Chapter Text
With the perpetual gloomy fog of Morytania, the sunless sky, the damp earth that seems to leach away one’s spirit, it would be hard for anyone to believe that there had ever been any light here.
Yet, there were flickers of it over the waters off Sanguinesti’s eastern coast. Flickers that traced themselves to an isle, and upon the isle, a crumbled ruin of a tower and its outskirts.
Indeed, Efaritay Hallow remembered the light that was once here all too well.
Hooded, sunken face, weary brows, even her teal garb seemed to reflect the dreary palette of her surroundings, especially next to the brightness in her mind. Feathers of pinions that were once grand, but now seemed to carry an ever so slight smattering of dust. The light almost gave her a headache, how it made her brilliant and weary soul ache.
“Sigh…” She buried a face in her palm, wings rustling slightly.
“Are you going to be like this again? Feh.” A high, snakelike hissing voice interrupted as it was so often wanted to, emerging from a more naturally pale face, much brighter violets and magentas and golds. Indeed, the crimson, dark eyes of Vanescula Drakan were oft wont to judge Hallowvale’s former queen with contempt.
“There are just...too many memories. Too many feelings.” Efaritay folded her hands over her heart, looking away from the vyrelady wistfully.
“So emotional, you Icyene. This castle has a lot of memories too, does it not? Yet you’re not staring at it all sad and sentimental,” Vanescula hissed, an arm on her hip and one at her side.
“This isn’t the same and you know it,” the Icyene protested, the ever slight raising in her soft tone like the roiling of the sea before a storm in its magnitude.
However, soon both figures of Hallowvale past and Morytania present were interrupted in their less than cordial tete-a-tete.
Another Icyene, much smaller in stature than Efaritay, leapt down from Darkmeyer’s walls, gliding semi-gracefully into a landing nearby the two. Hair like a much brighter sky, eyes like the grass, white-and-gold lightly armored robes stirring up memories even further in the elder’s heart
“Ah, Zorial! I was wondering when you would visit next...It always lightens my heart seeing you, child.” Her own warm, matronly smile stirred up similar emotion in the younger Icyene, though with far less clarity, or even any real recollection at all.
“Yes, yes, welcome back, young one,” Vanescula scoffed, glancing to the side before splitting her annoyed gaze between the two. “Well, I guess there would be some benefit in your being here, given the preparations…”
“Preparations for what?” Zorial tilted her head slightly, her sing-songy tone ringing with curiosity.
“Why don’t you have a look across the water at what she is reminiscing at?” The vyrelady said, barely lifting the arm off her waist to direct her gaze.
“What...is that? Some kind of ruin? I can’t make out much of it…” Zorial muttered, squinting, holding a hand over her eyes.
“Everlight. Or, what once was it.” Efaritay clarified, her voice holding a wistful note even as it went quiet.
“Everlight…” Zorial echoed. Though the name was unfamiliar, there was an ever-so-slight pang of nostalgia in her heart - so slight she wasn’t entirely unconvinced she was mirroring what Efaritay was feeling out of sympathy. The elder shot a glance her way, and the stirring in her heart seemed to reach a boiling point.
“Yes, that old place. The orders are already in place, and my-”
“And Zorial will be leading the effort,” Hallowvale’s former queen proclaimed, suddenly standing up straight with enough conviction to cause Vanescula to stumble back a bit.
“I beg your pardon?” The vyrelady hissed in annoyance.” I don’t see you commanding enough capable subjects to carry the sort of authority in this in any timely fashion. I won’t simply have you making this a...nostalgia field trip!” Efaritay seemed to waver for a moment, before her brow sharpened with resolve.
“...I think it’s the least you can do for her for her past efforts...and for all your brother stole from her...the life she could have had.” Now her face was twisted with a mix of tranquil fury and marked with the shadows of tears.
“E...Efaritay?” Zorial exclaimed, looking her way in wide-eyed surprise. “I...can’t say I know what you’re talking about, but I’m curious…”
“Yes, yes, PLEASE do explain, before I declare this a farce overstepping the bounds of authority we agreed on.” Vanescula’s glare seemed to rise to meet Efaritay’s as she held her arms akimbo.
