And when Hedda comes for me, broken and dark, to finish me, I do not fight her. I care only about this vast love-fire that blazes inside our wildest hearts now, lighting up our very souls from the inside out.
Because this is how I want to go out. I choose to be here forever, loving these drakes and my soul sister, rather than fighting all the enemies of the world.
As the feeling locks home inside me, I feel it give to the entire universe. My Bloodwalker power shines ultra-bright, as it resonates with Lærke and each of my drakes. Hedda thrusts her blackest magic right inside my deepest heart now, but she cannot touch me; she simply burns away.
And the final curse upon the Black Dragon’s heart burns away, as well.
The cosmic rift energy is vanquished as our light explodes throughout the space. The Black Dragon’s heart beats its last, then gives up—blazing all-white as our auric fire overtakes it.
As our Ouroboros sears through the space, the boundaries that hold this Void are shattered. Black heart-cursing sigils evaporate from the thousands of souls incarcerated here; as we create the ultimate Bloodwalker event with our united love, all those souls fly out of the Black Dragon’s Void, back to the everlasting universe.
As the Black Dragon and everything it’s tethered to burns up from our united love.
Finally returned to the ancient cosmos.
I’m thrust out of the Black Dragon’s Void, too, as it shatters—backinto my body upon the earth. Everything hurts as I come back—but as I gasp my first breath, tears of ecstasy rather than pain leak from my eyes.
Because I carry the blazing light of everything that just happened with me now as I’m returned to earth. The Void of Ancestors celebrates as jubilant roars lift in the most beautiful song, thundering all through me.
All the souls trapped inside the Usurper’s Void have rejoined the Void of Ancestors. I celebrate with them now, feeling their joy burst all through me as I laugh upon the earth.
Bjorn rolls to me, and my lips are crushed by his before I realize with a sudden jolt that he’s alive. As Ström’s jubilant laughter comes next, his lean body piling atop ours as his passionate lips kiss me with abandon, I know we’ve all come out of this, at last.
Baldur is piling on now, with Mikkel and Lærke, each laughing and crying tears of joy as we feel this tremendous lightness inside us. It’s inside us and all through us, bonded completely as we are now.
Burning with a universal love, as our hearts light up all throughout the cosmos and back.
31
HEAL
My Bloodbond and I kiss for a long while, as we celebrate being returned from death. Somehow, the cyclone of my auric fire swept everyone up above the cavern’s rim when I faced off with the Black Dragon; as we laugh and rejoice, only belatedly do I realize others are watching.
A massive swath of dragons gathers around us now, everyone naked and returned to human from the Black Dragon’s Void, just like us. Astonished laughter spills from everyone’s lips as they look around, amazed and returned from death; and I laugh in astonishment with them, as I finally look around.
Because as I sit up from my drakes’ smooch-pile, I realize the black curse-ropes from the Black Dragon and its Rift are gone. The land has been scoured clean of their taint, with only a fresh breeze stirring newly growing grass and wildflowers in the ruined city, no snow in sight.
All those who died from the Usurper’s curses have been returned to us as well, hale and whole. I glance over to the cavern and watch the last of the Black Dragon’s gargantuan form get razed by our blazing auric wildfire, along with its curse-ropes.
The remains of the Dragon of All Souls slough away in white ash on the wind, as the very last of the leviathan malevolence of the Black Rift wafts away, too. Ash from the Black Dragon falls upon the Rift, and I see blazing white sigils sear all through it. The entire cavern floor with its ancient sigils lights up now, too, blazing bright as day as all the walls and columns light up.
Searing like the sun—as the Rift is healed now, completely.
The sigil is whole again as a massive shockwave pummels from the cavern. That blast stumbles the thousands of dragons standing upon the bare earth above; as it hits me and my drakes, I feel a sudden locking-home inside me, of something that wasn’t there before.
I feel it lock inside each and every Blood Dragon now, as a gargantuan change in our magic blazes through us. As white sigils ignite on every dragon now, a sudden, ultra-massive surge of auric fire pours from us all.
I feel our magic become forever changed inside us, then—united, as the Rift inside us heals. Because we’ve healed the Rift and the Black Dragon not with war and divisiveness, but with love and togetherness.
As the Dragons of Blood and Bone suddenly become one.
Shocked laughter spills from every throat upon the battlefield, as we all feel our magnificent magic restored to us. Because we are no longer a people of Blood or Bone Magic alone. The Rift that divided us since ancestral times is repaired, and our Lineage’s entire magic has been repaired with it.
Every one of us is a Bloodwalker now, as I see everyone around us rub their chests, eyes glowing as spontaneous laughter takes them. My Bloodbond had already united in our Bloodwalker abilities, but that ability is now everyone’s, as I laugh with my people, overjoyed.
My drakes and I crash together in a knot with Lærke as we hug and kiss, celebrating this massive victory, which restoring our people’s magic brings. But most of all, we celebrate that we are alive again.
Able to love and enjoy each other another day.
