why had he come back here? There had been Babylon and…he couldn’t bare to bring himself to remember that night…Ishtar finally divulged what she knew which didn’t really help. He knew he needed to get away and…that brought him here.

Finally, something clicked. “The wise choose to survive.” He blinked and looked at her. “You told me something like that when we got to Poura right? If we are wise, we choose to survive. That’s the phrase I was given…”

Bahar nodded.

“You? It’s always been you?” Nim couldn’t help but feel both cheated for some reason and mad. It wasn’t her fault he ended up here. It wasn’t her fault he left. It wasn’t her fault he went to Babylon and Tyre and fought in wars. However, despite the truth of all of that, he couldn’t help but feel it was her fault.

Bahar nodded. It was now getting later in the morning and more people were bustling about. He hadn’t even considered all the dead they left in that fruit grove and that it was only a matter of time before it was reported. He felt like time was running out and there was a decision that was left unmade. “As long as I can remember, it always comes down to this conversation. The location is different, but the task is always the same. My job is to protect the loom, you find the loom, and then history continues to repeat. Even this conversation I’ve repeated more times than I can count. Will this time be different? Probably not. Will I have to say this again next time? Probably.”

She stopped when he looked at her like she was a completely different person. It was more words than he had ever heard her say at once. However, it was very similar to what Anahita used to say about repeating the timeline and trying to find him so they can…do something? Her memory, which was now partially his memory, stopped at a certain point. There was always a blank when it came to just before everything making sense like her memory was wiped so that it would lead her back to the same spot over and over again. Only this time, things were different, he, a different version of himself, had broken through somehow. He was not the same Nim as all those other times. He also had partial memories from that version of himself too, specifically of having done all this before. Only, in his timeline, he and Ishtar were deeply in love and in it together in a race against time. He envied that man. Not because of Ishtar, she had stabbed him (literally at least once) one time too many, but he had someone, Nim in this timeline did not.

“It’s different this time, Bahar,” as he said this, his voice didn’t seem his own. It was older and somehow more authoritative. It was still his voice, he often gave commands like this but on his own he never would have talked to this deadly person beside him in such a tone or address her so casually. “We are making progress.”

This was the first time he had ever seen Bahar look unprepared. She looked at him like she could both slap him for his insolence and hug him for the hope she now felt. “I do not know if we can ever be done with this dance. We have done it so many times. I suppose this time is different. I never found you so early. When I found your mother and father lost at sea, I didn’t even know who it was until that night we were attacked. Once I saw your powers, though, I knew it was you. Who else could it be? As a child, you were not fit for the task that laid ahead of us so I could do nothing but send you away and hope you would come back.”

“It is more than that. This is not a random happenstance,” Nim insisted. Again, his mouth moved on its own accord but it would still be something he might say. It was a weird experience. He definitely said these things and he was definitely thinking them but how it was said was in a manner not completely his own. “Part of me made it back,” this time Nim, the Nim of this timeline picked up the thread, “I don’t know how but something broke, whether from our end or his, but this time I am more…me…”

Bahar thought about this for some time and before she could continue the conversation there was a scream. Apparently someone had in fact recognized Nim and informed his mother. They both turned to see his mother much older than his memory running toward them with tears in her eyes. He had enough time to appreciate the fact that he thought Bahar looked younger and his mother looked older. He rose to his feet and took Meklit launching herself at him as if he were a wall. He didn’t even budge as she wailed against him - half in prayer of thanksgiving for deliverance and half a curse he never once wrote to her.

“You are back! My son is back! They told me and I did not believe it! Oh! This is the grandest of days! We should celebrate and throw a feast!”

“Mother! I won’t be long, I…” he looked to Bahar for some measure of assistance and she just shrugged. Was that really all she was good for? He felt like they were just making progress, he was almost at the end, he could feel it but his mother threw a hiccup in the progress he was making. He thought better of it though and embraced her. Bahar was right, this might be the last time he ever saw her again and something inside him felt homesick. “It’s good to be back,” he whispered.

