The world didn't end with a bang. It ended with a sound like a lung collapsing.
When Elian released the compression on his core, the air in the Throne Room was sucked into him for a split second, creating a vacuum that popped eardrums. Then, the energy expanded.
It wasn't just light. It was physical force. A shockwave of pure, white-hot solar plasma erupted from Elian's body, slamming into the containment field the Queen had erected around the altar.
The Queen's eyes widened. For the first time in twenty years, Valeriana looked surprised.
She had expected a stream. She got a tsunami.
"Too much!" she shrieked, her voice distorting as the magical pressure bent the acoustics of the room.
She tried to drink it. She opened her maw, the black void of her magic trying to swallow the sun. But it was like trying to drink a volcano. The solar fire poured into her, filling her, scorching her channels, boiling the lunar blood in her veins.
Above them, the Grand Prism—the diamond lens meant to focus the energy—began to vibrate. A high-pitched whine pierced the air.
CRACK.
A spiderweb fracture appeared in the center of the diamond.
Elian didn't stop. He couldn't stop. He was no longer Elian; he was a conduit. He was the door through which the star spoke. He felt his skin blistering, his bones rattling, but he didn't pull back. He pushed harder.
Burn her, the voice of the sun whispered in his blood. Burn the cold away.
"Stop it!" Valeriana screamed. Her diamond-hard skin began to crack. Beams of light shot out from inside her body, piercing through her chest, her arms, her face. She wasn't absorbing the light anymore; she was leaking it.
Vane, crouched behind the stone altar to shield himself from the heat, looked up. He saw the Queen faltering. He saw the blinding white light casting long, razor-sharp shadows behind every pillar and statue.
And he realized something.
The brighter the light, the deeper the shadow.
Elian wasn't just fighting the Queen. He was charging Vane.
Vane gritted his teeth, ignoring the pain in his frozen chest. He reached out to the shadow cast by the altar—a shadow that was now pitch black and solid as iron thanks to the intensity of Elian's flare.
"Elian!" Vane roared over the noise of the dying room. "Keep burning! Don't let up!"
Vane grabbed the shadow. It peeled off the floor like a strip of wet leather. He molded it in his hands, shaping it into a spear—massive, heavy, and humming with the kinetic energy of the light that created it.
He stood up.
The Queen was hovering ten feet in the air, thrashing, clawing at her own throat as the light consumed her from the inside out.
Vane stepped out from behind the altar. The heat was blistering, singing his hair, but he didn't care. He pulled his arm back.
"For Corin," Vane snarled.
He hurled the shadow-spear.
It flew true, a bolt of absolute darkness cutting through the blinding white room.
It struck Valeriana in the chest, right where her heart should be.
The Queen gasped. The impact knocked her out of the air. She slammed onto the marble floor, the spear pinning her there. The darkness of the weapon reacted violently with the light leaking from her body.
HISSSSSS.
Steam—cold, freezing steam—erupted from the wound.
"No," Valeriana wheezed, clutching the spear shaft. Her eyes, once black pits, flickered back to a pale, terrified grey. "I am... eternal."
"You are finished," Elian's voice boomed.
Elian stood up on the altar. The chains binding him had melted into slag. He looked down at the woman who had stolen his life. He raised his hand one last time.
He didn't fire a beam. He simply snapped his fingers.
The Grand Prism above them shattered.
Tons of diamond shards rained down. But they didn't hit the floor. Elian caught them with his telekinesis, heating them instantly until they were a rain of molten glass.
He brought the rain down on the Queen.
Valeriana screamed one last time as the molten glass encased her, trapping her, burning her, sealing her in a tomb of her own ambition.
The light in the room flared to a blinding crescendo—and then vanished.
Silence.
Absolute, ringing silence.
The eclipse outside was ending. A ray of true, natural sunlight pierced the gloom, filtering through the shattered ceiling. It illuminated the Throne Room.
It was a ruin. The walls were scorched. The floor was covered in glass.
And in the center of the room, encased in a rough, cooling statue of jagged glass and obsidian, was the Queen. She was frozen in a silent scream, a monument to greed.
Elian stood on the altar. He swayed. His skin was grey, his eyes rolling back in his head.
"Vane," he whispered.
He collapsed.
Vane was there before Elian hit the floor. He caught him, his arms trembling with exhaustion. He lowered Elian gently to the ground, brushing the hair from his face.
"I've got you," Vane rasped. "I've got you, little spark."
Elian was breathing, but it was shallow. His skin was fever-hot to the touch. He had burned through his reserves and tapped into his life force.
"Is she... dead?"
Vane looked up. Lysander was standing by the wall. The ice vines that had pinned him had melted. The fake Prince looked small, broken, and utterly defeated. He was staring at the glass statue of his mother.
