Fae was awake. She was back in the world, back in Grimoire…
And not in her own bed.
It took her a moment to get her bearings. She’d been in the storm of her own heart for what had felt like an eternity, whirling in pain and confusion alongside the Star sisters, Madeline, and Sonya. Olivia had been an anchor, a lighthouse, showing the way home.
But Fae had to be the one to lead. And she finally had, she’d found everyone and they’d all come out of that storm together.
So being back in the physical world felt… strange. It was so quiet. That was what first stuck out to her. And second, she wasn’t in her own bed.
But somehow, it felt familiar.
She knew before she realized she knew. Her mind, heart, soul, and even part of her body, were all linked to the other six. Through them, she understood that she was in Crowley Manor, in one of the lavish guest rooms.
She also got further impressions, thoughts and memories and subconscious understanding from Madeline. Jacob Crowley and his wife had never planned to have so many guest rooms. Guest rooms were a waste of space, rooms always sitting in expectation of people who were soon to leave.
The Crowleys had hoped to have many more children. But they’d only had Madeline, and sickness had claimed Elizabeth Crowley’s life soon after. There was a loneliness, a grief that had dulled over time to a soft, steady ache, pervading the entire household.
But there was also hope here, and light, and healing. There was an echo of what had been hoped for in Fae, Olivia, Sonya, Mercury, Jupiter, and Neptune all joining Madeline in Crowley Manor, occupying the many guest rooms that hadn’t been intended to be guest rooms.
There was an awful lot of mental and emotional noise, just like there had been before. But somehow, it didn’t hurt. Even so, it took Fae a long time to finally sit up, to even realize she was still laying down, to grasp how much time had passed that she’d just lay there and taken it all in. There was Madeline’s introverted, quiet presence, so similar to her own. There was Mercury, so bright, a dazzling star in the midst of them all. Jupiter, and her constant rhythmic energy, how her own internal clock ran a little faster than everyone else’s, always looking ahead, drumming on forward. Neptune, soulful and deep, an ocean of quiet emotion and thought, soothing and reassuring. Sonya, intelligent and inquisitive, always taking mental notes — or real notes, when she could — about everything she experienced, seeing all of life as inspiration and instruction.
And Olivia, calm and steady in the midst of them all. She wasn’t playing her viola right now, but her song still resonated with them all, a song that lived in her heart and flowed out from it, melding them all in its beautiful melody.
And where was Fae? For a moment, she couldn’t find herself in the midst of the others. And when she did find herself…
She didn’t recognize herself.
Quiet, reserved, introspective, introverted, certainly. She had always been those things.
But there were things that were… new. There was a compassion she’d never consciously recognized, a desire to help others, to save others. There was courage, too, courage that wasn’t like that of the Hunters and Guardians of the world, the fighters and slayers of monsters, but courage nonetheless.
She was brought back to early in her journey, reading Maxwell’s journal and for the first time wondering… Can I be a hero? Is that where my journey is taking me?
She still wasn’t sure. And she swiftly put away the title of “hero.” Forget the titles and the expectations that came with them.
She was Fae. She was who she’d always known she was… and she was changed. She was new.
The adventure had changed her. But she wasn’t a stranger. She was just… different.
I think… I think maybe… I’m better than I was.
Of course you are!
A chorus of affirmations chimed right in, from Mercury and Jupiter and Neptune. None of them were in the same room, but they could communicate just fine.
And it didn’t hurt.
There wasn’t the pain of mental feedback, of stranger’s voices living in her head, because…
They weren’t strangers. Not anymore.
Fae finally stood, getting her bearings. Though there was no longer pain, the connection between them all was still something new, and it was difficult to ground herself in the physical world. She was slow, sluggish without feeling tired at all. There was a disconnect that —
We’re gonna have to get used to.
Mercury’s thoughts. And then Jupiter, wondering, How come Olivia’s fine?
I’m not entirely sure.
Olivia’s voice in her mind, calm and steady.
Let’s all… Fae started, only to feel an intense grumble in her stomach. Not just hers — all of them, all at once, except for Olivia. Six girls, ravenously hungry. Let’s all meet downstairs. And eat.
Oh please, food! Came Jupiter’s voice. A chorus of agreement, and Fae made her way out into the hall to find everyone. Seeing them here, awake and in the physical world again, made everything that they’d been through in the inner storm more real. And watching how they all walked so slowly, occasionally veering off-course and reaching for the wall for support or bumping into each other, made Fae’s own sluggishness feel more understandable.
