Chapter Eight The Center

Chapter Eight The Center

Elloren Guryev

Zhilaan Forest military base

Gareth and Marina, then Alaric and the Selkie Nerissa tell us their extraordinary tales.

How, through Gareth’s joining with the mangrove forests of the Southeast and their power-joining as Selkie mates, they drove

off an invasion of Vogel’s Shadow sea and cast warded protection over the northern Salish Ocean and southernmost Vo River,

then convinced an invading army of Selkies and other Ocean’kin to align as allies against Vogel’s forces.

“We’ve held our protection over the Vo and the Salish,” Gareth tells us all, “even as Vogel kept hold of his Shadow net imprisoning

us under our own protective dome.” The lightning torchlight’s illumination flickers over Gareth’s face and hair, night closing

in on the military base’s mountaintop terrace. “And trapped there,” Gareth continues, “in the Shadow’s darkness, we pled with

everyone, Noi’khin and Ocean’kin alike, to align with each other and join with the mangrove forests of the South. At the time

of our leaving, many had.”

A prickle sweeps over my skin, Yvan’s echoing rise of emotion sending a juddering flare of heat through our bond. Because

it feels like we’re riding right up to the edge of sweeping, transformational change throughout Erthia, with the growing Shadow

power increasingly able to blot it all out before it can truly take root.

“Birds of light beckoned us here... in dreams,” Marina haltingly conveys, gills flaring, her ocean eyes holding an emphatic light. “You know them as Watchers and Ahxhils, and by other names. We Selkies know them as the Blessed Winged of Light, kindreds of our Ocean Goddess. Gareth’s Storm Whale kindreds managed to punch a small hole in Vogel’s Shadow net that allowed us quick passage through our Southern Voloi shielding, along with Zephyr Quillen...”

Fain Quillen and his sister, Lucretia, bolt to their feet. “You were with Zephyr?” Fain calls out, both Fain’s power and Lucretia’s

cast into tempestuous whorls at the mention of their adopted daughter.

Marina nods, gills ruffling. “It was Zephyr and an Asrai Fae named Fyordin Lir who helped us requisition a Vu Trin portal

to travel here while they stayed behind to help hold Southern Voloi’s shielding. And now, before you we stand. To join our

knowledge and power to yours.”

“We were almost apprehended by Vu Trin,” Gareth interjects. “There was no convincing them of the Ocean Peoples’ newfound desire

for an alliance with the East, since the Ocean People initially came here as an invading force.”

“But are now starting to realize there is only one true enemy of us all,” Alaric firmly states. “The Shadow.”

Alaric launches into his story—how as a Mage priest-apprentice, several years past, he was there when Vogel first found the

Shadow Wand after a treacherous, kraken-infested sea journey to the Lost Continent of the West.

“A Death Fae who had lived through a Reckoning there tried to warn us what the Shadow power had done to the Lost Continent,”

Alaric conveys, a haunted look in his green eyes. “After the Shadow consumed everything, there was nothing left alive save

that single Death Fae, who did not need food and water to survive.”

Alaric describes how Vogel sensed his trepidation over Vogel’s possession of the Shadow Wand and promptly hurled Alaric overboard

to die. Instead, Alaric was rescued by the Selkie here with him now, her translated name, Nerissa, meaning “of the Sea.”

“Nerissa brought me to a small island,” Alaric reveals, casting her a poignant look. “She helped me forage for food along

the coast and brought me fish. We communicated via the sign language known to ocean dwellers and mariners alike and told each

other the story of our lives.” His invisible aura of light magery intensifies, its sunset hues swirling around Nerissa’s deep-blue,

silver-haired form and answered by her own water aura and, surprisingly, a slim line of light power flashing from Nerissa

to embrace Alaric’s form.

“We were... drawn to each other... from the start,” Nerissa states, her gills flaring as she speaks, the column of her neck tensing, the effort needed to make air speech clearly formidable. “We could not fight... the pull,” she admits, her blue hand sliding over Alaric’s green one, their fingers interlacing as his light aura shimmers more intensely around her, a sympathetic heat crackling through my bond with Yvan. “Even though my people rejected Alaric as a ‘land devil,’ ? ” Nerissa says, “and I knew his people considered my Selkie’kin dangerous animals to be abused or disposed of, we felt an

instantaneous kinship.”

