Chapter 23: My Heart is My Own

“What the?!?!” Fate screamed, disintegrating the pieces that flew towards her while Purity and Faith covered themselves in barriers of golden light. Arcane was untouched, her portion of the car undamaged and hanging in the air as she calmly unbuckled her safety restraints and floated out, holding the remaining piece in a hand of magic.

“I found our target.” She observes calmly, pointing at a humanoid figure made of golden light with four arms crossed over its chest, glaring up at them. A heartbeat later it disappears behind a cloud of dust and the shattered remnants of half a flying car.

“It found us, you mean.” Faith comments, creating a ward around the area and blessing Arcane and Fate with a barrier of golden light. “I’ll keep it contained.”

“Why are you- Oh, forget it.” Fate yells, before sighing and throwing up her arms. Looking down at the clearing cloud of dust behind which a golden figure can be seen, she points at it and makes a shooting motion. A black hole appears in the golden figure, though it rapidly closes. “Bang.”

“I pray for salvation under your blessing, and hope that you grant me safety in the trials of the Burning plains.” Purity’s voice enters all of their ears as a golden figure begins to form behind her. “Grant me your strength, Lord of Punishment! Deliver judgement to this sinner who fell from heaven!” She shouts, and the golden figure falls to engage the other god in hand to hand combat.

“Is that going to help?” Fate wonders, still shooting bullets of black magic with pinpoint accuracy.

“I rather doubt it.” Arcane comments, and indeed a second later the golden figure they are targeting swells to a building sized giant with trails of black and red energy crossing its golden skin like veins or wounds. Yet as soon as the Lord of Punishment touches one of those lines, it begins to shake as red infects it, causing Purity to pale and shake in pain.

“Pull it back, Purity.” Arcane orders, calmly descending to stand eye level with the giant. Purity nods and dismisses her deity, which throws off the infection and turns into a flash of light. “We have to do this ourselves.”

“Of course we do. You thought this was a good idea why again?” Fate notes, countering a storm of magical attacks flowing from the deity. Mostly malevolent thoughts and fear magic, trying to break their will to fight, all four notice as they float above the giant.

Arcane hovers in front of the giant for a time, sending magic against divine power, countering every blow of its while searching for an opening. Pure magic power flows into the world, directed against other magical power to cancel almost completely without leaving an effect in the physical universe. Still, the sheer amount of such power is disturbing to both Faith and Purity, who hurriedly move higher to avoid being caught by a mistake either could make at any moment.

After a bit Arcane clicks her tongue and ascends, while the giant growls and throws a ball of force at her retreating form. She offhandedly deflects it back, smashing the trees and small houses around its feet without doing any direct damage to the corrupted deity’s manifested form.

“I tried feeling its connection, but it’s too aware of me to even risk getting close. We need to wear it down.” She says once she’s high enough to be heard by the others in a low voice.

Faith and Purity grimace, but Fate gapes in appalled shock. “Are you kidding me? The only reason this was feasible is that you could do that before we fought it and thus make it vulnerable!!” She shouts in a whisper, furiously rounding on Arcane while keeping an eye on the deity below them.

“That’s what I thought, too… This ambush messed everything up.” Arcane mutters, sounding far less upset than Fate obviously was. “Ah, well… just a slight change of plans.”

“Slight? Slight? Our entire plan out the window and she calls it a slight change?” Fate growls, her face growing red with fury. “That’s it! I’m so done with you! Next time you have a problem don’t even think about calling me! Do you understand me? Don’t you dare do it!”

“If it can infect one of my summons that easily, I won’t be much help.” Purity notes, looking down at the corrupted god raging beneath them.

“Possession, maybe?” Faith wonders. “How long can you maintain it?”

Purity shrugs. “Don’t really have a choice, do I?”

“Just get me an opening. I’ll do my best to watch for when its defenses go down while I’m fighting it.” Arcane declares, forming an aura of cyan radiance around her body. “Once we get that hole, it’s game over for this thing.”

Purity and Faith exchange a glance and then shrug. They were wondering if perhaps Arcane should refrain from fighting directly to take advantage of an opening as soon as it appeared, but she was the only one capable of fighting directly against the god on even terms. Thus she didn’t have much of a choice.

