Cerise's slap hit him so hard that he lost his balance, four of his six legs leaving the ground from the impact. He flailed, on the verge of toppling over sideways, the shock outracing the pain, his brain trying to figure out if he had really just been slapped, or if the world had simply gone sideways.

This, he had not foreseen.

He heard Cerise's voice, now so angry that it had gone cold. "You. Do not. Speak. To me. Like that."

The Blind Keeper's brain reeled, as his six legs scrambled and stumbled, his sense of balance still trying to make the case for the sideways world theory. "Wha–" was all he could manage, his hand pawing his face to make sure his jaw was still attached.

"Leave?? Leave?? Telling me to leave, just like that?? You. Do not. Speak. To me. Like that," Cerise repeated, his voice as smooth as a deep-running river of rage. "Not after what you did."

"What I did??" He shifted his jaw back and forth, finding that it was still attached, despite reports streaming in from his pain receptors claiming that couldn't be true. Now that the shock was dying down, his body could make sure he knew how much that hurt. "What did I do??"

"You left! You left!!" Cerise shouted.

The roach's voice was loud enough to shake the glass ceiling of the atrium, furious enough to blow the dust off the ancient tomes lining every bookshelf of the library. The Blind Keeper had heard Cerise's anger plenty of times before (given all the times he had deliberately provoked it), but this was different. There was a fury here devoid of Cerise's usual theatrics. This rage, this was pure.

"I– what?"

Cerise's fists hit his chest, a synchronized overhead blow that knocked the wind from the spider's lungs. The Long Votom had made Cerise weaker, but in that moment, it felt like he had gotten his old strength back, outmatched by none but the eldest dragons.

The Blind Keeper wheezed, caught utterly off-guard by the crushing blow. He had never been so surprised in his life.

He was twice as surprised when Cerise suddenly threw his arms around his wide torso, squeezing the spider with all the strength that his small frame could muster.

"T-that time you– whatever made you start wearing the blindfolds–" Cerise squeezed harder, as if trying to evacuate whatever air had been left behind in The Blind Keeper's lungs after the overhead blow. "--you left!! You were gone!!"

The Blind Keeper reeled, struggling mentally as much as he was respiratorially. "What?? You– you felt that??" he managed to croak out.

"Of course I felt it, you big idiot!" No one could ever be affronted as Cerise. To even suggest that someone could be as affronted as Cerise would earn you his unmatchable affront. "You... you left!! Somehow!! I could feel it! We all could!!"

"C-Cerise... p-please..." The Blind Keeper was torn between comforting him, and begging him to ease up on the increasingly vise-like squeeze he had on his chest.

But Cerise wasn't listening anyway. "Do you have any idea how I worried?? I was sick, you unbelievable idiot! One moment you were there, and then the next, you were gone, just, gone, and, and then that... that... that..." Cerise bit his lip, fighting past the oncoming headache. "...the... the old fifth Keeper... ow... was gone too... and I couldn't remember... and I..."

The Blind Keeper felt the roach's tears hit his chest.

"...and I... I thought, I might... I might forget you... I thought... I thought that any second now, I'd forget you, and, and... I was so scared, I was so, so scared..."

The Blind Keeper's arms were frozen in place, halfway to embracing Cerise back, feeling unable to move even an inch closer or further away from returning the hug. "You never said–" he tried to protest.

"I was protecting you!!" Cerise shouted back.

The Blind Keeper was frozen in place, shocked to hear the words he had himself wanted to say to Cerise for weeks now.

Cerise wiped at his face with the back of his sleeve, the normally-composed roach uncharacteristically snotty as he spoke, "...and then just like that, you were back." He snuffled, as dignified as he could manage. No one but Cerise could make a mucus-drenched snuffle sound halfway dignified. "And I came to see you right away, but–"

Cerise's voice was choked, pain flooding his tone. "...you had put those blindfolds on, and you wouldn't... say... anything..."

The Blind Keeper felt a tightness in his chest.

Cerise's voice was quiet. Defeated. "You... were closed to me. I... didn't know... how to deal with that..." Regret and guilt dragged Cerise's voice down. "...I didn't know what to do. I didn't know what I could do."

The roach spoke quietly. "You were back, but... but I had lost you anyway."

The Blind Keeper slowly let his arms fall limp by his side.

Gradually, Cerise eased up on his grip, releasing The Blind Keeper from his grasp. Quietly, softly, he took a step backwards, putting distance between the two once more.

The Blind Keeper said the thing he always said. The only thing he could say. "You wouldn't understand," he said quietly.

Cerise said nothing, not willing to dignify those words with a response. When he spoke, it was as if he was the one to break the silence. "We used to dance, remember?"

The Blind Keeper's heart tightened again, more than he thought was possible. "I remember," he choked out, his throat as tight as if Cerise had been gripping it.

