The Saintess and the Villainess

Chapter 101

There's something comforting about the fundamental linear nature of time, and it's this: Anything that happens, stays happened.

When something truly terrible happens, people can move on because they know that there's no undoing the past.

Conversely, when good things happen, people can enjoy their happiness without fear because they know, on some level, that the good thing is permanent.

No amount of scratching, clawing, or beating your body against the walls of the universe can make it so that your loved one never died. But, importantly, no tragedy is so complete that it can take away every moment that came before.

Each small piece of past joy—the way they first confessed their love, every kiss you shared, their warmth in bed next to you night after night—is a part of the physical fabric of reality itself. Even when, over time, you begin to lose your memory of the specifics. Even when everyone who ever knew either of your names has long-since decomposed, each one of those moments will still be a part of that temporal line that inexorably carried, carries, and will carry the universe along from point A all the way down to point Z.

That is, as long as time is linear.

Without that, it all kind of falls apart, doesn't it?

Anne the Saintess was, now, in the palace. Or was it the cathedral? She would be in the palace, then, or had been in the palace. It didn't matter. Light was shining through a high window, into her eyes, so she closed them and turned herself over in bed, burying her face so deep into the silk-cased pillow that she could barely breathe.

All of this would go away. All of this would come back again.

Anne's feet were bloody and bruised so that each step stung. (There had been no time to put on shoes when she fled the palace.) And she was tired, so very tired. The forest canopy above was thick enough to wrap the world around her in darkness, though she thought it might be midday. The scent of softly rotting underbrush filled her lungs, threatening to choke her. And in this place of dark, stinking pain, the eyes—watching, always watching.

And still she marched forward. She was nearing the end, and she wanted help. She wanted her mother. She wanted something different. She wanted it all to stop and go away. She wanted to go away herself. She wanted to be anywhere other than here, even—

A dark, empty void. No one here but herself, no one to watch but herself, only her own thoughts echoing back and forth, and somewhere else distant visions of... something different. Something changing. But not enough! The change, the difference, wasn't enough!

It would all go away! It would all come back again!

And then, a hand, reaching through the emptiness, grabbing hold of her, and pulling—

Anne the Saintess awoke with a start. She looked around. She was in the palace, now. Or was it the cathedral?

Her oldest friend, Eva, was smiling down at her in her gentle way, one hand on Anne's shoulder to wake her up. "It's time to get up now, dearest Anne. Your breakfast and your new vestments are ready for you."

"New vestments?" asked Anne, still half in the dream.

"Yes, of course," said Eva. "Now that you're going to be ordained as the new Bishop, you need to look the part."

That certainly was new. Anne had never been Bishop before, had she? Was she going to be Bishop?

Eva reached down and brushed a gentle hand across Anne's cheek, smiling at her so warmly. It made Anne feel at home, and it made her sick to her stomach.