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The sun creeps higher through the clouds, and the heavens bleed with its emerging rays. The rain has dwindled, and wispy drops brush the crown of my head.
Minutes stretch into hours. Arluin does not return, nor do his necromancers.
Only when the sun has long reached its peak do I dare stir. While I’ve been sitting here, cradling Eliya’s lifeless body, a small fraction of my strength has returned. It is enough to craft a teleportation spell and carry us both away.
“Laxus,” I breathe. The sound scarcely leaves my lips, but my magic obeys my command.
We leave the narrow street and materialize inside the Upper City’s cathedral, on the platform of the circular chamber. The ten major gods stare down at us. With the Aether Tower disabled and the cathedral’s power line cut off, the paintings have lost their enchantment and are frozen still.
Once, when my mother’s coffin laid inside this chamber, I pledged a silent promise to become powerful enough to prevent anyone I love from ever being snatched away again. Now I realize my foolishness.
Everyone is dead, and I could save no one.
I gently roll Eliya from my arms and kiss her forehead. Her skin is colder than the stone floor beneath us. Her delicate face blurs as a fresh wave of grief crashes into me.
“I’m sorry, Eliya,” I choke, my voice raw and cracked. “I’m sorry I couldn’t save you.”
But she doesn’t hear my words. She will never hear them again.
My tears patter across her icy cheeks and trail down into her crimson locks, dampening them.
When my eyes dry and I’m unable to shed any more tears, I lift my head and absently gaze out at the rest of the cathedral. Rows and rows of empty pews stare back at me, framed by the ribcage of the vaulted ceiling high above. A few are knocked over, and blood blemishes the otherwise polished ivory floor. The towering doors at the far end are both swung wide open. The street beyond is deathly quiet, rubble heaped like mounds of snow. Though much debris litters the cobblestones, there isn’t a single body in sight. Only a few stains of blood that the rain has yet to erase.
I return my attention to Eliya and clasp her cold cheek. My hoarse breaths echo through the cathedral’s hollow walls.
Then I stand and start through the narrow door to my left. I enter an antechamber filled with scrolls and holy relics and continue straight through. Soon I arrive at the stairs which lead beneath the cathedral. It takes longer than I expect to reach the bottom, and I hurry down the last few steps. I think all the necromancers and undead are long gone now—judging by the stillness of the city—but I don’t want to leave Eliya for longer than is necessary. I can’t bear the thought of her up there all alone, with the callous gods staring down at her.
The room is dark and musty. The faint glow atop the stairs provides enough light for me to make out the crystals lining the walls like sconces. Since they rely on the Aether Tower for their power, I have to draw on the remnants of my magic.
“Iluminos.”Though the spell-word is quiet, it shudders through the darkness.
An orb of brilliant light sweeps from my fingers. Its radiance illuminates the entire room.
Dozens of empty crystal coffins lie stacked in rows. Magic ripples across their violet surfaces.
I reach for the nearest coffin and haul it from the top of the stack. But it’s heavier than I anticipate and doesn’t budge, even when I shove it.
Again, I draw on the dregs of my magic, this time releasing a wind spell.
“Ventrez.”
A breeze blows the coffin down to knee height, and I use the spell to guide it back up the stairs.
Eliya lies where I left her. I lower the coffin to the center of the circular chamber and use another wind spell to blow her inside. The vibrant yellow skirts of her dress flutter with the magic. They look as lovely as they did at the Ball, aside from the few specks of dirt which sully them.
The coffin’s purple glow reflects onto her skin and paints it with an iridescent luster. Her hair also appears as fine strands of rubies in the glistening light. She looks so beautiful and peaceful in there, and gazing at her feels like stabbing a knife through my chest. But I can’t look away. I must soak up every detail and freeze an image of her in my mind so that I never forget her, even if hundreds of years pass.
I clench the side of the coffin, and my knuckles are cast ashen with the strain. Magic pulses beneath my fingers, the same magic that will preserve her until the end of time.
My eyes sting. They’re too dry to shed any tears, and it feels as if they instead shed sand. I blink away the grit, but much remains.
Finally, I tear my hands from the coffin. I know I shouldn’t waste my magic when I have so little left and still need to bring her down to the crypts, but I draw on the aether in my blood and use it to harness that which surrounds me.
“Alucinatus,”I whisper.
A single rose blooms in my fingers. Its thorns glitter in the coffin’s radiance, and its silken petals are the same rich ruby red as Eliya’s tangled waves.
The rose’s thorns don’t prick my skin as I lower it into her coffin and close her cold hands around it. The flower is an illusion and would usually wither away with time, but the crystal coffin is crafted from raw aether and will preserve my spell, just as it will preserve Eliya for eternity.
