Chapter Text
Nighttime falls upon the Grove of Epiphany. All becomes doused in silence, and the dark envelopes the litter of trees and buildings like a soft, comforting veil. The hustle and bustle of scholars grinds to a halt. Many retreat to bed, letting their dreams whisk them away tonight, and lead them further in their pursuit of knowledge another day yet. Should one wish to remain awake, working through the myriads of mysteries that Amphoreus, and if one were bold enough, the worlds beyond have to offer — the Grove glows a subtle, eerie green, guiding their way forth.
The light of the Grove is just out of reach from Anaxa’s residence. He wishes only to see it when he wills to, and not when he attempts to sleep, for any sight of it disturbs the absolute quiet of his mind. On nights like these, however, he believes he may just become convinced to change his mind.
Nights, where he stays up not because he wills to. Nights, where his head begins to ache more, until the tension is unbearable. Nights, where he is unable to get any reprieve from his eye that constantly jabbed, nabbed, grasped at his skull. The shadows around him loom large, creep up, and crawl to devour him if he is not alert; and whether or not he becomes choked by them, Anaxa’s chest constricts, disgusting, horrid cold sweat dripping seemingly from his every pore. No amount of knowledge lifts this pain, but Anaxa muses that, perhaps, seeing the Grove’s glow may just remind him enough of his purpose to jolt himself wide awake. Flush into him the clarity that he prides himself on, long gone on these treacherous nights.
Typically, Anaxa waits these periods out in solitude. He knows these moments pass, and that the weight in his chest will lift. What he also knows, is that if anyone ever witnesses him in such a state, their impression of him will crumble. His credibility, the rationality he boasts freely, and his dignity as the sharp-witted, all-knowing and wise. His ability to lead his faction. These qualities simply do not, and cannot coincide with uncontrolled bouts of neuroticism.
Unfortunately for Anaxa, he has promised to meet with Phainon tonight. It strikes when he is preparing the guest bed for Phainon, in the form of a thorned tendril twisting at his chest. It is sharp, and it digs deep. His heart skips, and a fiery pain abruptly rips throughout his body. His masked eye flashes white in his vision, and he cannot help but wince, hand flying to cover it, as though it can do something to stave off the impending doom that Anaxa knew was sure to follow.
Phainon, staring out the window into the starry sky from across the room, turns around to face him at the sound. Anaxa hoped the shadows would cease then, noticing that they had a witness. They dare not face anyone that is not him, Anaxa tells himself. Instead, the pain grows, and he drops to his knees, clutching at the bed corner as he attempts and fails to quell his wheezing. At some point, he notices that Phainon has materialised beside him, and vaguely tries to bat him off. The next thing he notices is that he has been transported onto the guest bed, snug and cosy under the covers, with Phainon sitting across him on the sofa just by the bedside.
He has no words. There is nothing to appropriate to say.
-
An hour passes. Anaxa sits quietly under the covers, staring pensively. This is a look that Phainon has seen several times. Anaxa, Phainon thinks, has a few distinct expressions. He does not show much emotion at all, even in the few specific faces that he has. He wonders if Anaxa ever wanted to peel away that elusive eyepatch of his, that the eye underneath would reveal all that he felt.
Anaxa always has a dazed look about him. If he is feeling particularly joyful, it shows up in the tiniest lift of both corners of his lips. If he feels disapproving, his eyebrows knit together slightly, although he looks more confused at your incompetence if anything. If he is angered, his gaze scorches into the ground, the fury of scholars before him coalescing in those elegant features of his. In all his expressions, his steely, foggy eye is a constant.
Anaxa is often solemn. He is solemn in his speech, often serious, depressive, even, and laces only the truth with no sliver of anything else. Today, Phainon sees the rare seed of hesitance take root in his countenance, and darkly counts himself lucky. Lucky, that Anaxa somehow trusts him enough not to have decided to murder him in cold blood, having exposed this hidden side that his scholarly self most certainly perceives to be weak.
Phainon waits. He has always been good at waiting, and he does not mind waiting longer. His patience is unending, unlike Anaxa’s, which he notices is beginning to wear thin. Anaxa fidgets on the bed, clutching at his sleeve uncomfortably. His mouth opens, closes, then opens again.
