Discordant Note | TBATE

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Circe Milview

The sound of my boots kicking up cold, winter dirt didn't do much to block out the slight exhaustion burning in my veins. I heaved for breath, my long hair sticking to my face as I trod after Seth. My younger brother bounded across the rocky terrain with impossible ease as he tracked toward something I couldn't see or understand.

"Just a ways over this ridge, Circe!" he called back to me as he stood triumphantly atop a boulder. "I recognize this place! We're so close!"

I finally managed to reach my baby brother, before collapsing in a heap atop the ridge. The winter chill tugged at my thick clothes, but the sticky sweat lining the inside of my jacket made me feel like I'd simply jumped into a hot river.

"Give… me a moment, Seth," I wheezed, laying out across the rock as I fought to get my breath back. "Can't… Can't move like you."

Ever since Spellsong had healed my brother, he'd borne an impossible sort of vitality that defied belief. Anyone who saw him would never have guessed that he'd spent his entire life stuck in a bed with twigs for arms and blood fits that brought him low.

He did still have fits. But they… they were different.

"It's just over this next ridge, Circe," Seth said, his slightly-high voice resolute. He'd turned thirteen recently, and he'd really started to shoot up. "You can still use True Sense, right? I think you'll be able to figure it out when we get there."

I finally sat up, groaning slightly. "You didn't see the place we need to go, exactly?" I said. "I thought you did."

Seth shook his head, his short dark hair waving slightly. I'd finally gotten around to cutting it regularly. "The visions aren't like that. Not really. I can tell that it's really important that we're here. Or somewhere around here. But it's really weird. You wouldn't believe it!"

I sat up slightly, staring around at the expanse of boulders where we stood. We were far, far from civilization. At Seth's most recent fit, he'd demanded that we leave to come here, traveling to the middle of nowhere. Dozens of miles from the closest town and near the headwaters of the Heart's Blood River.

He hadn't even been able to ask me why. Just had a feeling.

He'd told me I needed to have faith.

Faith in what? I thought bitterly, feeling my body tremble as the events of the past seven months sifted back through my mind. Faith didn't save my brother. Faith didn't give him back his life.

I'd always been an avid worshiper of the Vritra, believing in their promises. Following their vows of salvation for all. The lie that I would bring glory and honor to my Blood if I just dedicated my soul.

But my faith hadn't been rewarded. Far from it.

One of the first times Seth had another one of his fits, I'd descended into deep, primal worry. I feared that his blood sickness had somehow resurged, coming to reap its vengeance. But though he'd shaken and his eyes had rolled into the back of his head, he'd emerged from it no worse for wear.

Except he spoke of impossible things. He told me that we needed to leave our house and take our things, because it was a bad time to be there. I didn't understand what he was saying. I didn't really believe it, either. But I'd been so grateful to have my brother back that I'd acquiesced anyway.

And I'd watched from a block away as hooded men in robes of the Doctrination battered down our door, before ransacking every meager possession we had. I'd heard them as they'd walked by our hiding place, claiming that this was worthy tithe they were taking. Because I'd stopped sending in my monthly donations.

They'd robbed us blind. They'd taken nearly everything we owned. And they said it was worthy tithe.

The Doctrination was a lie, I thought angrily. They lied to me. They lied to Seth.

And then Seth continued to have his fits at their regular frequency. Except whenever he had them, he was granted knowledge.

Where we needed to be to avoid a rampaging carriage that would've flattened us both. Where I had to stand in the academy to catch a girl who fell from the roof and would have otherwise snapped her neck.

I didn't understand why or how. But Spellsong had bestowed something divine upon my brother. I remembered the wash of power that had held the air as he used that impossible light to bring us salvation.

"Do you know what's so important about this?" I asked weakly as I finally found strength again, pushing myself back to my feet.

"No, not really," Seth said simply, unperturbed. "I just know we gotta be here. And this is more important than anything I've ever had to do, somehow. And I've got faith in that."

