Liane felt the heat of the sword through her skin. She’d lived so long with the pain and the fevers—things she’d thought made her a burden, and undesirable. Instead, they were marks of her divine purpose. She could do this, because she was meant for it.
“I’m ready,” Liane said.
“Then step into the water and prove it.” The oracle gestured toward the pool.
Liane took that leap of faith and felt the water lap over her feet, and then she fell. Not the slow sink of water, but a free fall similar to what she’d experienced when she’d briefly slipped from Erich’s grasp while they flew. She was tumbling through an endless void, stars reeling around her, zooming past her like comets. Panic bubbled up in her throat, and she tried to tamp down her fear, even as the burning in her back, which had started out as an itch, grew more and more intense.
She heard beating wings, and it felt as if something was clawing at her throat, forcing her mouth open. She was drowning. Water filled her lungs and made her choke. She kicked her legs, attempting to rise back up to the surface, but no matter how hard she kicked or flailed, she made no progress. There was no light from the surface. She was merely suspended in time, falling endlessly, while water poured into her mouth, but she never drowned.
Would she die here? Would the gods find her unworthy after all and leave her in this falling void?
No. The oracle had told her to fight. She had to resist the urge to panic. And though it challenged every screaming instinct inside her, she let go of her fear and breathed. There was no water rushing into her mouth. She wasn’t drowning. She wasn’t falling. She was suspended in a place, outside of time, and immersed in pure magic. She realized she’d been here before. The memories were hazy, but this was the place where the sword had first fused with her back.
Suddenly, she felt as if her feet were on solid ground, or at least as close to solid ground as she was going to get. Though the realm in which she found herself took shape and form, her mind knew it was all for her benefit. The magic was not material but merely thought. It was a disconcerting feeling. To be suspended in place—there, but not really.
“You came back,” a voice said from within the void.
She tried to turn to see who was speaking. They were both young and old, genderless and ancient. Made of stars and sunlight, veiled as the person she’d mistaken for the Nameless Goddess.
“I have,” she croaked.
“Then draw the sword.”
“I can’t. It’s inside me. Aren’t you going to show me how?”
“You do not need instructions. The power has been within you all this time.”
“I don’t know how. I’ve tried already. It’s trapped within me.”
“Draw it,” the voice called.
Her insides churned, and she feared what would happen if she failed again. What if she was as powerless, useless, and terrified as she feared? She was no one’s savior. She was that sick little girl bound to a bed, dreaming of being a hero. But she couldn’t be one. No matter who she tried to pretend to be. How could she ever be considered worthy?
“Draw it now. The fate of the continent and the world rests upon your shoulders. Destruction will only continue to spread unless the sword returns to the world.”
“And then what? What do you want me to do?”
“Return to the source of magic; join the two blades. End the rift.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You will. Draw the sword.”
The riddles were maddening, but they struck her with a sudden resolve. Liane reached to her back, which burned against her hand, flaming hot as if she would ignite. She clawed at her flesh, until she bled. The pain was unimaginable. It burned and it hurt, and tears were rolling down her face. But she had to do it. For Erich. For everyone she loved.
Then she felt a bulge beneath her skin pushing against her flesh, before it burst from her—a hilt. She pulled on it, and every second it was coming from her felt as if it would last an eternity, as if it were tearing her apart from the inside. Despite the pain, she kept pulling, even as the pain grew so intense the edges of her vision blurred, and her knees buckled, and she collapsed onto the ground.
All at once, it came free, and the pressure on her back lessened, but the weight of the blade in her hands was immense. She held the shining blade. It was so bright it might blind her. It was there in the flesh, and she felt it pulse in her grip, as if it were always meant to be there, and then she was flying upward, back toward the light.
31
Liane emerged from the water, the Golden Blade gripped tightly in her hand. It wasn’t metal or bone or anything of the world, but seemed to be crafted of pure light given form. The magic pulsed against her palm, but the sword was also light and incorporeal, as if her fingers might pass through it, and it would disappear like mist. The light it cast illuminated her surroundings and the oracle’s tearful expression. Liane’s body felt lighter. She hadn’t realized how much the pain had weighed down on her, and now the area between her shoulder blades was empty, as if a great weight had been lifted from it.
It had felt like an eternity had passed in the water, but on the surface, it was still night. The moon had barely moved from its position in the sky, and in the distance, she heard guards shouting to one another in their pursuit of Erich and Fritz. She had to go help them. Then she took a step over the lip of the pool, and her knees buckled beneath her, and she tilted forward. The oracle caught her before her face met the earth, and Liane felt guilty as she leaned against her frail frame.
The oracle guided her to sit on the ground as her vision swam. The weightless feeling was gone, and in its place, she felt a pressure building behind her eyes and her skin burning with a coming fever and the accompanying fatigue. Liane looked down at her trembling hands.
“I don’t understand. I drew the sword. Why do I still feel sick?”
