In Chapter 143, Dora performed psychometry on a the scrap of skin Vik (as Rony/Sebastijonas) had left in Dylath-Leen with his daughter Katarina:
A middle-aged man was staring into a mirror.
Remembering…
A young man staring into a mirror.
Who was remembering…
A teenager staring into a mirror.
It was the first mirror the 50-year-old man had looked at in nearly two decades. And the face he saw was an almost unknown face. He stared, into the mirror, at the wrinkles, his gray hair, his… his eyes. He wouldn’t recognize himself. If it weren’t for the tattoo. The geometric spiral of tiny equilateral triangles on his left cheek. Just like his uncle had. Before the Red Death.
Sebastijonas stared at his face. And remembered… that that was not his name. It had been his oldest brother’s name. He’d started using it here and it stuck. Especially after Katarina was born.
Rony. That was his name.
Only it wasn’t. And it never had been.
Whoever he was, he stared at the marks on his face. He found the very last triangle… the outside-most one… That was the last one he had done. Trice. Doctor Trice. Not the last person he’d killed. Not by a long shot. But the last tattoo he’d bothered making. He stared at that last triangle, and then rode the spiral back down to its beginning, separating mind from body, reaching out, embracing the memories, all the way down to the First One.
The mark at the center.
It all started rushing back to him, and as he looked in the mirror, in that halfway space between memory and reality, blood started leaking out of his nose. And he remembered…
Rony staring at his face in a mirror, while the Vasilica Clan body artist drove the tiny needle into his face.
It wasn’t exactly the first mirror he’d looked at in over a decade. But it felt like it.
He stared at his sun-ravaged skin, his mop of hair, his… his eyes. And his expression. He looked harder. Crueler. Merciless. He looked like a young Uncle G.
It’s working.
Rony stared at his face. And remembered… that that wasn’t his name.
It never had been.
But it’s the one he’d claimed. For now. And now he was going to memorialize his uncle by building a tattoo of his own.
And as the artist marks him with his first triangle, he thought back to the murder it represented. He separated mind from body and rode the spiral of memory back down. Not to the beginning. But certainly to a beginning. And he remembered as…
Young Viktor caught his reflection in the shard of mirror he held in his hand. It’s the first mirror he’d had his hands on since his parents died. He thinks. Maybe?
Viktor was not nine years old any more. It was hard to tell exactly how old he was because the recent years had been hard on him. But he was definitely more adolescent than child.
He is in a period of Transition.
But, he’s gotta stop staring at his face. Now, it’s time to focus.
He doesn’t know how the gods came to smile on him this day, but they did for the first time in over five years and he’s not going to waste the opportunity. Stop thinking, keep moving.
Somehow, there was a hole in the Gnolls’ patrol and shift-change patterns. Somehow, he was able to squeeze his malnourished little frame through the bars. Somehow, there were no other prisoners on the floor today, or he would have been stuck dealing with their pleas for help. Somehow, no one heard when he broke the mirror and scooped up a shard of it for himself. His uncle taught him ya always gotta check your corners. Stay low, stay quiet, use a mirror. So that’s exactly what he’s doing. Somehow, he made his way through the yard with its nearly-100-foot-tall curved granite walls, and no one saw him. Somehow, he got through the Valley and past the murder holes. Somehow, the portcullis was open. They must be meeting a guest down at the entrance to the Quarter. But don’t stop. Don’t think. Go, go, go. That was his mantra. And then somehow, he was out of Blossoming Thorn. Somehow, he cleared the distance to the alleys. Somehow, somehow, somehow… until he was here.
He’d found out what they were doing. He was right. They were meeting someone and escorting them back up to the fortress. And there they go, passing through the street in formation. And he’s back here, tucked into this dead-end alley, crouched behind some crates, kicking himself because he’d kicked a stone and caught the attention of the man at the mouth of the alley, watching the Gnolls go by. Just a man. Just some guy. But now the guy’s curious. He heard the noise. He called out. He’s heading back. And the noise and the motion are going to catch somebody’s eye. And then those damned dogs are gonna take a look down here. And they can see in the dark. And they know what Viktor smells like. And it’ll be all over.
So he watches with the mirror while the guy, just some guy, approaches. Viktor stays low. Then, when it’s time, he slides out, cuts his ankle with the shard of mirror, and when the guy, just some guy, hits the ground, Viktor quickly cuts his throat. To silence him. Figuratively, and literally.
And it’s easy this time: killing.
And this time… it’s a Choice.
A choice made to keep himself Hidden. Undetected.
Viktor pulls the body back behind the rubbish and waits. It all happened so fast. There’s a small army of Gnolls out there, but maybe somehow, somehow, none of them noticed the brief disturbance.
And then it’s all over. They’re gone. They’ve passed by. They’ll reach the fortress soon and discover that he’s gone, so he’s gotta keep moving. Don’t stop. Don’t think. Go, go, go. He covers the corpse of his victim as best he can and moves to the mouth of the alley. Stay low. Check your corners. He does so.
And that’s when he sees the iron-shod goat hooves standing on the sandy street.
The Stranger steps around the corner and scoops him up with one hand. “I was curious. And I was right. You DO still have the capacity for hope.”
Viktor tries to stay stone-faced. But inside, another little piece of him dies.
“You’re a clever liar. And you can probably fool many. But I will always be smarter than you. And all of your endeavors, for the rest of your life, will turn out just like this one: Utterly Pointless.”
Weiralai howls a hideous cackle of glee. It lasts an uncomfortably long time. And the sound of her hollow, bitter laughter echoes off the pale stone walls…
As Rony stared at his new tattoo in the mirror. And wondered. The choice to come out here and get his uncle’s sword… that had been his choice? Hadn’t it? And he had chosen to come out here alone, right? He hadn’t been allowed to? Had he? And he’s going back to Iris Hill because he wants to, right? Not because he has to. Not because he has no other options.
He told the tattoo artist to make the next one and as the pain of the needle cutting his skin hit him, he thought of all he’d seen… and all he’d done… and he thought of his King… and all the blood to be spilt in his name… and Rony kicked this memory of shitty little weak little Viktor to the curb…
As Sebastijonas wiped the blood from under his nose, then dug his own dagger into his face and cut out that triangle, that first one.
The mark at the center.
And the vision faded.
First Reference: Chapter 143
Other Notable References: —