23 Ravalor  VII

25.05.2024

Xaronzul had left Ravalor alone, only to briefly return not much later, putting a datatab on the table with a informal “from Zenozarax” before he was gone again. The very brief appearance had reasonably startled Ravalor as Xaronzul had simply teleported into the room and out again like he was just jumping around places for the fun of it.

He realised that he’d probably have to, tactfully, remind Xaronzul that these were still private quarters and he really ought to use the door. But he postponed that for another day.

Xaronzul seemed to be surprisingly but very genuinely invested in his well being, and Ravalor didn’t want to jeopardise that by immediately telling him to mind his distance.

He took the tab from the table and gave its contents a look. Commonly doing anything magical was strongly discouraged while doing the initial scan, which Zenozarax obviously had brazenly ignored now. He had to assume that Zenozarax, as a former Soulturner, knew what he was doing. There were plenty of additional works on prophecies and a select couple of actual prophecies. Some were marked important.

There was also a summoning spell written into the datatab labelled “Summon me!”

With a light amused smile he placed the tablet into the summoning network of the station and ran the spell.

Drawing the magical matter from the station, the familiar assembled in a shower of light before him — taking Zenozarax’ likeness and, by the way he stood and looked at him, his mannerisms too.

The familiar vaguely followed him away from the summoning circle back to the sitting area, and stood now halfway inside the coffee table without paying any attention to it. These familiars could be made to interact with the world around them to an extent, but this one was only visual, seemingly phasing through solid objects like a ghost. An optical illusion of a physical three dimensional form, but a convincing one.

“Tell me about prophecies then. I’m listening,” Ravalor prompted as he sat down onto the sprawling sofa.

“About time,” the familiar said with a click of his tongue. He should have expected this really. Leave it up to Zenozarax’ vanity to create a familiar that was exactly like him. “What do you know already?“

Ravalor shrugged slightly. “Prophecies are visions of the future that some wizards can have. They usually don’t come true and you can’t rely on them.“

The Familiar of Zenozarax pinched the bridge of his nose as to ward off an upcoming headache — a gesture that was already ridiculous for wizards and double as unnecessary for a familiar made from nothing but a fine dust of magical matter and light.

“So you literally didn’t listen to me at all. Ever. That’s good to know.”

Ravalor signed him to hurry on. Mannerisms or not it was still only a familiar and thus bound to Ravalor’s command.

“A Prophecy is a path in time,” the familiar began, then it knocked on the door. Politely the familiar stopped in its explanation, and after being called in, Pelagius entered.  

“I heard you woke up—” The knight stopped mid sentence and squinted slightly confused as he saw the ghostly appearance of Zenozarax. “What is this?”

“A familiar. Magic put into form. Zenozarax sent it to explain prophecy to me.”

“... Ah. So he’s…”

“It’s not Zenozarax, just a conduit to convey some of what he knows.” Proof enough of that was the fact that the familiar had not reacted to Pelagius at all. As far as the magical hologram was concerned he might as well not exist as it seemed. Instead. It contented itself with plucking away on its holographic robe — lords forbid there would be something awry with his very much artificial appearance.

“Should I come back later?“

“You can stay if you want. It’s not too relevant to you, but if you’re interested?” Ravalor said after a moment and offered Pelagius to sit. The knight followed the invitation but not without a sense of concern in his face.

“Did you have another vision? That’s what knocked you out?“

Ravalor nodded grimly. “It would appear so.” And after receiving an inquisitive glare from Pelagius he added, “there seems to be the possibility that someone, somewhen, might try to kill me.”

“Oh, great,” Pelagius groaned.

Ravalor merely shrugged. “It’s vague and inconclusive. It might as well not happen at all.” It was what he did and always had believed. But, considering what had happened concerning his last vision he felt not as firm in that belief anymore as he used to.

As to point that out, the familiar cleared its throat - or at least pretended to. “May I?“

“Go ahead. Continue.“

“As I said, prophecies are a path in time — one of countless, but it is not random. They are always related to the Wizard who sees them. It is said that location plays a role into it as well, that you are more likely to see into the paths of times of a place the longer you stay there, but in the end it is always based on the path the wizard will take.”

Ravalor listened attentively — for the first time when it came to this topic. Pelagius on the other hand listened with a deep frown. But neither interrupted the familiar and so it continued.

“Prophesied events are big events — at least relative to the wizard in question. It doesn’t have to happen, but the fact that you are seeing it means that there are several paths in time already which all could lead to this event happening.  

