29 #2
She nods, and we settle down. The campus soon conjures plates with pralines and slices of buttery cake, along with pots of steaming peppermint tea in front of us. A fire jumps to life in the fireplace. Just as Aris starts to complain, a plate with racks of grilled pork ribs appears before him.
“I think I like it down here,” he remarks before devouring his food, while Faye and I get to work. She doesn’t ask anything about my strange behavior yesterday, and I’m grateful.
We spend the whole afternoon there, nibbling treats, until dinner is served and I realize how much time has slipped by.
When an acolyte appears, Faye’s head jerks up and her aura darkens with sudden fear.
I stare at the woman. Her robe matches Faye’s, but the wide belt at her waist, set with a moonstone, clearly marks her rank—Faye rises at once and bows her head.
“I need to go. I totally forgot that my archive shift started ages ago. I’ll see you tomorrow,” she says, and I think there’s a faint shimmer of hope in her aura, reflected in her beautiful eyes when she looks at me. “And you, Aris.”
With that, she follows the others out. I get up, too, stretching my legs with a sigh.
“Let’s bring this book back, shall we?” I suggest casually, grabbing the heavy tome we’ve just finished translating and heading toward the marble stairs that lead to the endless rows of books on the third level.
“What are you up to?” Aris asks suspiciously as I throw my talent out.
“Caryan once gifted me a book about silver elves. It was written in an old language. When I finished it, I found a message someone wrote inside.”
“What did it say?”
“‘Unravel the truth, starstruck and moon-kissed one.’ And then three places—the libraries of Palisandre, Khalix, and Avandal.”
“And now you’re desperate to find out what it means,” he guesses. “Using your talent.”
“Wouldn’t you?”
“I do not know, little one. It sounds like danger—and nothing Caryan would approve of.”
“Exactly,” I say.
“Melody,” he warns.
“You don’t have to come if you don’t like it,” I say, no longer listening to the reasons he rattles off about why we should abandon it.
Instead, I focus on my talent—the gift to find anything and anyone I wish.
But when I ask my magic to lead me to the answer of that riddle, it stays strangely quiet.
I pause in a dark row, chewing on my lower lip.
“And?” Aris asks.
“Nothing.”
“You may ask it more specifically,” he suggests.
“Like what?”
“Try silver elves.”
I look at him. “For someone who doesn’t want me to pursue this, you sound pretty eager,” I tease.
He snorts, steam puffing from his nostrils. “I am not eager. I just wish to avoid you finding something that could get you into trouble.”
“Which implies you believe what I find could bring me into trouble.”
He snorts again but doesn’t deny it.
I try “silver elves”—and again, nothing. I sigh, rubbing a hand over my tired eyes.
Then I blink—and someone in a beige robe stands at the far end of the row, her face swallowed by shadow. The figure lifts a hand and curls a single finger. Then she’s gone, swallowed by the darkness between the shelves.
Aris’s ears twitch sharply, his body coiling as a low warning rumbles in his chest, teeth flashing. “Melody, stay. Something is off.”
“What? She’s an acolyte,” I say. “And she clearly wants to show me something.” But the words feel thin even to me as I step deeper into the corridor, where the light dies and the air suddenly turns cool and strangely watchful.
She cuts around a corner. Weird.
I start to run, but when I round it, the corridor is empty. My heart slams against my ribs as I spot a single large book, bound in wolf fur, lying on the floor. I pick it up and, out of curiosity, open the first page.
“What is it?” Aris asks behind me.
I flinch. “Hells, you gave me a fright.”
“I was right behind you. Come, Melody—let’s go. We’ve already ventured far enough, and even the acolytes don’t consider this place safe.” Aris’s voice is tight with worry, and I feel it echo through our bond.
I look down the long corridor where the acolyte vanished, staring at the strange, swirling darkness at its far end—the way it seemed to knit itself closed behind her, slow and deliberate, like a mouth sealing shut.
It feels alive. Watchful. Hungry.
Or maybe that’s just my imagination—my nerves getting the better of me. A trick of the light, of shadows stretched too thin by distance and fear. The corridor is long; perspective can play cruel games.
And yet the darkness seems closer than it should be, creeping forward in subtle increments, as if the space itself is shifting and breathing. I swallow, unsure whether I’m drawing nearer—or if it’s reaching for me.
A chill slips down my spine like a cold hand as I realize how far I’ve come. I hadn’t noticed how deep I’d ventured.
“Let’s go back—now!” Aris butts his snout against me, nudging me as he growls at the darkness.
We retreat together, climbing the stairs quickly.
Back on the first level, Aris’s wings ease at last, though his gaze never leaves the book in my hands.
The archives glow with firelight and hundreds of candles now, the books bathed in warm gold.
Acolytes sit scattered in cozy chairs nestled between shelves.
