THE serpent's eye narrowed in what must have been amusement, and a wheezy breath blew from its nostrils. "I continue to eat well above ground," spoke Vraactan, their voice a hissing whisper that echoed down the tunnels and sent fingers crawling up her spine. Every word dripped with measured power - yet she sensed it was only a fraction of its strength. The strength of a god.

Vasilisa's lips twisted into a bitter smile. “It was I who fed you,” she said, her voice tinged with anger. “Do not lie to me. I know it is you whom I feed with every life I take, every drop of blood I spill.”

She had felt it for some time. They were one and the same - the feeling of euphoria was not her own, not entirely, and neither was her strength. It was the serpent, nestled in her heart, in the dark, cold corners of her mind where serpents were wont to dwell.

Vraactan did not deny it. “And is it not for a just cause?” the serpent asked, its colorful eyes glinting like windows into the astral heavens. “Has our strength not allowed you to save many more?”

"None of this mess would have happened if Chirlan did not take me!" She hissed back. "If he did not turn me into this...this...this thing that I am! My mother...she knew all of this would happen, didn't she? Unukalhai told me she and her kind could see into the future - if that was not a lie. She knew this would happen, and so did Chirlan."

Vraactan's scales rustled as it shifted, and in the narrow tunnel the serpent rattled loose a rain of dust from the dark ceiling. “Your mother was shielding you,” the serpent said, its voice calm and soothing. “You were the only one she loved - truly loved, as humans do. That is a beautiful thing, that is an enviable thing, for her kind to know such love.

"But that same love clouded her vision. She did not see the Harvest gathering - lost as she was in her little world. Peace would have only reigned for a little while longer, and then Gandroth's Chosen would have stormed out of the steppes all the same, bringing fire and blood to your land that it has never known before. You would have been helpless - another body among millions..."

The eye blinked, plunging the tunnel into pitch-black darkness once more. When it opened again, it seemed to glow ever brighter with promise. "But now, Vasilisa of Belnopyl, Vasilisa the Fair," spoke Vraactan slowly. "Now you have the chance to save everyone you love...if you have the strength to go on. The Question must be answered - it will not be denied."

Vasilisa tugged on the blood-red vines that bound her arms, her frustration mounting. Her head felt as though it was going to split apart at any moment, bursting at the wound left by the Hearteater. “I don't have the strength to go on,” she said, her voice trembling with despair. There was no point in hiding it - none could see her here, in the darkness and gloom. Her voice cracked. “I can't even free myself.”

“The vines obey your will and your will alone,” Vraactan replied, the serpent's voice a gentle rumble. “It is the last, small part of you that pushes against destiny that they sense...that is why they hold you back. Let go of it all, Vasilisa. Let go, and be free."

Vasilisa closed her eyes, taking a deep breath. The darkness pressed in around her, and for a moment, she felt as though she was drowning, drowning in the endless font of time that revealed itself whenever she closed her eyes, no longer content to remain in the realm of sleep. It was terrifying. It was maddening. It was divine. Let go, and be free. Save others by saving yourself.

Let the girl within die, and embrace the god.

She willed herself into the vines that bound her, and felt them as extensions of her own body, a clenched fist holding her in place. With a passing thought the vines began to retract, sinking back into the earth with a rumble. Vasilisa fell roughly to her feet, but her legs gave out from under her, and her knees burned as they scraped against the rough, rocky ground. With one hand she braced herself against the giant body of the serpent, and the cold of its scales were like a blessed balm against her raw and aching hands.

"Where do I go?" she asked, looking this way and that. All she saw was the yawning darkness running both ways, and the vague silhouettes of the dead who had been her bedfellows in the earth.

"Home." spoke Vraactan. "You must go home. I will take you there. Climb upon my back."

She did as the serpent told her, eager to give her tired legs a rest, and with nowhere else to go. The serpent's back was cold to the touch, every scale as large as a shield, yet smooth and somehow soft. She settled herself between two great ridges, her body fitting snugly in the hollow they formed. The memory had been dark, but she smiled nonetheless as she recalled how the serpent had once coiled about her finger, guiding them through like tunnels and gloom.

