The magitek, electrograv engines came to life with a purr that turned into a noisy buzz as the car-sized skyship shot off into the sky, taking my breath away. I watched the Amadea Barony get small and smaller yet, until the gothic castles and gardens vanished in the mists below.

The glider went higher and higher, punching right through the wall of white clouds. It reached the Stratosphere in mere minutes, having gone straight up and up and up.

I exhaled, glued to the window, observing the view of Andross and the Infinite Chasm. It was beautiful. Blue river deltas came down from the glacier-capped mountains, cascading endlessly into the absolutely gargantuan, circular hole. I tried not to stare into the infinitely deep, gaping maw of the limitless abyss.

The gold spires of Illatius glittered on the side of the Chasm closest to us.

A storm rolled from the mountains, covering the forests and the city beneath, lightning dancing far below with distant booms.

“Enjoying the view?” Agatha asked, her voice tense.

“Yeah,” I nodded. “I’ve never been up so high… it’s all so incredible, the Chasm, the mountains and the rivers. Andross is… amazing, like nothing I’ve ever seen…”

I was lost in the vast splendor beneath me, so lost that I didn’t even pay attention to anything else happening in the car or to what I was even saying. Some part of my brain questioned why we were so high up, why we weren’t heading to Lomb, but I pushed it away, gazing at the fantastic curvature of the magical, breathtaking planetoid mega-structure beneath me.

When I turned I found that an unlocked armacus was pointed at me by Agatha.

“Uh?” I gulped.

“Who are you?” Agatha demanded, her voice cold, sharp silver-blue eyes cutting right through me.

“Whatever do you mean? I’m Juni…” I said, my voice trembling. My hand tried to move to Endy.

“Touch the knife and I will open fire,” Agatha said. “Keep your hands where I can see them. I will repeat once again - who are you?”

“I am Juni,” I gulped. “A chimera… cendai.”

“Aggie, what’s this game?” Emerald asked. “She’s obviously one of us, a chimera.”

“She’s wrong,” Agatha said. “I tried to look ahead, to see if you would be safe with her. She is… without a future. I don’t like not not understanding something.”

“Huh?” The youngest princess asked. “Oh! She told me that the precogs can’t see her. She is a high-cendai after all!”

“Wrong how?” I tilted my head.

“You’re not four winters old,” Agatha hissed. “You’re far too clever and manipulative for a young chimera. I could presume that you’ve retained some of your ancestral chimera memories, but that doesn’t fit in either with the way you behave and know things. What are you? An Astral Phantom? An ancient ghost? Don’t try to lie to me, my armacus has a truth-sense hexagram magnified by the power of my glider.”

I choked at her words. She had me.

“She’s a good person,” Voltara said, suddenly coming to my defense. “She’s not a monster from the deep Astral. Please don’t hurt her, your excellency.”

“Voltara, why do you think that she’s a good person? Did she order you to say that?” Agatha’s eyes glanced at the maid for just a moment, then focused on me once again.

“No, your excellency,” the maid replied. “This is my personal opinion.”

“Why does this maid think that you’re a good person?” Agatha hissed through her teeth. “You don’t make any sense and I don’t like it. Give me an answer, damn it!”

“Fine,” I exhaled. “Take it easy with the armacus pointing. I am Juni… but... when I was born I died. Died like the rest of the cendai did to gain power. I sunk into the depths of the Still Forest, into the dark, cold abyss of the Astral Ocean. There… my soul sat, cold and alone, slowly fusing into the wall of bone-mesh imprints…

I lost my ancestral chorus, I forgot what it was like to be a chimera…” I uttered, trying to stay focused, to speak as Juni alone. “I thought that I was gone, lost and then… a girl found me.”

“A girl?” Agatha repeated.

“A soul from Inaria, a girl from a world long dead, an imprint from one hundred million years ago,” I said. “She and I… we became one, fused together, absorbed each other and then Eunice pulled me from the great, infinite unsea and shoved me back into my chimera body.”

Agatha’s gun went down just a notch. “No… no… that’s impossible. Imprints don’t last that long. You absorbed an ancient, female ghost then? What kind of a wizard was it?”

“Not a wizard,” I shook my head. “Just a girl from a world without magic or the System. A girl from a world that no longer exists. A memory of a scholar, an armorer and an adventurer from a place buried long ago beneath the Infinite city on the surface of Inaria.”

“Impossible,” Agatha barked.

“I can read Inarian,” I said. “Test me if you want.”

Agatha turned white as a sheet. Her magitek-gun went down another notch.

“You gotta be shitting me,” she exhaled. “You... you absorbed a ghost from one hundred million years ago? From before the fall of Inaria?”

