"Every soul brought into existence has its own path to follow," the voice breathed, "and a hundred destinies written before it was even a spark in the dark. Do you truly believe a mere creature such as you, who cannot draw a single breath without His permission, can rewrite the Decree of the Almighty simply because you are wishful?"
Aeryn felt the breath leave her lungs. The "power" she thought she held, the "daughter of trinity" title she wore like armor, suddenly felt like a child's toy in the face of a hurricane.
You think your shoulders are broad enough to carry the lives of others?" the figure continued, its stature growing until Aeryn felt like a grain of sand. "Every heartbeat is counted. Every leaf that falls is known. You are but a vessel, and even your rebellion is written in the ink of His Will. Who are you to think you can change what has been Ordained?"
All the times she had come in contact with figure, she wasn't this much scared but today it was different, she could feel the aggression the heat the power…Aeryn looked at her hands. They were pale, shaking. For the first time, she didn't feel like a savior, but a guest in a house she didn't own.
"I..." she whispered, the weight of her own insignificance finally breaking her pride."I…i… only wanted to help them." She was stuttering, the fear and weakness from the killing curse taking her over.
"Then seek the help of the One who holds their lives, and let it go…" the figure said, its voice softening into something like a divine warning. "For if He wills their end, your blood-magic is but dust in the wind. And if He wills their life, no curse in this world can touch them."
The room shuddered. It wasn't a sound or a physical movement; it was a sudden, violent displacement of pressure. The Captain made a low, guttural sound as the black veins in his neck began to retract, being pulled back like threads of silk into a needle. Inch by inch, the darkness fled his body, flowing back toward the hand Aeryn had held up.
Rissa was weeping silently, her hands over her mouth. Finn stood paralyzed against the wall. He had seen the Captain share a curse like splitting bread, but he had never seen this a half-dead girl pulling destruction back into her own marrow with the calm, furious authority with just flick of her hands.
It took exactly two minutes, but felt like an age.
When the last of the black ink vanished into Aeryn's skin, the Captain slumped forward. He was hollowed out, gasping, but the necrotic grey was fading. His color was returning.
Aeryn lay perfectly still. Her hair were turning entirely white, looking like a blinding white of ash. It fanned across the pillow like a shroud. Her chest rose and fell, but her soul was no longer in the room.
She stood in a place without walls.
The floor was a sheet of black glass reflecting a sky that didn't exist. Aeryn's hair drifted around her like smoke. The figure was already there a shimmer of darkness, grey and white, hooded and faceless.
"I know what you're going to say," Aeryn said. "You're going to tell me to let it go. You're going to tell me the power is a burden I wasn't built for."
"Will you?" the figure interrupted. The voice sounded like a bell struck underwater; heavy, ancient, and resonant.
Aeryn looked into the black water at her feet. She saw the reflections of her nightmares: the cracked streets of Sahirra, the hollow-eyed subjects of a dying kingdom, the blood on her own hands.
"No," she said. "Not yet."
The figure remained motionless, its presence expanding until it seemed to swallow the horizon.
"I am not ready," Aeryn continued, her voice trembling but determined. "I know the cost. I know every hair on my head has gone white. I know I haven't slept without screaming in months. But there are people alive tonight because of what I carry. Until I can put it down without them dying... I won't."
The silence that followed didn't just stretch; it crushed. It was the silence of a witness who had seen the beginning and end of time.
Then the figure spoke, and the very glass beneath Aeryn's feet vibrated with a terrifying, majestic authority.
"Every soul brought into existence has its own path to follow," the voice breathed, "and a hundred destinies written before it was even a spark in the dark. Do you truly believe a mere creature such as you, who cannot draw a single breath without His permission, can rewrite the Decree of the Almighty simply because you are wishful?"
Aeryn felt the breath leave her lungs. The "power" she thought she held, the "daughter of trinity" title she wore like armor, suddenly felt like a child's toy in the face of a hurricane.
"You think your shoulders are broad enough to carry the lives of others?" the figure continued, its stature growing until Aeryn felt like a grain of sand. "Every heartbeat is counted. Every leaf that falls is known. You are but a vessel, and even your rebellion is written in the ink of His Will. Who are you to think you can change what has been Ordained?"
All the times she had come in contact with figure, she wasn't this much scared but today it was different, she could feel the aggression the heat the power…Aeryn looked at her hands. They were pale, shaking. For the first time, she didn't feel like a savior, but a guest in a house she didn't own.
"I..." she whispered, the weight of her own insignificance finally breaking her pride."I…i… only wanted to help them." She was stuttering, the fear and weakness from the killing curse taking her over.
"Then seek the help of the One who holds their lives, and let it go…" the figure said, its voice softening into something like a divine warning. "For if He wills their end, your blood-magic is but dust in the wind. And if He wills their life, no curse in this world can touch them."
The light began to change. The black water started to ripple, not from her feet, but from a command she couldn't hear. The water was raising up …
"Then what am I?" Aeryn cried, her voice small and echoing in empty space.
"A witness," the figure replied as it began to dissolve into a light so bright it was blinding. "So witness well. And remember who truly holds the thread. You have time till then…"
The light surged, and the vision of the void shattered like glass and then the water submerged her into it muffling her voice and restricting her breathing, when she heard a loud voice,
"AERYN!"
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