The gale of wind propelled Zilliad so quickly, that tears began to leak out of her cloudy gray eyes. While meteors crashed down from the heavens, Zilliad maneuvered the winds as if they were her own personal army of air particles to shift her and the two deities, Isaa and Sego, out of their path.
From birth, Zilliad could sense the wind, as if it were speaking to her softly. To Zilliad, the air felt like a web, and she was the spider that wrapped the strings of wind around the planet of Garsuna. And as such, she felt every disturbance within her web of air.
Zilliad's pure white hair was forced backwards as she flew, haloing her face. She looked exactly as the daughter of the winds should look, like an angel. The more Zilliad manipulated the wind, the more skilled she got. Zilliad discovered that wind preffered to spin, and should be controlled in a circular pattern, creating a funnel, like a tornado, rather than being hurtled in a straight direction like when she launched off the surface only a few moments ago.
When the trio burst through the clouds, they were immediately confronted by a massive meteor. Inexperienced at controlling her winds at such high velocity, Zilliad made a vain attempt to avoid the meteor's impact. The daughter of Haboo directed the winds to shift their trajectory, but there wasn’t enough space to clear the humongous rock. Desperately, Isaa thrust his golden trident ahead of him like a spear. The trident connected with the uneven surface of the meteor, and a giant fissure shot through it, fracturing the space rock into thousands of small pebbles.
“The meteors are made mostly of ice!” Isaa shouted out over the roar of their flight, “if I can make contact with my trident, I can expand the ice within, causing the meteor to burst open. Zilliad, save your energy and leave the larger ones to me!”
"Yes, uncle!" Zilliad shouted.
“I’m not so sure about this,” Sego yelled from behind, “the hourglass’s view is narrowing, and it isn’t in our favor. We should retreat and confront Apena with a stronger force!”
“No!” Isaa yelled back, “we have to stop it now while we have the chance!” Sego held a hard stare in Isaa's direction, it was rare that the deity of the sea defied the deity of time's suggestions.
The meteors continued their relentless downpour. Zilliad was able to sense the movement of every single meteor in the sky and created the perfect stream of air that meandered around them, only rarely relying on Isaa to break the larger ones. As they flew higher, Zilliad’s breathing became more and more laborious. Eventually, they reached a height where Zilliad felt she could hardly catch her breath. A shining light appeared even higher in the sky, as if a third sun were present. The glow was growing brighter and brighter. Sego swerved out of Zilliad’s manufactured wind current and the daughter of Haboo quickly halted herself and Isaa.
“I urge you Isaa, we cannot do this, not in Apena’s own domain,” Sego pleaded.
“When’s the last time we’ve gotten this kind of opportunity?” Isaa asked, his temper erupting, “and can your hourglass tell us the next time we will get this close to the Maker of the Sky!?”
“You know it cannot,” Sego began but Isaa wasn't going to let him finish.
“Then we proceed!” Isaa declared definitively, "Zilliad and I will create an opening for you. As soon as you can Sego, take the opportunity to seal Apena."
Sego nodded; a grim look stained on his face.
“I follow you, King,” Sego retorted.
Zilliad resumed propelling herself and the two deities higher into the sky. They flew directly towards the giant light that was competing with the two suns. That is when Zilliad saw it, Apena, in all of its glory.
Apena, like the other Makers, isn’t anthropomorphic. Instead, it is a primordial being that takes on the form of its domain, the sky. Apena presented as a massive, glass dragon. Instead of scales, Apena’s figure was perfectly smooth, almost blending in with the air. Its body was completely transparent and emanated a bright white light with four, stubby legs that shot out of its long, flowing body. Apena stayed suspended in the air by giant, glass wings that stretched longer than its body. As Zilliad got closer, she could see whiskers that grew out of Apena’s slender, nearly transparent snout. Apena’s face was placed in a permanent snarl, showing off a mouth full of glass stalagmites and stalactites.
“I fear we will not succeed in this confrontation,” Sego reiterated as Apena came into view.
“Halt!” Isaa shouted, throwing his hand down with an open palm.
Zilliad calmed her winds and halted their advance, hoping Isaa was about to heed Sego's warnings.
“Zilliad, I need you to gather as much electrical energy as you can,” Isaa said, keeping his fisheyes forward.
“I'm not sure how I would do that,” Zilliad said simply.
“Call the lightning,” Isaa began as a giant meteor came hurtling for the trio.
Isaa thrust his trident forward and impaled it. The cracking of the rock alerted Apena to their location, sooner than Isaa had wished.
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“Isaa!” Apena growled as it glided towards them. “What is this madness?!”
Apena's voice thundered as it spoke as if it were calling out to Zilliad, Isaa, and Sego from above rather than from the glass dragon in front of them.
“The deities are your pawns no longer, Apena!” Isaa shouted back.
Call the lightning? Zilliad thought. She began to feel through her web of wind, searching for any indication.
“Chosrgel must remain suppressed!” Apena shouted back, the glow that emanated from its glass body began to brighten, “you know nothing of its malice!”
“Chosrgel is like every other being of Garsuna and deserves to be free,” Isaa stated back coolly. “We no longer live to serve you, Maker of the Sky.”
