Snow wanted to close his eyes the moment he heard the magicaltwangof the bowstring. He was scrambling to his feet as the arrow shot through the air, curving true and powerful toward its target. It hit Oblivion square in the chest, piercing with an ease that should not have been possible. Her torso curled in on itself at the impact, the slits of her eyes narrowing to almost nothing as she lowered them to take in the arrow now embedded in her heart.
“You. . .” She gasped a noise that sounded like a chainsaw on a chalkboard. “You think that can stop me?” Oblivion lifted a trembling hand, gripping the shaft of the arrow. Snow watched as she yanked it from her chest. “Hunt was a f—”
Her final words were cut short by a scream that shook the world.
Magic filled his vision and licked like flames beneath his skin. It was as if the goddess had been tapped like a keg. Magic poured out with all the brilliance—all the chaos, all the destruction—of fireworks. She leaned backward, her spine bending at an unnatural angle, arms dangling, as though she were held up by the magic being torn from her body.
Then, she crumpled, and it was over. It was finally over.
And Snow ran.
“Snow, wait!” Takako called.
“We don’t know if she’s really—” Eslar began to say behind him. But Snow paid them no mind. If Oblivion wasn’t dead, she would ride again to kill them all, and his distance from her would only buy him seconds.
Snow skidded to a stop, falling, scrambling, half-crawling to the corpse of the god. Her skin looked brittle, the light within no longer contained by it. It was as though she was burning alive from within and would soon be reduced to ash, scattered by the breeze.
“No,” Snow whispered, tilting her face upward. The wide eyes were still Pan’s, but the cheeks his hands cupped were Jo’s. “It can’t end this way. Not after everything we did.”
For a brief second, so quick he could’ve missed it, her eyes gained focus. She looked at him in a way Pan never had and Oblivion never could.
Destruction.
“What must I do?” he whispered to her, to the world. “I would give my life for you now, if I could.”
“You . . . can.” Jo’s voice, his Destruction, spoke. In an instant, there and gone. The focus in her eyes was beginning to vanish.
“I—” And it hit him. Oblivion was very much dead in his arms, and yet she was still there, the faintest of echoes trying to scream against a growing silence. Holding the limp form of the fallen god closer, Snow closed his eyes and reached deeper for that sensation, that spark of life that felt distinct and undeniable. The one that mirrored his own.
He felt no trace of Pan, no inkling of Oblivion, but just as he began to grow doubtful, worried that the feeling had been nothing but a symptom of his own grief, he sensed it. Jo was still there, burning up the last of her magic like a dying star.
“I’m sorry, Snow,” Eslar’s hand fell heavy on his shoulder. Snow hadn’t even heard them approach. He could feel Takako’s magic, still buzzing about the air after firing the arrow, and beneath that, Samson and Wayne’s, familiar and dulled by their own confusion and heartbreak.
“This isn’t over yet.” Snow hastily laid the limp form down. Sure enough, her skin was beginning to crack and fly away in the breeze. He didn’t have much time before the final casing holding in Jo’s magic was gone. And then,shewould be gone.
Unless he made a new casing for her.
“Eslar, I need you to do something for me.”
“Snow?” The elf seemed startled, but already resolved.
“No one else can.” He’d done it for her. When the time had come to end the Age of Gods, Snow had been the one to see Destruction split in two. He’d seen the process once before. “I need you to use the same ritual the elves would use to sever my magic and imbue it in a new form.”
“What?” Eslar balked.
“Like the pillars at Springtide.” For as panicked as Snow was, his voice was low, quiet, and he never took his eyes off of Oblivion’s slack form. “Do it.”
Eslar was at his side in a second. With a reluctance that bordered on physical pain, Snow tore himself away from Oblivion’s face to stare into the eyes of his first friend, his first confidant. The first member of the Society. Eslar’s brow was furrowed in concern, his expression distraught, but Snow rested a hand on his shoulder in brief reassurance and pressed on.
As pointless as it might have looked to everyone else, he knew what must be done for him to have a hope of a life worth living—a life with her.
“What are you going to do, Snow?” Samson asked, voice soft yet no longer filled with its usual tremor. There was grief there, Snow noticed, a sort of muted hope overshadowed by a sense of doubt that tainted and spread.
“I’m bringing her back,” Snow offered, persistence soaking into his voice, his magic, and then blocking the rest of the world from his mind.
There was no point in holding anything back. He’d give it all to her. Snow reached deep, and held out his hands in the air in front of him as Eslar began to chant at his side.
As if Snow were sculpting from invisible clay, light shimmered under his thumbs as he drew them through the air. He traced the outline of her face, sculpting her every curve from memory. His magic eagerly filled in the blanks, creating a doll of light and life from nothing—pure creation.
