Daughter.
Rune’s breath caught. His veins turned to ice as his gaze fell on the knapsack at his feet, the edges of the opening glowing faintly.
“How do you suppose she is able to absorb your power?” Sunnëva said. “She bears the blood of both light and shadow. She was dying tonight, would have died if she had not touched you. Her dark essence is consumption. Alora absorbing your power is anechoof the purpose etched into her soul. She is a devourer—like her father.”
Rune’s entire body went cold.
Sunnëva approached him, frost swirling into the night air with every step. Her gaze lifted to the sky, a crimson hue gleaming on her cheeks. “Vorak consumes light and shadow alike. Stars. Wolds. Creation. Anything that could give him more power. Alora was bred for that purpose. She carries both bloodlines lauded by Heaven and feared by the Abyss. Primordial and divine.”
Rune swallowed, his fists clenching. “Why?”
“To feed him,” Sunnëva answered simply, her blue eyes falling on him. “She is a sacrifice meant to restore his power and to ascend it. That is her true purpose.”
Through her, I will rise. Through her, I will feed. Beginning with her.
His stomach roiled.
Sunnëva reached in the knapsack and drew out the jar. The strands within shone like veins of white flame.
“You must have felt it,” Sunnëva murmured as they gazed at the glowing tendrils of divine fire. “The nectar in her blood, her scent, her kiss. It calls to you because she was fashioned to be consumed. The purest kind of feast.”
Rune hated that his mouth instinctively watered as he recalled Alora’s scent. It had not been so strong in their first life. He had been obsessed. He had waged war on the world for her, but his madness and craving for her wasn’t merely lust and longing.
It washunger.
A predatory instinct that wanted to tear into her because he craved that powerful essence in her veins, that power that demolished his.
For Alora was both Primordial and a goddess.
The first of her kind.
And such a being should not have gone unnoticed.
“He knew,” Rune said through his clenched teeth. It wasn’t a question.
Sunnëva only looked at him, and that was answer enough. “Elyon sees all.”
His jaw tightened, fists clenching so tight his claws pierced his palms. “Then why allow it to happen? Why let it get this far?”
The Heavens didn’t suffer flawed creations.
He would know.
Sunnëva’s gaze returned to the bleeding sky. Her voice softened into something ancient. “Because even the Fates must allow the threads of destiny to intertwine.”
The words hung heavy, like dirt settling on an open grave.
Rage stirred low and venomous in Rune’s gut. Of course.
His teeth bared in a soundless snarl. “This is regarding the fate of the world, Sunnëva. The very Realms themselves.”
“Since when did the God of Shadows care about the world?”
Rune’s shadows coiled at his feet. He never did care about it before. His purpose had been destruction and wickedness, festering sin, damning souls.
But he cared now because of her. Because Alora at last looked at him like he was more than what they made him.
If I asked you to remake the world into a better place instead of filling it with darkness, would you?