“You can’t be serious… Aargh, whatever! I swear you owe me big time for this, Arcane!” Fate shouts, creating a layer of black energy around herself and throwing a pair of similar orbs at the glowing giant. Arcane smiles back at her, but she ignores it. “Let’s go!”

At the shout from Fate the trio of fighters shoot downwards to engage the deity, with Faith kneeling on thin air to enhance the barrier preventing damage to the surroundings. It would soon show its worth, as immense amounts of energy clash below her.

Fate is the first to engage, streams of death energy drawing the life from all living things in the region instantly and reforming them into skeletal figures that she directs to drive spears and swords of bone into the giant’s legs. The death energy infecting their weapons eats away at the golden holy energy, though it fails to much affect the red or black energies infecting it. Tsking at the unexpected setback, she uses her own streams of death energy to attack the giant like a set of black whips, carving slices from its flesh though all of them instantly regenerate as soon as she relents the tiniest bit.

Arcane engages the head, locking eyes with the giant and battling magic against magic, mental attacks against mental attack. The deity tries to inspire fear, loathing, madness, and hatred in the girls attacking it, while Arcane precisely retaliates and nullifies each emotion before it can even be born. The deity is also constantly reshaping the region around, seeking a more favorable battle ground by raising earth and plant life to the girl’s heights. Fate obliterates the plants as soon as they start to grow, but Arcane is forced to deal with the attempts to float earth by increasing the gravity near the ground over and over again. As such the ground appears to be vibrating in several places, caught between the god’s attempts to raise the earth and Arcane’s countermoves to keep it right where it is.

Purity envelopes herself in a golden aura, summoning another god, this one female with a great golden bow. She draws the massive thing almost double her height with effort, shooting golden arrows at the black and red lines, severing them with pure power and often causing great sections of its golden flesh to become vulnerable to Fate’s concentrated assault.

“Stop targeting the purified areas!” Purity shouts finally, still shooting while Fate immediately follows up with attempts to wound the god’s manifestation further.

“What would you prefer I do?” Fate snaps back, sweating as waves of force explode from the god and dissipate right in front of her by Arcane’s actions. “This isn’t easy, you know!”

“Would… you… two… please… work… together!” Arcane says through clenched teeth, throwing the giant away with an explosion of pure force as she gets frustrated. It slams into the barrier Faith made, causing the entire structure to shudder and crack in several places before those are quickly repaired. “Just hurt the bloody thing!” She shouts, shooting towards the deity and beginning to rip apart the myriad gold and black entities it created to buy some time.

Exchanging a glance, Fate and Purity snorted at each other before jumping into the fray themselves, butchering the relatively weak minions while also sending sporadic attacks at the rising giant.

Arcane resumes her duel with the giant in magic, furiously waving a thousand hands of magic to counter a similar number from the god. While doing so she also keeps an eye on the other three, noting how much longer she has. Frowning, she realizes things do not look quite as good as they appeared at first. Making sure no one is watching, she secretly smiles for an instant and then focuses on battling the deity, which shrinks itself to human size and engages her in a physical fight.

The melded figure of three colors creates spears of similarly colored light, manipulating them around itself and charging at Arcane who rises to welcome the attack. Creating a straight blade of cyan light, she meets its first attack and easily destroys many of the rapidly produced spears in a single swing.

Appearing to frown, the deity makes most of the spears vanish and replaces them with a single one, though it is far brighter and seemingly solid. That is confirmed a second later when the spear clashes with Arcane’s sword, managing to push back into the glowing light and send Arcane stumbling.

Behind them, Fate slaughters the minions with Purity’s help, though both soon notice that the waves of minions are never ending.

“Defend Arcane, I’ll thin them out.” Fate commands, moving her death whips to do just that, landing on the unstable ground to better direct them.

“Fine by me.” Purity says, turning her bow on the minions charging towards the intense melee and magical battle in which Arcane seems to be at the limits of her concentration, while the god she’s fighting still has room to command its minions.

The gold arrows pierce and shatter the fragile constructs, often turning sharply to cut through several before driving towards the fighting pair and attempting to distract the god. After a few tries Purity notices that her arrows are not causing it to even flinch, leading her to frown and focus on slaughtering the minions instead.