That's okay. I don't need all the answers, I thought. I can have a little faith in him.

"You just need me to use True Sense here?" I said, already reaching for my emblem. Seth nodded.

I settled down into a cross-legged pose atop the rock, taking a deep breath. I'd graduated from Khaernian Academy as one of the top sentries the school had ever produced. I might have immediately gone into the Relictombs as an ascender or worked in some sort of medical field, but Seth had insisted we take this trip to the middle of nowhere.

Have faith, Circe, I repeated to myself like a dead mantra. Just have a little faith in him.

I engaged True Sense, and my spirit left my body. I immediately felt as if I'd been dunked in cold water, or left outside in a tempest of snow. But I was familiar with that sensation by now.

I gritted my teeth, feeling the strain on my core immediately even as I slowly panned about. All about me, I had an almost instinctive sense for the ambient mana.

Fire, I thought, honing in on the easiest element for me to sense. Red mana particles lit up in my vision, abounding close to the ground and higher in the sky as the sunlight carried them about.

I scanned the world, trying to see some sort of discrepancy. Seth thought that I'd just be able to piece it together without much effort, whatever it was.

I didn't see anything out of the norm. I shifted to wind mana, scanning the sky where the green particles were most present. Nothing out of place. Water mana, too, showed no signs of influence.

I was starting to get a little frustrated as my ghostlike form drifted about haphazardly, trying to see some sort of distortion or break or something. I could feel the time limit of the emblem nearing, and it would be a while before I could afford to use it again.

With a grim sort of resolve, I finally switched to earth mana.

And that was when I sensed it. Almost like a bleeding wound, there was some sort of tear in the earth mana right near where Seth stood. Like a jagged claw across the normal flow, there was a distinct gap in the normal weave of sturdy stone that always pervaded the world.

I focused in on it, feeling a measure of surprise. It was a small little tear, and I wouldn't have even noticed it without Seth's direction.

My mana core twinged, and my head felt foggy for a moment. I groaned as I was pulled back toward my body. I gasped cold air as my body trembled from that single use. Seth patted my back in a comforting way, his hands jittery despite his strangely solemn gaze.

"You were right, Seth," I heaved, trying for the second time in five minutes to catch my breath. I pointed a ways forward at the edge of a nearby stone. "Over there. There's some sort of tear in the earth mana. Like someone sank claws into the earth and churned it apart."

Seth waited for me to catch my breath, patting me on the back with a concerned furrow to his brows. He looked toward the place I'd highlighted, appearing hesitant for the first time.

I heaved myself to my feet, feeling a twinge in my mana core. Once Seth saw that I could move, he turned suddenly nervous eyes toward the boulder I'd indicated.

"I'm going first," I said with conviction. I placed myself in front of Seth as I looked at where I knew the strange tear was.

"Circe," Seth started, sounding unsure as the wind whipped at his hair. His lips looked dry. "You don't know what's over there."

"Which is why I'm going in before you," I said, reaching a hand back and ruffling his hair. He didn't look amused. "You've got the strange future sense or whatever it is. That's way more important than whatever I have."

I didn't give him a chance to protest. I walked toward the boulder, squaring my shoulders and presenting an outwardly brave front. After all, I was still Seth's big sister. Earlier, I'd thought his faith unshakeable, but I'd forgotten in some small way that he was still a young boy.

But as I trotted toward the boulder, I felt my anxiety spike. It wasn't much larger than I was at all, but in the cold winter afternoon, it seemed to loom with impossible height. The edges—rounded by weathering and smoothed by time—distorted into sharpened claws.

I swallowed as I finally stepped forward, right before the boulder. It's just a rock, I chastised myself, feeling the sweat inside my jacket all the more as goosebumps trailed along my skin. Stop holding yourself back.

That was something Professor Entrun repeated over and over and over. Our greatest limit was ourselves. We held ourselves back from greatness. Too often we quit before we could give it our all; before we drained every last drop of mana and blood for our Sovereigns.

