by S. E. Smith
Maybe it was another alien—drawn to the first one—but far more powerful. Powerful enough to kill our evil nemesis—including the piece inside of me? he wondered.
“Asahi, are you coming?” Ashure asked.
“Yes,” he replied, lost in thought.
Chapter 26
Nali kissed Xyrie’s forehead. “Thank you,” she murmured.
“Is she going to kiss all of us, Xyrie?” a young foal sleepily asked.
“Hush now,” Xyrie gently admonished.
Nali leaned down and pressed an affectionate kiss on the foul’s forehead before she straightened and walked back the way she had come. She brushed the willow branches aside, paused, and looked back over her shoulder. Xyrie returned her gaze with a steady and confident one of her own.
Nali bowed her head in respect and stepped out from under the concealing curtain of willow limbs. When she stood outside, she drew in a deep breath, held it for a moment, and slowly released it. The visit had morphed from the need to warn Xyrie of the impending danger to a heart-felt need to share her fears and doubts with her sage counselor.
As usual when Nali visited, Xyrie listened more than she talked and asked questions instead of giving answers. Nali looked up at the sky. Stars glittered through the canopy. A sudden desire to reach out and touched them filled her.
She unfolded her wings, spread them wide, and with a swift flap, she lifted off the ground. Soaring upward, past the forest’s canopy, she flew higher and higher until the air grew thin and ice crystals formed on the smooth granite surface of her skin.
She looked down at the Isle of the Monsters. This was her Kingdom, her people, her home. From this altitude, most of the Isle was visible, so she took the opportunity to examine her vast kingdom. The massive lake glittered like diamonds in the moonlight. The wind blew white trails of clouds across the snow-crested mountains. Faint lights from various villages twinkled in the darkness like fireflies. She imagined she could hear the songs and laughter of her people carried on the wind. In the camp, she knew Asahi was waiting for her.
She reveled in the beauty of the night and her resolve was renewed. She pulled her wings in tight, pinning her arms against her side to increase the speed of her descent. Her fear about the threat facing their world diminished in the thrill of her freefall to the Isle below. It was time to end the alien’s attack on the Seven Kingdoms once and for all.
An explosion suddenly lit the sky and illuminated the ground below. Almost as quickly, additional explosions reverberated through the air. In the glow of the bursts, Nali spotted the outline of four massive shapes climbing the face of the mountain. Her heart pounded with fear and rage. The attack had begun.
The Gateway
The vast power of the Gateway surrounded Phoenix. She marveled at the energy coursing through her. Unlike the portals she could create, this one was a long corridor whose walls, floor, and ceiling showed the universe.
She shifted back into her two-legged form. Stardust circled her, swatting at a comet as it passed by. She giggled when the symbiot tried to chase the tail of the comet as if it were a string hanging from a ball of yarn.
“Stardust, we mustn’t touch anything,” she gently admonished the curious symbiot.
Stardust stopped and stared longingly at the departing comet before returning to her side. Phoenix laughed and caressed her symbiot’s head. Stardust had taken the form of a juvenile Werecat, except she’d forgotten to change her ears. Instead of the usual short ears, Stardust still had long droopy ears like Harvey.
Phoenix curled her fingers to keep herself from reaching out and touching the planets, colorful nebulas, and star clusters. They looked small, but she knew it was an illusion. All around her were unique star systems of varying shapes, sizes, and colors.
She didn’t understand everything that was happening, but she knew she was witnessing the heartbeat of the universe. There were many planets that would never support life, yet there were just as many or more that would one day be just like Valdier and Earth with abundant life.
Mixed within the vastness, she noticed colorful threads connecting some of the worlds. She turned when she observed a flash of golden light, like a brief beacon in the inky blackness, then another and another. Tears burned her eyes as a subconscious awareness rose inside her—Aikaterina’s people.
“There are so few of them,” she murmured.
Help her, a series of voices called out, resonating in her mind.
“Who? Who am I supposed to help?” she asked, turning in a circle.