“I can’t interfere.” Purity notes to Fate beside her.

“Figured. Arcane’s having that much trouble, you and I can’t even hurt it until she wears it down a bit.” the pale girl replies, breathing hard but still evidently ready to fight. Purity shrugs and nocks another arrow. Can’t hurt to keep trying, can it?

The stalemate is only temporary, though. Arcane is blown away by a sudden eruption of power from the god, bouncing once on the ground before she manages to float and kill her momentum with magic. Fate and Purity lose focus in trying to save her, and the god is given a clear shot at Faith high above them.

“AAARRGGGHHH!!!” Faith screams as the full force mental attack hits her, writhing in pain as the barrier collapses around them. Falling out of the sky, she is caught by Purity who soon also spits up a bit of blood.

“Out of time?” Fate notes, frowning. “That’s just bloody wonderful.”

“I can keep going. That’s just the first warning.” Purity gasps while wiping blood from her chin, glaring at the free but furious god drawing power from the forest and creating a legion of tree monsters to fight for it. “Treants… I’ll hold it for a bit. Get your sister back in action.”

Purity races forward before Fate can say anything, depositing Faith on the ground where Fate can destroy the mental magic affecting her and wake her up.

“Thanks. Sorry… I screwed up.” Faith says, sitting up and shaking her head. “That’s wonderful.” She adds, seeing the army of living nature being torn apart by Purity.

“So now this whole thing seems like a bad idea.” Fate growls, rolling her eyes. “All fun and games until someone gets hurt, I guess.”

“Oh, shut up and be helpful.” Arcane snaps, walking over while rapidly healing herself, grimacing every few seconds. “I’m done playing with this thing.”

Faith and Fate stare at her, then shake their heads. “Arcane, stop bluffing.” Faith requests.

“Sis, you can’t do much more than you already have. Maybe it’s time to give this up as a bad job.” Fate agrees, concern filling her voice.

Arcane ignores both of them, closing her eyes and taking a deep breath. Suddenly all of them are crushed against the ground, Fate falling to her knees and Faith trying desperately to sit up. Ahead of them, the god falls to the ground, causing it to tremble as it regained its giant form, and the treants are crushed into splinters while Purity rolls down the slope Arcane makes to rejoin the other three. While the rest are still fighting the immense gravity, Arcane walks slowly forward to face the god shrinking its form while trying to stand again.

Trees explode as Arcane brings the gravity field with her, crushing everything in an immense radius without difficulty. The god screams in a deep voice, expressing hatred and displeasure at being harmed by a mere mortal and actually attacked by the humans meant to worship it. Arcane ignores it, enhancing the gravity field and leaving the thing kneeling ever further on the ground.

Finally, when it reaches the same size as a human, the god is able to rise to its feet and create a spear of light to hurl at Arcane. The first few throws fall short, barely managing to make Arcane flinch. The next passes right next to her, the wind from its passage stirring her dress. Arcane acts then, creating a hand of pure magic to grab the god and throw it back into the region of dead forest Fate created.

“Seal it, Faith!!” Arcane roars, and the priestess obliges as the gravity field vanishes.

Purity and Fate, realizing their task, reengage the god while Arcane catches her breath, the intense use of magic draining even her. After a few minutes Faith shudders, the barrier flickering as the god directs a new amount of attention to breaking it after the advantage it gained from doing that before. An army of wisps of light appears and rushes towards her, barely thrown back by the arrival of Arcane a second before they manage to break Faith out of her concentration.

Below them, the god attempts to manipulate the earth but Arcane, frustrated with this constant struggle, starts to compress it all into solid stone under immense pressure, the expanding stone ground resistant to the manipulation of the nature god, even corrupted by malice. Noticing the new stability, Fate and Purity send grateful looks to Arcane and Faith, who hang back while watching for an opportunity.

