Dissolution

by Kyle West

  I closed my eyes, relishing Alex’s touch and trying to commit the feeling to memory. “What must I do?”

  “Find Isaru,” Alex said. “Odium will still be in full control of him. If Isaru can be freed, then you can return here. Rakhim has outlived his usefulness to Odium, but Isaru is still very useful, so Odium will be committing all his energy to him. It’s up to you to challenge Isaru, and Odium, directly.”

  “And if I’m not enough?”

  To the side, the air shimmered and seemed to split at the seam, revealing a rip into reality through which I could see faces: Shara, Fiona, and Isa. They looked at me as if through a pane of glass, their expressions shocked.

  “I’m letting you out in the same place you entered the Xenofold,” Alex said. “Your friends have come back. I’ll hold things here while I wait.”

  I threw my arms around him. “Will you be okay in here?”

  Alex was quiet for an uncomfortably long time. “Once I give my powers to you, then I don’t know what’ll happen. I’ll be strong for a long time still. Strong enough, maybe.”

  “Alex . . . you can’t stay here if it’s going to hurt you.”

  “All I can do is buy us time,” Alex said. “My life on Earth ended four hundred years ago, Anna. It’s right for me to give myself to save the world, even a second time. But you can’t stay here. Isandru needs you.”

  I wiped the tears from my eyes. “We’ll go now, then.”

  I helped Isandru to stand. “Elder . . .”

  “She’s gone, Shanti,” he said, his voice raspy. “Gone . . . I couldn’t save her.”

  I knew he was referring to none other than his sister. “I know, Isandru. She will be one with the Xenofold. Alex is going to save everyone here, to make sure they go to the place of light.”

  “I couldn’t bear the thought of her being in here,” Isandru said. “I . . . challenged him. I nearly won.”

  “She’s in here?”

  Isandru coughed. “I can’t leave this place. Not until she’s safe.”

  “You have to get out, Isandru,” I said. “You’ll die if you stay.”

  “I’ll die if I leave!” he said vehemently.

  I looked at Alex, at a loss for what to do.

  “He’s right,” Alex said. “He’ll die either way. A part of him will be left behind; such is the fate of those who enter this place. Leaving will hurt him greatly, but staying would be far worse.”

  I nodded. “I know.” I helped Isandru toward the portal. “Let’s go back now.”

  “Shanti . . .” he said. “Don’t be afraid. The best is yet to come.”

  “Isandru? What do you mean?”

  He smiled then. “The world may pass away. But it won’t matter. The Elekai will not die. It will only be . . . different.”

  “Different how? Isandru?”

  “Elekim . . .” he said, looking into my eyes.

  Then, in my arms, he closed his eyes closed as his body sagged.

  “Elder?” I asked, panic entering my voice.

  He was unresponsive, but I felt a weak pulse at his neck.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  THROUGH THE PORTAL, THE OTHERS still gazed at me with their faces of perpetual shock.

  “There’s something you should know,” Alex said. “When you leave this place . . . it will be as Elekim.”

  “I know,” I said. “I’m still not ready for that.”

  “When I stay here, I’m sacrificing myself,” Alex said. “A sacrifice is necessary to transfer my powers to you. Just as the one called the Wanderer died for us, I die now for you. For the world to have hope.”

  “No,” I said.

  “It must be this way,” Alex said, tears falling from his eyes. “I know I’ll see you soon. And I also know I can’t see you again unless I do this. I can’t let you go back out there without the entire power of the Xenofold behind you. That would be like killing you.”

  “No,” I repeated. “I won’t let you die.”

  “Come back,” he said. “When Isaru is safe. Then this place will end, and I can return to the Xenofold. After that the final battle can begin.”

  Nothing I could say would change things. I had to accept this, even if I didn’t want to.

  I hadn’t wanted to be Elekai. I hadn’t wanted to be Anna. And now, finally, I didn’t want to accept this final threshold of responsibility. To become Elekim.

  “I don’t know how, Alex,” I said. “It’s too much!”

  “You can,” Alex said. “Because I did.”