"We used to dance," Cerise repeated. He briefly mimed holding a guitar. "The adventurers would play, and oh, how we would dance. How you used to twirl me. How you used to dip me," he said distantly, as if speaking to himself. "How you used to hold me. How you used to–" Cerise hesitated for only a moment, before, in a resigned tone, he concluded: "...how you used to trust me."

The Blind Keeper lowered his head, shaking it. "You... wouldn't understand," he repeated, the words ashen on his tongue.

He could feel Cerise balling his hands into fists and pressing the heels against his own face. "I... need... something. I can't..." He could hear Cerise gritting his teeth, grinding them in frustration. "I can't... I can't..." He took a deep breath, trying to compose himself. "...telling me I wouldn't understand isn't good enough. I can't... live with that."

The Blind Keeper laughed softly, without mirth. "Can't live with that. That's it." He leaned back, his blinded eyes turning towards the heavens. There was just the heavy material of the blindfold separating his vision from the cursed sky, where he had glimpsed the crack in reality. Where those cursed words hung even now, he knew, taunting him. "Can't live with it. Don't want to live with it. That's exactly it."

"What are you saying?" Cerise asked, his voice tense.

The Blind Keeper didn't answer. He didn't want to have to say it out loud.

"What I saw," he said instead. "...it wounded me. I feel like a wound upon this world, one that can't heal."

Cerise was trembling with frustration now. "Maybe that's because you won't talk about it." He was trying to keep his voice level, but the furious irritation was bubbling over. "...with the person you're supposed to trust most. With the Keeper of Rejuvenation." Cerise's voice peaked, his eyes nearly boggling out of his head.

The Blind Keeper shook his head. "It's not that simple–"

"It is that simple!!" Cerise screeched at him. "It's my job to heal. Except you've closed yourself off to me!! So now what??" He stomped his foot, hard enough for the tile to crack, all the dust in the library leaping off the shelves and books before settling back down. "It's my role!! It's who I am!!"

The sick feeling was bubbling up The Blind Keeper's gut again. "Stop," he hissed. He could feel the bile building in him. "Stop talking," he heard himself say, the twisted feeling in his gut speaking for him.

He could feel Cerise on the verge of yelling, and just as clearly, he could feel Cerise rein it back in. The Blind Keeper knew this was an act of supreme will on Cerise's part. Every nerve in Cerise's body was vibrating with offense, but still the roach held his tongue.

The Blind Keeper tried to find the words. "Is that... is that all you care about? Playing your role? Is that..." There were tears welling in his eyes, but he refused to let himself shed them. Just a role. The Blind Keeper. The Keeper of Rejuvenation. Just roles. Nothing more. "...is that... really all that you are?"

Cerise's fury was running quiet now. In words as hard and unyielding as stone, he spoke. "Of course not. Idiot spider." He lifted his chin, imperious, his self-assuredness like an anchor. "But I want to play my role for you, so let me play it."

The Blind Keeper let his head drift backwards.

Impossible. This was impossible.

The anger was draining from both of them now. The futility of the situation overtook both of them at once. The gulf that had formed between them sucked the anger from their bodies. What was the point, when every feeling is useless?

The Blind Keeper stared sightlessly upward at the sky, the glass dome of the atrium shining as the moon cast its light upon them. Anger faded, replaced by sadness and resignation. The hopelessness of it...

Mourning. That was the feeling. Mourning Cerise, in some sense. Mourning what could have been.

The Blind Keeper continued to stare upward. The stars, the moon. It all felt so infinitely distant, now. The feeling of mourning turned inward, and finally, he was able to name the feeling he'd felt in his chest since all this started. He was mourning himself.

He couldn't even bring himself to cry about it.

Perhaps Cerise sensed the change in him, terrible as it was. Quietly, desperately, he reached out to The Blind Keeper. "I... I don't know what I did to lose your trust. And if things have changed, then they've changed. I won't... force anything. So–"

Inevitability loomed large in The Blind Keeper's mind. "I trust you," The Blind Keeper said hoarsely.

He remembered the dancing. He remembered the music. He remembered the playing.

He remembered the former ferocity that Cerise had once fought with.

And he felt that ferocity, buried deep in the roach, just now. In the slap, in the punch, in the embrace.

He could connect to that. "...I trust you," he repeated.

"Do you?" asked Cerise doubtfully, barely a question.

The Blind Keeper exhaled. He didn't respond. "Do you trust me?", he asked instead.

Cerise considered this. While impulsive by nature, he also knew when to take his time. "...yes. I do," he said at last. "Despite everything," he added.

The way those punches had landed... the force of the slap...

"How much?" The Blind Keeper asked, pointedly. It wasn't a question to be taken lightly. He needed a real answer.

Cerise answered slowly. "...with my life," he said, almost sounding disappointed with himself for it. "I couldn't tell you why. But I do."

The Blind Keeper felt his eyes shift towards Cerise, looking in his direction through the intervening blindfold. He then turned them back to the heavens; once a canvas for the constellations, now only a callous reminder of their inescapable roles, and their inevitable fate. "...do you believe me, when I say I trust you with my life as well? That I would put my life in your hands?"

