by Kova, Elise
She kept silent, which forced him to glance over his shoulder.
“They hate us, sorcerers, because they don’t understand. And what they don’t understand, they fear. And what they fear, they seek to snuff out of this world.” She pursed her lips, letting him soliloquize to his heart’s content. “But I’m not like them. I do not fear what I don’t understand.” He reached the bottom of the stairs and stopped, turning to face her. Vi looked down at him, remaining a few steps away. “I do not understand what you are. But I do not fear you.”
“You should,” Vi whispered ominously.
A smirk cracked his lips. “No… you’re like me, just a few steps ahead on this journey, aren’t you?”
“More than a few.” Vi’s chest tightened to the point of quivering. He saw her. Somehow, out of everyone, Victor had been the one to see right through her. He could see she wasn’t like the rest. Until now, Taavin had been the only one to peer into the corners of her that no one else could see. Vi hated that Victor, of all people, would be the second to do so.
Let him see your sharp edges, a voice whispered to her. Let him see you have achieved what he can only dream of—an evolution from the shell of humanity that holds him back.
Vi’s hand tightened around the banister.
“As far as I’m concerned, you work with me, or you are against me.” He took a few steps back, giving her additional space. Vi didn’t move. “The choice is yours.”
At that moment, Baldair emerged from the side hall, nearly stumbling right into Victor. “Oof—Excuse me, Minister!”
“The excuse lies with me.” Victor took a step to the side and Vi saw the mask of a kindly sage slip over his features with the deftness of an actor’s well-practiced costume change. “I shouldn’t get in the way of determined princes.”
“I wasn’t looking where I was going.” Baldair shook his head and his gaze met Vi’s. She held it. He backed away as though he were staring down a monster.
“Is everything all right, my prince?” Victor glanced between her and Baldair.
“Yes, of course!” Baldair chuckled. “Now, if you’ll both excuse me… I have a bottle of wine I’ve been saving for something special and I think the festival celebrations will be just that occasion.” He retreated quickly and Vi descended the last of the stairs with forced slowness, not wanting to look like she was ready to race after him, even if she was.
“Even the prince fears you on instinct,” Victor said to her in whispered awe, so that none of the servants passing them would hear. “I’m right. You are the woman from all those years ago.”
Vi glanced at him from the corners of her eyes. So many had written off her similarity to a young woman they’d once met to faulty memory. Just a bit of insistence, and her agelessness had thrown them off her trail. But not Victor.
“I know you are.” He took a step forward. “I feel your magic. It is the same.”
“You cannot comprehend what I am. My being was not made for a mind like yours.” The words resonated from deep within and Vi followed their will on instinct.
“It’s the crystals, isn’t it? They gave you this power. They have made you ageless.” He stepped forward, encroaching on her personal space and staring down at her. “What else do they enable you to do?”
“More than you could possibly know,” Vi sneered up at him. She turned to leave.
“Help me find them. Work with me. I am not Egmun. I will be a willing student.”
Vi froze, then slowly turned to face him once more. “I would see this world burn again before I worked with you,” she whispered.
The man before her was nothing more than an extremely gifted sorcerer. He had a sordid history. He had experienced triumphs and pitfalls, most of which Vi didn’t understand.
He was as flawed as any other human and just as capable of great and wonderful deeds.
Except in Vi’s world, this man had murdered the people she called family. In Vi’s world, he’d nearly cost her parents everything… just as he had in various ways across every other world, according to Taavin’s recollections.
This man wasn’t a stone in the river. He was a glacier, cold and unfeeling. That was how she would treat him.
“Then it is to be war between us,” he whispered ominously and, for one brief second, Vi wondered if this moment had been an opportunity to guide him into more than the hateful man she had always heard him to be. Was it her insistence that he was wicked that pushed his wickedness over the edge?
“It has always been war.” Vi put her back to him and strode out of the Imperial quarters. Her feet were hasty beneath her, but her head was held high. This wasn’t a retreat. She was keeping two steps ahead of him.
Two became four.
Four became six.
She slipped into the back passages and began to run. Vi sprinted through the darkness, into the depths of the palace, keeping in a scream.
Though what she longed to scream about, she didn’t quite know.
Vi slowed her feet and took a breath. She side-stepped behind a tapestry and emerged in a hall that led to the wine cellars. The soft clank of a lock disengaging in the distance caught her attention.
So, Baldair really was heading to the cellars.
“Durroe watt radia,” Vi breathed and felt invisibility slip over her as she moved forward. “Durroe sallvas tempre.” A glyph wrapped around her other wrist, masking the echo of her footsteps.
Light danced on the barreled ceiling ahead as Vi emerged into a large, underground wine cave. The walls on all sides, three floors down, were lined with casks. Most seemed new and well-tended. But farther down, the shelves became cluttered with cobwebs and caked in dust.
At the bottom floor, the barrels were locked in vaults. The wine was kept prisoner down here, most likely for its own safety. Some vintages had been exclusive to the Solaris family for generations. One bottle could be worth a fortune.
Baldair stood by a vault in the far corner. He held a torch in his hand and peered through the bars into the inky blackness.