“I have… Not told you about my siblings,” Anaxa’s words finally pierce the silence. His shadow flickers in the candlelight upon the wall, fuzzy, uncertain. Phainon gazes at him, trying to meet his eye, and finds that which is always so intense and concentrated has become utterly unreachable. “It has been plaguing me. It is unbecoming of me.”
This confuses Phainon. What does this have to do with whatever had occurred just then?
Instead of voicing this, Phainon plays along. “You’re allowed to have feelings, y’know,” he says encouragingly. He leans upon the arm of the sofa, and his legs lay side by side, steady. “I’m glad the great Anaxagoras trusts me enough to share the repertoire of emotions that lay deep within. Truly am honoured.”
Anaxa lightly huffs, shifting under the thin blanket. “If you are going to act that way, I’d rather not say. I will return to normalcy within a matter of hours, and you can forget this ever happened.”
Phainon puts his arms up innocently. “It wasn’t sarcasm, and I didn’t mean to offend. No, I really am glad. How many people can say Anaxagoras has blessed them with his backstory?”
“I really will not tell you if you’re going to make such a big deal out of it,” says Anaxa, not unkindly. When Phainon shakes his head, chuckling softly, Anaxa sighs. “But yes. Perhaps you may find that you understand me better with this knowledge.”
“My pleasure,” says Phainon earnestly. His stare and Anaxa’s are yet to meet. “When you’re ready.”
A pause. And then another. Anaxa is deathly still, and it almost seems as though he has become marble. Still, Phainon waits, watching the shadows cast around the dimly lit room.
“It is difficult for me, not to speak to disseminate knowledge,” Anaxa says, quietly. “Not knowing how to refute something with alternate logic, knowing only a solid past.”
“…I understand,” says Phainon emphatically, albeit growing more befuddled. It is not often that he feels somewhat duped by Anaxa, typically so forthcoming in his words, now dodging him like a serpent amongst shrubs. “I didn’t come from an ideal background either. I know what it’s like to have a tough past.”
Something in Anaxa’s gaze shifts. Phainon can almost hear it, ‘you don’t know what I’m thinking, unless you let me speak and hear the words from my own mouth’, but this does not come as he anticipates. Instead, Anaxa gingerly nods.
“They are a few years older,” says Anaxa, looking outside the window by the end of his bed. The moon hangs serenely amongst the light wisps of clouds, casting a soft glow upon his face. His eye twinkles as it stares into the night, searching for memories dredged within the dark. “Stronger, seen as more intelligent than I. My father once told me he’d planned on giving up on my future to favour theirs.”
This information takes Phainon by surprise. Many thoughts cross his mind, the first of which comes Anaxa’s identity as the revered Nousporian visage. He is careful of what he says next, imagining just how many other people would jump to raise this as a supposed counterargument to the ridiculousness of his father’s judgement. Before he speaks, Phainon keeps in mind Anaxa’s peculiar notion regarding others’ ‘unsolicited empathy based upon nothing but foolish assumptions’, and thinks he should tread carefully.
“In what way?” Phainon asks curiously. “The Grove of Epiphany… You were brought up here, right? Did your father plan on raising particularly outstanding scholars or something?”
“I could not tell you,” says Anaxa. “I have thought of it many times, what it was that he truly wanted from us. The easy answer would be to say yes, that was his line of thought. But plans come with effort, and he exerted naught. When there is a mismatch between action and thought, the only truth that remains is the former.”
Phainon nods in understanding. Tilts his head, to encourage him to continue.
“My siblings were unfortunate,” Anaxa continues. His hand grips at his knee, but he is otherwise placid. “Craved not for the life of a scholar, but for the praise of one. Within the Grove, the only seeds that sprout are ones who yearn for the sky, due to one’s own ambition to grow alone. The ones who crave others’ applause in this pursuit are bound to wilt.”
“So wilt they did,” he says, face carefully neutral. “Until they both hit the ground.”
Phainon scratches at his cheek. “I see,” he says, attempting to take in Anaxa’s words, “But what about this is troubling you?”