The day passed quickly. His mother ran him around ragged re-introducing him to neighbors and friends, some of whom he suspect were enemies. The village council had changed hands and the younger men only remembered the trouble he caused and a strong desire to see him quickly move on and leave them alone. He would happily oblige this notion but his mother had gotten enough excitement garnered in such a short time over his home coming that a small banquet was in order. Even though he never would likely admit it to himself, he appreciated the gesture. The food was delicious and exactly how he remembered. The fire and the lack of pomp was refreshing like he was actually in the moment instead of just doing what he rehearsed for the infinite time. There were jokes and special talents and everyone seemed to be having a great time as the sun, which was just rising upon his arrival, was now waning.

In the glow of the fire light, Bahar pulled him aside while there was currently a very fascinating display of bravery, something about fire and dancing. He was dragged away before he could hear exactly what feat was being attempted. He felt like a child again and it felt so good to forget, for ever how brief, his current situation.

“It is time,” Bahar told him quietly, away from all the festivities.

“Now? But…I just got here and the fire…” Nim whined as if he were really just 10 years old again. Coming home had a way of turning back the time. He has seen war and death and loss but being back here reminded him of simpler times. He could almost feel the pull of forgetting everything.

“Yes, now. Do you want the Persian army to come in and destroy and torture and kill everyone here? If you want them to live, you will follow me now,” Bahar growled as she continued to tug at him with less and less resistance until he was walking along side her. “We have work to do and it needs to be done. Besides,” she looked back at the party still raging, “it’s better to leave when the memories are pleasant.”

All Nim could do was follow her into the wilderness. They stopped short of a cave, one he never realized was there, or saw it but never went in? It didn’t seem like the boy Nim to leave a place unexplored, but then again, when you are constantly being blamed for everything wrong, it’s hard to find time to explore everything. Bahar gestured for him to go in first. “You will want a moment, I promise you. I am right behind you,” she said but she positioned herself as if she meant to stand guard for the whole night.

The young man sighed and stepped inside the cave to fulfill his destiny.

Word Count - 1903

Chapter 45 - The Temple of Time

Nim stepped into the cave, he didn’t really see anything different with this one as opposed to all the other ones he had been in. It was dug out of a cliff, again, how he didn’t notice it as a child he couldn’t guess. However, there as nowhere else to go, it was a spacious room with what looked like empty clay jars. It might have been used for storage at one point but he saw nothing else out of the ordinary. He heard Bahar’s footsteps follow him in after she made sure they weren’t followed. He turned to address her and ask what she thought she was doing, but she walked right past him and into the wall! It took Nim a full moment to process what just happened. Bahar couldn’t have been a ghost, he saw her fight Azar. She could perhaps be a demon, that was always a possibility.

However, when he walked over and touched the wall it shimmered and waved like a tapestry. Magic. But a magic he had never seen before. He hesitated a moment longer before he stepped through the veil, leaving the dusty cave and setting foot on marble tile. Nim blinked. It was a corridor flanked on both sides by colonnades. Some were well worn, others in various stages of disrepair and still fewer whole and seemingly untouched. Torches lit the way from the pillars that were still whole enough to hold them. Bahar, by this time, was at the end of the corridor, waiting for him in front of an archway into another room. As he approached, Nim could see it was some sort of temple, old and also in a state of disrepair like its priests had left long ago. Then, in the center haloed by some sort of light form the ceiling was a mechanism he had never seen before. He stood at the archway with Bahar and gaped. This was the moment he had been waiting for!

“Be careful. When you cross this threshold, you will see things. I don’t know what you see. It always seems to be the same though.” Bahar said wearily.

There was that turn of phrase. Nim turned to her and asked, “Are you also a god? Who are you really?”

Bahar, despite her serious nature, smiled ruefully, “I was a mercenary in Anatolia. Recruited when I was about the age you left Poura. I joined the Persian army. Worked hard, like you. I rose to the rank of Immortal and that is when they found me. Or perhaps the person you might meet. As for how I know what is bound to happen…well…it is Zurvan’s will that I am here.” Nim blinked at her and saw the warmth and sorrow in her eyes. It was her. Before he could tell her how much he was sorry she motioned him into the room and he stepped through the threshold.

