Dreaming Ends

Luna allows him to find her hand, eyes slipping closed, humming a little to herself at the comfort she feels even holding his hand in this dream.

Technically speaking, she can't feel it the way she can feel it in real life, where they sleep side-by-side, but it doesn't mean it doesn't touch her and bring a soothing warmth over her, warmth she hasn't had in a dream in years.


The words normally feel heavy but there's something relieving about them right here with him.

"Forever."

Her promise is soft but stern and steady, reassuring to both of them, thumbing over his hand, and she can feel as he works to steady his heartbeat, but even with how uneven it feels, feeling it is more than she thought she could ever hope for.

"You'll stay with me forever? It's a long time so think it over carefully."

It's just like before, when she was gripped in his arms dying, how she tried to comfort him with jokes, trying to lighten the mood, and she's still trying. She will always try until the day forever ends. It's what he does and would do for her.

Shand snorts out with a laugh that he doesn't even expect and he's sure is a little gross and obnoxious due to leftover snot.

"I️ kind of already did, remember? The whole dumb deal with Olvreign thing?"

When he mentions it, he starts to feel tired for some strange reason. It hasn't been all that long ago, but with the world-hopping and all the discovering, it makes it feel like more time has passed than actually has.

He turns his head a little and slumps slightly, letting it rest on her shoulder despite the height difference and the fact that he's almost laying in the floor now.

"I'll stay with you no matter what. For always. And if you get tired of me and try to run away, I'll go full stalker and come find you."

He pokes at her with his free hand playfully, right back to little brother mode like it's his default.

He laughs softly to himself, but it turns into a rasping cough that takes him by surprise. With a little difficulty, he sits up, rubbing at his nose with the back of his hand.

In the dim light, he can see that his hand comes away bloody- and the blood has a strange, blue-black tinge to it.

"Luna-"

He pulls his hand from hers and holds it under his nose, catching the blood that's trickling from it now.

His tone shift catches her off guard, but the way he leans against her makes it difficult to turn to see what's going on, only leaving her the option to peak over her shoulder down at him.

Luna doesn't see anything at first which almost concerns her more than anything she was expecting. If she can see it, she can try to think of something to do to help, but if she can't see it then what is she supposed to do?

But, shining in the dim light, she can finally see something smeared across the back of his hand and pieces together what's generally going on quickly.

She keeps a hand on his back to keep him from falling over as she sits up, scooting to sit by his side on her knees, hand under his chin to tilt his head to look at her.

It looks like a nosebleed, but that doesn't look like blood and her brow furrows as she tries to think of any possible explanation for it.

They're here in a dream... Dreams are connected to their minds...

"Olvreign? Or the dragon? Is this related to them?"

The first suggestion feels ridiculous, considering she saw Olvreign turn into a crystal tower, but that doesn't necessarily mean that she's dead, right? And what if, even if she is, her crystal power is still flowing in his veins?

It's not impossible, but the dragon seems more probable.

She looks around them quickly for something she can use to help the "bleeding" but comes up empty handed so she has to improvise, tearing off a part of her torn dress.

Once it's rolled into a ball, she covers it with both of her hands, a strong chill surronding the air as a soft blue light emits between her fingers. When it fades, the chill is gone and she reveals the cloth again, this time almost completely frozen.

"Here."

It's cold but not unbearably so as she gently pats it on his cheeks then bridge of his nose, making this sweeping motion over and over, keeping each pat as soft as possible to not make it worse.

The room is starting to spin around him, and the edges of his vision are blurring and turning fuzzy black.

"I️ don't...I'm not..."

He can't get out any other words, it feels like daggers and slicing through his head, his neck, his arms. When he looks down, shifts his arms in the lamplight, his veins are pulsing in his arms with his rapidly increasing heartbeat, the black tinted blood spinning in whirlwinds through him.

The pain keeps coming harder, and in the midst of the confusion and the haze over him, he remembers this feeling, kind of.

It's the pain of his blood breaking down crystal, trying to kill Corruption, but it's not entirely the same. It feels like more than that, like something is poisoning him, leeching through his entire circulatory system at a pace his healing blood is struggling to keep up with.

A rush of heat burns up through his core, like he's standing way to close to a raging fire, except it's burning him from the inside out. It rushes through his chest, up his neck, into his face and his breathing is labored, but he can't seem to take in enough oxygen to make him feel calm or cool. He's starting to understand some of what Luna must feel all the time.

But the heat brings with it a dullness in his head, a thumping and a throbbing that beat out into his ears and only make it worse when his ears start to ring viciously.

He opens his mouth, feels himself trying to say Luna's name, and he can't tell if there's no sound coming out because of how parched and raw his throat feels, or if he simply can't hear his own voice over the ringing in his ears and the rush of his own blood.

But it doesn't seem to matter because as she sits there applying the coldness to his face, the heat starts to pool in his neck like someone has his throat in a vice grip, and it only takes a few moments before the color is choked out of the room and then everything fades altogether.

When Shand opens his eyes, he takes a huge, greedy gulp of air like he's never breathed air before. It was just a dream, and he's awake now. Everything is fine.

But as the sleep slowly starts to fade off him, the pain starts to settle back in with a vengeance, stronger even than before. And when he looks down, his shirt is covered in the blue-black blood that's streaming from his nose.

Shand disappears right before her eyes and there's a sudden sinking feeling. It's not like she doesn't recognize the fact that this is a dream but that doesn't stop the initial panic, the shaking in her hand that holds the stained cold cloth in front of her.

He's awake, she reminds herself over and over.

But she can't join him to check. She's refusing to join him and check, her body still leaning against his, head back on the lounge, eyes closed and resting.

If she's correct, if this has to do with Olvreign, with that dragon that has been with Shand all of these years, then this isn't something physical they can fight, no matter what world Shand creates.

No, she has to stay here. This shared space is the only access she has into his mind.

Luna suddenly regrets refusing to learn how to possess people all the times Nameless offered to teach her, but it always felt wrong in the moment.

How was she supposed to know it would help save the only person she has left? Nothing could have prepared her for this.

The scene around her loses the comforting nostalgia, quickly shifting to an irritating obstacle. This isn't where she needs to be.

