Chapter 43
Alora
The world snapped back into existence with a rush of a cold tempest. Instead of the smooth passage of her last portal journey, Alora struck an invisible force and her boots stumbled over uneven earth before Rune caught her arm.
Nexus leaped lightly from her shoulder as the portal winked shut behind them in a burst of fading white.
She held still, breathing in the crisp air while the world steadied. Tall pines loomed around them, their needles gleaming in the early light. The air smelled of moss and frost.
But the ruins were nowhere in sight.
Only endless forest.
She turned slowly, frowning with confusion and disappointment. “We are nowhere near Khar Avalen.”
They stood in a clearing several miles from where she had hoped to arrive. A hiccup in her magic. A reminder she was still a novice with the strange power she bore.
Rune turned east, the dawn brushing over his face. His expression shifted in a way she could not quite place, something like wariness sharpened by memory.
“No,” he murmured. “You would not have been able to portal us into the ruins even if you wished. Khar Avalen is its own domain. It has been steeped in dark magic, and it repels all other intrusions—or destroys them.”
A shiver ran up her spine. “You didn’t think to warn me?”
He chuckled. “You stole my power, Alora. I doubted the ruins would give you too much trouble. Other than an arduous journey.”
“Borrowed,” she groused. “Then I suppose we must walk there. Perhaps we may reach it before dark.”
Could she even summon a clover horse while her magic was tangled with Runes?
He turned to her, amusement dancing in those copper eyes. “Or we call on Saeroth.”
Alora frowned questioningly. “Saeroth?”
The moment she said it, the shadows vibrated. Darkness peeled away from the ground like ink rising from paper. It swirled, gathering shape, solidifying with a snort that puffed black mist into the air. A massive black stallion stood before them, hooves made of smoke, mane drifting like torn velvet.
Rune stroked the large creature’s neck. “This is Saeroth. My mount.”
The horse tossed its head, embers glowing deep in its eyes as if acknowledging her with ancient disdain.
Alora stepped back. “Rune… that’s a demon.”
He huffed a quiet laugh. “And an obedient one. He isn’t normally this receptive when called.”
Saeroth snorted heavily, flicking his tail of smoke. It was much more sentient than her ponies of clover.
In one fluid motion, Rune mounted the saddle, then extended a hand down to her. The gesture shouldn’t have made her pulse stutter, but it did. Placing her palm in his, he pulled her up effortlessly and seated her in front of him, drawing her close against his chest.
Heat swept up her neck.
His arm slid around her waist with commanding ease, strong and warm where it circled her stomach. His breath brushed her temple. The slow, steady beat of his heart pressed against her back. Even mortal, Rune still smelled of smoke and amber.
Mist curled around the stallion’s hooves as Rune gripped the reins.
“Hold on,” he said softly.
“I am,” she replied curtly, though her voice wavered.
Rune’s lips brushed her ear, tone a seductive threat to her composure. “Tighter.”
Alora flushed, fingers gripping the mane. The horse surged forward, and Rune’s arm tightened around her, firm and sure, his hand splayed protectively over her abdomen. His other hand took the reins, guiding the stallion through the trees with fluid confidence.
The forest blurred into shades of amber and evergreen.
Her heartrate thrummed at every shift of his body against hers, the press of his thigh, the warmth of his breath, the strength coiled in him even without magic.
She didn’t dare look back at him.
But she could feel him watching her.
The trees pressed in close as Saeroth carried them deeper into the woods, hooves trotting over fallen leaves. Alora tried to focus on the path ahead rather than the heat of Rune’s body against hers, or the steady weight of his arm wrapped around her waist.
“So,” she said after a moment, clearing her throat, “your magic is more useful than I thought.”
He hummed, noncommittal. “Well, it’s certainly no array.”
The word pricked against her mind like a cold needle. Array. He referred to the glyph circle she had trapped him in.
“I didn’t mean to do that.”
“I know.” His voice dipped low. “I will forgive it once. Never do so again.”
“Then don’t lie to me again,” she replied sharply.
Silence stretched between them, taut as a bowstring. He didn’t argue. Didn’t deflect. Didn’t tease her the way he usually did when she tried to pin him down.
Rune simply held still behind her, quiet in a way she wasn’t used to.
They rode for several hoofbeats before Alora spoke again, softer this time, but firmer too.
“We have met before, haven’t we?”
His grip on the reins tightened, tendons flexing. The bond tightened with it, like a heavy vault door of thick stone, sealing closed. He was shielding his thoughts.
