[centre][hider=Summary]Vowzra walks and finds Vulamera, in her old woman form, hunched over the Codex
She has gone mad
He takes the Codex from her and opens it to the page 
It is the Fated page which she tore a tiny bit from
The Codex absorbs her spirit and the tear is thus sealed
Vowzra takes the Codex to Chronos and seals it within the Cube
He suggests that when it leaves it will be something else entirely[/hider]
Thanatos, Part IV[/centre]

No great amount of Time had passed since he had set off. He had counted one thousand steps, and two hundred after that, and twenty after those, and then five…and then four. When he arrived, he found the old crone. He had known she would be there. He had known for endless eons, since aforetime. And perhaps even before that. The witless woman had, with her own hands and the greatest foolishness, brought together their threads and laced them in enmity. She had stolen what was his due right, and Fate had willed that she taste the fruit of her theft. And here she now was, labouring and gagging ‘neath the weight of Fate’s curse – the curse she had gleefully seized with her two hands, the curse she had embraced and brought into herself. The Great Criterion, the Scroll of the Beginning, the Dictator of the End, the Codex of Creation, the Blueprint of the Universe, the Book of Death, the Tyrant, the Liberator. It went by many names, but all knew it for what it was. All had a vague idea of what they perceived it to be. And all knew that it was best to perceive of it no more than that.

All, that is, except her.

For one so intelligent, there could have been no greater fool. She had opened it and peeked within, and she had realised the depths of her ignorance. What could have been more devastating, for a being such as her, than to come to such a revelation? Such epiphanies were dangerous things indeed, and there were some things best left unknown – even for those who claimed that they - or wished that they - knew all, or had a monopoly over knowledge. She had thought all knowledge her prerogative. Such heights of pride. And such as he saw before him was the great fall which cometh swiftly thereafter.

‘But what does it mean? It makes no sense…no no…what if….yes! Yes…well, [i]maybe[/i]...it could be. But this line! This line! It makes no sense, why is it there? It looks like I can see it, yes! It all comes together so per- but then this line! Again and again this line! Damned line! Cursed thing! What is it? What could it mean…’ even as he stood so close by her, all her mind and wit were fixated upon the great book which lay open upon the ground before her. She was hunched over it and looked even more the ugly, ignorant crone for it. If there was one thing he could come to an understanding with the Jvanic Entity on, it was that both he and it held this creature with almost equal disdain. But his disdain for this Witless One was even greater. For she had robbed him – she had attacked him personally. He had nothing against the Jvanic Entity, she had not insulted him or attacked his person or taken what was his Fated right (no, that Defiled Flesh merely offended every conceivable sensibility that he had, and was unnatural no matter how one twisted and reinterpreted the possible Timelines).

‘Maybe…maybe this line isn’t related to this part. What if…ah! Yes…maybe. Maybe it is read after this great curved- no! In conjunction with this other…’ she screeched in exasperation and angrily slammed the book shut, ‘stupid book! Useless! Dumb! What is it what is it what isit whatisitwhatisit…’ her head snapped upwards and she slowly turned towards her not-so-secret observer.
‘How long have you bee-’
‘Long enough.’
‘What do you wa-’
‘Nothing. Nothing that you can give.’
‘How did you-’
‘And did you think you could hide from [i]me[/i]?’
There was silence for the slightest second. She opened her mouth, but he answered her question before she could utter a single syllable.
‘Even if I could read it, what makes you think I would help [i]you[/i]?’
‘Why would-’
‘I not? Is that a question that one with intelligence as vast as yours asks?’

She looked around herself, eyes wide with fear and anxiety. A maddened god was truly a tremendous sight. He had, of course, seen it many times before, a thousand times in a thousand different Timelines. But there was nothing quite like seeing it in person. No vision, however vibrant – no glass ball, no screen, no oral or written description – could ever quite capture the solid reality of being stood there before her. And nothing would ever be quite so exquisite as delivering his damning verdict to her in his own person (though, admittedly, he found nothing ‘exquisite’ – his expansive breast had no space for emotion…if he could help it).
‘You have lost your mind.’

