Page 82 of A Rising Hope

“Everyone is so eager to find and kill the villain that they forget to stop and ask why the villain has become one.” Her hand lingered on the linen covering the mummified body. Her eyes shattered with such sharp hurt that it sucked the air out of the room and my throat tightened. “You think people are worth saving? But where was theirgoodnesswhen I was broken? Where was their kindness when I begged for their help? Where was their mercy when I cried for redemption? You want to be a hero, but heroes fight for good, and there is none left in this world.” Her eyes returned to me. Unlike mine, there were no tears in them. Only emptiness, only lethal grief that devoured all hope. “My entire life I hoped, and I trusted, and I believed in a greater good. I’ve been wounded and I’ve been hurt, and I forgave, again and again. Call it a flaw of a Creator’s nature, but I believed in beautifying the world, not only in the appearances but by nurture the true kindness within it.” She held her hand to the glass coffin, her eyes lingering on the body within. “Until they took her away from me. You think gods are just. But they are cruel . . . and the world they created is nothing but that.” She motioned with her hand and thorny vines wove around the glass once more, protecting it from the world.

“She never took a single breath. Forever an angel. Even the most powerful of dark mages were incapable of bringing her spirit back, claiming it had never crossed the veil into this world in the first place. Forever held back by the gods. One that has never held mortality is never able to regain it,” Insanaria murmured the last words as quoting them from a book. “Never to be together. Never to be united again. Her soul was carried away by the winds, never to be found.” The Queen paused, and heavy silence filled the room. “Elpis. Her name is Elpis.” Her eyes met mine. “Heroes will come and go, kings and queens shallrise and fall. Stars and moons shall turn to dust, and I will still spend eternity making every single person, every single god pay for what they took from me.”

The shadows shifted once more.

And we were back on the shore near the cliff.

“Do you see them now? The world’s true colors. Do you understand?” The Queen scowled against my ear. I didn’t fight her tight hold. I didn’t fight the blade inching closer to my heart.

The salty wind caressed my reddened cheeks. My previous plans and thoughts all scurried away, leaving me barren. My tears, like clear water, washed away the muddied theories.

The Queen and I had shared more than I had realized.

But where she had stumbled and found cruelness, I had fallen and received compassion.

I hadn’t deserved it any more than she deserved cruelty.

I wasn’t special nor was I more worthy. And yet, when fate or luck or whatever you wanted to call it, rolled its dice, I found kindness.

I thought of Tuluma, of Oli, of Viyak, of Priya, of Florian, of the Ten, of Gideon and of every other kind soul that I discovered when I needed them the most.

A shiver ran down my skin, and the hair on the back of my neck stood up.

And in that moment, I knew.

I knew exactly what I had to do.

Priya once said that I chose forgiveness over justice.

But justice wasn’t always vengeance.

At times, it was mercy.

“I understand now,” I uttered into the heavy nothingness.

Villains weren’t born, they were made.

And so were gods.

I took a single breath. Moving as fast as lightning, I yanked free the knife hidden at my waist, twisted on my feet and wedged it deep into the Queen’s heart.

She paled in shock. But it was too late.

My knife had found its mark.

Just like Heart Piercer she held found its place, wedged deep inside my heart.

A flashof bright light blinded me, and I shielded my eyes with my arm, giving myself a second to adjust.

There was no familiar nothingness, no onyx waters and the lingering calmness that I had previously felt. No, this time it was vivid, white and striking.

I was in a place with no end and no beginning, a place where eternity and time crossed paths.

I didn’t feel the dagger in my chest or the heaviness of my decision as I glanced around, taking a step into the unknown.

The long light skirts of the simple snowy dress I wore flowed in my wake. Time, like sand, shifted beyond me.

“I’ve come to bargain,” I proclaimed loudly and waited.

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