Zodiac Academy 8.5: Beyond The Veil

I opened my mouth, all the things I needed to tell Roxy rushing to my tongue as silence fell, marking the end of the song and the end of the time we’d stolen far too soon.

But before I could utter a single word, a clash of power exploded throughout The Veil, a deafening boom making the foundations of the Eternal Palace rock beneath us, and Roxy stumbled back a step.

I caught her hand, the pain of our separation rising in me as I tried to capture everything about the way she looked and felt, wanting to keep every moment with her captured in my heart for the endless time which would follow on without her.

My grip tightened as a force started pressing against her, an impossible weight of power which tried to drive her back the way she’d come, back to a world without me in it.

“No,” Roxy gasped, her fingers locking tight around mine.

The world flickered and blurred, my hand losing substance before materialising again, my grip firming once more.

“I’ll wait for you,” I swore to her, seeing the panic in her eyes and needing to comfort her in whatever way I could. “Right here. I’ll wait for you for as long as it takes. And I’ll watch over you, Roxy. I’ll be there even though you won’t see me. I’ll never truly leave you. I swear it. I’ll wait for you even if eternity passes me by while I do. I won’t ever leave you.”

“It’s not enough,” she choked out, tears gilding those bright green eyes, her pain mirroring my own. “I won’t leave without you.”

I wanted to hold on, I wanted to give in and go with her, I wanted so much with her which we couldn’t possibly claim, and I had no idea how to let go of her now that she was here.

The walls splintered with cracks as she refused to leave and I fought to hold on too, not knowing where this could lead, but knowing I couldn’t simply release her.

“Roxy,” I began. “You need to find the Guild Stones and reform the Zodiac Guild. Your mother and Azriel have seen a turn in the tide of this war if you can do it. Three of them are hidden in music boxes-” my words cut off as I realised she couldn’t hear me, The Veil thrashing so wildly that it was stealing my words, keeping the information she so desperately needed from her. I tried to call her name, but she wasn’t trying to listen to me, her focus had moved on, and she drew a sun steel dagger from her hip which sent a chill of utter terror through my soul.

That blade had been the thing to steal my life from me, the dagger which had pierced my heart and ripped me away from her once and for all, making certain my body couldn’t heal.

“Don’t!” I roared as I took in the blade, the intent in her wild green eyes. She was going to end it all, sacrifice herself so that she might stay with me and no matter how much the most selfish parts of me yearned for that, I couldn’t allow it. She had too much to live for, too much to achieve.

Her grip on my hand became insubstantial again but she refused to let go, instead latching on to that thread which connected our souls, that unbreakable link between us that nothing could rip apart.

The sky beyond the windows flashed purple and orange, a storm of pure magic thrashing against the confines of The Veil as her presence here threatened the stability of it all.

In the distance the clash of blades and a roar of raised voices sounded, letting me know that the people we loved fought on, buying us this time, keeping back the dead who were rushing for the gap she’d torn in The Veil. They couldn’t pass back into life, not truly, but whatever might get through could cause chaos unknown and we couldn’t risk that happening, no matter how tempting the call of life might be.

“Don’t let go,” Roxy snarled.

I blinked at the raw power in her voice, realisation dawning on me as I looked at this dark goddess who had given herself to me. She wasn’t succumbing to death. No, she was telling fate to get fucked all over again. And if there was any chance at all of her making it listen then I was right there with her for the ride.

I nodded in agreement, not even fully understanding what she was doing. But I knew my wife. I knew she didn’t have it in her to back down and with a flash of desperate hope, I realised she wasn’t going to give in this time either.

“You are going to fight this,” she ordered me. “You will fight it with all you have and if the price of that fight is the end of us both then I will gladly take that over death or life without you.”

My jaw locked as I took in her command, the oath I’d just made to her singing in my soul. I was her creature to command in all ways and if this was what my queen demanded of me then she would have it.

“I’ll give you all I have,” I swore.

My fingers gripped hers tight enough to bruise, the full might of my magic building within me until a roar powerful enough to shake the stars in the sky erupted from my chest and my Dragon burst from my flesh, clawing its way free of me and moving to beat a path around us with its immense wings.

Roxy gasped, looking between the beast and me, taking in the insanity of seeing us as two separate beings.

She burst into flames, bronze wings tearing from her back before beating once and taking off, leaving her Fae body behind as a bird of flame and fury raced to join the Dragon.

We were surrounded by our beasts, the creatures who resided alongside our souls fighting off the laws of magic for us as we stood between them in an orb of potent power, our hands still locked as one while a wild wind tore at our clothes and hair, almost knocking us from our feet.

The roof of the Eternal Palace splintered overhead before hurtling away like it had been caught in the fist of a giant, and we looked up at the spiteful stars as they looked right back, their almighty power washing over us, promising their wrath if Roxy didn’t stop.

She smiled at them, a savage, beautiful smile that stole the breath from my lungs. She slit her arm open, the blood of a true royal spilling from the wound.

Roxy reached for me, fisting my shirt right over the place where my heart should have been and ripping the fabric open to reveal the inked skin there.

“Roxy,” I growled, catching her wrist as she raised two bloodstained fingers, my fear for her overriding my need to let this go further. I had to know what price she was paying to make this happen, what expense this great and terrible magic came at. “What will this cost you?”

