Volmira's first breath of Valorian air was thick with the brine of the sea and the earthiness of the lake. She and Rosum had arrived unnoticed, slipping through the shadows into the bustling encampment at the port city's edge. As if carried on like an unseen current, they found themselves amidst a tribe that lived harmoniously by the serene waters.
Valorians fared so differently from the people of Tripolis. Most of them were human, untidy, in their clumsy, simple lives.
Volmira had not one judging bone in her body, her job was maintaining status quo, peace.
But the Assigner's divinity was dim here, unfeeling as if obscured by something that blocked the natural order from developing and with it, Volmira's inner nature.
The women's tunics were a rainbow of colors, each one adorned with delicate floral and animal embroidery. The men wore loose-fitting trousers that seemed perfect for movement and vests that proudly displayed symbols of their family heritage.ents made from woven reeds and animal hides stood in a harmonious circle, like sentinels guarding the sacred center. Smoke wafted from communal fires where cooking pots hung, bubbling with stews that mingled spices Volmira could not name but would never forget. Children chased each other, their laughter piercing the smoky veil, while elders mended nets by the lakeshore, their fingers deftly knotting the cords that would hold the catch of the day.
A small spark ignited inside her chest. A disconcerting reaction, considering she had been made in the image of utter impartiality. Absolutely objective. Neutral. Non-feeling.
This place was cursed, she knew it.
As the sun dipped lower, casting a golden glow on the faces of the Vlachy, there was an undeniable energy that permeated the air—a mysticism that caressed the senses like a whispered secret. It was akin to the atmosphere that cloaked Millenia, where Father, the Assigner, resided. The connection was palpable, stirring within Volmira a reverence for these people who lived so closely entwined with the unseen forces of the world.
This planet had not yet moved into the era of intergalactic travel. Everything these people knew about the world was probably superstitious nonsense. Completely wrong.
Oh, I can't judge. I cannot …It's not my place, nor what I am made of.
And yet still …
She marveled at the way they moved with purpose yet seemed guided by an unseen hand. Each task, whether tending to the herds of goats that roamed just beyond the encampment or weaving baskets that would carry the fruits of tomorrow's labor, was done with a solemnity that hinted at the sacred. Volmira felt it then—an invisible thread pulling her towards an understanding that here, in the midst of the Vlachy encampment, lay secrets to where Mila had gone.
***
I floated in the void, a spectral haze blurring the edges of my vision. Stars blossomed and died in rapid succession as I drifted through this dreamscape, a ballet of events unraveling before my eyes. I knew it wasn't real, yet the chill of space seemed to seep into my spirit.
"I was born among the stars. With the first flicker of the universe," the White Snake proclaimed, his form coalescing from stardust—a serpentine apparition wrapped in celestial light.
The story felt like a fabrication, too grandiose to be anything but a concoction meant to intimidate.
"Would that make you feel better?" He asked, his gaze piercing through the swirling constellations. "To know that I might have been a mortal, an innocent caught in the machinations of fate?"
Was there a shred of humanity left within this entity?
My thoughts turned unbidden to Areilycus, whose own soul seemed to dance on the edge of light and shadow when the Snake crawled toward me, his white scales shining in the sun at the edges of my vision, coiling, red eyes glued to my brown.
"Are you so alike your Areilycus," the Assigner continued, circling me slowly, "that you seek a reason to feel empathy for me?"
I could almost touch the contradiction in my feelings. It gnawed at me, the idea that failing to find compassion for someone as lost as the White Snake would render me unworthy of Areilycus' love.
"Because you most certainly do not feel it right now." His voice echoed in my head. He so rarely spoke out loud, with his mouth.
"But it's too contradictory to everything he is. It makes you think you wouldn't deserve him if you couldn't find the silver lining in someone you deem as irredeemable as myself."
The dream shifted around me, the stars dimming to a soft glow as the weight of his words settled upon my shoulders, heavy and unyielding. And even as my mind screamed out against the notion, the seeds of doubt had already begun to take root in the fertile soil of my thoughts.
"I do not seek to redeem you. I pity you, As. I pity you so much." She stepped closer, feeling the cold pull of his presence like a tide trying to drag her under. "You talk of balance but you scoff at kindness and embrace evil. What kind of balance is that?"