It looks inviting, yet I can’t shake the thought of Faye, somewhere down here, kept away under the ground like a prisoner, while I head straight for the door leading back to air and life.
“What is this book?” Aris asks quietly, his gaze fixed on it as we walk.
“I don’t know. It says The Reign of Darkness . Do you know what it’s about?”
He stays silent, but the bond tells me it’s his dark coercion again. I frown. Why would Caryan forbid him to talk about such things? I press the book to my chest as we make our way back. The corridor grows lighter with every step, and suddenly I’m aching for fresh air.
“Who built these archives, Aris?”
Again, silence, his wings twitching with unease. I blow out a tired breath, swallowing my anger at how it must feel to be unable to speak—to even hint at certain truths. Gods, how much Aris must know.
***
Later, I lie sprawled across my bed, the ancient book open in front of me like a captured relic, its pages brittle and brown with age. The parchment smells faintly of dust and something metallic—blood, maybe, or just the ghost of it.
Aris is a dark curl of scales at my side, his chest rising and falling with deep, rumbling snores, claws twitching as if he’s hunting even in sleep—and I smile at him.
But sleep won’t come for me.
The book has me in its grip, its words a whisper too old to die. These pages speak of a time even before Gatilla—before any ruler still remembered in song or story. Gatilla reigned for five centuries, but this history is older still—so ancient no fae alive could tell of it.
It tells of two kings of the nine hells—winged beings crowned in shadow and fire.
One with the power to coerce, the other with the power to command demons themselves.
They were called Kirachat and Rhyxun, meaning the god of the skies and the star eater in old Elfish.
Together, their magic was so vast they could raise ashes and twist the very bones of the world to their will.
The book says the skies burned for a year and a day as hellbeasts—winged horrors, perhaps dragons, perhaps creatures like Aris—fought in an endless war, their fires keeping the sun from ever setting. Night never fell.
And yet, even with the skies aflame and all the beasts of the hells unleashed, the kings could not be killed. They were too bound to each other; their power too complete.
So the world itself was broken into pieces to stop them.
The text describes how the fae and their gods severed the two kings from each other, tearing their magic apart and splitting it across the lands.
They ripped away a whole piece of the world—a continent, the sixth, called Zeranewed—and turned it into a prison to hold one of them.
A prison so deep and dark that even the stars could not shine there, cloaked in everlasting twilight.
I want to close the book, but again, I find a handwritten note scrawled on the last page—a logbook of some kind.
Day 2: The library burned. Everything burned with never-ending black fire.
He is hellbent on finding his brother. We grabbed the books we deemed most important for the afterworld.
Kirachat destroyed everything. First, he purged the light elves, then he came for the books.
The acolytes. The scribes. We know about the three libraries and that their magic wards have never been breached.
It’s our only hope to bring the books there.
Some of them hold the key to Rhyxun’s eternal prison—and the cost of breaking it.
Others contain theories of ancient magic, fatal in the wrong hands.
We found a tiny ship and a mermaid willing to pull it, to deliver those books to the mer queen.
Thank the gods he is not his hellish brother, Rhyxun, who can pull memories from the minds of the dead—else Kirachat would see our plans laid bare.
Still, Abyss forbid he finds us before we can finish our task.
Day 5: We know our lives will be forfeit—a sacrifice to the mer queen.
But we believe it’s worth it, to trade our lives for these books to preserve.
The balance of magic has tipped fatally.
The stars have changed their courses, even the sun has altered his path, and in some parts of the world, he no longer rises.
The cursed have finally been slain, but the demons roam the skies in their endless search for his lost brother.
For now, Kirachat has not found us. May hope be enough.
Day 7: We arrived. May Kirachat and Rhyxun never be united again. If they were, it would mean their absolute dominion. May Rhyxun rot away in his prison and never see the light of day again. I can hear the nixies coming to claim our flesh. Goodbye.
Goodbye. I sit up and pull my legs close, my fingers tracing the last, hastily written word.
Kirachat and Rhyxun. Winged fae who thirsted to dominate the world. Invincible—until the world itself was split, along with their magic. Kirachat who killed the light elves. A purge….
My mouth is dry, and my fingers automatically find the smooth, polished stone I always carry in my pocket. The one I got from Caryan’s twin. He said he was trapped in another world—that he would bring the worlds back together.
A strange feeling washes over me. Could it be, maybe, that Caryan and his twin….
No. Maybe Kirachat and Rhyxun were their forefathers.
After all, Caryan is not the only immortal.
Aris is immortal as well. I push the thought away and curl up around Aris, stroking his soft scales, wishing—not for the first time—that he could tell me more.
Because I can’t shake the feeling that there’s so much I don’t know. And neither does this world.
At last, I fall asleep, dreaming strange, dark dreams of burning skies and black fire—darker than smoke, eating stone and stars.