"She is gone," Vane said coldly. "Sealed."
The doors of the Throne Room burst open.
Hundreds of guards, courtiers, and nobles poured in. They stopped dead when they saw the scene. The destroyed room. The glass tomb of the Queen. And the High Commander cradling the boy from the Wards on the dais.
"What is the meaning of this?" a High Duke shouted, stepping forward, his hand on his sword. "Commander Vane! You have assaulted the Queen!"
Vane stood up slowly. He placed himself between the crowd and Elian. He didn't draw a weapon; he didn't have one. He just stood there, radiating the terrifying authority of the Wolf.
"The Queen attempted to destroy the sun," Vane announced, his voice carrying to the back of the room. "She betrayed the Realm. She betrayed the Rite."
"Lies!" the Duke spat. "Arrest him!"
"Stop!"
The command didn't come from Vane. It came from the wall.
Prince Lysander stepped forward. He was limping. His arm was still in a sling. He looked at the crowd, then at Elian, then at the glass statue.
For a moment, silence hung in the balance. Lysander could lie. He could order them killed. He could try to take the throne.
Lysander looked at Elian—the boy who had burned with the power of a god. He looked at his own trembling hands, which could barely light a candle.
Lysander walked to the center of the room. He reached up and took the gold circlet from his head—the Crown of the Heir.
"He speaks the truth," Lysander said, his voice shaking but audible.
The court gasped.
"My mother... she was a monster," Lysander continued, tears spilling down his cheeks. "She lied to us all. I am not the heir."
Lysander walked up the steps of the dais. He stopped in front of Vane and the unconscious Elian.
He knelt.
He placed the crown on the floor beside Elian's hand.
"Behold," Lysander whispered, bowing his head to the floor. "The True Sol."
A ripple went through the crowd. The Duke hesitated, looking at the kneeling Prince. Then, slowly, he dropped to one knee.
One by one, the sound of armor clanking against stone filled the room. The Guards knelt. The courtiers knelt. The servants knelt.
Within moments, the entire court of Aethelgard was bowing to the boy from the Soot-Wards.
Vane looked down at the sea of bowed heads. Then he looked down at Elian.
"Wake up, Your Majesty," Vane whispered, a tired smile touching his lips. "You have a kingdom to fix."
One Week Later
Elian woke to the smell of lavender and clean sheets.
He wasn't in the panic room. He wasn't in the ship. He was in the Royal Bedchamber—the one that had belonged to the King.
He sat up, groaning. His body felt heavy, but the pain was gone. The burn on his hand had healed to a faint, silvery scar.
"Easy," a voice said.
Vane was sitting in a chair by the window, reading a report. He was wearing his black uniform, but he had a new insignia on his shoulder—the Sun and the Wolf intertwined. The King's Hand.
"How long?" Elian asked, his voice raspy.
"Seven days," Vane said, closing the folder. He walked over to the bed and poured a glass of water. "You missed your coronation. We had to do it by proxy. Lysander stood in for you. He's actually surprisingly good at paperwork now that he's not trying to be a god."
Elian took the water, drinking greedily. "The Queen?"
"Still in the Throne Room," Vane said. "We left the statue. A reminder."
"And the Wards?" Elian asked, looking at Vane with wide eyes. "Bram?"
Vane smiled. He walked to the window and pulled back the heavy velvet curtains.
"Look."
Elian climbed out of bed, his legs wobbly. Vane caught him, wrapping an arm around his waist to steady him. They walked to the balcony.
Elian gasped.
The view below wasn't grey.
The smog was gone. The slag-chutes had been sealed. Massive ventilation crystals—installed by Royal decree—were clearing the air. And down in the square, where the mud used to be, there were fires. Not trash fires, but warmth fires. Food tents. Healers.
"I sent the Royal Guard down," Vane whispered into Elian's ear. "Not to beat them. To feed them. We emptied the granaries. Bram is currently living in the guest wing of the Palace. He's eating his weight in tarts."
Elian leaned against the railing, tears pricking his eyes. "We did it."
"You did it," Vane corrected. He turned Elian around, pinning him against the railing.
The sun was high in the sky, warm and bright.
"Now," Vane murmured, his grey eyes dropping to Elian's lips. "There is one matter of state we haven't resolved."
"Oh?" Elian smiled, wrapping his arms around Vane's neck. "And what is that?"
"The matter of the King's consort," Vane said. "Rumor has it he's sleeping with the High Commander."
"Scandalous," Elian whispered.
"Truth," Vane replied.
And he kissed him.
It wasn't a desperate kiss like on the cliff, or a goodbye kiss like on the ship. It was a beginning. It was slow, and deep, and full of promise. High above the world, bathed in the light of the sun he had saved, Elian Sol finally stopped running.
He was home.