The Forsaken Hero

The blinding ocean of light receded to a mere trickle, revealing an enormous crater where the initial impact had struck. Secondary explosions and shockwaves continued to erupt, sending dazzling waves of light outwards and vaporizing demons left and right, but my eyes remained fixed on the crater’s center. Luke was... gone.

The Apostle of Curses had vanished without a trace. Tears welled up, blurring my vision, and my shoulders shook with the force of my sobs.

”No way,” R’lissea breathed, her voice filled with disbelief.

”How is that even possible?” Elise echoed.

I turned, about to bury my face in R’lissea’s shoulder, when the nuances of their voices registered. It wasn’t fear or sorrow but disbelief. Slowly, barely daring to hope, I raised my head and blinked away the tears, peering anew through the lingering ribbons of light at the scene before us.

The bottom of the crater glowed with molten rock, faint wisps of light still dissipating from the devastating attack. The entire area pulsed with residual mana, nearly as blinding to my sensitive eyes as the initial Solar Flare had been. There was still no sign of Luke or anything for that matter—just a glassy crater.

”On the wall,” Elise said in a choked voice.

My gaze darted to where the mage stood atop the battlement. There were two figures there now: the plainly robed mage and... Luke!

The apostle stood tall and confident, sword held out to the side, motionless at the end of a swift, decisive cut. The mage stood frozen in place, eyes bulging, mouth agape. Ribbons of darkness trailed from the mage’s chest to the edge of Luke’s sword. A thin black line wrapped around his chest.

No, not a line. A cut.

Time stood still for a heartbeat as I stared at the scene. Tears continued to trickle down my face, unnoticed, as I struggled to comprehend what had just happened. Luke was whole, unharmed. Not even the edges of his cloak were singed.

But how? How was he fine? Solar Flare was a...a...

Time resumed with a sickening lurch, and blood spurted from the mage’s chest. He staggered forward, coughing up mouthfuls of blood before collapsing to his knees. His hands clutched at the cut in his chest, but his shallow breaths only caused his body to separate. Luke’s sword had very nearly bisected him, with only a few fragments of bone and muscle keeping his torso together.

Luke straightened and turned, his cloak billowing as the shockwave generated by the sheer speed of his approach finally caught up to him. His sword moved in a casual, lazy arc, slicing cleanly through the mage’s neck.

The man’s head toppled from his shoulders in a grotesque fountain of blood. It bounced once before coming to rest on its stump, eyes rolled back and his mouth open in a silent scream. His body followed, crumpling to the ground in a bloody heap. Luke flicked his sword, scattering the blood from the gleaming blade before dropping it. The weapon dissolved into shadow before it hit the ground, followed soon by his staff.

The apostle glanced at me and, upon meeting my eyes, smiled. I tried to smile back, or at least nod, but my body wouldn’t respond. I just stared back at him, clutching my skirt to keep my hands from shaking.

When I didn’t react, Luke’s smile slipped, and he shook his head. He nudged the corpse with his boot, then glanced at the battle raging around the keep’s walls. His demons had pushed back the remaining humans, but it was still too early to call it a victory. The demons I had seen around him and at the war council were tied up in the front, eager to get a chance to devour more powerful souls.

His attention turned to the Devoted circling the ridge, protecting me. As he moved, raising a hand to beckon toward us, I finally regained my senses.

”What does he want?” I asked, frowning at him.

R’lissea shrugged. ”Who’s to say? I bet he’s looking for a demon, though.”

”A demon? but why?”

I tilted my head, watching as the bird-like ice demon rose into the sky, streaking toward Luke in a silver-white blur.

”He doesn’t want the soul to go to waste,” R’lissea muttered. ”Even if that’s one of Fyren’s demons, the rest of his servants are a little occupied right now.”

The sixth-level ice demon landed beside the apostle with enough force to crack the wall. It towered over Luke, easily twenty feet tall, yet lowered its head to him. Luke stepped back and gestured with his hand towards the mage’s corpse.

