“I want it to be known,” began Reil, “That I still think we should wait for His Majesty.”

“Noted,” said Rain. “But you already agreed to this, so we’re going through with it.”

Everyone who had been in the basilica, with the exception of the remotely monitoring General Graves, now stood packed in a descending lift. White had moved to Avira’s shoulders, as was only fair since she hadn’t had a turn yet, and she had silently explained that portals lay at the bottom of all The Sanctuary’s elevators. Beneath the top layer where the kingdom stood, these portals opened at the ship’s command to hundreds of locations across its interior. The one they were in now was going to take them directly into the Crucible, the building where the Heart was housed.

Initially, despite how everyone around him had been acting, going to the Heart hadn’t meant a whole lot to White. But the genuine excitement of both Avira and Naroe was beginning to rub off on him and his tail was gently swaying behind them.

Reil sighed with all his years, rubbing the bridge of his nose with his calloused hands. “If he’s from both, it's all the more reason to wait.”

“The two of us can handle whatever happens,” replied Rain. “Especially with our backup,” he gestured to Isaac and Poe who stood behind them.

The Chief Speaker, as White had learned his title was, was trying to stop shaking. What he was shaking with, the dragon couldn’t tell beneath his uniformed ensemble but his mirror, The Deacon, appeared to be vibrating with excitement.

“Besides,” Rain continued, “we’ve gotten no word from them since they arrived in Andromeda. Which means the Council is probably wasting his time, as usual.”

“Did you at least send word of what we’re doing?” Reil asked.

“Of course I did, I asked John to send out a message to Aria before we left.” The General nodded back to Isaac then. “And Isaac grabbed one of those new communicators so he can contact us if he hears back.”

The Deacon pulled out a small metal box then, showing it to Reil. It was barely the size of his hand, with a smoothed crystal antenna and a few unmarked buttons. “General Mareth has been tinkering with their design as a ‘pastime,’ she says.” chuckled Isaac. “They work directly with The Sanctuary without the need of a blessing. There’s only a few, but we can talk to people across the Kingdom from anywhere in its borders.” He smiled with pride then. “Once the design is finalized, we’ll be able to give one to every member of the Order, then anyone in the Kingdom!”

Reil stared at the device. He was clearly impressed, but it wasn’t enough to outweigh his concern. “Still…” he said.

“What has you so worried?” Rain’s question was asked with legitimate concern. “If anything, I worry we’re wasting Isaac and Poe’s time. It’s not like anyone is needed to bless a Monarch.”

“But he isn’t a Monarch,” retorted Reil. “Not only that, I have never once, in any records or in my own experience, heard of either of the Planes referring to something as ‘family.’”

“Yet we’ve confirmed that he’s at least related to the Planes. We’ve never seen anything like him before, true, but that only adds more to the Light’s statement. If we name someone who’s been blessed by both Planes as our ruler, I don’t see what the issue here is.”

“I’ll say it again, he isn’t a monarch.” Reil repeated. “Why aren’t we able to sense him as we are His Majesty? Why did it take so much effort to look inside him? Why have the Planes remained silent regarding him until now?” The veteran shook his head. “There are still too many questions.”

White felt them pass through the portal then, signified by the familiar rush of power and pressure that he had felt during his first descent. There were two differences this time however. The first was the vastly increased intensity, he could feel he was much closer to the source of it now than before. The second was that, despite the increased intensity, the things that lived in that power gave him a wide berth. The air was still heavy and he could even see wisps of light and dark flying freely through everything. A fair few gravitated towards those who were blessed with their element, who sensed but did not see them as the dragon did.

A few from both sides hovered around him, but did not get close like they did with the blessed. White felt an unfamiliar feeling run down his spine. He didn’t feel any hostility but nor did he feel welcome. He felt out of place, but also at home. And to make things more complicated, he believed the things that lived in the power were just as confused as he was.

The metal doors to the lift opened then, revealing the contrasting interior of the Crucible and a hall twice the size of their elevator. It was similar to the exterior, with black stone making up the foundation of its structure and sucking in any light that touched it. But the glowing white roots that were its veins now dripped with sparkling sap, that rose into the air before dispersing into a rainbow of color. The thicker the roots, the more varied the colors became.

The party stepped out onto the stone and the elevator behind them disappeared into the floor below, leaving no trace that it had disturbed the room to begin with. None of them could bring themselves to break the silence beyond their steps, and even those seemed muffled. As they continued down the corridor with Reil and Rain leading the way, though White had no idea how they knew where to go. Turning back, there was no sign of the openings he had seen from the building’s outside.

