50.2 It All Fits

General Summary

Day 1062

The memories we get as we sleep aren’t quite like the crystal clear memories of past lives that I got when I first slept. This time, the Heart stitches a patchwork life of memories from thousands of songs woven together, each influenced by the choices we make within the dream.   We live out the Dawn of Chaos, seeing explosive growth after the Ancients created Chaos and let it loose upon the world. And while we are all clearly ourselves, I also get to see Void come into himself. The mysterious, peaceable person he grows into is what he might have been if No Moon and Starfire hadn’t died. In her Samsara cycle, I get to see Ausha as a child and adolescent - pampered and loved by her family.   Void learns to touch omens and healing as a Night mystic, while Ausha connects to a wilder, more instinctive wildling self. And I settle down even more with my faithful sword and battlefield knowledge.  

Day 1092

Coming out of sleep is very different from my first time - I don’t feel disoriented or embroiled in the life I’m waking from. It feels just like a restful nap, and the memories feel like old memories of my own academy days or early time in my own elvish life. It’s much easier than before.   The three of us all wake into Harmony together, looking just as we did when we slept. Void’s eyes open, and the feeling of relief as I crash into him is that of encountering an old friend who we’ve been fighting to save. Ausha, as well, experiences the relief of our old friend waking up, even though she has not been close to him aside from these memories we now share.   He looks sheepish.  

Sorry…

  The frustration and distress I’d previously felt about his reckless behaviour evaporates in the excitement of having him back and I blurt out everything I think he needs to know to come up to speed. Mostly, I tell him about Qing Chen, reassuring him that he’s a good guy and that he and Trillium are actually quite close.   As we rapidly catch up, the Heart of Song approaches…and of course Void has no idea who she is. When she introduces herself, his jaw drops and Ausha gently pushes it shut again.  

I hope you won’t count yourself a stranger among fae anymore.

  Before she sends us home, the Heart asks if Ausha is sure she wants to keep the fae life she has led. After all, it is meant to be a gift, and if the memories of Samsara don’t feel right, she still has the choice to let them fade and return to how she was before entering Harmony. But of course, Ausha squeezes Void tighter and says no - those are the only memories she has with Void.   And with that, the Heart taps the air before Ausha’s forehead.   The wings of Samsara spring forth from her back - beautiful veins that lead to coiling spiralled wing tips. They are blended golden-green in the same spiralling pattern throughout the wing so that I can’t see where things start or end. They shimmer with the silver sands of time. Her skin markings glow and slowly take shape around her hands, legs, and temples - a deeper green, reminiscent of Leaf and Vine. After all, she is still an elf. It feels like her Samsara nature now is reflecting the history of elves even if she herself is no longer Leaf and Vine.   When it is Void’s turn, the membrane of his dragon wings shifts to become the night sky. His midnight black hair goes blueish and the deep blue patterns start to rise on his skin around his chest and neck. The scales on his clawed hands retreat a little into scale-shaped patterns.   And then it is my turn.   My day-and-night wings remain the same swallowtail shape, but the membranes shift as though the sun has fully sunken below the horizon. My rosy-gold underlit cloud markings fade as the last rays of sun slip away, leaving my skin pale and unmarked for just a moment. Then, as my hair and wings darken to a deep blue-black, speckles of silver stars emerge on the upper wings and across my cheeks and shoulders. A moment later, iridescent rippling banners of green unfurl across the lower wings - an aurora beneath a cloudless sky. The same green curls upwards from my bare feet, wrapping my legs in light. The same silver and green shots through my hair like the first strands of grey when my elven hair went white.   After all three of our transformations, the Heart does look rather drawn and tired. In six months, I promise to return with Oblivion. For now, she needs to rest and it is time for us to go home.  

Day 1093

When I come to consciousness, Ausha and I are cuddled up together with Void on a pile of cushions nearby. When he opens his eyes, he immediately slumps down again as he feels the curse at play. I watch proudly as he comfortably reaches for his own night healing magic to ease his pain. I remember decades of teaching him to heal and watching him grow into his magic.   Emerging from our resting place, I find Qing Chen poring over his diagrams and sketches at a desk outside and can’t resist teasing my junior brother.  

You’re done, right?