“Yes,” I said with a twinge of irritation. “I’m old and weird, alright? Give me a break. I just want to make friends, explore tunnels, enjoy skyships and design pretty dresses, damn it! I don’t need any of this crap. I don’t need magitek guns pointed at my face. I was going to tell you this stuff anyway, in time… not that you would believe me because it's all so ridiculous!”

“Do you want to hurt me or my sister?” Agatha asked.

“No,” I answered. “I don’t want to hurt either of you. You seem nice and wholesome. You are alone and you care for each other. You like me, just want to fit into a world that's different from you. You want to break the chains that bind you, chains into which you were born. You’re the future of Andross, human-chimera synthesis. You are just like me,” I punctuated every word.

The gun went lower still.

“Just… like you?” Agatha repeated.

“I’m a chimera with a shard of a little lost human soul in my heart,” I said. “From a world that no longer exists, from a place in time she can never return to. Put the armacus down, Knight of Nemendias… and let's be friends. Let's make a future, build a better world for all of us, a world in which chimera and people can exist alongside. A world without Vows.”

“Chains? What chains?” Emerald whispered, her eyes wide.

“You are a backup, a future body for your mother,” I said. “You and Agatha are both potential future hosts for Amadea’s soul. I can see her Dominion saplings all over you. They’re damaging, interfering with your growth. They’re hurting you, not letting you be more. They’re a noose hanging over your future.”

“Oh,” Emerald said. “That… yes.”

“You’re right, lost ghost of Inaria,” Agatha exhaled. “You’re right… about us. I’ve been working hard, trying to free myself and my sister.”

“She’s not lying, sis?” Emerald turned to her sister. “Everything she said… is true? Mother wants to take over our bodies?”

“Everything Juni said is true,” Agatha rubbed her face tiredly. “Mother is getting old, slowly but surely. Vitality… can’t keep her alive forever. She will… take you or me as her body in the future. I’ve been looking for a way out and… I’ve got nothing. I’m so sorry.”

Emerald swept her sister in a hug.

“I knew that you were working hard in Nemendias… but I didn’t know on what… I’m not going to go back to the Estate… I’m coming with you… I’m going to apply to Nemendias. I’m ready,” the little princess uttered.

Agatha’s gun pointed away from me towards the maids.

“Don’t,” I said.

“Don’t?” Agatha raised an eyebrow. “We’ve said too much. These Vow-bound maids cannot tell our mother what they’ve heard. I have to…”

“Have to what?” Arouetta asked, trembling. For the first time in a decade she must have felt fear and it shook her to her very core.

“I’m sorry,” Agatha said. “There’s only one way to permanently silence a Vow-bound.”

“You’re wrong,” Voltara spoke up. “My Vow is dead. Juni killed it.”

"What?" Arouetta gasped.

“Dead? But… I can see it floating right above you…” Agatha said. “And you’re not lying… I don’t understand.”

“I don’t either,” Emerald said. “This maid, err… Voltara, was acting off all day, though. She hasn’t obeyed a single order from me.”

“Really?” Agatha asked, squinting at Voltara.

“Please don’t kill me,” Arouetta whispered, trembling. “I don’t want to die. I won’t blabber… I won’t say anything. I…”

“Don’t move! This is an order,” Agatha barked. Arouetta froze. A green and then a light-purple spell struck her in the chest from the knight’s armacus. She slumped backwards onto the chair, her eyes closed.

“Did you just…?” Emerald whispered.

“I put her to sleep and erased the memory of this conversation from her mind,” Agatha said. “It's a temporary measure. I’ve never heard of anyone killing a Vow… but I suppose if anyone could do it… it would be a soul from Inaria.”

“Voltara, obey my order,” she turned to the remaining maid. “Blink a thousand times!”

“No, that's ridiculous,” Voltara replied.

“Voltara! Stop breathing!” Agatha ordered.

“I’d rather not,” the maid responded.

"So… your Vow is really dead?"

"Yes, my Lady," Voltara nodded. “My Vow is dead.”

"That's not necessarily good," Agatha said. "I want to know who you will serve and obey."

"I will serve and obey the girl who freed me from my dark Angel," Voltara turned to me. "I will be by Juni's side and by your side if you permit it, my future Empress."

"Not you too," Agatha groaned. Her armacus folded up as she crossed her arms.

"We good then?" I asked.

"Yes," Agatha exhaled, looking stressed and exhausted. I now knew what she feared, what she worked so hard for.

"Good," I said. "Now if we keep being friends, I can cut out your mother's tendrils."

"You can do that?" Agatha blinked.

"I can," I nodded. "It will take time, but I think I can help both of you be free."

"I'm sorry for threatening you," Agatha exhaled, fumbling with her robe. "I… had to know which side you were on."

"I understand," I said. "No hard feelings. Lunch?"

"Lunch," Agatha nodded.

She flicked a switch on the control panel and the glider shot down towards Lomb shearing the clouds beneath with a noisy hum.