Cerise took his time before answering. The Blind Keeper could feel Cerise tugging anxiously at his robe. "...yes. I do. Where are you going with this?"

The Blind Keeper felt a coldness in his heart. A path lay before him. It was a terrible path. A cruel path. It was a path that would lead him over the edge of a cliff, and he did not know what awaited him after the fall. It might make Cerise hate him.

But somehow, the misery of that paled in comparison to the idea of Cerise growing distant and indifferent. He couldn't live with himself either way, but indifference would still be worse.

He spoke his next words coldly, cursing himself for breaking his own promise. Just as Cerise had been trying to protect him, so he had tried to protect Cerise. In the end, it seems both of them had failed. "...I can give you a taste of what I saw that night. You won't like it. And it won't get better. Ever. It will make your every moment of existence worse, stealing from you, robbing you of–"

"Shut up," Cerise interrupted, touching two fingers to his temple in aggravation. Cerise's patience was always thin, and the conversation had exhausted it about seven times over. "Just shut up. Don't you dare try to tell me what will spoil my life." Haughtily, the roach crossed his arms in front of his chest. "Whatever you're going to do, just do it already. And hurry it up! You've kept me waiting long enough."

This time, the smile managed to get as far as tugging at the corner of The Blind Keeper's mouth. It was a grim smile, but he couldn't help himself in the face of Cerise's show of arrogance.

"Very well," he said quietly. "There's no going back."

He turned his attention towards Cerise. His full attention.

He reached out with his mind.

There, before him, was Cerise. Not actually Cerise, but the conception of Cerise. The outline of Cerise, without any of the specific details that made him Cerise. A blueprint, with none of the material. A sketch, with none of the color. A face, with no light behind the eyes.

He hated this.

After the incident, after the hidden words became visible to him, he had made the mistake of examining himself. He had seen his own blueprint, his own sketch, his own face with those dead, soulless eyes.

The revelation and all its implications revolted him. He had been unable to calm himself down until he had done two things: First, wrapping the blindfolds around his head, shutting out the false world, cold and hollow.

And second, erasing his name. He had seen himself, seen his title, seen his role. He had realized how the words formed a circumference around his existence, unbreakable, beyond defiance. And inside that circumference, there was nothing. There was no need to dignify the thing within those miserable confines with a name.

So he had erased it.

And so everyone forgot.

And as always, they moved on. They called him The Blind Keeper, as if that was all he had ever been. As far as he was concerned, they were right.

Now he reached out, seeking Cerise instead. Finding Cerise's blueprint among the words.

In the beginning was the words, and the world was the words. The words are everything. Where the words end, the world ends.

There, among the words, was Cerise. There, among the words, there was no Cerise. There were words, and Cerise was nowhere but in them, and Cerise was nowhere. To see Cerise's words was to witness his creation and his destruction in a single moment.

There, in front of him, were the words. There, connecting the words, were the threads. These threads, like all threads, could be plucked, and twisted. An infinitely interconnected web, in which all things were ensnared. Everything bound together, forever.

He hated this.

He reached out, and, plucking one thread, watched the words unfold before him.

There. Everything Cerise was, and could ever be.

Only words. Nothing real.

There. A piece of Cerise that was turned off, limiting him.

The limits were as fake as everything else. The Blind Keeper understood that now.

The Blind Keeper plucked the thread connected to that piece, sending a vibration down the length, negating the limitation.

He could feel Cerise – the roach in the room with him – shudder.

"What– what did you just do??" Cerise demanded, the panic freezing the blood in his veins.

The Blind Keeper continued, silently. He plucked another string, watching it resonating, causing a ripple to pass through the words.

There was a change in the air. It had started.

The Bloodleaf wine was in Cerise's hand. Cerise didn't know when it got there. With one finger held up, he took a long, dramatic sip. The arrogant finger. The haughty sip. Cerise's eyes boggled as his body followed impulses he couldn't actually feel.

"What is this," Cerise spluttered, wine running down his face and soaking the tile at his feet with a blood-red stain. "Is this... forbidden magic?"

The Blind Keeper sighed. The threads were singing now, warping existence as they vibrated, spreading their patterns to each other.

The music started, Cerise's theme resounding through the spacious atrium. The ring of Bloodleaf, planted in a circle around the perimeter as if it had always been there, began to sprout, trapping the two inside.

Cerise trembled, fighting a hopeless battle with himself. "Don't– No–"

"There's no going back," The Blind Keeper repeated.

Cerise's feet left the ground.

The Blind Keeper raised his head, staring sightlessly as his roach drew the sword sheathed on his hip. The sword that had always been there, and had always been there from the moment when it appeared just a second earlier.

Nothing mattered. But finally, he had found a way to do something with that feeling.

It wasn't Cerise standing before him anymore. It was Count Cerise, Keeper of Rejuvenation.