Spring 65 (Afternoon)
The Work awaited anointment: a world tree to contain the great serpent.
Alisandra enjoyed the poetry of it. Now, grown in new ways, she began to see the power in poetry.
For what is real to an angel? Blood and bone are tools. Pain is an entertaining diversion. What else can we call true but the names we claim for our own?
And by those names – by the gravity of what they claimed in the Song of creation – defined their own downfall.
The Archangel and Tempest laid a hand upon the gleaming tower of Light and smiled.
It will serve in other ways as well.
Through its weave, drawing tight, she felt every threat as it blossomed. Each branch fed home, and her halo resounded with every budding mage and every furtive monster on this sphere.
No longer would she require the drums of war. Armed with this foresight, she would prune all threats to her peace before they blossomed.
You will be safe under my reign
With Alisandra ascendant among the Mighty, there would never be another Lumia.
Tapping a finger against the tower, she listened for Sebastian. She had heard him arrive at the witch mountain, but he had slipped out of sight thereafter.
“He had better not be late!” she groused.
The Work was built to harness a single angel, she consoled herself. Tracking the others would be a side benefit. Perhaps I can enhance further once the Wyrm is entombed.
She would not be able to rely on Sebastian to do her chores any longer. His service was required at the altar, a far greater calling than her mail.
Part of her hated to ask so much of her former mentor, but pragmatism won in the end. Sebastian claimed to desire the most good for the most people, and she could think of no greater application of that principle. In the end, was she not fulfilling his dream as well?
And I cannot trust him anyways, she thought in the darkest corners of her heart. A stray thought arose: Perhaps he returned to Ruhum for a final vigil.
She would respect her mother’s wishes, wasteful as the gift might seem. Her own Work froze at Ruhum’s nautical borders, and she laid no hand on the bounty left for Fire’s use beneath the Conclave.
They will squander it, she thought, sadly confident. Perhaps build a weapon of it and challenge me once more.
Alisandra allowed them that choice. In the back of her head, though, she already planned the aftermath.
To conquer the land will take an afternoon. But to undo the pathology beneath the Fire? Ah, that will be the work of decades. How do we begin to break the walls of hate? Hmm…education. We begin with schools. Let them see beyond the boundaries of their village and learn histories beyond their own. Their parents will hold onto their hate until their dying gasp, so we must lay our hope on the children.
Currently, however, that lesser deacon – Maxwell, of all people! – exhorted the faithful to pray for the salvation of the world.
It occurred to Alisandra that if she killed him, the Wyrm might not awaken. But was it not better to face the opponent while prepared? His coming known and her resolve firm? She had damn near lost everything in their last bout through laxity. She would not risk Esmie’s life on the same mistake twice!
So Ruhum murdered its own, and Alisandra waited at the heart of her power for what their begging would inevitably spawn.
In the background of her weave, a propeller engine buzzed closer.
***
Still rubbing her ribs, Valkyrie limped into the squalid town. Despite her rather flashy entrance, no one spared a glance for her. Tura attracted some minor attention on account of his charms, but no one seemed much interested in a shattered plane and its miraculous descent.
The folk just swirled around their chores like every other day. Plateau, Jungle, and Azure, they went about their business…
All the people of the world, quietly mingled.
“Something is very wrong,” Valkyrie whispered to Tura.
“I was hoping for a less anemic response to such a historical event!” the Inventor agreed.
“No, I mean Plateau priests chumming it up with Azure dancers!”
Believe me, the Plateau are still very much not over the fact that the Tempest walks incarnate and the Peak does not!
Tura shook his head. “Ah, well. Have you seen any journalists? Perhaps a photographer? I hope this town is large enough to have one…”
He marched off in search!
Staring after him in bafflement, Valkyrie strained her soul to understand.
Then her eyes snapped into focus, seeing without the protection of Grace, and she understood.
Every soul in this town walked in the secure blanket of a shared golden weave.
There is no need for the old feuds
Let all be gathered under one banner
One name
You will be safe under my reign
An offer of safety. Of belonging. Home. All with the Archangel herself as the anchor – the shining beacon around which the wheel turned.
An everlasting peace… Yet her stomach clenched. No, this isn’t right. Ali, what is going on?!
Valkyrie hurried down the street and intercepted an Azure priestess.
“How do I get up the plateau?” she asked, pointing towards the root of the weave lost in the fog.
“Oh?” the priestess smiled. “Did you wish to pay your respects?”