“Precisely. What about this is troubling me?” Anaxa echoes, his tone contemplative. “For years, I have focused on nothing but my work for the Nousporists. I have become the person my father wanted, the glowing branch of a grand tree whose name he could parade around. I have restored his hopes in me. What more could I want?”
“Are you sad for them?” Phainon suggests, taking it as a genuine question. “Your siblings, I mean. Where and how are they now?”
Anaxa laughs. It is a hollow sound that rivals the darkness outside the room, and a sound that Phainon, in the time that he had known him, has not heard before. “If only I can spare that empathy. And I should, shouldn’t I? That’s what a benevolent person would do. Recognise his brethren’s struggles, and be compassionate. Forgiving,” he spits out the last word, with a passion seldom observed.
“…Depends on the situation,” says Phainon after musing briefly, giving a nonchalant shrug. He leans back against the sofa, shifting to a more comfortable position. “I once heard a legend, where to succeed the throne of a mythical kingdom, one must fall all his brethren,” he recounted, “Twenty, thirty, forty… Until every last drop of blood dries. When you’re raised like that, it’s hard to be sympathetic.”
“Impressive story. However, that doesn’t apply to me,” Anaxa is quick to shoot back. “There is no kingdom. There are no twenty brothers. The blood we shed is invisible.”
Phainon resists a frown and a sudden pang of irritation. “Okay, sorry,” he says, once again raising his arms. He laughs then, attempting to diffuse the air that suddenly seems to have grown heavier around him. “Silence is golden. Yeah, yeah.”
Anaxa turns to him, unimpressed. Phainon, for the first time tonight, finally catches his eye. He finds that even under this lighting, or the lack thereof, his eye is sunken by an indescribable weight. His cheeks are hollow, and his skin is pale. He now also sees there is an insignificant, but present tremor in his fingers.
“Wait, okay, before all this, have you been eating?” Phainon asks before he can stop himself. “Sleeping? What have you been doing?”
“That’s why I said it was unbecoming,” Anaxa says, letting slip a sigh. “I don’t want to have to explain my lifestyle habits to you.”
“So you haven’t been,” exclaims Phainon, spreading his arms in protest. “You’re worse than Mydei, I swear. At least he eats when he’s sad!”
“Don’t be dramatic,” Anaxa says, rolling his eyes. “I’m not dead yet.”
“Gods above,” Phainon laments, shaking his head. “I don’t know how you live like this, Anaxa—“ he nearly fumbles that dreadfully long name, “—goras. Anaxagoras.”
“Well, this was a productive evening,” says Anaxa. “You may as well start making your way out. There are plenty more inns in the area.”
“This is no way to treat a guest,” Phainon huffs, “you haven’t even finished your story yet.”
“You changed the topic”, says Anaxa simply, “I didn’t like the direction it was going in. And, in a conversation where neither party is enjoying themselves, one can simply exit the premises.”
Phainon looks at Anaxa, flabbergasted. “Has it ever occurred to you that ‘one can simply’,” he emulates his companion’s tone jestingly, “change the topic again?”
“There is a reason why conversation topics move on,” Anaxa explains, as though his line of thought is self-evident, “there is a natural pacing when two or more exchange words. It is like riding the Dromas in that great city of yours. You ride along a set path, you get off when it no longer suits you, and the Dromas cannot turn back until it finishes its route.”
“We’re not Dromases?” Phainon interjects, furrowing his brows in incredulity. “I mean, I like the analogy, but conversations aren’t quite like that, dear friend.”
“I want to hear what you have to say,” he continues, directing a sincere look at Anaxa. He shifts closer to where Anaxa sits, the curtains brushing softly at his broad shoulders. “When you’re with me, there’s no need for any social rules, or anything of the sort to apply. Just say what you want.”
To his credit, Anaxa laughs and pulls the blanket closer to his chest. “That’s what I always do,” he says, voice low, “You know that does not make me popular with the masses.”
“Since when did you care about public opinion?” Phainon asks, scoffing lightheartedly.
“Rarely,” says Anaxa. His lips twitch, as though he wants to smile, but remain decidedly flat. “But this notion does not extend to…” he hesitates, “friendships. It would be easier if it did.”
