Fire Heart

by Dan Avera

  People called his name, shouted at him, asked if he was hurt, asked Clare if she was hurt—he did not hear them. He had eyes only for the ruined city, for the blackened grass and the glassy sand around it. What have I done? he thought. Soon blackness rushed up to meet him, swallowing him and wrapping its arms about him like a mother drawing him to her breast. The last thing he saw as he fell to the ground were hundreds of dark shapes in the sky—they were flying, flapping their powerful wings as they descended upon the survivors of the Titan fleet.

  They're big, he thought as one plummeted toward him, beating its wings to slow its fall, the wind ruffling his hair and whipping his shirt into a frenzy. Very big.

  Gryphons.

  Twenty-Two

  But the Dark One was not yet finished. It drank all of Keth's hate, all of his rage and fear and despair, and when it had drunk its fill it unleashed one final, terrible blow.

  Betrayed by his family and cast into the deepest reaches of the Void to fend for himself, Keth had reached desperately for anything that could save him. The Dark One had been the answer to his problems, and though it could not free him from Koutoum's prison it now gave him the only comfort it could.

  “Sleep,” it hissed, stroking Keth's face like a mother with her child. “Sleep, and I will protect you.”

  In the end Keth gave up the very last shred of his sanity willingly, and that was all the Dark One needed. It reached out and sealed the Titans in their mortal shells, damning them to remain as humans until the end of time. Never again would they be free to walk the halls of Ataavtic Vinouac, and only death would send them back to the Void. But even then they would never know peace or rest, cursed to return to the mortal plane without a moment's pause.

  And as its final act reverberated throughout the cosmos like a child's wail, the Dark One chuckled to itself and drifted into an endless slumber.

  ~

  They flew for two days, never stopping to eat or drink or rest. At first Clare found it difficult to sleep astride a great beast flying so disturbingly high above the ground, but eventually exhaustion overcame her and she fell into a deep, dreamless slumber. She awakened a long while later, once the sun had slipped far beneath the horizon and given its throne in the heavens up to the moon and the stars. The air was noticeably colder as well, and some dim part of her mind realized that they must be flying north. As a whole, however, the drop in temperature barely registered on her ravaged mind, and she stared dully at the back of the gryphon's feathered head with numb indifference.

  Some time later her body became aware of a deep, painful rumbling emanating from her stomach, and she searched mechanically through the cracked leather satchels hung about the gryphon's neck for provisions. She found water; she drank it. She found dried dates, and some sort of hard, bland bread that broke apart unevenly and loosed flurries of flaky bits into the air every time she tore into it; she ate both the bread and dates, never truly noticing the flavors. To her they were sustenance, nothing more, and she allowed her body to simply take control of itself while she hid away within her mind.

  She was a prisoner there, it seemed; no matter how hard she tried, she could not banish the memories of Will's mad, murderous rampage. She relived the terror and desperation over and over again as they danced in an endless loop before her eyes, haunting her like a recurring nightmare. She remembered the man who had begged for mercy most of all—not the Fadoré, but the commoner who had tried to stay Will's mindless slaughter. Every detail of his stricken face was etched firmly upon her psyche, a wriggling parasite that she would never be free of.

  She never spoke, and when Serah used the winds to inquire as to her needs she simply shook her head and stared blankly at the gryphon. Not even when they passed over the southernmost strand of the Ice March the next morning, and the land below them glittered majestically with hard-packed snow, did she look up. She had seen snow only twice before in her life, and yet now even its diamond beauty failed to lift her spirits. The others cast quick, concerned glances at her, but did not speak. It would not have mattered even if they did; she would not have heard them.

  Memories of Spaertos continued to flicker through her mind—the screaming children; the woman trying desperately to shield her son from Will; the guard who had...what had he done? For a long while she tried to jar her memory, a frown of concentration etched across her face as her thoughts buzzed with confusion. She remembered being dragged down the hall with Katryna; remembered being kicked, hit, beaten into submission as the guard shoved her roughly up onto the table; remembered his meaty hands fumbling at her breeches; but that was all. Between that moment and the moment when Will had burst through the door in an explosion of fire and shrapnel, her mind was shrouded in concealing darkness.

  A small knot of panic formed in her gut. Why could she not remember? What had he done to her? She had been unable to walk afterward, or perhaps unwilling—everything was muddled in her mind, a confusing mess of thoughts and images that did not make sense. And yet, deep down, she knew. Somewhere in the darkest reaches of her memories, her consciousness had come to a conclusion that she had unknowingly hidden from herself, burying the knowledge beneath layers of fog and shadow.

  What did he do to me?

  Then, finally, the panic bloomed into a sickly flower deep inside of her, and she leaned forward and buried her face in the warm, soft feathers of the gryphon's neck. She cried for a long time, her body convulsing with each wracking sob, until once more blessed sleep came to claim her.

  ~

  Serah gazed dully at the back of her hand where the skin was still light and fresh—a reminder of what she had almost done to herself. Abominably stupid, she thought. And yet...had I succeeded, Borbos would still be alive. She let her hand fall to her thigh and looked up, taking a deep breath to steady herself and beat back the tears that constantly threatened to flow. Feothon and I are the only two left, she thought. Everyone else...the family I was born into...Borost...they are all dead. I should have been faster—stronger. I should have been able to save them. But I am weak. I have always been weak. A goddess powerless to keep the ones she loves alive.

