Gabriel watched in abject horror as Lydia fell. She was the strongest person he had ever known, and in the end, she had been utterly powerless. Surely she had been meant to die in a clash of blades, at an age where her experience and her energy were misaligned. Surely she was destined for some epic dual, to fall at the hands of one just like her, who would take the mantle and continue the way of the warrior. Not like this. Not like this.

The shriek of a young woman, much younger in spirit than she was in body, yanked Gabriel from his mournfulness.

Natasha was slashing away with a dagger at a man just out of reach. Her other hand was wrapped around a spear, a spear that entered at her midriff and was visible through her arched back, just to the right of her spine. The redheaded girl bucked and flailed, her teeth gritted in pain, her heart set on the kill. Blood was staining her teeth and chin as red as her burnished locks.

“No, no, no!” Gabriel cried as he stabbed the soldier who had stabbed his sister. He didn’t even watch the other man die as he took Natasha in both arms and half-guided, half-dragged her to the edge of the room, “It’s okay, Natasha. It’s okay.”

Gabriel’s hands were hovering over the wound, unsure of what to do. He swore and he cursed at his own ineptitude as he debated whether to pull the spear or leave it. Finally, he simply held Natasha’s cheeks in his hands, painting them with more of her own lifeblood, and repeated over and over, “It’s okay.”

There was little enough reason left for Vish to pretend he had been fighting. He dropped his sword, sat on the ground, and ran his fingers through his hair. It would be over soon, he knew, and even if he survived, he would have to start a new life again. He may as well just leave now. What difference would it make if he just made for the stairs and never looked back? Lydia was gone. Bling? Gabriel soon, for sure. What difference would it make?

Vish didn’t register the first few times he felt a pull at the hem of his robe. It was a feeble little thing, barely stronger than the tugging of a toddler, but just as persistent. He looked down to see Tulcetar, propped up on an elbow, staring at him through glazed eyes.

“Help, me,” the mage croaked through an impossibly dry throat.

Vish shook his head, “I can’t help you.”

“No,” Tulcetar tried to swallow, “Help me… stop him.”

“How? What can I do?”

“I can still,” Tulcetar touched his forehead with a crabbed hand, “fight.”

It took Vish a moment to get the dying mage’s meaning, but when he did, hope tingled through his body. He checked over the edge of the pew to see Hamish strutting down the center aisle, dispatching survivors with morbid glee.

“Are you sure?”

Tulcetar wheezed the ghost of a laugh, “Very sure.”

Vish smiled ruefully, “One last hurrah then, buddy.”

Vish crouched low, tracking the channeler as he went from one kill to the next. He had thought his powers useless here, so strong in will was a magic user that he had little chance of influencing his mind, and no chance at all of displacing it. That wasn’t what Tulcetar was suggesting though, he was suggesting that the mind-mapper assault it. Vish was going to bombard Hamish’s mind with the only weapon he had left at his disposal.

With one hand resting on Tulcetar’s scalp, and the other gripping tightly onto the edge of the pew, Vish pulled Tulcetar’s willing soul from its body, and launched it at Hamish.

The channeler, already basking in his victory, suddenly stumbled. His head spasmed on his neck, and his face contorted with foreign emotions. He clutched at his temples, and watched in bafflement as his hands were hesitant to respond to him.

It was working, Tulcetar’s hate-fuelled soul was burrowing into Hamish’s essence, and enmeshing itself with his own intent.

It was working, but not fast enough.

Vish whimpered when Hamish figured out who had assailed him and started forming a lance of rock to counter this intrapersonal threat with a very interpersonal one. Quickly, the mind-mapper found another of Tulcetar’s men close to expiring, and sent that soul to join his leader’s.

Hamish reeled again.

It was definitely working. It was just going to take some serious volume.

Vish ran up and down the room, stopping at every half-dead or heavily injured soldier and launching their souls at Hamish like missiles. The souls hammered Hamish’s own, eroding his very core. Some were deflected, but many stuck. Those that stuck spread the seeds of their hate and loathing into Hamish’s being.

Seeing the channeler weakened, Gabriel took up his sister’s dagger and charged. He set his teeth, and willed murder into his pacifistic heart. He would avenge his people if it cost him his life.

