The Beginning After The End 08

by Turtle Me

  Tess darted forward and thrust with her sword-staff. Rather than using her beast will, the elf princess unleashed a barrage of mana strikes. Windsom’s spear twirled, deflected all of them before countering with a thrust of his own. His spear seemed to grow longer as it raced toward her, forcing her to drop suddenly out of the way. She seemed to have difficulty holding focus on the flying spell and nearly struck a tree before righting herself.

  What was Tess doing? Why was she holding back like that? Why wasn’t she using her beast will?

  Nico was screaming at the asuras, flying rapidly around Windsom to draw his attention away from Tess. A moment later, the asura vanished as a globe of hellfire engulfed him.

  A nova of pure mana split the dome in two, and the hellfire faded away. Inside, Windsom was unhurt. I watched as the nova spread farther and farther across the sky, dispersing the low clouds of dust.

  Black spikes appeared from the shower of hellfire sparks, each launching inward toward Windsom, and each batted away just as quickly. The asura’s steady gaze didn’t even flicker as he made another short diagonal cut.

  Nico was thrown to the side as a dozen of the black spikes appeared to deflect the blow. In the distance, the shockwave leveled a section of the forest at least a mile wide and three miles long.

  My attention turned fearfully back to the ground. The crowd of Alacryans and elves was still paralyzed, but Ellie was moving.

  Her arm shook with effort as she slowly reached into her armor and pulled out one of the djinn medallions.

  A wave of relief washed over me as she clenched the device in one pale hand, but instead of activating it immediately, my sister’s gaze crept across the crowd to rest on the small cluster of elven prisoners.

  Fear and frustration replaced my excitement as I watched her turn and take a single painful step toward them.

  Just get out of there, Ellie!

  She took another sluggish step, then another, like she was walking under water. A few sets of eyes turned to her in surprise, but most couldn’t see anything except the battle above.

  From the treeline just outside of the village, a beam of pure mana cut through the sky, aimed at Aldir. Windsom blocked the spell, deflecting it directly at Nico.

  My old friend dipped under it as his entire body burst into hellfire. He shot forward like a burning arrow and two gouts of dark flame erupted from his hands. The fire dispersed against a translucent shield of mana, but gave Nico just enough time to ram bodily into Windsom. The hellfire jumped from Nico to the asura’s uniform and began to spread across the rich fabric, blackening it.

  Windsom threw a seemingly casual strike, and although a huge metal spike appeared to block it, it wasn’t enough. The asura’s blow shattered the metal and glanced across Nico’s shoulder.

  Nico was sent spinning wildly through the air before crashing headlong into the forest just outside of town with such force that he dug a quarter-mile long trench in the earth and leveled dozens of huge trees.

  Aldir’s eye had grown brighter and brighter as he continued to do… whatever the hell he was preparing. I couldn’t imagine what kind of ability would require an asura of his strength to power up.

  Why wasn’t he helping Windsom fight?

  Below, Ellie had reached the elves. She grabbed the first one by the arm and turned him around, trying to stir him into motion, but the elves were far too weak in their current condition. Instead, she pushed her way into the middle of their group and held the medallion above her head. Her arm trembled with the effort.

  The sky above her darkened.

  Shifting my perspective, I watched with awe and dawning horror as Aldir began to expand.

  As the asura grew, his third eye glowed even brighter until it shone like a golden sun from his forehead. Tendrils of golden mana writhed like holy flames from his silver armor as he continued to grow.

  Where his feet approached the ground, the golden flames caused the trees to combust, burning them to ash in seconds. The fire quickly spread, racing around the perimeter of the village so that it was ringed by fire.

  Ellie stood like a statue, her arm still raised, but her wide-eyed gaze and slack jaw were turned upward toward the impossibly large asura.

  Tess and Nico rose up over the burning trees, supporting one another. The question of why she was fighting alongside Nico came to me once again, but at that moment, it didn’t matter.

  It was obvious now what Aldir was about to do. This wasn’t a threat, or an assassination. He was sending Agrona a warning.

  By destroying Elenoir.

  The enormous, blazing golden eye in Aldir’s head swelled with pure energy, rippling the very space around him. The asura’s face, now a hundred times magnified, gazed blankly down at where Tessia and Nico hovered above the ground, clinging to each other.

  Ellie’s fingers twitched and mana seeped out of them and into the medallion. The mana bubbled up from it, curving over the top of the elves and surrounding them in a thin, shining dome. But the dome was flickering, inconsistent.

  She’s not putting enough mana into it, I realized in horror. She wasn’t able to, with Aldir’s pressure weighing down on the area.