  The gryphon she rode, perhaps sensing her foul mood, shook its head and gave a low, throaty coo. She smiled softly and ran her fingers gently along the back of its head, and it purred its pleasure.

  Jhai and Zizo had not failed her, and that, she supposed, was something to be grateful for. Her warriors from Falcos had already been on their way, but her two most loyal guardians had brought them even faster. Two thousand gryphons in all—nearly half of her children—had answered her call. Several hundred bore riders, the legendary Fa'Shaad who lived and died on the backs of the gryphons, but the majority had come as she had bidden—with nothing more than bags of provisions hanging about their necks. And yet, as she looked around, she felt an overwhelming wave of despair wash over her.

  Feothon and Will had brought nearly a thousand alone, and Borbos' fleet had been three hundred ships strong; with anywhere from forty to a hundred and fifty sailors on each vessel...Serah forced the calculation from her mind, unable to accept such staggering losses. The evidence of their failure, however, stared her in the face no matter how she tried to escape it; two thousand gryphons, with over twelve hundred arriving riderless. What paltry few of their forces had survived had barely managed to fill half of the empty mounts. Only once before in her life had Serah suffered such an overwhelming, catastrophic defeat. Only during the Great Fall had they lost so many.

  And then there was the matter of Will and Clare. She closed her physical eyes, and then opened her eyes in the wind, focusing her attention first on Will. He had yet to awaken, which Serah found slightly unnerving. Reason dictated that he should be physically fine, and from what she could see this certainly appeared to be the case. There were no wounds, no remnants of charred skin. She could see the tear in his shirt where someone had stabbed him, but the flesh beneath was smooth and healthy. And yet, despite his perfect health, he seemed to be held in
the grip of a deep, unending sleep. Had the traitors perhaps inflicted wounds too grievous even for him to recover from? Had they done something to him while the other Titans slumbered in the Spaertan prison? She could not be sure, and after a few moments of silent contemplation she turned her gaze to Will's other half.

  Clare was asleep now, her brow creased and the corners of her mouth angled slightly downward despite her unconscious state. Serah knew the woman had suffered an unfathomable blow in Spaertos—one she feared Clare might never recover from. Seeing Will in his true form would have been enough to send the most iron-willed of men to their knees, but Clare had been forced to watch even beyond that. Even Prado could not possibly have prepared her for such a thing. Will she still love him after this? Serah wondered. She supposed the soul-bond between the two should compel her to, but what if Clare's revulsion were strong enough to eclipse even the power that held them together? Serah herself was sickened by what she had glimpsed of the carnage Will had left in his wake. Davin had never done such a thing, not even during the traitors' uprising, and the strange new volatile emotions Will was displaying left Serah with a profound sense of disquiet. Davin and Talyn had always provided a counterbalance for each other; Talyn had only lost control at the very end, when Davin had been a thousand leagues away fighting his own battle. Did we make a mistake in keeping Clare's identity from her? Serah wondered. Could this all have been avoided if...if we had told them the truth?

  That thought twisted her gut with anxiety. Were the Titans to blame for this? How could the rest of mankind trust them after Will's rampage? And if the Titans' own misguided judgment was at the heart of this mess...

  She put her head in her hands and hunched over, leaning her elbows against the gryphon's feathered neck. She suddenly felt very sick. Great Black, she thought, what have we done?

  ~

  As he had before in the Dark Forest, he dreamed of the oak tree. He stood beneath it once more, listening to the silence of the plains with a vague feeling of unease; the tree was almost entirely dead now, save for the trunk and a pitifully short span along its innermost branches. The grass was lifeless as well, with only a small area around the tree's roots still green, and even that seemed to be turning brown.

  It was nighttime, which Will found vaguely disturbing. Before, when the dream place had been illuminated by an eternal midday sun, it had felt tranquil and inviting. But now in place of the sun was a full moon, pregnant with white light and closer than he had ever seen it in the real world. There was a sinister air about it, and he felt as though it were watching him. The dark patches on its surface reminded him of great eyes that leered down from the heavens with wolfish hunger. He turned away.

  A faint breeze stirred around him, tousling his hair and gently bending those stalks of grass that were still supple enough to bend; it brought with it the scent of lavender, and suddenly Clare was there at his side. He was unsurprised, having somehow expected this. She looked sad, though, which troubled him, and he wondered if he had done something wrong. But she spoke not a word, and simply gazed out over the vast, dead fields.

  She was wearing a dress, he noticed—the same stunningly beautiful one that Asper had given her in the Dark Forest, the one made of rose petals. Her bare feet nestled in the waning grass, and occasionally she would clench her toes into the dry earth. He smiled as he looked at her, his eyes dancing across her features. She truly was beautiful, and he felt the still unfamiliar but welcome sensation of desire blooming deep in his chest. His gaze roved down to her slender hand—strangely healed—and he debated momentarily on whether or not to take it.