As the pale mercenary rushed towards him, Hamish hastily unleashed a burst of flame. It was a feeble thing, stretching little more than an arm’s span in front of him, but it was enough to keep Gabriel from getting close enough to cause harm. Hamish was severely addled, but he still had enough wherewithal to defend himself.

With a curse, Vish realised that it wasn’t yet enough. The mind-mapper worked quickly, using all of the ammo he had. Some were Tulcetar’s men, some were Hamish’s; whatever, they all looked the same, and they would all add to the confusion. All of the souls made an impact, regardless of origin, and some of them, like Tulcetar’s, tore hungrily at the very fabric of the channeler’s being.

Hamish was close. He was perilously close to losing the battle for himself. However, Vish was running out of souls.

“Vish,” a small voice said.

The mind-mapper turned.

“Vish,” Bling said again.

Vish looked back and forth between the redhead and where her brother was recklessly trying to penetrate through Hamish’s defences.

“Geez, Natasha, are you sure?”

Bling took a few deep breaths to steady herself and said, “Yes.”

Bling had never looked so much like Natasha as she did in this moment. Even through all of the blood, sweat and grime, she looked like the girl Vish had watched grow into a fierce young woman. She looked like the wise and caring leader she had been. Just as she had before, she looked utterly determined.

“Well then,” Vish said, placing his hand in hers, “Go be awesome.”

Hamish was upping his tempo, unleashing blast after blast to keep Gabriel at bay. The souls were worming away inside of him, but he knew he had to deal with this threat of the flesh first. If he could just muster the concentration for one good bout of aether infused magic, it would all be over.

That’s when Natasha hit him.

This new soul landed with a neck-snapping smack, physically staggering Hamish, and mentally devastating him. It wasn’t just ‘a new soul’, though. Here was a Valkyrie of sororal passion and protectiveness, intertwined with the cunning and self-preservation of a crow, and the total bemusement, of a year’s old Rodney the cricket. The new souls worked as one, boring a hole straight to the center of Hamish’s own self, and unleashing their carnage on the collective that now resided there.

The channeler succumbed to the writhing snaking of utter madness. His body froze. His eyes locked.

He screamed.

Hamish screamed in fear, in agony, and in unfettered self-hatred. He screamed with the voices of a dozen men. He screamed with the voice of Tulcetar, that hope-filled and pure-hearted soul. He screamed with the panicked fear of an ancient crow. He screamed with the love and determination of Natasha.

He screamed right up until Gabriel plunged the dagger into his heart, and then he stopped.

It was a surreal sight for Gabriel. One moment the channeler was locked in lunacy, the next he was perfectly calm, a dagger sticking from his chest, and a smile playing on his lips. In the last few seconds before he died, the channeler took Gabriel’s hand, and helped him to sink the dagger deeper still, right up to the hilt. There was gratitude written upon his face. With his other hand, Hamish held out the pearl, unmistakable in its size and beauty.

Gabriel took the pearl as Hamish fell back into an eternal bond with the aether, and ran to his sister’s side.

“No!” Gabriel shouted when he saw the vacant look on Natasha’s face, “No, you can’t go!” he said, dropping the pearl to shake her.

“It was her time, Gabriel. It’s been her time for a while now.”

“Don’t say that! You can’t say that! She was… She was,” Gabriel wiped at his eyes, “You did this, didn’t you! You did this, you selfish bastard.”

“Gabe, it’s not like that.”

“Get her back! Get her back! I,” Gabriel’s face switched from anger to agony, “I need to say goodbye, Vish. Please. I beg you. Please let me say goodbye.”

Vish sighed. He picked up the pearl, the thing that so many of his friends had died for, and looked Gabriel in the eye.

Vish saw a broken man.

“Please,” Gabriel whispered, his eyes brimming with tears.

“I’ll,” the mind-mapper breathed heavily, “I’ll see what I can do.”

With that, Vish stood up, and approached Hamish’s body. It was an absurdly long walk, through rows of white limestone seats and ranks of the deceased, many of whom he had yanked from their bodies to live out their final moments tormenting the soul of another. Some lived, at least, but they were tight of mouth, their losses too great to dare speak of victory. Vish saw several of Screamer’s men checking the dead, including Nail-Puller, who was dispatching the last of Hamish’s ilk. Vagalad was also there, watching from the balcony, with two or three others tending the wounded behind. Sadly, that was about it.

