46. The Falling Star
The Falling Star
On the chosen day of Fire, beneath the eyes of the Destroyer and the People of Krystopolis, you—the one known as Sokar—step out onto the Path with your head held high.
The People had been given a day's reprieve from duty to attend and witness this moment of divine spectacle.
Crafters had set down their hammers. Weavers had stepped away from looms. All trade was halted, and even the rebuilding of the Han was set aside in favor of gathering one and all to witness your glorious communion with the Void.
From the moment your crystalline shoes touch the gold-inlaid stone, small invisible Auryn is left far behind.
The woman that loves Kailorien.
The woman yearning to be free.
The woman dreaming of the Moores, of grasslands, of the boundless skies—
Is gone.
In her place walks the Child of the Void.
The Sovereign Star.
The Radiance of Krystopolis.
Straight spine, Auryn'reh Solah. Do as you are bid. Walk as you are expected to.
Your Sokar’s face is as empty as the Void, your hands clasped before you in serenity as you walk through chaos and usher the Destroyer’s breath into the city walls. The Sovereign Horn bellows its welcome from atop the Jade Lattices, its throaty call a catalyst for the worshippers to greet you.
Look at their faces. Listen to them gasping as you emerge into the blazing light of Fire.
The air is sticky, thick, and wet. Feel how your mana recoils from the weight of it. You clasp your hand around that tetherstone you brought from your beloved’s chambers. Keep your eyes on the crowd. Stand ready. If a spell should come your way, the tetherstone will help you counter it.
That is, if it’s a clumsy cast from that snake of a Companion and her ilk.
Don’t startle, Auryn’reh. The sound behind you is merely footsteps.
Attendants carrying the heavy red, orange, and white train of your dress.
Can you feel their hands shaking in terror?
If even an inch touches the ground, their lives will be forfeit.
They will be Branded. Nullified. Not Repurposed, but given then ultimate punishment for traitors and blasphemers.
The Godblind’s manafire will sever their souls from the Flaeme and obliterate them from the Nine Rivers for all time.
Heinous, is it not? Yet none would dare to question it. Look at them, throwing flower petals in your path from all sides. Planned, of course. Orchestrated. Still, they are quite beautiful. Bright pink, crimson, and blue. Cultivated for nearly a year. Magically preserved just for this day.
You pity them for having such short lives. Grown, nurtured, perhaps even loved—only to be stepped on now and forgotten in moments. When my Garden was whole, not a single blossom would have been subjected to such futility. Each bloom had a place. Each life had meaning.
But there is no use in lamenting what has faded. Once wilted, a plant will never look to the sky again. That is why you cannot wilt, Auryn’reh. You must rise, even if you bleed. Even if you falter.
Even if you still deny your birthright and your memories.
No. Do not turn from the truth.
You are Numen.
You must take your Silari’s breath and claim your rightful place before this cage tightens any more than it already has. This city is doomed—
The Void is impartial.
The Darkness does not take sides in judgment.
The Void guides our steps.
No, do not fall into that listless chanting. Do not let it break your mind.
The Sovereign Horn rings out again. Ever obedient to spectacle, the People fall to their knees.
One by one. Hundreds. Thousands. Their hands and faces touch the ground, fingers reaching out, praying that even a breeze from your passing will brush against them.
Their mouths move in silent, hissing prayer.
They are lost. Ever lost.
Where the Reckoning was all drums, and war, and lust, and blood—your Sokar’s Path of Flame is hush and reverence. In their eyes, you are Kaos, the embodiment of the Void—your body a sacred vessel, your magic divine destruction and deliverance.
It is so. But not for the reasons they were taught to believe.
Each step is harder than the last. The choking heat rises like pressure all around, squeezing in-between the gaps in your royal silks and shoes until you sweat uncontrollably. Petals cling to your damp skin, wilting into your cheeks and neck, soft and suffocating like leeches.
Focus on your breaths, Auryn’reh. You can endure this heat.
They still had too much ground to cover to stop now.
The Void is impartial.
The Darkness does not take sides in judgment.
The Void guides our steps.
You approach the first torch in the Commons, a towering pillar of stone and emerald Polis crystal inset into the district’s very heart.
There had been a temple here once. You recall once coming to pray here.
To calm the sick. Now it is gone. Sevrion Hale had leveled it to place these pillars for the ceremony. To lash out at you in any way he can.
You place your hand on the circular disk engraved with the Void’s symbol on the stone and watch as fire takes root at the top.
The People cheer. For each torch, they are allowed to use their voices. The Sovereign Horn rings in celebration.
You continue on the path, still lost in the chant. Lost in the falsehood of your sacred title.
The Darkness cradles us.
Strength is our spine.
You light the second and third torches in the rubble of the Han. More cheers. More flower corpses thrown to wither at your feet.
Silence is our freedom.
Order is our mercy.
The Iliri and Varrow cheer as the fourth and fifth torches are lit.
Focus. Only one now remains.
Endure the dizziness. The sickness. The nausea.
Poor little Sokar. Beneath this ornate dress, you are soaked to the skin. The heat buzzes like flies around our rotting corpse—a scavenger ready to pick at our flesh when it wears us down to our barest threads.
Look there, Auryn’reh.
At last, the final pillar is in sight. Wait.