“It’s safe,” he murmured. “No one has come for it.”
Vi walked over, standing behind him, just far enough away that he wouldn’t feel her breath on his shoulder. She followed the prince’s gaze to the bottom left corner. The cask there looked like any of the others. Vi wouldn’t have thought anything was different about it if not for the prince’s sole focus on one, single barrel.
“And no one will use it,” Baldair said firmly, walking away. The light of his torch retreated with him, enveloping her in darkness. Vi watched as that mote of flame danced all the way up along the walkways and out the entry high above.
“You’re the wisest of them all,” she whispered.
Baldair likely didn’t even understand what the crown truly was. But he did understand that some powers were not meant for mortal hands. She pulled the iron key from her pocket and slotted it into the lock on the vault door.
It fit perfectly.
Vi extended her sallvas glyph to envelop the whole vault as she unlocked the door. Iron on iron squealed loudly as she swung open the bars. But Baldair was none the wiser, if he was even still close enough to hear at all.
She knocked on the barrels. Sure enough, the one in the lower corner sounded hollow. With a grunt and brute force, she pulled out the barrel. It was lighter than a wine cask should be and there was no sloshing liquid within. The top was nailed on clumsily, as if it had been removed once by an unskilled hand.
“Juth calt.” Glyphs flared around the nails, splintering the wood. Pale blue light washed over her face as Vi peered down into the barrel. Her pulse quickened; her breath hitched. She reached forward without hesitation, like reaching for a lover, a child, a part of herself that had been missing for eons.
Her fingers closed around the crown. The light brightened in intensity until the world went white.
She stood in a room beyond time. It was blindingly bright, yet she could see perfectly. Heat washed over her, but she was q
uickly cooled by unseen breezes.
A window was cut from the brightness. Vi looked through it, out onto the greatest map she’d ever seen. Hills and valleys rolled into plains and mountains. All kinds of people occupied these lands, making them their own. Cultivating them with the magic she’d bestowed on them.
She had bestowed magic?
Someone moved her head for her. The world around her changed as Vi’s eyes looked in a different direction.
No, she wasn’t looking through her own eyes. Because Vi saw herself enveloped in a bed of light opposite the body she occupied, staring back at her. Vi saw her body was hollow and fading. She had not been made for this world, and now she had no place in it.
This was the end.
Or, perhaps not.
“Time for time,” a voice said, speaking with the force of every man, woman, and child on the earth below them.
“Time for time.” The words echoed, but Vi didn’t know who spoke them. Was it her? Or was it the body she was in?
She was suddenly falling. The vision slipped away as Vi reemerged into her physical form, where it lay on the cold floor of the Solaris wine cellar. She blinked several times, staring into the dim light her body was emitting.
Just like with the scythe, Yargen’s essence had sought her out and she was helpless to try and refuse it. The magic seeped into her flesh, rejoining its other severed pieces and leaving only shards of obsidian behind. One by one, she would collect the last remnants of the goddess’s power within her.
She would add up the pieces of Yargen until what the world had known as Vi was nothing more than that hollow, fading ghost.
Time for time.
“I know what I must do,” she whispered to the living goddess within her. Vi would give her time on this earth for Yargen. The goddess demanded a body—in particular, the one Vi was merely borrowing.
She knew her true purpose now. Yargen had shown it to her. To fulfill it, she first had to peel herself off the floor. The next step was crushing the obsidian shards to dust under her boot. Then, she carefully put the barrel back where it was. Vi didn’t suspect Baldair would return so soon after ensuring the crown was safe, but just in case he did, she didn’t want him to be suspicious.
After that, it was merely a matter of planting the fake crown for Victor. “It’s all going according to plan,” Vi murmured. She knew Yargen could hear her. The goddess was watching and waiting in that ethereal prison for the moment she could be whole and present in the mortal realm once more. As Vi’s presence faded in the world, Yargen’s brightened. “We’ll switch places, and you’ll save this world.”
Vi ascended the stairs and out of the wine cellar. As she walked, she fiddled with the watch around her neck. It had suddenly become heavy, constricting.
It felt more like a noose than a necklace.
Chapter Twenty-Six
“We’re leaving,” Vi announced as she entered the shared room she, Deneya, and Taavin had been using as their base of operations while in the palace.
“You found it.” Taavin didn’t mince words.
“I did.” Vi looked at her palm. “The power is already in me.”
“Where was it?” Deneya asked.
“Baldair hid it in a vault in the cellars.” Vi held up the iron key. “That’s what this was for.”
“A miracle he kept it hidden and safe.” Taavin sounded genuinely impressed. Vi was forced to agree.
“We’re going to take the shifted crown and place it in a treasure vault or storeroom somewhere.” Vi went to the back of the room, retrieving the fake crown from the sack where they kept it.
“Not return it to Baldair’s hiding place?” Deneya asked.
“No, if we put it back in Baldair’s hiding place, we risk Victor raising the prince’s suspicions when he finally moves to take the fake crown. If Baldair has reason to think it’s gone, he might raise the alarm and prompt everyone to look for the crown.”
“Which would likely involve going to his father,” Taavin murmured.