“This sucks,” Mercury said, though there was a huge, dazzling smile on her face as she swayed, bumping against Neptune. “How do we get our bearings here? It’s nice that we’re not in pain, but I can’t even walk straight. And I feel fine. I don’t feel like I’m weak or tired or dizzy, I just can’t —” she bounced off of Jupiter, “seem —” she held onto Fae for a moment, then reeled back, “to get —” back to Neptune, who held her for a moment, “my bearings.” She reeled away from Neptune, then held the wall for support.
“Just another thing to get used to,” Neptune said, her deep, soothing calm washing over the entire group.
Olivia joined them last, coming out from the roof and down to the second floor hall where the guest rooms were. She walked with easy grace, steady and swift, looking even faster to Fae within her own sluggishness and the slow reeling of the others.
“You’re totally, one hundred percent okay?” Jupiter asked with a groan. “So not fair.”
“Sorry,” Olivia said. Her hood was up, and she ducked her gaze in mild guilt. They all felt it, and Fae almost wanted to duck down too and hide, feeling guilty for something she hadn’t done — and that Olivia didn’t need to feel guilty for in the first place.
Count on Mercury to drive that point home. “No, this is great!” she said, bouncing off of a wall and grasping onto Neptune for support. “One of us is healthy and whole. And you’re the only real fighter out of all of us, so if danger comes our way, you’re the one who most needs to be composed.”
“Hey, maybe that’s why she’s okay,” Jupiter said. “She’s all used to being balanced and composed and stuff.”
“Speaking of danger,” Olivia said, “we do have some things to talk about. But you should all eat first.”
Six stomachs grumbled in unison, followed by seven voices joined in laughter. Down the stairs they went, supporting and supported by each other, Olivia leading the way. Downstairs they met Toryu and Ciel, who further helped guide them to a lavish dining room with a huge table, all of which felt too grand for the father and daughter who lived here, another reminder, an echo of what had been hoped for, what could have been. Toryu, Ciel, and Olivia set to making breakfast, while the other six sat around the table. Mercury and Jupiter were particularly giddy, giggling and fooling around with each other. Sonya had her notebook out, taking notes that played out in the rest of their heads, but she didn’t try to hide them. She wasn’t trying to be private, to keep things secret, not from them. Neither was Madeline, whose Summon, the lavender Raven, was out and perched on her shoulder, and all of those joined to her could feel the joyous bond between Summoner and Summon.
Sonya and Madeline, like Fae, were normally withdrawn, closed, private individuals. The fact that they willingly let themselves be open with the others joined to them was representative of what they’d found within the storm. And Fae realized, her heart light and full, that she didn’t feel the need or even desire to close herself off to them, not anymore.
They were friends. Fae almost wanted to say more than friends, but that suddenly struck her as wrong. Who in the world could say that friendship was something lesser than other kinds of relationships? What made Fae want to call these young women that she loved something other than friends, as if love meant transcending friendship? Why was friendship something to transcend in the first place?
Fae loved her friends. To call them friends wasn’t to lessen the bond they shared, to downplay it or undersell it.
It was exactly, beautifully, right.
“You’re darn right,” Mercury and Jupiter said in unison, and then burst into a chorus of laughter.
“I was trying to wrap my mind around the same things,” Olivia said, coming out of the kitchen to set the table. “And my mind instantly thought that, because of how much I love all of you, that you couldn’t ‘just’ be friends.”
“There’s no ‘just’ to being friends,” Mercury said with a grin. “If you don’t love your friends, then you’re probably not really friends.”
“There’s no ‘probably’ to it,” Jupiter said.
“Maybe that’s why we’ve always been reticent to have lots of friends,” Madeline said, looking at Fae. “I always thought it was just because we’re quiet and private people, but… maybe we instinctually recognized that friendships are a big deal, too. And… well, it can hurt, loving someone. It’s easier to get hurt by the people you love than the people you don’t care about.”
“It is,” Neptune and Sonya said as one, nodding in understanding.
“Thankfully, breakfast won’t hurt you,” Toryu said, coming out of the kitchen with Ciel, both of them carrying serving dishes with all sorts of wonderful food. There were pancakes and waffles, eggs and bacon and sausages, and a huge mix of fruit. Drinks were poured — all of the Star sisters went for milk, while Fae and Madeline had orange juice, Sonya had water, Olivia had grape juice, and Toryu and Ciel had tea.
