There were fifty-four steps on each side of the staircase leading to the Temple's core; the tiny circle chamber many considered its beating heart, though he amongst few knew that the twin heart imprisoned within no longer beat to any meaningful tune. Like dolphins caught in a whirlpool these once-lifeful souls had spiralled lethargically down, trapped beneath the ever-weightier coils of the currents that dragged them in, those same currents that had once brought them life, and so much love. It was neither of their faults, he knew; but it was still a horror, to see his father trapped, to see any human trapped, in stagnant patterns, like words caught between the pages of a book, never-changing. He did not relish looking upon that sight once more. He never did, these days, never could find comfort within that hidden chamber, the origin of the Temple's peace.

The steps beneath his feet sensed his burden, and sought to ease his progress. No one looking upon them would have said they moved, nor even changed their texture; but he found his footfalls lightened, less strenuous to take, as the earth found the rhythm within him, and sought to match it, their purpose as one. He practically glided up the last few steps to the hallway, an act whose elegance would have befitted any formal appearance, yet felt ill-attuned to the emotions of this moment. There was little formality before the Absolute One, any more. He was not aware enough to notice it, to care about it. The nominal ruler's last three summons had been all but wordless, the two of them inhabiting uneasy silence until eventually he had managed to raise a hand to dismiss Sasarai, being able to speak no sense.

As the door's seal gave way beneath the impression of his ring, he breathed in deeply and stepped forward into dreams.

The world beyond those doors was made of memory; when he stood before his father's throne, it was the first time he had ever stood there, and it always was this way. Every thought, every emotion, every unique sense of atmosphere that flickered through his mind was inescapably identical, a perfect replica of the first time he had ever entered this room. Little newness could thrive within these walls, now, heavy as they were with the imprint of circular time. Ironically, the only thing that ever changed therein was the man himself, and then only by how stripped of creativity, of novel thought, his actions had become since the last time Sasarai was there.

The shift in consciousness caused his steps to falter, jarred him mentally as he attempted to reconcile the old feelings with the new; he had been six years old, the first time, his thoughts all unformed and searching, of caves and exploring and playing with mud, of fresh hints of magic that teased at his mind from a True Rune carefully, lovingly asserting its influence over the fragile child. Now he flowed with magic as easily as tide with tide, had known deep valleys and heavy mountain corridors, been a sea-worn pebble over a thousand years' shaping, and the old, fumbling, fuzzy thoughts and hopes seemed alien.

He attempted to shuffle the impulses into memory, back where they came from, back where they belonged. But the walls and the floor and the robes and the mask and, behind the eye-holes, a glimpse of those grey-green eyes, perfect mirrors of his own, all were soaked in the feelings of childhood, sparking in his mind inescapable indicators that then was now, and it was all he could do within the conflict of his mind to bow down, his eyes upon the ground, searching its pale surface not for unshifting security but for the currents of life he knew moved through it. The tendrils of his magic reached down into the crystal, which faintly sparkled at their writhing there, and he searched out every little thing in it that moved and glittered and breathed. He had to reach deep down, down almost to the staircase outside before he could feel the shifts enough to comfort, and he could always find the life in stone. The very ground here was silenced. No wonder he felt so frail, he thought, and his stomach quailed anew at the thought of the dead earth. Not dead, no, he forced himself to think, just not moving. Nothing under magic's influence was ever really dead; this place was filled with life, but it was a strange kind of life, crippled, uselessly swallowing its own tail.

"You summoned me here, Father." It was an effort to get the words out; his voice was like a rebellion against the staticness of the room, warring with it, the magic of the Circle wanting to warp his words into echoes of those that had gone before. He had taken pains-- and they were pains; his lungs ached from the Rune's attempts to stifle him-- to say something different, to shift the pattern of his words slightly, carving out a small pocket of solace in the magic, driving it back. He felt a pang of remorse for that-- not for the action, but for the intent behind it. It wasn't the magic's fault; in its own way, in the right circumstance, it was beautiful. It was just confused, had grown overeager and was now locked in a loop it could not escape. He needed to break into it, to ease it apart from itself, as much as it wanted to flow; but he need not think of driving it off. The Rune shimmered behind his father's mask, its glow spilling out from the sockets; as if to say, no, don't disrupt me, don't change things here, this is perfect, this is good. This is endless. This is forever.

One can have too much of a good thing, Sasarai's mind welled up in response, but he could not feel the thought reach the Rune; likely it was quashed before it even escaped his mind, a dissonance, an unallowable intrusion. But none the less, as his Rune-senses felt over the surface of the room, he could sense a cracked façade, a slightly weakened circle. In parts here and there, the awareness of now filtered through like tiny shafts of light. And in the space created by his words, he heard a sound.

It was a feeble sound, almost a squeak, air pushing against vocal cords stiff with disuse, prompting a flurry of coughs as the weak muscles rebelled. Sasarai's eyes flicked up to the mask, to the man who shuddered behind it, torn between anticipation of his father's words and a gripping terror at the thought. Suddenly now it seemed awful, forbidden, for anything to break the silence of that room; the Circle Rune's strands had pushed into his own mind, and he felt reflexive fear at that notion, too, fear at the thought of change and fear at the thought of disrupting change.

There was another croaking sound, and then, caught in the Rune-glimmer that shone behind the mask, a tear.

His father was crying.

Something about that awareness tore into Sasarai, and just as he was on the brink of throwing his arms around the man a second weight slammed into him, a weight that felt like dusty old books and faded light and crushing uniformity; and suddenly he was six years old again, and there was his father with tears on his face, and it felt so wrong and so huge, like he was falling, like something that he had always relied on, some deep-rooted stasis, some unchanging foundation was crumbling from beneath him, and all compassion and all sensibility fled from him in the name of self-preservation.

A flight of fifty-four steps was not a safe thing to flee down by any stretch, but the earth caught each hasty footfall, and carried him to the bottom, effortlessly.