Light could be an exit, right?
The hope gave me seconds of air as my lungs dredged it up from some stored part of my body. Or maybe it was my focus on the light that had me forgetting I was dying second by second.
When the glow was strong enough to nearly blind me, I realized my mistake. This was no exit or way out… it was a line of power, similar to the ones we’d used to get from the Capital down into the Deep.
This one was four times the size, and a bright relentless gold, a shade that hadn’t been in the other ones.Original power.Was this the Great Queen’s line? A part that hadn’t been severed.
My descent slowed, and as darkness crept into my shaky vision, I slumped across the glowing strand. With the last of my strength, I reached out and wrapped my hand around it.Help me.The words were in my mind, the last of my power fading, and it was like before when the darkness tried to take me from this world.I’m from your line.
The last stores of my air were gone, and I sent out a final goodbye to my loved ones, tears dripping along my cheeks, soaked up by the sandy coal that would form my final resting place. Tabitha’s sweet little face flashed in my mind, and I could only pray they found a way to save her. If they couldn’t, I’d wait for her in the next life.
I’d never leave my baby again.
Or Len.
His powerful features filled my mind, and his energy mingled deep inside where our bond existed. It was tempered by the glamour that held us apart, but we both knew it was there now.
My fae prince held every part of my heart, as did his daughter, and this was no wasted life to have known and loved them both.
When I released my hold on the mortal realm, my soul slipped free from the vessel it had been encased in, following the golden path of light. No longer in the depths, I was moving freely without an ache in my lungs or fear in my heart. The weight of mortality was gone, and as I drifted along, a sharp spike hooked me in my center, yanking me sideways.
Even in spirit form, the sudden movement hurt, and I gasped when I landed on a burning surface. Pushing up, confusion clouded some of the lighter energy as I tried to figure out where I was. My spirit form was standing—not floating, standing—on the surface of a land that burned in flames, as if we’d landed on the sun.
There was no heat as I took a step forward, following the curve of the land, like a cartoon character walking on the top of a small planet. It was too bright to see anything beyond where I stood, outside of the flames that tossed and turned before me.
There was no pain, heat, or cold, almost as if I couldn’t quite interact with the world itself.
My steps continued on until I came upon a golden beam of light, floating a few feet above the ground. It took me a moment to remember that I’d been clutching that same beam when I died.
My pace picked up as I reached the golden line, wanting to touch it, only I didn’t really have hands any longer. Deciding to follow it, I set off once more, the gold growing brighter and brighter as we crossed the curvature of this land. There were no other changes until the strand grew larger, thicker, and so bright that I almost couldn’t look upon it.
It had turned the flaming surface of the sun world into a dull backdrop.
Eventually the cord was as large as a huge water pipe, with a diameter so big that if it had an opening, I’d have been able to walk right into it and not hit my head.
My ghostly head. Or whatever I was now.
This was the point the ground levelled out, and when it did the cord suddenly shrank, as if its size had all been to ensure I didn’t lose it. The gold joined other cords, all of which were attached to… Uh, I actually had no actual idea what they were attached to.
It looked like a giant sphere hovering on the horizon, and weirdly, despite it being the size of a skyscraper, I hadn’t noticed it until right this moment. The dozens of other cords spanned from its surface in a multitude of different colors.
Moving away from the gold line, I drifted between the other lines, heading for the sphere.
As I got closer, I could feel a pulse of energy, one of the first sensory changes since I’d been yanked here. That pulse had me wondering if the giant sphere was a hub of power, feeding or being fed. It was difficult to tell the direction of power.
Maybe it went both ways.
Balance generally required an equal flow.
Not having a clue what I was supposed to do next, I kept pushing forward, losing my gold strand as I closed in on the sphere. The giant structure, floating a few feet above the ground, was not a color I’d ever seen. It appeared to be a wash of every color and every shade that existed in the worlds, moving and ever changing.
When I was close enough to trulyseethe minute details of the surface, a hoarse sound escaped me, and it was kind of terrifying to know I could make sounds here. This land was so quiet,and I was dead, so sound just felt out of place. But the reason for the sound remained. The sphere was not a mix of colors as I’d thought, but its surface was made up of a trillion tiny images, small and lined up next to each other so that the individual was hidden in the whole, hard to detect until you were all but pressed against the surface.
The images were moving too, akin to a television tuned into a trillion different channels.
“What in the worlds…?” I murmured in a voice that sounded like tinkly bells.
Deciding I had nothing left to lose, I urged my ghostly form closer to the sphere, wanting to touch the power.
