by Elise Kova
Darkness exploded from the wound. She released the weapon, watching the magic unravel and the sword disappear as it sank into him. Raspian’s glowing, dead eyes fixated on her as darkness sprayed like noxious gas from his body. It filled the air around her, threatening to suffocate her.
Soon, the world was blotted out entirely and the faint glow of magic that coated her body was the only light she could see by. Even the sky had vanished.
Vi spun, looking for any sign of him. She raised a hand, firing a beam of light into the darkness, and then another. She was shooting blind.
Uncose, she tried again. The light flashed out along the earth, but it did nothing for the darkness in the air. Vi moved over the desolate wasteland, climbing over rubble and buildings and what must be the remnants of the lives Raspian’s loyal followers had made. Her feet stopped in the center of the glyph of the dragon, split in two. Vi spun in place, still searching.
Lightning cracked behind her, sparking a surreal sense of familiarity. She was in two places at once. She had seen this before.
The vision.
She turned, looking to the lightning on instinct. A plume of smoke rose from the dark spot on the ground, but there was nothing.
She heard the inhale. He was behind her. This was the moment of her vision, a truth that she had seen but that eluded Yargen. This was why she was meant to be in this battle. Vi only had time for one choice, one decision, one word, before his claws and teeth overcame her.
Wein.
Glyphs shot out from her midsection. One rose to the crown of her head and the other sank to her feet. A thick coating stretched over her skin, turning it to stone. A protective barrier, identical to the one Deneya had used that fateful night in the Caverns, now covered her.
Raspian was dedicated to his attack. His teeth and claws struck her barrier, bouncing off harmlessly. Vi spun, no longer turning away from the face of darkness itself. His gigantic arms were outstretched, ready to crush her.
Grasping both sides of his face, her brow furrowed, Vi snarled aloud, “Suladin dupot chronot hoolo.”
Suladin—seal him and lock him away once more for a millennium.
Dupot—enhance this power and make it stronger than ever before.
Chronot—slow its natural weakening over time.
Hoolo—stabilize and elongate.
Half of the words were hers and half were Taavin’s. They had come from the goddess, but she and Taavin had made them their own. She heard him within her, across time and space, his voice echoing inside her.
The glyphs that surrounded them condensed into crystal. It started at Raspian’s feet and began to creep up his body. He roared, swinging for her. Vi released his face, leaving crystal handprints embedded in his flesh, and stepped out of reach.
Her mouth began to move. The language of the gods spilled from her tongue almost like a song. The words were light and airy; they boomed power and whispered twisting glyphs into existence. Despite Raspian’s struggles, the crystals continued to grow up his body, caging him.
With a final roar, Raspian promised he would one day return—as he always did.
Then, silence.
Stillness.
The crystals grew toward the moon. They would patch the cracks and smooth over the edges of chaos that nearly escaped into the world she loved.
Yargen’s chant hastened, faster and faster. Vi felt power siphoning from her body like someone was pulling an invisible rope from her navel. Light flickered around her, growing ever stronger, fading, then brightening once more as the goddess’s essence was drawn out to power the crystals.
This was how the Crystal Caverns had been formed, Vi realized. History was repeating itself. Yargen would split herself again. A new cavern would be made to entomb Raspian, hidden on a new land. And when that tomb was inevitably breached, Yargen would be too weak to fight him.
“Yargen,” Vi whispered aloud. Her voice was her own—quivering, tired, scared, and human. “Do not split yourself again. The world needs you whole. Stop this vortex.”
Silence within her was the goddess’s response. Vi hoped she wasn’t too late. She swallowed hard.
“Take me. Take my life. Seal him with all of my magic. Buy time for this world with the time left in me.”
Are you certain?
Vi closed her eyes, a tired smile crossing her lips. One final time, the memories of all those she loved flooded her. She thought of the faces of every person she adored—those lost in her world who had lived on in her memories. After this, they would be gone for good.
And she would be gone, too.
“Do it,” Vi said with conviction. “This is my destiny. This is what you brought me all this way for. The world still needs you.”
Another few seconds of stillness before light exploded out from her. Vi watched as the raw essence of Yargen peeled away from her body. She couldn’t stare directly at the goddess; Yargen was too blinding and too incomprehensible in this form. Vi squeezed her eyes shut.
Flames seared her from the inside out as her spark was set free one final time. Every layer of skin boiled off of her bones. Her tongue crisped and her hair singed. She unraveled in the reverse of how Yargen had made her. Cycle after cycle of becoming condensed into this singular moment of release, lifetimes in the making.
And Vi gave herself over to the brilliant void of nothingness.
Chapter Forty
Tick…
… Tock
Tick…
… Tock
Tick… Tock.
Tick. Tock.
Tick-tock.
Something ticked softly in the distance. A sound she shouldn’t be able to hear—because she shouldn’t have ears, at least not working ones.
She was dead. She’d died.
Hadn’t she?
Who was she, anyway?
“Vi Solaris.”