And they dug right in. Mercury and Jupiter were awfully rambunctious, their enthusiasm infectious, and at the same time tempered by calmer hearts and minds in the seven-part bond. It was a fascinating mixture, something that, now that it didn’t frighten or harm Fae, captured her curiosity and amazement as she took it all in. She didn’t lose herself in the bond, she could always pick herself out, while also being impacted and influenced by the others. And likely influencing them in kind, she realized.
And the food was marvelous. Fae ate far more than she ever had for a single meal, amazed at her appetite. All of them ate a lot, feasting on the abundance placed before them. Dozens of pancakes and waffles, a mountain of scrambled eggs, plates full of bacon and sausage, a massive bowl of mixed fruit, all of it was gone, not a single scrap of food was left behind to be saved or go to waste.
And they were still somewhat hungry. All of them were.
“Okay, that’s freaky,” Mercury said. “I ate like a giant! Like twelve of me! How am I still hungry?”
“I don’t think I’ve ever eaten so much in an entire day, let alone a single meal,” Fae said, nodding. “But I’m still a bit hungry.”
“It’s our bond,” Sonya said. “The Orphan of the Dawn said so, didn’t she? Most of us fell asleep right after we initiated this bond. Because of its weight upon us.”
“Geez Fae, I didn’t realize you weighed so—oof!” Jupiter started a tease but was swiftly cut off by an elbow jab to the ribs from Mercury — that all of them felt. All seven of them, even Mercury, winced and flinched and gasped in sudden sharp, but swiftly abated, pain.
“Dang it, I forgot I can’t do stuff like that anymore!” Mercury said, rubbing her side. She glared at Jupiter. “Stop giving me reasons to hit you.”
“Stop trying to justify acts of violence towards your little sister,” Jupiter said, pouting.
“We’re triplets.”
“You always say Neptune’s the oldest and I’m the youngest.”
“Give it a rest, you two,” Neptune said. “We all need to be a little nicer to each other. With our bodies and our words.” She shot pointed looks at both of her sisters.
“So anyway,” Madeline said, “it’s the weight of our bond that’s changing everything. We’re more easily tired out, and I guess we also need to eat a lot more to keep our strength up.”
“But why’s it a weight if we figured it all out?” Jupiter asked. “We harmonized and everything. It doesn’t hurt, so why’s it weighing us down?”
“She said this isn’t supposed to be a permanent solution,” Sonya said. “No matter how well we handle it, we have to find a proper solution somewhere, somehow.”
“But why can’t it be permanent?” Mercury asked. She sighed, and sorrow rolled off of her to the rest of them. “I just… I know it’s a lot, and it’s weird, and there were growing pains, and it’s still kinda complicated, but… I really like this. We get to know each other, in a way no one else can. This is totally unprecedented, and it’s exciting and beautiful. I… I don’t want to let this go.”
They all sat there in silence for a moment. Fae could understand Mercury’s sentiment. There was something really special about this, something beautiful. But it was a weight. There was still a certain level of discomfort. To be like this for a little while would be fine. To be like this forever… she didn’t want that.
But that wasn’t a good enough response. She needed to figure out something better than that.
“Even when it ends,” she started, working it out slowly, feeling on the cusp of an answer. “It… won’t really end. We won’t be bonded like this if we find a permanent solution, but that doesn’t… it doesn’t change us. We’re friends. The kind of friends I never thought I’d ever have aside from Madeline. And what we learn about each other, how well we come to know each other now, that won’t just go away. At least, that’s what I believe.”
“You’re not alone,” Neptune said, and her sense of calm, and hope, suffused through all of them like warm, comforting waters, soothing their worry and fear.
“Besides, how the heck do we even find a permanent cure or whatever?” Jupiter asked, rocking back in her chair. “It’s gonna be a while. And we have important stuff to do right now, right?”
“Yeah,” Mercury said, a smile on her face. But it was subdued, a melancholy cheer. “So.” She turned to Olivia. “You said you had some stuff to tell us, right? About danger?”
“I got some impressions here and there when we were asleep,” Fae said, “but it was all so… chaotic. What happened?”
