Yelena

The next morning the only thing she could think of was that her head felt like shit.

If Dimedrious felt the same hangover, he showed no outward signs of it. He was up, fresh as a daisy, his cloak billowing behind him as he looked towards the horizon.

"Rise and shine," she said to her over his shoulder. "Afraid your majesty’s breakfast is going to have to wait."

Her bewildered face begged a question that he answered without even turning around.

"We’re here," he said simply.

She bolted upright immediately. It wasn’t excitement that drove her, but a deeper desire to see what if the legends spoke the truth. About the glimmering obsidian from another world or plane of existence that lined the doors, about the great Titans of Amarata that held its chains shut. The books she’d poured over all her life hadn’t prepared her to actually see it in all its glory.

As she looked on it now, she wasn’t disappointed.

No Titans holding the doors shut, sure, but the Gate looked just as imposing as she’d imagined – a giant slab set into the side of Averix’s highest mountain. Ancient beyond comprehension – every notch and inch of the thing a testament to craftsmen who had toiled for centuries under the protection of Amarata – who had but one purpose: to close shut the jaws of the abyss forever from the rest of the world. To erect a barrier that would ensure a peaceful world.

They’d tried, and they’d met with enough success that every boy and girl on the planet – regardless of race or creed – knew the legend of the Great Gate, and the horrors it kept at bay at the throat of the world.

As the carriage stopped a few miles short of their destination, she suddenly felt her joy abate all at once. She couldn’t forget why she was here.

"So, what d’you think?" Dimedrious asked her. "Everything you thought it would be?"

She answered without hesitation. "More."

He noted for a second the sparkle that gleamed in her eyes, and then hopped off to speak to the driver.

It seemed the ailing human wouldn’t go any further. He shook his head as Dimedrious questioned him, and pointed to the Great Gates without daring to look in their direction. His eyes passed over Yelena’s inquisitive gaze, and then darted away just as quickly as they’d settled on her.

She knew then that this man must have been from Yarruck. Maybe he had even been there when the Voidspawn had taken hold of her.

She said nothing as she hopped off the cart and crossed to Dimedrious.

"Come on, Di," she said. "I could do with a morning stroll."

He hid his frustration behind an indignant hrumph directed at their human driver, who bowed low and sidled back to his carriage.

And with one snap of his reigns and a neigh of his horse, he began his journey home without once looking back.

They walked in silence towards the Gate, its onyx skin becoming only more and more impressive as Yelena inched towards the end of her journey. The Gates towered above them, and here, at their feet, the blizzard that raged all around them seemed like a tiny trickle of dandruff on a flea’s brow. Yelena felt her feet sink into the snow and grunted with the effort it took to bring them together at the base of the Gate. Here, the wind itself felt changed – tinged with a power that was barely contained. She could sense it. Her heart leaped to experience this sight, even as her mind told her that it marked the end of her life on the surface world of Averix forever.

Dimedrious looked from the Gate to his charge, and entertained the infantile notion that, maybe, the Prophet had made a mistake. The thought was heretical, and to even give voice to the idea would brand him a traitor, but he thought – hoped – for a miracle either way. For those great ancient slabs set into the mountain to remain closed to them. To see her as a victim of unfair discrimination, not as a warrior here to challenge what lay within.

But his silent prayer was cut short even as it begun, as the mechanism unknown even to the oldest scholars began turning like clockwork, and Yelena gasped with sudden awe as the door to her destiny slowly tore itself open.

They still said nothing as they trudged the path that now stood before them – the claustrophobic-inducing road that short out between the walls of two glaciers. Here, the darkness of the walls around them consumed their forms, and the sun would not show its face. Nor would their own shadows cast themselves along the icy blue hue of the ground. It was a path that only the damned could tread, and so Yelena kept her hand on her sword as she and Dimedrious walked on, with no alternative, borne towards her final destination.

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She felt it before her eyes registered its physical form: she sensed its malevolence in the dark cracks that it had carved into the ground, where dark eyes waited hungrily, watched these two new pieces of meat. She could close her eyes and could hear its heartbeat as they drew closer to its mouth, its pulsing, burning desire to claim another soul rising with every step they took in its realm. And when she finally stopped before the precipice of the abyss, she opened her eyes and saw the fears of the entire world was staring back at her with one black, pulsing eyeball.

She had finally come face to face with The Everloft.

What struck her most was the ghostly tentacles that rose from the rim of its throat before she had even stirred. They coiled around themselves, grasping at air, sweeping the great abyss’ circumference like a predatory bird circling its habitat for new prey. She saw her own reflection in the translucent darkness of the tendrils, and with every writhe and gyration she knew that there was an awareness there – an intelligence. It knew she was looking at it. And it knew that she was to be its next meal.

