Dragon Aster Trilogy (21 page)

Like what?
Cirrus asked by psi, not knowing how much more he could worry without bursting from it.

‘Sentry can’t enter the Keol. Yet this pluma can. It almost sounds like the story of Daath. An estus demon masquerading around as a pluma Awl.’

She doesn’t have any of her former life’s memories back yet. Is it possible he’s trying to trigger her memories by tormenting her?

‘It’s possible. This Awl might be the only way she could have been brought here through a broken Gate. Daath was a cael. Now he’s using her to lead us to a possible watery grave. We’re the only ones left who have not sided with Yri and the Atrum.
’

So the question is why does he want us dead? Because he is answering to Vanir, or because of something else? He had enough chances to kill me.

‘We hold most of the Texts, but I’m willing to bet that Daath hasn’t caught up in his reading on us. Maybe he’s confused and doesn’t know exactly where our kind fits in.’

A cael that is lost and confused. That’s all we need.
Cirrus’ memory flashed back to that of Nafury and what he had emerged from the Rift as during his Trial of Somn. He remembered fearing that he would never see his Prince again.

“Cirrus, what’s wrong? You look at me as if I’m a ghost.
”

Nothing,
Cirrus had replied to his Prince, even though it was far from the truth. Nafury had emerged with the dragon form of a monstrosity. His flesh was torn in some places deep enough to expose the bone. His wings had holes that went through the webbing. His flesh was a rotten dark brown, and his face where his deep sapphire eyes once glowed were now green and held by sinking sockets.

A monster, just like the one he had seen in the memories of Sybl’s mind. One able to take the soul of his Prince.
You scared me. Are you in pain?
The question Cirrus regretted asking, as he touched Nafury’s face with both his hands and his aeri energy to try and heal him. But he would never heal again.

But exactly when was his soul lost? Cirrus closed his eyes tighter in thought.

‘Cirrus?
’

An image of the destruction of the Fay Wall passed through his mind. They had all lost their minds for a while after its collapse and the death it brought. The Aeger was to blame for the attack.
They were after him.

‘What?
’

The attack on the Fay Wall. They wanted Nafury.

‘But why? As a cael wouldn’t he terrify them off?
’

Not if he was infected with the Aeger. I’m willing to bet that the same way he has been taunting me and triggering the Aeger to drive me mad, it also had the same effect on the plumas. The last place the Prince left a mark of his blood was on the Fay Wall, after scratching it from his anger at me from our fight. They must have picked up on his scent and thought he was behind it.

‘But we didn’t raid the Canyon for months before it all happened.
’

No, we didn’t. But Simera did. He also did so after he bled Nafury with a whip. The blood didn’t come off the walls in the room, and there’s a chance Nafury’s Aeger blood didn’t come off our King, either. Simera could have spread it through the Canyon.

‘Ever get the feeling Simera is missing on purpose?
’

This Awl is somehow Nafury’s somn. The Eminor of Daath.
The Prophecy from Serena said that her son would be the one to lead the Caelestis back to Aster. Asil’s here. If this is Daath we’re dealing with, the Aeger would have a feast on his estus energy and easily drive him mad before anything else.

‘So what’s the plan? Kill the Prince cael and save the Princess? And we have never seen the full extent of Nafury’s power. He always held back.
’

The pendant in Cirrus’ hand moved as the monster did, towards Mer City. But that didn’t catch his senses as much as the Keol did.
You see that?

‘What?’

The Keol is frozen.

‘Wha…?’
Lintrance asked as he looked into Cirrus’ psi for what he sensed.
‘Ice…how…?’

Nafury,
Cirrus said in certainty.
That’s his power right there.

‘And the Atrum owns Mer City now, and all the Gates—’
Lintrance stopped thinking there as the same thought went through his and Cirrus’ mind at the same time.

He’s going to try and bring her back.
Cirrus turned and aimed his sights back for the ocean, as the storm continued to rage over it.

‘Don’t be crazy! That static will tear you apart!
’

You remember that game you used to scold us for when we were kids?

‘No, we are not—Cirrus!’
But it was too late as the dragon unsomned and then fell for the ocean, sending a fury of opposing bolts at him. He twisted and spun out of their paths by inches, his only warning to their burning strikes was the spark they made just before they darted at him.

Lintrance had no choice but to unsomn and follow his air supply.

Cirrus avoided all the Threads that he could. The estus and aeri static channeled their wrath towards his way as thin streaks of lightning.
Nafury
.

“I saw her Cirrus—I saw the Caelestis! She was so beautiful but so sad.
”

I see her now too.
Cirrus missed a Thread ignite before him, and it sent a paralyzing surge of pain through his body. Lintrance dove faster and caught him, setting his focus straight again as the water approached and they took back to their dragon forms.

Cirrus pulled his power of air upwards enough to slow their fall into its fastest safe dive, before they entered the water side by side.

Sybl opened her eyes to find herself surrounded by darkness, until a faint light caught her attention. For a moment, she thought she was dead, until a beautiful voice sounded from afar, coaxing her towards it. She got up and began to walk across the cold floor, until another voice who sounded like her own brought her to a stop.

“Erebus it’s perfect!” Asil said as she took the delicate pink life form from her twin. Her white, wispy spirit form solidified to touch and hold the flower.