She's on her feet in an instant and there's a distant coldness over her eyes. This is it, this is what she needs, the hardened blood of a merciless soldier flowing through her veins.

There is a certain foreboding rush in each muscle, a rush that she had forgotten at the moment of her death, the last moment she ever needed it, flinging herself to protect Ivor, the last hope for her world.

It's a feeling she was okay forgetting, okay with allowing a softer side to be her normal state of being instead, but she should have known: She can't shake it, this has always been her core mode through life and forgetting it will only cause pain and unnecessary hurt.

Being a soldier was never her goal, she hates fighting, but she's damn good at it. War became her livelihood from the young age of five.

This analytical, detached thinking can never leave her, no matter her hatred for it.

For once, though, she's glad for it.

The familiar walls begin to fade, things glow brightly as the scene shifts, but she doesn't even shield her eyes from the light, simply narrowing her eyes further to push her sight through it.

Any discomfort she feels in this moment is good, it keeps the fire burning.

And if it's fire they want, it's hell they're going to get.

He tries to hold a hand up to catch the blood, to stop it somehow, but his hands are shaking now and his arms feel like dead weight as burning fire and sharp, cutting pain dagger through his veins across his entire body.

A series of stifled gasps escape his lips as he falls against the back of the chair, unable to even keep himself upright anymore. He's not sure he's ever been in this much pain in his entire life.

It's got a choke hold around his vocal chords even, so that he can't yell out with the pain or scream. The best he can do is take ragged inhales, emit broken exhales that carry with them the ghosts of groans and whimpers.

His body is jerking too, moving without his permission as his nerves dance with the searing pain. It takes all the effort he has, but he turns to look at Luna. She's still sleeping there beside him on the lounge, so so close but far enough away that he can never get to her in this state, wake her up.

He's not sure what she could do if he were to wake her, but at least he wouldn't have to be alone, wishing for death in every agonizing, silent moment.

A violent cough shakes him, and a spasm in his chest sends a bit of blood spewing from his mouth, trickling down his chin. The droplets staining the chair in front of him are bright cherry red, unlike what's swirling like a black monsoon through his veins now.

He can't begin to guess what's going on. He knows it must have to do with Corruption, with the crystal left behind in Olvreign's wake. But his memories of the crystal in his veins from before, from the same day he'd met Luna, were nowhere near this intense.

It feels like his body is trying to destroy itself from the inside out.

Luna's feet step forward, knowing good and well that she'll make it to where she needs to be, a confidence about her that wills the place into being.

Left, right, left, right.

Her steps are a steady march and the sound is oddly comforting. She knows this role, despite hating it. She knows what to do with this fire in her hand.

Before her, coming into view, is a shattered blue crystal tower.

Of course it is.

She's not sure what she's expecting to see after that. Olvreign? The dragon? Both?

It could be Hadrian or even Nameless for all she cares, this is just clearly the work of something feeding off of or fighting crystal signature to that long forgotten, destroyed world and extinct species.

The air sparks, sparks that she knows well, popping in her face, nearly singeing her skin but her steps never hesitate.

"You want to play?"

Not a clue who she's talking to, her eyes scan the area on constant guard, voice low and biting, commanding attention and demanding attention of anything close by, much louder and assured than she's ever spoken in front of Shand, that's for sure.

But none of this is really all that new for her, the act his well practiced.

Or maybe her soft caring nature is the act and this is who she is.

The sky above him is still the glowing, grayish violet hue and the moon is beaming lovingly down on them, long strands of cottony clouds drifting by and curling in the wind.

That's what he's trying to focus on, to keep focusing on. If he can just lock onto something to ground him, to focus all the effort he can on, then maybe he can stay conscious.

Truth be told, at this point, he's not sure what he's staying conscious for. Every test run he's ever taken has left him the conclusion that whatever this is, it can't kill him. Nothing can kill him. Conscious or not, his blood will rebound from all this pain and fight whatever is trying to take him down. That's what always happens.

Even with thousands of years under his belt serving as proof for this belief, something about this pain gives him a sliver of doubt. The oppressive nature of it, the way it's stolen his voice away from him and refuses to let him even move. So he tries to focus on the moon and stars above him in a struggle to stay here in his body.

His heart is pounding fast beyond belief. His lungs heave on their own, in no discernible pattern or rhythm, just trying desperately to get air any way they can, working around the random spikes of pain in any way they can.

Another brutal wave of it hits him, and as he gasps in breath, he can feel blood gurgling in his throat, pushing up into his mouth, choking him.

His body is spasming, convulsing, and it's like he's not even present there anymore. His eyelids fight it, but in the end they can't win against whatever this is, and a trickle of blood starts from the corner of his lips as he passes out.

Shand thinks he'll wake up in another dream, or in his subconscious maybe, but neither of those things happen. When he opens his eyes, he's underwater.

He's down far, but he can still see the surface from where he is. All he can make out, though is light at the break of the water, sun shining brightly on the reflective, undulating surface.

He's always loved being underneath the waves. Something about it is calming, insular, protective, nurturing. He'd spent so much time under water during his pearl diving days that he'd come to enjoy it more than being topside. It's how he'd come to force himself to get so good at holding his breath.

He's holding his breath now, but the slightest tinge of pain is bleeding over from reality, and his lungs feel heavy. He tries to push off the bottom toward the surface, but is jerked back down as he tries to move.

He looks down to see that there's a chain attach to one ankle, and on the end of that chain is a huge metal ball, sunken halfway into the sand at the bottom of the ocean floor.

"My dear, I believe you should leave. Uninvited guests aren't welcome here."

The distorted voice is still recognizable and it makes her heart stop but only for the briefest of seconds.

"Aren't you supposed to be dead?"

Luna hisses, looking at the ruined tower that used to stretch up towards the sky, the bright blue still reminding her of deep water even in this moment.

"I am. And I am not. Consider this a fragment of who I was speaking with you. All that remains is the Corruption I left behind."

The grating voice seems to be coming from the crystal itself and there is no sign of Olvreign herself in sight. It's bizarre how normal and calm the usually twisted voice sounds in this moment, speaking evenly and calmly.