I laid my hand on the rock, not knowing what to expect. But I wasn't entirely shocked to feel the stone rippling unnaturally beneath my palm.

"Woah," Seth echoed behind me, entranced as he leaned closer to the rock, watching as it churned like the surface of a lake. "That's so weird!"

"A barrier spell," I said quietly, recognizing this from my lessons at Khaernian Academy. "But like nothing I've ever seen."

Most illusory barrier spells had some sort of sign that could identify them to sentries, especially with True Sense. But this was an unnatural entry point, as far as I could tell. Which meant the spellwork had been perfect enough to avoid detection from my emblem in all ranges of ambient mana. Only this entrance point—an unnatural, wrenching one—was what gave it away.

I felt my worries resurge again as the implications washed through me. A mage who could cast a barrier strong enough to avoid True Sense? They must have been using a regalia at least.

"Circe?" Seth asked behind me, sensing my trepidation.

I gritted my teeth. Have faith in Seth, I thought. He's been there for you so far.

I stepped forward, the rock rippling and pulsing around me. For an instant, all was darkness as the claustrophobic sense of the earth swallowing me took hold.

Is this what a grave is like? I thought for an instant, my breathing instinctively ratcheting up. Is this what it's like to be a corpse?

And then I was falling. It happened so suddenly that I didn't even have time to scream. The sense of the stone around me vanished as I was suddenly embraced by the air instead. I breathed in sharply, ready to scream in surprise.

I hit the water, submerging instantly. The sudden sense of my thick clothes and jacket being submerged swallowed me. I paddled my arms in surprise as I desperately swam to the surface of whatever I'd been, my thoughts a jumbled mess.

I gasped as I splashed to the surface, coughing and hacking as I treaded water. I blinked, trying to adjust to the utter darkness I found myself in. I could barely see a foot in front of me as I oriented in the water, looking for some spot of land or something.

Then there was another splash. I turned about abruptly, noting that Seth had fallen from the ceiling as well. He thrashed in surprise and fear as he was nearly pulled underwater, kicking and sputtering.

My instincts kicked in as I swam over to him, grabbing his hand and trying to steady him. "Seth!" I called, giving him a place to hold. "Seth, it's just water! Remember the river! I taught you to swim! Remember!"

My baby brother continued to kick for a moment, but then he managed to meet my eyes. His fear and terror managed to even out slightly as I held him tightly. I gritted my teeth, trying to convey my care.

Seth's frantic kicking and pushing–while still fast and unwieldy–took on the pattern necessary to keep him afloat. He wasn't the best swimmer. I'd barely had time to teach him as his blood sickness went away. But he didn't need to be a good swimmer right now.

I held Seth's shoulders lightly. "I think I spotted the far bank behind me," I said quietly, noting how my voice seemed to echo. "We're going to swim toward there, okay? Slowly and carefully. You go in front of me. I'll be here to help if you start to panic."

Seth nodded quickly, his face pale. He took a deep, shaky breath, orienting in the water and facing toward where I indicated.

And then he began to swim.

I followed behind him, my mind alert and buzzing as I focused on keeping Seth above water, but also on where we were. It appeared like an underground cavern of some sort, the stone above likely an entry point of some kind. We'd fallen through the stone to reach this place, but what was this place?

Seth finally reached the shore. He hauled himself to a rocky outcropping, dripping with water as he lay there bonelessly for a moment. I reached a moment later, resting on my hands and knees as my sopping clothing clung to my body.

"We gotta get these clothes off," I muttered tiredly, shivering as the cold water bit into my very soul. Professor Entrun's lessons on wilderness survival bounced around in my head. "Cold clothes sap body heat faster. Gotta let 'em dry," I wheezed, water dripping from my shoulder-length hair.

I was a sentry, not a striker or shield, so I had no way to augment my body and keep myself warm. Neither did my brother.