  “You’re special,” I said. “You’re better and stronger than me.”

  “No,” Alex said. “You are just as strong as me. Stronger, in some ways. Please tell me that you’ll try. I’ll always be with you, Anna. Always.”

  I looked into his eyes, and I didn’t know how much was me and how much was her, but I trusted him with everything I had. I trusted him back then when he sacrificed himself, I trusted him when he told me we would be together again, and now, I had to trust him that this was the only way.

  “Okay,” I said. “But this is the last thing I’ll do. The last thing you can ever ask me to do.”

  “I know,” Alex said. “It’s so much. But I know our love is enough, Anna. Everything we’ve been through, in life and outside of life . . . it’s all been building toward this. And we will be together again. I believe that.”

  “I do, too,” I said.

  All this time, I was still holding Isandru. I wanted nothing more than to throw myself into Alex’s arms, but to stay here any longer with Elder Isandru would be a dishonor to him. I couldn’t let him die in this horrible place, the way I was allowing Alex to die.

  “I have to go,” I said.

  “I know,” Alex said. “Remember everything I told you. Remember to come back when everything’s done. I know you can do it, Anna.”

  “I’ll come back,” I said. “Goodbye, Alex.”

  “I love you, Anna.”

  I closed my eyes. At that moment, I was fully Anna.

  “I love you, too. With everything I am.”

  I faced the portal, which was already growing smaller. I carried Isandru through, stepping out onto the other side just as it closed.

  * * *

  We were under the ichor. I pushed off the ground toward the surface, holding tight to Isandru. When I broke the surface, I pulled him toward the shoreline, where Fiona and Shara rushed to pull us out.

  “Elder Isandru!” Fiona said.

  At that moment, his eyes opened, but just barely. “Fiona.”

  Isandru then closed his eyes, unable to do or say more.

  “We need to get him on board,” I said.

  “Is he going to be okay?” Shara asked.

  They helped me carry him up the slope toward the ship.

  “What happened?” Isa asked, walking beside me.

  “I’ll get to that in a moment,” I said. “Elder Isandru is very weak. He fought Shal and is hurt badly.”

  The wound didn’t seem to be anything physical, but he was hurt all the same.

  We walked on board and laid Isandru on my bed. I touched his old, withered arm, and opened myself to the Xenofold.

  Only to be shocked by the sheer amount of power I felt. Time seemed to slow as the exhilaration of power filled me. I felt as if I could do anything with that power.

  I could perhaps even give Isandru his life back, repair all the damage done to him by Rakhim Shal and the Hyperfold.

  So, I filled him with that power, somehow knowing by instinct exactly what I had to do.

  And due to that instinct, I knew that even I couldn’t save him, not with all the power of the Xenofold, just as Alex couldn’t.

  Even as I was coming to this realization, Isandru’s gray eyes opened and shone brightly, as if he himself were channeling the power of the Xenofold. I could feel a block in his mind, something that kept his connection from being fully pure. Still holding onto Silence, I unraveled that block, only realizing once it was untied
that the block was due to his Aether addiction.

  As the tension loosened, Isandru breathed a sigh of relief, as if a great weight had been lifted. His eyes faded in intensity until they were their normal gray color.

  “Peace,” he whispered. “At last, peace.”

  Everyone around us watched closely. He gave each of us a look in turn, before his eyes settled on me.

  “Elekim,” he said, his voice weak. “Thank you.”

  “You’re safe now,” I said.

  “No,” he said, reaching a hand out. “I haven’t long. Without Aether . . . this life has been unnaturally long. I was . . .” He was wracked with a fit of coughs. Isa ran out of the cabin, returning with a glass of water as soon as the coughing fit was over. He ignored it, however. “I was waiting for my sister’s return . . . and your return.” He looked at me meaningfully. “But now . . . I must rest.”

  “No,” Fiona said, tears in her eyes. “You’ve only now returned to us. You can’t leave when we need you the most.”

  “Pain . . . great pain,” Isandru said. “He nearly destroyed me . . . kept me on the edge of madness.”

  “I’m sorry I couldn’t save you,” I said.