Zilled continued scanning her web, feeling throughout the currents of the wind as it moved throughout the sky. Zilliad could feel the wind separate as it hit Isaa, Apena, and Sego’s figures. She could feel the reverberations of the meteors as they hit the surface, creating pulsating shockwaves. Zilliad searched and searched. Suddenly, Apena changed the course of one of its meteors. The meteor flew against the force of gravity towards Isaa. Zilliad quickly created a funnel of wind that propelled herself, Isaa, and Sego out of the meteor’s way. It was then that Zilliad began to feel the vibrations of a high pitch buzzing, far, far away, in the clouds below.
“If you surrender now, I will take this as another one of your bouts of self-importance, ‘King of the Deities.’” Apena said, as if it were flicking its serpent tongue at them.
The feeling Zilliad found was like a fly being caught in her web of wind. The fly was buzzing around and pulling at the strings, creating aggravated vibrations. Zilliad began to call on these vibrations, funneling them along her wind web towards herself. Isaa unlatched the waterskin that was tied around his belt and allowed a stream of water to circle around him. The circle of water around Isaa began to grow in size as it collected water vapor from the air.
“We bow to no one!” Isaa exclaimed as the white light that Apena emanated became almost blindingly bright. “Now Zilliad!” Isaa shouted, pointing his trident at Apena. The stream of water that wrapped around Isaa shot straight towards Apena like a bullet.
Zilliad built up as much of the aggravated, vibrating air as she could and then pushed it along her web of wind, directly at Apena. A flicker of lightning shot out of the clouds from below in an unnatural trajectory towards the Maker of the Sky. Apena’s light pulsated and grew brighter, so bright that it concealed the light of the two suns. The light met Isaa’s water bullet and Zilliad’s lightning bolt and dissolved them instantaneously. Apena turned its massive body towards Isaa.
“So, you think you have found the child of prophecy?” Apena asked, with a thundering chuckle paired behind its voice. “Daughter of creator and creations, Queen of the humans and conqueror of the sky?” Apena let out an arrogant puff of air and two smoke rings shot out of its glass nostrils. “The sky already has its conqueror.”
Apena then began to glide closer to them, its glass scales shimmering. Seeing his opportunity, Sego then moved in on the Maker of the Sky. To Zilliad, Sego seemed to teleport from right next to her to directly next to Apena. In the same motion, Sego extended his hands in front of himself, holding out a solid black band. Sego reached out to wrap his binding around Apena’s neck but when the band touched Apena’s light, it caught fire. Sego screamed in pain as his hands burned along with his pure black band. Sego then vanished into thin air. He reappeared a moment later next to Zilliad, rubbing his scorched hands.
“Sealing Apena was our only chance…” Sego began.
Apena’s chuckle echoed across the sky. “Isaa, how low you have fallen. Following the prophecies of a faulted deity and revolting against your own creators in a foolish attempt for freedom. No matter, everything will fall to Chosrgel in the end,” Apena announced as the trio continued to dance around its meteor shower.
Apena’s fixed snarl seemed to curl even deeper into its rigid cheeks. The light Apena emanated focused into its mouth, as if the glass dragon was being filled with fire. Apena pointed its nose directly at Zilliad. Zilliad felt the air between her and Apena begin to boil before she quickly directed a gale of wind to propel herself, Isaa, and Sab away from Apena. A beam of light exploded from Apena's mouth and Zilliad felt the ray of light dissolve the wind around her and cut a giant gap across the clouds below. Isaa quickly began gathering water from the vapor around him and batted his wings to get away from Zilliad and Sego, positioning himself to be on the other side of Apena, opposite Zilliad.
Zilliad began to collect the electrically charged air from the clouds below as Isaa fired multiple water bullets to distract Apena. Zilliad fired a second lightning strike at Apena and again, Apena’s entire body flashed like a spark. The flash caused both Isaa and Zilliad to cover their eyes. Zilliad’s lightning bolt met with Isaa’s water bullets where Apena should have been. Zilliad and Isaa both uncovered their eyes to reveal that Apena had disappeared. Zilliad quizzically looked towards her uncle. Then the two suns began to darken as if setting and a giant, moon-sized meteor appeared in the sky.
“There’s still time to help the others evacuate. Isaa, forget about Apena!” Sego pleaded as Isaa frantically searched the sky.
There was no sign of Apena.
“Yes,” Isaa began to say, nodding his head, “Apena’s end will come, but today’s not the day. We must tell Sab and Cajo to gather the humans and head back to the ship.”
“Allow me,” Zilliad said, beginning to funnel the air around them.
The trio plummeted out of the sky, heading straight down. Once they broke through the clouds, they saw the entire surface littered with shattered meteors, creating a field of stones. Zilliad watched as the humans fought off a swarm of beasts. Swords clashed against claws and shields bashed against scales, creating the ominous symphony of battle.
“Just as I foresaw,” Sego yelled, “the Makers have sent their creatures for us as well!”
The giant meteor now completely blocked out both of the suns, turning the day into night. As the darkness fell, Zilliad could only see two things. The green glow of Sab’s bulwark shield and a pale blue figure illuminated amongst the beasts.
“They’ve sent a Ruonian!” Isaa yelled out, referring to the glowing stone golem. “Zilliad use your winds to send Sego to Sab and direct me to the Ruonian. Get as many humans back to the ship as you can, I’ll meet you there!”
“Yes, uncle,” Zilliad uttered as she followed Isaa's command.
With Sego and Isaa properly placed, Zilliad landed on top of one of the crashed meteors. She momentarily looked over the battlefield before diving in.
Did Apena just call me the child of prophecy? Zilliad thought to herself.