I sidled over to Seth first where he lay, my brother looking up at me tiredly. The exhaustion in his eyes mirrored mine, but I wasn't about to let him freeze. He shivered, his teeth chattering.

I helped Seth work at his buttons, my body starting to tremble more and more as the chill set into my bones. He finally managed to get his jacket off, tossing it to the side to air.

With the hardest part out of the way, I let Seth continue on his own in undressing. I hobbled a bit further away as I worked at my thick jacket, inspecting my dimension ring for our spare clothes and some towels to dry ourselves.

It took only a few minutes for us both to lay our clothes out to dry. I handed Seth a spare set of pants, a shirt, and everything else he needed. But he would still be cold without his jacket.

I trembled, my teeth rattling as I pulled on a new shirt in the darkness. I could barely see anything in this cavern, but there was almost an… aura that made the cold bite harder, sink deeper into my very soul. The ambient mana felt strange in a way I couldn't describe, like the legs of a hundred spiders ghosting across my freezing skin.

Well, we're here, I thought as I withdrew a flare from my dimension ring. One of the only ones we had. But what exactly is supposed to happen now?

I struck the flare, giving me solid light for a moment. A tiny ember of red banished the darkness in a small radius around me as it hissed, sputtering in little sparks. Seth sidled up to it, hugging me for warmth–and I thought a bit of comfort.

My fingers brushed against the dagger on my thigh, my throat drying out as I was suddenly very aware of the possibility of mana beasts in this little cave. I couldn't see much, even as I rotated around. "Any idea what we need to do next, Seth?" I asked, wrapping an arm around him as we shared body heat.

"I don't know," he said in a small voice, the fear radiating from him as his eyes darted everywhere about the lake. "I just feel like we need to be here. Or somewhere nearby. That's… That's all I got."

I gritted my teeth, feeling my heart rate increase. Did his vision just lead us here to die? I wondered, looking up at the ceiling. We wouldn't be able to get out from whence we came.

No, Circe, I chastised myself. You can't think like that.

I moved the flare in a circular manner, trying to find something of note in this darkness. I was starting to lose hope even more until the light reflected off of something a ways away.

"Seth," I said hastily, patting his shoulder and gesturing toward what I'd noticed. "Look! A stream. Probably what leads to this underground lake."

"I'll follow you, Circe," he said, huddling down. "I… I'm not any use here."

I exhaled lightly, that pervasive sense of death in the air resonating with my blood. I trembled lightly. "Okay. I'm gonna try and follow that stream to see where it goes," I said, already beginning to lead us toward the water. "It would be good if we can find a way out of here, then come back for our wet clothes."

The sound of my shoes squelching on the stone echoed into the din, nothing responding. The silence was eerie, the kind that almost felt like a noise of its own. The kind that demanded your attention in the same way a subtle whisper did.

And then I reached the stream, and I felt my heart drop out of my chest.

It wasn't a stream that slowly trickled toward the lake. I'd thought the glimpses of red I'd seen were simply the reflections of my flare off the surface of the water, but I'd been wrong.

It was blood.

My hands clenched around the flare as I turned slowly, following the slow stream back to its source.

And I saw a god. Dead, ruby eyes stared out from a face of gray skin. Shattered onyx horns spiraled from their blood-drenched skull, the Vritra judging me like a lesser. I froze utterly, my eyes locked onto the corpse.

Only a torso remained, the lower half crushed entirely by a large boulder. The Vritra's arm was outstretched toward us, almost demanding. Accusing.

My breath sharpened as I began to hyperventilate. In, out. In, out. In, out. In, out.

By the Sovereigns, I cursed internally, unable to tear my eyes away from the dead body. As if it would just rise again and curse me for my lack of faith. The aura in the air suddenly made far, far more sense as it clenched in around me like the constricting scales of a serpent. It's here. A god. An asura. It's dead. Why am I even here? What–

And beside me, Seth began to shake violently, collapsing to the floor as he seized. My mind was torn from the shattered body as my adrenalized mind focused in a scattered way on my baby brother. He groaned as his eyes rolled up into his head, the trembling intensifying.