Do not dare to quicken your halting pace.
The Attendants behind you barely keep up with shallow breaths.
If you make them stumble, their deaths will forever be your fault.
Do not stop searching the crowd. Keep the tetherstone close.
You were warned. Zeera plans your downfall, and all of this has progressed far too seamlessly.
As you approach the final pillar, you see two figures standing on a balcony at the Prismatum’s fifth story dais. One in shimmering white silk and the other in obsidian aethersteel rune armor.
Your Silari watches you from above. Negligent fool. He should be beside you. He should never leave his Numen unattended. He should not—
:: SILENCE. ::
:: YOU ARE NOT HIS WARDEN. ::
:: HE IS MINE. ::
I tilt my head with a wince.
The other voice retreats.
And slowly. Step by step.
I am myself again, though I hardly recall how I came to stand here.
My eyes seek out Lu'ma—my friend, my tether—until I remember that she'd stayed behind at the Lattices to prepare for my return.
She'd worried that the heat would trigger my Flares, and as my head pounds and swells, I see she was correct.
I waver on my feet, the heat pressing in—choking me—and clutch the tetherstone so hard in my palm that my hand hurts. The pain helps me focus, and I look up at the Prismatum's balcony where Shu’Khan’s figure stands beside my Resh’Agar.
Reaching out through our Bond, I whisper to him.
Kailorien.
We’re almost there.
Just one more torch.
One more touch.
A flicker brushes across my mind—my beloved's voice in the Bond, hushed and steady, with Vargrún's rumble echoing behind.
One more step, little one.
One more touch, emberling.
I pause at the final pillar and wait for the Sovereign Horn to sing. When its call shakes the air and the People cheer, I touch my hand to the disc in front of me.
And then—weightlessness.
The ground beneath me gives way.
I careen into darkness, and the Voice rises like a tidal wave in my mind—roaring, shrieking.
:: Not this day! Not this moment! The Numen does not kneel! ::
The Weave surrounds me, and in a blink, I Veilstep, my body slipping between realms, melding with the elusive Veilweave and reforming several feet away.
Once. Twice. Then again.
Up and up until I clear the pit beneath me.
Just as I land on solid ground, a familiar haunting wail pierces the air.
Not the onyx horns, but the ivory ones of the Solutus.
Again, it comes, but this time its call is drowned in screams. A single gasp in the crowd multiplies into thousands, rolling like a gale through the Prismatum as shouts and cries of "Enslavers! " thunders through the plaza.
The Solutus emerge from the ground like monsters bursting from their graves.
I can’t see where they’re coming from, but in moments, the plaza transforms into a battlefield.
The Solutus cry out and flash their blades, colliding with the People like a seething ocean.
Endless rows of white masks and weapons spear into innocents, cutting them down without mercy.
For a moment, I cannot believe what I am seeing.
These zealots who risk their lives to break into temples and steal dying men, women, and children now cut down healthy innocents as though they are nothing more than obstacles in their path. The attackers don’t even look at them.
Blank eyes in the masks focus on me instead.
On the Sokar.
But why?
Why are they slashing through innocents to converge on me?
I haven’t done a thing to warrant this.
I’ve never harmed them. Never insisted on punishing the rebellion in the Council. Never threatened them directly.
If anything, I only ever wanted to understand their hatred.
:: Hatred does not grow roots in wisdom, Auryn’reh. Must you pay with your life to understand that? ::
I freeze, and the mistake costs me everything.
An impact to my left side. A scream right in my ear.
"Die, Enslaver!"
Three of them descend on me. By instinct—or perhaps thanks to all of Kailorien's training—I Veilstep. But not far enough. Hands grabbed at my veils, tear them apart as I’m yanked backwards. I twist around, pushing at the attackers with all the strength I can muster.
Silver light shoots from my palms like a blast, setting the masked attacker closest to me aflame. He screams and pushes me away, tearing at his burning clothes.
I manage to take a single breath before more of them jump on me. They pull me to the edge. To the pit.
I kick at kneecaps, scratch at arms and hands. I bite, not caring at all about my dignity or the foul bitter taste of sweat in my mouth.
I try to Veilstep, but they’ve caught on to my motions. Just as Kailorien warned me, the motion for the shift is a tell. Predictable. Observable.
Helpless to stop them, I shout Kailorien’s name in my mind.
I scream as they hold my hands against my side and throw themselves over the edge, taking me with them into the abyss.
Weightlessness.
My stomach drops into nothing.
Then pain.
Agony.
Something breaks.
Blood fills my mouth.
Above me—a spec of light.
But all around is only darkness.
I try to move.
Can’t.
My body won’t listen.
I close my eyes.
Curse my fate.
Void curse all of you.
Void take all of you.
Void rip all of you to shreds.
Zeera’s face appears in my mind’s eye, and I rue the day I met her. Hate myself for not burning her alive where she stood.
The dignified Sokar disappears. Only I remain, and I do not have the tears to hold the volume of my sorrow.
Humiliated. Destroyed—just at the moment when everything mattered most.
I close my eyes, darkness taking me.
Just before it all disappears, I hear a voice…
“Auryn. Auryn!”
Furious. Pleading.
But I cannot tell if it is Kailorien coming to save me or the wolf howling to pull me farther into the abyss.