“I know you won’t answer,” she murmured, staring straight ahead. “For whatever reason it’s a secret you must keep. Though I suspect we both know I will find out the truth eventually, Rune.”
She waited for a deflective answer, but he offered none. He was always so talkative. Smug. Clever. Infuriatingly quick with a retort. Except when she needed him to speak.
Frustration gathered behind her ribs. “Do you mean to stay silent the whole way?”
Rune hummed. “I didn’t realize my wife required constant serenading. Shall I whisper poetry in your ear to keep you entertained? Or bore you with the history of the ages?”
She rolled her eyes, fighting a smile. But the offer did give her another thought. “History, it seems, is a subject you are well versed in. Tell me, how do you know so much about Khar Avalen?”
Rune’s posture stiffened.
He was quiet for a long pause, then his low breath coiled down her nape with a sigh. “The ruins are not merely ruins, Alora. They are a graveyard of promises. A place built on bargains made at the dawn of creation.”
This time she fell silent, listening.
Rune’s breath warmed her ear, low as distant thunder. “Before the Seven Gods of the Seven Gates, all bowed to the Primordials.”
The word itself drew a gloom over the forest.
“They were Titans,” he murmured, each syllable weighted with old memory.
“Seven forces that carved the first breath of creation. They shaped the first realms, the Gates, split the sky from the sea, bent magic into rivers through the fabric of many worlds.” His fingers tightened on the reins.
“And they destroyed with the same ease. Creation meant nothing to them. Mortals even less. They could create entire worlds and unmake them with a wave of their fingers.”
Alora swallowed. Images flickered in her mind of the idols Sal’vathar had gifted them on Samhain. The way Rune’s rage had snapped through the air at the sight of them still echoed through her chest.
“Any lesser being was insignificant to them. Seeing the magnitude of their power, and fearing how easily they could be snuffed out, mortals bowed to them out of fear and piety. Primordials influenced the first people to build places like Khar Avalen. Altars were built in forests, in mountains, deserts, and in the seas. They were places to worship where they could pray for blessings and for their wishes to be granted.”
He let out a quiet, humorless huff.
“But Primordials do not grant wishes. They consume them. They devour what they create because hunger is their nature. They have no humanity. No mercy. No respect for life.”
Alora shivered.
“Their greed unmade continents. Threatened the balance of the Realms. And of the seven of them, only one saw the devastation they were truly creating.”
“Who?” she whispered.
Rune inhaled a shallow breath. “…Elyōn.”
Alora’s heart shook, goosebumps going down her arms. Elyōn… the god her people prayed to. The God of Life.
A Primordial.
Rune’s voice dropped, grim. “He knew the universe would collapse beneath their destruction, so he turned against them. The Heavens waged the first war for the Realms, and the world fell into turmoil. Titan battled Titan. Celestials against the Wild Hunt.”
“The Wild Hunt?” she breathed.
“The foul of the Abyss,” Rune confirmed. “Creatures born from every wicked thing that ever drew breath. Not demons as you know them. But entities of darkness. Older. Hungrier.” He paused. “I called them once to serve me, but they only answer to blood.”
Cold crawled down her spine as she pictured it, celestials battling shadow demons.
Rune exhaled, gaze fixed on the horizon. “The war spanned ages. Many worlds were lost, many more like this one left in ruins. By the end, Elyōn defeated them.”
Which had to attest how powerful Elyōn was to overthrow six Primordials on his own.
“The final battle nearly unmade him,” Rune murmured, sensing her thoughts.
“Only one of the Primordials truly rivaled him in power, but even Elyōn could not destroy them. Gods cannot unmake gods. Balance forbids it. Thus, he imprisoned them … deep within the bowels of the Netherworld, known to us as the Abyss. Bound in slumber. Left to starve in the dark.”
Alora tried to breathe. “But if they were imprisoned…”
“The Realms and their Gates needed sovereigns to govern them,” Rune said.
“So Elyōn forged new gods from the stars. Not as powerful as Primordials, but divine beings who understood balance, humanity, and what it meant to feel as they do. They are the Seven that your kind pray to. Jokull, the God of Death. Eitan, the God of Mortals. Gavriel, Goddess of the Heavens. Zohar, the God of Spatial Dimension. And Hiram, the God of Time.”
Names her people had never known, unfolding like constellations in the air.
But one star was missing.
“And you…” Alora murmured. “The God of Shadows.”
She glanced back.
For a moment, she glimpsed the eons in Rune eyes. They were heavy and despondent, weighed down by all he had seen.