And so Olivia told them. She talked of the World Tree, of the Hollows, of how she stood and watched… until the Cult of the Dragon arrived. She spoke of her fight with them, and her brief interrogation of one Cultist, including the strange quotation he’d recited: “The first victory is always easiest. Never does the sun rise the same way thereafter.”
“Wasuryu’s forces found us?” Sonya asked, her voice soft and haunted, a shudder of icy fear rolling off of her to the other six. “But then…” she tugged at the collar of her jacket, where she’d fixed her fos pin, “what use are these?”
“They protect us from Wasuryu himself,” Olivia said. “It completely hides us from his gaze unless he’s physically present. And it should limit the power he can wield against us?” She looked to Toryu, who nodded.
“But he does have a great host in his thrall,” Toryu said. “If Olivia managed to defeat all of the Cultists who were here, then they may not have sent word yet. But silence will be word enough. More will come in time.”
“Then we can’t stay here,” Jupiter said with a sigh. “Always on the move. We never get to rest.” Her impatience stung Fae slightly, like tiny brambles wound around her heart.
“We can rest when we’ve cured Fae and turned the Key and ended all this Darkness,” Mercury said. Her usual sunny cheer was brightening again, and Fae sat up a little straighter, a smile tugging teasingly at the corners of her mouth. “Until then, you should be happy. You’re the restless one.”
“Yeah, but I’m getting restless to come back home and do school and music and all our normal stuff,” Jupiter said. But the brambles were softening, loosening, wilting away. She tapped out a rhythm on her legs, a rhythm that Fae felt in her heart, a bouncy, energetic pattern that made her want to get up and dance — and she wasn’t a dancer.
“Let’s get out of the city to somewhere at least temporarily safe,” Fae said. “We should probably… well. I guess we should get our thoughts together and figure out where we’re going next.”
“Oh yeah!” Mercury said. There was a pause as everyone looked at her, and she grinned shaking her head. “Yeah, I just realized, I have no idea what’s next for us. Where are we going?” Neptune and Jupiter sighed.
Fae took the lead, and Sonya helped her out, both of them combining their notes — Fae’s drawn, Sonya’s written — to go back over their adventure and figure out what there was left for them to do. Everyone else chimed in as thoughts and notes came back to them, a discussion going round as they steadily worked to itemize a list of what they needed to do next.
“So there’s the Key of the World,” Madeline said. “Delilah’s team is figuring out the big picture side of that. Shana’s team is handling the Key in Dreams. And we’ll need to find the Key through the glass.” She smoothed out her message in the bottle from the Celestial Shore, a drawing of a Key in its pedestal upon a stage. Written below it, the word: Finale.
“How do we even find it?” Mercury asked. “That’s not much of a clue. A pedestal on a stage. Key through the glass… what’s that even mean?”
“I have a theory,” Madeline said. “I think it’s partly why this clue came to me. The Hall of Reflections.”
“Hall of… oh, right, you went through there when you came to find me,” Fae said. “And it’s full of mirrors… a place full of glass… and Delilah talked about some Theater of Reflections at Revue Palace, didn’t she?” She and Sonya checked their notes, confirming that she had.
“So we should go to the Hall of Reflections,” Olivia said.
“Or should we go to Revue Palace first?” Neptune asked. “Maybe the only way to the Key is through there.”
“But then why give the clue to Madeline if she wouldn’t have been to the Mirror Theater or whatever?” Mercury asked. “I think we should at least scout it out at the Hall of Reflections. Besides, it’s a neat place. Kind of tricky, but I always liked that about it.”
“Me, too,” Jupiter said with a lopsided grin.
“So there’s one,” Fae said. “Then we also have this.” She placed on the table the book she’d received from the Fates, a mysterious locked tome that she still had not opened. But she also laid with it a key on a chain, a key she’d received from Oliver at the Celestial Shore. “The Fates said I would know when the time was right. Even though I have the key… it still doesn’t feel right.”
“Such a tease!” Jupiter said with a groan, slumping, resting her head on the table.
“But it’s gotta be soon, right?” Mercury asked. “There’s not much left for us to do. Unless you aren’t supposed to open the book until after the world is saved and all that.”
“That would be such an anti-climax,” Jupiter moaned. “It’s gotta help us save the world, or what’s the point?”
“Won’t know the point until we open it, sis,” Mercury said, gently rubbing her back.