“I told Nerissa of my upbringing in Valgard,” Alaric says. “How sheltered I was. Kept from every other group on Erthia save

my family’s strict Styvian sect. How I’d been taught to hate everyone who wasn’t Styvian. And Nerissa told me of her rich,

happy upbringing on the Western Ocean’s floor.”

Nerissa continues their story, conveying how one night, under a rose-blush sunset, their lips first met. And then on another

night, not long after, how more than their lips touched under the ocean’s warm current. In the way of Selkie’kin, their powers

merged , shocking them both, Alaric gaining gills and the ability to breathe underwater and Nerissa gaining a connection to Alaric’s

Level Five light magery, which granted her numerous new ocean abilities, such as the ability to color-shift like octopi and

draw on the electric power of moray eels.

“We decided to approach my people to seek acceptance as both mates and Selkie’khin,” Nerissa continues. “And to warn them

of the Shadow Wand. We traveled together to my city on the ocean’s floor, only to be met with revulsion and damnation from

our Naiad priestesses.” A look of pain tenses Nerissa’s features. “I was cast out and shunned.” She glances at Alaric. “And

all the while, there was always this terrible knowledge hanging over us that Vogel and the Mages would use the Shadow Wand

to do to the Waters what they did to the Lost Continent, its coastline Shadow-poisoned beyond repair.”

“We journeyed back to the Lost Continent,” Alaric says. “And tracked down the slain Death Fae’s journals to read the entire

story of what happened there. And now, we come to you with the weapon of that Death Fae’s knowledge.” He glances around at

us all, his green eyes weighted with urgency. “The Shadow Wand is adept at unearthing fracture points in societies so it can

parasitically feed on that division.” A sly light enters his gaze. “But it has its weaknesses and can be fought.”

“How?” Vang Troi presses. “Its magic is primordial. Predating all our grimoires.”

Alaric’s shrewd gaze slides to her. “You have primordial texts at your fingertips, as well. Your religions.”

Discord erupts, and I feel Yvan stiffen beside me. I’m suddenly on edge, too, remembering our heated debates about religious

faiths.

“Religion is an agent of fracture ,” Yvan levels.

“I agree,” Wrenfir scathingly chimes in. “Vogel tracked down the Shadow Wand to use against every other group on Erthia because

of religion .” My uncle slices his hand emphatically across the air. “All these competing faiths are the greatest scourge Erthia has ever

known.”

“They can be,” Alaric agrees, nodding. “When their flawed edges are worshipped instead of the true things at their center.

But, if you look to that center, you’ll find power there, and tools to help you defeat the Shadow Wand. But you must bring

all your faiths together .”

Wrenfir spits out an incredulous laugh. “Erthia has never been able to do that.”

“Erthia has never been staring down the imminent destruction of the Natural World,” Alaric counters. “The paths of division

have landed us here . On the precipice of the Shadow overrunning everything , the Natural World ready to collapse around us. Pool your faiths. Pool your cultures and their strengths. Keeping them separate

and shutting each other out is not working . You’ll have runic border walls for your final monuments.”

“The Shadow is at our doorstep,” Gareth agrees. “The Natural World is about to irrevocably fall .”

The Dryads are silent beside us, as if waiting for us to come to our senses, urgency coursing through their magic, the acute

awareness inescapable—they’re one of the only groups who consistently, throughout Erthia’s history, put the Natural World

first. But then, I remember that the Dryads were also a group that drove the Mages away from the Forest when my people begged

them for help in the face of cruelty and oppression, my people longing for both Forest linkage and refuge.

I realize we all shoulder some of the blame for what’s come to pass on Erthia. Some so much more than others, but it doesn’t

change the fact that we have to forge a new path forward.

Together.

With the Forest.

“The Great Source Tree appears in every one of your faiths,” Alaric says, holding up his III-marked palm. “Along with stories

of messenger birds made of starlight. And everyone has stories of the sacred Verdyllion Wand-Stylus. And the Shadow Wand-Stylus.

Use those common threads as your central rallying point. Then mine each other’s faiths and cultures for every primordial weapon you can use to bring the Shadow down. It’s all there .” He levels a grim stare at us all. “Or remain separate and divided. And fall .”

“The Errilor Ravens spoken about in The Book of the Ancients ,” I tell Alaric, an ache constricting my heart over Errilith and my other ravens’ noble sacrifice. “They came to me, and

have drawn themselves into Nature to try and hold off a Reckoning.”

