by Azalea Ellis
Jacky clenched her fists. “I saw a monster. He’d been a man, but he couldn’t stop growing stronger, even when he wished he’d die instead.”
Birch let out a scratchy mewl and pushed his nose into my hand. An image burst through my mind. A woman with light purple skin, like the color of a sunset through storm-clouds, raising her arms to make the skies writhe with wind and anger. Hail the size of boulders crashed down from the clouds, crushing the army arrayed before her. Birch pulled back and blinked his inner sideways-closing eyelids, which looked a little disturbing combined with his green irises and human-shaped pupils.
“He saw a purple woman, controlling the weather,” I said.
The others relayed varying versions of the same thing. Past counterparts to their symbols, the Sickness in action, and visions of strange, fantastical things they didn’t understand.
“What does this mean?” I turned to Torliam.
“I do not know. I can only make guesses.” Torliam’s voice was strained, and he stood from his seat, letting the ship fly itself as he paced back and forth with long strides. “I do not know how the Spire of Prophecy truly works. Perhaps these visions were indeed meant to aid us in our quest, in some way. Why else would the Oracle encourage our visit?”
“Maybe we’re just not thinking about this the right way. We all saw the Sickness, and past versions of the Seal of Nine with different powers. That’s relevant information. Prophecies are things that can come true, but how exactly they do so could be any number of ways, right?”
He rubbed his jaw, fingers smoothing through the short beard there. “Yes. Additionally, there have been many, many ‘prophecies’ about our struggle against the Sickness, the great battle. There is very little way to verify the veracity of a prophecy, unless it comes from one such as Testimony and Lore.”
“When I spoke to the Oracle during the battle with the God of Knowledge, she told me that I was one possibility for a cure to the Sickness. Not the only one. What if the gods have been doing this, over and over, for millennia? Creating new Seals of Nine, and when they die, waiting till the legends or rumors fade away and then trying again? And,” I stood up, sweeping my eyes over the symbols of the others, “each variation is similar. ‘The Summoner, the Gale, the Gifter. The Tracker, the Struggle, the Shadow. The Black Sun, and the Veil-Piercer.’” I quoted Testimony and Lore, during our Trial with her. “‘One for each of the greater Trials.’ So maybe it was trying to hint to us the ongoing theme of the resources they’ve given others, what we’re going to need to find the cure. The other visions probably have some relevance, too, even if we don’t have the framework to understand them.”
Torliam found it disturbing that he’d been unaware of previous, legitimate subjects of prophecy meant to cure the Sickness. “Research into the Sickness, the god, and the cure…I have made it my life’s work. And yet, how did I not realize this was happening? When possible agents of prophecy were mentioned, they were always discredited. It seemed obvious, that none could have been legitimate, as the Sickness still plagues us. In my shortsightedness, I did not think of any other possibility.”
“You weren’t the only one, I’m sure.” I meant the words as a consolation, but he just shook his head, eyes closed.
Zed fiddled with one of his specialized guns, its pieces spread out in his lap as he cleaned them carefully. “Well, it’s not like it really matters, right? We knew finding this god wasn’t going to be easy, and that we got these Skills for a reason. Even if it has happened before, this is just more confirmation of that. It doesn’t change anything. We still have to get to Earth. That’s where the god is, right?”
Torliam opened his eyes. “Yes, I believe so. You are correct, Zed. We can only forge onward.”
We were all exhausted from what felt like one of the longest days I’d ever trudged through, but I sucked it up and took Torliam and Sam with me to talk to the civilian passengers again, who were all extremely alarmed and speculating amongst themselves. None of them had been seriously harmed during our travel to or escape from the Spire, but a few had minor bumps, bruises, or pressure injuries from the restraining straps or when the ship’s maneuvers had thrown a couple loose items about.
I sent Sam around to heal those injuries, figuring he’d gotten a healthy dose of healing stored up from the damage he’d done to the monsters, and the return of the people’s goodwill was likely worth some of us healing our own small injuries naturally. It might even force our Resilience to level up, which could only be a good thing in the long run.
Still, a lot of people were disgruntled and even downright angry. I focused on Voice, wondering if its Charisma-boosting effects could act as crowd-control when directed properly. “Thank you for your patience, and your participation in our fight against the Sickness.” Voice didn’t activate, but I resisted the urge to groan aloud, and continued speaking. “Your cooperation has allowed us to enter the Spire of Prophecy, as was the will of the Oracle, and receive visions to aid our quest against the Sickness. When we stand together, who can stand against us?” Voice finally thrummed through the air as I spoke the last words, and I raised my fist in the air in sincere triumph.
Some of the crowd smiled, and others cheered. The angriest of the bunch weren’t persuaded to cheerfulness, but they only grumbled to themselves a little bit.
“What have you learned from the Spire of Prophecy, Eve-Redding?” one of the reporters asked. The woman held out her empty hand as if pointing a camera toward me. When she realized, she blushed and dropped her hand back to her lap, but still looked at me expectantly.
