"Let me tell you a story," said Augur.

"Are you coming to our winter solstice celebration?" I said.

Everett grunted before inhaling deeply from his clove cigarillo.

Our lessons for the day had finished several minutes ago, but by his own admission the tutor preferred lingering around the manor over returning to his lonely home. I certainly did not mind his presence; matter how many times I sat beneath that lemon tree, listening to his gravelly voice explain esoteric concepts was always calming enough that I just wanted to close my eyes and fall asleep. For his part, the tutor had finally stopped chastising my 'unique' manner of paying attention.

"Come on," I said, trying to sound convincing. The tone sounded more petulant than anything, even to my ears. "You love my mom's cooking. There won't be more than a dozen guests and you won't have to talk to any of them."

Everett squinted one eye at me and lifted one side of his lip, a comedic expression that made him look like some sort of annoyed shepherd eyeing a wayward member of his flock. Eggshell blue smoke drifted past his face. "Tempting offer. Heating my little shack does get annoying. Strangely cold winter this year too. Maybe I will take you up on that invitation. You need some friends your own age, Leones."

I laughed, unsure how to respond.

Since my tutor loved to lament about his poor living conditions and paltry wages, I had once gone to my father since I thought Everett may be too intimidated to negotiate with him. My father had laughed and said that the tutor lived in a quaint home in a nice part of town, and he received far better compensation than a farmer toiling in the fields just to lecture me for a couple hours every day. Though I had long since confronted him about this fact, Everett continued to pretend otherwise.

"Yes or no?" I said. "We have to know how many plates to set."

Everett exhaled sharply. "Yes, then, if you really have to press me about it."

He winked and began walking away. After a few moments he stopped, glancing up at the sky. He lifted a finger; a fat snowflake drifted down and alighted on the tip before melting. "Interesting. When was the last time it snowed in these parts?"

I blinked.

* * *

Though I experienced no time passing, I woke up in a chair I had never sat in before. Of course, I recognized my location immediately: behind the desk in my father's study. Through the window, the half-moon loomed within the midnight sky.

A quill and inkpot had been set a careful distance away from the stack of parchment piled in front of me. My ink-stained fingers revealed me as their author. A candle guttered in the center of the desk, casting its light over the first page.

My time to communicate is limited. While you may be skeptical of these words, and I know that I would be as well, the evidence rests directly in front of you. I will simplify this as much as feasible, as most of my time must be committed to recording my knowledge to pass along. I am you, thirty five years and ten months into the future.

The snowfall beginning on the night of the solstice is the consequence of a colossal amount of magic released due to an Archon's death. It was on this night that one of the Goetia's plots finally succeeded in killing Winter, sovereign amongst the mortal powers that be. Though the Civilized Lands will hold out for several decades, they will inevitably lose, even after it became commonplace to bond with so-called 'benevolent demons.'

Within two years, all able-bodied men near adulthood are conscripted into the soldiery. This includes me, and, by extension, yourself. For years I lived among friends at a castle near the Frontier, until one night the demons overran us. I was thrown from the walls, and as I lay there, broken and hopeless, a power manifested within me, bringing me back thirty minutes into the past. The battle continued to rage around me, but I knew the premonition was real. I deserted, along with a few others I convinced to come with me, leaving the valiant to die.

So, at the age of twenty, I attempted to master my time magic to the best of my ability. However, too many events had been set into motion that were irreversible. My experiments delved into learning how to reverse time to a more distant past. This is when I began to learn the truth about the Mental Realm, and how our preconceptions form limits over our power. Once the mind becomes set on a certain path, altering our fundamental notions of the world becomes near impossible.

Along the way I did learn how to temporarily break the time barrier, but the results are not promising. I hoped that I would be transported back to this moment, at sixteen years of age, and from here I could begin my work. This is when the mind is first able to comprehend the truth of the anima, as we are able to consider more abstract concepts. However, the ritual to bypass my limits requires a massive sacrifice of energy---perhaps even some of my mind. I have only hours to stay here, instead of remaining to carry on my quest. Another in an eternal line of failures.

So I will leave it up to you, since we are one and the same. The Goetia are creatures of fate. They cannot comprehend things outside of it, and they fear any disturbances in the pattern. To overcome them, you must unravel whatever destiny they think has been determined for the universe. Since in the Increate's great working, every potential path is explored, I know that despite having failed so many times to save everyone, some day a path to victory will be discovered. I hope that path is us.

While I have enclosed as much as my knowledge as can be committed to paper, I recommend you read as little as possible. Find your own path. If you follow my teachings, you will learn the same things I have, and then you will be destined to experience the same failures. But if there is truly no other option, you must do what is necessary to continue. The penultimate page continues the method of replicating this deep-past time travel. The final page is a method I have discovered of halting the inevitable, though I fear it may be irreversible. At least, with my current capabilities.

I leaned back in the chair, considering what to do. At first I rejected the message as some bizarre attempt at confusing me, but such a thing seemed pointless. Flipping through the pages revealed diagrams of geometric shapes and symbols so precise they must have been created with the aid of a tool. Elegant, clean diagrams depicted meditating figures, the interior of my family manor, a sword. Who would even be capable of such a thing? My father? Everett?

The most likely proposition was the unlikely possibility everything was true.

I began reading the next page.

* * *

It took a week to muster enough courage to follow the instructions from the second page. Despite the warning, I had read deeper than I intended, compelled by the depth of the mad creation before me.