“My Saffron Eagles,” Alder puts forth, glancing toward the flock of orange birds perched all around us, “they’re known as

the Goddess’s Fire Eagles in Issani myths, harbingers that the Shadow Times are at hand.”

“The V’yexwraith demon shows up in Alfsigr religious lore,” Rivyr’el adds. “I thought it was simply a mythical monster. But

here we are, faced with it.”

“And Ironflowers,” I say, my mind whirling with everything I’ve read in the mythology and religious texts Professor Jules

Kristian gave to me to read, as well as the religious myths I grew up hearing. “They’re used in The Book of the Ancients as a tool to fight the demonic.”

Jules nods thoughtfully. “Both Keltish and Mage religious myths include their use in fighting back primordial Shadow power.”

“Back in Verpacia,” I say, “Tierney Calix and I used the concentrated essence of Ironflowers to block Mage spells. Perhaps

they can block much more than that.”

“I can manifest Ironflowers,” Yulan tells us. She snaps her fingers, and the flowers on her head morph to tresses of thick,

glowing blue Ironflowers. “I can manifest them in large numbers.”

“I am a professor of theology at Noilaan’s Voshir University,” Fain Quillen’s partner, the Wyvern-shifter Sholindrile, says

from where he stands beside Fain. “I have studied the many faiths and myths of Erthia. Read all the major holy books and mythological

texts. The Shadow Wand-Stylus is a parasitical force in all of them and employs a branching Shadow net that consumes the elemental power of everything it binds to, eventually drawing

it all into its Void.”

“Vogel will link that Shadow net to every Mage fasting spell and Alfsigr Zalyn’or necklace,” Mavrik cuts in, warning blazing

in both his and Gwynn’s eyes. “He almost took control of Gwynn and me through our former fastlines. He’s tethered to most

Mage and Alfsigr soldiers and increasing numbers of civilians. He’ll soon control all of them.”

A dread-filled silence descends.

“Your twinned magic is a formidable weapon,” Alaric says, breaking the quiet, a calculating glint in his eyes. “There’s a possibility that if you get hold of both the Verdyllion and the Shadow Wand, as well as enough prismatic light power, you can use your twinned power to take over Vogel’s Shadow network. You might then be able to divert everyone’s fastings and Zalyn’or spell-linkages to join them to the Forest instead of the Shadow, so that the Mages and the Alfsigr can hear the Forest out, en masse, as we all have done.”

Alaric’s words are like the detonation of a runic explosive. Intense conversation rises, the path forward suddenly clear,

the surrounding Forest’s palpable rise in energy emboldening our joint Dryad’khin aura of purpose and power.

“The Smaragdalfar religion speaks of what Alaric has conveyed,” Sholindrile says, lightning leaping through his eyes. “The

ability of multihued light power to overtake Shadow.”

“Mavrik and I can track the Verdyllion,” Gwynn offers, “then connect every shred of our shared light power to it. I’ve seen

visions of this path forward.”

Yvan’s eyes meet mine, our fire bond searing through us, and I know, as much as he mistrusts religion and all its lore, there’s

a spark of agreement in his eyes that this bold plan to use the Verdyllion to link everyone to the Forest may be the only hope for Erthia.

“It will be nearly impossible to bring Noilaan’s Vo Conclave to the Forest,” Ung Li puts forth, a scowl twisting the former

Wyvernguard commander’s mouth. “My people have fallen into religious rigidity. They’re clinging to stories about the Great

Ending Times when the Goddess Vo will swoop down on a broken world and set everything right.”

Both Jules and Sholindrile nod at this. “Most faiths teach the same thing,” Jules offers. “The Gardnerians have their Reaping

Times.”

“The Amaz have the Goddess’s Time of Reckoning,” Alder grimly adds.

“Perhaps,” Sholindrile quietly puts forth, “these ‘end times’ stories are imperfect metaphors for this very time we’re living

in.”

Wrenfir spits out a sound of disgust and glares at Sholindrile, my uncle’s power burning white-hot. “So, we’re supposed to

sit around and wait to be saved by some god or goddess,” he snaps, “while the entirety of Erthia falls apart and the Death

Fae are pulled straight into the Reckoning they’ve risked their lives to stave off ?”

“No,” Sholindrile calmly counters. “I believe these stories are misread. I think they are about an inevitable worldwide crisis

that will force us all to choose between radical unity or radical fracture. And that time is upon us.”