  “Don’t be sorry,” Isandru said. “I did what I had to. I . . . slowed him down. Gave you a chance . . .” He paused to gather himself. His eyes shut from some unseen pain.

  Despite my powers, there was nothing I could do to stop the inevitable.

  “I’ve lived almost two centuries,” Isandru said. “That is too much time for any man. Only the Aether kept me going this long. Without it . . .”

  “We have some still,” Isa said.

  “No!” Isandru’s voice spoke with surprising volume. “No, Isa. I cannot go back to that.”

  He turned onto his side, as if doing so might relieve some of the pain.

  “What can we do for you, Elder?” I asked.

  “I will not have Aether ever again,” Isandru said, very quietly. I had the feeling I was the only one who could hear him. “The time for that . . . is past. There is no place for it in our world any longer. I would see . . . each of you in turn. After that . . .”

  He didn’t finish. I gestured to the others, so that they would come closer.

  “He wishes to speak to all of you,” I said.

  I didn’t finish, because they knew what I meant. Isandru wouldn’t be with us for much longer.

  * * *

  I went outside the cabin and fixed myself a cup of coffee, sitting at the table in the wardroom. Shara joined me there, looking at me from across the table.

  “You did what you could, Shanti,” she said.

  I nodded. “It wasn’t enough this time.”

  “No one can stop what’s inevitable,” she said. “Isandru fought as a warrior should.” She looked at me closely. “Did you see Elekim? I heard Isandru mention him.”

  “Yes,” I said. “Alex is in the Hyperfold now. If he’s there, Rakhim can’t cause any more trouble. But we must find Isaru. Odium is controlling him directly now, and we must drive him out and save Isaru. Only then can the Hyperfold be dissolved.”

  Before Shara could ask any more, the door to my cabin opened, revealing Isa with tears running from her eyes. She had just seen Isandru. She came to sit next to me. I placed my arm around her as she cried into my shoulder.

  “It’s no good,” she said. “He looks like he’s in so much pain, Shanti. Why is this happening?”

  “He held on for all these years because of Aether,” I said. “He’s free of that burden, that false strength. His body is shutting down.”

  The words sounded so harsh, but there was no other way to say it. Shara nodded from across the table. It was every person’s fate to die of old age, if they didn’t die from an illness, accident, or from battle. Death didn’t care about the niceties that were our shield.

  We sat out there quietly, until the door opened to reveal Fiona. She looked even worse than Isa. Of all of us, she had perhaps been the closest to Elder Isandru. She gave a solemn, grieved look before walking past us to go to her cabin.

  Without a word, Shara stood and went to see him. She didn’t look back, walking through the door. She wasn’t there long, perhaps a minute or two. She came back out and sat down, sharing nothing of what was said.

  Now that I had given everyone their chance to speak, it was my turn. Walking across the wardroom and entering my cabin was the hardest thing I ever had to do. I went inside and closed the door behind me.

  Elder Isandru lay there, groaning and in pain. He drew shallow breaths, and was muttering incoherently under his breath. I walked close and knelt, until my face was about a couple feet away from his. His face was a piteous mask of pain.

  “Elder . . .” I said. “I’m here again.”

  He opened his eyes, and forced a smile. “Shanti.”

  “Thank you for everything you’ve done for me,” I said, my voice thickening. “I’m sorry you have to go through this. I’m sorry it couldn’t be better . . .”

  “I always thought I would be ready for this . . .” Isandru said, his voice barely audible. “It won’t be long, now.”

  “I’m sorry if I took something from you during the healing,” I said. “I didn’t know taking away that block would make things worse . . .”

  “It needed to go,” Isandru said. “If it didn’t, then Odium would have found me too, one day. It . . . was necessary. You did the right thing.”

  “Is there any way I can save you?”

  This actually made Isandru laugh, a laugh which was cruelly cut short by the pain it caused. “Not even Elekim can stop entropy, Shanti. You are strong enough, wise enough, to finish what was begun years ago. I have lived long enough to see the final fulfillment of my prophecy. That makes me happy. That lets me know my life, for all its sorrow, was worth living.”