The gaffe reminded me that without any cameras to catch me in the act, I was safe to lie. Not that I actually needed to, in this case. “Torliam originally went to Earth on a quest to find the lost god, the Shaper and Molder who stands as Champion against the Sickness. He found me, instead. Now, we return to Earth to search for that Champion.” I ignored their stunned silence and the questions that quickly followed. “You’ll have normal use of your ship back shortly.” I left to go back to the control room, leaving Sam and Torliam behind to deal with any other issues.
In the hallway outside the control room, Adam lay on the floor, propped up against the wall awkwardly, his legs sprawling into the walkway.
“Adam! What happened?” I hurried to his side, kneeling down beside him. My hands reached out for him, but I didn’t know where to touch or how to move him without making things worse, so they just kind of hovered.
He was so pale he looked almost green, and sweat stood out on his temples, matting his curly hair down. He still found the energy to scowl at me. “My fucking back is broken. What do you think happened?”
I could guess. He’d run himself into the ground earlier with overuse of his Animus Skill, which was the only way he had to get around without help. When he’d awoken, he must have decided to use it again despite his exhaustion, and it failed him. “I can help get you back to the control room, and we’ll call Sam to come take a look at you. What were you thinking? You just passed out from Skill overuse. You should be resting.”
He slapped my reaching hand away, fairly spitting with anger when he spoke. “If you really want to help, why don’t you use the only Skill that can actually help me, and do something about it? This is torture, Eve! If it was you going through this, you’d understand.” He panted, then slumped back against the faintly rippling wall.
“Adam, I… It’s not that I don’t want to. Trust me, if I could fix you with Chaos, I would.”
“You could try, at least,” he said in a low voice. “I wouldn’t mind if my back changed, got alien-like, like your arm. As long as I could walk again.”
I clenched my jaw, as the muscles of my neck grew achingly tight. “Adam, I told you. I don’t know how to do that. When I unleashed Chaos on the God of Knowledge, the information he had implanted in me released itself, all at once. I got an overwhelming amount of information about how to use Chaos to destroy a god and the Sickness contained within. But most o
f that information faded. I don’t know if he always meant it to do that, or if my brain is just literally too stupid to retain clear comprehension of how it works.”
I stopped until he met my eyes again, then spoke slowly. “I was literally dying when Chaos finished things off. It was out of my control already, and suddenly, I was alive again. It’s not just my left arm that it recreated. I had a skull with a half-cooked brain inside, a torso, and about half of my inner organs remaining. Then, I was like this.” I held up my six-fingered left hand and unfurled the too-long digits.
His eyes widened. I hadn’t told them the full extent of my injuries before, because I knew they wouldn’t take it well.
“So I don’t know how to recreate what I did. Maybe we can go see Behelaino, when it’s safe. It’s her power. She knows how to use it. If I try to fix your spine, when I’m not even confident I could fix a paper cut, I could kill you, Adam. If there’s some chance you could be healed any other way, I’m not going to risk killing you. You’re too important. And, you know,” I took a deep breath, and lightened my tone, “Legs aren’t everything.”
He snorted, but when he spoke there was no anger in his voice. “Maybe you just need practice. Since legs aren’t everything—incredible revelation, you know—I guess I can wait.” He reached an arm up, hooking it around my shoulders so I could help lift him. “Carry me that way, servant.” He pointed the way back down the hallway, voice completely deadpan.
The way Blaine, the kids, and Jacky were all staring at one of the screens on the console clued me in immediately that something was wrong. “Is it the wyrm?”
Gregor turned to me. “It’s catching up. Unless something changes I estimate we’ve got less than an hour till then.”
“Go get Torliam,” I ordered, then helped Adam to one of the more comfortable chairs at the back of the room. I fiddled futilely with its controls till impatience won out, then used a quick burst of Chaos to eat through the rod keeping the back straight.
Adam raised an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything as Blaine and I helped him to lay on his stomach on the now-flat surface.
When he was secure, I moved to the screen where the wyrm was displayed. It had changed. Some of its wings were bigger, toward the middle of its body. And it was closer to us. Much too close, and gaining quickly.
Torliam strode in and sat down in the captain’s seat.
“How far out are we from this passage to the main level?” I said.
“A few hours at most.”
I watched the wyrm open its maw slightly, as if it was grinning in anticipation of tearing us to pieces. It would overtake us in less than an hour, at this rate.
Gregor’s bushy eyebrows looked even bigger over his wide eyes. “Being eaten sounds like a horrible way to die.”
Kris wrapped her arms around herself and turned to me. “Is there anything we can do?”
I clenched my jaw, but before I was forced to respond that I didn’t know, Jacky spoke. “Doesn’t this ship have any weapons? Blast it out of the sky!”
Torliam touched the controls and the ship began to rise higher, the sudden change of the floor’s angle making the rest of us wobble till we regained our balance. “This is a passenger ship, meant for long, lazy travel through safe areas and the space between worlds. It is often escorted by smaller fighter ships. We have shields, but they draw power from the ship’s speed when flying through atmosphere, and they are likely not strong enough to stand against the wyrm.”
She tugged at her fingerless gloves. “Anything heavy we can drop off to lighten our load, then?”
“Why would the ship be carrying unimportant, heavy items that we could simply discard?” Torliam asked. “That makes no sense.”
