eander, First King and Savior of Ardoria, was in the very heart of the temple on both his knees, staring vaguely at the five long flames swaying in front of him. The room was circular, falling in the midst of the place and flanked by both sides with many chambers and pools and candle rooms, a good amount of steps into this maze.

It was a memory.

He was younger here, staring past the glass walls at the starless sky. It was the night before the war. The calm before the storm.

And he was not alone.

Laydana was at his side, fully dressed in her armor just like him, her hair, a dark shade of green as though emerald and Nightbleed had been rendered to strings on her scalp, pulled in a tight ponytail. They knelt there, silent as they counted each ticking second before the moon bled. She wasn't his wife yet, both of them unmarked and unbounded—only a lover. And a deadly one, especially with a sword in her hands.

The silence remained and I stood there, observing Leander's back buried deep beneath the weight of his tough, scarred armor. And through that memory, Saél walked, the image misting and turning into a shimmering bit of swirling dust before readjusting. She couldn't see it and neither could Leon. But he still stood two steps in front of me, eyes fixed on where mines were. He knew there was something. He possibly could see the outline of the scene unfolding in front of me through my mind—the image as clear as I allowed him. Letting him see Leander, letting him this deep in my mind would unveil so many other things to him—things he shouldn't know about. Not now.

"It is approaching," the First King whispered, voice low, barely more than a drift of sound in the empty room. "The Red War is near. Apocalys is near."

Laydana's hand fell on her lover's shoulder, squeezing it gently, thumb rubbing light circles.

"Your men are ready. They believe in you,'' she said, voice as soft and feminine as her body and frame. It was hard to imagine from where all the strength poured under that tenderness; but she was powerful. As powerful as killing three hundred men on the first hour of war. "They believe in a better life.''

I walked around the room, sitting crossed-legged behind the flames, back leaning on the wall that was glass from the inside, rock from the outside. And on those walls, words were written in blood that was gold in both its shades: yellow and white. Those words were the vows made by each Armedes up to this day, going all the way from the first one the First King voiced barely an hour after this glimpse of the past, to the ones my father swore on his coronation day. The newest one was the one still glowing brighter than the others, the one he took the night of the ball.

"They will die on that battlefield.'' No hope, I noted. There was no hope in the eyes of the man who was about to free this world. "Apocalys is bringing down mountains and wrecking oceans with his sheer will.''

''You are powerful, Leander—"

"He is a god, Laydana.''

The First Queen didn't blink at the hardness biting at his words, her face remaining beautiful and serene. She attempted at a smile, her amber eyes crackling like embers with the reflection of flames in them. "And you are made by the Five, fed by their ichor."

He breathed out a sigh, the action born from both frustration and anxiety. It was the weight of the world pressed on his shoulders, breaking down his bones. "How strong can they be now, when they couldn't even defeat him, five against one?"

"You know''—she trailed her hand from his shoulder to his nape, rubbing his tensed muscles until a groan evaded his throat—''that one deity cannot kill the other."

"That didn't stop Apocalys from killing Celestia."

"But he paid the price, did he not?"

Leander Armedes did not reply, eyes staring far behind the flames and the walls and the woods. He was looking at the stars, at the world behind it, at the new sort of life there. Then, he turned to stare at the woman who would be his wife and queen. And there was a light—a single spark of belief—in his golden irises as he stared at her. And he kissed her, the gesture ginger and tender and simple.

And interrupted.

Because in the far background bone-drums boomed in the chilled air, carrying the first cries of men to get ready. The moon was starting its bleed, the massive, slate body slowly washed by red waves that swallowed it whole.

The Red War began.

In that moment, Leander stared with a heart heavier than stone at the sky. Then, at the spot where I was, his eyes so stilled there, his face—scar less yet—so hard it was as though he could see me, as though he could sense me there, staring and waiting.

The memory died, leaving me sitting alone behind the empty rounded dais where the flames would light upon prayers, and staring into the voided room, the echo of those drums bouncing in my head from one ear to the other.

It was the same Leander portrayed in writings and drawings as the brave, mighty king who rode his people to victory, the king who grasped hope and light in both his hands, who was hopeless in heart. The same one who knew there was no clean victory. The one who couldn't swallow the thought of knowing all his men's deaths were on his hands. He knew better than to hold onto lies.

I rose, aimlessly walking, gazes drifting from one room to the other. My eyes had turned sore from the glimmering of gold and precious stones, searching a bit of darkness in a place where there was none. So I read the vows inked on the transparent walls, stared at the weapons attached to the ceiling, Leander's poised in the middle. It was a massive bow and a quiver full of arrows, both made from Nightbleed and ichor, given to the First King by Rimel's angel. It was told that the quiver was infinite, that it never ran out of arrows. Some believed the bow could be stepped on by a dragon and it would not even dent.