Ah, yes, that was her name. Or rather, it had been one of her names. She’d had so many of them. Vi Solaris—it was a good name. She’d thought that before, hadn’t she? Yes, certainly. That name had meant something to her… something important.
“Vi Solaris, it is time to wake up.”
It wasn’t so much waking in the way Vi had once understood it. More like going from a state of stasis to a state of awareness. The light around her was blinding. She could see every color blending together into a brilliance far greater than what mortal eyes were meant to see.
She was a spirit—an idea of life. She was a slice of consciousness in the primordial void, drifting for who knew how long.
I know this place.
“Yes,” a familiar voice said. Every man, woman, and child in the world was speaking all at once through the voice.
I shouldn’t be here.
“No, this is not a place for you.”
Her back settled on something solid. She had been drifting like a leaf through space and had finally settled somewhere soft. Vi blinked, which was odd, because she didn’t really have eyelids in this state. Or maybe she did have eyelids? She blinked again. Yes, there were definitely eyelids of some kind.
Around her, a room came into focus. Marble columns supported a ceiling so high she couldn’t see it. A bed of plush feathers and clouds surrounded her. A woman with long, black hair stood by a wide window that overlooked the whole world. Vi found herself inhabiting the vision she’d seen after absorbing the crown, but this time from a different vantage.
A familiar face of angular cheeks and sharp eyes regarded her. A silver necklace hung around the woman’s neck. The chain was weighted down by a vaguely familiar silver pocket watch that had a sun and wing on its surface.
Ah, that was where the ticking was coming from.
“You look like Fiera this time.” Vi smiled, though the expression felt weak and tired.
“Do I?”
Vi remembered the last time that she had been in a similar space with the goddess, a place where eternity stretched on forever. How painful it had been before, to lay eyes on Yargen�
��s raw form. She was grateful now that Yargen took the shape of something—someone—easier to comprehend.
Before.
What had happened before?
“The battle with Raspian,” Yargen reminded her gently.
Yes, that was it. The pieces clarified and slotted back into place, one after the other.
“I died,” Vi whispered. She sat up. A body was attached to her essence now, though Vi had the distinct feeling that what she perceived as a body was merely another aspect of Yargen’s magic. It was another way her mind tried to comprehend an impossible place and situation.
“In a way.”
“Death seems fairly black and white.”
“I have carved earth from nothingness. I have breathed life into creations of crystal. For me, very little is black and white.” Yargen crossed over and sat on the edge of the bed. “Yes, you gave the raw essence of life itself—such a powerful thing—and the body that housed it back to me, so that Raspian could be sealed. But consciousness does little to seal away dark gods.”
“You took my body and life essence, but not my mind.”
“Just so.”
“Was what I gave… enough?”
“Yes.” Yargen smiled with Fiera’s lips. It was as tender and warm as the real princess’s.
“Then the world…”
“The world you helped shape will be safe from Raspian for another thousand or two thousand years, perhaps more if we’re lucky. Things were not rebuilt, this time.” The smile became slightly coy and her eyes a little sad. “Eventually, he will break free of that containment. Or mortals will somehow find a way to set him free, whether they know what they’re doing or not. Though I have made sure he is well hidden, this time.”
“I see.” Vi smoothed her hand over the foggy blanket atop her, watching glittering starlight dance underneath her fingers.
“Do not despair.” Yargen rested her hand on hers gently. Magic and life shot through her. Vi inhaled sharply. Feelings were starting to return. Vi felt like laughing and weeping, singing and screaming, all at once. “That is simply the order of things. When he returns, I will be ready.”
“You are not fractured, then?”
“Do I look fractured to you?”
“I’ve been told my eyes can lie to me around the divine, so I’ve stopped trusting them in moments like these.”
Yargen chuckled at that. The sound was pure delight and as sweet as bells. “You have been an amusing one to watch, all these revolutions of the vortex.”
“It’s really all over then…” Vi looked out the window. She saw nothing but a bright blue sky, clear and filled with light. She brought her attention back to Yargen. “So why am I still here?”
“That is something I have debated for many mortal years now.”
“Years?”
“For me, it has only been a moment.” Yargen stood once more, looking down at her with Fiera’s fiery eyes. “I have been thinking while I harbored your consciousness, keeping it safe from the passage of time. What is a just reward for a Champion who has served me so faithfully across the ages? Then, it occurred to me…
“Do you wish to return to that world?”
“What?” Vi whispered. Something jolted in her chest. It felt like a heartbeat, the first of what could be many.
“You enabled me to return the watch to Vhalla Yarl, and a Vi Solaris was born into the world you have saved. This new Vi’s body is as you know it, though the world is slightly different than you remember. Your actions did cause ripples of change these past eighteen years. However, if it would please you, I could return your mind to that form.”
Vi considered this, trying to wrap her head around it. “What would happen to the new Vi’s consciousness? Would she know what’s happened?”
“No, she wouldn’t. You and she are mirrors; it would be a seamless merger of your awareness. Though there might be some memories and feelings from your separate childhoods that would get confused from time to time—memories you won’t be sure which one of you made.”