The monstrous bird wasted no time, snatching the body in one of its enormous claws. I watched in horrified fascination as a chaotic stream of energy erupted from its soul and plunged into the corpse’s chest.

The mage’s body twitched violently as the demon’s mana turned into a conduit, greedily swallowing the dying embers of his soul before they could fade entirely. The ice demon’s soul begins to pulse with an eerie, fiery light, swelling in size before condensing and beginning the process again, getting just a little bigger each time.

In just a few seconds, the monster’s soul bulged, growing dangerously close to bursting. The last few remnants of the mage’s soul vanished, and the bird dropped the corpse. It spread its wings, screeching at the sky in triumph, before it staggered, collapsing into the stone beneath it.

The already weakened battlement crumbled beneath its immense weight, but the demon didn’t react, allowing itself to tumble to the ground amidst the cascading stone. When the dust settled, it was half-buried in debris, its feathers dulled with dust. But its soul glowed brightly as it began the laborious process of assimilating the mage’s life force into its own.

”Incredible,” I whispered, unable to tear my eyes from the macabre spectacle.

The entire process was uncannily similar to the spell I used to fix fate, except instead of weaving together the threads of the stars, this demon tore them apart and absorbed them into its own soul. It was a crude and wasteful method, far less efficient than I would have imagined, but in just a few seconds, the demon surged past the seventh level.

”What is it, Xiviyah? Thought that bastard got me?”

I let out a squeak, whirling to see Luke standing just behind us, arms folded, a smirk on his face.

”N-no, I um...” I scrubbed my eyes with my sleeve and clutched at my twitching tail, holding it behind my back with both hands.

His eyebrows shot upwards, his mouth falling open. ”I...I see.”

My grip on my tail tightened, and I shrank back against Fable, vainly attempting to disappear into his fur. Every instinct urged me to crawl up into a ball and hide. He would lose interest in teasing me then, right?

”I really wasn’t,” I whimpered again.

”Really? Who are you trying to–” Elise eyes sparkled with mischief, but R’lissea laid a hand on her shoulder, and her mouth clicked shut.

”Xiviyah,” Luke said softly and gently. Though I kept my eyes on the ground, the tip of his boots entered my vision. ”It’s alright. I’m okay now.”

”He... he almost killed you. If you hadn’t dodged...” I whispered, squeezing my eyes shut.

A rough, calloused hand settled on my shoulder, stilling my twitching tail. My chest grew painfully tight, a shiver causing my whole body to tremble.

”I didn’t dodge.”

”What?” My eyes shot open, but all thoughts fled as I came face-to-face with the apostle.

I tried to shy back into Fable’s waiting fur, but his eyes, dark and intense, held me captive. My breath came in short, ragged breaths, catching with every beat of my heart. He was close. Too close.

”L-Luke,” I stammered.

He jerked, abruptly stepping away, his hand disappearing as quickly as it had come. I collapsed backward, my heart racing with adrenaline anew. The ghostly warmth of his hand caressed my shoulder, and I unconsciously raised my own hand to cover it.

”Sorry,” he mumbled, his tail drooping. ”I just...”

Elise coughed, causing both our heads to snap toward her. Oddly enough, her eyes glimmered with excitement, not the hostility they had the last time he touched me.

”Why did you say you didn’t dodge?” she asked.

He shook his head, expression clearing. ”Ah, right. The Shard said Xiviyah’s resistance could handle seventh-level sun magic, so I figured I could just use it as a cloak for an eighth-level technique. The bastard was too confident for his own good and lowered his guard.”

My hand slipped from my shoulder, curling in a loose fist against my chest. It was the same audacious tactic as before.

”Why?” I whispered, squeezing my eyes shut. Why did he have so much faith in me?

I hadn’t even considered adaptive resistance would protect him. To me, Solar Flare wasn’t just a spell. It was the magic Soltair used, the spell that had inflicted me with sunpurge. It wasn’t something that could be fought.

But Luke had done it.