And so it came to pass that Jhrad chose to leave the Company of the Traveller, and wandered in the desert for a moon and a day. On that day, he came upon a pool in the sand, exactly equal to the measure of a man in all directions, and as he bent down to slake his thirst, the pool turned to blood before his eyes, then roiled and bubbled with the fury of the sun.

As the blood bubbled, it burst, and spewed forth in all directions, covering Jhrad and the sand with its rich wetness. In place of the blood lay a mouth, and it addressed Jhrad in a voice that came from deep beneath the earth yet was not of the earth. "Who are you that wander this trackless desert, where no man may breathe more than three times without becoming dry as a stone and still as dust?"

"I am Jhrad, sorceror. I was one of the Companions of the Traveller, and I shall be again, but now I must seek that which cannot be held in the presence of the Traveller."

"That which you seek lies in the hands of the Queen of Fire, whom no man may bear to approach unless he bears the Red Mark."

"By your blood I am red from head to toe, and thus bear all red marks."

"You are wise, for one who seeks something so foolish," and with that, the mouth grew wide, and Jhrad stepped within.

The tale of Jhrad's battle with the locusts is sadly lost to us, with only the scrap regaling of how he "smote the second seven-hundred count of their number with the breath of dreams, and charmed the last third into slaying themselves" still existing on this mortal plane. His approach to the Fortress of Angoreth is also lost, and we must resume following him after he has passed the first gatehouse.

And at the second gate, twice as tall and four times as fearsome, Jhrad again called out, and again a face appeared at the battlements, with eight times more teeth and sixteen burning eyes. It called out to him, "In all time, but thirty-two seekers have passed the first gate, and none have gone further."

Shifting the giant's spine to his other hand, Jhrad answered, "I know the sixty-four secrets of the stars, and shall use each one to pry loose a nail from the gate, and it shall fall."

"Then I shall let you pass, for the gate must not fall, and the stars themselves would slay you if you were lying."

And thus he passed the second gate and came to the throne room of the Queen of Fire. It was a vast and opulent hall, with pillars of living flame supporting a dome that was stolen from the roof of the world, before the lesser gods had to craft the mere sky to take its place. Under the dome sat the Queen of Fire, red and perfect, burning since before Fire was tamed and made to swear its oaths to only burn where fuel is to be found.

Jhrad called out, "Queen, I have come to claim your favor and your gift."

"And why should I favor you, half-mortal as you may be?"

"I bear the Red Mark of your Ladyship, though no man, not even I, knows how it is drawn, for to do so would insult your sovereignty."

"You also bear the red whorl of the Unburnt Knight, sorceror. I should kill you for that."

"Ah, but you see, your Ladyship, your mark is on top of his, for you are superior."

"You are clever. Come, claim your gift."

Jhrad approached the throne of glass, and embraced the Queen, and she drew out his breath and burnt it and infused it with fire and he died and was reborn and knew the ways of Passion. Releasing her, turn his head, for he could never look at her again, and as he turned, he spied Mhzad, who had been waiting for him at the side of the throne the whole time, having come by the Twilight Ways. He kissed her, and she too knew the ways of Passion, and in perfect silence they left to rejoin the Traveller as his Trials of Joy and Anger were to begin.

I have seen the past, and now I am old. It is only upon the realization that time has passed that we age. Were we to remain oblivious, we would be children forever, free to bang our drums and climb trees and frolic away from the cares of life.

Time is a river, and we float upon it like garbage, rushing downstream to be dumped into the vast ocean. It is only by the remembrances of the fishermen lining the banks that we can leave a mark of our passing.

To the fish in the river of time, the rafts of junk that make up our lives are great places to hunt. All sorts of tasty bugs lurked trapped in the crevices of our lives—little mad, twitching things that we refuse to show to others and hide underneath our air bubbles, hating them but afraid to drown them. When the fish catch them, we convince ourselves that we never liked them at all, despite their being the only things that truly matter.

Somewhere, far out at sea, a giant raft is forming from all the millions of lives that flow downstream into it. One day, this raft will achieve sentience and claw its way upriver like the great, blind beast it is, devouring the fishermen that have in turn eaten that fish that once consumed our dark secrets, closing the cycle and unmaking all things as it stumbles back into the source of eternity. On this day there shall be only Joy and Pain and Oblivion.