Help our sister, the voices replied.
She slowly turned. The corridor in front of her stretched out to a planet that looked eerily like Earth. It was a mirror image, connected to her mother’s world by one of the colorful threads. On the mirrored planet, she noticed a faint golden glow fading in and out.
Fading—dying, she thought with dismay.
The alien who controls her must fail, the voices urgently called.
“But, why me? How will I know what to do?” she argued.
It is time.
“Time? Time for what?” she demanded, searching for the glitter of gold among the worlds.
There was no answer. Phoenix turned around and stared at the flickering golden light again. Even in the few seconds of conversation with the beings out there, the minute speck of light had become dimmer.
She closed her eyes and focused. “Aikaterina, what am I supposed to do?” she whispered.
Be yourself, Aikaterina’s soft voice replied from far away.
Phoenix opened her eyes as the image that Aikaterina had revealed seared through her. Her body glowed with dancing flames, and her eyes blazed with a golden radiance. She was Phoenix. She was the Dragon Warrior Princess, chosen by the ancient guardians to help protect the star systems. It was time to be herself.
Isle of the Monsters
Nali landed near the edge of the cliff just as Drago transformed and plunged off the edge with a dozen gargoyle soldiers. Ross and Ashure stood on either side of Asahi with Koorgan on Ashure’s right. She didn’t see Orion, but she could hear Ross’s loud curses.
“Why the hell isn’t it working?” Ross demanded, peering over the edge of the cliff.
“What is wrong? What isn’t working?” Nali asked.
They all turned at the same time. “It’s Gem. The power she emitted destroyed the last alien. It isn’t working this time,” Ashure replied.
“Asahi…,” she gritted out with dismay, her eyes locked on his face.
“I’m in control,” he promised her.
The spider-like webs ran up his throat and along his cheeks now. His eyes held a haunted expression but they were clear. She reluctantly returned her attention to Ashure.
“Drago is laying down some dragon fire, but it doesn’t look like it slowed those things down either,” Ross commented.
“I wonder if smashing it with a rock will work,” Koorgan suggested with a grim glint in his eyes.
Asahi frowned. “It would take an enormous rock to do that,” he observed.
“I’ll find the perfect one,” Koorgan promised before he bolted toward the edge of the cliff.
“What is he—? Is he suicidal?” Asahi exclaimed in shock.
Nali grabbed Asahi’s arm when he stepped closer to the edge. “He’ll be alright,” she reassured him.
“Koorgan always had bigger balls than brains—literally,” Ashure muttered.
Together, they watched as Koorgan twisted around and faced them as he flung himself over the edge and began to grow. Asahi’s shocked intake of breath reminded Nali of the first time she had seen a giant enlarge. Koorgan’s hand, now with a palm spread of close to twenty feet across, gripped the edge of the cliff before he began descending along the sheer wall. Asahi pulled away from her and walked over to the edge to peer down at Koorgan.
“Now I understand why he’s called King of the Giants,” Asahi mused.
“It looks like he’s found a rock,” Ross commented.
&nbs
p; Nali was about to comment when she noticed Asahi suddenly stagger. She reached for him only to stop when he shook his head. His eyes swirled with—gold.
“What is it?” she murmured.
“You must stop the alien before it reaches the Gateway,” Asahi urgently instructed with a feminine voice and inflection that didn’t sound like him at all.
“Asahi? Are you—you?” Ashure warily asked.
Asahi turned and looked at Ashure. A smile curved his lips, and to Nali’s shock, the alien’s black spider webbing turned to gold under Asahi’s skin.
“He is here, but I needed to communicate with you. There is only one way to stop this creature,” the entity inside Asahi answered.
“Who are you?” Nali demanded.
“I am Aminta. I could only inject an infinitesimal amount of my energy into this body, I am sorry, but I can give you information.”
“What are you?” Ross asked in a guarded tone.
