The sky did not tear.
It revised itself.
The green wound at the horizon didn't rip open violently—it slid apart with surgical precision, as if an invisible hand had decided the Spires' skyline needed less color and more restraint.
The light dimmed, flattening.
Shadows lost depth. Reflections dulled. The crystal towers that had once hummed with aesthetic confidence now looked… hesitant. Like a masterpiece suddenly aware it might be criticized.
I felt it immediately.
The Shard behind my eyes throbbed—not with power, but with pressure.
"He's here," Valerius said, her voice low. "Not a projection. Not Janitors."
Puck's ears flattened. "That's not the Curator's cleaning crew, Artie. That's his pen."
The tear widened.
Something stepped through.
Not a monster.
Not a god.
A man—tall, slender, draped in marble-white robes that looked carved rather than sewn. His face was smooth and perfect, but wrong in the way mannequins are wrong: all features present, none alive.
Behind him, reality held its breath.
"Arthur Vane," the Curator said pleasantly. "Senior Archivist. Beige enthusiast."
"I feel seen," I muttered, though my mouth was dry.
Valerius raised her rapier, starlight flaring. "You are trespassing in the Spires."
He glanced at her—truly glanced—and for half a second, her wings flickered.
"I am correcting an error," the Curator replied. "This realm deviated from its intended draft."
The ground beneath us shifted.
I didn't see it crumble.
I saw track changes.
Lines of possibility struck through. Alternative outcomes hovering faintly in the air like rejected paragraphs.
The Curator raised one finger.
The world responded.
A section of the terrace simply… simplified. Crystal lost its facets, becoming smooth, dull stone. Decorative arches vanished. Beauty was not destroyed.
It was edited out.
"Stop," I said, stepping forward before Valerius could stop me. "If you flatten this place, you erase what makes it matter."
He smiled, thin and indulgent.
"Matter is inefficient," he said. "Perfection does not require texture."
I reached for the Aesthetic again—
And felt nothing.
Cold panic hit me.
The Spires weren't offering it anymore.
Reality here was scared.
"Arthur," Valerius hissed, sensing it too. "What's wrong?"
"He's locked the style guide," Puck said grimly. "No more creative liberties."
The Curator gestured again.
This time, something wrote itself into existence.
Figures stepped out of the air—humanoid, elegant, featureless. They wore robes identical to his.
Editors.
Not Janitors.
Each carried a long, thin blade that hummed with narrative authority.
"EDITORIAL OVERRIDE," they intoned in unison.
They moved.
Valerius launched herself forward, wings flaring gold, rapier singing. Her blade struck the first Editor—
And skipped.
The Editor didn't bleed. It annotated her attack, scribbling Ineffective into the air. The word burned.
Valerius cried out, staggering back, a thin red line opening across her arm—not a wound, but a correction.
My stomach dropped.
I had to act.
I reached inward—not for Beauty.
For something else.
Structure.
I saw the Editors' attacks as footnotes stapled onto reality. Overbearing. Pedantic. Arrogant.
I grabbed one mid-swing.
My fingers sank into the sentence describing its existence.
It hurt.
Not physically—mentally. Like trying to erase something you half-agree with.
"No," I gasped. "You don't get to decide what stays."
I crossed out Final Version and scribbled Draft.
The Editor froze.
Then shattered into loose punctuation.
The backlash hit me like a migraine wrapped in static. My vision blurred, margins bleeding red.
"Arthur!" Valerius caught me before I fell.
"I'm fine," I lied again. "Just… realizing why no one edits reality manually."
The Curator watched with interest.
"Fascinating," he murmured. "You're not rewriting. You're recontextualizing. Dangerous, but inefficient."
He raised his hand.
And pointed at me.
The air thickened.
I felt words wrapping around my bones, my thoughts, my name.
"SUBJECT: ARTHUR VANE," the Curator intoned. "STATUS: UNSTABLE. RECOMMENDED ACTION—"
He paused.
Then smiled.
"—DEFINITION."
Reality lunged.
Not to kill me.
To label me.
I felt my past rearranging—memories flattening, choices simplified. My life compressing into a neat summary.
Librarian.
Anomaly.
Problem.
"No!" I shouted, fighting it with everything I had left.
I reached for the only thing the Curator couldn't own.
Contradiction.
I wasn't a hero.
I wasn't a villain.
I wasn't even brave.
I was tired.
I was scared.
I was angry.
I shoved that mess into the label.
The definition buckled.
Reality stuttered.
For the first time—
The Curator frowned.
"That shouldn't be possible," he said softly.
"Yeah," I panted. "Story of my life."
The Spires trembled.
Not from damage—
From choice.
Valerius stepped beside me, bleeding light, stance unbroken.
"If you want him," she said coldly, "you go through us."
The Curator regarded us both.
Then, slowly, he lowered his hand.
"This chapter ends here," he said. "But the book does not."
The tear in the sky closed—clean, controlled.
The Editors dissolved into footnotes and dust.
The pressure vanished.
I collapsed to my knees, vision swimming.
Valerius knelt with me, steadying my shoulders.
"You're shaking," she said quietly.
"So is reality," I replied. "I think I annoyed him."
Puck hopped onto my chest, unusually serious. "You didn't just annoy him, Artie."
He looked at the sky.
"You proved you can't be categorized."
The Spires brightened—tentatively.
But far away, somewhere beyond realms and drafts, I felt it:
A new section being written.
And my name—
Underlined.