The silence grew heavier not just around them, but within White as well. It felt almost suffocating and it worsened that unknown emotion that had now taken root inside of him. As his connections to his companions continued to strain under the growing pressure, White steadily began to panic. It wasn’t that long ago he had met Naroe and Avira, but he had already begun to change so much from their influence that their sudden absence was having a greater impact than he could have imagined. But when neither of his companions appeared to notice the change, White subconsciously collared his emotions. He could see that this meant a lot to them, he would not disturb it.

For Naroe, this was a first-time experience. His eyes darted to every little detail they passed, taking it all in with restrained bewilderment. Despite what he had told Avira earlier, he had not expected to be here on the same day. He had thought that if General Graves gave the okay, Reil and Rain would have been the ones taking White through this. What he had not expected was to be heading in himself with a full party. Now he could barely guess at what was going to happen.

Normally only a maximum of three people entered the crucible at a time. On the solstices, only one apprentice at a time would walk through the halls. They would meet with two waiting Generals from both sides of the Order within the innermost chamber to test for a blessing. The exception was if someone was directly apprenticed to someone who had at one point possessed the rank of General, then their master could choose to test them when they chose. He had heard stories of those blessed being incredibly empowered in the presence of the heart, where members of the order were made into gods.

Naroe’s pupils went to pinpricks as his body tensed involuntarily. His large hands balled into fists as he suppressed a crooked smirk, even as a bead of sweat rolled down his cheek. Then just as quickly, he breathed and relaxed just enough to suppress the anxiety and not the excitement.

But that sudden burst, that ignition of Naroe’s spirit was just enough to spill through the smothered connection. Just as when they had first met in the forest, the dragon understood his companion once more. Naroe wanted to see the heights of strength and scale them. White didn’t understand why, but those burning desires resonated with him on an instinctual level.

A spark of that made its way to him and that burning excitement slotted into place as something that just made perfect sense, and it ignited something inside him. It wasn’t like in the forest, with conflicting sensations flowing out with a burst of power. It was small, like the flame of a single candle. But this flame, now that it was lit, would never go out.

White relaxed with a deep sigh, feeling the panic subsiding a little with the flame’s inner warmth.

Avira, having made this same journey the day before, was less awed by their surroundings. The otherworldly brilliance of this sacred place still had an impact on her, but she had known what to expect already and that mental bracing is what allowed her to notice the silenced breath on her shoulder. She glanced at the dragon, and only then did she notice the change between them.

He turned, meeting her widened violet eyes. For a moment, White thought she was beginning to panic as he was, but she said nothing. Though with how deep they had gone, White wasn’t sure he would have heard her if she did. The carved stone had faded into a smooth void and the roots had lost their physicality. They became like liquid light, their colorful sap flowing freely into the air like spectral mist before fading into the perfect abyss.

Avira slowly took White into her arms, cradling him as she subtly pointed curious formations of the roots and how they interacted with their dark neighbors. Pillars in the dark stood wrapped in roots, their sap staining the void’s liquid surface like stellar winds in nebulae. She pointed to their footsteps, which now rippled the surface of the ground and left imprints of swirling mists of changing color. She pointed to the walls where spiral roots had erupted from seemingly no source, blooming misty petals that resembled the arms of galaxies. Black holes and quasars churned restlessly against the surface of the walls, drinking and spewing the energies around them.

The walls and ceiling had become an endless, living painting of the universe.

White realized then that he had been identifying things that he had never seen before. It wasn’t hard then to find the small stream that had begun flowing through his link with Avira. It wasn’t anywhere close to the ocean he knew was on the other side, but Avira was steadily pumping her knowledge and memories through the cracks in the choked connection. It was a gentle flow that White’s mind easily took in, so easily that he hadn’t even noticed it was happening. He reached into the stream, attempting to add to Avira’s efforts, and was rewarded with more information than he had ever taken on at once.

It was an old story, older than their world and everything they’ve ever known, told to them when her ancestors first entered The Sanctuary.

The Planes are places, peoples, and powers all at once. They are fragments of greater things that came before them, lost long ago in event of extreme grief and pain that they dare not speak of. But before they lost what they once were, the Dark and Light had created by repeatedly colliding with one another, testing themselves in contests of their very being, each resulting in a new space for life to spring forth. These spaces, which contained their own rules and realms, the Planes had referred to as “Verses in Life’s Litany.” And so they came to be known as “Verses.”

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White was stunned as a chill ran down his body, a sensation that took a moment for him to understand. He had comprehended her story in its full magnitude. Without realizing it, Avira had just infinitely expanded the small dragon’s world in an instant, giving him her own comprehension of existence itself.

Her gifts poured into his being like a fresh flood, its current swirling around the flame Naroe had ignited before growing into heavy clouds that surrounded the fire. But instead of smothering what had come before it, the storm fed the flame, making it strong enough to in turn begin feeding the storm. Then both began to grow.