But she knows she doesn't have time for pleasantries.

"So you're not doing this on your own."

"No."

She clicks her tongue against her teeth in impatience, knowing time is short and that, if time runs out, she can't fix things like Shand can. Giving life is not her gift, all she can do is take it.

"Then how?"

"I believe you need to find the dragon. He's the one so opposed to my presence."

"I don't have time!"

Her fists clench at her sides as she snaps, fire flaring up around her arms.

It's fruitless, she knows, but she lashes her arm out and a flaming whip twirls out, cracking against the remains of the tower, beating a dent into it, cracking the outer surface.

"What are you hoping to do with this Corruption? It belongs here now, it's just as much a part of him as the color of his eyes, it's his own now."

As the voice speaks, she rams her shoulder against the base, fire burning into the material, shattering through it slowly.

It's taking too long.

"Fine then. Call the damn dragon, it clearly hates you. Something has to give, right? You can't both exist in his body at once. I know what's going on. So why don't we negotiate?"

Despite her own panic, her voice isn't frantic in the least bit, staying terrifyingly controlled, though there is a rolling growl and ice to each and every syllable, knowing full-well that "negotiating" could be a bloody battle and welcoming the challenge.

The crystal dimly glows in response, like light through the water's surface. Time is so incredibly short, she has no clue what she'll do if this fails. There is a plan B, but she's hoping it doesn't come to that, even though she's prepared for it to.

Inside of himself, Shand is tethered to the bottom of the ocean and his breath is running out. To either side of him, the ocean floor is empty and lifeless, just an endless stretch of perfectly golden sand that remains unmoved by the currents whipping around it.

The currents pull at Shand, too, but the irons keep him anchored to the ocean floor no matter how hard he tries to swim. The manacle is cutting into his ankle from all his efforts, and he's tried working it with his hands, looking for any weak spots in the metal that he can manipulate, but there are none.

Outside in the world he's made, Shand's body is well on its way to dying. Blood still trickles steadily from his nose and his mouth, slightly open, air rasping in and out slowly and haltingly. The blood has a strange, metallic blue glint to it in the moonlight.

But the most alarming change in his condition lies with the large, sharply spiked water blue crystals that are jutting out from jagged rips in his arms. growing straight out of his veins. The crystals are covered in his blood, which hisses at the strange substance, making smoke rise from his veins like whatever's inside them is smoldering.

But unlike with Olvreign's crystal, his blood isn't eating this crystal substance away quickly enough, and it's growing at such a rate that it's threatening to consume him from the inside out.

"You are a fool."

A large glittering door comes into focus with warring crystal colors of red, iridescent pink, and blue, the outline of it drawing itself in right before her eyes.

This fragment of Olvreign is right: She is a fool. What she's about to do is very idiotic.

"If you merge your inner subconsciouses to find what it is you're searching for, you are allowing both this crystal and the dragon access to your own mind. You already house my Corruption and Nameless's Destruction in your body and have found a way to balance and keep them at bay. What do you think will happen if you add a third power to the mix?"

There's a sudden sharp pain in the very center of Luna's heart and it connects up deep inside her mind, like someone is driving a sword through both at once.

She knows this pain, she's dealt with it for over a century now, but the skin ripping pain on her outer hip never gets easier to deal with. Gritting her teeth, she pushes herself to the door, taking controlled breaths, not having to look down to know what's going on.

Piercing crystal, red, pink, and blue, tear through her dress from her skin, slicing her arm whenever it swings by with her walk, and she can feel more crystal begin to travel further down her leg, tearing through the muscle on its way.

The door swings open when she is close enough, but no light pours in. Not that she should have expected it.

Beyond it is a confusing mix of something familiar, yet desparately forgotten, and something new. The winding tunnels, crypt, and cave of Shand's own mind are broken into pieces, littered between sections of upside-down buildings, staircases to nowhere, and windows floating free of walls.

It's chaotic and unnerving to see their inner thoughts so connected like this but the blue crystal growing off his world, beginning to overtake and reach out towards the pink and red of her own kicks her into gear.

The pink and red never grows, never attempts to cross over beyond her, Olvreign was right: She's concealed this disease to herself, she can keep it at bay for a little longer. But the blue substance is relentless in its conquest.

The more she sees of all of the glowing stones, the more the pain inside her begins to escalate and the faster she can feel herself losing her leg in the grasp of its casing, eventually getting to the point she has to swing that leg, unable to bend it.

Oddly, this pain isn't what worries her the most. She did this to level the playing field between her and the eventual encounter, bringing it into her home field the most she can. She knew what she was getting into. What she wasn't expecting isn't the steadily rising water that she now has to slosh through at ankle deep.

It matches the crystal of Shand's inner workings, in fact she's convinced it may all be originating from the cool blue waves.

The tunnel from before is before her, but it's flooded, just enough room at the top for her to keep her head above water and she swallows hard at the thought of trapping herself in this place of her childhood fear. Luckily, the crystal trapping her leg glows to provide light, taking care of the darkness, but there's nothing to be done about the water.

In the face of her own terror, she still moves forward, stepping down into the water, hands gripping in fearful desperation at the cave wall, using it to pull herself along the submerged corridor. The weight of the crystal wrapped around her leg acts like an anchor and threatens to pull her down to rest under the water forever.

Several times her hands slip on the wet, slick rock and she finds herself under the surface, her mind flashing scenes of a rushing river overhead, no doubt only traumatizing herself further, but the hurt she's inflicted on her mental state will have to be handled a different day if she makes it out of this. Her hands always pull her back out and, after coughing up water, feeling the sting of her lungs, she pulls herself back into motion again as if it never happened.

It takes longer than she'd like, but she eventually makes it to an opening, almost every substance covered in the battled crystal, and she throws herself up onto the ground, taking a moment to appreciate it underneath her.

The crystal under her reflects a large dark form off a little ways from her, she can tell it's watching her so she lifts her head to greet it, forcing herself to stand, a little lopsided as her fully crystal leg throws off her height and balance.

It's the dragon and it's large enraged eyes are staring right at her.

