"I choose Zaria," he said.
* * *
Morwin
Zaria was Larentii. I suspected that she was other things, too, but I wasn't going to point that out to Deris.
He didn't wait, either, for the rules to be explained or to follow any protocols of a normal duel.
He fired at Zaria, almost the moment her name left my mouth. It was his intention, I think, to keep the weapon no matter the cost.
When his particles separated, they were red instead of the usual gold. I'd seen a Larentii separate particles before, in Queen Lissa's Council Chambers. This was like nothing I'd ever seen.
"You will never be reborn, Deris Blackmantle," Zaria breathed as the last red spark disappeared.
The ranos pistol dropped to the ground.
"You bitch," Daris hissed and dived for the pistol. The moment she attempted to fire it at Zaria, she also disintegrated into red, dissipating sparks.
I think I knew then that I'd overstepped my bounds, as Queen Lissa often said. Zaria had done so many things for me, and I'd used her as a weapon.
"It won't happen again," her gaze locked with mine. Instead of blue eyes, her eyes shone gold.
"I and my family owe you," I bowed to her.
"Yes. You do." Her voice was flat. "Rylend, I trust you can take Master Morwin back with you? He'll have to ask for transport to SouthStar from Karathia. I hope he isn't late for dinner."
Zaria disappeared.
* * *
Royal Palace; Veshtul, Kifirin
Lexsi
It has taken three years to rebuild most of Veshtul. Mom and I stood in the arboretum at the top of the palace, looking over the city. In the distance, more construction was in progress.
Schools had been built; more were planned. The humanoid population was beginning to believe they had rights and that their votes counted. Kifirin was a member in good standing of the Reth Alliance, and trade in Gishi fruit was the best it had ever been.
Sunset is the best time to visit the arboretum, as the last fingers of sunlight bathe Veshtul and turn its multi-colored streets to gold.
The sun was setting, now, and we'd just finished a long day of Council meetings.
"Want to come?" Zaria appeared between Mom and me.
"Come where?" I asked, turning to her. She looked like Zaria instead of a Larentii sprinkled in gold today.
"Oh, a short trip to the past," she sighed. "Just something I want to see, to remind me why I am."
Her words were odd, but I didn't question her meaning. I was tired from a long day of dealing with High Demon Council members and politicians from the humanoid cities.
All had a voice now, thanks to Mom.
"I'll go," Mom smiled at Zaria.
"Yeah. Me too," I agreed.
Zaria landed us on the streets of Veshtul. The sun was setting, still, but I knew this wasn't the Veshtul I'd been gazing upon from the arboretum.
This was a Veshtul in another time.
"Is that?" Mom placed a hand over her mouth as a comesuli walked out of a wine shop and closed the shutters on the open window.
"It's Roff," Zaria said. "It's all right to talk—we can't be seen or heard."
Roff went back inside.
A few moments later, I gasped. Kifirin appeared, with Gran.
"It's Lissa," Mom breathed, her hand beginning to tremble.
Kifirin called out.
Another comesuli stepped outside the wine shop and bowed to Kifirin.
Toff.
Only that's not how things happened.
Not that I remembered.
Toff, grown and smiling, went back inside the shop and then returned with two bottles of oxberry wine for Kifirin, who paid.
"This didn't happen," Mom choked out.
"It did. And it didn't," Zaria replied. "Come. I will show you more."
We landed at the edge of a massive crater. All around us, the ground was burned and blackened. In the distance, I could see Foth Castle. It lay in ruins. Everywhere, amid the rock and charred grasses, lay the bodies of the fallen.
High Demons, dwarves, humanoids—all sorts. All dead.
All. Dead.
None had survived this battle.
"When?" Mom's voice sounded strangled.
"It did. Then it didn't," Zaria said. "Shall we?" We were transported again.
"It's Peru," I gasped, my breath catching in my throat. It was the only thing left that thrived; all around it was devastation. N'il Mo'erti guarded the borders, but there was nothing left to guard it against.
We drew closer.
Fields of drakus seed, as far as the eye could see, grew in that country, tended by humanoids who appeared as automatons, picking the seed pods and placing them in large baskets.
I couldn't bring myself to ask where Morgett was, because he was surely there, at the root of all this evil.
