Say… Julius… what if we lived in paradise?
Do we not?
No, Julius… we don’t… We live every day by the blade, eat every meal by the flower… And if we slip up, we die.
…
I’m sorry about Rose, Aurora… I should have been there…
Forget about her, Julius… I should have listened to you…
…
We can do it, Julius, with my power and yours. We can disappear, we already do, forever, here in this sanctuary, happily ever after…
What are you saying? Aurora… I don’t understand.
We don’t need to live by the blade, we can live by the magic. The riches we’ve already made will last us for as long as we need.
It won’t. Eventually, it’ll all run out, and what will we do then?
It’ll never run out, Julius. We can grow our own food, the soil here is enough to feed countless generations. We can raise our own animals, and let them graze on the magical grass that grows thick.
What will become of this House then? What will become of our history?
We leave it all behind, forget it all, and live in paradise… This sacred sanctuary, safe from whatever disaster befalls the outside world…
How will we do that?
With our powers, Julius… You tell me the future, and I’ll let us see it. Whoever controls the past controls the future, whoever controls the present controls the past. We control the present and the future, Julius, our powers combined.
Aurora, what’s happened to you? Are you suggesting we give up this sacred lineage your fathers founded?
My father told me to cherish this House, and that’s what I’m going to do.
….
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I’m tired of it, Julius… I’m just tired of it all…
Aurora…
Lucky you. So disconnected from it all, so independent, with infinite space in your mind for contracts to occupy… I apologize…
…
I don’t control the future, Aurora…
If you see it you control it.
I barely even see…
But you saw Rose’s death, did you not? I should have believed you, Julius. I really should have… How can you speak to me now, face to face, and convince me your powers aren’t real…
But the scholars…
They’re wrong, Julius. They’re just wrong.
Then…
We can change things, Julius, you and I.
What about everyone else? What about the rest of the House?
They’ll never know. I’ll make sure they don’t.
Our history? Our lineage?
Gone, I’ll erase it all, rewrite it with new knowledge. Then we’ll live here happily, as an academy for magically inclined orphans. You give me the future, I control the present… We’ll make it work…
How much have you thought about this, Aurora?
A little…
You know the future never changes, right? You can’t fight against it…
We can, Julius… We will…
How are you so confident?
We’re special.
I don’t have faith…
What is your faith? Your power?
Yeah… And it’s telling me no… It’s been telling me no since the very beginning…
Fight against it, Julius… I have faith in the present, and I control the present.
Where do we start?
We start with the past. Then the present. Then the future. I’m the House Master, and you’re the Overseer. They’ll listen to us.
So we lie?
For the right reasons.
…
Julius?
Fine. I’ll reject my faith for yours… But this will change the House of Rose forever…
We’ll disappear forever. They won’t even know we existed in the first place, Julius. It’ll work.
You’re capable?
I have faith in my power.
I don’t have faith in mine…