Nim heard what sounds like the shattering of glass and an explosion that echoed in his head. His heart dropped and his body turned cold. He shivered and broke out in a sweat, dampening his robe. The shivering turned to shaking as his mind screamed for release. His breath caught in his throat and he tried desperately to breath. His vision blurred as if the life was draining from his body. He was dying. Just like that. This was the end. He could feel himself breaking, shattering as the glass he heard, life flowing out of him and no way to heal himself.

And then as suddenly as the feeling came, it vanished. He looked around and seeing nothing, he walked to the center of the room where the loom was seeming to work by itself. It was beautiful. The tapestries it crafted were intricate and seemed to be marking large events and around the borders smaller figures and people rippling from those events. It was like nothing he had seen before. He saw Artexerxes as a central figure that was still being worked on, and then a gold line from the King connecting…he saw Vash and Ishtar…and there was Abela and Azar…and his eyes traveled to what appeared to be a tear right where the next big event would have gone. It looked as though it was trying to repair itself. He took a step back and realized…it was trying to fix a tear that would be been him. Instinctively he reached out and touched it.

The searing pain came back with a vengeance.

“I’m telling you it’s right here!” A voice called out down the corridor he had just entered from. “Ishtar! Come see!” It was…his voice. An man stepped through the archway holding the hand of the woman that stabbed him. A pain grabbed at his heart as he writhed in pain. The memory was coming back to him as he watched the scene unfold. He wanted to stop them. He wanted them to leave this place. The smile that was on this Nim’s face was so bright and hopeful. The robes he wore was pristine and he wore no weapons at his side. The way he looked at this Ishtar was a man madly in love. Nim could feel himself choking in despair.

“Bahman! We shouldn’t be here! We aren’t allowed!” Ishtar protested, her voice excited but she was looking around worriedly - perhaps more afraid of someone finding them. It was then that Nim saw that he, that was this doppelgänger, was holding the ebony statue of Anahita in the other.

“Don’t worry, no one knows what this place is! I think it’s an old temple, but that’s not the amazing part! Look!” The Nim with Ishtar pointed at…well…at himself, who was now sat next to the loom clutching his bleeding side, dying. However, it was obvious neither of them saw the wounded man and ran to the loom. Heedlessly they touched the fabric with wonder in their eyes.

Nim had never lived this but he somehow knew it well. A dagger. Nim wanted to cry out for the young man who clearly did not know who this woman was. The other Nim had bent down to examine the same tear that the wounded one had noticed moments before hand. He turned around to see the dagger arching high. A hand up and a scream, he was knocked into the loom and, touching the tear, disappeared. The tear grew wider, where partially his face had been it was not completely gone as it was when he touched it. This must have been him the time before.

The scene vanished but the pain was still killing him.

“Here. I think it’s here,” this time it was an older voice. A man entered the temple holding a torch with a woman that made the pain he was experiencing that much more bearable. It was Abela only they were both older. The trust they had in each other palpable as they crossed the threshold and made their way to the loom. “We finally found it. We can stop the invasion of my homeland. We need to save Macrobia,” this Nim muttered, carefully looking at the loom. Abela was there and helping to stretch the fabric out to figure out how the mechanism actually worked.

This Nim also carried no weapons. His robes were equally pristine and just as the last vision, the pair didn’t seem to see the man now prone on the floor struggling in pain and near fainting from blood loss. He had the ebony statue of Anahita at his hip. He seemed to be muttering to himself, asking someone how to stop the loss. He saw his hand glow and when he touched the tear, once again he vanished. This time the tear which showed his whole face tore until it was partially his face.

Anahita’s words came back to him in his delirium. He was always found in Macrobia. Before he could grab onto that thought another vision started to play.

“Anahita,” a voice echoed through the corridor. A woman ran through the threshold. They were dressed in a way with a fabric that he had never seen before. It was a dark skinned woman but she looked strangely familiar. A man stepped out, he knew this man. He…was this man. He saw him. At the wellspring, when he was dying from his dagger wound. The rugged man grabbed the woman he called Anahita by the wrist. “It’s too dangerous. We cannot use this to change the past.”

