I closed my eyes with my face buried deep in Valentina’s sweet silky hair. I didn’t have to ask; when it came time to lay down, she curled up next to me just like she did in our old bed.

Valentina released a quiet moan as I shifted her closer, wrapping an arm around her midsection. The warmth of her body seemed to draw my own. Each gentle rise and fall of her chest pulled me into the gentle flow of her rhythm.

Like ocean waves pulling me out to sea, the steady pulse lulled me into a dream.

The deep blackness took form, blooming with many colors as the sound of birdsongs filled my ears. Tall pines swayed on a winter breeze as footsteps crunched the snow behind me.

“It’s lovely, we should’ve come here sooner!” Valentina said. Her voice was rich, melodic and warm, filled with a kind of genuine excitement that reminded me of my younger years.

I turned with a smile that melted away when I saw the two blue uniforms, embroidered with gold numbers.

Enforcers! Even here? But why…how?

Sleek black masks covered their faces as the women slid over the snow like fairies dancing on ice. I cast a barrier on instinct, shielding Val from a projectile I couldn’t see until it burst against the mana wall.

A blur off to the right caught my eye. Then the sound of metal scraping on stone drew my focus. I pushed Valentina down as two more enforcers appeared, each from different directions. They cut through the empty space then slid around behind me, cutting off any retreat.

My eyes flicked up the nearest tree, a tall evergreen with thick branches and hardy trunk. It would buy some time at least, perhaps even enough that they wouldn’t be able to follow my jump.

Impressing my will on the ice, I caused a circle of frigid spikes to blast up from the ground. A muffled grunt and loud squelch told me I’d caught at least one, but given the location of the sound, it must’ve been another enforcer I had yet to notice.

How fucking many are there?

I shook the thought away. It didn’t matter, I had to escape with Val. I had to keep her from the founders!

She reverted, racing to the tree then floating up as I climbed.

Within moments eight or nine enforcer’s had gathered around the tree’s base.

To delay them further, I blew fire down the tree. I waited until I felt the heat on my hand before pulling my mana back in.Flames exploded from the branches in a fury of hot red, yellow and orange. The lower half of the tree burned bright even in the daylight.

I continued up until I reached Val at the top.

Her sweet eyes met mine with a painful apology. She grabbed my cheeks, pulling me closer, then kissed me.

For a brief moment there was nothing but she and I. Shouting faded into silence, her fragrance overwhelmed the pine scent in my nostrils. I only saw her deep concern as she came closer then the image froze, lingering in my mind as our lips met. I felt her warmth, her power, her nature, then I knew.

Why hadn’t she told me before?

The moment ended with a jolt.

Launched from the tree, I fell toward the earth, but she remained in place.

Space warped around me, bending and twisting so that I couldn’t be sure what was what.

I was certain only that Val’s hair turned a dark shade of pink, ends and all. It flowed out behind her in the wind as trees began to splinter and burst apart. Her gentle, warm eyes became cold and harsh with vicious wrath. Then everything disappeared.

I was falling up, then gravity pulled me back down hard to the ground.

It was warm and humid. Gulls called over waves that broke against the shore and I felt my heart shatter.

“Val,” I whispered.

She wasn’t there. I knew she hadn’t followed me, but I couldn’t accept it! Why would she do that? Why would she stay behind and fight them all on her own?

My eyes flicked up. My mana pulsed through me and my body was filled with renewed energy.

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I would kill every one of them that stood between me and Val. I would even slay founders!

I reached for the tethers of space that would pull me back to that place, but I couldn’t grasp the right thread. It was too mired, too tangled. It was like the spell she used had destroyed the path so I could neither return or be followed.

“Valentina!” I cried out.

A gust of wind swept up and swirled around me, lifting the sand and grains from the beach. The gale grew, rushing forward then fading into the sea as if a great dragon was breathing and sighing. My anger brought forth flames that scorched the sands and boiled the water, but nothing could bring me closer to Val.