“So that’s… everything,” Madeline said, eyeing their notes and possibilities. “There used to be so much. Wild scavenger hunts all over the place, even before I joined you. But now…”
“Now, it’s all coming together,” Neptune said. “It really feels like we’re coming to the end. The end of everything that started so long ago.”
“It was a wild, winding road to get here,” Fae said. “But…” She paused, because she’d been about to say a terrible cliché. She smiled slightly. “I would have liked some things to go differently. But I wouldn’t change a thing, if this was the only way we could all be together like this. And for all the pain that’s been involved, we’re finding healing. We’re going to be all right.”
“Speaking of healing!” Mercury said. “We have to figure out how to heal you! Even though I don’t want this super-special-kinda-trippy bond to end… I know it has to. I know you need your privacy back, and I’m not necessarily fond of being hungry for a giant feast twenty-four-seven.”
“But where do we even start?” Jupiter asked.
“Put it on the list,” Olivia said. All eyes went to her, and she nodded. “I believe it’s just as important as turning the Key. We can’t just talk about it.”
“Right,” Sonya said, and she wrote it down right alongside the notes about the Key and the Book. “We’ll find a way. Sooner, not later.”
“Thank you,” Fae said, her heart warm and light. “So, then. We should also leave — sooner, not later. And I think our first destination is pretty clear.”
There were no questions, because Fae’s mind wasn’t hidden from theirs — and many of them had come to the same conclusion on their own.
If they were leaving Grimoire, heading out on another adventure through the Enchanted Dominion, there really was only one place to go.
Cartographer’s Waystation.
They had plenty of time before midnight, when the path would open at the Bay Overlook. So they took some time to wash up, to dress in fresh clothes, and to pack everything they might need. They had no idea how long they’d be gone, how difficult it would be to both reach the Hall of Reflections and get back from it when they were done. Packing was convenient for all of them, though. The Star sisters all made liberal use of Conjuring Magic, keeping numerous instruments in magical space, so they had tons of room. Madeline, Olivia, and Sonya also used Conjuring Magic. Meanwhile, Fae had her nearly-bottomless — and nearly-weightless — messenger bag. None of them had to worry about being encumbered with supplies or belongings.
Despite having had breakfast when they’d awoken, it had been much closer to dinner time. And with the girls’ ravenous appetites, they ate a second feast just a few hours later, as the clock was ticking its way towards eleven PM.
“Thank you so much for cooking for us,” Fae said to Olivia, Toryu, and Ciel, who once again looked after the six who were struggling the most.
“Yeah, it’s amazing,” Jupiter said, leaning forward, eyeing Toryu, “but how’d you learn to cook so well for people? Don’t Dragons eat different food?”
“Some Dragons do,” Toryu said. “And I daresay most wouldn’t go for Human or Enchanted food. Most Dragons, of course, are magnitudes larger than I.” With a twinkle in his eye, Toryu popped a half a sandwich in his mouth, chewed, swallowed. “There are a great number of benefits to taking on a small form like I have. I think more Dragons would be more comfortable people-sized, if they’d lay down their pride enough to try it out.”
“Most Dragons are prideful?” Fae asked. “I… did get that impression from the Spiral Dragons. And of course from Wasuryu. But both Kairyu and yourself seem so humble and relaxed.”
“We are exceptions to the rule,” Toryu said with a twinkle in his eye.
The time had come. They all left Crowley Manor, heading out into the snow, and for the first time, the six who’d been sleeping gazed upon Grimoire’s World Tree. A sky of gold scattered an endless, gentle rain of golden motes of light. Great, twisting boughs the size of bridges and corridors formed a multi-layered protective umbrella over the city, blocking from sight the ashen veil that choked out natural light. Even now, in the darkest part of night, the city was bright and beautiful. Gold reflected off of the snow, a soft dazzle that brought smiles to six faces.
“Oh, it’s perfect!” Mercury cried, racing to a snow drift and scooping up a double-handful of snow. “Winter just got ten times better than it ever was before.”
“Don’t even start with snowballs,” Jupiter said, eyeing Mercury cautiously.
“Party pooper,” Mercury said, tossing the snow overhead, where it scattered down around her in a powdery mist. “It’s too fine and fresh for snowballs anyway.”
“Don’t be too carefree,” Madeline warned, stepping ahead of them and gazing out across the street. “Remember, Hollow Hour’s been steadily extending. It isn’t midnight yet, but we’re already in the thick of it.”
