“What is unmade by death may only be remade by life,” Alora clenched her fists. “You were speaking of the Rift. What price do we need to pay to fix it?”
“At last,” Sunnëva said, her voice like a sigh of wind over snow, “you are asking the right questions.”
At that, she arched a brow at Rune pointedly and rolled his eyes. Was that why she had refused to tell him before?
Sunnëva lifted her hands, and frost spun into the air like threads of silver, weaving shapes that shimmered in the dim chamber. Two figures formed in miniature—one cloaked inshadow, the other bathed in light—circling each other as though caught in an eternal dance.
“As there is dark, there is light,” Sunnëva said softly, the frost-figures twining closer with each word. “As there is death, there is life. Mortal and immortal. Shadow and flame.” The two shapes pressed palm to palm, their frost-limbs threading together, until they glowed as one. “A union between two can do what one alone cannot.”
Alora’s breath caught as the figures merged, their light steadying into a luminous tether. “You mean… both of us?”
Sunnëva inclined her head. “The Soul Anchor entraps one soul alone, forever. But a Soul-Covenant is a tether between two souls that can bind the Rift into place.
Rune’s eyes narrowed. He had learned long ago to listen for the trap buried beneath a god’s honeyed words.
“But?”
Sunnëva sighed and a wall appeared between the frosted figures connected by a line. “A Covenant is not a permanent seal, but a barrier. Without your souls to hold it, the Rift will rupture completely, and the world will fall into peril.” She closed her hand, and the frost-figures shattered, scattering into shards that melted on the ground.
The bond shook with Alora’s dismay as Rune’s chest sank into his stomach.
Whatever choice they made, the cost was still heavy.
Sunnëva frowned. “If you falter, it is not simply your lives that end. It is annihilation. Mortals devoured. Demons unleashed. Titans freed. And make no light of this delicate spell. The Realms are already weak. Any destabilization could cause another Rift.”
Rune’s jaw tightened. His shadows lashed once, then coiled close to his body, restless. “I have no need for your lecture on cosmic ruin.”
But still, the words shook him, knowing what was at stake.
Alora’s voice broke the silence. “And… if one of us should die?”
Sunnëva’s blue eyes dimmed.
The silence itself was crueler than words.
The fact was clear: the Soul Covenant required two souls.
“What else?” Rune pressed, because he sensed there was more.
Sunnëva paused, measuring them carefully. “The barrier can only be held on both sides of the Rift. Thus, Alora must remain in the Mortal Realm and you …in the Netherworld.”
Rune snarled. “I have waited eons for her. Over a hundred I mourned her. Now you demand more?”
“Were you not prepared to endure eternity without her?” Sunnëva’s voice cut sharp like a whip. “This is what the scales require to mend what you broke.”
Rune clenched his jaw tight, his regret damming him. The gods offered a solution but not without consequence.
The price of his sin.
And he sat on a mountain of them.
“There is balance to all things, Rune. That is the oldest law of the universe.” Sunnëva continued, softening her tone. “The Blood Moon rises each cycle to realign the Realms. When the moon bleeds, you must renew the barrier, or the Rift will tear once again.”
Finally, Alora said softly, “Then… we will only see each other once every five years?”
The words pierced him like a blade through his chest.
Five years was an eternity when measured in her absence.
