Chapter Sixty-Eight
Aelia
Now, Aelia. We must use the Moirai Shard. It’s our only chance.
I watched in sheer terror as Reign drew the shard of shimmering crystal from the folds of his cloak. Elian still stood in the crater, hellfire and shadows raging around him in a storm of power. His gaze was lifted to the heavens, lips flapping incoherently.
No… A tremor coursed through me, so violent my voice shook. We don’t even know if it will work.
Reign tugged me into his arms, lips brushing a frantic kiss to my forehead. But we must try.
And if I lose you?
You could never lose me, starlight. I will be with you, always. He pressed his palm to my heart. In here.
I nearly shattered as he released me.
Reign’s fingers curled around the Moirai Shard, and the moment its crystalline edge caught the fractured moonlight across the battlefield, my heart stopped.
As if the gods themselves had sensed its presence, Elian’s storm of stolen power faltered for the briefest breath.
A scream of primordial energy ripped through the air, deafening and divine.
Light exploded from Reign’s hand, something raw and furious.
The Shard shimmered in a rainbow of essences of all the gods that ever were—golden for Raysa, obsidian for Noxus, violet for Zaroth, azure for Selraya, crimson for Avarnok.
Then the triskelion of power that hung from Elian’s chest spiraled outward in a vortex that blossomed across the night sky.
Elian’s eyes widened. He turned, mouth open, hands flailing at Tharos. But before the dark Spellbinder could conjure something, some counterspell, maybe, Reign’s mouth began to move.
He raised the Shard high and roared, “Moirai incendiae.” Then louder. “Moirai incendiae. I sever this unnatural tether. Return what was stolen to the gods!”
The Shard responded like it had been waiting an eternity for this command.
A bolt of raw energy surged from the heavens, spearing directly into the Shard.
The daggers at my sides vibrated, the tiny shards embedded in the hilts awakened by the force.
Reign’s entire body shuddered, his form aglow in radiant light.
From the glowing prism, a pulse of divinity erupted, a tsunami of power that tore through the battlefield like a star being born.
It hit Elian square in the chest, and his scream was like the tearing of reality itself.
“Reign!” I cried.
I’m okay, starlight. His voice wavered through the cuorem, but he held strong, bearing the fury of power.
The dark spell crumbled, ashes falling to the earth in a sooty haze. The bond between Elian and the gods snapped, a loud pop that vibrated the air.
The stolen powers, Helroth’s twisted zar, Tenebris’s venomous nox, even the corrupted light of Elian’s rais, were ripped from his soul. Each one unfurled like silk threads rushing back toward the skies, into the great ether where they belonged.
Elian crumpled, gasping, his knees hitting the earth with a crack of bone. Steam curled from his mouth. A tangle of hellfire and radiant light licked across his form. His golden armor blackened and disintegrated to ash.
A sharp cry erupted from Tharos’s gaping mouth as the spell dissolved to nothing, along with Elian himself. He scrambled backward, but Reign was already moving.
My cuoré stalked across the field like a living shadow, eyes glowing like twin stars. The Shard had altered him somehow. It had poured the strength of the gods through his veins, and for this moment, he was limitless.
Tharos raised a hand, invoking some incantation, but Reign’s blade found his throat before the words could form.
“No more spells,” Reign whispered, and his shadows devoured Tharos, body and soul. There was no scream, only silence, and then nothing but dust on the wind.
The storm suddenly died. The skies cleared and glittering sunlight parted the clouds. It was as if nothing had ever happened.
For a beautiful, perfect moment, everything was still. Then, just as suddenly, everything and everyone was back in motion. The grunts of wounded soldiers, the howls of pain, and the gasps of confusion echoed all around us.
I stood frozen, trembling, not from fear any longer but from the impossible weight of what had just happened. Gods, we did it.
Reign turned to me, eyes softening. The Shard had dimmed in his palm, now just a crystal husk completely spent. “We did it,” he breathed, echoing my thoughts.
