Reykjavik greeted them with cold air and endless sky.
The sea lay still beyond the glass walls of the Harpa Concert Hall, its dark surface reflecting the pale Icelandic sun. This was not just another tournament city. This was hallowed ground — where Fischer had fought Spassky, where silence itself had once trembled under the weight of thought.
Alexei felt it the moment he stepped inside.
The hall did not echo.It listened.
Dozens of boards stood in perfect symmetry, each one a battlefield of wood and time. Cameras hovered silently. Commentators whispered. Spectators breathed carefully, as if afraid to disturb something ancient.
Elena walked beside him, calm but alert.
"You feel it too," she said quietly.
Alexei nodded.
"This place remembers."
They took their seats at Board One.
That single detail sent a ripple through the hall.
The Opening Round
Alexei's opponent was Sergei Volkov, a positional purist known for squeezing life from the smallest inaccuracies. The kind of player Tal used to laugh at — and then destroy.
As the arbiter started the clock, Alexei placed his hand on the pawn.
For the briefest moment, the world faded.
The board shimmered — not visibly, not dramatically — but internally, like a thought half-formed. He heard Tal's voice, not commanding, not instructing, but amused.
"Careful, genius. This is where they expect magic."
Alexei smiled faintly and played:
1. d4
A murmur ran through the hall.
No fireworks. No immediate chaos. Just control.
Elena watched from the players' lounge, her fingers wrapped around a warm cup of tea. Anya's presence was gentle today — observant, cautious.
"He's choosing balance," Anya whispered."That's harder than brilliance," Elena replied.
The Moment of Distortion
By move 17, the position was tense. Equal on the surface. Deadlocked in theory.
And then — it happened.
As Volkov leaned forward to calculate, the lights above Board One flickered once.
Just once.
Alexei's vision blurred — and suddenly the pieces were no longer still.
They did not move physically.But he felt their intent.
Each square radiated pressure. Each diagonal hummed with restrained violence. The board was no longer wood — it was possibility.
On the far side of the board, a shadow formed behind Volkov's chair.
Tall. Still. Watching.
Alexei did not look directly at it. He didn't need to.
"Not yet," Tal's voice murmured."Let him come to you."
Volkov moved. A natural move.A safe move.
A fatal one.
Alexei's hand moved almost by itself.
18. Rxf6
Gasps.
The sacrifice wasn't objectively forced — engines would later argue for hours — but it was inevitable. Like a truth spoken too late to take back.
Elena stood up.
She felt it too.
The Magician's Smile
As Volkov sank into deep calculation, Alexei leaned back.
For a heartbeat — just one — he saw Tal sitting beside him. Not as a shadow now, but as he once was: eyes bright, grin crooked, fingers drumming impatiently.
"You didn't copy me,"Tal said softly."Good. That would've been a tragedy."
"Then what am I doing?" Alexei asked in his mind.
Tal's smile faded into something deeper.
"You're finishing a sentence I never could."
Checkmate in Silence
The game ended not with drama, but with resignation.
Volkov stared at the board for a long time, then quietly extended his hand.
"I don't know where I went wrong," he admitted.
Alexei shook his hand gently.
"Neither do I," he said honestly.
Because the truth was — the game had stopped belonging to calculation somewhere around move 18.
The audience erupted only after the arbiter confirmed the result.
Cameras flashed. Commentators scrambled for metaphors.
But Alexei looked only at Elena.
She met his gaze and nodded once.
You're still you.
That Night
In the hotel room, the boards were waiting.
When Alexei opened his, the pieces were arranged in a new configuration — unfamiliar, unrecorded. Not Tal's handwriting this time. Not Anya's.
Something older.
Something collective.
Elena's board responded instantly, one square glowing faintly — the 64th square.
"They're pushing us," Elena said quietly.
Alexei placed his hand over hers.
"No," he replied. "They're asking."
From the space between the boards came a whisper — not a voice, but a sensation:
What will you create, when there is no one left to imitate?
Alexei closed his eyes.
For the first time, he wasn't afraid of the answer.
Outside, Reykjavik slept beneath the northern lights — green and silver waves stretching across the sky like infinite diagonals.
And somewhere between those lights and the 64 squares below, a new legend was beginning to write itself.