Within the mental universe only she perceives, Arcane sees Faith drawing golden light from thousands of stars, each individually dwarfed by massive pools such as the three shifting around near Purity made of pure gold liquid or the mostly gold pool tainted by numerous strings of black and red that fights against them. That tainted pool is connected to the real world by several thin strings, many of which are guarded by spiky threads of red and black that, while still too thick to break easily, are far less numerous than they were before. Arcane sees Fate as a brilliant but tiny light of black energy, outshining the pools but lacking the size needed to oppose them. The massive pool refuses to shrink even as the thread constantly pumps energy into the bright star representing the manifestation of the deity itself, Arcane reaffirming that the thread needs to be cut, and soon. Purity’s light is flickering, a clear sign that she can’t maintain the possession of her gods much longer, even while constantly healing herself with her divine blood.

As if on cue she collapses to her knees and spits another mouthful of blood, the internal damage of too much divine power seen in the golden tint of the fluid. Staggering, she manages to throw several more wisps away from her but cannot react in time to prevent the god from stabbing her in the leg with a spear. Grunting in pain she acts as if she’s about to heal it, but Arcane grabs her telekinetically and pulls her back to where she and Faith waited.

“Don’t even think about it.” Arcane warns Purity, cutting her off from the holy powers she saw in her mindscape and shaking her head. “Resurrection will add too much divine power to your body. It needs to cool down first.” Arcane makes sure Purity wouldn’t try anything, then turned to Fate and shouts “Fate! Let me control you for a second!”

Fate, surrounded by wisps, nods while rolling her eyes, letting her power fall under the control of the massive wave of magic that flowed over her. A burst of death magic manifests into a number of humanoid figures that charge and annihilate thousands of wisps until the god freezes and splits into a similar number to fight against them. Seizing that moment Arcane has the myriad figures vanish, focusing the death and her own pure magic into a blade in the mental landscape and swinging it at the threads between the star and the pool. The thorns, dissipated across hundreds of threads instead of just one by Arcane’s ploy, barely put up any resistance, allowing her to sever thousands of them in an instant.

“Faith!” Arcane calls, hoping the other girl gets her message.

She does, letting the barrier drop and focusing her holy power to destroy the humanoids disconnected from the main source. They manage to withstand her for a while, reorienting themselves and charging at the trio frozen in place. No one moves to stop them, Purity being still wracked by the pain of channeling too much holy power, Faith concentrating to wield her holy power to maximum effect, and Arcane and Fate both motionless and powerless while the great blade in the mental realm is being controlled.

Not letting that enter into her thoughts, Arcane continues to swing, severing more and more threads while the god slowly reacts and starts reforming the defense around the strings one at a time. Targeting those it tries to repair first, Arcane keeps the blade moving without encountering serious resistance. For a second, it looks like she will succeed and cut the god off from this world permanently.

And then she falls backwards, shuddering in pain as the blade dissipates. Fate shakes in a similar way, also experiencing the backlash of attempting to cut through the full power of the god rather than a mere string. The god had not been a fool; once it realized it couldn’t defend its strings, it moved a portion of its self towards the real world, intentionally exploding one of the strings with the precise timing necessary for the shockwave to stop the blade of death magic in its tracks and rebound on the girls. Now realizing its weakness, the god recombines all of its avatars into a single shining entity, saving Faith and Purity from the oncoming wave of humanoid god fragments but also making it impossible to sever it from the real world. The golden giant that reformed at the opposite end of the dead circle of forest roars in triumph, noticing the weakness of the girls and walking slowly towards them to claim its victory.

“Ack…” Faith coughs up a mouthful of blood, kneeling on the ground with sweat pouring out of her body. She looks at the god and then shook her head at Arcane. “Time to go.”

“Yep. You got Purity?” Fate asks, running over and hauling Arcane up over her shoulder. While her magical and mental strength are exhausted, Fate keeps herself able to move by pure will, ignoring the pain in favor of escaping immediately.

“Yeah. Once Arcane recovers we can teleport, right?” Faith asks, picking up Purity and letting the other girl lean on her as they start to retreat.

“Or me. Either of us get our powers back in a minute or so and we’re good.” Fate declares, glancing over her shoulder at the slowly moving god. “I think it’s arrogant enough to give us that.”

Arcane suddenly pushes herself off of Fate and staggers to the side. Faith and Purity get several steps ahead before noticing as Fate runs back to grab Arcane again.

