Not to Learn, but to Remember (Sanctuary)

[Luminar]

He offered his palm, a silent invitation to the connection. The moment stretched, weighted by the unspoken possibilities contained in that contact. Theron held his breath not in fear, but in anticipation of the inevitable shift. He had asked to confront the depths of his own continuity, and he would not retreat.

As Anton’s bare hand met his, the effect was immediate, visceral, and astonishingly strong. It was not a gentle brush but an instantaneous, magnetic surge that seemed to breach the carefully maintained barrier between his inner and outer worlds.

First came the acid taste of the past, the brutal, crushing knowledge of something. A wave of profound trauma, heavy with the weight of chains and the memory of inflicted wounds. The absolute, degrading reality of servitude and humiliation surged like bile in his throat, tied to the echoes of abuse one might have had suffered as a slave.

The darkness was instantly countered by the fierce, unyielding bonfire of a new life. The emotion was an iron-willed, burning determination. The refusal to be broken, the decision to seize control. This was instantly accompanied by a deep, righteous anger against his captors, feeding the relentless surge of pure power that allowed him to rise, conquer, and command. It was the thrill and the absolute cost of liberation.

Following the storm of battle and ascent, the long, stable reign asserted itself. He felt the cold, calculating satisfaction of wisdom. The tactical genius of rule. This was intertwined with a relentless, consuming ambition that stretched out for centuries, demanding growth and dominance, backed by the sheer, unquantifiable weight of immense power that had shaped his existence for most of a millennia.

But at the bedrock of all that power, a cold, crystalline tremor erupted: deep, instinctual fear, the constant companion of one who ruled through strength and knew the cost of impending failure that could not be side-stepped. This fear was sharp, punctuated by the frenetic energy of ancient, terrifying battles. The scent of blood and burning, the sound of tearing metal and the death screams of enemies.

Theron felt the overwhelming confluence of these feelings. The trauma and the power, the abuse and the ambition coalescing and rushing toward the surface, intensified by Anton's touch. He felt his own stoicism bend, the muscles in his jaw tightening against the pressure. His exterior poise remained, a masterpiece of iron-willed control, but internally, he was a maelstrom of his own history, exposed.

[Anton]

Anton followed the emotions within Theron, allowing them to guide his movements. They flew threw Theron. Trauma and humiliation forced away by iron-willed determination and ambition. There was anger there, deep and foreboding. There was also fear. The moments stretched as Anton felt it all. Theron's own stoicism was undermined by everything he felt in those seconds of time.

When Anton let go, it was done quickly. It wasn't fear. He wasn't afraid of what he could do or even the revelations he had by witnessing Theron's emotional map, but it had been unexpected. The shifting had been quick and abrupt. Emotions didn't change like that most of the time, unless something forced it.

Theron's face hadn't changed when it was over, but the surging emotions were there in his calm exterior. Anton stepped back as he let go and took a seat, taking deep breaths. "I felt everything you did, but that's it. I'm sure more was revealed to you in that exchange. Still, my promise to you is that I won't reveal what I...you...felt." Anton wondered if he had seen scenes from a former life as well.

The Luminar was an enigma though. Perhaps this was true with others, but he had never looked for it or simply that they both had a common purpose in this endeavor. "Something was different though. Some emotions," he didn't say which ones. "Were less malleable than they usually are. Stonger, more solid, deeper. Like they had a stronger connection. Never felt anything like that before."

[Luminar]

When Anton stepped away, Theron did not move much. He stood as though carved from the white stone of the Sanctum itself. The light through the stained glass struck him in long waves of gold and violet, like the world had chosen this moment to mark him. Again.

By while he was composed and still, within, something pleasantly shifted.

The sensations had not been images as he’d half expected. There were no sweeping vistas of past ages, and no broken voice whispering ancient names in his mind. No. It had been feeling. It was like drawing his fingers across the map of his emotional soul drawn out like calligraphy on fire.

Pain. Power. Pride. Fury, yes; strangely, there was fury enough to set the world alight, and hold it there until it begged for forgiveness. But beneath all of it blazed conviction.

He had always known there was a structure within him. Something monumental. Not just belief in something larger, but the quiet, maddening certainty that he was part of what was large. That he was the scaffolding others stood upon. He had never spoken it aloud, never dared give it language, but the feeling had always been there, coiled beneath the surface like a serpent waiting for its name.

Important. That was the word. He did not know who he had been before, but he knew he mattered.

Theron slowly closed his eyes and drew in a steadying breath. The sensation of being seen so clearly and deeply cracked something within him. A momentary fissure in the wall he kept between the man and the mask. But only momentary.

When emotion flared, control was quick to follow, and when his eyes opened again, they were calm. The storm had passed, and all that remained were still waters.

“You are... not mistaken,” he said. “What you touched is not of this moment alone. There are feelings within me I have never earned. Anger with no source. Pride with no cause. And certainty... with no proof. These emotions do not belong solely to the life I remember.”

He lifted his gaze to the far side of the library, to the high windows that wept colored light across the floor. Beyond them, the sun still shone, indifferent to the weight of revelation. The world did not shift. The marble did not crack. But he had changed.