She sheathed her sword and bowed her head, breathing deep. Centering herself. The time was here, and yet she felt lacking. Despite all the books she’d read, she couldn’t steady herself before the real thing.

But she took one step forward anyway, and the living mass of darkness swelled.

"You don’t have to do this."

She turned to face Dimedrious’ tired eyes. He hadn’t moved an inch. Truthfully, he could barely look in her direction.

"It’s my destiny," she said.

"Destiny?" Dimedrious spat. "The hell is destiny? It’s a stupid word made for lambs going to the chopping block. You’re better than that. I didn’t train you to be a pawn, did I?"

She felt the heat of the tendrils’ desire behind her. It was like a withered old tongue licking at her neck. But she did not shudder. She looked straight at Dimedrious.

"We could leave here, together," he said. "You and me. Could make our way on the roads. Hire on as mercenaries. I’ve got some old contacts down South."

She looked at him with unsure eyes.

He was serious.

Of course he was.

Was this your plan all along, Di?

"Just say the word, Lena," he said. "Say the word and we’ll go."

Slowly, her head began to shake. But not in a manner that sought to condemn. It was as a mother showing sorrowful disapproval as her child performed some taboo act it thought it could get away with.

"They’d hunt me down, Di. You and me."

"So we’ll fight them!"

His voice cut through the spectral wails of the great maw behind her, and echoed through the ice canyon like the wail of a despairing ghost.

"You’d really fight your brothers and sisters – your own kind – over me?"

He snarled at his feet. Tasting futility.

"Di," she said calmly. "The next time I lose control, it could be the last. And it’ll be you that has to put me down. Or die."

He grit his teeth. She could almost hear him gnashing away as mere mumbles were dashed from the corners of his mouth.

"That’s exactly what we’re doing right now, Lena. Don’t you see? You’re being sent down there to die. That’s all. The warriors that go down don’t come back. They never come back. Not even Jael came back from the depths."

"You give me too little credit," she sniggered.

He looked up at her with shame smeared on his brow. She stepped closer to him, never dropping eye contact.

"After all," she said. "I’ve had one hell of a teacher."

When she reached him, she took his paws in her hands and squeezed them like she used to on the coldest nights of the deep winter, when not even the moon was visible in the sky. She’d hang from his neck when she was a baby, pulling at his fur and dangling off his ears. He’d groan, he’d complain, but everyone knew that if he really didn’t like it he’d shake that dumb Firvak kid off.

He never did.

"I have to do this," she told his grief-stricken face. "To stop the dreams of the dying I see in my head every night, and to make sure I never hurt the people I care about again."

He looked down at her hands and squeezed them back, gently. Then, a barely audible snort escaped from his lips.

"It’s pointless, isn’t it?"

She nodded. "I’ve made my decision."

"But you don’t have to do it alone," he replied, raising a hand to stroke the hair out of her face. "Let me come with you."

She’d thought about it. She’d thought about even asking him as they journeyed here. When she was drunk last night, she’d almost let slip that she was afraid. She was afraid of finally being truly alone. Forever.

But she swallowed her fear. She’d need it to keep her sharp down there.

"The Prophet chose me," she said. "And I’m not about to let someone else I love throw their life away for me. I told you all – I decide my own fate now. Besides, Averix needs its little doggie defender."

He bristled at that, and she watched the blush that appeared on his cheeks with relish.

"I – I don’t know how to say goodbye," he said.

Laughter spilled from her lips. "Then let me say it for you."

She stood on her tiptoes and planted a single kiss on his cheek, feeling the soft bristles of his fur brush against her face.

"Thank you, Di," she said. "For everything."

He was loathe to release her. She felt the strength in his arms as she pulled away, but slowly his claws relaxed, and he let her go. His hand lingered on her fingertips for the briefest of moments before she turned, taking a deep breath, and began the march towards her fate.

Moments before she was about to let the waiting tendrils take her, she heard Di’s voice again from behind.

"Lena…"

She tried ignoring him this time. But then it came again, couched in his characteristic battle-tone. And there was fear in his voice.

"Lena," he said. "Turn around."

She did so only as she registered the urgency of his demand, and slowly her eyes widened as she looked upon the same sight he did.

She was standing at the entrance to the Gate, her steel-plated torso reflecting the icy walls that surrounded them. With every methodical step she took, her tail sliced left to right, cutting into the snow at her feet and throwing it aside in great, eviscerated clumps. Her rapier was drawn, and glistening along its pristine edge was the unmistakable red sheen of fresh blood.

Her smile was more akin to that of a snarling beast, savoring the meat it had caught within its reptilian eyes. And as those same eyes fixed on Yelena, she saw the dark smile grow.

"Hello, Yelena," Virtir said.