White’s eyes widened as his pupils became thin slits, gaining a thin layer of royal indigo fire, but nothing happened to gain Avira’s attention as she cradled him. White, however, felt this instant change as a surge of self-awareness. He suddenly understood the significance of where he was going and exactly what was waiting for him.

Yet still, there was something inside him, buried deep from before he ever awoke on that shore, that was telling him this was where he wanted to go. When he accepted that voice, he relaxed and even felt his own excitement begin to rise.

Just as White made peace with himself, something came into view from the depths of the Crucible. It was gentler than White had expected, a soft gray glow that drifted against the end of the hall. He could see tall, deep blue grass waving in the rolling fog.

White suddenly realized he couldn’t recall how long they had been walking.

The blessed began to change in the presence of the end, the power inside welcoming them like a mother would her returning children. It embraced them, lending them whatever it could.

Isaac had changed the least out of the group, but not by much. His silk robes had become like alabaster, as if he wore a statue’s clothing like he would any other garment. His stole now appeared spun from golden fire while his stitching burned with blue embers. His eyes glowed a brilliant amber from bronze skin that glowed gently amongst the roots.

For Poe, his form became like a wraith, his legs appearing seeming to fade entirely as he glided across the floor. His robes grew to flow behind him like a trail of the void that was around them. His trinkets gleaming like distant stars as their once silent tinks sounded now as gentle bells. The raven mask, which now looked to be made from dark crystal, hung from empty darkness.

Then there was Reil and Rain, who’s transformation left the rest of the party pulling back from the intensity of their blossoming transformations.

For the former General, his small body was no longer physical. He moved like a heat haze with each step, his form faded and trailing the mist the roots around him produced. The colorful light that had marked Graves trailed a silhouette under his translucent form, silent golden lighting dancing across its paths. The air around him shuddered and popped as his power fought the air pressure around him, though the being that was once Reil didn’t seem concerned with the lack of oxygen. Where it walked, the void eagerly gave way for the stars that were born in its steps. This champion’s counterpart was the only one unbothered by the transformation.

White didn’t know when the world around them had begun to shake, but it did so now. No Light, not even Reil’s could reach the pitch black mass that shook the crucible with its footfalls. The movements of its limbs were only identifiable by the rush of air that instantly filled the vacuums it created. The miniature black holes that had been sustained in the walls broke free, and threw themselves into the growing form. By the time it reached the end of the hall, it had to bend down to fit through the exit.

The two demigods stepped out into the chamber, somehow disappearing into the fog. Both Isaac and Poe looked at Avira, then at White, and she nodded. Avria lowered herself to place the dragon on the ground, who looked back up at her. Isaac smiled and Poe nodded in approval before they both followed their superiors inside, the last three not far behind.

The inside was almost like the Sanctuary’s, with light blue walls that steadily became darker as it rose into the unseen ceiling. The light was coming from the top of a hill, the only hill in the room it seemed. Obscured in the fog, its dull platinum shine stood tall and somehow lit the entire room in deep breaths of light.

As soon as White set foot in the grassy chamber, the mist came alive. No longer drifting naturally through the air, tendrils around White reared at him like smoking serpents. But they didn’t strike, so White didn’t pay them any mind. What had his attention was that Naroe and Avira hadn’t followed him inside.

He turned back and looked at them, Naroe leaning against the dark stone and Avira waving White on. Naroe nodded at him, smiled, and pointed at the source of the fog before giving a thumbs up.

White blinked before nodding and began climbing the hill to the Heart.

The wind began to pick up as the fog concentrated around the dragon, following him in pacing coils that still kept a distance. As it did, the area around the Heart grew more visible and White found where the members of the Order had gone. All four of the ascended blessed stood by the towering source of the fog, two flanking each side. On the left was the Deacon and the old trapper, the latter now too far to see any detail and giving him the appearance of trapped lighting. The General of the Dark and the Chief Speaker stood as their opposite. the gigantified Rain standing as a true monolith with nearly the height of the Heart itself.

When White was halfway up the hill, the fog seemed to finally let go of its hesitation. The smoking tendrils slowly, almost carefully. began enveloping White’s body. It coated him in its swirling power, obscuring the world around him entirely. Then he felt nothing from the world at all.

White was suspended in endless nothingness. No Light, no Dark, just pure emptiness. The only thing that existed here was him, though he no longer felt the body he had grown used to. Where was he?

That was the wrong question. White searched the empty world once more, but found nothing. It had been the barest of things, devoid of voice and volume, but they were the clearest words White had ever heard.

Who he was was easy. He hadn’t lived that long, but he’d been given a name and he had gotten to see a lot of stuff in that short time. He liked a lot of what he’d seen and he wanted to see more of it. He wanted to be a part of it. Yes, “who” was easy.