What startled him most was how easily he accepted the notion of reincarnation.

He, Theron, raised in the logic-fortresses that was Di Inferi, whose traditions once excoriated superstition and sang only of science was now contemplating the existence of the soul like a man turning over a stone and finding grubs beneath.

Still... certainty was a seductress. One could be fooled by their own need for meaning, and Theron would not let himself become a slave to untested truths. It could be a hallucination or a projection of unmet desire like some subconscious narrative masquerading as memory.

He turned his head slightly, gaze falling with calculated precision on the man surrounded by books and centuries. Lucien.

Theron didn’t smile exactly, but there was a tilt to his chin. The kind of expression that often preceded one of his more dangerous ideas.

“Fascinating,” he said, letting the syllables bloom like smoke. “A phenomenon worthy of record. But even the most extraordinary of impressions must be verified.”

He took a half-step to the side, casual but intentional, placing himself so Lucien was clearly within Anton’s line of sight.

Theron’s hand drifted outward not fully toward Anton or Lucien, but in a loose gesture that beckoned... invitation. Suggestion.

“Lucien, you’ve always had a fondness for scholarship. It would be… academically dishonest, wouldn’t it, to let this moment pass without corroboration?”

He did not command. He never did. But his voice had that velvet gravity that made refusal feel like a deviation from the natural order.

[Lucien]

Lucien watched with open curiosity as the unusual communion began, hands clasped in front of him. Mostly, it was Theron’s expression he observed: the hardening of his jaw, as though in endurance; the intensity of his inward concentration. Afterwards Anton lowered himself into a chair, clearly spent of spirit. The Luminar did not move.

Though he listened to the two men discuss the moment, Lucien’s own expression had become deeply thoughtful. He retook his own chair, began carefully and quietly clearing his desk in order to retrieve a leather notebook, which he laid open before him. It was an archaic ritual of recordkeeping, but one he enjoyed for that very reason. The nib of his pen was scratching softly when Theron’s suggestion hung an unspoken weight in the air. One of certain expectations. It softened half a smile to his lips.

They’d known each other too many years for Lucien not to second guess the moment he’d felt Theron’s sharp gaze turned in his direction.

“Not simply fond, Luminar. Committed. However, in this instance I believe I would contaminate the data,” he said, gently placing down his pen. His full attention returned to the moment, and he made a subtle gesture with his gloved hands before his fingers clasped once more. Lucien could not manipulate the veil, but he was not without gifts of his own. Much like Anton, he would not use them unethically. But consent required explanation, and Anton was yet a Seeker – uncertain how long his path would stay with them. “I would recommend one of the Veilwardens, or perhaps the young Aethemancer. Should any of them be willing, of course.”

Lucien’s gaze turned briefly to the man in question, kindly in aspect, before it returned to Theron. There was not an ounce of insubordination, but certainly a gentle guidance. He was not a rash man, and in scholarliness he was ever patient. “The act appears to have taken a toll. Perhaps some refreshment, and an invitation to stay a while longer?” To Anton, he continued. ”I confess curiosity, Anton, if you were amenable to the offer, and an opportunity to further explore this nuance of your gift among like-minded scholars.” The words were spoken without appeal, but in honesty.

[Luminar]

Theron listened without interruption, his expression composed, his hands folded within the long sleeves of his vestments. Yet Lucien’s words landed with precision, striking not at pride or authority, but at something rarer: judgment.

He had been ready to press forward with testing and probing. To strip truth from the moment regardless of the cost. That instinct was old, older than the Brotherhood itself. Theron had never pretended otherwise. People were instruments; moments were levers. If a sacrifice purchased clarity, he had never hesitated to weigh its worth.

But Lucien was right. Theron’s gaze drifted, just slightly, to Anton. The man sat still, shoulders drawn in, breath coming deep and tired. There was a pallor to him now of depletion like candle burned low after too sudden a draft. Theron felt a flicker of something like irritation at himself, quickly banked.

He inclined his head once, a gesture subtle enough that only Lucien would recognize it for what it was: concession.

“You are correct both in principle and in practice I would not have you compromise your integrity, Lucien. Nor our findings.”

He studied Anton then, not as a tool, but as a presence newly entered into the orbit of something vast. The Veil had not brushed Anton by chance. Of that, Theron was now convinced. Chance was a word used by men who lacked the vocabulary for design.

“You have given more than was asked of you today,” Theron said at last. His tone carried warmth, restrained but genuine. “And you have done so with courage and restraint. You have my thanks, Anton. For your trust. And for your honesty.”

“What occurred in the Chamber of Echoes, and what followed here, cannot be dismissed as anomaly. Nor should it be rushed into spectacle.” His gaze flicked briefly to the shelves surrounding them. “Understanding requires time. If you are willing, I would have you remain with us. Not as a subject, nor as an experiment, but as a participant in your own becoming. We here who can help you refine what you possess. Teach you its limits. Perhaps even its purpose. And in doing so, you may yet help us understand what waits behind the Veil in ways we have not before.”