The Ascension of Shadow's Reach
Like a waking dream, Destiny felt herself rise from her bed in Corda Mandulómi and slip her robe on, hands working to tie it tight against her body. Bare feet carried her across the floor and toward her door, which opened before her absent of an actual motion by the young girl. Led by an unseen force, Destiny strode up the massive spiral stairway to the highest spire of the temple, which rose some hundreds of feet from the surging lake below. Atop this highest spire, a widow’s walk had been constructed to circle about the peak and give a full view into both Barbarois and Nod.
Even at that height, the air around the temple was hot and muggy, the lake’s surface unusually calm as the winds had died down to nothing. The lake below was near as flat as glass; reflecting the moon above by the image almost undisturbed, but for ripples caused by insects in their death throes. Her steps led out onto the widow’s walk, hands gripping the railing only moments before she boosted herself up onto the wooden framework. Beneath her bare feet, she could feel the swollen wood, thickened by many weeks worth of humidity, fattened splinters digging into the soft soles of her feet.
Overhead, clouds began to gather. Their convergence together caused the heavens to rumble, thundering dark and imposing. Pressure formed, making even the thin air oppressively heavy and almost too thick to breathe. While no rain formed, the sky resounded with fury, lightning flashing violet across the pitch black sky and only a sliver of the moon remaining.
As the winds kicked up, Destiny’s hair rose from her shoulders and splayed out across the sky; the thigh-length strands seeming even more extended as it traveled into unnatural directions. In the darkness, only her flesh and hair gave any light, even the lightning that ricocheted through the sky was far from pristine white; emerging out of the darkness, Destiny almost appeared to be a ghost, clinging to the temple for her own sake. In the darkness between bolts of lightning, she stretched back and seemed to cry out, but the sound was lost upon to the blustering sky. With a pained expression marring her features, an explosion of white shot through the darkness behind her; feathers unsheathing and bursting free from their fleshy prison, some ripped out and sent plummeting through the sky as they were plucked from the angelic wings. The wings flexed and then spread out wide at her sides, producing a halo effect around her body.
Another bolt of lightning flashed across the sky, but rather than dissipating as the others had, this one struck the metal spire, sparks showering about Destiny. The bolt itself was absorbed into the spire, and then refracted back into the sky like a Tesla coil, lashing out in an erratic pattern. Two struck the wings that had emerged from Destiny’s back, seizing the foreign limbs. Fixated into the very joints, the electric voltage acted like a set of puppet strings, wrenching the wings into awkward positions. Her lips twisted and parted to cry out once more, but before she could her eyes shot open and from the abnormal black eyes came a red glow, much as Demere’s own single eye glowered.
No words were spoken; however Destiny could feel her Father’s presence, as though he were looming behind her, perched upon that electrical crackling spire. Perched upon the pinnacle, the man exuded radiating intensity unlike any other Destiny had known in her young adult life. Mayhap she’d been truly alive during the reign of the Founders; she could compare her Father’s presence with another; as it was Demere simply rose to the top of all time darkness. The man remained perched upon the spire, no motion evident in his body; however he was certainly in control of the blonde before him. By his thoughts alone, the voltage caused her wings to extend and surge out, grabbing the air. Muscles tensed, twitching along the length of her legs hidden beneath that black robe. Unhindered by thoughts, her body vaulted up and drove into the air; but rather than flexing out and taking to the air, her wings were drawn in by the sparking electric connections. As they narrowed against her body, Destiny’s form began its downward decline toward the lake below.
With over 800’ of air between herself and Crystal Lake, Destiny’s body twisted and began to spiral through the dive. Feathers were ripped free of the wings, flaring out around her by the friction of air against her fallen form. Those that remained intact began to darken. Originally a pristine white, the feathers grew silver and then lost their sheen, making them a dull gray.
A quarter of the way to the water, the first bolt of violet lightning struck her plummeting body, followed swiftly by a second and third. The gray of the feathers began to peel away like ash, leaving a darker color underneath; rich violet, much like the lightning, much like the secondary color of the Empire of Nod.
Halfway to the water the flesh of her arms erupted. It started at the wrists where the two minor tattoos had existed, but they were now flayed from her skin. Further up the skin burst open, zigzagging from scar to scar, reopening wounds she’d given herself while adjusting to the innate nature of the Heartseeker upon maturity.
There was only a quarter of the distance between the girl and the water when her wings took on their final transformation. The violet sheen deepened and bled black, leaving behind only a bare hint of the former color; an accenting that gave the wings a depth unattainable with only black. Moments before colliding into the surface of the water, the wings exploded into a storm of feathers—not destroyed but merely sinking back into her body, tucking themselves safely within the flesh of her back.
Striking the surface of the water would have killed almost anyone, but the girl had no true life to steal. Blessed by her Father, not once but twice in all, Destiny was saved from the murdering grace of the cruel lake. Its waves broke before her, cracking open the surface to allow her to sink into the chilling water. An explosion of energy rushed out of her, rippling along with the lake’s waves and rocketing toward Nod’s soil. By then she was wholly unaware of what was transpiring; knowing only that her Father had driven open the channel between them, giving her near unlimited access to his divine power. Even Demere had departed, having witnessed his daughter’s risen control. Neither knew that as the ripple of black and violet power rippled through Nod that it struck souls bound to the land. A new couple in the midst of consummating their new binds would give birth to a child in nine months time, who, while blind, could communicate into the NeverWhere. A mother who mourned for the loss of her son would be gifted with a single touch by the young man’s lingering soul; and that farewell would allow him to move on without being chained to a mournful existence, unable to truly shed his mortal coil.
Finally, within the cathedral that Demere had sealed up years ago, enough energy would converge upon that sacred soil and structure to bring a woman’s memories into a solid state, and breathe life back into this shell, making her whole once more.
The next day, (little) Destiny would awaken upon the sandy shore of Crystal Lake, under the bluff her family’s home had been built. Her body ached and her memories were shattered. If it were not for where she had woken, the girl would have thought it a dream. Lifting her head from the sand, two onyx tear shaped stones remained upon the damp shoreline, which she carefully picked up. Power radiated from them, feeling strong of Demere and herself, containing within them the necessary strength to turn away the vilest of curses.
Within her chest she felt a faint fluttering, like a butterfly caught within a glass. Some of Demere’s essence had been captured by her, and held close to her heart; a treasure that she could use to bring back a loved one at a later date, most assuredly. Struggling to her feet, Destiny cast her gaze toward the mansion upon the bluff and began the long walk home, ignoring the sand that coated her water-stiffened robe.