I knelt, my body shaking nearly as much as his. "Seth," I cried, terrified. "Seth, please! What's happening? Are you okay? What–"

And as quickly as it had come, it passed. Like a flash of lightning, Seth's shaking evened out as he heaved for breath.

And when he looked up at me, it was with a fear and terror fit to match mine. He quickly pushed himself to his feet, his head darting around like a startled prey animal. "We need to go, Circe!" he said in a shaky voice. "We need to go right now!"

"I know!" I snapped, the stench of copper invading my nostrils. "We need to leave! To get out of here!" I felt on the verge of tears, my arms trembling.

Seth's attention finally centered on something past the crushed Vritra, his eyes widening. And he didn't even respond to me, just started running. His boots sank into the blood, red staining his shoes as he darted away from me.

"Seth!" I cried frantically, all my reason and sense abandoning me as fear took hold. The eyes of the dead god flashed dully in my mind as I began to try and chase after my brother. "Seth, no! Don't go!" I pleaded desperately.

My heart beat like a hammer in my head as I stumbled limply through the darkness, the sound of Seth's footsteps all that could guide me. The red light from my flare cast consuming shadows everywhere it went. But no matter how fast I ran, I didn't seem to catch up. All I caught were whispers as terror suffused my entire being.

Seth was going to get himself killed. My baby brother was running toward something with no care for his wellbeing, drawn by whatever horrid power had taken him in the wake of Spellsong's healing.

As I ran, I saw more dead Vritra. One had been pinned to the wall by a massive spear of stone, their core pierced as they hung lifelessly. Another was stuck in an eternal wrestling match with golems of earth as they choked the life from his body. And somehow I registered a rolling skull near my feet with no clear sign of death besides decapitation.

"You know, Wren Kain, nobody has ever managed to escape the pits of Taegrin Caelum before. Man or asura. That's a feat worthy of praise," a hissing, pained voice echoed out as I lurched deeper into the darkness. "You might have managed to kill us all if you weren't stupidly insistent on protecting that husk. But now you're going to–"

The gravelly voice paused, then grunted in surprise. "And what is this?"

Dread power radiated like a graveyard up ahead, but I didn't even pay that mind as I stumbled forward. I felt half mad as I chased Seth's footsteps.

And then I finally caught up to him, and I felt despair.

Seth stared up at a Vritra in the center of a massive cavern. Dust and debris and destruction painted every inch of the place in shadow, but my eyes could only focus on my brother as he was pinned by the scarlet gaze of the armor-clad woman.

She had short, reddish-black hair with horns that thrust downward to her chin. Her black battle armor leaked blood from a hundred places, and she was favoring a single arm that held a large axe. Half of her face appeared to have been run across gravel, tearing out her eye and making her gray skin weep crimson. There was someone behind her, too, but I didn't really see them.

The Vritra cocked her head. "An unad?" she laughed. "A strange plan to escape the blades of the Wraiths, Wren Kain, but a foolish one."

Seth stared mutely up at the looming figure of the god. I stood frozen, too, only able to really watch as my flare began to sputter sparks like a limb pumping blood.

And then it all rushed back into focus. I screamed a hoarse cry of terror and fury as I ran forward, cocking my arm back. I hurled the flare in my hand like a knife, throwing it toward the Vritra as my fingers scrambled for the dagger on my hip.

The Vritra winced as the light reached them, shying away with a slight snarl. "Pathetic lessers," she hissed, the flare bouncing ineffectually off their black armor. "Get out of my way."

And then the Vritra swung their axe. Casually, I watched as the flat of it struck Seth in the chest. I could hear him break, the strike rumbling through his small, frail body as it flew like a broken doll.