“It’s not always easy to see, but the initial prophecy relating to any event doesn’t occur without a trigger. The catch is, that trigger does not have to be directly linked to you. Let’s say you are on a space station, as you are, and somewhere out there in space some space junker decides to hurl a piece of space rock your way which would against all odds hit your station 5 years down the line. You could have a vision for the destruction of the station. In this case it’s simple — move the station out of the way until the visions stop and viola, crisis averted.  That’s an easy one with only two variables.

“Now imagine a whole mesh of influences! That’s how it usually is. Influenced by not only your own actions but that of many other people too. You can end up in a situation where no matter what you do, since you do not command the actions of those other variables, your influence on this path in time might be minimal.“

“Is there a way to know? To see what causes it?” Ravalor asked.

“No. Unless you’re already aware of it you usually won’t be able to identify the cause until after it has been written to history. Hindsight and all that.” The familiar waved his hand dismissively.

“The visions I had on earth kept changing. Sometimes a little, occasionally stopping outright. That’s because some choices that were made by the variables at play, correct?”

“Yes.”

“The first one occurred shortly after I arrived on earth and just before I met Pelagius. But not when I made the decision to go there. And it was the vision which led me to the path of trying to use the spire in the first place. How does that make sense? Doesn’t that make it — well a self fulfilling prophecy?”

The familiar of Zenozarax frowned, his arms crossed, looking from Ravalor to Pelagius. “No, I don’t think so. From what I know, It appears to me that it probably was Pelagius’ arrival in the first place that made this chain of events possible. That the option had been there before, and you’d have come up with it eventually, but you wouldn’t have been able to do it on your own. Or, it would have been more unlikely, let’s put it like that.”

Ravalor pondered that for a moment and there was logic to that. Pelagius had saved his life more than once during the time, so his part in all of it wasn’t negligible.

“So if I hadn’t seen that light, or had decided against investigating, it wouldn’t have happened?” Pelagius asked tensely.

The familiar rose a brow. “In that moment, yes, it probably would have changed the likelihood. We can only assume that your arrival strengthened this particular outcome. But we don’t know what might have happened hadn’t you done that. We need to be careful when assuming any alternative events, or worse assuming a complete negation of one event by changing only one factor that led to it. The amount of variables at play is simply too large.”

Pelagius stayed quiet, no longer looking directly at the familiar but a vague point at the table, his brows furrowed.

“You’re not to blame,” Ravalor said quietly.

The knight looked up, the frown eased a little. “But you are?“

Ravalor stayed quiet and so Pelagius said.

“See. I thought we agreed that we all are in this together. Him included.” Pelagius nodded to the familiar of Zenozarax.

“I am merely a familiar. I have done nothing but tell you about prophecies,” the familiar said reasonably aloof and almost outraged at the sudden accusation. Pelagius ignored the objection as he asked,

“You wouldn’t have fixed it, right? You probably would have left Aeven and me rotting there if it weren’t for the curse?“

The familiar frowned, the aloof attitude dropping from his face and being replaced by blank confusion.

“I am sorry, I can’t answer that.”

“It doesn’t know,” Ravalor said quietly. “It has only a very small selection of Zenozarax’ memories, those he wanted me to hear about. It literally can’t answer any questions like that.”

Sourly Pelagius scoffed. “Figures.”

Ravalor wasn’t sure if he was too unhappy about it. He wasn’t sure he’d have liked the answer. And so, to divert the question he said,

“Is there anything else you wanted to tell me?“

With a deep breath of relief the familiar nodded.

“Only one thing, that is very important. A Prophecy can occur thousands of years in advance, but they can also tell of events just about to happen. Like the Prophecy of Grand Wizard Fanohelix, I marked that one down for you. One hour. That’s all he got — because of a chance encounter nobody could have seen coming. But once it happened, there was no way around what it would cause.“

Ravalor felt a nervous tingling in his body. The idea that someone might just show up out of nowhere to kill him seemed outlandish to him, but without temporal reference in his vision he really couldn’t know.

“What does it take into account? How… do we know?”

The familiar looked at him plainly and almost tired. “We don’t know. The strongest theory is that it’s just the actions of wizards. Others are sure it’s a lot more than that. Including everything we built and influenced. Maybe everything the lords created. Maybe more, maybe not only the actions of wizards but everything a wizard is aware of relating to the motivation of other living beings. This would imply a fundamental uncertainty since it would rely on the wizards personal judgment of said living beings. With the nature of prophecies being so elusive it is hard to test or make any conclusive statements.”

“I see.”

The frown on Pelagius’ face seemed there to stay forever at this point as he asked, “So what are we going to do about it?”

Ravalor thought about that for a moment then said, “We keep going.”

“That didn’t turn out great the last time,” Pelagius reminded him grimly.

“No. But it’s the only thing we can do. Until I know more.”

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