“Y-yeah.”
“Follow the pilgrim’s way. White flags.” The priestess pointed to the first one, barely visible at the other end of town. “Mind your footing, dear. The rock is very slippery in this weather. Keep a firm hold of the guide chain.”
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“Yes, ma’am.” Not even alarmed? Does the weave not call them to its defense?
She preferred that thought to the alternative: that she was expected.
Tura passed her, headed back for the broken plane with a photographer in tow. He called after her for a photoshoot, but she jogged over to the white flags instead.
She found the guide chain, hammered into the grey rock, and gave it a test pull. It rattled, wet in her hands, and she stared up the nauseatingly steep, inset stairs into mist.
“Let’s not tell Mom about this part…”
Valkyrie grasped the chain and climbed.
Two hundred steps in, the rock beneath her fingers started to itch.
By four hundred steps, it throbbed like a heartbeat.
At six hundred, she heard Song notes leaking through.
Caked in mud and dripping from mist, Valkyrie finally crested the last of seven hundred stairs. She crawled onto the plateau proper, released a strained breath, and paused a moment to steady herself.
Despite the exertion, her heart beat steady with determination.
Her dress in ruins, turned the same color as the mud, she sighed and spun a little faerie fire to at least pretend to presentability.
I am Ali’s Spear. I should look the part!
Unheeded, droplets of mud splattered around her feet.
She marched forward into the shadow of the boughs.
***
The weave chimed softly with an approaching figure. A girl that echoed of Ruhum, Highbranch, and the open sky…
Alisandra took a small step, landing at the base of her Work. She let the backwash of her passage rumble with thunder and banish the fog.
Bathed in the golden Light of her Work, she beheld her Spear.
***
Alisandra Mishkan, Tempest and Archangel, broke the sky above Valkyrie.
Power and Principality, regal as a queen.
Beautiful and strong and sure to set things right.
“Valkyrie?” The Archangel smiled warmly. “It is good that you are here, my Spear. Our time is near, and our utmost will be required. Where is Sebastian? He went to fetch you.”
“I don’t know and I don’t care!”
Alisandra’s smile switched off. “He did not fetch you?”
“He came to tell me to die on the altar!”
The Archangel shook her head. “Nonsense. Sebastian’s place was on the altar. You, my Spear, are needed at my…”
But she stilled, thinking.
The Witness gone
The Work requires sacrament
“Ali! We have to sever this weave!”
The angel tilted her head. “Why?”
“It will smother the world and beyond!” Valkyrie answered. “Even idle thoughts can spawn monsters from it! It will catch your daydreams and magnify them – the good and the evil – until all tremble before the Tempest!”
The angel shrugged. “They already tremble before me.”
I tried, my Spear, to walk as mortals might
Look where that got us
Even Father set aside that dream to face the Wyrm
“I thought you didn’t want to be a Queen!”
Ali’s eyes narrowed. “This is not the time for that discussion.”
“We don’t need a Queen! We’ll manage ourselves somehow!”
The Tempest dropped from the sky and landed on the stones before Valkyrie. The plateau rang with the impact, and the stones rattled with every step as Alisandra closed the distance.
“Like Edward Curia managed a brick to the head? Like Angela Cecille managed her Inquisition? Or Father Lucas managed his feckless principles into a posting under the ash?! Even when a mortal spends their lifetime to accumulate a mote of wisdom, it is lost with them! Deaf children ignore their passing words, and the cycle plays out once more!”
Those deaf children only learn too late
When they grasp their Blade and taste their victory
Amidst the ruin of their family
Shaking, Valkyrie held her ground. “That’s not the point! Ali, your weave is spawning monsters! I’ve seen them. I’ve fought them!”
Mortals this. Mortals that. Already you’ve set yourself apart! Where will you be in a hundred years? In a thousand? You will grow to resent and then to hate!
“Monsters are easy to remove. The weave tells me when trouble arises, and I will meet the newborn terrors with Blade at the ready. There will be no more sailor’s stories of leviathans; no more shadows lurking in the darkest pits.”
Valkyrie hesitated. How could she argue against an end to the monsters? Against safety from the Wyrm?
“Someone has to win this war,” Ali explained softly. As to a child. “I know you are scared, but I am here for you.”
Gritting her teeth, Valkyrie shook her head. “You can’t bear this burden, Ali! No one can! Can’t you hear the Chorus narrow!”