  She was staring at him when he looked back up, her emerald eyes shining in the moonlight and her mouth curved in a gentle frown. The wind blew a strand of hair across her face, and with his free hand Will reached up to brush it back behind her ear. His fingers trailed across her cheek, lingering for an instant, and when he made to pull them away her own hand came up and caught his, holding it against her skin. She closed her eyes, but the sadness never left her face.

  He made to pull her closer then, but to his surprise she stayed firmly where she was—half an arm's length separated them, but to him it might as well have been a league. “I can see,” she whispered, her jaw moving against his hand. “Can you?”

  Her words sent a jolt of memory racing through him, and images of dark clouds flashing with red lightning flared across his mind. He felt suddenly afraid, though he could not explain why, and he wanted to ask Clare the meaning of her words but found that he was unable. He felt his mouth open, felt his lips move—but no sound came out. The dream, it seemed, did not intend for him to ask questions.

  “You have failed me, Will,” she continued, still with her eyes closed, and he felt his stomach plummet. What had he done?

  “You have failed us all.”

  Will shook his head, unable—or perhaps unwilling—to believe her. This had to be a nightmare. How had he failed Clare? He could not remember...hadn't he been trying to protect her? To save her from something?

  And then a mind-numbing thought hammered against the inside of his skull. Had she died? Had he been unable to keep her from harm?

  She did move closer then, stepping softly and slowly toward him until her body pressed lightly against his. She still held his hand to her cheek, and he felt his heart flutter as she leaned more firmly into his touch. “I loved you,” she said. “Did you know that? I would have died for you, or killed for you had you only asked. My heart was yours.”

  Her eyes still remained closed, and he found himself desperately wishing that she would open them. Why did she refuse to look at him?

  And what had he done?

  “I trusted you with my soul,” she continued, “but you betrayed that trust. And now...I am dead inside. I feel only sorrow. Sorrow for the lives you have taken, sorrow for those who died to defend you—and sorrow that I could not save you from yourself.”

  She pressed her lips against his palm then, the soft touch sending a tingling sensation up his arm that spread throughout his body. Then she leaned in and gently kissed his mouth, and he found his own eyes sliding closed as he lost himself in the sensation.

  She pulled slowly away a moment later, and he could feel her linger a hair's breadth from him. Her warm breath tickled his lips, and he realized he was not breathing—any movement on his part, he was sure, would make her draw away completely, and that was one thing he did not want. “Open your eyes,” she whispered and, reluctantly, he did.

  She was crying—twin shining trails traced delicate paths down her cheeks, and he felt his heart twist with emotion. But all thoughts fled from his mind a moment later when his eyes found hers. They were no longer gold-flecked green, but pure gold—they seemed to shine despite the shadows that hid her face, giving off a faint glow that was at once both beautiful and painful to look at. And they churned slowly as though molten, twisting and flowing like magma.

  “Can you see?” she asked, and because it was a dream he knew in that instant, though he could not see them himself, that his own eyes shone crimson.

  His mind, addled from the dream, worked sluggishly to comprehend her meaning. She stared at him, her hand still resting lightly on his own as it lay against her cheek. Her golden eyes entranced him with their swirling depths, and the longer he gazed into them the more he felt he was falling into a well, a font of energy so great that the only comparable thing was...

  Himself.

  They stood thus, unmoving for what could have been belltolls or mere moments—held as he was in the power of her gaze, time had no meaning for him.

  “Can you see?” she asked again, breaking her own spell, and he blinked, suddenly grasping her meaning.

  “It's you,” he said, his voice hushed, and he was only mildly surprised that he was finally able to speak. “I was right—it's always been you.”

  She nodded sadly in response. “It is,” she confirmed. “But even a bond forged in the Void can be broken. Are you still the man
I love?”

  “Of course—” he began, but something made him stop. His mouth moved, then closed, and he was suddenly unable to meet her gaze any longer. His hand fell away from her cheek. Was he? Or was he simply a monster—a monster with the power to destroy the world at his fingertips? “I don't know,” he said softly.

  “That,” she sighed, “is not the answer I wanted.”

  “I can't control it,” he said quietly. “It's like nothing I've ever felt before. The power grows and grows until suddenly, it takes over and I go willingly along with it. They said the Phoenix—they said you would be able to help me. But...” He trailed off, his mind reaching for answers that would not come. He could remember now—how she had screamed at him, hit him to make him stop. Why had he not noticed her at the time? She had brought him back in Prado, hadn't she? So why had she been unable to in Spaertos? It made no sense.

  “I...” he murmured, “I don't...I don't know what happened...” He shook his head slowly, disbelief burning through him like a river of molten lead. His next words came in a hushed whisper. “I can't...I can't control it. I can't control it at all.”

  They were quiet for a moment, until Clare said, “Then you are not Willyem Blackmane. And I cannot love you anymore.”

  The words hit Will harder than anything Strife could ever have done to him. He fell to his knees, winded, and shook his head in denial. The bottom of his stomach fell away and he felt sick. The dream, it seemed, had decided to make itself as real as possible. “No,” he whispered, and then more loudly, “no, Clare, please, I need you—”