“No! You are not going to keep fighting in this condition!” Fate yells, grabbing her sister’s arm and pleading for her to run with them.

Arcane smiles at Fate. “Do you trust me, sister?”

Fate gulps, looking towards the approaching god and back to Arcane. “In most cases, yes, but not with your own safety. Come on, let’s run.”

“Do you really think I would risk your life?” Arcane asks sadly.

“Fate, Arcane, come on!!!” Faith yells, staggering towards the forest with Purity on her arm. The god slowly approaches as Arcane waits in its path, Fate hanging off her arm.

“I don’t have time for this, Arcane!!” Fate yells.

“Of course we do, Fate.” Arcane says, turning and walking towards the god with Fate right beside her, pulling desperately to get her to retreat. “We have all the time in the world.”

“You have got to be-” Fate starts, then freezes. Faith and Purity turn around as they feel something terrifying come into being, and even the god stops dead in its tracks. “You’re joking.” she says, her eyes fixed on something floating above Arcane’s palm.

“Of course not.” Arcane smiles, raising the tiny marble up in front of her and smiling towards the god before them. “I wonder how it will fare in my world.” She wonders.

The god turns and tries to escape, but realizes that the manifestation has not been targeted, but its actual self. Horrified, the black and red are overtaken by a new color, a pale and sickly yellow that quickly binds it in place. Screaming its unwillingness to let this happen, the god slowly stretches towards the tiny marble and breaks apart in midair.

“So, Fate, do you trust me?” Arcane asks again, looking towards her sister with a twinkle in her eye.

“Haa…” Fate sighs, glancing at the marble in her sister’s hand which contains her own personal universe. “I do. I just lost sight of that for a second.” She says, smiling at herself for ever doubting that her sister had an invincible trump card with which to absolutely annihilate the enemy she had been toying with the entire time. Even if she doubts this god would not be an easy foe, it was doomed as soon as it allowed itself to be caught in the mythic world Arcane possessed and kept secret as her greatest trump card. “Let’s go.” She says, stretching out a tendril of magic and letting herself be sucked into the tiny orb.

Seconds later, Fate stumbles onto a plain of infinite white sand, the pure and fine grains caressing her gently as her cyan haired sister materializes next to her. As she does, the world seems to bend around her, joyously welcoming the arrival of its master and absolute ruler. Then there came a violent and angry roar; hardening her face, Fate turns to see the massive golden giant charging at them, knowing the only way out of a mythic world is to kill the user or make them use up the energy needed to maintain it.

But Arcane merely rests her hand on Fate’s shoulder, calmly stopping her too tense sister who doesn’t yet realize that this battle was already over.

“Arcane?” Fate asks, glancing at the cyan haired girl standing tall and unconcerned.

“Just watch.” Arcane says, smiling as the sand recognizes the giant as something trying to harm its master and becomes aggressive.

The giant is torn apart a thousand times in a second, even its regeneration insufficient to keep up with the pace of the assault. Fate’s eyes widen as she notices what is happening, seeing portions of the divine power of every type absorbed and purified into mana by the grains of sand. The god pumps more and more energy into the giant, and more and more is absorbed by the crystalline grains. Then Arcane herself steps forward.

Buoyed by the immense mana and energy in this world, Arcane starts to prepare a massive spell. A circle of magic appears, a book worth of words floating around it in every direction and none. Fate doesn’t both trying to read it, knowing her sister’s habit of mixing in meaningless nonsense to disguise how easily she could cast extremely powerful spells. A few seconds later, Arcane releases the spell.

Neither the god nor Fate notice what happened for a few seconds, until the grains withdraw from the giant and start forming into a massive crystal which shines with immense radiance. Then both of them open their eyes wide in shock at the impossibility of what is happening.

“Arcane, you’re insane!” Fate whispers, unable to find her voice as the god itself is absorbed without bothering with the manifestation. That manifestation futily attacks the crystal, being instantly absorbed by the reservoir large enough to imprison its entire self.

Arcane watches in silence until the entire god is absorbed and then bursts into laughter. “Hahahaha!!! I didn’t think that would really work.”