“What I am is no longer important. The creature’s composition used to consist of a bacterium that lives and grows within the DNA of its host, but a portion of it mixed with me and the remains of a genetically mutated symbiot. It feeds off our energy. I am too weak to stop the mutation,” she explained.
“How do we destroy it?” Ashure demanded.
Aminta glanced up at the stars. “Someone is coming. She can destroy this abomination once and for all. Make no mistake, you will all be needed to battle this enemy. Kill its various forms, make it condense into a single body with a fraction of its power left—that is vitally important. You must hold it off until the visitor from Valdier arrives to deal the final blow. It cannot be allowed to reach the Gateway. If it were to access the River of Life, I fear it would be unstoppable. Every spark of life in this universe would eventually be consumed.”
“What about Asahi? If we defeat the creature, what will happen to him?” Nali quietly asked.
Aminta looked at her, and Nali saw the answer reflected in Asahi’s possessed eyes. Tears filled her eyes, and she silently shook her head.
“No—I won’t lose him,” she said in a raw voice.
“This has never been done before: dual essences within a human like this. I have claimed him for the side he wishes to fight for, but the creature still sees him as one of its own resources in this war. What happens next, it will hurt him. I wish I could give you hope, but I simply don’t know if he can survive this.”
Nali leaned heavily on Ashure when her knees threatened to collapse, and he wrapped his arm around her waist. She regarded Asahi's calm face, past the thin veneer of Aminta’s control. The gold faded until she was staring into Asahi’s brown eyes.
“Nali,” Asahi hoarsely said.
She pulled away from Ashure and wrapped her arms around Asahi’s waist. Closing her eyes, she held him. All around her, she could hear explosions, Drago’s roar, and Koorgan’s booming curses.
“Empress, our forces have retreated to the second level,” Pai said.
Nali opened her eyes, pulled back, and stared into Asahi’s eyes. She slid her hand up his chest and caressed his face. He wrapped his hand around hers and held it against his cheek.
“Go. Aminta and I will connect with the alien,” he said.
She nodded and reluctantly turned toward Pai. “I will assess the situation,” she replied.
“We’ll help Asahi,” Ashure said, waving his hand at Ross.
“Thank you,” Nali murmured. She nodded to Pai. “Let’s kill these things.”
Chapter 27
Before reaching out to the alien, Asahi linked to the Goddess inside him, bringing to the fore a strong desire to join forces—and knowledge flooded his entire being. The scene they had witnessed in the mirror made much more sense now.
The entity that had shattered Aminta’s original form was a tainted symbiot. Symbiots, Asahi learned, were the living gold companions of the Valdier, a dragon-shifting species. These golden companions were healers and shapeshifters, and they were born in the River of Life that contained the essence of the species many believed to be Goddesses. The symbiot that had attacked Aminta, however, had been perversely altered by the power-hungry Valdier outcast, Raffvin Reykill. Together they had waged war on the Goddesses in the sacred cavern.
To survive the tainted symbiot’s attack, Aminta had mixed her essence with that of the mutated symbiot. Luckily, she was able to section off enough of her mind to force her new self through the Gateway, away from the river of symbiots and inadvertently back in time—any centuries back in time.
That version of their enemy had the potential to be powerful and destructive, but when it encountered a meteor that contained the alien bacteria, it became something even worse. Weakened by the battle, they could not fend off the bacteria that seeped into their merged remains.
The bacteria had quickly spread, evolving and engulfing what remained of them to become something new—a dangerous and dark liquid parasite. The joining of the bacteria and Raffvin’s tortured symbiot had produced a need to destroy and consume any and every living being they encountered. Aminta had unwillingly supplied the tainted symbiot with her species’ immense power and the knowledge of the worlds she had encountered.
Thankfully, she was again able to encapsulate a small portion of her essence, holding on to her sense of self. She had hoped that one day she would grow strong enough to reach out for help from another of her kind.
In the meantime, the evolving entity had divided into more parts. The meteor had become a living ship, formed from the majority of Aminta’s essence. With her knowledge of the star system as a guide, it had proceeded to the nearest planet with life—The Seven Kingdoms.