  My attention jumped from Ellie to Aldir to Tess and Nico, and caught Tess and Nico’s shared gaze, hers uncertain, concerned, and yet not afraid, while he was looking at her almost… tenderly.

  Then they were gone, leaving nothing behind but the faint ripple of whatever magic they’d used to teleport away.

  There was a sudden massive swell of power, and a wide golden beam was unleashed from Aldir’s eye. The air around it rippled and burned away, sending out a halo of visible heat and energy.

  Where the beam hit the ground, the ground was pushed up and away by the force of it. Trees were knocked over, splintered, then obliterated. The town began to vanish, the houses crushed to kindling by the force.

  I tried to focus on Ellie, but the last thing I saw of her was the half-formed dome dimming before the wall of concussive force carried the village away.

  My perspective was shifting upward, pulling away from the village, and I watched as the blast expanded out from where the beam still blazed into the earth, a constantly growing ring of destruction that leveled everything it touched, wiping away Elenoir and leaving behind nothing but a cloud of dust that rose higher and higher toward the clouds.

  And just before Aldir’s form disappeared from view, I saw his gaze turned… straight towards me.

  A palpable chill ran down my transient form as his giant golden eyes bore into mine with frigid, deadly apathy. He knew I was watching.

  Our gazes locked for what seemed like eternity even as my form was dragged back away from Elenoir and Dicathen. And even as I stood once more in the plain white room of the sanctuary, I could still feel the asura’s gaze on me.

  Blinking the sweat that ran down my brows and into my eyes, I realized that Caera had one hand around my wrist and was trying to pull the relic out of my fist. She was shouting something, but I couldn’t make out the words.

  I was nauseous and weak, and I couldn’t breathe.

  “—ey! Grey, what is it! What’s wrong?” Caera’s eyes were wide, her voice full of panic.

  I fell to my knees and the relic slipped from my hand, bouncing off the white-tiled floor.

  ‘Where the hell have you been?’ Regis sounded uncharacteristically worried, and I realized not all of the panic I felt was my own.

  I tried to speak, but there was a cold lump in my throat that made me gag.

  Elenoir was gone.

  Ellie…

  I fell forward. My forehead pressed against the cold tile as I hammered a fist into the floor, causing the ground to burst apart with a sharp crack. A deafening scream ripped out of my throat as tears blurred my vision.

  Only one asura could have given the command to destroy Elenoir. Lord Indrath must have realized the pact of non-intervention had failed and feared the Alacryan’s expansi
on throughout the forest, and so he sent Agrona a message in the only language either of them understood.

  My jaw clenched as I ground my teeth.

  Clan Vritra or Clan Indrath… it didn’t matter, these asuras were all the same. They didn’t care for the peace and well-being of the lessers. If anything, they were even more violent and greedy, willing to kill indiscriminately to get what they wanted.

  No, maybe not all of them.

  The memory of Sylvia in her last moments, dying alone to protect her daughter, surfaced in my mind.

  I thought of the white dragon, dying alone to protect her daughter. She had understood better than anyone what Indrath and Agrona really were.

  Was that why she had entrusted her daughter to me? So Sylvie could be raised outside of Epheotus, away from her own people and their inherent cruelty?

  My hand slid over the rune on my forearm where my bond was in her egg-bound form. Even after all Sylvia’s sacrifices, it still came to this.

  And not just for my bond, but my father, Adam, Buhnd, and so many others.

  The cold, shallow voice of my former self rang in my mind, reminding me that it was because of them that I had become so weak, so emotional.

  “Having people to protect only serves to hinder you from making the optimal and most rational decisions,” Lady Vera had repeatedly stated. It was why I had walked out on everyone I cared about as Grey.

  I shook my head. But it was those same people that I cared about in Dicathen that had driven me to make it this far. Rejecting Caera’s outstretched hand, I pushed myself up to my feet.

  I wasn’t going to let them down. This was only the beginning of my journey now. With aether, I could rewrite reality itself, it was only a matter of learning how.

  Then these gods would see what I was really capable of.

  Afterword

  Hello! TurtleMe here, author of this little novel that you’ve just finished reading. I hope you’ve enjoyed the story and you’re looking forward to the next installment of Arthur’s journey! While waiting, please consider taking the time to leave an honest review of this novel. Ratings and reviews are tremendously important on Amazon and since this is what I live off of, I would greatly appreciate your thoughts on this book so others can make sure that this is the book they want to read! Whether you loved it or hated it, I hope you can spare the time to write your two cents.

  Kindest regards, TurtleMe