“Hey,” says Phainon, smiling warmly, “I’m glad you think we’re friends. And it’s precisely because we’re friends that you can tell me anything you want. You don’t have to be an impeccable scholar to be my friend, you can just be whatever. If you think about it, isn’t that much easier than being a scholar?”
It takes Anaxa a moment to find his words. “It doesn’t matter what it means for me to be your friend,” he says, “it is not my personal meaning that accounts for the friendship. It is the impact of my words upon how you perceive me.”
Phainon stares blankly, resisting the urge to scratch at his cheek again. “Okay. I have to say, I’ve lost you there.”
“It matters not,” says Anaxa. “I digressed, and it wasn’t my intention to expand on the nature of friendship.”
“Fine,” Phainon relents, sensing the end of that topic. Anaxa gives him a grateful nod. They sit in silence for a moment before Phainon speaks again. “Then, what do you want to talk about?”
Anaxa does not answer. Instead, he brushes off the blanket, goes to dangle his legs off the bed, where cold feet find wooden planks as he begins to lift himself. Phainon instinctively rises from his seating, arms darting out in an attempt to catch him, just as he did when he collapsed. This time, however, Anaxa is able to bat his arms away, and he does so without hesitation.
“Don’t touch me,” he says flatly. “Rule number five. Nothing has changed just because I made a show of heaving before you.”
Phainon spreads his arms, palms out. “Yeah, yeah,” he says, in a higher pitch than he would have liked. “Geez. You’re like a spikey chimera.”
“There are no spikey chimera,” says Anaxa as he stands. His hand finds the wall just beside the bed, his palm tracing the rough surface as he begins making his way to the window by Phainon’s side. “Even if there were, it is a metaphor better suited for Mydeimos.”
Phainon snorts, settling back upon the sofa. On the side, he keeps a watchful eye on any major wobbles of Anaxa’s legs. “Yeah, well. Goes without saying, doesn’t it?”
Anaxa, again, does not respond. He extends a hand to shut the tiniest gap of the open window, no doubt opened by Phainon, and turns to meet the gaze of his companion.
“I don’t want to talk about this,” he says, recalling Phainon’s previous question. “But since you’ve seen me in my sorry state, and considering you’ve tucked me in bed like a child, I think I owe you some form of explanation.”
“You owe me nothing,” says Phainon, shaking his head genially. With a smile, he adds, “maybe some mead. I have to say you shocked me half to death when you fainted, and I still have no idea what you’re on about.”
Anaxa scoffs. “Mead. How uncouth. You know it serves only to cloud the mind.”
“So, Dromas comparison,” Phainon interjects. “Do you actually want to talk about mead, or should I take you off the Dromas and walk backwards?”
Anaxa’s breath hitches. For what reason, Phainon cannot tell.
“Fine. I will stop evading,” says Anaxa, his arms crossing over his chest as he turns to gaze outwards. “It is a waste of both our times.”
Another stretch of silence descends upon them. Phainon watches, quietly, as Anaxa searches his mind for his next words, amazed at how much strain this is clearly causing him. This is a scholar who can speak for hours, preaching the philosophies of the world with the familiarity of the back of his own hand. Yet, whatever is on his mind has rendered him speechless. Just what could he be thinking, or withholding?
Phainon waits. Again, Anaxa’s face is indecipherable. He refuses to acknowledge Phainon’s presence, essentially melting into the wall with how unmoving he has become. Phainon always finds it eerie when Anaxa does this. When he turns from someone who cannot be ignored, spewing blasphemy on the streets, to a mere speck of something taking up little to no space.
Seconds stretch into minutes, and he wonders whether Anaxa will speak at all — until finally, those lips part.
“My pursuit of knowledge as my current self,” begins Anaxa quietly, “is entirely segregated from that of my past self. I have made it so. Ensured its certainty. But no matter what I do, my past lingers behind me.”
“Envision the Golden Scapegoat of Amphoreus,” he says, extending an arm to the side, as he always does in teaching mode. “On good days, its shadow is six steps behind. It follows, but it is no trouble to me. I know where it is.”
