The burning village frays away to the void, and that too folds in on itself, forming into a white expanse.

  Thraevirula takes a seat. Hugs her knees. Stares off into the distance.

  Bubbles of light—blues, blacks, reds, purples, greens—form and sway around the three of us. I stare at one bubble of gradient colors and reach a finger to it. When I pierce it, the bubble doesn’t pop but rather, its inside stirs with energy. Mana. Ambient mana for fire, wood, darkness, wind, ice, light, aether, water, heavens, hells, eldritch, dimensional, time, spirits—

  What in the hells? How do I know any of this?

  “We are in the in-between space,” Hypna suddenly drones, startling me. Her voice is flat and her eyes do not meet mine. Rather, they stare, unblinking, at the floor. “Some call it purgatory for magicks.”

  “And what does that even mean?”

  “Tia—” she catches herself and shakes her head. “Thraevirula’s and your stamina for dream magicks has unraveled. Or, more likely, she has decided to stop maintaining dream constructs, yet at the same time, she wants to keep us in the mental realm. And, as a result, we now lie on the lines of the spiral of magicks.”

  She points to one of the bubbles. “These are mere lenses. Viewpoints into the other levels of magicks.”

  “You mean circles?”

  “No. Levels… Right, I forgot,” she says, chuckling now. “This is a misconception of the modern mancer. They want magicks to be simple, so they model the whole realm of magicks as a series of concentric circles. Their so called ‘Fundamental Theory of Magicks.’”

  Right. Sorina and I talked about this on our first day of the journey.

  “And you’re saying that this theory is…Wrong?”

  “Misunderstood is a better way of putting it. Concentric circles are limiting. Rather, magicks are better visualized as a spiral. Infinite. Expanding. Ever-changing.”

  My mind reels. I shake my head: “so there is no limit?! At all?”

  She shrugs, eyes finally meeting mine. They are wet. I try gesturing for her to continue. “The core elements, the ones closer to the center of the circle, stay the same. Those are the easiest to learn. But yes: new magicks are being learned and manifested all the time. This is why niches are formed: mental magicks. Shield magicks. Spiritual necromancy. These are harder to learn via immersion and often, require a sophisticated understanding of magicks concepts.”

  A single tear glazes down her cheek. She sniffs, but continues, staring at me. “Magicks are—they are—” she pauses, wiping another tear.

  I wanted this conversation to distract her slightly. I suppose I have failed.

  This time, I do manage to put a hand on her shoulder. She shoves it off at first, which hurts me far more than it should—but then, she starts crying. Hypna, the Witch of Dreams, the mother of my enemy, buries her head into my chest and clutches her fingers at my collar and weeps uncontrollably. Her tears feel real. Her touch feels real.

  Yet, she is not real.

  A mere imitation, as Thraevirula said.

  And somehow, someway…

  I’ve grown to care for her.

  Maybe I’m going insane in this realm. In this long-night, the dream has shown me so much—too much.

  “Magicks,” Thraevirula cuts in, her voice equally as blank as Hypna’s. “Are boundless.” Her crimson gaze hawks me, watching me hold her mother awkwardly.

  My own eyes narrow back at her. “So what now? Why keep us here? Why not expel us? Try killing us? Shove another centipede down my throat?”

  She stands up and adjusts the hems of her war dress, purposefully unhurried despite the venom behind my last words.

  “Do you know why I want your amulets, Raiten?”

  “Not a damn clue.”

  “Acromner, the being that Saegor drools over, is a primordial—and quite a powerful one at that. I’ve tried fighting him before. He nearly killed me. No magicks I threw at him worked. In my desperation after the fight, I sought a more… Prophetic solution.”

  My hands unconsciously reach for the sack of amulets at my belt. Hypna stops sniffling on my collar and pulls away from me, wiping her eyes. More tears stream down, but she manages to turn and face Thraevirula.

  “You sought Destiny?” Hypna asks, deadly serious now.

  Thraevirula nods.

  I look between both of them, confused. “What does that even—”

  “She is a phantom specter who goes from world to world and prophesizes futures beyond what we can conceive,” Hypna spits. “But, half the time, she’s wrong. Deadly so.”

  “But when she’s right, her futures have determined the course of the universe itself,” Thraevirula argues. “And she told me that angel dust might be the key to defeating him.”

  What? How does that make sense?

  “Are you not with Souta Matahashi?” I realize. “Can you not just use his—”

  “His are not made for that purpose.”

  “And mine are.”

  “Only one way to find out.”

  Before I can ask about it, Hypna pushes on. “That doesn’t excuse—”

  “Excuse?!? What do you mean ‘excuse?’ You died. You died and left me with a monster who bred me to become a sacrifice for a deity. I did whatever I had to do to avenge you. To save the world from the monster that you worshiped. I mean—” Thraevirula pauses, laughing as if she can’t even fathom Hypna’s position. The Witch of Plagues turns it back on me: “You know that’s why Saegor and the rest of the Harbingers gather children, right? They aim to sacrifice generations of young souls to bring back the youth of their master. The more potent the soul, the better. And if they had it their way, this whole continent would be a mere feeding farm for Acromner’s pleasure.”

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  “You say this as someone who plagues children and uses them as pawns in your army,” I counter.

  “I give them dreams, Raiten. In their plagued forms, they are in eternal sleep. They get to be whoever they want and do whatever they please. And it is a much better fate than what lies in store for them should the Harbingers take their lot. A much better fate than what will happen if Acromner truly awakens, for more than just a season.”

  I back away from Thraevirula as she approaches. “You’re sick.”