"They're all there," Zaria said. "And they're not."
We moved again.
I gasped as we hung in the air above the burning remains of the cruise ship. Morgett and V'ili had undoubtedly found Morwin and the others there. Blinking back tears, I watched as the smoking, broken hull rolled and disappeared beneath the waves. There were no lifeboats floating in the water; all aboard had perished.
Zaria moved us.
"Where is this?" Mom asked. We'd landed inside some sort of structure built of smoothed red sandstone.
"Uluru," Zaria answered.
"There are people, wait, is that Kiarra?" Mom asked. She sounded terrified.
In the distance lay two walkways, separated by a chasm. Morgett's Ra'Ak, accompanied by V'ili, Deris and Daris, stood on one side while Kiarra, Anita and others stood opposite.
A rumble shook the structure; only then did I seen the massive, curving walls of empty shelves surrounding us.
I heard screams and jerked my head toward those on the walkways.
I will always find it difficult to revisit those images in my mind, as all were consumed by a terrible, red fire.
None of them had survived in this scenario.
"They died and didn't," Zaria sighed.
We moved again; I found that we were suspended above the space that should have contained Earth. Only a massive, red sandstone monolith floated there, barren and lifeless. The sky around us was black and empty of stars. I choked and couldn't speak; so many questions needed an answer and I couldn't voice any of them.
Then, I found myself back in the palace arboretum, just as the sun dropped below the horizon.
"Why did you show us that?" I wiped tears off my cheeks. Mom was too overcome to speak, and chose to pull me into her arms instead. We both gazed at Zaria, horror surely written into our features.
"You hold a copy of the library, as does Kory," Zaria reached out to wipe a tear off my cheek with a thumb. "In the past, it has either destroyed everything, or chosen this one or that as a catalyst or a weapon. It chose you and Kory, there in Tungurahua."
I blinked at her while more tears blurred my vision.
"Don't worry, sweetheart," Zaria wiped more tears from my face. "It will never speak to you again. Or control either of you again."
"What happened?" I sobbed. "How? Why would it?" I begged.
"It attacked me when I went back there," Zaria shrugged. "It thought to take me, too. I fought it for a very long time. Once I had the upper hand, it took even longer to control it properly," Zaria blew out a breath. "But it is controlled, now. It actually understands, now. Before, it didn't feel. Now it does."
"You hold the actual Library?" Mom asked.
"Yes. All those metal books inhabit my cells in a miniature form. I won't say it happened without a great deal of pain, either."
"So, my memories of how things happened," I began.
"Is just one of the ways—the last of those ways, that things really happened."
"May the Mighty be merciful," Mom sighed.
"The Mighty? That's between you and them," Zaria said and disappeared.
&n
bsp; "Dearest?" Wardevik's voice interrupted.
"Warde?" Mom turned toward him. Their wedding would take place in a moon-turn. He was good for her, and it was fitting. Those two on Kifirin's thrones would ensure the planet grew and thrived.
Thanks to Zaria.
* * *
Larentii Archives
Nefrigar, Chief Archivist
"These are the only prophecies associated with the Vhanaraszh that are contained in the Archives," I nodded at the massive books lying before the pod'l-morph.
"This isn't everything," Phrinnis Tampirus lifted his eyes to mine.
"Hmmph," I made a noise at him and turned my back. Those records the pod'l-morph desired would never be placed in his or anyone's hands, although he was mated to the Vhanaraszh. The answers he seeks lie within Corinnelar, whom most name Zaria.
She bore the weight of it—not in actual weight, but that of responsibility. She'd told me once, when I asked, that it was like carrying the reset button for everything. "Lather, rinse, repeat," she'd added. "Control, Alt, Delete."
* * *
Zaria
Even my white wings are dusted with gold when I employ them. Quin stands on the balcony outside the royal suite at Avii Castle as I fly toward her.
She is smiling as I approach.
"Hello, daughter," I land beside her and offer a hug. She wraps her arms about me and laughs because I am there.
The End
Table of Contents
To Walter, Joe, Larry, Lee, Dianne, Sarah and Mark.
Acknowledgements
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
A Demon's Due: Latter Day Demons, Book 3 Page 25