“Are you kidding me? You tried to imprison an entire god in a crystal and you didn’t even know if it would work? What if it exploded?” Fate demands, staring at her sister for a whole new reason. “Also, you just basically killed a god… that’s supposed to be impossible!”

“Oh, it’s not dead.” Arcane shakes her head. “I just stole all of its power, leaving only an empty frame where its concept used to be.”

“That’s dead, to a god.” Fate sighs, rolling her eyes at her perfectionist sister. “And you killed it.”

“Technically…” Arcane tries to correct again, but Fate puts her finger on her lips.

“Dead.” She says, cutting off all of Arcane’s disagreements. “Alright, now let’s go back. I wonder how Faith and Purity are going to react… kukuku.” Fate giggles to herself in a decidedly unpleasant tone.

“Um, about that…” Arcane says in a hesitant tone. “Can we stay here for a while?”

Fate turns and looks at her, shrugging. “I don’t have a problem with it. Why?”

“I don’t really want to reveal how powerful this place is…” Arcane explains evasively, not looking at Fate. Fate nods in agreement then narrows her eyes. That’s a very reasonable explanation; thus Fate was curious as to why Arcane was acting like it was suspicious.

“What aren’t you telling me?” Fate demands, not letting on that she has no idea if there actually is any such thing.

Her bluff bears fruit. “Uwah…” Arcane cries, her eyes swimming.

“Arcane?” Fate pushes, forcing her sister to look her in the eyes.

“Um, well, you see… I kind of, asked you to help… um, entirely to talk to you… um, in private, kind of, so… you know, can we…” Arcane mumbles, looking everywhere but at Fate herself.

Fate stares at her, processing what she just heard. “Let me get this straight… you went through that entire thing, fought with an actual god, came this close to killing all of us,” She held up her hand with her fingers held just barely apart, “All so you could talk to me?!”

“Um… yes.” Arcane whispers, looking down and blushing.

Fate sighs and sits down. “Okay then.”

“Um…” Arcane says, peeking at Fate from the corner of her eye. “You’re not… mad?”

“Oh, I’m absolutely livid.” Fate says cheerfully. “But I figure if you’re going to go through this much trouble to talk to me, I might as well hear you out.”

Arcane sighs in relief and sits down. She opens her mouth, then stops and sits in silence, feeling Fate’s unblinking stare boring into her. Even so, she doesn’t respond and looks around at the mythic world they now find themselves in.

The ground is an infinite plain of white. The plain is made up of endless grains of white sand like substance, though they are actually a form of crystallized magic that obey no physical laws. In every direction, it looks identical, save for the one in which the massive crystal is now sinking below the ground, shining like a beacon of light. As it sinks it is breaking up into countless tiny grains, dissipating the immense power of the god throughout this entire plain.

The entire thing was made to cover for Arcane’s one weakness, a low reservoir of magical energy. Thus it is able to absorb her nigh infinite power constantly, having a capacity beyond that of every god known to man but one. High above are stars, sparkling masses of light made up of crystals radiating rather than absorbing energy. Threads of white can be slightly seen against the dark sky, connecting the stars to the ground and each other.

They sit in silence for a while Fate waiting for Arcane to make the first move, Arcane trying to figure out what to say. Finally, after what seemed like forever, one of them spoke.

“Fate.” Arcane says softly.

“You’re finally ready to talk?” Fate replies, raising an eyebrow. “For someone who went this far just to talk to me in ‘private’, I expected better.”

“Uwah…” Arcane cries, ducking her head into her knees again. “Um… Fate, can I ask you something?”

Fate waits in silence for a while. Then she coughs and shakes her head again. “Arcane, normally that’s a rhetorical question. Nobody actually waits to hear the answer before asking their next question.”

“Oh.” Arcane replies, her voice muffled by her head being between her knees. “Then is that a yes?”

“God, yes!” Fate yells, flinging sand over Arcane as she throws her hands in the air in exasperation. “Get on with it.”

“Okay.” Arcane says, without lifting her head. “Fate…”

“...” Fate says nothing, clenching her hands as she waits.

“Um, what do you think, about me?” Arcane finally asks, keeping her face hidden the entire time.