“Exactly.” If the Emperor thought he had a crystal Weapon before the War in the North was over, it could change things dramatically. “Furthermore, the last thing we want is Victor to feel rushed to inspect the crown, or take it to the caverns when we’re not ready, and risk him finding out its fake.” No matter how good the shift looked and felt, Vi still feared Victor would somehow see right through it.
“So how do you propose we orchestrate Victor finding the fake crown without Baldair realizing his hiding spot was compromised?” Taavin stood from the chair he’d been sitting in. It was positioned opposite the sofa where Deneya sat, a now-forgotten carcivi board on the table between them.
“Before we leave, I’ll sneak into Baldair’s room and return the key to its previous hiding spot. Baldair has already checked on the crown once and believes it secure. If we don’t give him a reason to, he shouldn’t check again,” Vi postulated. “Deneya, you take the crown and hide it in a vault somewhere. Falsify some records with the guard that will leave just enough of a trail for Victor to follow over the coming months. Let’s not let him find it too quickly.”
“You got it.” Deneya stood and crossed to Vi, taking the crown from her.
“And I assume I’ll give Victor his first breadcrumb?” Taavin asked.
“That was my thought as well.”
“I approve of this plan,” Taavin murmured. “It keeps things tidy. No need for Baldair to go making waves. And Victor stays on track with the crown.”
“We’re glad you approve. You know how important it is to both of us.” Deneya shot him a playful look and Taavin rolled his eyes.
“I’ll go take care of this.” Deneya held up the bag with the crown. “And let you know what trail I can set up.”
“Then tonight, I’ll sneak into the Tower,” Taavin said.
“And I’ll sneak into Baldair’s room at the same time.” Vi remembered the servants’ passage she discovered. With her glyphs, she could slip into his closet unheard and unseen. “We can start for the North tomorrow and get the axe.”
“There’s a stop we’ll make first in the Crossroads.”
“For what?” Vi asked, not able to spare her voice from exasperation at the idea of another delay.
“I’m going to let you two talk that over. Be back!” Deneya fled hastily.
“Vhalla will head there with the army, and that’s where you must read her fortune. In doing so, she’ll charge the watch with her essence and link it to us and Yargen. That’s the key to ensuring the—”
“Birth of a new Champion,” she finished for him. Vi stepped forward, looming over the chair in which he sat. “There won’t be another Champion.”
“Vi, let’s not do this.” He sighed.
“There won’t be,” she said softly. “I’ve seen it, Taavin. The crown showed me.”
She could almost hear the echo of his heart racing. His eyes widened a fraction, their pupils dilating. The air around him thrummed with anxious energy. Her fingers twitched, begging to reach forward and take the power of the Caverns from within him.
Return it to me.
He stood suddenly and stepped away from her and the movement jarred Vi from the almost trance-like state she was in. Her hand was outstretched, as if she had been about to grab him. But Vi hadn’t given her body permission to move. She snatched her hand back, holding it to her chest as if it were wounded.
“What have you seen?” he whispered.
“The end of it all.” It ends with me, she wanted to say. She would be the last one standing, before she gave the goddess her remaining hours. “We are on the right path.” Vi studied his face as conflict raged across it. “I expected you to be happy about this news.”
“Hope is a fragile thing.” Didn’t she know it. “For all I want to believe we’re on the right path… the stones in the river remain. Our duty remains.”
“Seeing the birth of a new Champion is not your duty,” Vi said sharply. “Saving this world is.”
“Part of saving it is ensuring it doesn’t end,” he retorted. “We finish things here and head West to the Crossroads. From there, we’ll rejoin the Imperial army and swap the axe.”
Taavin started for the door, but Vi remained in place. She wished she could make him understand, wished things were still simple, as simple as they had ever been, between them. But something held her back… only for a moment.
Vi broke free of whatever tethers were holding her, raced after him, and wrapped her arms around his waist. She clutched him tightly, her cheek on his back. Taavin’s warmth seeped into her and thawed the icy indifference that had been trying to encase her.
He felt like him, and she like her.
Yargen’s magic was quiet.
“There’s a point when we won’t be able to run from it anymore,” she whispered.
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“I do.”
All they had ever had was borrowed time. Eventually the choice would have to be made to risk everything, and that choice was nearly upon them. The moment she held the axe, there would be no going back. The flame of Yargen would be extinguished. Its magic would be used to restore Yargen in Vi, and its ashes used to summon Raspian.
“Then we’ll follow along until the axe,” Vi said, sparing him the agony of spelling it out bluntly.
His hand covered hers. “Thank you.”
She nodded and closed her eyes. For a little longer, they could enjoy these fleeting moments of peace; they could enjoy each other.
Because if what Vi saw truly came to pass… neither of them was long for this world.
* * *
It took the army a few months to finally arrive in the Crossroads. The military arrived carried on the back of desperation, a sandstorm on their heels.
Tales of Vhalla Yarl were whispered on every tongue in the days following. People spoke of her bravery, of the power of the Windwalker, of her running into the storm head-first and saving them all. Vi was certain there were embellishments here and there; much like the rumors Taavin heard in the Tower of Sorcerers, every story was more fantastic than the last.