  He sighs, seemingly unsurprised to find me awake. I suppose we are on time and things have been progressing well from their perspective. He thinks he is basically done with the inscriptions he’ll need, and waves me over to review his work. He clearly has the basics complete and is in the process of optimizing and tweaking things but wants me and Ausha to review it. Magdalena says it’s “fine” and that really doesn’t mean anything coming from her.   When the others gather up and greet us, I get to see Darkness scooping up Void as though he’s still a small child. It takes him a second, but Void readily returns the enormous hug, looking very overwhelmed.   Qing Chen is the first to speak to Ausha, with some clearly rehearsed line that he’s had in his head since they all realized she was coming with me.  

I didn’t think it was possible to be even more beautiful…but the night sky draped around you suits you like a string of pearls.

  I smack him and laugh - obviously she is not night. He looks absolutely shocked - clearly he had this whole romantic spiel planned out around Ausha becoming a creature of darkness and water, just like him. As he stammers and tries to guess her actual cycle, both Magdalena and I chide him for not knowing this critical part of his fae family.  

Day 1094

The next day, I refine Qing Chen’s inscription plans for Void to bring them a little more into alignment with his nature. The work is fine, but there are placement choices for how magic flows through fae that Qing Chen simply doesn’t know much about, and I can optimize parts of it that he hadn’t thought of.   The curse is quite easy to work around - Qing Chen has done his work well and even advanced demon magecraft is no match for the combined talents of Magdalena’s family, aided by Oblivion and Darkness.   And then it’s my turn.   Oblivion brings me to a newly dug-out expansion to the cavern with a magical barrier that Darkness has created. It will hide the enormous release of magical energy given off by the transformation. Even if I can absorb most of it and Void absorbs some of the residual energy, such a magical happening will certainly be obvious to anyone who knows what they’re looking at.  

My mischief has not created many legacies, and the ones that have been created have usually been passed between dragons, especially after Avan’Nal.

  Darkness says, referring to Oblivion and her work. He thinks that Void and I ought to be bound together to ease the transfer of magic, either by one of his bindings or by my own blood magic.  

He has been waiting for a very long time, and it isn’t your fault. He is clearly so happy, so healed now that everything has finally caught up and he does not have to hide anymore.

  The process begins with blood, very similar to elven ritual. An incision is made above my heart and we pour No Moon’s origin blood over the wound to meld with my own heartsblood. At first, it feels like dragon claws digging into me, and then wings wrapping around me. I feel the cover of darkness and the sensation I had being sheltered by No Moon on our last night together.   There is silence that stretches on forever, and I am alone. Then, soft wingbeats in the darkness until No Moon joins me in this dim twilight space.  

It’s my fault. I risked it all and in the end, I never got to see the place where darkness is precious and shadows are warm. I hurt too much. By the end, I didn’t know if I was rescuing or revenging. If I hadn’t gotten lost in it, I might not have taken the risks. I might not have fallen too soon. I realized too late. Your lover tried to hold me back. I felt like I couldn’t rest until I had killed everyone who had to die, and that list just kept growing. So I’m sorry I got lost in the end. But it’s okay. Starfire told me what you said - that you had fate with our daughter and that you’d be her best friend.

  I nod - she’s with me. She’s here with me and Void, and Mistress and Lyssa and Ying Ling.  

Tell your lover that I don’t blame her for Starfury. She did more than anyone could have asked. That I raised my daughter at all is thanks to her. I know he felt very guilty. In the end, at the fight I couldn’t win…I found him. I won and I lost. The Zephyr fled the last stronghold in the mountains and claimed an island with an unnaturally large mountain. That’s where they’ve taken him. If you can free him…

  His voice trails off, as though he thinks he is asking too much from me even now. I nod before he has even finished talking. Even if it weren’t for the ever-growing dislike I have for the Zephyr, even if it weren't for my own burning curiosity about the cloud-touched island that Magdalena showed me from her travels. There is no world in which I walk away from this lost brother, the lost ward of my friends and partners, a dragon whose family has never paused in our war to get him back.

I hope your tree is still there. I hope you can keep things safe. I hope that this helps.

  He holds out a beating heart.  

And I hope you never need this strength.

  He holds me close.  

Just listen to our heartbeat.

  We stay together until our heartbeat synchronizes into one.  

Goodbye, Heiassa

 

And eventually I can feel the light touch of Darkness smooth out transition, though No Moon is guiding me through all of it. It is a soft transition, with a gentle wing shielding me from the roiling energy that I know could otherwise be very painful. And then I know he is gone.