“You know as well, if not better, than I do of how her being here now is nothing short of a miracle, given the fate of Zorial Diamond’s...or as it would have been, Zorial Lucai’s house.” Her determined gaze remained locked on Vanescula as the vyrelady’s face twisted in unfortunate recognition.
“...Yes...I suppose I do,” she hissed in concedement.
Hearing the name again, though, Zorial’s eyes were drawn to further up the buildings in Darkmeyer, up the spires, to the very peak of Castle Drakan. Now there was something she remembered all too well. She probably couldn’t forget it even if she really wanted to.
In a moment, she was there, though in another world with blood red skies and in the canvas of her mind. The remnants of the Myreque by her side, bloodied and exhausted, and her likewise, hanging on by threads and prayers. And looming over them all, the immense, silver-haired, savagely regal reds, blacks, and golds, massive wingspan seeming to blot out any theoretical sun...not that there ever would be any in the ideal realm of Lord Lorwerniel Verdigyard Drakan himself.
Her last lunge at him with her blisterwood polearm failed, and she jumped back with a light glide on her own crimson-tainted plumage, changing it out for the staff by her side as she tried to call out what little hint of sun they could bring into Vampyrium from within the silvered branch. The bolts of dark energy grazed her, as the vyrelord took to the air again, seeming to have his sights on Safalaan, who was preparing another spell of his own. In a moment, she interposed herself, locking her branch with Drakan’s own sword, a crackle of determination and fury in her eyes.
Surprisingly, the vyrelord paused his assault for a moment, seemingly to take in her face, before letting out a low, amused, windy chuckle.
“Well, now...it seems I missed one. And here I thought Lucai had died aeons ago.” Drakan freed himself from her locking grip easily enough as the force of the sword snapped the blisterwood branch in half.
“You...WHAT?!” Zorial snarled, half in fury and half in confusion as her stave clattered in two clean halves on the ground.
Now the low chuckle was nearly a hollering cackle, bloody bolts scattering the Myreque further in his sudden amusement.
“How quaint, the little fledgling doesn’t even know. I don’t know by what miracle you survived, but it matters not,” Now, his blade seemed to glow crimson red with the very blood his violence had wreaked on his opposition gathering together. “I will snuff out the light in you, all of you, and make it nothing!
Force rang out. All seemed pushed to the periphery in a crimson burst. Veliaf and Safalaan watched in horror as the latter’s instinctively raised shield shattered in fragments of radiant cyan light on impact. Zorial had only barely withdrawn her polearm before it was blown back into one of the metal spires surrounding the platform.
The despair, the pain, the confusion...She had felt like this once before. Once, deep under the earth, against another foe with crimson eyes when the light within had first made its vengeance known.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about...and right now, I don’t care...but what I do know, is that you’ve hurt my friends, and your tyranny has reigned far too long! GAAAAAAH!” Crackles turned into sparks. Sparks, into bolts that seemed to dance along Safalaan’s own flying shards. Bolts of cyan-blue light that lanced out at Drakan, staggering perhaps more from the surprise at the sudden display of power than its actual force.
She knew, of course, that it was Vanescula’s seeming betrayal that truly turned the tides of that battle. But knowing she’d spit in the face of that wretched vyrelord’s declaration was enough at the time...even if it was entirely by accident.
“Feh...Well, if it’ll get both you and that blasted light out of my hair, fine. But you’ll need to get some qualifications first.” Vanescula conceded.
“Really…?” Zorial exclaimed, a flood of emotions rushing through her. She knew that in theory, that once Hallowvale had been her home. But, of course, the miracle that led to her surviving now took the memory from her. Perhaps now...perhaps now they’d truly return.
“I’m glad you came around to see things from our perspective, Vanescula.” Efaritay said, now with a warmer smile, now turning to Zorial. “I can only remember so much from that time, and of your closer kin...these bones of the past may do far more for you than for me. The light may be too bright for us now, but it’s not too bright for you.”
“I’m glad you think so...I’ll do you both proud!” The younger Icyene returned her smile, and a moment later, took to the skies once again.