Vraactan began to move, its undulating motion gentle as it gained a steady rhythm. Vasilisa clung to the ridges, her fingers digging into the cool, smooth scales. The serpent navigated the labyrinthine tunnels with ease, its movements fluid and with a direction she could not have parsed. In the darkness, all passages looked the same - all paths felt as though they led to the same end.

Time lost its meaning as they traveled. The pitch-black tunnel seemed endless, the silence only broken by the soft, rhythmic hiss of the serpent’s scales against the stone. Vasilisa felt her exhaustion creeping back, her eyelids growing heavy. She allowed herself to lie down fully upon Vraactan's back, the gentle sway of the serpent's movement lulling her.

In the embrace of the darkness, she finally found a rest. For a time, she was blessedly free of dreams, the void offering a respite from her torment. She floated in that emptiness, her mind quiet for the first time in what felt like ages.

When she stirred again, it was to the sound of water dripping somewhere in the distance, echoing softly through the cavern. The air was cooler now, a faint draft brushing against her skin. Vraactan's pace had slowed, and she felt the serpent begin to descend, the tunnel widening as they moved downward.

“Where are we?” She asked.

The serpent replied, “We are at the home of all things. Of all life. The Cradle.”

Vraactan came to a stop, and Vasilisa gingerly slid off the serpent's back. The ground felt soft and moist at her feet, and she saw an array of small, twinkling lights at the end of the tunnel’s yawning distance. When she came to the edge, the sight stole away the bated breath in her chest.

Before her was a vast, circular cavern - thrice as large as the Great Hall - and its floor seemed to be covered in fallen stars that twinkled brightly in the gloom. The walls curved up to a ceiling she could not fathom in the darkness, and she wondered how deep they had travelled. Yet if this was the Sacred Hollow, then there must have once been ceremony and life, and pilgrimages by the Vorodzhi and dozens of other tribes in the olden years. But there was nothing left of those times now - and the only sounds that echoed in the chamber were the rhythmic drip-drip-drip of falling moisture, and her own breathing, amplified tenfold by the cavern’s vastness.

“Vraactan-” she began to say, but when she turned her back the gigantic serpent was no longer there. How?

I am going mad, she thought to herself, squeezing her eyes shut. I am going mad in this darkness. Were you ever there? No, you must have been. I could not have found this place on my own. I could not have-

Vasilisa.

A voice cut through the darkness, sounding high and clear.

“Mother?”

She leaned out from the opening, squinting in the darkness. It was her voice - her mother’s voice. She had heard it a thousand times raised in anger, soft with concern, and soothing with love. She called out again, but received no reply. Was it another hallucination, another dream? No, it could not have been, she told herself. Her own mind had never tricked itself with such voices.

Was that why she had found herself here, at the bottom of the world? Had it been her mother’s voice she followed, whilst dreaming she was upon the serpent’s back? Vasilisa’s mind raced with a thousand possibilities, a thousand delusions in truth, and she silenced them hastily before descending into the cavern.

The walls were almost completely straight, with hardly any handholds or grooves, and the fall seemed perilously long. If I go down, I cannot make it back up, she thought to herself.

She went down all the same, taking a deep breath before she slid down the side. Her feet landed firmly on solid ground, and then she saw the lights on the floor were not fallen stars at all.

This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.

As her eyes adjusted to the dim light, she realized the twinkling lights were dancing flames within the empty eyes of many skulls - all of them beasts of the earth. Some skulls were large, almost the size of her torso, with elongated snouts and rows of sharp teeth. Others were small, delicate, and finely boned, seeming almost translucent by the pale flickering light.

The sight was both mesmerizing and eerie. Vasilisa stepped carefully among them, feeling a sense of reverence and unease. Each skull seemed to hold a story, a fragment of a forgotten past. She remembered Austeja’s story of the Hollows, and the font of life that was extinguished when the goddess had left the world. Did the beasts that were here perish with the goddess, or did remain abandoned and starving in the darkness, waiting for a mother who would never return?