“That’s what you wanted to ask me in private?” Fate exclaims, staring at Arcane. Getting no answer, she sighs and shakes her head. “Seriously…”

Looking up at the sky, Fate begins to answer. “You’re annoying, overconfident, and a perfectionist. You can never do anything perfectly right, but nobody else can either because you’re better than anyone else. You’re a busybody who won’t leave anyone else alone, constantly meddling in things that are none of your business, and can’t figure out where the line is between reasonable and unreasonable concern and have absolutely no people skills. And there’s your lamentable love for fighting, though you also always have to have a good reason for doing it which is even more annoying, honestly. Then you pretend to be mature when anyone’s watching, despite the fact that everyone knows you’re just a child on the inside and it’s all completely pointless. I mean, you’re probably the source of ninety percent of all my problems, if not more.”

Fate then smiles while looking up at the sky. “But you’re also pretty amazing, you know. I mean sure, you can be a bit of a child, and you’re oh so bossy and controlling, but you’re still a really good sister. Whenever we need you you’re there, as long as we ask. Sure, you can’t read us that well and know when we want to be left alone, or when we want you to comfort us, but somehow you always seem to know what to do to get us back on our feet even if it’s not what we wanted from you. You seem naive, but it’s actually a bit more like optimism or just belief in yourself and all of us, which makes us believe in ourselves too.”

“Don’t even get me started on your magic.” Fate continues, looking around in awe at the mythic world. “I mean, there’s this, your own personal reality, for god’s sake. Then there’s that trick where you can control the rest of our powers, which is awesome when you combine then into more and more ridiculous abilities the rest of us would have never thought of. And even without any of that you’re strong enough to face a god one on one and at least tie it for a while, when there’s probably nobody else in existence who can even last a few minutes without being beaten to a pulp.”

Fate looks at Arcane and smiles, though the other girl is still hiding her face. “So what do I think of you? I think you’re the best sister a girl could ask for, a wonderful ally I can always count on, a terrifying opponent in any competition, and a trusted friend. Does that answer your question?”

Arcane doesn’t say anything for a long time, prompting Fate to poke her and check if she’s awake. “Arcane?”

“Sister, ally, opponent, friend… is that is?” Arcane mutters back, so softly Fate barely hears it.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t catch that?” Fate asks.

Arcane raises her head and looks at her sister with watery eyes. Rubbing them quickly, she continues to stare at her sister with an intensity that makes Fate uncomfortable. “Um, Arcane, are you okay?” She fidgets, looking away from that piercing look.

“I’ve tried to control it, I really have…” Arcane mutters as if to herself, looking away from Fate and back out into the endless plain. “But no matter what I do, it keeps coming back.”

Frowning, Fate examines her sister, seeing her trembling shoulders and noticing that Arcane suddenly appeared a lot more fragile and uncertain than she had outside. But no matter what she did, she couldn’t think of what was wrong.

“Fate.” Arcane calls, prompting the named girl to sit up and meet her sister’s eyes. “Let me tell you what I think about you.”

“Go ahead.” Fate says with a shrug, figuring it wouldn’t be fair if she was the only one who got to complain.

“You’re beautiful, Fate.” Arcane says to start. Fate’s prepared smile fades. This is not what she expected at all. “You truly are, when you aren’t pretending to be someone you’re not. You’re kind, generous, and compassionate. You care so much about your friends and family that you’d cut yourself off from them so they would be happy. You pretend to be cold hearted, like the death you believe is part of you, but that only makes you shine all the brighter.”

“You say I’m the one who supports everyone around me… maybe. But I do it by being supported by them; it’s you who stands alone and lets yourself be pushed down so others may rise. I don’t think it’s even close, which one of us is more supportive than the other. You say I’m naive, but it’s you who actually still trusts people and shows them herself. You trust me so deeply you don’t even notice that I’m never being authentic, never being myself. It’s wonderful having such unconditional trust from my sister. Neither Dawn nor Flame does anymore, you know…” Arcane continues, taking a deep breath and wiping her eyes once again. Fate doesn’t say anything, unsure how exactly to react to this turn of events.