During that week I attempted speaking with Everett and my father, mentioning concepts within the pages to see how they would react. Mostly they considered what I had said for a while before admitting they were unsure how to respond, though on occasion they provided a nonsensical answer beyond my understanding. Once, my father asked me if I had taken that question from an obscure philosophical text known as Dasein, or 'Being'. With my allowance I tracked down the book for a purchase, and stayed up late into the night attempting to understand it, to no avail.

While I wanted to reveal everything to my father, my future self cautioned me not to tell others about my powers, even those I loved and trusted.

So, following the instructions from the second page, I eventually convinced myself to climb onto the roof of the family manor. As I hoisted myself out through the attic window and onto the truth, doubts assailed my mind. This was insanity. A plot against my life. Hesitant steps took me to the edge of the roof, overlooking the yard where I had spent so much of my youth. How many times had I savaged a tree with a stick, pretending I was a noble hero felling a demon with his blade?

None of my fantasies included leaping to my death in order to manifest my magical powers.

My future self had claimed that danger, preferably a near-death experience, was required to activate my initial time abilities. As a soldier on the Frontier, his company was overrun by the Goetia. Left to die from a fatal gut wound, he discovered the ability to reverse time in order to save himself. At first he had thought himself lost in purgatory, repeating the same miserable death for all eternity. When everything happened exactly as he recalled, he decided it might be real and deserted the army along with a few companions who believed him.

An inordinate amount of time was spent detailing this story, mostly in warning not to allow it to happen again.

An entreaty to be a hero.

My throat felt heavy as I looked down at the yard, trying to imagine myself leaping from the edge. The distance looked far, but was it enough to actually kill me? What if I ended up crippled, but not damaged enough to manifest my time magic---assuming it was even real. My heart sped up in my chest.

A gust of wind caught me by surprise; my boots slipped on the snow-slick roof. Frantically I windmilled my arms and crouched to regain my balance. For a terrifying moment the world tipped around me. I managed to dig my fingernails into the timber roof and steady myself.

No, I couldn't do this. It would be madness to attempt suicide in the hope that I gained some magical power. Maybe I had been possessed. While I was tempted to show the papers to my father or one of the city authorities, Archon Nony would burn me in the public square if he learned about this.

Best to keep the papers a secret for now. Have patience. If the words inside were true, I would find out in due time.

* * *

Two years later, I arrived at my garrison in the Frontier. The first thing that struck me about the place was how filthy it was. Smoke billowed into the air from the smithies and various other fires around the encampment. Despite the appearance, it seemed well-fortified, with armored guards patrolling at regular intervals. Judging from how skeletal and dirty most of the others looked, most of them would have been more than happy to join the soldiery; the small pittance and guaranteed two meals a day would have been a blessing.

The constant snow had ruined much of my family's livelihood as well---people had little need for a clothier while the staple foods remained in perpetual shortage---but we were well off enough that my fur cloak drew more than a few lingering eyes. Following the listless directions from a young woman at the gates, I presented myself to my superior officer.

Lieutenant Haron was a grizzled older man with skin like tanned leather. Despite his shabby uniform and dirty face, he seemed to be one of the few people who took his role seriously. He strolled through the compound with the easy confidence of a veteran, pointing out various important buildings. We skipped most of them, only taking a tour of the mess hall and the barracks.

The living arrangements were not what I expected. Cramped, pungent with sweat and tobacco and leather, filled with shouts from a group of young men playing dice. Several of them were shirtless, proudly displaying bandages and fresh scars earned from the battlefield.

Lieutenant Haron patted one of the cots bereft of any personal belongings. "This'll be you, then."

I settled in, setting down my oversized satchel and removing my ostentatious fur cloak.

The lieutenant thumbed his nose and sniffed. "Mind your stuff. This is the male's barracks, which means to be here, you have to have a set of balls and a heartbeat. Lot of these folk weren't much to begin with. Turned out the jail cells for this lot. A lot of you high-class sort find a way around the conscription."

I thrust away some unwanted memories: my mom pleading with my father, him insisting that there was nothing that I could do. He had spent time in the soldiery during his youth and said that it helped him build character. At least he had the good fortune to end his service before we were on the losing end of the war.

"I'm from Velassa," I said.

He gave me a look that said that explained everything. "Rough draw, that one. Archon Nony is shipping them out straight from the cradle nowadays. Mind, his Magisters are some top notch combatants. Would've lost this war months ago if it weren't for them."

Strangely, that ignited a spark of pride in my chest. It died quickly as I recalled the stack of papers bundled in the bottom of my satchel, along with the vial of poison to commit suicide if necessary. Or if I deemed it worth the risk.

Over time my doubts had grown, though on occasion I laid awake at night telling myself I knew all of it was true. Since that day on the rooftop, I had made a few pitiful attempts at taking my own life, but when it came down to the final moment, I truly wanted to live. Too many uncertainties. The original Leones hadn't killed himself, after all; being on the verge of death may not have been the actual trigger.

"That's the gist of the camp," said Haron. "First day, get your bearings and make some friends. Dinner starts at five. You find me in the mess hall, I'll give you a seat free of charge. Questions?"

Quite a few, to be honest, though I shook my head and took a seat on the cot. "Thanks for all your help, sir."

His grin was wide and yellow. "Keep saying 'sir'. Lot of these boys don't have any respect."

He nodded in farewell, leaving me wondering what to do next.

According to the papers, everyone here would be dead within a couple years.