Vasilisa shuddered, and peered out towards the cave. She saw a silhouette, tall and menacing in the distance, but even with the soft glow of the skulls she could see little else. She knelt down, and scooped up the skull of a wolf from the ground. The hollowed eyes seemed to glow brighter with her touch, and when she raised the skull before her the candle-like flames swelled until their glow was like that of the moon, chasing away the darkness until she could see what lay ahead.

In front of her was a grassy knoll, like an island amidst the sea of bones. And in the middle of the knoll, the trunk of a human body ran up and out from the earth like a slender tree, naked and bristling. It towered up and up into the darkness of the cavern, and stood twice her height, perhaps more. The tree however, had no branches, nor arms. Instead, Vasilisa saw a multitude of heads sprouting from the great trunk where the crown ought to have been. Each face was youthful, almost childlike, and strangely sexless. By the light of the wolf’s skull, the faces cast dim shadows as they turned to one another in unspoken conversation, and then turned to face her with empty eyes.

Whispers bounced along the cavern walls, though their words were indistinct. She realized the faces were speaking to her, in a manner of sorts.

They were asking her to approach. She felt it almost as a compulsion, but one she was aware of. The faces brooked no ill intent in their manner, and so with bated breath, she stepped forth into the clearing, illuminating more of the faces in the ceaseless glow that spilled from skull in her hands.

Come, came the whispers from the tree, echoing in her mind. Come, daughter of the Forsaken, and drink.

The faces became distorted in the wake of their own words - like an image in water distorted by an errant ripple. The faces reformed, angelic and beautiful once more, but the voice that spoke shrank from a chorus of whispers into a lone woman’s whisper, strangely familiar.

The Mother of the World. Vaal.

Drink, and be enlightened, my daughter.

Vasilisa looked down to see that at the foot of the tree, there shimmered a small puddle the size of a dinner plate. At first glance, it seemed hardly deep enough for her to even gather up a sip from her cupped hands, yet when she swayed her macabre torch over it, she could not see the bottom. Was this the First Spring that Austeja had spoken of? How old was it then, truly? How deep were its fathoms-

Her breath caught in her throat. There, in the depths of the water - nestled in a small crook of the watery pit - she caught the hint of carved, crafted shape amidst the natural contours of the earth. The shape of a blade, a decorated handle. The knife. Her mother’s knife. It could only be such.

She looked up to see the Mother of the World looking down. The faces were twisting and melting into one another, expressions of anguish melting into sorrow, melting into joy. Their lips moved as one, however, and with one voice they spoke.

Drink.

The Mother’s water…Chirlan’s words echoed in her memory. The Question…the question of all mortal men…it must be yours…

She set aside the skull onto the grass, and knelt before the edge of the puddle. As she crouched, the great trunk swayed down over her. The faces, rippling with anticipation, were now a foot away from her.

DRINK. The voice boomed with command, and like a trained dog she felt herself jerking on instinct towards the pool.

No, she asserted, standing defiantly against the tree whose faces seemed to twist with anger and disgust.

Vasilisa closed her eyes, and sharpened her senses to grasp for the knife with her mind's eye. In the world of dream, flooded by blinding pale light, she saw the knife as a mass of coiling, writhing shadows that hissed at her Sight. When she imagined herself reaching for the blade a skull-splitting pain shot through her skull as if she were struck by lightning. She found herself violently ripped from the world of dream, lying on her back before the tree.

No, of course…She thought. Why would it have been so easy? It was with the Apostles' sight and reach she tried to grasp it, but the knife itself was a bane to their kind. It was a mortal hand, and with her mortal will that she needed to claim her inheritance. Somehow, she suspected it all along. What better way to guard it against the Apostles, who could only see and feel the world through the Sight?

Vasilisa turned away from the edge of the pool and let her battered helm clatter softly to the ground. Next went her coat of maille, pierced a dozen times by bolts and spears, and then her cloak of suns, more tatters than cloth. She shivered in the darkness as she stripped down to her smallclothes - suddenly, she felt more alone and frail than she had ever been in her whole life. The rippling faces leered menacingly at her as she knelt before the pool and tried to discern the depths. The knife did not seem too deeply stuck, but she would need to plunge wholly into the water to retrieve it.