Of all the things he is good at, Shand is probably the best at holding his breath. But the surface of the water is so far off and the weight holding him down is so heavy. His lungs are burning with both the desperation for air and the prickling of the growing crystal in his bloodstream.

Although he's so far under, he can barely hear noises above the waves, sounds that are so far away that it's almost like they're echoing in another world. There is a heavy, hollow sound- the screech of a bird? A shadow passing over the surface of the water.

The water around him starts to glow, and there at his chest, under his shirt, he can see the pearl start to come alive, light swirling out of it and dissipating into the water. The water is reverberating now with noises, wet thuds that are more waves of pressure than sounds, in time with his heartbeat. He can see the water all around him moving in time with it, like shockwaves.

He closes his eyes against the barrage of the water against him, and when the pressure subsides, when the waters calm, he opens his eyes. The weight around his ankle is gone, and when he looks down, the chain and the iron weight have disappeared, as if they'd never been there.

He starts thrashing his legs immediately, swimming for the surface like a mad man, knowing his lungs will give out any moment. He's so close- he knows if he can just get to the surface, he'll wake up, back on the rooftop, somewhat safe for the time being. That's how his subconscious always works. If he can get to the surface, he'll come around.

But when he breaks through the surface of the water and takes a heaving gulp of air, gasping and sputtering, his surroundings are pitch black, cold, stony.

In fact, there is stone encasing him all around, tightly, in an area only large enough for him to lay down without moving. He feels all around, but he's enclosed from every side by cold, damp stone that pushes at his bones and amplifies the ache and chill of the crystal.

All around Luna is a cavernous, gaping cave, with ceilings so high their limits can't be measured. Sounds echo and bounce off every surface, sounding hollow and sharp all at the same time.

The dragon spies her first, but stays still, keeping most of himself secluded in the shadows, letting only his bright yellow eyes glow intensely out into the dark.

"He never gets angrier than when he's in pain, poor snake."

The voice jumps off several different stone surfaces that make it seem like it's coming from everywhere at once. It's a husky but inviting female voice, and by the time its echoes have stopped repeating her words, Luna looks up to see it's coming from some form of rocky outcrop above her.

It's too dark to make out nearly anything that lies above her in the vast upward expanse of the cave, but it's clear that she's not alone.

The voice is a stranger's but something tells her that she has a vague idea of who it is already. Nothing as concrete as a name or a face, but just the general idea of who is in this room other than herself and the dragon across from her.

Luna pushes herself to her feet, staggering back against the cave wall as she attempts to adjust her heavy crystalized leg but it throws her off balance.

A short wince later and her eyes are back up towards the unseeable top of the cavern, focusing on the outcrop the most though her eyes flick around in any other direction she can spare to glance at.

She hates everything about this place. The fact she had to submerge herself in water to get here just to enter an impossibly large and dark room does not settle well with her.

The crystal through her body pulses out hot pain but also light with the beat, keeping the area around her illuminated at least, so she tries to keep her mind from wandering too far past her bubble of light.

"What's your name?"

Something deep down tells her that it's okay, that she needs to calm herself just a bit, but the words don't kick into action until after she demands to further know the identity of the voice. The tone clearly doesn't even settle well with herself, but she controls any flinch or overly open display of that, settling to fix it the next time she opens her mouth.

"You and I are both here because he's dying, right? What do we do?"

There's a little more of the Luna Shand knows this time, a little softer, more concerned, but still quick and guarded. Anything could happen here, and she's aware of that so she won't play a fool, knocking down every well-placed military defense.

"You're quite safe here for now, dear Luna."

The voice float down from above again, tone motherly and gentle. At her words, the dragon starts a deep rumble in his throat, something that will grow into a growl, but a snapping sound echoes through the cave sharply, and the dragon silences itself, pulls back further into the shadows watching Luna with it snake eyed stare.

A different kind of rumbling sound fills the cave now, and the floor quakes slightly, loose rocks jumping about on the stone floor, sending tiny pelting sounds crashing off the walls. As the cave shakes, the woman's voice echoes in the chaos.

"My name is not one that you could know, as even my own world abandoned its mother tongue millennia ago. But it translates roughly into this language as Sabina. I️ don't mind it much."

It sounds like the cave is about to fall in on itself, like an earthquake is about to pull it apart, but then high above Luna, she sees a hint of movement as a ridiculously tall woman, a giant, starts to make herself visible from the other side of the cave.

She's nearly as tall as the dragon itself, and in some ways, she draws instant comparison to Olvreign. But as Luna studies her, she realizes that this woman is actually quite different.

Although her voice is mature, her face still seems youthful and smooth, her skin the color of porcelain so pale she almost takes on the slightest gray pallor in the shadows. Her face is thin, but her high, chiseled cheekbones are her most noticeable feature. They sit out so much that her cheeks seem slightly hollow under them.

Her gray-blue eyes are rimmed in dark lashes, dark brows, opened thinly. Her face is surrounded by dark hair the color of Shand's, framing her eyes with long bangs, hanging long down her back but falling in around her face. She's wearing some kind of leather vest with a collar that sits up high, protectively around her neck and similar thick leather pants, making her seem more like an out of work warrior than the goddess she's supposed to be.

She steps lightly around rock formations growing up from the floor, ducks around the ones growing down from the ceiling until she reaches Luna, her thigh-high boots making a gentle clacking on the floor. She kneels beside Luna, easily fifteen feet tall.

Up close, her face is hard and angular, her bone structure obviously regal, but she still looks soft and gentle.

"So this is the treasured one."

She reaches out a hand with slender, graceful fingers, letting one glance gently across the back of Luna's hair, as if she's meeting for the first time someone she's known and loved her whole life.

"And yes and no, my dear one. His body is tempted to give in to death. If that happens before the crystal takes our friend here, Shand will be gone from this body but my nemesis here will remain."

She looks over at the dragon, and her gaze changes from one of awed admiration to one of cold, steely death, and it's obvious that this woman is powerful in her own right.

"But you see, though the crystal is killing him and causing him pain, it makes the dragon strong. So he lies in wait to try and outlast the one I️ chose, to steal his body, to heal himself."

"Sabina?"

The name is odd on her tongue and even though she speaks like this name is what a new language may call her, her original lost, it's still a very foreign sounding name for Luna's own world.