“I was completely appalled by my first sight of it, hence how I knew you would be busy just short of eternity trying to understand why you love it.”

Sybl looked to the other spirit as his blue eyes were like her own. But he looked so much like Kas.

“It’s so beautiful. What is it?”

“Earth calls it a flower,” the look-alike Kas explained.

“What does it do?”

“They use it to cure illnesses and plant them around to heal their spirits.”

“Why couldn’t they just ask their Eminor or Ancient to do that for them?”

“They do not have spirits to guard their souls as we do, Asil.”

“Why would Hino take away their spirits guards?”

“Mother?” Erebus asked as he looked to Asteria as she approached them and stopped at the sight of the flower.

Sybl looked at the spirit as it became as solid as a Sylvan could be. She looked nothing short of an angel from how her aura glowed a bright white light around her body. Her long, white hair and perfect complexion stood over the two other spirits with a stature of dignity and uncontested beauty.

“They still have spirit guards, my children. They just do not have as many as they need.”

Sybl didn’t know how she remembered Asteria, but as she looked at Kas, his first name, Erebus, came back to her memories as well. She looked back at Asil, but didn’t see how she could be the reincarnation of such a spirit creature. Asil’s hair was a pale white, and the Fay was very frail-looking.

“Can we send them some of the Feharin?” Asil asked.

“No, my daughter. They do not welcome that which they do not understand. Too many have been separated from their spirit guards for too long to so much as recognize us anymore. They would not accept our help—or us.”

Sybl could see that Asil felt bad as she looked at the flower. The Fay tried to hide her feelings, even as Erebus looked to feel it as well.

Asil touched the pink flower, petal by petal as she began to think of what she could do to help. “Then I want to give them more than enough flowers to cure all their sufferings.”

The apparition of Asil vanished as the darker mist of Erebus did the same, leaving only Asteria and the flower in the darkness. It drifted side to side before reaching the cold ground in a ripple that extended its light across the room.

Sybl walked closer, as Asteria’s bright, light blue eyes that moved like air and water within a glass sphere watched her. She looked at the flower at the base of her feet then as it began to wilt quickly, before it dried up and vanished in pieces under the light of the floor.

“You cannot continue to seek redemption for the past, Asil.”

Sybl looked up as there was no mistaking that the spirit was talking directly to her. “Is this the first Aster?”

“It was,” Asteria said with a voice like tiny chimes in the wind, “very beautiful once. Now this emptiness is all that remains of my perfect world.”

“Why are you still here? Why haven’t you come to the new Aster?”

“There is a history that you should never have to remember. I want you to be able to live free of sins, and the answers you seek will only pull you further away from both.”

“So what do you want me to do? What can I do like this?” Sybl asked and looked over her human self in comparison to the spirit.

“You must trust your soultwin, Erebus, who is called in this lifetime, Kas. You were both reborn together, but a tragic twist of Vanir’s wrath colliding with the Iynx known as Gei, killed you. Gei was only able to save your soul and place it in Serena, so you might get another chance to be reborn. And you were, but because Serena was a human, you were also reborn as a human. It is why Nafury, the reincarnation of Damek, is now your twin. He refused to have such a tragedy kill you again. He also took as much of the Aeger that he could from your spirit into his own before you were reborn. But not all of your memories have healed yet.”

“I have a brother…you mean that demon is?” Sybl stopped there as she didn’t want to believe any of it anymore.

“Yes,” Asteria replied to the rest of her thoughts, before pulling her psi away from Sybl’s mind. She left within it only the reality of her past as many more timeless memories that they once shared.

“What about my father?”

“That you will have to determine for yourself. Fay are not born as genetic copies of their parents’. You are Asil. You will always be Asil. Your father is merely a means to allow your immortal soul to exist in a physical form again.”

Tears began to swell up in Sybl’s eyes, as the realization that she would never see Nafury as he once was swelled in her mind. She thought about Cirrus and how it all made sense to why he had taken such good care of her. She was his best friend’s sister. Sybl didn’t so much as know if he knew just that.
Princess.
They knew. She was the only one left out of the loop. “How did I end up on Earth?”

“Those are answers you must find on your own. First you must help Daath remember who he is. The Aeger has taken many of his memories. He doesn’t remember you, or even me, and he believes he is still a Sentry of Death in servitude to Hino.”

Sybl could see the sadness hiding behind Asteria’s eyes. “How do I make him hear me?”

“He is already listening to you.”

“Is there a cure for this Aeger?”

“The Aeger is the result of the Sylvan Threads of Aster disappearing. When the Sylvan Aur went down, the very balancing axis of light and dark, it left only one possible side for the world to fall into. The estus energy of Aragmoth. Estus uses sadness, hate, jealousy and fear to channel its spread.”

“What about that unicorn?”

“He is Sial, an Ancient of the first Aster reborn through Nephena. You must retrieve the festra he protects with the names of the Eminor. You must do this before our enemies find a way to utilize the Aeger to their advantage. They will make the Ancients and Eminor into slaves. With their help, you will be able to stop the Aeger’s continued destruction and raise the Sylvan Aur once again.”

“Are you saying I have to save the world, while avoiding going crazy by the Aeger, and get a bunch of Eminor and Ancient spirits to listen to me?” Sybl gulped.