Chapter 27: The Weight of Waiting
Lucien had once believed that time was impartial.
It moved.
People did not.
That was the arrangement.
Entire civilizations had risen and fallen beneath the same stars. Kingdoms vanished. Oceans changed their shores. Even mountains eventually surrendered to the patient insistence of time.
Waiting, however, appeared to follow different rules.
He stood before the black door in complete silence while a single realization repeated itself with increasingly uncomfortable persistence.
He had asked them to wait.
Not one of them.
All of them.
The Dragon King.
Seraphina.
The Last Witness.
Sol.
And now, apparently, whatever existed beyond the black door.
The pattern was becoming difficult to ignore.
“You look troubled.”
Lucien opened one eye and found Orion watching him with entirely too much amusement.
“I am considering several things.”
“Dangerous.”
“So I've been told.”
Orion smiled.
“Thinking has always been one of your more destructive hobbies.”
“That seems unfair.”
“It isn't.”
The old immortal folded his arms.
“The last time you spent more than a week thinking, reality developed three new laws and lost two existing ones.”
Lucien stared at him.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“Lucien.”
“What?”
“You once argued that gravity was becoming complacent.”
“I continue to believe that statement lacks context.”
“There isn't any.”
Fair.
His attention returned to the black door.
The hand remained resting against its edge. It had not moved since their conversation ended. Somehow, that made everything worse.
The thing beyond the door wasn't demanding answers.
It wasn't asking to be released.
It was simply waiting.
Patiently.
Like everyone else.
The older Lucien eventually sighed.
“You're doing it again.”
Lucien looked toward him.
“Doing what?”
“That expression.”
“I don't have an expression.”
“Yes, you do.”
“No, I don't.”
The man carrying the black sword pointed at him.
“That's the expression.”
Lucien resisted the urge to ask for clarification.
He suspected he wouldn't appreciate the answer.
The Eighth closed his book.
“You're trying to decide whether you deserve it.”
Silence.
Lucien slowly turned toward him.
“I beg your pardon?”
“The waiting.”
The scholar version of himself smiled faintly.
“You're wondering why they stayed.”
“I am not.”
“You are.”
“No.”
“Lucien.”
“What?”
“You've never been particularly difficult to read.”
The Last Witness coughed loudly.
“That is objectively false.”
The Eighth glanced toward him.
“You're emotionally invested.”
“I am not.”
“You taught him how to play cards.”
“That was one time.”
“It was six hundred years.”
Silence.
The Last Witness suddenly found the stars within the Mindscape deeply fascinating.
Interesting.
Lucien was beginning to suspect that every immortal in his life possessed approximately the same emotional maturity.
A deeply concerning realization.
The voice beyond the black door spoke again.
“You're quiet.”
Lucien looked toward the narrow opening.
“I've been informed that I appear troubled.”
“Oh.”
There it was again.
Apparently, he had infected other beings with his verbal habits.
“Is that bad?”
“I don't know.”
“Usually, it means you're thinking.”
“That has also been brought to my attention.”
The voice was silent for a moment.
“You always did that after difficult conversations.”
Interesting.
“How many difficult conversations did we have?”
“Oh.”
The hesitation immediately caught his attention.
“That many?”
“Yes.”
“Remarkable.”
“You cried during most of them.”
Lucien stopped breathing.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
He looked toward the others.
“Is this true?”
No one answered.
That was answer enough.
“I refuse to believe that.”
Seraphina finally smiled.
“You cried when Sol was sad.”
“That doesn't count.”
“You cried when the Dragon King lost his first hatchling.”
The Dragon King immediately looked away.
“You cried when the Last Witness pretended he didn't want to celebrate his birthday.”
The old man looked deeply offended.
“I maintain that birthdays are unnecessary.”
“You cried during your own funeral.”
Lucien went still.
“I beg your pardon?”
The older Lucien winced.
“Ah.”