I continued my wander, walking past the room made of rubies where Saél reached Nevor, seated in front of his fire and staring at it with a tear-stained face. I crossed Leon who was reading the vows in the far end of the shrine, his body still heavy in the scent of smoke and musk—the remnants of his own prayers.

I heard someone sobbing.

The sound was faint and weak, a muffled scream swallowed with force. I turned in haste, heels shifting so fast I didn't feel the earth beneath my soles as I ran to the center of the temple, well aware of Leon who sprang behind me, seeking to look if everything was alright.

Leander was back. Bloodied. Crawling. And weeping.

He was on knees and elbows, face pressed against the cold, tiled floor with blood seeping from his mouth and dripping beneath him. His armor was removed, leaving him clad in his pants, his back shuddering and bones jutting as he cried. There were blood and scars and still healing wounds crisscrossing his flesh, golden ichor merged with crimson blood smearing every inch of his skin.

But he wasn't crying because of the wounds. I sensed it in the aura of the memory, in the dull, heavy crashing weight that singed his throat and lumped over his heart. His eyes burnt, his jaws were clenched, his teeth were gritted, his bones were aching and quivering. It was guilt.

He had come back from war, had saved thousands and thousands of souls, had written our world a new future. But—

"I failed,'' he whimpered, voice as trembling as his body before the five flames. "I failed." He cried harder to the point he couldn't feel his lungs or the air rushing in them. Leander fisted the dagger laid in front of him—the same one that ended his brother—until the steel cut through his flesh. He clenched it tighter, hiccupping and wailing as he screamed. I failed. He repeated those words over and over, each time they got smaller. Weaker. They were filled with regret, with rage, with hatred to his own self.

He repeated it again. And fell silent.

I waited in my spot from behind him as he remained crawling right there, pushing the dagger around and hitting the floor with his fists.

When I thought the First King would say nothing more, when I thought the memory was fading, he raised his head barely enough to stare not at the flames, but at the stars. I moved, rushing to stare at his face, to see the scar running from his face to his shoulder—the one, it was said, he received as he battled Apocalys—to see his eyes so I could read them.

The sound that evaded his lips was as faint as a man's final breath, broken and hollow and painful.

"Please forgive me."

And I knew right there he wasn't addressing the Gods. It wasn't their forgiveness he sought, it wasn't their approval he needed. They were mine, the ones of who he had damned to fulfill what he couldn't finish.

Leander stood, body tattered and face gaunt with smears of dirt and drying blood. And his eyes locked with mine, emerald and gold lost in each other. He wasn't the same after that long, intent stare. Because the moment I broke it, the moment I took in my ancestor's appearance, he was different. Clean. Healed. Glowing.

It was the Leander I had seen in the Eye, the Leander who had bowed to me along all other Armedeses, the one who was long dead.

I breathed hard, the intake coming in trembling inhales. He looked—felt—stronger. Older. Wiser. And still broken. The wounds were gone, leaving his chest clean but the scar that was never removed. He demanded the Gods to keep it, to never erase it not even after death. A reminder.

Sunlight radiated around him, birthing from the very sun he was remade of, the light running across his face, over the stray strands of golden hair, over the sharpness of his features and toned muscles of his body. And for a second, I saw my father in his features, in the sharp jaws, the cunning, emperor eyes, in the sharp eyebrows. In the very way he stood. Nostalgia hit me like a wave, carrying my heart back to the castle. To father. To Ramos. To Carter and Mayra and Siltheres and Téors and Rhia and Luthian.

I almost saw them in his eyes, almost saw the world in those golden orbs that glowed like twin suns. My heart quivered between my lungs.

He kneeled. The First King kneeled. Not just bowed like the last time, not just saluted. But kneeled. My muscles turned to stone.

"My queen,'' he said and his voice was different now. It was still hard and deep, the voice of a warrior who had yelled for days and days on the battlefields, but tender, too. It reminded me of warm mornings, of the chirping of birds between trees as the sun rose. It reminded me of hope—something that I had already threw away. We weren't so different, it seemed.

"I am no queen yet,'' was all I replied with. The words had gone out themselves, rolling by their sheer will. I was not thinking, not blinking, still lost in his eyes and voice.

Leander rose in a swift, smooth movement, his irises burning as he gazed at me, taking me in to the deepest detail. "You are, with or without a crown on your head." He turned his attention around us, drinking in the construction that once was his house. He paused at Leon, at the eyes that were smoldering with an intensity it could shake the very temple we were in. The Nevorain Lord bowed and I asked, "What do you see?"