“It is when I take a wrong turn that we collide. When we do, it results in what you saw,” he explains, looking towards the bed corner. “I yearn to light the flame to douse the darkness. My method of doing so is seeking and sharing the truth, becoming the light of the evernight. Truly, evernight or not, nothing gives me more joy. But when I am not careful,” a slight, almost unnoticeable crack slips into his voice, “when I do not keep a watchful eye on my past self, the evernight encroaches.”
Phainon takes in a long breath as he gauges Anaxa’s flickering shadow upon the wall. He gives Anaxa another moment to speak, and when Anaxa does not, he does.
“You speak in metaphors,” he says calmly, putting a thoughtful hand to his chin. “I think I understand what you mean. You’re trying to say you’re like the Golden Scapegoat in those tales, right? But for the sake of my not misunderstanding you, could you try to phrase your words more directly?”
Anaxa looks down. “My past self. It is bitter, vengeful, angry. It makes dawn scurry in fear, and no matter how bright the sun appears, the shadows eclipse all.” His voice is but a mere whisper. “I am overcome by pain of all manners, and in the process, I lose myself. Isn’t it risible? One who is so adamant on being the truth of the world… Overcome by something as insignificant as one’s past.”
Phainon shakes his head. “No. We all have ghosts of the past, but when their wails are louder, it’s more difficult to focus on what’s before you rather than behind, no?”
“I am able to silence them,” says Anaxa, a small furrow in his brows. A hand lifts to fix the fringe before his eyes, so it falls flat before them again. “Utilise them, even, and I do so immaculately. Today, I have faltered in your presence. I’m telling you this, Phainon, to let you know it shan’t happen again. So, if you were planning on using this against me in a future altercation, it will be a waste of your efforts. I prefer contentions to reach a productive ending.”
Confusion returns to Phainon at this unexpectedly charged response. Initially, he is shocked at the implications of Anaxa’s words, then slowly, ire begins bubbling within him.
“I’m your friend,” he says, eyes wide, as the anger simmers. “You said so yourself. Sure, Amphoreus is currently filled with strife, and it could be a good opportunity to strike if I wanted to, but never once have I thought of… Using this against you?”
Is Anaxa telling him this, because he thinks his own explanation a shield? Because he thinks if not, Phainon will utilise it as leverage? Is he treating this as a war tactic, because he cannot trust him? Using vulnerability as his own weapon, pointing it at Phainon, implying he is acting on self-defence when no advances have been made? Making him out to be the bad guy, when all he had shown him had been geniality? It is a twisted idea to him.
“If I’d wanted to hurt you, I would have when you were struggling right there,” he says, his tone low. He stays seated, but he pulls out his trusty dagger then, seemingly out of nowhere, and aims it at the gap between the planks beneath the bed corner. He throws, and it lands expertly in a place where it does not scar Anaxa’s tiles. His posture seems casual, but the plap of the blade sticking upon the ground resounds throughout the room, a sharp warning in the stilted air of the room. “It would have been easy,” he says, forcing his gaze upon his companion’s. “Don’t think me the fool, Anaxa.”
When Anaxa grants him another suffocating stretch of silence, Phainon cannot bear it. He stands, shoving closer to Anaxa, and effectively towers over him. “I can’t believe you,” he says, wanting to laugh out of sheer ludicrousness. He moves closer still, now trapping Anaxa between himself and the wall. “We’re on the same side here, but you’re treating me like I’m some backstabbing enemy, after everything we’ve been through together. What game are you playing?”
Annoyingly, Anaxa shows no hint of fear even when cornered. No constriction of pupil, no flinch, no raise of eyebrows. In fact, he shows no hint of anything — at least when he was incapacitated, he’d acted somewhat human. He trembled beforehand, before whatever nonsense he’d spit in Phainon’s face, but he is now looking away as though he is unworthy of even a single reaction. Like he’s any other passerby, who will never even get close to understanding his brilliant mind.