Lucien was beginning to hate that word with extraordinary passion.
“What do you mean my funeral?”
Silence.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
He looked around the ruined city.
“I had a funeral.”
“Several,” Orion admitted.
“Several?”
“Well, you kept dying.”
“That seems like an administrative problem.”
“We agreed.”
Lucien pressed two fingers against the bridge of his nose.
He wasn't entirely certain when his existence had become this complicated.
The thing beyond the black door laughed softly.
“I remember the first one.”
Silence.
“Of course you do.”
“You said the flowers were excessive.”
“That sounds reasonable.”
“You also sat up halfway through and complained that your portrait was inaccurate.”
The ruined city fell silent.
Lucien stared at the door.
“I did what?”
“You weren't entirely dead yet.”
“That seems like important information.”
“It was very confusing for everyone involved.”
The older Lucien nodded solemnly.
“We still talk about it sometimes.”
Naturally.
“Did the portrait resemble me?”
“No.”
“Then my complaint was justified.”
The hand beyond the door shifted slightly.
“I missed this.”
The simplicity of the statement caught him off guard.
“You missed arguing?”
“I missed you pretending not to care.”
Lucien found himself without an immediate response.
Again.
Dangerous.
That feeling returned.
The one he had begun associating with memories and promises and things that waited.
“You shouldn't have waited.”
The words escaped before he could stop them.
Silence immediately followed.
The dragons lowered their heads.
The older versions of himself looked away.
Even Sol's enormous eyes dimmed slightly.
The voice beyond the door remained quiet for a very long time.
Finally—
“I know.”
Lucien went still.
“You know?”
“Yes.”
“Then why—”
“Because you asked me to.”
There it was.
Always.
Promises.
Lucien hated promises.
No.
That wasn't true.
He hated what they did to people.
“How long?”
The question emerged quietly.
The voice understood immediately.
“I stopped counting after the stars were born.”
Silence.
“You were lonely.”
“Yes.”
The honesty in the answer hurt more than it should have.
“And angry.”
“Yes.”
“That seems reasonable.”
“I thought so too.”
Lucien looked toward the black door.
“Did you hate me?”
“No.”
The answer came instantly.
“Not even once?”
“No.”
“That seems statistically unlikely.”
There was a pause.
“I tried.”
Lucien blinked.
“What?”
“You were gone for a very long time.”
The hand tightened slightly against the edge of the doorway.
“I thought it would hurt less if I hated you.”
Silence.
“It didn't work.”
The Infinite Mindscape had gone completely still.
No stars moved.
No chains rattled.
There was only the door.
And the unbearable weight of someone admitting they had spent eternity trying and failing to hate him.
“Oh.”
“There it is again.”
Lucien ignored that.
“I am beginning to suspect I owe a great many people apologies.”
“Yes,” said everyone simultaneously.
He chose to ignore them.
The voice beyond the door continued quietly.
“Do you remember what you said before you left?”
“No.”
“You apologized.”
That surprised him.
“I did?”
“Yes.”
“What for?”
The answer came in a whisper.
“For making me wait.”
Something inside him broke.
Not dramatically.
No stars fell.
No doors shattered.
Just a small, quiet fracture somewhere beneath his ribs.
“What did you say?”
Silence.
Then, softly—
“You said, 'I'm sorry. I know it's unfair. But if anyone can wait for me...it's you.'”
Lucien closed his eyes.
Dangerous.
Everything about this was dangerous.
“And I said yes.”
The voice laughed softly.
“I always said yes.”
The black door opened another inch.
Not enough to reveal what stood beyond it.
Only enough for a second hand to appear.
Small.
Human.
Waiting.
And for the first time since his rebirth, Lucien realized something that frightened him more than crowns, Architects, or beings older than creation.
He wasn't afraid of what waited beyond the door.
He was afraid that, when it finally opened completely...
He would remember why he had loved it enough to ask it to wait.