“Oh, right,” Mercury said, suddenly on her guard. “Well, let’s hurry it up to the Overlook, then.” She gazed up at the World Tree as she walked, and needed Neptune to steer her by the arm to avoid running right into the corner of an iron fence. “Man, it sure is beautiful. Makes you feel so safe. Like nothing could ever go wrong ever again.”
“I hear it’s been helping with the Hollows,” Olivia said, stepping through one of her Mobility Magic gates at street level, and exiting out onto a roof above them to the left. She had her hood up, and her alabaster scythe in hand, poised and alert. “But we should still be cautious. The Hunters are weary and overburdened.”
“Hey, you’re a Guardian in Renault, right?” Mercury asked. “So you’re like a Hunter, but for those giant Stalker things. So Hollows must be easy-peasy for you, right? You probably put all our Hunters to shame.”
“We have different training, different objectives, and different foes,” Olivia said. “It isn’t really comparable.”
“She’s being modest,” Jupiter said, grinning. A flicker of bashfulness rippled through their bond, and Fae knew it was from Olivia. She downplayed her achievements, but her words only told part of the story. The fact that she’d easily dealt with more than a dozen enemy mages when the Dragon Cultists attacked told a different story. And Fae wouldn’t soon forget the brief displays of Olivia’s prowess in the Fault Line Dungeon when they’d had to escape, battling vicious, gigantic Darkness-versions of Hollows. Olivia had been unstoppable then.
“I merely wish to —” Olivia started, but then cut off and motioned for them all to be silent — and her alarm was felt by all, hushing them into an immediate silence.
There were sounds all throughout the city, of course. It was more peaceful than any Hollow Hour Fae had ever been awake for, but even so, she could hear the distant minglings of monstrous cries and human voices, of snarling beasts and concussive bursts or musical explosions of magic.
But there was something new, now. Something familiar to Olivia, but completely new to the rest of them.
The earth shuddered. A rumbling at their feet, that made Fae sway for a moment. A slow, booming rhythm, one, two, one, two, like…
Footsteps.
Huge, gigantic footsteps.
A few cries of alarm went up — and those multiplied, and turned from alarm to panic. There was a rumbling boom-boom-boom-boom, a cannon volley from the Manors that stood at the perimeter of the city, followed by a chorus of startling explosions that made Fae jump.
But still the giant footsteps came on.
“But this is impossible,” Sonya said in a hushed voice. “They only appear at Renault.”
“It isn’t a Stalker,” Olivia said, twirling her scythe, opening a gate in front of her. “It’s a copy. Born of the Darkness. Stay here. I’ll be back in a moment.” She dashed through the gate, and it closed behind her.
“I want to see her in action!” Jupiter said, racing for a nearby stairwell. And then they were all racing to it, climbing up to rooftops and gazing east, towards the tall forested mountains beyond Grimoire’s eastern borders.
And they saw it, then. Not just one, no — two giants. Fae’s heart skipped several beats, her breathing caught in her throat. Greyson Manor was huge, and transformed into its moving fortress mode, it was even larger. Her family’s manor had a training hall more than half the size of Grimoire Academy’s soccer field and still had space within for dozens more rooms. And it wasn’t even the biggest of the great Manors.
But the pair of giants approaching the city were larger still. At least ten stories tall — and Fae was sure they were taller, distance distorting their true size — they were truly monsters, with slavering jaws of triple-rowed teeth, one walking on two massive legs with boulders for fists and small hills for shoulders, the other walking on all fours with fire flickering in its jaws and a massive tail flicking back and forth behind it, ending in a huge, bumpy club-like ball.
Hunters were panicking, scattering. The three Manors closest to the oncoming shadow-Stalkers fired another volley, a dozen shots in all. Every shot hit, exploding across the monsters’ bodies in a bright, flaming display.
The giants shuddered, flinched — for a moment. And then continued their advance.
“No way,” Jupiter breathed. “And Olivia’s gonna fight them all by herself?”
“That’s what she did in the past,” Sonya said.
Fae nodded. “We saw her memories, but…”
But she was still having trouble believing what she’d seen. Especially now that she saw Stalkers for real — or Darkness versions of them, but just as big, just as powerful.
Olivia. Alone.
Could she really take them down?
A purple gate opened nearly one hundred feet above the bipedal Stalker’s head. Down came Olivia, in free-fall, her scythe cocked back to slash.
