Dragon Aster Trilogy (24 page)

“His blood is the water.

His anger, storms of fire.

His wings are the mountains.

His breath whispers through the chasms.
”

Sybl looked for the source of the familiar psi as she sat up. It could have only been Daath’s. He had brought her to Aster, so he might be here again on Earth. But it was him who handed her to Vanir as well, so it didn’t make any sense.

She was drenched in water and covered in mud; as if something had dragged her across the bank from the pond. Sybl was right back to where she had started; at the back of her old foster home. But the woods were a dead silent.

The still pond was heavily layered in green algae. But that wasn’t what held her attention, as she lifted her eyes to the cougar on the other side of it. The glowing brightness of its green eyes betrayed its appearance as any normal animal of Earth.

It stood up on all fours, then walked over the pond to the center of it. The ripples it made killed and sunk the algae. Then it sat down and simply stared quietly at its reflection, tilting its head to the side as if to listen to the sound of falling death. Then Daath began to speak to her psi again,

“His dreams fortify life.

His nightmares channel death.

His waking brings absolution.

He is the darkness from where all emerge.

He is the darkness from which only light can escape.
”

Daath’s green eyes looked to her then. “Fayless, he is the void of space that will reclaim it all.”

When the pluma spoke, there was no denying that it was him, only wingless. She could see now how his cougar-like appearance was handy. But under his newly grown brown fur, that was as puffy as new cub’s, was a devil of flesh woven solely from the pain and death of others. His whole being was thrown back in Time to before she was so much as ever born.

The part of him that Sybl had healed three hundred years ago into Damek was now lost deep within Aragmoth. The part of his soul that was reborn as Nafury. Lost forever. Or maybe it was here, where Hino quietly held his victory.

“When we go forward in Time, we learn. When we go back, we remember. But when we are lost in-between it all, we forget. When our memories stop moving, then are thawed afterwards, they shatter just like fallen ice. Everywhere and nowhere. We can lose all of what makes us who we are. It is not Hino who holds the soul Asteria gave me. It is Aragmoth who holds it. Should he release it, I will return.”

“So what you’re saying is it was all for nothing? Your memories as Nafury—as Damek for that matter? The world doesn’t go on oblivious of those who just disappear or die.”

“Wishes send you forward, regret sends you back in Time. If I am to avoid falling victim to the Aeger again, I must continue forward. I am not a puppet to be had by those who would stumble on the shattered pieces of my memories. My life as Nafury was made into such a puppet, as was yours. I am a Death Cael; one promised to Asteria. I am not bound to the festra that stands a chance at saving the other Eminor, I was its master. Now you are destined to have it. If I am to have a chance at regaining what Asteria gave me in the past, I must find the future she wishes for. It is her call that summons my being more than anything now. You will not feel regret in my leaving.”

Sybl staggered mid-yell at him. She could lie, but he would feel every inch of it. The truth was that she didn’t miss him. Not only had the Aeger freed him of his past, it had also destroyed all his connections to her. What she remembered of him was not from her own memories of experience. She was different now. He was an Awl. He was from Earth and a time before the Bible. He was a soldier that served war, only to closer serve death. In taking the lives and souls of others, he was able to exist. “Send me back to Aster.”

“Is that what you want?”

“Yes. I can’t stay here. I hate this place. I don’t belong here.”

Daath looked around, trying to pinpoint what caused her to hate the place so.

“There is nothing for me here. No wishes. Just regret.”

“Then this is my good-bye to you.”

“Where are you going?”

“This realm and Aster both give me heavy regret. So I will go to where it no longer exists. I will return to where she waits for me.” Daath turned his head around and flared his teeth, before biting into his thigh. It sent a couple of lines of blood streaming down his leg and into the water. What didn’t touch the water, began to flow up his back, until it grew like a tree on him. The skin of his wings and then his feathers from his ice-cold blood formed together. “There is a Heaven for each of us, and I will pray alongside Asteria that you find yours.”

Sybl looked at the dark pool of water, then watched as he sprung off it and into the air in a single ripple. Then in a prism of rays split and cast from his unholy wings against the sun, he was gone.

She waded into the dark water, terrified enough to shiver. If this Rift landed her on the bottom of the ocean of Aster, she would be dead from the pressure in moments. All she had to go on was a shaky trust from the Awl she just freed. One that wasn’t so much as a demon anymore to relate on any level of humanity, for there was nothing left of his soul that loved her. She didn’t know if she could find it in Aragmoth. She didn’t so much as know if she truly wanted to.

“Do you know why your father was successful in bringing Alexia here?”

Cirrus didn’t answer Nyx.

“He was successful because it was a cloudy, rainy day the night that she fell from that rooftop.”

“What of it?” Cirrus replied, distrusting the mermaid more by the second.

“The Sentry cannot see at night. They are the opposite of dragons in many ways. While you excel at hunting in the dark, they excel at hunting in the brightest of light that would sooner blind us.”

“So to get Sybl back I need to have my luck with the weather of Earth?”