“See, I’d be less irate if you’d just get off your high horse for a minute,” says Phainon, fiery eyes alight in the dark. He doesn’t know why he is so angered, when he is usually relatively mild-tempered, but something about Anaxa’s face, and his words, are truly bugging him in this current moment. “No. I thought you did, when you were talking about your siblings, your past, about being friends. But, even those moments of vulnerability had to be some kind of planned-out response to counter whatever paranoia you spun up in your head, huh?”
“Are you done?” Anaxa cuts him off, sparing him a glance now. Even though he still remains impassive, Phainon spies a glow in his eye that he has seldom seen — a flicker of disdain.
“This interaction not going the way you wanted it to?” Phainon seizes the opportunity throws a jab despite himself, staring Anaxa down. A little voice inside him tells him he should not stoop down even one singular level, and remain amiable, but he swats it aside. “Maybe it’s time you learnt that the world doesn’t just revolve around your schemes. Or, whatever schemes you think I have.”
The air between them is still, thick. Phainon takes this moment to reassess their situation, their bond, and soon decides this is not a fight he wants to keep up. His gaze softens slightly. He looks to the side, and he steps away with a sigh. “I harbour no ill will towards you. I just think I don’t deserve to be thought of in such a despicable way. Frankly, I’m quite hurt.”
Anaxa is trying to search Phainon’s eyes. What for, Phainon cannot guess. Honestly, Phainon has grown tired of trying to. The patience that he prides himself on, is, of course, still something to commend, but he decided it no longer extended to Anaxa. At least for tonight. They can begin anew tomorrow, but right now, he senses he cannot deal with him for much longer.
“You…” says Anaxa, his tone eerily slow, faint, as his lone eye scans Phainon up and down, “harbour no ill will? Don’t make me laugh.”
Phainon furrows his brows. Anaxa remains magnetised to the wall, it seems, as he continues. “Yes, you could have taken me out when I was at my most vulnerable. But to my enemies, what better fate is there than to see my face, awake, alive, fully aware, contorted in fear at their prowess? What sick joy do they derive from trapping me between the walls of my own room and their hands?” He pauses, palms sweaty against the surface behind him, “you think they would grant their prey a merciful kill before they play with it? This isn’t how the world works.”
“What are you…” Phainon asks, trailing off. Under the moonlight, which has steadily grown brighter as time passed, he notices that Anaxa’s hand has begun shaking. A hefty sigh of guilt leaves his mouth, and he shakes his head. “I’m sorry I got aggressive. I just, I thought we had something. Some form of camaraderie. To hear that you think of me as someone untrustworthy really got to me. It confuses me.”
Phainon gestures towards Anaxa widely. He swiftly swings his arm up, then down. “All of this confuses me. You collapse, you don’t tell me what’s going on even after you say you want to, or don’t want to — I don’t know,” he puts his hands to his head, “you tell me we’re friends, you tell me a story, what you say suggests you trust me, and then you turn around and tell me that not, you actually don’t. You tell me not to hurt you. And it seems I have hurt you, scared you, even.”
Anaxa does not speak. He grasps one hand over the other, and decidedly looks away.
“…Look,” says Phainon, after one final glance at Anaxa. “Maybe it’s just late. Maybe you’re still shaken up, or something, from your fall. I get it. It’s sudden.” He begins gathering his belongings into a sack — not that there was much to pack, since he’d only planned on unloading after Anaxa had finished preparing the guest bed for him. There is no need for that now. “Sorry this turned out to be so awful, I can’t imagine what’s going through your mind. Based on what you’ve said, I…” he falters, struggling to find the right words, “I don’t know. I think I’m going to need a long night’s sleep.”
Phainon raises the sack and lifts it upon his shoulder. He walks towards the door. “Thanks for the hospitality.” Or the lack thereof, he thinks, but keeps silent. “Good you said there’s a few inns around here, huh? In case something like this happens.” He knows full well Anaxa has his eye on his back. “Are you really still going to keep silent?”
The lack of response makes him turn the knob. The door slams behind him right after, and just like that, Phainon disappears into the night.
Anaxa is left to stare at the dagger, still lodged by his bedside, and wills himself to feel something about Phainon’s departure. Wills his weak legs, weak self to move, and say something, to stop his companion from leaving. Nothing comes, and yet his hand trembles, chest aching beneath it.