“No cost is greater than the loss of you,” she replied as the world hissed, the acidic whispers of the stars closing in on us.

Stealer of life.

Twister of destiny.

Beware the cost.

Turn from this path.

Stop before you unbalance the scales.

His ascension will bear a price.

“I don’t care,” she snarled, and the truth of her words silenced them instantly.

There was no denying her now.

I released her wrist, and she threw herself into the dark power of ether as she summoned it from the ground itself, the air, the flames, the distant rain, all of it flooding towards her and answering her call without so much as a hint of starlight among it.

That magic filled her up, making her skin glimmer with it, sparks of power crackling across her limbs.

Roxy released it like a whip, lashing at the sky far above and battering the stars themselves with a many-tailed attack.

They screamed as the ether tore into them and she smiled grimly, finally able to fulfil the curse she’d sworn against them.

Talons of ether cut into their power and with a flood of her will, she stole a piece of magic from each and every one of them. She took what they refused to give willingly, and ignored their horrified screams which rattled the sky as she twisted their will to her own and forced them to fuel her magic.

Roxy’s legs gave out, but I caught her, holding her upright so she could keep going, so she could exact the vengeance she was owed and claim back what was rightfully hers.

Roxy hissed in pain as she began to paint a rune over the place where my heart should have been, but she didn’t slow.

“My soul is his,” she said, her words thick with magic as the declaration became an undeniable truth, like it was written into the fabric of the world just as any other law of nature might be. “My heart is his.”

I gasped as I felt the weight of her power crashing into me, my knees almost buckling. I stumbled towards her, but she was there, waiting to catch me and I caught her too, both of us holding the other up. I clasped her face between my hands, my forehead pressing to hers and we held each other there like matching pillars of stone, each unable to fall while they had the other, stronger together.

“Let them beat as one,” she choked out, the power almost too much for her body to bear, but I tightened my grip on her, lending what strength I had. “Let them be one,” she demanded, painting another line on my skin, the rune unlike any I’d ever seen or studied, the power of it biting through my flesh and sinking into the essence of me.

“My life is bound to his. His death bound to mine. One heart….” Roxy panted heavily, her legs caving and nothing but my grip on her holding me upright. I wasn’t going to let her fall; I wouldn’t let her fail after coming so far. “One life… One path. Together,” she hissed, a slash of her finger completed the rune and a scream of unimaginable pain burst from her lips as she finished it.

“No!” I bellowed, my gaze falling from her face, finding the sun steel blade now piercing her chest, mirroring the wound which had ripped me from life, the echo of its agony resounding through my chest in reply to what she was feeling.

Her eyes fell closed, hope abandoning me as I drew her into my arms, a roar burning from my throat, all of our combined magic thrashing and writhing, demanding the spell she’d cast to take hold.

Roxy’s eyes snapped open meeting my terrified gaze, but she shook her head in denial.

She hadn’t bound us in death. She’d bound us in life and the stars were simply trying to deny her.

Power exploded out of her, ricocheting across the sky itself, time warping and shifting around us as she refused their call again, denying them as she had been doing for so long already, refusing them even in the matter of death.

With that explosion of power, they fell back, the sun steel blade no longer piercing her heart but gripped tight in her fist.

Roxy summoned the power of her Phoenix to her fist and the blade turned molten, a puddle of silver dripping to the floor between us as it was destroyed, and the power of our binding sank in.

Roxy gripped my forearms where I still held her and met my eyes as the most astounding thump began to pound within my chest. One heart. Hers and mine. Bound in endless rhythm with one another, beating again, defying death.

“There is only him,” she swore and with that vow, her power broke, crashing from her, through me and into the very heart of death itself. She tightened her grip on me and wrenched me back towards the blazing light of the living realm.

I caught a glimpse of the dead who battled to buy us this chance as we raced past them, Hamish waving wildly with a whoop of, “Tallyho, my son! Give that dastardly Dragoon what for!”

Hail’s Hydra bellowed, joined by the ferocious roar of Radcliff’s Dragon, the beasts singing their farewell to my own golden reptile before it collided with me, sinking back into my being where it belonged.

“Raise the Zodiac Guild!” Azriel hollered.

“Fate is shifting. My daughters can rise, Darius. Tell them that – tell them we await their call at the final gate and even hell shall bow to the voice of the true queens!” Merissa called.

Time seemed to slow as I passed by my mother last of all, her hand reaching out to claim mine, her eyes glistening with tears of pride, love, and happiness.

“Live long, live well, and love fiercely, my brave boy. I will watch over you both in every day that is to come.”

“I love you,” I choked out. “I’m so sorry for all we missed. I love you, Mom. I love you-”

The Veil snapped shut between us as the one true love of my life hurled us back into the land of the living and I crashed into a body preserved in ice, a heart which never should have been able to beat again coming alive once more, pounding to the tune of my wife’s own love.

I sucked in a sharp breath as the fire at my core heated me through, the ice melting away and revealing the picturesque edge of a mountain where I was born into life again. I let that breath roll into me as I stared up at the dark sky, the winter solstice coming to an end above me and the stars all peering back with furious, vengeful gazes.

A slow smile grew across my lips as I stared right back at them, the rioting defiance in my heart all for them. If it was a fight they wanted, then they could have it, because I had just reclaimed my destiny from their clutches and I wouldn’t be relinquishing it for anything.