I launched myself at him, arms wrapping tight around his shoulders.
“We did.” He held me in his arms spinning me around as the battleground came alive once more.
Then his lips crashed into mine, there in the center of the chaos with ash and starlight falling like snow around us.
For a moment, a fleeting, wonderful moment, everything was right in the world.
Then Reign’s knees buckled, and he slid from my arms. He crumpled onto the scorched earth as I watched horrified.
“Reign!” I dropped to the ground beside him, terror squeezing my lungs. “Reign!” I cradled his face, then drew him into my lap. His skin was ice. “No, no, no—stay with me.”
I pressed my ear to his chest. Not a sound, not a heartbeat, not even a whisper of breath.
No! Reign? I searched deep within my core for the pulsing cuorem. It was still. The faint threads that connected us had gone silent. Completely silent. Reign, please! Come back to me!
A shape emerged through the mist, drawing my attention. The female was garbed in white and silver, eyes glowing with radiant wisdom and sorrow through a sheer veil. Her voice carried like a bell through the stillness.
“Greetings, child. I am a priestess of Selraya from the Lupherium. Your mate severed what none have dared to touch,” she said, kneeling beside me. “In order to maintain balance in the world of the living, a thread must be cut so another can be spun.”
“No, no… I do not accept this!” I cried, holding Reign tighter. “It’s not fair. How can the gods demand such a sacrifice? He’s my cuoré, chosen by the damned gods themselves to be with me. How can they steal him away?”
“It is for the Moirai to choose, child. Not us.”
She placed a gentle hand over his heart. “He carries the burden of gods now. And gods do not slumber easily.”
“No,” I snarled again.
“Noxus’s nuts, what happened?” Symon moved to my side, blinking the haze from his eyes. Then Rue, Devin, Heaton… all my friends surrounded me.
“Oh, gods, Reign. What did he do?” Ruhl slid to the dirt beside me, bloodied and covered in ash. His mouth twisted, darkness settling over his expression as he scanned his brother’s still form.
“He… he used the Moirai Shard to defeat Elian…” My throat was raw, agony bloating my insides as I cradled Reign’s head in my lap and rocked gently. A sob built in my chest, a torrent of emotions threatening to burst.
A rumble shook the earth beneath my feet and Sol’s warm breath wafted across my shoulders. Then Phantom’s agonized roar split across the sun-drenched sky.
He can’t be gone. I will not allow it. I pushed the thought through our four—no, three-way connection.
Then fix it before it’s too late for all of us.
Phantom’s voice was pure misery drenched in torment.
You are the child of twilight, blessed by the gods themselves.
You have the power. Now use it. Her words echoed in my skull like a drumbeat of fury and grief.
Her anguish was my own. Sol’s sorrow rolled through our bond like smoke and fire.
How?
Use your power, damn it, Aelia. Phantom’s dark timbre only intensified. All three of them.
I looked down at Reign’s lifeless face, his dark lashes still against pale cheeks, his lips tinged blue. My chest heaved, the world pressing in from all sides. A faint tremor vibrated the daggers at my sides, but I was too consumed with grief to focus.
No. Not like this. I refused to allow the gods to steal him from me. Not after how hard we fought to be together. Not ever.
My fingers curled tighter around him. “Do you hear me, Noxus?” I screamed into the sky. “You gave him to me. I will not allow you to steal him away!” I pressed my forehead to his. “I will tear the veil apart myself if I have to.”
And then, I felt it. A flicker of power. Not from Reign… but from me. From us.
Not just the rais burning in my veins, or the nox I’d trained so hard to wield. Not even the insidious zar that hummed low and dangerous beneath the surface. This was something new.
It was wild and boundless, a streak of energy unfurling deep in my core. My heart pulsed in time with Solanthus’s wrath and Phantom’s sorrow. With their power behind mine, I reached deeper still, tapping into the trinity of energies within me. Rais—light. Nox—shadow. Zar—night.