Your weave and Will etched across the stars
Even in victory, this place will be shackled to Mighty design
Is that why we’re here?!
“Let them Sing,” Ali snapped. “I will stir when one deigns to raise a hand against the dark!”
“That’s the Tempest talking!” Valkyrie countered. “The Ali I know would listen!”
The Ali I lo–
“Then let them say something worth the effort! Let them do more than Sing what must be from the safety of the far reaches!”
The sky overhead rumbled.
“Ali, please! If you make a weave of your heart, think what you shoulder! You will never be safe to cry in grief or the world will flood! How can you–”
“I know the cost!” Alisandra roared, gripping the hilt of her Blade tight enough to warp the air around her knuckles. “I know, and I will bear it!”
For I am Archangel!
Nothing less is expected!
“Ali, I–”
“You, my Spear, have a part to play as well,” Alisandra stated firmly. Lips pressed tight, she nodded to herself. “I…I am sorry that I must ask it.”
But you understand, don’t you?
What we must sacrifice
“Sebastian has abandoned his duty,” she reasoned, tapping one nail against the Blade. “But the Wyrm comes on the morrow. He comes, and he will kill for no better reason than his whim.”
There must be sacrament
“Though the weave will be weaker without Sebastian’s connections, that is unavoidable now. We might still salvage a binding of a thousand years.”
Long enough for the Archangel to hone her arts, marshal her forces, and construct a redoubt of the Mighty against which no other would stand.
Valkyrie trembled. Swallowing, she ventured, “A-Ali?”
Please…not you too!
The angel of Valor forced a smile. “Come now, Valkyrie. We are together in this. That is what I saw in you among the detritus of Ruhum. You have bloomed so well.”
Young and beautiful – at the very pinnacle of your arc
“I am truly sorry to make the request, but think of your mother. Of your friends. Of what we can achieve in a single moment.”
A moment of pure, unfettered service
And you go home
The angel convinced herself of the necessity, one rationale at a time.
I will not let it hurt
Valkyrie stumbled back, clutching her breast, and shook her head. “No.”
It isn’t right!
Ali winced. After a moment, she glanced away. “I understand.”
Too much to ask of a child
A shame; her heart would last the longest
To my Temple, then…
After all, as the Chorus sang…
Service and sacrifice
“No!” Valkyrie gasped. “Not me and not anyone! Ali, I won’t let you do this!”
Like a switch flicked, the Archangel’s expression closed. “Excuse me?”
“I don’t care what the Chorus has to say! No more necessary sacrifices! No more pre-ordained paths!”
We’ll Sing our own hearts!
The Archangel planted her feet. “Mind your words, Valkyrie. I will not tolerate interference. There is too much at stake here.”
An Archangel’s resolve, set against every opposition.
No matter who.
“We will discuss this later,” Alisandra said, clear dismissal. Her gaze turned south, ready to–
And Valkyrie cast out her faerie fire, a bubble around them, bending every road inwards.
Alisandra’s step hit the edge of the bubble and entered from the other side.
The Archangel landed, skidding on the side of her boots, and whipped around to face Valkyrie.
No, the Tempest – hair lashing and halo pounding.
“First Oliver and now you?!” she hissed. “Is there no boundary to mortal foolishness?!”
“I can’t let you go!” I can’t let you anoint someone else in my place!
Ali stepped up onto the air, staring down her nose. She stopped ten feet in the air and deliberately drew her Blade.
Letting its edge reflect in every facet of this little bubble.
Another betrayer revealed
Such a shame
I had such hopes for you
“Do you honestly believe you can hold me? I know you are not that foolish. Release your little spell and spare us both the effort.”
I should have known better
Mortals cannot be relied on for anything
Not even a simple sacrifice
The mist beyond their bubble boiled with Tempest fury, blazing bright.
Valkyrie had come this far; she had to try.
Even if it meant facing a god.
She called her faerie fire forth into a blade of her own, mere echo of the Hand of God before her…
As her faerie fire flowed out, though, it revealed more than that.
Peregrine wings tucked tight against her back.
Feathers shivering against the growing cold.
Alisandra stared at those wings a moment.
Her pupils shrank to tiny, furious points.
“You would dare…”
Dare claim our precious wings!
Alisandra raised her Blade.
Valkyrie leaped forward, wings beating, and launched herself towards her doom.
Tempest and girl met mid-air before the Edenward.
Blade and blade; the strength of the Archangel and the only thing Valkyrie had to offer.
A sliver of hope.