He hit the wall in a wet crunch. I screamed tears as I finally reached this monster, swinging my dagger down as I tried to aim for their wretched heart.

The thing caught my arm with the same contemptuous ease as it had struck my brother. She snarled as she looked down at me, clenching her gauntleted fingers around my wrist.

My bones crumpled like a tin can, blood spurting between her fingers as she stared down at me. She hefted me up by my arm, roughly dangling me as she hefted her axe.

She killed Seth. And now she was going to kill me.

How could I have ever worshiped them? I thought through the pain and grief and horror, my dagger clattering to the floor. How did I think this was a being worthy of my faith?

"You're like a gnat," the beast hissed down at me, blood sizzling beneath its teeth. "How an unad and a wretched little sentry got here, I have no clue. But after I–"

The Vritra coughed, their single eye weakly peering down at their armor where it had parted. Blood streamed from their mouth anew as a spike of earth slowly erupted from her chest, right where her core should've been.

The monster dropped me, allowing me to hit the ground with a flop. They stumbled backward, forgetting about me entirely.

"Typical lessuran," a pained voice said from further away. "Even as you slay deities, you forget how mortal you are."

I didn't hear the voice. Not really. I didn't even really feel my obliterated wrist as I stared at Seth's weakly sputtering form. Blood pooled around him, red and stark and wrong.

I pulled myself to shaky legs, not fully conscious as I hobbled over to the body of my brother. His eyes stared up at me pleadingly as I knelt weakly by his side. Begging me, his big sister, to do something.

I wrenched out a sob as I pressed my forehead into Seth's chest. He didn't even seem to be able to make a sound beyond wet gurgles, his end slow and painful.

The Doctrination always promised valiant deaths. Deaths that brought meaning to our Sovereigns in our small lives. But where was the meaning in this?

"Seth," I sobbed, feeling his bones rattle with every wheezing breath, "Seth, please. Don't leave me. Not now. Please!"

We'd finally found a way for him to have a life. To not be burdened by his sickness and consigned to a sickbed for eternity beneath a cruel world.

I felt the distinctive, wrenching urge to pray. That horrible habit that the Doctrination had imbued into me for years on years on years surged up to the edges of my mind.

Yet praying would do nothing. It was a Vritra who had broken my brother; who had taken him from me.

But then a frantic, rabid thought wormed its way to the front of my mind. Like a star in the darkness, I remembered the only person who had ever noticed Seth and me. Who had ever heard our plights and assuaged our suffering. And I felt my blood tremble in my veins.

I looked up toward the ceiling of this cave, my body limp and weak as I knelt. Tears streamed down my face as I felt the last kindling ember of my faith find something to latch onto.

"Spellsong," I wheezed, kneeling over Seth's body like a devout faithful, "please."

That single word carried so much of me as I sent out my prayer. I bundled every ounce of my gratitude and fear and anger and love and passion and everything into that tiny little word. The prayer I uttered, like a single feather thrown to the breeze, echoed from my lips with a grim silence.

But nothing came. The room remained dim and dark, quiet save for Seth's dying breaths. Because why would it? Prayers were never answered. Spellsong himself had told me that it wasn't my faith that saved Seth before.

And as my final, desperate prayer went unanswered, something in me broke. As I knelt like a groveling petitioner before an altar, I realized that I'd never had a single prayer be noticed.

I wept silently, staring upward in quiet despair as that realization sank deep, deep into my blood. That nothing I had ever tried had meant anything. That my brother would die at my feet because I'd put faith in those visions of his, because I had faith at all.

And then I felt it. Like a little ember at first, approaching from the edges of my mind. It cast rays of sunlight across my mind, soothing and warming my very bones. I felt something in my blood resonate with that pulsing star.

It flowed through me, welcomed in like floodgates. Coursing power of a kind I could never put into words rushed in orange-purple weaves along my bones, banishing my aches and pains. The chill that had made my teeth chatter in unending rattles was banished by the warmth of a hearth. The crushed bones of my wrist reknit under the tender care of something truly divine.