Then it came to me. The one Night Fae ability I’d dreaded to master. Necromancy. Phantom was right. I could bring him back. But would the soul that returned still be my Reign?
The ancient Night Fae art whispered in my bones like a seductive promise. I had seen Helroth wield it, pervert it, turn it cruel. But I was not Helroth.
I was his antithesis. A daughter of Light.
“Help me,” I whispered to the earth, to the gods, to whatever forces were still listening.
Calling on my healing rais, the dark necromancy of zar and the cool shadows of nox, everything I needed to save Reign, I turned my focus inward.
With Reign’s hand in mine, I reached for my dagger and raised it toward the heavens.
“Raysa, Goddess of Light, Noxus, God of Death, and Zaroth, Keeper of Night, hear me now. Grant me passage. Allow me to cross the Veil and bring him home.”
The air thickened, charged with raw energy. The crystals in my daggers flared, flickers of the Moirai Shard spinning to life.
My body began to rise, hovering just inches above the battlefield. Below, Reign lay still beneath me. Golden light poured from my core, weaving with my shadows and threading with violet zar.
I closed my eyes and shadowtraveled. Not across the lands of Aetheria, but through realms. Through a veil of smoke and silence and starlight.
I fell into a cold place, gray and endless. The in-between. Spirits drifted like phantoms, whispers caught in endless wind. I screamed his name, again and again.
“Reign! Reign, where are you?”
Nothing.
Tears streamed down my cheeks as I searched the endless space. “Reign, please. You swore you’d be with me for eternity.”
Time stretched on. Endless.
“You spoke the words, Reign.” My voice faltered as memories consumed me. “I will always come back to you. Even if I have to crawl through every realm of shadow to do it. So do it now. I need you.”
Then… a flicker. A curl of shadow and night, then a spark of rais.
I turned, and a sob broke free.
Reign. He stood in the void, bare-chested, shadows and night coiling at his feet, light gleaming from beneath his skin as if he was carved from moonlight itself.
But his eyes were pools of infinite darkness.
“Reign,” I sobbed, running to him. “Please, come back. It’s me.”
He didn’t move.
My knees hit the infinite space beneath.
“Do you remember me, my love? Our bond. You’re my cuoré.
You are the other half of my soul, and without you, I will never be whole again.
” My voice cracked. “Remember the night in the cave. Our dragons. The first time you kissed me then stole my memories of it.” I faltered, each word more of a struggle with the grief tearing me apart.
“When you came for me at the cottage and saved me from that dark Fae lord.”
His head tilted slightly. A flicker. A tremor. Like something inside him stirred.
I reached up and pressed my palm to his heart. “You promised we were forever,” I whispered. “Now, I’m calling in your vow.”
I poured everything I had into him. The healing Light, the icy Shadow, the thrilling Night. Fire from Sol. Grief from Phantom. Even the whisper of necromancy I’d pulled from the depths of the dark zar. The crystals in my daggers vibrated with power.
The wind howled in a whirlwind of energy. The Veil screamed as if the very fabric of existence were being torn apart. And then, Reign gasped.
His hand closed over mine as his once vacant gaze focused on my wild one. “Aelia,” he breathed, voice cracked but real. “You came for me.”
Another sob tore from my throat. “Always.”
My soul reached out to his, enveloping it in a glittering mist. Then I pulled him into my arms and shadowtraveled hard, ripping us back through the Veil of death with nothing but sheer will and the fury of our bond.
We landed on the blood-soaked battlefield with a crack of light that split the dark clouds that had formed when my love fell.
I collapsed over him, heaving, and every part of me shaking. With my ear pressed to his chest, I heard it. It was faint at first…his heartbeat. Slow but steady. But it was there.
Reign’s lids fluttered as I held my breath. “Starlight,” he rasped, and I inched back to look at him when he blinked up at me. His voice was rough, deep and glorious. “That was one heart stopping kiss.”
Laughter burst from me through the tears, messy, wild and alive.
We survived. We were together. And gods’ help me, we would never be torn apart again.