The White Snake's eyes, two red moons in the dim light, glinted with a mirthless amusement. He slithered around me, his thick scaly body enveloping my legs, my hips until his large head was level eyed with mine.
"Would you like to take my place? Is your goal to unemploy me?"
I saw through him, to the heart of his twisted existence.
"My goal is to unalive you," I said. "But I'll settle for saving Ari."
"Well, Anchor," he hissed, his white tongue sticking out, sniffing me, licking my chin. "When you find it in you, do come back. I shall be looking forward to it."
***
"You are exceptionally welcoming people," Volmira noted as the village witch stirred a pot of herbal concoction she referred to as 'tea.'
Her tent was full of little artifacts that by the looks of them, had nothing to do with one another, a collection of different cultures and totems from different eras, probably passed down from mother to daughter - witch to witch with special magical instruction on how to hex a bittered old lover.
"The woman of description you have provided was here," the witch mother confirmed. "Once she got what she wanted, she left with the pirate."
"And what is it she was seeking?"
The witch mother ogled the Ros' horns and smirked at his shyness trying to mask them with the hood of his cloak.
"Information."
"We are here to bring her home. Mila is not Valorian, she does not belong here," Rosum said, compensating for his previous fumble in decorum with a low, deep grumble, overstating his sense of seriousness.
"This is exactly where she belongs," the witch said. She threw a concoction of red sparrow powder, cloves and black garlic into the low-burning fire which immediately sprouted into a large flame licking the ceiling of the tent without catching blaze.
"Before the times of the sea queen," she began, talking to the flame, "the Vlachy were the most powerful sorcerers alive. We had the power to summon the demon. To ask favors of him. Until Vajda Uruk struck a deal with him. A bad deal born of spite and jealousy."
Ros and Volmira exchanged worried glances. The demon? There was no source of evil, no realm of demons, it was just superstition perpetuated by the Assigner to keep the masses obedient.
The witch mother was spewing nonsense dressed as truth.
"We lost access to him, we lost the ability to summon him at will and ask him to do our bidding."
The flames transformed into three figures. A girl, a boy in one another's arms while a large snake hovered over them with extended fangs.
"He rid the Vajda of the unwanted, washed away the sin which was committed on his person and in return … We were to never speak to him again."
Rosuminstinctively shielded Volmira from the fire snake that tried to lick her robes.
"You will take a message to your father, children," the witch mother commanded, the snake returning to heel and nuzzling against her bare hand with his obscenely large head.
Volmira could not bring herself to speak up as if the magic of the witch tied her tongue to the roof of her mouth, stitched it clean.
"I have a new bargain for him."
***
Captain Edward Kinsley's voice thundered through the wooden belly of the ship, the timbers seeming to shudder with the force of his anger. "I will not be kept in the dark, Mila!" he roared from within his quarters, a room that had witnessed many such tempests. "The sea has its secrets, but you will not keep yours aboard my ship!"
Mila's voice, though softer, was no less intense, the sound of it piercing through the heavy door like the tip of a rapier. "You don't understand, Captain."
On deck, the sea breeze carried the salty tang of Salacia's sirens. They had left the bay, they were free to sail. She did keep her word. And yet the Lioness was still firmly parked where the sirens had lured them.
It tousled the hair of Bonnie who stood near the mainmast, her arms crossed as she listened to the distant quarrel. Areilycus seemed unperturbed by the discord as he gazed out across the endless blue expanse.
The small creature perched on his shoulder, a baby dragon with scales that shimmered like the sun-dappled sea, craned its neck to nuzzle against Ari's skin.
Ari lifted a hand to gently stroke the dragon's head, feeling the thrum of its vitality beneath his fingers.
"Seems they'll be at it for a while," Bonnie remarked, her gaze still fixed on the closed door to the captain's quarters.
Ari nodded, his eyes never leaving the horizon. "My sister is exceptional at arguing."
"So is Edward."
Areilycus snorted at the remark. Bonnie glanced at him, then at the dragon. "And what about you, Lord of Light? Can you be content amidst such mortal squabbles?"
Ari smiled faintly, the corners of his lips tugging upward with an ageless wisdom. "Even an eternal being finds intrigue in the fleeting sparks of human emotion." His gaze shifted to meet hers, a light brighter than any lantern flickering deep within his eyes.