Jacky frowned. “In the films, they always do. You know, that ‘ballast’ stuff?”
Gregor shook his head. “Ballast was stuff like rocks or sand that ancient people used to steady their ships, because the construction was too poor for good balance otherwise.”
“There is no need for this ‘ballast’ on my world,” Torliam said, his upper lip curling into a sneer. “Our ships can maintain balance without tying rocks to them.”
I rolled my eyes. “You said the shields draw power when flying through atmosphere. You just started flying higher. Can this ship actually leave the atmosphere?”
He paused, then turned to me with a surprisingly straightforward smile. “Indeed.” He returned to the controls, then ruined it with his next words. “I see your powers of deduction are not as stunted as I might have imagined.” I could hear the self-satisfied smirk in his voice. “This ship does not require air to operate, but the wyrm does. And the wyrm has lived its life within the ground, a stranger to true cold. We will rise high, where there is not so much air to slow us down as we flee, and then we will dive like a hawk onto prey. If the cold of the upper air does not stop it, perhaps the friction of the fall will burn it up.”
Gregor frowned, crossing his arms. “Isn’t the outer atmosphere actually really hot? It wouldn’t be cold unless we went all the way into space. Maybe we should do that.”
“There is no sun on this level to heat the outer atmosphere,” Torliam said. “Did you not notice that the light comes from the ground itself? If I thought there was much time to waste, I would agree. Even the wyrm might not adapt fast enough to survive the true emptiness of space, especially without any way to reliably propel itself. But the Sickness waits not for mortals. We must get to an array, and from there to Earth.”
Sam frowned. “We’re going to be diving from the upper atmosphere? Is that…safe?”
“I am a skilled pilot. However, you should most definitely take advantage of the safety straps on these seats.”
Sam and I shared a look, and he sighed deeply. “Right.”
Within the next half hour, we’d risen high enough that the wyrm struggled to keep up. Its wings were sluggish, and it now flew with its mouth fully open. I could see crystals form as the skin inside its maw froze. We began to draw ahead of it, as whatever propulsion method the ship had apparently didn’t need oxygen or even air at all.
After another half hour, the wyrm was a small blip in our rearview screens. “Maybe we’ll lose it entirely, if we get far enough ahead?” I said.
Torliam shook his head. “It is already adapting.” He was right. Another half hour later, the wyrm was gaining on us. Its hide looked thicker, it had lost some of its massive size, and the obvious blood and membranes were completely gone from its wings, which had continued to grow and change shape.
Blaine peered intently at the creature, his excitement completely at odds with our impending doom. “This type of adaptation is completely fascinating. The research implications are staggering. Do their alterations pass down to their offspring, I wonder?”
“How do you ever beat something like that?” My voice was tight, as I realized the true gravity of our situation for the first time.
“Kill it while it is small,” Torliam said. “And kill it quickly.”
“It’s a bit too late for that.”
He didn’t reply verbally, instead pointing out the viewing window in front of us.
I peered out, but didn’t see anything until I let my Spirit of the Huntress Skill sharpen my vision. We were flying far above an ocean now, instead of the blue grass plains. The surface of the planet was so far away I could see it curve away into the distance. Far out, there was a spot of water that looked different from the rest. A large circle of froth surrounded a dark mark. “That’s the connection back to the main level?” I frowned. “I think I may have seen the other side of this, when we first broke you out of NIX. A whirlpool in the middle of the ocean, right? Are there many of those?”
“Not many.”
When Torliam instructed, we once again warned all of the passengers and helped to make sure they were secured fully as we prepared for extreme maneuvers. Then we strapped ourselves down into our own seats like we were wards of a mental asylum and any allowed movement might b
e dangerous.
The wyrm loomed large in the rear-view screen by the time Torliam angled the ship’s nose down. I felt a second of strange calm, almost weightlessness, and then we were diving.
My stomach heaved up into my throat and I choked it back down, grinding my teeth together. Things only got worse from there.
Kris screamed, though I wasn’t sure if it was out of fear or the same visceral sense of wrongness I felt, knowing that we were plummeting through the air, aided not only by gravity, but by the ship’s propulsion.
We flew faster and faster, fast enough that I could see the air bending around the ship as we passed, lighting up with friction as it rubbed over the surface of our great clam. Behind us the wyrm suffered the same, but with less grace. The heat melted its flesh and the more tender part of its wings, and the pressure of the air threw it into a tumble instead of a controlled dive.
At the control console, Torliam laughed.
I felt like my body was about to be squeezed apart, and closed my eyes to keep them from popping out of my head. Wraith spread out within the room, but I didn’t even attempt to sense outside the ship.
As we entered the whirlpool and flew up out of the ocean on the other side, the world flipped around me, so hard and so fast I thought I might be ripped apart, cut to pieces by the restraints I hoped would save me. I would have bruises where I’d strapped myself in, across my hips and legs, my forearms, my chest, and my forehead.
Gregor floated past me as the effects of gravity receded at the apex of our ascent, having slipped through his bindings in his Shadow form. It had probably been instinctual and unintentional, a reaction to the deep-seated fear of death.