Wrenfir bares his teeth at Sholin in a mocking smile. “If you’re going to find weapons against the Shadow in your faiths, do it quickly . The Death Fae saw what was coming better than anything in your religious texts did. They are holding off nature’s vengeance .” A look of pain slashes through my uncle’s spider-marked features. “Hazel warned me, again and again—we’re running out of time .”

“What of the Great Prophecy?” one of our new Zhilon’ile Dryad’khin calls out, murmurs of agreement rising around him.

Tension flares hot through Yvan’s and my Wyvernbond as his mother’s invisible fire explodes into being to lash protectively

around him. I glance toward Soleiya, her fiery eyes streaked with pain.

Yvan sends out a tendril of consoling fire to embrace his mother before he looks pointedly at Alder, his jaw set tight. “You

hold the clearest reading from the Forest.”

Tension tightens Alder’s forest green features as she nods and rises. “I am Alder Xanthos,” she greets everyone in that timber-steady

voice of hers. “I am a Dryad’kin Seer and have been gifted with scrying abilities from multiple lines of lineage. The Prophecy

is still embedded in the trees. A battle that determines the future of Erthia is still foretold.” She meets Yvan’s gaze once

more, her expression unwaveringly intense. “The Great Icaral against the Black Witch—Fallon Bane.”

My heart constricts as Yvan rises, his invisible fire flowing out to keep tight hold of me. “I’m ready to fight for you all,”

he states, violet flame crackling in his eyes.

I can barely pull in a breath, every muscle taut.

“You will not fight alone, Wyvern’kin,” Naga vows, rising along with Ariel, Raz’zor, and the rest of our horde, the power

of the Forest’s last stand rising with them. “You will fight this battle alongside an army of your Dryad’khin and with our

horde’s full fire.”

Yvan nods and sends out a bolt of invisible fire to them all.

“We go to war in two days’ time,” Sylvan states, “when foliage power reaches its peak and our joint power will be strongest.”

He narrows his gaze on Hizar’drile and Vang Troi. “Charge a sky portal to bring us West toward the location of the Verdyllion.

And send Dryad’khin envoys to Noilaan and the entirety of Zhilaan to bring as many people as possible to the Forest as quickly

as you can. If you’re able, send envoys to both sides of Noilaan’s runic border wall and to the Sublands below. And send word to Or’myr Syll’vir and Tierney Calix to hold the Vo .”

“In the meantime,” Vang Troi puts forth, “we need to gather everyone here who holds an in-depth understanding of Erthia’s faiths and mythologies to aid us in developing a plan of magical attack so we can get hold of the Shadow and Verdyllion Wands of Power.” She pointedly looks at Oaklyyn and me, Mavrik and Gwynn, Ra’Ven and Sage and Rivyr’el and others. “Those with powerful sorcery need to runically amplify the power of every weapon and place iron wards on every susceptible Dryad’khin.”

We all voice assent before Hizar’drile’s gaze zeroes in on Yvan. “We deploy the evening after next. As your army, Yvan Guryev.

To aid you in bringing down the Magedom’s Black Witch.” He turns to the Dryads, lightning streaking through his eyes. “And

then, we fight as the Forest’s own army. To get hold of both the Verdyllion and Vogel’s Wand, and take back all of Erthia

from the Shadow.”

Emphatic cries of approval rise, the Zhilaan Forest’s martial energy flooding through us all, the Dryads’ collective power

joining the magical surge, my throat cinching tight as I struggle against my surging fear of losing Yvan.

“Elloren,” Yvan says, his hand finding my shoulder.

I look up at him, his gaze locking hold of mine, blazing resolve in it. And love. A love for me that has defied all the odds

stacked against us. A love so heatedly potent it fuels the rise of my own defiant love for him, a sudden yearning crackling

through the air between us.

My heart in my throat, I stand and press my hand to his chest, right over his strong heartbeat, and he folds his hand protectively

over mine. Blinking against the rising sting of emotion in my eyes, I hold his scorching stare, no words sufficing. We’ve

been on a collision course since we first met at Verpax University, his love, once he fell into it, like a fixed, burning

star.

Yvan’s fire aura breaks loose to brush against my lips in an impassioned kiss and I give in to the bond-pull as well, my fire

flowing unreservedly around his, the whole world momentarily fading save for his heat on my mouth and the molten pillar of

Wyvernfire connecting his heart to mine.