By the Terrible Adjudicator! The look in her eyes, her slack-jawed shock, the horror that pervaded the very air around her. Now, he was not by any means a vengeful being, but there was some truth in that adage which mortals and immortals alike held – revenge is sweet. Of course, true as the wisdom was, he was not a vengeful being and, indeed, he was not taking any kind of revenge. On the contrary, he was carrying out the Will of the Timeline, when the Timeline dictated, in the way it dictated, for the reasons it dictated. He was merely that Will made manifest, the hand which seized those whom the Timeline decreed. He was, after all, the very Vicegerent of Fate, was he not? 

And why should he not admit it? His duties did bring him a certain degree of joy – if you understood ‘joy’ in a very – [i]very[/i] – particular manner.
‘You are maddened. You are cursed. You have lost your mind. Utterly.’

He did not know what, exactly, the sound that left her buccal orifice was. It was halfway moan, with something of a screech therein – and was that the deep grunting of a brush beast somewhere in there? But as it were it mattered very little. The Codex rose up slowly, and she let loose shrieks of rage and threw herself at him when she realised what he was doing.
'You shan't! You shan't take it! Not my...not my...' she fell at his feet, tears streaming down her face as he looked frigidly at her.

'Be calm, this shan't take overlong,' as the Codex of Creation hovered before him, he began turning its leaves. He saw the pages, but his eyes did not register any writing. Indeed, he did not wish to register any of it, or know what was within it. He had been maddened by the Hells once long ago, he knew the objects that infused beings such as he with madness. And this here Book was one such thing.
At last he arrived at the Fated page, and his fingers rubbed the edge of the paper where Vulamera had once [i]torn[/i] the Codex.
'And for thine trespasses shalt thou be punished. And none wronged thee, but thou didst thine own self oppress.'

With that, the Codex turned in mid air until its pages faced the tearful Vulamera. One would have expected it to shine and vibrate. Perhaps one would have thought it would glow, or maybe sing or shriek. Maybe one would have thought that the book would grow wings, or maybe dance a morbid dance. Perhaps one expected it to morph into an almighty, demonic jaw and engulf the trespasser. Maybe one even expected it to speak with the voice of Niciel and let the maddened goddess know that for her sins she was forgiven, and of her madness she would soon be cured. Perhaps one though the Liberator would become a Comforter in the final moments of the diseased and decrepit woman.
But none of that occurred. There was no pomp and ceremony. Vulamera did not even scream. One moment she was a maddened woman, and the next she was gone. And her essence, with a calmness that did the gravity of the moment no great justice, slipped into the tear in the Codex and sealed it. And so the Codex was once more complete and whole. She had without thought torn it, and she had not realised that the little tear was worth more than even her godly essence. But despite that, it would do. And the book's pages turned one by one. And it closed and fell upon the earth.

Vowzra took it with his two human hands, and he walked away from the site of Vulamera's trial, guilt, and punishment. Had they they thought that they would not one day be called to account for all they did? [i]Woe is yours, oh Vowzra, and Woe there's.[/i]

And he took it till he reached the Solitary Mount, and he climbed that king of hills. And he hailed the Guardian.
'And ne'er more shall I,' he whispered cryptically as he passed through the portal to Chronos. And once there, he made his way to the Cube and split it open, and the Codex was placed upon the alter which had been awaiting it for countless eons. And the Cube was sealed, and Vowzra knew it would be but a little while before Codex and Cube were forever parted. But would the Codex be the Codex, and would the Cube be the Cube?

Nay, it would be a killer of gods, for soon there will be no one left who would strive to cure.

'For Fate dictates and wills. And what am I to dictate and will otherwise? All that begins must end; and be ye ever so high, greater then the fall.'