  “What final fulfillment?” I asked.

  Isandru’s gray eyes were unfocused, but still seemed to find me. “That you would become Elekim. And you would destroy the Radaskim once and for all. A prophecy, at the time, I didn’t dare to believe true. Yet I believe it now.”

  “But how is that even possible?”

  “I don’t know,” Isandru said. He closed his eyes, and his voice entered my mind. But I have seen it. I see it now.

  I knelt there for a while, holding his hand that had grown cold. He breathed shallowly for a while; through his touch, I could feel some of the pain he went through . . . a mere fraction of it.

  “Leave me, Shanti,” he said. “Please. Bury me on the Sanctum grounds, beneath the large Silverwood by the stream. Several good prophets are buried there . . . old friends, long dead. Let me rest with them.”

  I sniffled, a tear falling from my eye. “I’ll do that.”

  “Shanti,” he said.

  “Yes, Elder?”

  “You are like a granddaughter to me. You and Fiona both. Promise me . . . when all this is done . . . promise me . . .”

  At this point, Isandru was starting to lose his strength. “Promise what, Elder?”

  He didn’t respond. He took one last breath, and released it as a half-completed sigh. He was still after that.

  I cried there for a good two minutes, and made sure his eyes remained shut. The pain was gone, and his countenance was one of peace.

  I stood on shaky limbs, and left the cabin to tell the others.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  WHEN WE ARRIVED AT THE Sanctum, we didn’t bother landing far away like last time. We went straight for the courtyard, which we found empty under the morning sun. The noise of our arrival drew a few people to the square, but they went right back to hiding as soon as they saw that we were landing. As hot as we were flying in, I couldn’t blame them.

  Pallos cuts the thrusters a few inches above the old stone courtyard, and the suspension of the landing struts ate the force of the fall, the hull bouncing a couple of times before going still. We unstrapped ourselves and went to my cabin, where Fiona was standing watch over Isa
ndru’s body.

  It was hard to keep together as we lifted him off my bed. His thin form barely weighed anything; a good deal of his muscle mass had apparently withered away inside the Hyperfold.

  I tried to brace myself for whatever was coming outside, as Shara pressed the button to open the blast door. Just a couple of minutes after landing, the courtyard was filled with dozens of Seekers, apprentices, and initiates, staring with widened eyes that went even wider as they realized who we were carrying, which was followed by gasps and murmurs. At the top of the stairs stood Elder Haris and Elder Draeus, each wearing a frown.

  “Hold him for me, guys,” I said. “I need to talk to them.”

  I waited to make sure their hold on Isandru was secure before stepping away to face the assembly. The voices quieted as soon as they saw I was about to speak.

  “Elder Isandru has passed away,” I said, loudly and clearly. “He expressed his wish to be buried under the old Silverwood by the stream, the one close to the courtyard, where the other prophets are buried. That’s what we’re doing now. All of you are welcome to help us.”

  Several Seekers broke from the crowd and went into the Sanctum while the others got closer.

  “They’re bringing a casket,” an old Sage said, referring to the Seekers who had gone inside.

  With surprising speed, the Seekers returned with an old pinewood casket. It was of simple design, not worthy of the last Prince of Hyperborea, but Elder Isandru wouldn’t have wanted anything grand, anyway.

  We laid his body tenderly into the box, leaving it open so that all who wished to could come and pay their respects. We waited half an hour as each initiate, apprentice, and Seeker came. Elder Isandru deserved better than an impromptu funeral like this, but this was the best we could do given the circumstances.

  The Elders, I noticed, held back until the very end. First was Elder Lian, whose stony demeanor softened upon seeing the Elder Prophet, with whom he had worked for decades. Elder Draeus pressed his palm to the Elder Prophet’s head, mouthing a few words before withdrawing. Elder Alan and Elder Arminius approached together, each bowing their heads low in respect. Last of all came Haris, the new Elder Scholar. As he stood in front of Isandru, his expression was neutral, and I could discern little behind his dark, glinting eyes. He glanced at me before returning to the stairs with the other Elders.