Page 133 of The Arrow and the Alder

Seph hadn’t connected with hereloitbecause she was part kith. No, she wasn’t kith at all; her grandfather had forfeited that when he’d chosen a mortal life with her nani. What Seph had inherited was something else entirely.

She was part star.

Seph could see the moment the Fate realized Seph understood. That Seph had seen through the Fate’s deception, this verbal sleight of hand.

Sound screamed. Voice and form distorted and blurred, and the Fate flew at Seph in a violent whip of shadow and claws.

Just when her decrepit form was nearly upon Seph, symbols glimmered into existence. Enchantments, made of pure, unadulterated light. They could not appear in the corporeal world, where the air was tainted by corruption. But here, in this dimension of pure light, they could shine brightly, and they arranged themselves into moving rivers, like those on the coat.

Pulsing and whispering.

Waiting.

And in that space, in that supernatural plane of existence, and with Alder’s translations so near, Seph knew what they meant and how to use them. Or, rather, she felt how to use them, direct them, with her power. Herlight.

Those threads were extensions of her, like arms and legs when she had neither in this plane, ready to move at the slightest command. And so with hardly a thought, Seph lashed out with one of those shimmering streams, striking out with it like a whip, toward the Fate.

The Fate tried to flee, but the end of Seph’s enchanted thread of light caught her ankle and wrapped around it, yanking her back.

The Fate shrieked and stumbled, trying to tear away, but Seph’s thread was unbreakable, solidifying even as the Fate fought and struggled. Seph lashed out with another river of symbols, this time binding the Fate’s wrist, then her other, until the Fate was tied up and suspended between Seph’s shimmering ropes of enchantments. The Fate wailed and gurgled, screeching inhuman sounds. She thrashed and bucked, gnashed her teeth, trying to break free of her glowing white binds. These chains of solid starlight that cauterized her inky black form.

Seph was acutely aware of every strand, every strain and point of contact, and with one great and groaning heave, she pulled them apart. Farther and farther, stretching the Fate’s warped form until the strain was too much. The Fate screamed from the pain of it, and with one horrible, otherworldly wail, she exploded.

Darkness diffused in an explosion of opalescence and heat. Symbols flew everywhere, throwing prisms of light, sizzling as they rushed over Seph.

In a flash, Seph saw her family. She saw Nora before the war, before illness had stolen her strength, bounding and laughing through their yard with a beaming Linnea. She saw herself, joy pouring out of her as she laughed with Levi and Rys, and she saw Mama and Papa, Grandpa Jake and Nani, and then she saw Alder. His handsome face and brilliant smile, his gray eyes that saw straight to her core. He held her face between his hands, looked into her eyes, and whispered, “Let it fly, my little arrow, so sharp and so true.”

Seph would have cried, if she’d had form. “I will see you in the next life,” she managed.

His lips touched hers so softly, like a whisper of cool air. His image faded away, and through the space he left behind, another string of enchantments shimmered into view, one she had not noticed before, though she’d felt it.

One that was anchored inher, just over her heart.

And it was from this string that all of the other strings of light rooted, binding light to Seph’s soul.Thiswas the connection that needed severing—the one the Fate had created to bind the little star to the world of the living.

This was the piece Seph needed to give back.

Here is my heart,she thought through her grief and the fire.Here is my sorrow.I will endure this fire and surrender the light I’ve borrowed.

And Seph…let it go. Like opening her fist—when she had clutched so hard, for so long, trying to hold on to anything she could to survive. To hold on to herself.

She let the glittering enchantments free, unraveling them from her core like a spool of thread. They frayed and broke apart, and with that strand thus unraveled, the others could not hold form. They too began unwinding, faster and faster, their constituents falling apart and raining like diamonds, to where they were absorbed back into the light.

Gone.

Wind rushed like a tempest, the light convulsed. Seph’s last thought was of the sea, those white-capped waves and bobbing masts, and a dozen white gulls flying toward freedom.

In the quiet, Seph slept, her shapeless form numb in this world of black and stars, as if she were floating through the heavens.

Ahead of her, one of those stars burned brighter than the rest.

At first, Seph didn’t notice; her consciousness was a fractured thing, unspooling into the infinite abyss—forever unraveling, just like the enchantments that’d been woven into her soul—but something caught hold of that fraying thread and pulled.

The force of it roused Seph from slumber, though her mind kept sliding back, retreating into those endless depths.

Wake, daughter of light.

They were two voices—female voices—spoken together, and Seph spotted the little star ahead. The one growing brighter, drawing nearer. It reminded her of the little orbs she’d trained with in Velentis.

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