What he was was a completely different story. He had been completely reliant on the people around him to figure that out and White had thought they had been doing a good job of that so far. He didn’t feel any need to complain, though he was stuck in a world of nothingness.

“When” felt like a hopeless question to ask in that place and why…

Why had opened up a trove of fresh questions. Why the questions in the first place? Why wasn't he back at the heart? Why didn’t Naroe and Avira come with him? Why was Rain so adamant about doing this? Why was Reil so hesitant? Why were the Planes so conflicted about him? Why was he left alone? White didn’t know for how long his thoughts cascaded, it felt like time had no meaning, but something silenced them.

He had grown bored. Bored with the questions. Bored with nothingness. Bored with the lack of a body. And most of all, he was bored with waiting. Something needed to be done, so he decided that if the Planes brought him here, the Planes were going to do something about his boredom.

He thought back to the night before in Rain’s bar and found the moment number eleven’s introduction had ended. The suspended soul that was White pulled everything he could into him like he was the dragon he used to be, sucking in all the air he could for his first roar. But here, he drew in the nothingness.

He could feel it now, the space around him was finite, and it was shrinking. It invigorated his efforts even further and right as he felt the walls around him, the song was unleashed. It crashed against the space that had been crafted to hold him, and shattered its boundaries completely. White let it play, his soul its only source as it resonated with the sounds from his memories.

He felt them now, the limitless spaces of Light and Dark. They surrounded him on all sides, the endless void and limitless light, though White didn’t care. They brought him here, now they needed to do something about it.

But to his surprise, they did nothing. Numberless eyes and ears all turned toward his soul in that one moment and he held their gaze with the song of his choice as his voice. And they watched and listened.

And when the song was over, a silence fell over everything. The Planes didn’t react and White had no idea what his next course of action should be. He considered playing something else, but the only other song he knew the entirety of was Hyperion.

Then the Planes shrank, or condensed rather, into two floating orbs, one light and one dark.

“Better to keep things simple, yes?” The Light sounded like a chorus of layered voices that changed as it spoke, inflecting its words several different ways at once.

“Agreed, time is short.” The Dark had been what White had heard in the emptiness. “You are welcomed, sibling, but we cannot aid you yet.”

White pulsed multiple questions to them involuntarily, catching the rest before they could slip into their alien communication. It wasn’t like with Avira and Naroe, in fact White got the feeling this is what it was like to speak with him.

We apologize to you, the Light communicated, we had attempted to accelerate your growth in a dimensional pocket–

Which succeeded, The Dark interrupted.

But only partially, the Light continued with no reaction. You have the capability to act as a conduit for us as the Heart does, but not to utilize us. In order to grant you that ability, you must bring home this kingdom’s monarch.

He has spent a great deal of time with us, a fine ruler, continued the Dark. His soul will act as the blueprints for what will be our connection with you. As you grow, it will aid you in rejoining the Family.

White understood what they were asking of him, but he weaved his discontentment at the ambiguous statement into his questions.

“‘Sibling’ may not be entirely accurate at the moment,” the Light clarified. “We are not what we once were, but we still possess the fragments of our progenitors. You were broken by something before you could become anything. What was responsible now turns its attention to this kingdom.”

“That Empire stirs beyond our sight,” said the Dark, “but we see some who use it as an entry into this world. We do not know how you came to be here in your current state, but your arrival has not gone unnoticed by them. Both for his political and practical power, the Monarch must remain where he is in case something happens during your journey.”

“We predict it will take time for you to acclimate with him anyway,” assured the Light. “The more time you spend together before you’re brought before the Heart, the easier the process will be.”

White felt the pressure that had smothered him begin to fade with the conflicting sensations of the planes. His vision began to fade when both planes spoke. “Dear sibling, this connection is not one we can maintain, but we have opened the doors. Bring King Elicus Vala home and we will teach you how to step through them.”

Then the physical world returned and White found himself standing on the side of the hill he had been climbing. The fog was gone and the dragon found himself looking up at a coiling structure of white and black. A double helix of two disconnected forces that rose from the center of the hill over a shimmering beam of dull platinum light. They pulsed with energy, rippling in place like plucked strings that played soft, bassy hums.

Turning to the four who had flanked the structure, White saw that each of them had reverted back to their pre-ascension states and stood with absolute stillness. White had surprised people multiple times already, but he could tell that whatever he had done in his trance went beyond anything that they had anticipated. He turned to look over at the two he had bonded with to find that both seemed even more shocked than then the others.

Then the dragon realized that their connections had not only been reopened, but strengthened. As he looked back at them, feeling something like a chuckle attempting form in his chest, White remembered what the Planes had called him. He felt his mouth slowly work into a smile. He liked the sound of siblings.