Everyone stared. A collective held breath, rippling across Grimoire. It wasn’t just Fae and her group — it seemed as if every Hunter, every civilian, those piloting the Manors, even every Hollow, stopped to watch and wait for what would happen.
Olivia had aimed just right. She came down right on top of the Stalker as it took another step, and with a powerful twist, putting her entire body into the motion, she spun in an arcing slash. Her scythe flashed alabaster edged with the golden Blade of Dawn, leaving an after-image like a gold-rimmed crescent moon.
Olivia kept falling. Below the Stalker’s head, down to its hips, then its knees, and then — two whole seconds after her attack — the Stalker let out a howling cry of pain.
And was swiftly silenced. Its head separated from its body, tumbling down after the tiny white ant-sized human that was Olivia from this distance.
Just before Olivia hit the ground, she opened another gate, hurtling through it.
A gate opened up beneath the four-legged Stalker. Olivia came shooting up out of it, all of her momentum from falling now sending her rocketing upwards. She spun, slashing, leaving behind another flickering image of a gilt-edged crescent moon, and hurtled skyward for two whole seconds before the second Stalker suddenly cried out in pain, then went silent, its head tumbling down to the snowy earth.
At the height of Olivia’s flight, when her momentum stalled and she hung in the air for a brief, beautiful moment…
She opened a gate and stepped through.
Out onto the roof in front of her companions.
They continued to stare beyond her, at two Stalkers still in the process of realizing they’d been slain. It had all happened so impossibly fast. Just as Olivia closed the final gate behind her, the massive giants shuddered…
And dissolved into ash.
“That…” Jupiter said, her mouth moving much more, forming words she couldn’t find the voice for.
“That was…” Mercury added, but then she stood like Jupiter, struggling to say anything.
But stunned, shocked silence was radiating through their bond, so Olivia knew. And as that shock slowly morphed into awe and excited admiration…
A cry went up.
Not from Fae, or any of those in her group, no.
It came from far off. From a Hunter.
And then another Hunter joined the cry. An exultant cry of victory and amazement. One by one, more Hunters cried out, a growing, city-wide cheer for their unknown hero.
On the slopes of the mountains, a new shadow-Stalker came into being, and started its slow, ponderous, ominous march towards the city. But this time, panic didn’t ensue. This time, a volley of cannon-fire sounded, rippled against the giant, and was followed by…
Hunters.
Two Hunters.
Fae couldn’t tell who they were from this distance, but they moved with amazing speed, charging the shadow-Stalker at ground level. One was clad all in black, standing out against the snow, and seemed to be holding some kind of sword. The other outpaced him, cobalt-blue electricity flickering around his body. He dashed forward, morphing into electricity, shooting up to the Stalker’s knee, then hip, then rib cage, then shoulder, and suddenly blasted a powerful discharge of electricity full-force in the Stalker’s face. The second Hunter leapt here and there, sword swinging, small but mighty in the night.
The Stalker roared. It tried to fight back, but its tiny attackers were too swift, too small, too coordinated.
It took longer than Olivia’s approach. But after fifteen seconds of intense combat, the Stalker shuddered, slumped, and then dissolved into ash.
“They just needed to see it could be done,” Olivia said, already starting ahead, resuming the walk to the Bay Overlook. “They’ve never fought Stalkers before. I have. They’ll figure it out.”
“You need to stop downplaying your achievements!” Mercury said, chasing after her. “You’re amazing!”
Olivia didn’t say anything. But as Fae followed with the rest of them, as amazed and proud as they were of Olivia, she could feel, just like they could, the pride and humble honor that Olivia’s heart was bursting with.
And Fae thought she started to understand Olivia, then, in a way she hadn’t fully grasped yet. Olivia had been a Guardian at Renault. She’d been their very best, on top of that. She was also a musician, and music was the language of her heart. There was no denying that.
But along with the artistic soul that Fae resonated with so easily, there was also a strong, deep-seated sense of duty. Olivia wasn’t a fighter, not really.
She was a protector. She fought to protect others. It was her job, but it was also a passion, as deep and as identifying for her as music was. It was the other half of her soul, the half Fae hadn’t really seen until now.
And as she walked with Olivia and all the rest of them to the Bay Overlook, she kept her eyes on the white hooded figure at the front, leading them — and watching over them.
And she’d never felt safer in her life.