“No, not luck. Just myself and one other to raise up a storm to your advantage.”

Now Cirrus had lost the last of his trust for her, if he had any to begin with. But he didn’t have a choice. He followed Nyx into the loading dock, and looked to where the mer soldier he had killed remained as a corpse on the floor. “Do the mer no longer have any respect for their dead?”

“We are already dead.”

“You had me fooled.”

“Yes, because you would be a fool. The mer are not air-headed creatures of aeri energy. We are of estus and as such, we can only exist in the most concentrated places of it.”

“You surface, though.”

“Yes, at night. I doubt you ever saw a mer in the daytime. If you did, it was likely because they were surfacing to perish entirely.”

Cirrus didn’t say anything as she somned into her half-fish form, and her legs were replaced with a long, dark green tail. He followed her out of Mer City and towards where she led to a wild Rift. He swam closer to it, keeping careful balance against its whirlpool-like pull. If he landed in the direct sunlight of Earth, all the aeri Threads in his body would be burned to nothing.
Are you coming through with me?

“No. I have a history that would not assist you on Earth with the Sentry. There is one waiting for you in the Keol who will help you, however.
”

Cirrus didn’t get to argue, as the water turned on him and pushed him with massive force through the Rift and into the Keol. He pulled himself up on the other side and looked around the fiery desert for his assistant. Of everyone he might have guessed, the phelan kid stood nearby. “Not you.”

“Likewise. I am Kas, High Priest of the Sanctus and son of Kira.”

“If you think that I am bringing Sybl back to be had by you—”

“I am not her Bond.”

“And that Mei on your arm?” Cirrus asked as he brought his face closer to Kas. He was in the right mood to clench his teeth around the phelan somnus’ head.

“Once there were two Fay, and although I am only her shadow, I still retain the soul and memories of Erebus within me.”

Cirrus unsomned and couldn’t help but laugh. “You? Erebus? That would be impossible.”

“It is not a matter of what you think. We both want the same thing. If Sybl stays on Earth, it is only a matter of time before Vanir arranges the humans to kill her.”

“And as his son I should trust you because…?”

Kas stopped to think on it for a moment, before looking at the gold fairy that hung on his neck. “Did Serena ever tell you how she came about that necklace?”

“Yes.”

“Did she tell you where it was made?”

“It was bought.”

“No, it was not bought. It was given to her. You cannot trace its Threads to its maker, because its maker is an Iynx,” Kas said.

“The Iynx are all dead.”

“All but one. But we do not have time to discuss history. I need your trust, now if we are to reach her in time.”

“What in this Hell do you think I will trust you?”

“It is the only way to get Sybl back. I can also offer you and your friends refuge at the Sanctus. My mother’s home was Serena’s for a while.”

Cirrus was once again left without any options. “I don’t obey you.”

“I have my own army, White Death. I am simply asking for you to see that we are no longer on opposite sides. You want to avert a war, and I have been doing nothing short of such for every year of my life in this body.”

Cirrus could feel the estus pressure of the Keol burn away his sanity. “Fine. So how do we do this?”

“I can open you the Rift and keep it open for no more then thirty minutes.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s all the time we will have before the Sentry realize the storm Nyx is creating is not normal. It is also the amount of time that I can lose my blood before I become unconscious. There is a reason there is lightning in Earth’s storms, and I suggest you avoid it. Grab her so that she cannot argue and bring her back. You will not have time to debate with my soultwin,” Kas explained.

“Will I be able to fly?”

“I do not know. Your command over the air might make it possible. But lightning strikes what is highest, first.”

“Alright, stop talking then.”

Kas cut his hand, and pushed aside his aeri energies with his focus to keep the wound open. His Mei began to glow, and he traced its Threads to where Sybl was. The Rift began to expand, and Cirrus entered it once it was wide enough.

Sybl could only think of Cirrus now. If she did go back, what would she tell him? She was supposed to be a miracle—a Prophecy come true, yet there was nothing she could do to restore Daath’s soul as she was now. There was nothing she could do to return his best friend to him.

But all of her doubts didn’t stop her. She had to enter this Rift and pray that the other side wouldn’t kill her. Before she could duck her head under the water, something cocked a gun. She didn’t have a moment to react before it fired and struck her in the shoulder.

She gasped as she fell back into the water. Sybl stayed under the surface as another shot fired off and whizzed past her head. The blood from her shoulder floated past her eyes, and she swam for the bottom of the pond.

A sign of hope appeared like a star in a moment of absolute darkness. She touched her neck to check for her pendant, and it was there. Daath had returned it to her. Which meant the one under her was
Cirrus…

“I got you. So help me I’ll never let go of you again!”

The white claws appeared from the Rift and reached to pull her into their safety. Just before Cirrus had her, another shot fired.

His dreams fortify life.

His nightmares channel death.

His waking brings absolution.

He is the darkness from where all emerge.

He is the darkness from which only light can escape.

Fayless, he is the void of space that will reclaim it all.

—Texts of Gei