When Vish finally reached Hamish, he realised three things:

Vish realised that he would never be able to extricate Natasha’s soul from the mess of beings that were rapidly fading from the corporeal realm. He tried, he really did, but he could only send memories of the spirits they had been back to that broken body. There was too much confusion here to take hold. Not enough of a single consciousness to take charge.

Secondly, Vish realised that he was finally all alone again. He had lost the few people who had tolerated him, and with Gabriel hating him that would be a full house. He was once again doomed to be an outcast, wandering without friend or kin until old age finally took this borrowed body and consigned him too to the aether.

The third thing Vish realised…

Was that this fucking pearl had a soul attached to it.

It was a faint little thing, quiet and sleepy (sort of like a cricket’s, actually), but it was unmistakably a soul.

That was when Vish had an idea. Gabriel didn’t need Natasha back; he’d lost her long ago. Gabriel just needed a goodbye. A little flash of light in Natasha’s eyes would be enough for him to say his piece, and then Natasha’s body would expire anyway, and, with it, the borrowed soul. What harm could it do? By the time this soul knew what was happening, Bling’s body would be dead anyway.

And then?

Then maybe Vish would still be able to keep one friend.

“Ah, screw it,” the mind-mapper said, “What’s one little fib?”

And so Vish willed the subdued soul from the pearl, and into Natasha’s body.

Gabriel stopped crying the instant he felt Natasha’s hand twitch.

He watched her closely.

He didn’t dare believe.

Slowly, Natasha raised her head, and looked up.

“Oh, gods!” Gabriel said, taking her by the shoulders, “I thought I’d lost you!”

There was no recognition in Natasha’s eyes, though, just a listless, lethargic bewilderment, like she had woken from a very, very long sleep. Then she stood up.

“Natasha?” Gabriel said, reaching for her arm.

The redhead batted Gabriel’s hand away and looked at him like he was utterly repulsive. Her lips curled with disdain, but she just as quickly forgot about him. She had become distracted by something else - a giant spear sticking out of her.

“What the?” Natasha said, snapping the spear effortlessly and removing both ends, “Bloody splinters,” she snorted.

Gabriel, Nail-puller, Vish, and the few other remaining survivors, watched in paralyzed awe as Natasha flexed her joints, jogged on the spot, and did a couple of star jumps. She didn’t seem especially impressed by her own performance.

“Are you… alright?” Gabriel asked.

“Hmm?” Natasha answered, and then got sidetracked by her reflection in a battered helmet, “Oh no, no, no. This won’t do. This won’t do at all.”

Natasha shut her eyes and, as everyone watched, her blazing red hair transformed from root to tip. Each strand was bleached a magnificent, shimmering white. Like ink on wet paper, it spread until every last drop of colour was sapped from her glorious tresses.

“What in aether?” Nail-Puller said for all of them.

With her hairdo complete, Natasha bent forward and started groaning and grunting like she were lifting a tremendous weight. The onlookers were dumbfounded, until two toothlike hooks tore from her back. They ripped through Natasha’s skin and extended behind her. They were long, rib-like things, and from them more of the horn-like protrusions jutted and grew, until finally they unfurled. They unfurled into two enormous, glittering, bright white wings.

Gabriel’s mouth hung open. As he watched this nightmare unfold, Agnes the tea lady’s prophecy came to him unbidden:

‘… she was carved of ivory, driving an ornate carriage. The carriage moved backwards, though the wheels never turned. It was dragging in its wake the three horses that had guided it. One horse of black. One horse of brown. One horse of red.’

These were not the only words Gabriel recalled. He also recalled the words of the crypt keeper. He recalled how Ruby had made dragons of his own construction, and how he had made them in his image. He recalled that the dragons had largely been dormant for centuries, hiding away in places unknown. He recalled that they were, “as vain as they were unimaginative,” those self-absorbed aetherlings that lorded themselves over humans with names such as Emerald, Sapphire, Diamond and… Pearl?

Gabriel looked beyond his sister’s body to where Vish was standing, still holding the gemstone.

“What have you done?” Gabriel breathed.

Vish could only shake his head in disbelief.

The spear wound Natasha had suffered was now completely gone. She looked totally fresh, and maybe even a decade younger. Now satisfied, she flexed her opalescent wings.

No, not opalescent, pearlescent.

“Right,” the freshly awoken dragon said, “Which kingdom’s mine?”

END