Gods…spirits…Vraactan…protect me.

She took a deep breath, then slipped into the First Spring.

The cold was like a knife slipped through her ribcage: it spread through her chest like a wildfire. For a brief moment she felt her wits freeze, and she remained floating in place, gasping and shaking. She looked down to the knife, and struggled to hold her precious breath before she dived.

In the darkness, mortal sight was useless. She closed her eyes, then pushed deeper through the pale chasm of the pool.

The biting, needling cold sapped away her strength with every stroke. She swam with all her might, each movement a struggle against the oppressive chill. Her breath burned in her lungs, a cold fire yearning to be free.

She looked over her shoulder and saw the surface of the water far above her, a shimmering veil of light receding into the darkness. It felt as though she were suspended in an endless void - every stroke seemed to carry her nowhere, and the knife seemed ever distant, taunting her.

Her muscles screamed in protest, and the burning in her chest became unbearable. She pushed on, struggling against the cold and the fingers of despair creeping over her mind. No, no - she could not fail, not when she had come so far, lost of much. So many.

At last, her fingers brushed against something solid. Her eyes shot open, and she saw the silhouette of the dagger right in front of her. She struggled to tear the dagger free, but it resisted her grasp - as if it were anchored by some unseen force. The effort drained the last reserves of her strength, and she felt her grip weakening, slipping.

The burning in her chest became too much to bear. Vasilisa’s mouth opened, and the precious bubbles of air spilled out into the darkness. Then the waters of the First Spring flooded in.

She tasted it on her tongue, in her nostrils, spreading to her eyes, her lungs, her heart. Cold - endless, freezing cold. It spread through every fiber of her being, and with it came acceptance, knowledge - knowledge of her smallness, her miniscule nature, which was even less than that of an ant. Vasilisa of Belnopyl, Vasilisa the Fair, was a tiny mote of drifting dust in the greater cosmos - a tiny, frail, helpless creature. Then darkness of the First Spring faded away, and she saw the history of the world's youth unfolded before her nascent Sight as she floated helplessly in the void.

For long eons, there had been nothing - swirling darkness, but of a kind that was far blacker and more bleak than the night. It was absence in its totality. There was nothing - yet then, she felt the first presence appear. The first will. It was without shape, ungoverned by any form, for form itself had not come into being. Then she heard a voice- no, a thought, sent out like the cry of a newborn into the great, bleak nothing.

I AM.

There was nothing. But then, a reply - there were two more now, two more wills drifting through the unshaped heavens, given presence, given knowledge of themselves. Vraactan had cried into the void, and there were two who gave answer.

WE ARE.

The three gods, the three wills, the first wills.

She saw fire give shape to the world, forming from the darkness stone, and then earth. Then there was water - and from water, life. Life that flourished out from the First Spring, covering the barren world that was made by the First Flame. She saw the first men take their form, molded into shape by the Mother of the World, and given spirit by the one who cried into the void. Fear, love, and above all else, curiosity for the world around them - imparted from the touch of the one who was the first and the last: Vraactan, the Star-Eater. The voice whispering in her mind, who had once whispered wisdom to all men.

She beheld the faces of humanity in its whole: millions who had died, the millions who lived, and the billions who had yet to live. In the void, their faces were inanimate as masks, painfully issued from past, present, and future. They were surrounding her, crushing her beneath their tide of endless growth.

You are not looking at the whole, came the whisper of the Star-Eater to her mind. You still do not look with the eyes of a god.

She twisted her Sight, trying to make sense of the vision. Then she saw: taking each face individually, the vision was overwhelming as she struggled to make sense of each life set before her. But taken as a whole - as one great, swollen body of spirits and minds - she realized that the Question of Humanity given form made up just one face: hers.

And she was screaming.

Vasilisa screamed into the void. Lights like stars popped before her eyes as she fell out of the vision, and then she realized she was drowning.

Nothing. There was nothing left. Just the knife in the darkness, and a small, frightened girl who was going to die in the cradle of the world.