“I’m touched you still think I’m innocent. I’m stained, Fate. Stained with the sins I’ve seen, sins I’ve done. You can’t imagine how cynical I truly am, how unable to trust anyone I’ve become. I… I always hoped, it wouldn’t have to be this way. That you… you of all people would notice, would see that I am not who I pretend to be. That maybe… maybe I… I wouldn’t have to be the one… to shatter your illusion.” Arcane stammers, her voice breaking every few words while she frantically wiped her eyes.

“You said once, that I cannot control others.” Arcane says abruptly, firming up her voice. “Of course I can’t. There’s only one person I can control, and that person is, and always will be, me. But, despite that, it seems there are parts I can’t quite perfect.”

Fate watches as Arcane finally turned to look at her, taking a deep breath and wiping her clear eyes one last time. “My heart is my own, and I can deny it no longer. Fate of Magia, you are my sister, my ally, my opponent, and my friend. But above all…” Arcane pauses, taking a deep breath. “Above all… you are the one I love.”

Fate remains silent, looking back at Arcane’s clear yet trembling eyes for a long time. Finally, she opens her mouth. “This is why you brought me here?” She asks, her voice unnaturally calm.

Arcane nods slowly. “I’m sorry… I couldn’t go on not… not telling you anything… about how I felt. I know… I know things can never be the same between us… so… I’m sorry… Can you ever… forgive…”

“What is there to forgive?” Fate asks, her voice filling with confidence.

“For…” Arcane starts to say.

“What’s there to forgive?” Fate demands again, causing Arcane to fall silent. “Falling in love? When did that become a crime? Confessing to your love? How do you think babies are born, if no one is allowed to speak of their feelings? You feeling guilty for this? That’s probably wrong, but certainly not something I need to forgive you for.”

“But… but…” Arcane stammers.

“But what, Arcane? Is this all you want? If you claim to love me, is this all the further you want to go, just saying some words and then never speaking of it again? Is this really what you think of me, that I’ll be mad or something? What happened to all those compliments you were spouting a minute ago?” Fate continues, an endless barrage of questions.

“It’s not you!” Arcane shouts, her eyes blazing suddenly before turning dull and lifeless again. “It’s me… I’m not worthy…”

“To Inferno with that!” Fate snaps, slapping the sand with a brisk motion. “Not worthy? Not worthy? What in the heavens are you thinking, that you aren’t worthy. Besides, does it even matter what you think? What about what I feel, have you ever considered that?”

“You don’t love me, though!” Arcane cries. “Sister, Ally, Opponent, Friend. That’s all you think of me as!”

“Who said you’re the only one who can hold things back!” Fate shouts. “Maybe I’m the one who feels she’s unworthy to love the perfect sister she’s always looked up to, maybe I’m the one so ashamed of my feelings that I won’t speak of them even when a perfect opportunity comes along! Your heart is your own, well so is mine! And if you’re going to say you love me, then I’ll say it right back! I love you, Arcane of Magia! Even if you always make me so angry I could scream, so ashamed I could explode, and so miserable I could cry, I love you more than anyone! I always have, ever since the day I first met you, and I always will!”

“You…” Arcane says, her eyes flashing as she stares back at Fate.

Fate tries to catch her breath, panting at the furious tirade of words she just unleashed on Arcane. The two stare at each other for a while before blushing furiously and turning away.

“So… I love you, and you love me.” Arcane says with a giggle.

“Seems that way.” Fate replies, her face burning scarlet but a hint of joy in her voice.

“I see…” Arcane mutters. “So… what now?”

“I don’t know.” Fate says. “I’ve never read a lot of romance.”

“Neither have I.” Arcane notes. “You think we need to?”

“They tend to be boring and sappy.” Fate observes. “Let’s just try to figure it out our way.”

“Our way?” Arcane asks.

“Our way.” Fate replies. “I love you, Arcane.”

“And I… Love you, Fate.” Arcane replies, and the two lean back so they’re shoulders are touching. “Let’s just stay like this for a while.”

“What about Purity and Faith?” Fate asks, though she doesn’t directly disagree.

“They can wait. That god’s pretty strong, isn’t it?” Arcane returns while closing her eyes.

“Really strong.” Fate agrees, as the two girls watch the dancing sparks of diamond dust in their own personal world, forgetting everything else in the universe but each other for a few short minutes.