Then again, so is Fengari hence why people call her Luna to begin with, and for other reasons after that, of course.

Even though the moment shouldn't allow it, she finds herself falling into a quick fascination with the extremely tall and equally beautiful woman kneeling next to her that is ever so delicately and gracefully chancing quick gentle touches to the back of her hand.

This was not at all what she was expecting when she merged her subconscious with Shand's to find a solution and end his pain, but she's becoming enraptured by this new interaction with a being so ethereal Olvreign looks just as average as she herself does.

Her own pain, crystal consuming her entire leg and working up her side now, doesn't even register, everything is an afterthought in the face of the being before her, even the darkness surrounding them. She's felt this peace before in the face of her own fear, that time in the dark cave, standing before a floodgate, when Shand handed the glowing pearl over to her.

Actually, it's exactly like that, too much so to be a coincidence.

But she doesn't say anything, still retaining some small sense of logic, knowing other things need to be addressed.

But did this otherworldly woman just called her "treasured one?" The look in her eyes nearly makes Luna believe right then and there that she is some sort of marked treasured presence in this place without even knowing how or why.

What does Sabina mean? She's not sure she can handle being part of any more prophecies in her lifetime, but that's not what it feels like this is in reference to. This feels different, more loving than any retelling of a future already long decided.

There's a long pause while she fights to think of something to say, like she's forgotten how to speak completely, and she's afraid of looking like a fool in front of this magnificent presence before her, but it may be too late for that.

"So what do we do then? I'm no stranger to these sort of odd crystal powers. I have two different types from completely different beings in my own mind still. They're nearly impossible to completely remove, and..."

For the first time in what feels like minutes, she moves her bright blue eyes from Sabina, making eye contact with the slit yellow eyes of the dragon.

She came to fight it, as ridiculous as it sounds, but it seemed more probable than removing the crystal itself in a strange way.

Now, looking at it watch her, she's not sure she shouldn't just stick with plan B: Absorb this new crystal into herself and try to sort out a new balancing system between Corruption, Destruction, and whatever this new one wants to be called.

"I️ see."

Sabina nods at Luna's words slowly, her head tilted ever so slightly in wise understanding, but also directing her attention to the crystal chunk that's taken over Luna's leg.

"Oh, dear."

Sabina clicks her tongue and reaches down, touching a just the tip of her fingernail to the crystal shard. In response to her touch, it cracks from the inside and falls away like broken bits of mirror.

"We face a unique problem with the dragon in our midst."

Sabina stares down the dragon as she speaks, standing back up to her full height. The dragon still cowers in the corner but meets her furious gaze. As she starts to speak, her eyes start to glow the same color as the crystal, the same color that Shand's do when he becomes furious. But her voice stays calm, even, cool.

"The crystals destroying Shand's body have been burned by dragon fire. He has killed death itself before in his veins, but the combination is a precarious one."

She begins to look oddly sad, eyes flicking to the bits of crystal that have fallen off Luna.

"Shand accidentally created this substance when he killed your Olvreign. It's a summation of his power, of mine, of hers."

She looks intently into Luna's face, a strange, knowing, inquisitive expression on her face as she turns from the dragon and kneels again close to Luna, the glow of her eyes dimming and waning and then fading back to her steely blue.

She lets her hand rest supportively on Luna's arm, although it dwarfs her.

"Sweet one, you cannot entertain thoughts of taking this upon yourself. Shand's body is meant to withstand eternity and every blight or destruction any world is capable of creating, but... this. This is my own powers, his, turned against us. It will tear him to shreds as he tears it to shreds, and there will be nothing left. You would not live. And you must live."

She sighs, like she carries an incredibly heavy burden on her thin, graceful shoulders.

"I️ know a way. It is not guaranteed, but I️ know of no other possibility. But the passage we need is blocked."

She cuts her eyes to the dragon again, a look almost childish in its anger, and Luna is instantly reminded of Shand in such a clear, comical way that she wants to laugh despite the horrible situation they find themselves in.

Luna stares with childishly wide eyes at Sabina, even long after she's turned around to pout in a familiar fashion towards the dragon, latching onto probably the most insignificant part of anything that's been said so far.

You must live.

Any sane person would think those thoughts on their own, attempt to survive, but her life has never been hers to decide when to survive and when to die. Most people were always content to tell her to die, when to die, and how to die.

Sabina's words are so final, refusing to leave room for questions, like if she wills that Luna must live, then all hell be damned if Luna isn't going to do just that.

It's not up for debate at all, and, in this moment, she wonders if this is how people with mothers and fathers feel. Is this what it's like to have people care so deeply about your future that they will bring it into existence themselves to see it happen? To worry over any and all reckless ideas you have, not because of how it will look on them or how it will impact other people, but because of how these ideas may hurt you?

Even right down to Sabina's light touch on her tiny arm in comparison, how Sabina doesn't flinch away from the heat, sends a new unknown feeling spinning in her mind. Sure, this goddess may not have to worry about death or even long-term pain, but she can still feel the fire that is Luna's skin, can't she? But she doesn't even react, holding her gently like she's any other person.

Like there's nothing wrong with her and she deserves to have tender touches and loving embraces.

Like she deserves to live.

Luna has to swallow hard to dismiss any emotion that is bubbling over, knowing now is not the time to become emotionally attached to a person she just met, even if it's all her heart wants to latch on to.

"So we need to get past him to get to our only possibility then? Sounds about right in line with everything else Shand and I do. We can never make it easy on each other."

She attempts to keep her tone light but still as guarded as she can manage with Sabina swiftly trying to knock down every wall she can in just a few seconds.

Shand is trapped in the stone tomb in his mind, the lid is locked on tight, and he can't get out.

Crystals are cracking out of his veins, growing more viciously by the second. They're pressing against the sides of the stone box he's in now, pushing against the walls and closing him in even more.

He's screaming with the pain, but the sounds echo off the stone and attack his own ears with the harsh noise.

There is a crystal formation growing out of the side of his neck with harsh, jagged, sedated edges, ripping his shoulder and pressing down on his collarbone with the heavy weight. It's not only growing out, but in, ripping into muscles and tendons in his neck, slicing open veins.

