Chapter 31 Feather #3
I stared at the vision before it faded, trying to comprehend it.
Somehow, Mikhail was sustaining Righteous.
And Precious… she was feeding her own soulfire into Mikhail.
My heart constricted, though the remaining power of Sanctuary still flowed into me.
I wished I could send some of it to them, so far away.
Shore them up, somehow. It made me proud and terrified to see my baby doing it. She was so selfless and brave.
She is perfect. Revel’s voice trembled, and I wasn’t sure why. As we watched, the puppy that lay beside her lifted its head and began to howl. The sound was excruciatingly sad.
Hot tears streamed down my face. What did it mean? Was she dying along with them?
Revel’s voice was a panicked, pounding drum as he thundered, Feather, can you drain the rest of the realm? Do it now!
I focused, hoping the thread that connected me would be enough… and realized it was not. Like a damp match, all my efforts to channel the remainder of the power failed, even though I reached again and again.
Revel’s voice was hollow, but gentler when he spoke next. Gavriel, carry her through. Fly as far and fast as you can. There is no time. Go, now.
Gavriel almost stumbled from the command in Revel’s voice. “I have no wings. How do I—”
Revel laughed. You have an entire realm of power before you, Lightbearer.
And you can’t leave it here for the Abyss to consume.
Make wings. Gavriel’s mouth fell open in shock, but Revel went on.
I will hold the shadows here for as long as possible.
There will be no pathway to the Celestial Realm for you once this realm is emptied of its power.
No road, no light to guide you. I pray you will still find your way. Find it fast. She is dying.
I wasn’t certain which she he meant.
Gavriel turned to the gate, hefting me higher, so I could see over his shoulder.
And what I saw terrified me: a thick, wickedly jagged shadow knife was flying through the air, thrown by a beast a dozen yards away, and headed straight for Gavriel’s mangled shoulder blades.
It traveled silently, flipping end over end like an ax, too fast for me to shout a warning.
All I could do was pray, with one word: Help.
And help arrived, from a direction no one would have expected.
The instant before the knife pierced Gavriel’s back, Slim Shady, who had been stuck to my back this whole time, was suddenly zipping over Gavriel’s shoulder. Slim shifted into a compressed ball of taint and corruption midair, and threw himself in between the shadow knife and Gavriel’s back.
The jagged blade carved the brave shadow ball almost in two, a split second before Gavriel could turn and recognize the danger. With a roar, Gavriel sent a burst of light at the beast that had attacked, and it fled.
Slim couldn’t flee; he was dead. He had to be.
But before I could mourn the little guy, Gavriel sang a note, and then another.
A tune I knew: a naming song Mikhail had used once.
The notes wrapped around the two halves of the ball, and it rose and reformed as Gavriel added a name to the end of his song.
One that was familiar. The naming chime in his pocket rang out in agreement, the overtones making my teeth ache.
Gavriel’s eyes glowed, a gorgeous smile stretching across his face as he finished the song with a coda in High Angelic. “And thus you have earned your name once again, my friend. Thank you, Valor in Service of the Light.”
Valor?
Gavriel channeled more power into the crumbling shadow, and it began to change color and shape. Unfurling like a sail, it expanded and grew into a very familiar form.
If it was Valor, it was a new iteration of him.
The last time I’d seen him, he’d been trying to kill me, had tortured Righteous and Sunny, and stabbed Precious, though the soul knife hadn’t made a dent in her.
The old Valor had always worn a cruel expression, and walked as if he had something to prove and didn’t care who he hurt to prove it.
This Valor’s eyes were filled with gentleness, penitence.
He was also not precisely himself. He was semi-transparent as he had been as a shadow, but instead of glowing with gray smut, he shone with brilliant, glittering fire.
And also actual glitter. There were tiny specks of purple caught inside him, and his wings were the same transparent shade of silver-gray that Rumple’s had been when I saw him in the void the first time.
It looked amazing. As I stared, he became more and more opaque, until it seemed he was made of shimmering starlight.
Valor bowed his head to Gavriel, and then, with luminous tears falling from his eyes, he reached out, gesturing toward the knife at Gavriel’s belt. “Go,” he said, his voice clear and pure. “I can buy you more time.”
Handing the knife to Valor, Gavriel bowed his head, then reached one hand to the floor.
I felt a twin pull to the one I was still channeling into him.
Sanctuary, I need the rest. I need it all, I heard him say, his voice strangely majestic.
Protect your maker, and your leader, and your servant.
Give me your light. I will bear it to the next realm and return it when I can to the Maker of All Realms, if you will allow me to carry it.
I gave my blessing, felt Sanctuary’s resounding yes, and realized why Gavriel had the name Lightbearer. Between one heartbeat and the next, the entire realm emptied itself, not into me, but into him.
And he was able to hold it.
Some of it spilled out of him. Not just in trickles, but streams of fire, draping his entire form with light. I couldn’t close my eyes, though they ached. I needed to bear witness to this miracle. Fountains of light surged from his face as he glanced at me and moved to the open gate.
“Hold on, love,” he said, and began singing his name as loud as he could, and mine as well. Gavriel’s song traveled through us, and the gate sighed happily as we pushed through an invisible barrier.
Make wings, Revel had instructed Gavriel. Whatever that meant. I knew Gavriel hadn’t understood what to do. But even if I had, I’m not sure I would have had the faith to even attempt what he did next.
He stepped off the edge of the realm, and we fell…
until enormous wings of golden light suddenly split the void.
The wounds left from his sacrifice, those long, straight scars, now bloomed with silver-white beams. The power of Sanctuary substituted light for feathers and pure energy for flesh, replacing Gavriel’s wings so that he could carry us home.
One downbeat, then two, and we were rocketing forward.
The gate was already closed. I stared behind us at the once again sealed hull of the realm I had fought to save, that we had all struggled to rescue.
As I watched, the pearly shell changed, becoming the chalky white of old bones, crumbling at the edges into the void.
For the longest time, I stared as Gavriel flew on his wings of light, and mourned soundlessly.
I grieved for Revel and Valor. I knew that inside that dead shell, they were both fighting as Sanctuary crumbled around them, to give us the head start we needed to get away, to get home. And I knew that they might never have that same chance.
I didn’t allow myself to grieve for Rumple. If I succumbed to hopelessness now, when I didn’t have the feather he’d given me to smack me around for it, I wasn’t sure I’d survive the journey to the Limen. And I did have hope, even if it was no larger than a single grain of glitter.
I knew he’d meant to sacrifice himself, but the thought that he had done so didn’t ring true. He hadn’t been created to be a sacrifice, like Arabella. He’d been created to be mine. My lover. My teacher. And someday, my soulmate.
I couldn’t believe in the ultimate goodness of the Dreamer of All Dreams, in a world where Rumple was taken from me forever.
For some reason, Arabella’s words to me echoed in my thoughts: “My Mother would never throw away one of Her children. Would never give up. Who am I to believe that this is my ending? Perhaps it is my beginning.”
All I had to do was hold on, and believe that this wasn’t the ending, not for any of us. I wrapped my soul around that belief, that impossible hope, as Gavriel held onto me and flew, Sanctuary becoming at first a pinprick of white, and then only a memory in the void.
Thank you, Revel, I thought, sailing my gratitude for his sacrifice through the space between us. I won’t forget you. None of us will.
And then, I began a song that I knew I would never stop singing, until Rumple walked back into my life again. Come back to me, my first, perfect love. Follow this song. Follow our love.