Anahita, he was now able to place her as the woman he also saw at the spring, beckoning him to follow her. “We must try. Our magic is fading. We are losing our powers with each passing day. We need to find our place in the tapestry.”

Magic fading? Their accent was strong and he was barely able to comprehend that they were speaking a much older dialect. Was this how…it started? Anahita raced over to the loom and bent down beside it looking over the artifact for perhaps some hidden compartment. It was then that she locked eyes with the man on the floor. She…saw him. He gasped for her to save him but no words came out. He tried with all his might to reach her. All she did was nod his direction and stand up.

“There is hope. This is going to sound crazy, but you have to listen to me very carefully. We have to get a message to the future. Our world depends on it.”

“Anahita, there is nothing to do. Magic is dead and we will be too. It is our fate,” the man stepped forward and took her hands in his and looked at her as if she had lost her mind. “Let’s go before the others find us.”

“No. You must listen to me. You must not forget,” Anahita was saying but Nim couldn’t hear anything. He couldn’t make out what it was he was supposed to remember! He tried to remember now, he tried with all the might that was fleeing his body. The wall still stood. Shattered and broken now but still blocking him from a single core memory, perhaps the memory that could save his life now.

Nim watched helplessly as Anahita thrust an ebony block into the other man’s hands. It was shapeless and void. While still holding onto the block, Anahita pulled out a dagger. Nim knew that dagger. But instead of stabbing the man as all the other women were wont to do to him, she…stabbed the tapestry. “Remember, Nim. You must remember,” she said softly, looking not at the Nim she came in with but staring directly at him. Before they vanished from his sight, she saw that the ebony block had carved into the figure of Anahita, and instead of fading into oblivion, there was a bright flash and his body no longer felt pain.

Nim opened his eyes. The dilapidated temple was replaced with one that looked brand new, as if untouched by time. Marble so blinding and polished it seemed to reflect itself in infinity. There was an empty desk at the far end of the temple stacked with papers seeming long overdue for some sort of correction or signing. Along the colonnades of the temple, which Nim only now realized stretched far beyond eyesight in rows permeating from the center, there hung tapestry after tapestry. He rose to his feet, somehow he was alive, or was he dead. Blurry eyed he looked at the loom and saw a woman slowly working its threads. The click clack of the handles folding and twisting and weaving the thread together. He knew that woman.

“Where am I?” Nim startled. His voice sounded otherworldly and echoey to his ears.

The woman looked up and gave him a knowing look. It was Khannah. “K-Khannah?” He asked as if in a dream like stupor.

“That is what some people call me yes,” she said as she went back to her work. Nim found his feet carrying himself to the pillars to examine the tapestries. Each tapestry hung from floor to ceiling and in each one there seemed to be a hole. He found the one he had most recently saw. It was as he had thought. It was a tapestry detailing the age of legends he had learned about in Babylon where magic flowed freely but…it appeared, if he was reading the work right, that the gods had once walked among men. In the center of this tapestry there were two central figures with their faces seemingly burned out.

He moved to the next tapestry. More of the same. The next, the figures that were burnt moved further and further to the periphery. He found himself now at the desk. He started looking through the pages but they looked like they were all blank. The only movement, the only other person here, was the woman he knew as Khannah working the loom. He turned to look at the next row.

“I wouldn’t go down there if I were you,” came the priestess’ voice. “I never invite you here to so you can go gawking at my work.” She seemed so casual as if this was always the expected outcome.

“There is something I am forgetting,” Nim said at last as he walked the length of the temple back to the loom. “Something just out of reach. I saw…I saw visions of…myself. From my time. Each time different but each time ending the same way. I touch this tapestry,” he motioned to her work, “and then everything is gone. But…” he noticed she was watching him very attentively as if this monologue was the most unexpected thing in the world, “I saw…I saw…”

Khannah had stopped her weaving, her hands in her lap and turned toward Nim. She waited patiently, almost expectedly.