The baby dragon's snout puffed a tiny ember as it resettled its wings, the delicate membranes whispering against Areilycus' collar. Bonnie watched with a mix of fascination and something softer in her eyes that she'd quickly blink away if anyone were to catch it.
"He adores you," she observed, leaning on the ship's rail, her tone laced with a hint of amusement.
Areilycus turned his head slightly toward the creature, his smile fond. "It is a she," he corrected gently. His voice held the resonance of the ages, yet there was an undeniable warmth there too. "I think I'll call her Bonnie."
At that, Bonnie's eyebrows shot up, and she delivered a playful slap to his shoulder, her eyes betraying the ghost of a smile. "You name a beast after me?" she challenged, though her mock indignation couldn't quite mask the note of honor in her voice.
"No," Areilycus replied, his gaze locking onto hers with an unwavering steadiness, "I am naming a creature of light after a kind woman."
Bonnie scoffed lightly, turning to gaze out at the sea as if it could hide the flush creeping up her cheeks. "There is not much kindness in me," she retorted, but her words lacked the sharpness.
He tilted his head, inviting her story. "Tell me, how did you come to this life? How did you end up aboard the Lioness?"
Bonnie's fingers idly trailed along the wooden railing of the Lioness, her gaze distant. The sea air wove through her hair with a gentle insistence, as though urging her to unburden her soul.
"Once," she began, her voice a low murmur barely audible over the lap of waves against the hull, "I was nothing more than a fisherman's daughter, tethered to the tides like the boats we sent out to the seas."
A seagull's cry punctuated her words, and she watched it for a moment, admiring its effortless glide. "Edward, he was but a boy of fifteen when wanderlust took him. He sought Isla Rhea." A laugh, sharp and short, escaped her. "He sailed off with dreams bigger than his sails, chasing shadows and whispers. I think he was always looking for Neptune, even when he didn't know it yet."
Her eyes followed the gull until it was but a speck on the vast canvas of blue. "Seven years he was gone. Seven years that shaped the boy into a captain. No Isla Rhea on his horizon, but a crew, steadfast and enigmatic. How he gathered such loyalty is a secret he will take to his grave."
The wood beneath her hand felt more solid than her own flesh. "By then, the streets had claimed me. The sea had taken my father, and I found myself lost, fighting not to starve."
Bonnie's eyes darkened, the memory sharp as a knife's edge. "I tried to rob him, you know. Edward. I thought it'd be easy pickings, a young captain flush with success."
Her lips quirked at the irony. "Instead of clapping me in irons or tossing me back to the gutter, he offered me a choice." Her hand left the railing to touch the hilt of her cutlass, a fond gesture. "Another path. One where I could stand tall amidst the waves rather than be swallowed by them."
Ari offered her shoulder a squeeze. "You love him?"
"Of course I do, he's an absolute idiot," Bonnie laughed. Then the true meaning dawned on her and she recoiled, spat in the sea. "Oh - not like that! Ew."
The salt-laden breeze tousled Ari's golden locks as he leaned against the railing of the ship. The wooden deck creaked underfoot, a soothing rhythm against the gentle lapping of waves.
It felt peaceful. More peaceful than he has ever felt. Like this was home, somehow, even though his rationale told him otherwise, there was a bone-deep conviction that he belonged on Valorian soil. Or, sea.
"What does it feel like to be eternal?" she asked, her voice barely rising above the whisper of the wind.
Ari offered her a wistful smile, as timeless as the stars dotting the night sky. "I quite enjoy it," he confessed, turning to meet her probing gaze. "I like the idea of never meeting Lady Death." His words were light, as was his entire manner of conduct.
Bonnie met quite a few people light on their feet who carried burdens large as meteorites.
"Yet my sister," he continued, his smile fading, "she struggles with it. She cannot imagine her purpose to be eternal."
Bonnie's brow furrowed, a flicker of concern dancing through her eyes. "She loves you, you know," she said softly, reaching out to touch his arm.
Ari's response was automatic, almost rehearsed. "And I love her."
"No, she loves you," Bonnie pressed, the intensity in her voice commanding his attention. "She might have just potentially started a war with the Creator for you."
A conflict stirred within Ari, his immortal composure wavering for a moment as he absorbed it.
"We are one," he murmured, "We have always been one. You wouldn't understand."
Bonnie nodded, her expression resigned. "No, I wouldn't," she conceded, her gaze drifting back to the endless sea. "And I would never want to."