  “You don’t understand Raiten. I’ve been fighting these men for so long. Ever since I found out what happened to my mother, I took Saegor’s eye and ran. I alone have been the wall against their filth. I beat them at Grettleberg and they fled to Catolica—clutched their talons in that country’s hierarchy. So I will beat them here as well. All of them.”

  So that’s why she plagued Grettleberg first. It wasn’t just random chaos. She had a purpose.

  Still…

  “You’re just justifying one evil with another,” I say.

  “Oh don’t lecture me now: I’ve seen into your mind. I know what you want to do to each and every member of Clan Adachi. Don’t delude yourself into thinking your vengeance is bound by the confines of justice. You are not some paragon of purity.”

  I remember how I felt killing that old man in the dream. How elated I was to see his eyes pop as my fingers pressed and pressed. And pressed.

  She takes another step. I don’t move back this time.

  The witch surges. “I’m going to give you one last chance, Raiten. My cause is the same as yours. My purpose is the same as yours. And you know how dangerous Saegor is now. You understand the threat that Acromner poses. If you join me, I won’t need to use Masaru. We can kill him. Then, you can help me kill Acromner—beat the Harbingers. In exchange, I will cure the children I’ve plagued and avert a war between two great nations.”

  She reaches her hand out. “This is your last chance, Raiten. If you don’t take it, you will lose. And everyone you know will die.”

  My hands start shaking. I clutch them into fists and rack my brian.

  “You’d truly do that? Cure everyone you’ve plagued? Even the ones who have passed–”

  “I can’t bring back the dead. I can revert the living ones though. I have a cure, Raiten. This can all end here and now. But only if you take my hand.”

  Think. If you ignore everything that she’s done to you, everything that’s happened up until now, this is a good deal.

  You kill Acromner for her. You kill Masaru. You cure Dandy. And you move forward to the Boar Ranges.

  That was always the plan. Nothing else matters.

  Why resist?

  Incanta will bind her to the deal. She can’t back down once it's made.

  And yet, my body struggles against it. I have to force my hand up. Uncurl my fingers.

  Reach out.

  Hypna steps in front of me, back turned towards her daughter. And she shakes her head. Her amethyst eyes implore me: no.

  What right does she have to decide for me? She doesn’t understand. None of them do. They think that just because they’ve seen my memories, they know how I feel?

  They haven’t lived how I lived.

  They haven’t felt what I felt. They could never understand.

  Because it wasn’t Thraevirula’s fault that Hypna died.

  But it was my fault that my mother died.

  It was always my fault.

  And I need to make it right.

  I step past Hypna and approach Thraevirula. Her expression is unchanging at first. But the closer I come, the more her mouth shapes into a sad little smile. No sign of victory or glee.

  Relief.

  A traitorous thought emerges from the muck of my mind. It screams and shouts. Fights off all else and pushes to the forefront, like a dying soldier’s last stand.

  My hand lowers.

  I inhale deeply and shake my head. Not like this.

  “Acromner will die. The Elders will die. Adachi will die. The Harbingers will die. You. Will. Die. Do you know why, Tia?”

  Her smile drops. “That’s not my na—”

  “Because I’m going to kill you. All of you,” I interrupt. “You’re right, I am no hero. No paragon. No: I am just the solution. How many have you killed already? How many mothers have you taken from their sons? Husbands from wives? Daughters from fathers? No more. You say you have a cure? I’ll pry it from your rotting corpse.”

  I back away, standing side by side with Hypna.

  “No one else will ever have to feel what I felt. I swear it. And that future is not achieved through you or Destiny or Saegor—it is mine. Mine to reach for, to grasp. To squeeze.”

  I turn my gaze upon Hypna, intending this message for her as well.

  “I will no longer be anyone’s slave.”

  Hypna smiles.

  Thraevirula’s left eye twitches. The right side of her mouth curls like a scorpion ready to sting, but the left quivers like a frightened child. She shakes her head once.

  Then she laughs—high, raw, manic. Laughs like Daichi after he threw the Angel of Verdan into the pit. Her chest heaves; her laughter pitches higher, sharper, like a hyena baying at its own kill. She flings her head back and her hair reaches up in the void like a blade of fire against the white heavens.

  The strands fall back onto her eyes, providing a curtain for her madness.

  Then, her hands clap together all too rapidly. “Well, I’m glad you got that off your chest! Very good Raiten! I see that none of my work has borne fruit. Wonderful. Marvelous. You are still an ignorant little dog. But that’s fine, it’s all going to be just fine Raiten. Now then, since I’m such a prolific taker: I’ll be taking you from my mother now. Goodbye, Raiten.”

  She reaches a hand out and squeezes. The darkness of the void rapidly webs toward us. But before it can reach us, Hypna grabs onto my hand and holds it tight.

  “Brace yourself.”

  We are flung. Like catapults, like arrows, like shooting stars—we sail across the mindscape and break through its confines, into the boundless spiral of magicks. And all is wrought true and mana is brought forth and for one perfect, clear moment, I see the worlds and all they behold, all the horrors and tortures of our time, all the heavens and all the earths and I bear witness to the very conflux of magicks in all its glory.

  And it is beautiful.

  …

  I open my eyes.

  Crickets hum near the bog.

  A frog hops over Saegor’s slumbering form, landing on Zyla. She doesn’t seem to notice, shoving it off before muttering some curses in her sleep.

  The air is dry. And the sun rises above the land, clearing away the night.

  I sit up on my elbows and watch that great orb make its ascent.

  “No more dreaming,” I whisper to myself.

  The frog croaks its approval.