Nim chose to change the subject. “Can these parallel timelines…that’s what these are yes?” He said trying to piece together what this temple symbolized, “are they all the same reality or just dreams?”

Khannah seemed to sigh as if this was not the direction she wanted and she seemed to recite from rote memory, “what you see before you is time trying to right a wrong. I do not know what that wrong is. I only have access to this loom. I have also been trying to solve that myster. Right now I am working on keeping Artexerxes II, king of the Persian empire, the hell out of Egypt. He can bugger off and go find some other country to ravage,” her hands worked as she talked. “I will give him Cyprus but he is not getting his hands on my country,” she said, a contrite kind of satisfaction in her voice.

Nim was struck at how this all seemed to be business as usual for the priestess, and she didn’t seemed at all concerned now that what was happening was anything different. “I saw Anahita. She was telling me to remember something and I do not know what it is. She did something to the tapestry,” he pointed to the hole in the tapestry that she was currently working on. “That. Can’t you fix that?”

Khannah shrugged. “I come here and it is like that. The loom weaves as it wills and I just guide it. Sometimes I start and there is only a whole fabric here. And other times I come and it has already decided there must be a hole.” However, she changed the subject back, “You said Anahita. Do you know who you are, Nim?”

“I know that Anahita must have sacrificed herself in some way to save me. I know that we are in some way now the same entity in a single body. I do not know though. Or rather, I cannot remember, what it is I am or who I am. My last vision I saw…Anahita see me. Not the me she was with but she saw me and seemed to give me a command. I did not hear it though.”

“This is different,” Khannah said as she once again set down her work. She thought for a moment and then said, “I cannot tell you what it means. But something was done to catch these instances in a paradox. Sometimes I see you come and go. Sometimes you stay and look around but always you disappear and it’s always bound to repeat itself. Whenever I see the holes in the tapestry, I know you are coming.”

Nim walked around the area while he thought about what Khannah had said. He noticed that each pillar represented a time period. When he peered around the column the next seemed to be more of the same. Perhaps then, the main pillars were the time period and the consecutive layers of pillars after were each time period trying to correct the issues of the main pillar.

Nim was starting to see the bigger picture but what he wasn’t getting was what he was expected to do about it. What was it that Anahita wanted to tell him and what time period was that. As he walked around he border of the temple he noticed there was one tapestry that was whole. The missing piece of the puzzle showed him and Anahita in the same mosaic. It wasn’t just him but Anahita too. “This one is whole?” It was a question more than anything else.

“I noticed that too,” Khannah said looking up from her work, watching him thoughtfully. “It seems the end is finally coming. But before then, it looks like you have some visitors.” She snapped and suddenly the sounds of rushing water filled his eyes. He blinked and he was back on the ground in the ruined temple, bleeding out on the floor and gasping for air.

“Thank you for your service, Commander Nim. You have done an excellent job leading me directly to the loom,” the condescending tones were familiar to him as he looked up and saw King Artexerxes walk through the door. Behind him followed Vash and Ishtar. Behind them guards had Bahar bound and gagged. He would have been more surprised by their betrayal if it were the first time. However, all he could see was the ebony figure of Anahita swaying from Ishtar’s hip. If only he wasn’t dying…

“Why?” He asked the couple standing behind the figure of the king, at the moment ignoring the most powerful man in the world. “How?” He asked, clutching his side where the would was threatening to take his life.

“Because I had them followed. It was my order to send them to Babylon. It surprises me they also didn’t think I would be keeping tabs on them. Anyway, they arrived in Sousa and once I told them that I knew, it was easy to extract what they told you. I also had a second unit with the one you so deftly dismantled coming to this forsaken backwaters. And now. I have no more use for you.”

“Guards. Kill him. Make sure he is dead this time.”

What was Nim to do? This was the end. He had failed whatever it is he was supposed to do. Everyone was dead because of him. He had no more strength length to even summon magic. His body felt like it was ripping itself apart and now the only thing left to do was embrace the sweet embrace of death.

"Say my name," a voice so distant, so sweet, lilted and danced into his mind.

"A..." he said as the last thing he saw were boots. "Anahita."

Word Count - 3288