Page 53 of Bright Blinding Ruin

Standing there, so close to him, feeling the slight brush of his fingertips on my waist, with my hand still resting comfortably upon his chest, it’s easy for me to forget what he is and what he’s done. I don’t know his beginning; I don’t know when he first came alive. I don’t know why he seems to be tied to Laconia, even before the first high empress was banished here thousands of years ago.

There are so many things I don’t know, but none of that matters right now. The only thing that matters is that I’m here—and that means everything is going to change.

But before I go, there’s something I am curious to know, so I ask him, “Why did you heal me?” It had to be him. Had to be. If I was going to heal myself somehow, I would’ve done it when I was hobbling through Magnysia’s castle.

“I—” It seems like that’s the only word he can say, because his brows furrow after that, and all he does is stare down at me with those unnatural, shimmery eyes.

“You don’t know, do you? You don’t know why we’re here, why it’s so easy for us to connect.” I chuckle in disbelief. I mean, I thought that high empress was full of shit, but how else can any of this be explained? “It must be the tiniest piece ever, if you can’t even feel it.”

“What… what are you talking about?” Invictis shakes his head. “No. It does not matter.”

“No, it doesn’t,” I agree, and I pull away from him, taking one step back, then another. The look he gives me as I back away is one of conflict, inner turmoil, and slight confusion. Almost like he’s in pain.

Ditto. This is going to hurt like a bitch. It’s not going to be fun. Don’t need to be a psychic to know it.

“Tomorrow at dawn,” I tell him. “See you on the battlefield, Rune.” Before he can argue with me, before he has the chance to remind me that his name is not Rune, that it was never Rune, the white world around me fades, and the last thing I see before I’m back in my real body is his golden, sparkling eyes.

A hard gasp escapes me when I jerk back to reality, and I stand in the library staring at the stone wall, Frederick’s and his father’s voices behind me. It’s like I never left, like I never went inside.

I glance down at my hands and flex them. It’s not visible, but I can feel it: the magic inside me. The magic of not only the three empresses, but all of it. Every single woman who came before Krotas, Gladus, and Morimento, all the way back to the first high empress. The threads of magic have never been so tangible.

“Combining them could be dangerous,” Frederick says. “We don’t know what’ll happen. What if it sets off a reaction we’re not prepared for? What if we need to evacuate the entire city? The people have nowhere to go.”

“I don’t know what’ll happen, son, but I know it in my soul. It must be done. It is the only way—” Fred’s voice halts the momentI turn around and face them, and his eyes study me. “You… you did it. It’s done.”

“What?” Frederick sounds stunned, and he turns toward me, examining me in much the same way as his dad. “How did you—you never left.”

My silence is enough of an answer, but it’s obvious Fred has put on his thinking cap and is full of questions, because he pushes his son aside so he can stand directly before me and get a better look. “What happened? What was it like? How did you fare in the chasm? Remarkable.” I think the man would gladly study me for years, if I let him.

“I saw the first high empress. She… she told me a lot of things,” I whisper.

“Tell me everything,” Fred says.

“Father, I doubt she wants to answer every one of your countless questions.” Frederick looks to me for reassurance.

I tell Fred, “After. We can play twenty questions after it’s done. For now, we need to get the word out, let everyone know to stay inside tomorrow. Lock their doors, barricade their windows, everything they can. I’m meeting Invictis tomorrow at dawn.”

Tomorrow’s the day. It’s the final countdown.

Chapter Twenty-One

I help Frederick and his dad spread the word. We get the council on board, and they rally the guards. Some of the richer folk need convincing; the people who fled the lower district the night a shadowstorm crossed the outer walls need a place to hunker down while Invictis and I fight it out. They don’t want to share what they have, but I make it clear to them they have no choice if they want to survive.

I don’t know how this is going to work, what’ll happen during the fight. I don’t know if Invictis will summon a shadowstorm or not, but it’s better safe than sorry when it comes to the scourge.

We do what we can. Frederick manages to convince one of the nobles to allow the animals from the grazing field to huddle inside his house. Can’t be too careful, since those animals are all these people have.

They’re scared. Of course they are. They’re scared because they never thought it would end. For the past twenty years this entire kingdom has had its fair share of bad luck. Woe after woe, each one more debilitating than the last, Book of Revelations type shit. And after spending the last two decades living like this, they probably thought they’d slowly die out.

But they won’t. I won’t let them.

Hah. Guess I’m a fucking hero after all. How stupid.

By the time everyone gets the word, the sun is setting. I grab an apple from the stocks that have been brought up and wander to the ramparts by myself to watch the sun set in the distance. I crawl up onto the waist-high wall that is basically just a fancy guardrail and sit on the stone as I stare out at the expansive land outside Laconia’s outer wall.

It will take a long time for Laconia to recover from this, but it will, and I… I guess I’ll be there to see it happen. Man, that’s a weird thought.

I bite into the apple as I stare at the world beyond, full of magic and wonders I never thought existed. If things weren’t shit when Krotas was pregnant with me, what would my life have been like? Would I have spent half my time here and half my time with my dad? Would she have eventually invited my dad to stay here with her?

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