The meteor ship had crashed into the ocean near the Isle of the Sea Serpent. Two smaller portions had remained behind with Aminta’s depleted form, while the other aliens spread out, searching for new and more powerful hosts to inhabit. The first one had discovered Magna. The others had worse luck, overtaking weaker inhabitants of the Seven Kingdoms and burning through them quickly. The possessed Magna had caused so much chaos that no one even noticed the trail of the other aliens, assuming it was more of Magna’s carnage.
The last two had accessed more of Aminta’s memories, eventually recognizing the power that lay beyond the gateway in this world—the power found in the River of Life. They then spent a long time preparing for this war to reach the Gateway. The mountain itself was the biggest obstacle. The aliens could not access it until Aminta had grown stronger—because she was pure of heart.
When it was time, all the aliens in the Seven Kingdoms except the one imprisoned in Nali’s palace had merged and began their assault. Many hosts had died along the way, but at last, now the merged alien was on the mountain. Asahi reeled with the sudden knowledge. He felt as if he had lived centuries in just a few seconds.
“Asahi, are you with us?” Ashure asked, touching his arm.
He looked at Ashure with a start before he nodded. “Yes. Aminta was sharing her memories with me,” Asahi quietly replied.
“Learn anything useful?” Ross asked.
Asahi hesitated, his mind whirling. “I’m not sure. No—the plan is still the same,” he somberly answered, closing his eyes.
I cannot do anymore to help you until the alien inside us is destroyed, Aminta instructed.
He pulled Mr. Gryphon from the sheath. The lion yawned and shook himself as he came to life, then he looked over at Ashure and Ross, twisted around on the hilt of the dagger and glared up at Asahi.
“Well, you took your sweet…,” Mr. Gryphon said in an annoyed tone before he looked into Asahi’s eyes, snapped his jaw shut, and bowed his head in respect. “My apologies, Goddess. How may I serve you?”
“Goddess!” Ross and Ashure exclaimed at the same time.
“I want you to kill the alien inside me, Mr. Gryphon,” Asahi quietly requested.
Mr. Gryphon bowed his head again. “As you command, Goddess,” the lion replied.
Mr. Gryphon wrapped his claws arou
nd the hilt and fluttered his wings as he lifted the dagger from Asahi’s open palm. The lion carefully scanned Asahi like an MRI machine, searching for the exact location of the alien hidden deep inside his body. Then the golden gryphon suddenly lunged forward, burying the magical dagger deep into Asahi’s heart.
Asahi gasped and stiffened at the blow but surprisingly felt no pain. The tip of the golden dagger pierced the black matter of the alien. The magic contained within the blade glowed, blossoming outward, and spread throughout Asahi’s body.
Asahi vaguely heard Ashure and Ross cursing. Inside him, the dagger’s powerful magic combined with Aminta’s unique energy and surged through him. Spider veins of gold rippled along his skin, and his blood cells mutated.
Aminta’s calming words flowed through him. Do not be afraid.
I’m not afraid of death. All I ask is that you protect Nali and the worlds endangered by the alien, he replied.
I will do my best, Asahi, Aminta vowed.
Asahi sensed Aminta’s resolve to keep her promise but knew that she was still so very weak from her ordeal. He looked down at the cliffs below, searching for Nali in the light from the explosions. Like a beacon in the night, he saw her. She was his precious warrior.
I love you, Nali, he thought as Aminta took over his body.
Nali ducked under a cascade of falling boulders as Koorgan struck one of the alien trilobites. Three of her elite soldiers were trapped and needed assistance. She raised her sword and struck the trilobite when it swung its spiked tail in their direction. Her sword caught between the joint of two spikes, embedding it in the alien’s flesh. The force drove her back into the cliff wall.
She grunted from the impact and fought to prevent the spike from piercing her granite flesh. She turned her head and saw her three gargoyles. One of them was wounded.
“Get him to safety,” she ordered.
“Thank you, Empress,” one soldier said.