His blood is running out of him in pulse-like waves, washing over the crystal and making it crack, sizzle, turn a dusty looking charred black on the top and shrinking it to an extent, but never enough to alleviate it altogher. His blood and the crystal are fighting, damaging each other, but neither one winning or giving up yet.

The pain is worse when his body fights back. He knows where he's laying now, and knows that if this space is empty, she roams around his mind freely, the dragon roams freely. He pushes down any sort of hope this tempts him to have and reminds himself that he's trapped in a tomb.

Maybe this is finally the death he's been so fascinated with. Hadn't he and Luna just been talking about it? Hadn't he just dreamed of it, hadn't she just told him not to wish for it? He had half started to take her word.

And now here he is, crystal working to encase and slit open every vein he has. If he can't find a way to vanquish the crystal of his own making, it will consume him.

In a moment of raw panic, he realizes what that will mean for Luna. He's brought her here to this new world, this incredibly empty world, just the two of them. If he dies here, now, she will be more alone than when she started.

He thinks back to what she'd said earlier, comforting him in his dream. The worst part of dying is knowing that you're leaving the other person alone.

The idea of Luna hunched over him, holding his broken body like he'd held hers, sends him into an absolute frenzy. He won't imagine her that devastated, he won't imagine her that alone. He can't.

The inside of the pitch black tomb jumps to life with color, light, as his eyes burst with that angry blue glow and his veins start to pop with concentrated bits of blue light, pushing the light up through the crystals attached to him and illuminating them.

He's yelling with all the capacity that his lungs still have to offer and he can feel the stone shaking all around him, he can't move to look down but he can feel threads of electricity pulling and jumping and winding around his fingers and there is a loud, deafening crack and for a moment, Shand wonders if he is dead.

The lid of the tomb jumps, but only slightly. It falls heavily back down on top of the box and he continues yelling, screaming, putting on a light show just for himself.

Sabina smiles fondly at Luna, her mouth pulling more to one side than the other, drawing more and more comparisons with Shand by the minute. It's easy to tell they're related, but at the same time, she carries a regality about her that Shand hasn't learned yet. She can't imagine Sabina stumbling over herself, letting her long legs trip her up for no good reason.

"You are stronger together for that reason."

She agrees with Luna, standing, turning to the dragon.

"I️ cannot remove him. If I️ use my power to do so, I️ will only weaken Shand's body and his ability to fight off the crystal for as long as possible. His only chance now lies with you."

Oddly, this isn’t the first time someone had paired her up to battle against a mythological creature a hundred times her size. This was monthly training in her younger years and even Nameless has conjured up great beasts for her to slay and stay in fighting shape.

But more rests on this fight than all of those. She can lose so much more than blood, limbs, or her own life.

“So, just move him?”

The “just” is much more sarcastic than arrogant, she knows this won’t be easy, but she walks past Sabina regardless.

She hates fighting, for multiple reasons.

Fire springs from her fingertips then burns up the length of her entire arms, blazing wildly around her, her appendages no longer visible, completely consumed.

Her body feels like it’s melting and a sweat builds up on her face instantly. She hates fighting and this is one of the major reasons why: She has to fry herself from the inside out to build an intimidating fire.

Maybe in another life she would have loved water, swimming in the waves of the sea to cool over and put out this flame.

The dragon doesn’t move but its attention does shift from Sabina to her. It seems to consider her of little threat and that’s fine, she’ll take that. Being underestimated is one perk of her petite frame.

The flame on her right arm extends downward, curling like a snake on the ground beside her, forming a large red hot whip.

Red hot isn’t enough for this.

But she’s afraid to go hotter so she’s willing to try this level first.

She throws her entire body into lashing the long flame forward, cracking it against the creature’s side to gauge what she’ll have to do. It growls long and low at her, looking at the light seer on its hide.

Annoyed more than anything, it swings its tail and she hits the ground to avoid it, an idea coming to her but just a second too late to put it into action this round.

She blows a huff of air up, blowing her hair out of her face as she stands. As the hair falls into place, time seems to flow and a constant snapping pops from the fire on her arms as the color shifts with the movement of the flames from red to blue, the flame from her left arm growing in length to match the right.

It’s so painfully hot, her bones and muscles aching, body screaming to run from the heat, but she can’t.

Luna cracks both whips at him relentlessly, marking up his giant scaled body, flipping and jumping out of his own attacks and fire like its a choreographed dance between them, ignoring any cuts or minor broken bones she gets when his tail manages to collide with her and throw her back.

Nothing hurts as much as what she knows is coming so it’s easy to push past it.

They get into an odd rhythm of sparring back and forth, the cave flaming to life in bursts as their fire mixes, nearly incinerating the stone that gets in the way out of existence.

It slams its tail down hard enough to break the ground and send up shattered rocks into the air. Luna is nowhere to be seen, long enough that it seems like she was smashed under the weight.

But it can’t be sure. It lifts the tail and noticed, quickly, that her remains aren’t in the new crater.

Luna runs out from the shadow of its body, jumping up on the tail and sprinting on it like a path leading directly to his main form. It thrashes to throw her off and it takes everything in her to stay balanced, now aware of her various injuries, but she manages.

In no time at all, she pushes off of his shoulder, right at its open mouth, foot anchoring on its bottom jaw and arm holding its upper, using her own body to keep him from snapping its snout shut. Her muscles strain and shake as his teeth dig and slice against her hand and arm but she pays him back by burning his gums and lips.

A bright hot light forms in the back of its throat as he readies to burn her body away, but she doesn’t need his help with that.

She points her free arm in his mouth, aimed towards the heat forming within him, eyes slipping closed.

A beat passes.

The blue flame erupts into pure white fire, consuming her entire form, no trace of her body remaining other than the vaguely humanoid shape the glowing fire takes, illuminating the entire room, light bright enough that the very highest point of the once unknowable ceiling can be seen.

Just as he fire his flame, she bursts hers with a sickeningly loud snap into his mouth, overtaking any attack he planned and traveling deep down inside its entire body, every possible organ, the heat so hot that the temperature of the room increases far beyond what could ever be considered comfortable by anyone.