“Would it feel like two people at once?” Vi had that sensation before with Yargen. She wasn’t keen to have it again.
“No. You would have one mind. One, final Vi Solaris.”
“Would I feel like me?”
“Mortal feelings are elusive to me.”
Vi looked around the room, considering this offer. She would be returned to the body of the ninety-fourth Vi Solaris, born into the world she’d saved. It would be a chance to live in a time that was not ending. And, if Yargen was to be believed, it wouldn’t result in pain or confusion for the girl who was currently walking in that skin.
“What’s the alternative?” Vi dared to ask.
“I would fully join you with my essence. You would live forever as an aspect of me. You would know every corner of this world and whatever comes next in a way a mortal never could, just as I promised.”
“Are my parents and brother alive in this new world?” Yargen had mentioned ripples of change caused by her actions. Just because there had been a Vhalla and Aldrik when she’d left the Dark Isle didn’t mean they still lived now.
“They are.”
Relief made her dizzy and a sound somewhere between laughter and a sob escaped her. There were changes, but the people she held dearest were still there. She could still have a life with them—the life she’d been robbed of. “Tell me one more thing: is there a new Taavin?”
“Yes.”
“Then I wish to return,” Vi said gingerly, a smile working its way onto her lips. “I would rather live one life with them than an eternity without.” Vi paused, then added hastily, “No offense, your magnificence.”
Yargen laughed in delight once more. She crossed over to the bed and leaned forward. “I didn’t expect you to choose differently.”
Vi stared at the watch around the goddess’s neck, realizing where it had come from. It was the timepiece Yargen had traded with Vhalla during that long, dark night. That meant the watch with Taavin’s essence was still out there.
“Time for time,” Vi whispered.
Yargen lifted her hand, touching the watch with a smile. “When Aldrik gave this to Vhalla, he bestowed on her his minutes, his hours, his days. I think he would be very pleased to know he was really giving them to you.”
A thousand questions danced on her tongue but she remained in stunned silence as Yargen leaned forward. The visage of Fiera melted away to pure light. The goddess placed a single, tender kiss on Vi’s forehead.
The air was sucked from Vi’s lungs as she fell backward and descended from the realm of the divine one final time.
The room vanished into a misty light. Wind sped around her. Her eyes dipped closed and—
Vi woke with a gasp. She jolted forward, covers thrown from her shoulders and pooling around her waist. The smell of fresh wood, sap, and the damp tang of morning filled her nose. It was a familiar, nostalgic scent—one she hadn’t smelled in a long time.
She looked around in the darkness. The walls were smoothed and polished. Overhead was a gnarled ceiling of decorative roots and branches that spilled down, weaving into the four corners of her bed. Across from the foot of the bed was a dresser, adorned with carefully painted portraits in gilded frames.
Turning, Vi peered at the candle on her bedside table. Her breath hitched as she lifted a hand.
The candle lit on command.
Vi threw off the familiar covers, standing. She grabbed at the sleeping gown she wore, feeling the cotton. She rushed over to the corner of the room. There, a pile of supplies was neatly stacked in the corner between the dresser and the window. A quiver she knew so very well hung on its peg, bow attached. She ran her fingertips over the fletchings of the arrows and the Solaris sigil emblazoned in the quiver’s leather.
This was her room. Everything was just as she remembered it: the clothes she’d laid out for her birthday hunt, the candle she’d struggled to light. That meant she had woken at the dawn of her seventeenth bir
thday once more.
That also meant—
Vi sprinted from the bedroom. Her heart was racing faster than her feet. Every emotion was competing for dominance within her. Yargen’s hold over her body and mind had been so slow that Vi hadn’t realized for how long her emotions had been muted. It seemed like it’d been forever since she’d truly felt anything.
A strangled noise of hope and fear escaped her mouth as she rushed into the main living space of the quarters. The couches were in a slightly different spot than she remembered. Or… were they?
Yargen said time had continued along while her consciousness had been in stasis. There were changes and variations from the world she’d come from. Vi shook her head, turning to the door that led to her personal study. Only one thing mattered right now.
She yanked on it so hard that it slammed into the wall as Vi rushed into the room. Every map was where she remembered. The table where she’d drawn them was as much of a mess as she’d last left it.
Five presents were stacked atop the drafting table, neatly piled and out of place in the room.
“Don’t let this have changed,” she pleaded. Let Fritz’s gift be a stone in the river.
Vi pushed aside four of the gifts and reached for a small parcel wrapped in black silk. It was feather-light and a had a black envelope slid under a black ribbon. Vi’s fingers trembled as she ripped open the seal on the letter—the Broken Moon of the Tower of Sorcerers. The symbol of the Tower was something she needed to change the instant she got back to the palace. She couldn’t look at it now without seeing Raspian’s followers.
But Sorcerers and the sorting of symbols could wait. Vi hurriedly skimmed the letter that began with, “Dear Vi” and ended with, “Your friend who cannot wait to meet and teach you, Fritznangle Chareem, Minister of Sorcery.” She didn’t need to read every word. She knew what it said.
