4
LOVE AND WAR
Interlude
Sirens howled, or maybe they cackled; hard to say when the world itself was drunk. Never, not in her darkest foresight, had Eydis imagined it would be Lust.
Lust, an inconsequential pest, could fester into havoc beyond asure.
She walked through the ruin, though her feet never touched the ground, dark violet mist trailing behind her.
Smoke and embers hung in suspension; fire crackled from the charred skeleton of a school bus. One jagged panel spun toward her brow. It stopped inches away, quivered like it sought to breathe, then crumpled and ricocheted elsewhere.
Wind pulled at her dark brown waves. Another pest. She smothered that too.
Her golden eyes ignited. Street caras sparked, cracked, and burst into glitter. Gravity, offended, flipped upside down, sulked, gave it another shot.
Of course. Every new chapter of her life began with a gravity glitch, punishing her head, her stomach, or both, like so cosmic joke she wasn’t in on.
All that remained was the obligatory life-and-death showdown to round out the cliché.
Blink.
And she was back in Mythshollow: twisted oaks overhead, a sky that couldn’t pick a side between insomnia and blackout. Nothing fit, which felt about right.
Through the gray haze, a figure slid forward. The woman glided, her gaze a slow-burn fuse, her silver hair waterfalling in strands too fine to be real. That felt about right too.
Because naturally, it was Astra.
Eydis shortened the distance in a single heartbeat. Shadows unspooled from her fingers, knitting into a dagger carved from the absence of stars. She rested its edge against the woman’s throat.
When had everything fallen apart?
It was all her fault. And now, it was hers to fix.
The dagger trembled, just slightly.
“You…” Astra growled. Her own blade, carved from light, now leveled at Eydis’s throat. “You lied to .”
Eydis froze, lips parted, words about to form, none good enough, so she let them go.
The blade pressed, drawing a neat line of red. And then, one drop fell.
Drip.
Drip.
Drip.
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