The dragon stands, slamming its head into the wall to dispel the flame, backing from his perk, smoking pouring from his mouth and filling the area.

He manages to fling Luna away from him in his agony, growls and snarls shaking the space, and the way her body falls enveloped by fire looks more like a discarded phoenix than a person. The fire shoots out from her in waves when she makes contact with the ground, body visible again but some flames remain, clinging to her form like she’s a dying ember.

There are burns the entire length of her body that blister over already, hurting enough that she doesn’t move, staying on her side where she is, gritting her teeth at the pain, shuddering as every nerve ending she has sparks down like a fuse.

But she did it, she managed to make the beast move, even if only for a short moment, and she can tell it’s not dead by how it coughs. She did it.

She can only hope that was enough.

Sent from Topic'it App

The window is small, Sabina knows, to take advantage of what Luna has accomplished with the dragon. So she moves swiftly in long, graceful strides and scoops the burned Luna into her hands, ducking into the shorter corridor that the dragon's removal has revealed.

She's crouched over in the tunnel, and it's too small for the dragon to enter after them, but they can still hear it growling and snapping in pain, the vicious noises echoing off the walls threateningly, but far enough way to put them in no real danger.

Sabina looks down into her outstretched palms as she walks, surveying the damage done to Luna's body, the pain that she's in, curled up, trying to sit up and ignore it, but being unable to.

"What a brave young soul."

Sabina murmurs it more to herself, pausing in the dark corridor, kneeling in the glow of the light that she herself gives off. The light is calming, soft and dim but bright enough to light their way. On her knees, she lays Luna gently on the ground.

She is wearing a strange ring on her right hand. The top of the ring, a conical shape, is on a hinge, and she pulls it back from the rest of the ring to reveal a thin, sharp point like a needle. She pricks the very tip of a finger with it ever so gently, producing the smallest bead of light blue fluid on her skin.

With a gentle brushing motion, she lets her finger run down the side of Luna's burned body. The blood takes Sabina's glow with it as it transfers, and now all Luna's wounds are glowing with warm blue light as they mend and heal.

"Now, dear small one. You are familiar with the crypt, yes?"

Sabina takes Luna back in her palms as she recovers, testing out her movements.

"We must make it there, and quickly. It's going to take a bit more of your fire if we are to halt this destruction."

"If by brave you mean reckless, then yes."

Luna forces out a laugh, clutching at the fabric over her heart as it works overtime to get her body temperature back to its unique resting temperature, finding it a simpler task with the burns taken care of but it will still take time.

And not the kind of time she has given Sabina's cue as to what needs to happen next.

"What kind of fire do you need? I have three settings, but you may need to wait a minute for the last one."

She's being surprisingly witty and light all things considered, mostly glad she doesn't have to do this alone.

But it doesn't mean she should be any less careful, she's walking a thin line of hot and scorching, the comment about the white flame a little weightier than her tone leads on.

Oh, she could do it again right this second, but probably at the cost of falling into a coma for a few weeks while her body attempts to regulate itself. It's not the worst thing to happen to her, sleeping for weeks on end, but it's not a pleasant thought either being trapped in her dreams, fire all around so there is no escape.

Sabina frowns, listening to Luna's pulse. race, her heart pound in her chest.

"An offset to dragon fire will be required. But I️ will not demand that from you at the cost of your health. I️ will find another way. There's always another way."

She says it gently, almost like a crooning and comforting lullaby as she continues to duck through the low halls, making this turn and that in a labyrinth-like pattern.

Before long, the passageways start to become more recognizable to Luna. The ceiling starts to open up to the extent that Sabina now stands at her full height, not having to hunch her shoulders or duck her head.

They go through one oversized, stone hewn doorway and suddenly they are back in the huge vault that Luna recognizes as the crypt.

Small caches are cut out of the rock along all the walls- hundreds, thousands dotting the stone from floor to indiscernible ceiling in a straight, organized pattern.

And near the center of the floor is the stone box, the coffin, the mausoleum. Sabina strides, flowing across the floor over to it, letting Luna down beside the stone box as she herself reaches down and forcibly removes all the metal gating and bars from around it, tossing the metal over her shoulder. It falls to the floor somewhere behind her in the darkness with a hollow, echoing clanking sound.

"Darling one, you must be prepared for what you will see now."

Sabina lets a few fingers rest on the lid of the coffin, preparing to push it off.

"It will be unpleasant."

Without any other explanation, she slides the lid off cleanly with two fingers.

Crystal has completely filled the box to the point that it has taken on the same rectangular shape and the coffin looks full of hard, glistening and glowing water up to its brim.

But throughout the crystal, small channels like veins are running, like tunnels in an anthill. And in the veins, a deep blue-black liquid is pulsating, glistening with a dark metallic shimmer. The crystal is blackened on all its edges and emits an eerie sizzling sound.

Luna can see inside the crystal, with the strange way that it refracts light and encased, entombed entirely in it, is Shand. His eyes are frozen open, staring straight forward, showing no signs of movement or struggle. The crystal that has filled the tomb grows directly out of his own veins, veins that the crystal has pulled out of his body and has strung throughout itself as it grows, letting Shand's blood course through it and strengthen it.

Shand is torn apart in every way possible. It's hard for Luna to look at, and she can't even tell if he's alive.

"Are we too late?!"

Luna rips her eyes away, staring up at Sabina like it's her fault then down to the crystal, every inch of it and everything in it. She hesitates to call what's left inside a person anymore.

If she didn't know what was going on, she wouldn't know it was Shand.

He's immortal, right? This doesn't happen to immortals. This happens to humans and to ageless like herself. Not immortals.

Not Shand.

No, no this can't happen to Shand. It's impossible. She refuses to believe it, and she mumbles these thoughts over and over.

But no matter how often she shakes her head, closes her eyes and reopens them, nothing has changed. He's still there in pieces, disassembled and, from all looks of it dead.

Was this her fault? Did she take too long with the dragon? What was she supposed to do? She's no god, how is she expected to fight one, especially on a time limit?

No, this isn't fair, he doesn't deserve this, he doesn't deserve whatever the hell this is or to be punished for her own limitations.

