Chapter 57
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
LYVIA
The weave reshapes magical bonds, requiring the power of two mystics.
Lyvia – Pyracantha, Lotrennia
Idove deep into the chasm housing my powers and listened for the lilting tune of the Transcindiel, the sweet, transformative light perking its head at my call. A rush of energy left me as it surged forward, and I stretched my hand to the black vine lounging in the center of the floor.
Golden light erupted from my fingers, encasing the line of black thorns in a blanket of shimmering sparkles.
The razor thorns twisted and softened into delicate leaves and small buds, before blooming into the six sharp, violet petals of the nyxteria.
I straightened, letting the Transcindiel siphon back into my hand before snapping my shield in place, and I waited for whichever goddess came for me.
Roars echoed outside the tangle of Pyracantha vines, and my hair stood on end. I held Enya’s heavy blade to the side as I waited, the slight burn in my bicep and forearm a comforting reminder of my strength, of my own transformation in the past two years.
The twisting of vines hushed in the distance, and my heart quickened to a steady gallop. Someone was coming. I plucked a few blossoms from the nyxteria vine as I stepped over it, striding to the opposite end of the cell and turning to face the entrance.
“Come out, come out, wherever you are,” she crooned in the distance. The voice pitched in ethereal notes even my elf ears couldn’t register, the sound originating from a part of the universe far, far from here.
My stomach turned over, and I tightened the grip on Enya’s blade, its hilt slippery in my sweating hand.
A moment later, a soft white light gleamed through the vines of the doorway, and my hair stood on end as a single, blue eye glowed beyond the smallest crack.
“Hello, little thief,” Renova purred.
In a blast of golden light, the doorway vines hardened into brittle, emaciated twigs, as if the Embodied had sucked the life from the enchanted plant.
A moment later, something crashed against them, and they splintered, exploding across the small chamber in a tornado of tiny, broken sticks.
My powers tightened their grip on each other as the debris bounced off my shield, and I adjusted my footing as I came face-to-face with the goddess of the moon.
“You have something of mine,” she hissed, stepping lightly over the debris in a humanoid form, her long, white ears poking through her straight hair. She cocked her head, almost curiously, as I poured more power into my shield of death to strengthen it. Her lips pursed.
“It’s working with his power?” she sneered as she examined the tiny bits of golden, Transcindiel light that emanated from the shield of death.
“They work well together,” I replied, keeping my voice as even as possible, pride bursting at the two powers, hands joined in defense.
“It’s time to return,” Renova said, straightening and curling a too-long finger out before her, calling the transformative light back.
The Transcindiel living within me bucked at the summons, but it didn’t cower as it had that first time.
No, it reared in response, pulling the Obscura along with it and thickening the shield between us.
Renova’s lips pulled over a line of sharp teeth, and she let out a gut-curdling snarl.
“This power has no allegiance to you,” I replied, needing to keep her distracted. “It has chosen a new leader.”
Renova’s head fell back as she laughed.
“Leader? It needs a master, you fool.”
The Embodied threw her hands forward as she whipped her power across the shield in a blast of golden light. The force of it rattled my teeth. My powers screamed in response but held strong.
I forced a mocking smile to my face. “Surely, a goddess as mighty as yourself doesn’t need this small amount of power,” I said, moving to the side as she took a step toward the nyxteria vine.
“The Starlings may have only taken a small piece of our power, but they took the most important.” Renova smiled as she neared. “We can change anything, except the most crucial piece of all things,” she continued, moving closer to my dark shield.
“And what’s that?” I dared, backing up one more step, so she was just over the line of nyxterias.
“The soul,” she shrieked, snapping her teeth as she slashed her power once more against my shield, the force of it finally breaking through in a wave of might.
A crack ripped through the small space just as Renova’s fingers transformed into long, sharp talons, and Drystan and Kellan appeared on either side of her. They slapped two rubelline cuffs on her outstretched arms, and I moved.
The zinging activation of the cuffs reverberated through the air as I sliced Enya’s blade over her outstretched talons, and she let out an earsplitting cry that rippled through the prison of thorns.
Long, white nails rattled as they hit the ground, and Renova’s eyes went wide as they landed on the blazing red cuffs around her wrists. Her long body writhed as she struggled in Kellan and Drystan’s grip, but the goddess was nothing without her power.
Her limbs lacked any definition, any strength, as she flailed them wildly around her. She gnashed her teeth at Kellan, and he whipped his face back just in time to avoid losing a chunk of his perfect face.
Rage swarmed, and the Obscura threatened to break free at the threat. The scene of Kellan’s death ricocheted in my mind, and I shook my head.
“Hold her down,” I commanded, moving closer to the goddess who killed my love, who tortured him before dragging him to the Abyss.
Kellan’s bleeding body was like a translucent image painted over my current reality.
His penance replayed behind my eyes—every painful moment of his life he was forced to relive.
“Open her mouth,” I said as I pressed my knee into her bare chest. Her strange organs glowed through the pale white of her skin. Kellan and Drystan’s knees pushed against her arms, and they forced her chin down as they held her head in place.
The Embodied raged beneath us, and the red of the rubelline cuffs glowed in the dimness of the cell with a violent pulse, as if they knew more power was required to keep hers subdued.
I pulled the handful of nyxteria blossoms from my pocket and held them reverently in my hand.
My eyes slid from the delicate, violet blooms to Renova’s twisted, enraged face.
“The nyxteria is beautiful,” I said quietly, repeating King Saros’s words from last year and leaning close to the goddess’s face.
“The buds of the snowy flower can be used to induce sleep… But as its petals stretch, it becomes dangerous…” I let the word dangle as it hissed off my tongue, before a quiet smile crept up my lips.
Renova’s body bucked beneath my knee, and Kellan’s grip on her jaw hardened.
“And at night, only under the cover of darkness… when it finally blossoms…” I continued, locking my eyes onto her single blue iris. “It is a death sentence. You are the first god I give this message to, but you will not be the last. I am the nyxteria, Renova. And I’ve bloomed.”
I shoved the flowers down her throat with two fingers, careful not to brush my hand against her fang-like teeth.
Renova choked and coughed, trying to force the flowers up, but Kellan had shoved his hand over her mouth.
His other hand was lodged at the base of her chin to keep her from snapping his fingers off while Drystan kept her arms pinned down.
Renova’s eyes widened as she choked down the last of the blossoms, her brows narrowing in rage and realization. I stood, nodding to Kellan and Drystan to haul the goddess to her feet.
“I, Lyviánala Natara Cantor Astraeus, of the Realm of Vael, Bonder of Bellators, sentence you, Renova, to death,” I declared, gripping Enya’s blade with two hands. “Say hello to Tynan for me.”
With that, Drystan gripped Kellan’s hand, zapping the two of them across the small chamber as I swung Enya’s longsword with all my might.
It sliced into Renova’s stretched neck with a sharp whine, the blade cutting through her strange flesh like butter.
Her head balanced as the light in her lone, blue eye guttered out, before her head rolled to the floor with a thud.
Her body collapsed a moment later, and I moved swiftly to where her severed head had landed. I pulled Honor from my belt, and its golden gem sparkled as I plunged the sharp end into Renova’s dim, blue eye.
A distant part of my self, some shadow of who I once was, seemed to flinch, as if it was too much. But any being that tried to kill Kellan, or succeeded in it, would die three times over.
I stood with Renova’s white hair tangled in my grip as I lifted her head and turned to face Drystan and Kellan. I was Death and Creation. I was vengeance. I was the nyxteria. And for the first time in my life, I had fully bloomed.