I stared down in gaping awe at the light misting from my body, given freely. I felt my heart pounding in some strange resonance as that burning ember gave me what I needed. As it answered my prayer.

I reached out my hands, feeling a kindling fire roar from within my soul. I pulled on that light, using that warm sun to guide me along. To show me what I needed to do, like a parent watching over my shoulder.

Seth watched the light as it misted from my fingers, his eyes barely comprehending as his breath began to slow. But I knew him. I knew his struggles with his sickness, knew how it made him feel worthless and useless. I knew that feeling of hopelessness. But I also knew the utter joy and elation he'd felt at the sense that he could truly walk and run again.

Memories of our shared experiences ran through my mind like a cascading tidal wave as my hands rested over his chest, little misting dewdrops of dawnlight leaking down into his chest in a perfect mirror of the very first time.

I called to his heart in a way that Spellsong showed, and his heart responded.

Seth's body slowly healed. His ribs re-sutured themselves. His internal organs realigned as their pulped flesh became whole once more. My brother was reborn in fire and light, brought back from the very brink.

He coughed blood as he lay limply, exhausted despite the sudden healing. The light suffusing my blood drifted away, the powers I'd used—I'd channeled—leaving my spirit as their use was done. I felt as that warm, happy light wrapped me in its understanding embrace for a moment.

Because he knew what it was like to lose a brother before their eyes. He knew what it was like to see their life's blood drain onto the stones. He knew what it was like to fight and struggle.

And then it was gone, finally misting away. I stared weakly upward, unable to feel. To truly understand.

Footsteps echoed out on the stone as a figure slowly approached. I turned my head to the side, looking at the broken and battered god.

But that was wrong. This wasn't a god. It was simply an asura, the same one that had been threatened by the Vritra from before. Their greasy hair was matted with blood, and they were covered in a million wounds that bled slowly. And they were holding someone in their arms.

I met the asura's eyes, noting their beetle-black color. I might have felt fear before. Fear that they would strike me down for being lesser, would break me for intruding on their battle.

But that rekindled ember in my chest gave me faith. I would not die here. This asura would not strike me down; could not strike me down.

"It has been a long time since I've seen something I didn't understand, lesser," he muttered, clutching that ash-haired husk closer to himself. "That light. The color of it… I'd recognize it anywhere." He grunted in pain, shifting before spitting out a wad of blood. "What was it? How did you… It shouldn't be possible. She's dead."

I didn't respond for a moment, still feeling slightly overwhelmed by everything that had just happened. But something seemed clear despite it all.

"I had faith," I said numbly in reply. "I was answered."

The asura crumpled to a sitting position, groaning in pain as they did so. They clung tightly still to the body in their arms as if it were the last thing in the world.

I thought it funny as I stared at the being in front of me. Not long ago, I might have bowed and scraped. But for the first time, I could see the oh-so-human emotion in their eyes as they stared down at the corpse in their arms. Those thin arms trembled.

"Faith," he uttered weakly. "Something you lessers have so much of. In spades and spades. It never seems to run out."

He let out a low, humorless chuckle as a tear traced down the edge of his eye. It splashed brokenly against the body in his arms. "Tell me, human," he said in a shattered voice. "How do you keep your faith when everything you love breaks away?"

Seth's breath rose and fell in an even rhythm. As I finally started to piece things together, I felt a strange sense of calm in my bones. "That's when it's the most important," I whispered. "When it seems that everything is gone."

It was strange, understanding the truth… The asura weren't gods. None of them. Not Toren, either. But there was something up there above even them, guiding it all. Sending visions and insight down… It had guided me here. Guided me to Toren in a way that could only be divine.

It must have guided Toren, too, pushing him on currents. He'd healed Seth, hadn't he? Opening the way for whatever it was to bestow its sight?

Almost as if it were… destined.

Fated.