She can go back even further: This is because he trapped Olvreign in his mind to protect her. He would have never met Olvreign if he never met her.

Every single path her mind can take to see if there was a better way are all deadends with her at where all the roads stop, his blood soaking into the skin on her hands for eternity. She'll never be able to wash it away.

"I thought we were supposed to spend forever together on that damn planet he made? Why did he bring me back? It would have been better if he hadn't. He would have been better."

Her fist strikes the top of the crystal casing and she kicks the side of the stone container for good measure, knowing she's being childish but she doesn't care.

The ache in her lungs tells her she's hyperventilating now, which doesn't help her heart regulate her furnace of a body any further, but she doesn't care. She'd gladly burn from the inside out if it meant he'd be okay, if that pain would somehow right this.

All he wanted was to die. How stupid and selfish. How dumb and short-minded.

"Shand!"

Her voice cracks and there's something in it that doesn't even sound like herself anymore. Or, maybe it does but a different version of herself, one from long ago.

The one that turned and screamed for her parents as she was taken away, the one shoved to the ground in disgust by the two people that were supposed to love her the most. Or the same frightened girl that begged another group of children to leave her alone, that cried for someone, anyone, to help her before her head slipped below the current of the river she was pushed into.

She sounds childish because she is childish. There's a small purple-haired child still locked away in her mind that cries to herself in the dead of night.

Luna had forgotten about her because of Shand, or maybe Shand had forced himself into her life and scooped up the terrified little girl safe in his arms, taking her with him on grand adventures with promises of never being alone.

In the blink of an eye, that all seems to be fading and the little girl is all that remains, begging for a way out of this until she can no longer force her small voice from her throat anymore.

"You said we need fire."

Her knuckles are white as she grips the sides of Shand's tomb and, despite the labored breathing, she manages to get her voice out.

"I don't care what kind of fire you need, I have it. I won't die so don't give me this lecture about finding another way. Another way isn't worth the time."

If Sabina thought she had been reckless, or "brave," before, she hasn't seen anything yet.

Sabina touches the back of Luna's head with affection, calmly.

"He still lives. The energy and the power I️ am conserving are ensuring it. But in order to save him, I️ must break through this crystal that is tempered with the dragon fire. I️ need some fire tempering of my own."

She collects one of the metal pikes that had served as a corner of the gating around the tomb and plunges the sharp side into her palm, her face calm and devoid of any pain as her cupped palm fills up with her blood.

Once its full, she cups over it with her other hand, flipping the two back and forth like she's rolling a snowball, and soon it becomes clear that she is forming the blood into a sphere, much like Luna's seen Shand do.

Sabina holds the orb out and it floats in the air, glowing the calming blue color and pulsing like it has a heart beat of its own.

"It will need to be hot."

Sabina offers no more explanation, clearly believing that Luna can fill in the blanks for herself as she nods toward the orb.

From inside his crystal casing, Shand can see Luna and Sabina standing over him, speaking, but he can hear nothing but the sound of his heartbeat thundering wildly through the crystal, pumping his blood through it, giving the crystal the strength its stealing from him.

He can't move, he can't blink, he can't say a single word or even let Luna know that he can see and hear her. He's frozen, buried in the crystal that he's becoming more and more sure will entomb him permanently.

Through the pain, his mind can't concentrate on much, but it is stuck on what Luna will be left with after him. Will she be saddled with an empty, decaying world full of this rampant crystal? Will it take her life eventually, too? Or will she be fated to be alone, having watched him die herself?

Seeing Sabina and Luna together is strange. The only time he sees the goddess is in his dreams, when he's unconscious, and she's not always in this form. The sight of her and Luna side by side, their size difference notable, makes him feel like he's losing his grip on reality and maybe he's slipping even faster than he thinks.

Luna takes the longest breath of her life, unsure of what she's hoping for but hoping for some sort of miracle nonetheless.

Fire of red and orange twists around her arms and it already feels hotter than usual.

This isn't a good sign.

Yes, even this fire is normally hot but not like this. She hasn't cooled down yet.

Without even trying, the flames crackle to life, consuming her upper body in blue heat and she winces at the result.

She didn't do that, the fire did on its own. There's little control over it right now, it's burning how it wants on its own.

Things are unstable and she knows it, fears it. What happens if she hits the next stage and she can't be put out?

Sabina watches her closely, monitoring everything and, in a way, she's glad for it. In another way, she's not about to stop.

The fire is beyond most of her control now, for starters, but, more importantly, she's going to do this, caution to the wind and future state of her skin and internal organs be damned.

Maybe that's why the fire is acting according to its own plan? It's always been spurred by her emotional state and, if she's this determined, it only makes sense the fire would be the same.

The smoke and steam makes it difficult to breathe but she manages to catch her breath and hold it when the fire suddenly spreads and her body is lost from sight.

At first, the white flame looks like a moving pyre, fire pulsating in time with her forced breaths. Many seconds tick by and she doesn't touch the orb, like she was incinerated in the heat and now her ashes burn forever.

It's when Sabina moves to touch the raw energy that it flicks, shifting itself around into a vaguely familiar shape. The only discernable features are the body itself and the long wisping hair flowing out and about chaotically like a natural disaster waiting to happen.

This form looks like a fae, a spirit of raging white fire. In a lot of ways it is.

That is, at its core, what an Aterkin is: A spirit of the elements.

She reaches for the orb, taking extra care to not touch Sabina when she grabs in.

The object immediately ignites just from being in close proximity to her. When she brings it closer to herself, it no longer looks like blood but an extension of herself.

Still, it's not enough. Not for her to feel like she's done enough.

Luna brings the orb to where one can only imagine her lips would be and places the softest kiss on the burning surface.

It bursts out like a volcano from the touch, rings of fire waving out and the air feels hot enough to melt metal, like she's turned it into its own mini sun on "earth."

Her heart beats slowly and she can hear it in her ears.

She's done a little too much and she knows it.

Sabina knows it.

Even when she hands it back to the goddess, she keeps up her current spirit form, on ready should something go wrong, even if she begins to lose the feeling of her own body to the fire encasing her.