I woke with a suffocating sensation, tears trailing down my cheeks as Val lay peacefully beside me. She was warm and her soft scent drew my nose into the back of her hair as I buried my face there, crying softly.

She was still here. I wasn’t alone.

I dried my eyes on my sleeve, being careful not to disturb her rest.

My body and mind were at war with each other. My eyes began to drift closed, but my mind wouldn’t rest. I couldn’t risk going back to that dream, to that lonely beach.

“You’re already alone.” A woman spoke in my mind.

Her voice was unfamiliar, but the sound was soothing like a warm hot spring. My heart jumped at her words, but my anxiety melted away a moment later.

‘Who are you?’ I asked, reaching outward with my mind. I let my focus sweep over the room, but I found no one.

“Fool,” the voice replied, this time coming from all around me. “You think too much of yourself.”

Everything went still. Even my own body felt frozen and beyond my control.

“I am your worst nightmare, should you oppose me. Or…”

A hidden force holding my chest in place was released. I gasped several times as oxygen refilled my lungs.

Then a sense of euphoria overtook me. My limbs tingled with pleasure and I felt myself growing hard as warmth and lust flooded over me. I had never felt so good and so right before.

“I can be your everything, should you obey.”

Something in what she said didn’t feel right. It felt familiar, but not in a good way. Solari came to mind, his experience with a founder and her grip on his life flashed through my mind.

I didn’t want that for myself, but how could I oppose her?

The world shattered like glass as I fell into nothingness.

Val vanished as a deep darkness swallowed me. The sensation of falling soon faded as I had nothing to reference. It was disorienting, confusing, and most of all frightening.

“You would dare to cross me?” She demanded, her words twisted with a snarl.

Great silver jaws appeared in the distance below me. They rose rapidly like a set of scissors flying upward, eager to meet and devour me.

The creature looked like some monstrous serpent of the deep. A beast that could only exist in myth, yet it was real. Her shimmering eyes, cold and unfeeling, struck me with an instinctual fear.

I shouldn’t…

Her jaws reached me, closing around me. she didn’t chew. She just swallowed, sending me tumbling down her throat towards the silver jaws of a mythical beast.

The mother of all beasts, Leviathan, rose up beneath me. Her evil eyes incited panic in my heart, her vicious teeth struck fear into my very being, and I could see no way to oppose her. She was so large I might have mistaken her for an island, if not for the ripples in the black sea surrounding her.

I don’t want to…

She snapped her wide maw and I tumbled into a deep pit of despair.

Silver jaws roared open in the distance, rising towards me with impossible speed. The great beast let her full power pour out in a beam of hatred that felt like falling into a pit of lava, only my body didn’t disintegrate and the pain never stopped.

I can’t oppose—

The jaws of endless death closed once more.

“You are but a toy to me! Do not dare to consider obstinance, lest you seek this fate.”

She clamped her jaws again, but this time they closed on my diaphragm.

It felt like I might break in half, but she was merciful. She held me there letting one set of what I now realize were six pairs of eyes, meet mine.

“Bring me the ancient book, or I will destroy you and take it!”

Val! She must want Valentina, but for what?

No, it doesn’t matter why. I won’t give up my friend!

The silver jaws turned pale white as black veins spread over them. Her hold on me loosened and I drifted up rather than down.

“You!” The beast fell back roaring in pain. “How can you break free of me?”

The beast faded into the pit, then I was back in bed with Valentina sitting up next to me.

The bed was cold and hard as rock, not at all how I remembered it. Energy flowed around and through me, filling me with the most intense sensation. It was a kind of… I couldn’t begin to describe it. I lay on my back with the world around me shifting bending to my will.

Everything was becoming stone, everything except Val and Me.

“Dexter, what are you doing?” Val asked.

“What, I—”

Reality struck. I was turning my whole house to white marble stone. I didn’t know how, I didn’t even know how to stop. I only knew why.

The magic came to a stop on its own. Instead a barrier formed around us as I thought of protecting Valentina.

She sighed, her eyes dropping hopelessly as she said, “I guess it’s time. Let’s go Dexter, we have to go see Gaia.”