"A sun. And the outline of a man."

"Can you hear?"

The Shadow shook his head, hands rubbing at his beard-covered jaws. "Only the rustle of air in trees."

"He sees through your eyes," Leander let out in a voice that was calm and well-toned. "Even without tapping through a bridge." His face seemed to glimmer and I barely looked deeply into it. I already knew.

Saél came rushing into the room, hands clasping her night robe as she sprang from where she was. Her eyes were wide. Her soul was wild. She sensed him, too, even when she couldn't see him.

The First King extended me his hand and I took it with no reluctance or trepidation. I still held it as we lowered to the ground, sitting opposite each other. Leon and Saél did too, keeping a few feet away.

"You've grown since the last time.'' He smiled, hand still holding mine, our bodies close enough that our knees touched in our crossed-legs position. And even the glorious portraits hung back home were not enough to capture his light, his handsomeness washed with a bit of brutality.

"I can't seem to say the same about you,'' I said, tightening the hand around his. He felt so familiar, so real—just like my father had been the very first time we spoke before our quest.

"It is one of the many privileges of death."

I chuckled faintly, the sound swallowed by the vastness of the place. When that chuckled died, the bits of amusement lining Leander's eyes withered, leaving a face well-trained to show no emotions past what was needed. But I was spirit, I was the power that could read and change minds and souls, and not even thousands of years could hide what I saw in his eyes.

"What is it like up there?" I asked, knowing well the question didn't ease the guilt churning in his guts. I had to know how the world Apocalys had fallen from was. How the world I would ascend to was.

"It is different, if the word is enough. It is either bliss and happiness and unending mirth or a torrent of agony and immortal torture." His face was solemn, jaws clenched.

"And,'' I added, fiddling with his fingers, the grip suddenly feeling too heavy, his skin too warm. I could almost feel real skin and flesh and not the glowing, silky one that was like touching silk and breezes. For a moment, he was alive beneath my touch. "Does it hurt, dying?"

His chest heaved and even the scar running across his shoulder throbbed. He clenched my fingers. Leander knew what I was asking, knew why.

"It depends on how and why you die. It depends on how and what you did as you lived. My end was light, like a caress of feathers on my chest, the blade coming out of my heart as warm as sunlight. And when my bounder broke, it was like all my bones were snapped at once, like the air was sucked out of my lungs. Like the world turned to void. It lasted seconds.''

I stared past his shoulder, eyes falling on Leon and Saél, on the enormous statues and columns behind them. I built a bridge between my ancestor and mine's mind, cautious to not let the words slip away.

'Do you think I will go down burning or exploding in dust and cinders?'

His breaths hitched. And when I focused back on his face, I saw the tear that slid down to his chin. The First King tightened the hand on mine before pulling it, placing it on his head before he lowered to the ground.

"Leander,'' I breathed his name as his hair brushed the cold floor, his arms wrapping around my left knee, his back trembling with each shuddering intake and broken sob.

"I tried.'' He dug his fingers in my flesh in the way I had done with Father. In the way that would reassure me I was still there, that he was still there. And in that very second, Leander was more than just alive beneath my touch. "I tried killing him. But I was weak—''he held tighter. "I wasn't enough to defeat him, Celestia. Dearcious was stronger—his demons were stronger—than anything I'd seen in that life.''

I tugged at his shoulder, nudging him several times until he lifted his head, until he stared at my eyes. I held his face in my palms and the agony, the ache in his heart radiating from him, stole every breath from me.

"When I stood in front of Apocalys, I wished I had been skinned and burned to death instead of being there. He was nothing and everything at once. He was a power that was so mighty I felt my bones turn to clay under my muscles. I knew before I could not defeat him—but at that moment, I saw Ardoria as nothing more than a burning hell. At that moment, I believed that the extinction of everything that existed—including us—was better."

I closed my eyes, blood going cold at the mere attempt of imagining what he said. Such horrors, such destruction…this was what I truly was fighting against.

"So you put him to sleep." I pressed my palms harder as I felt him trying to pull away and grovel again.

After a good few heartbeats of silence, he confirmed, "I did. With every bit of strength I had in my blood and ichor, I fought him, casting spells after spells that the Gods whispered in my ears until he blacked out. I kept going on for hours, holding his consciousness in my hands and squeezing it so hard until it was almost nonexistent. When he fell, the Five carried him away with the illusion of death, making everyone believe it ended. That we won."

I felt him stir and push my hold aside before big, warm hands cupped my face. I opened my eyes, gazing past the shadows of my lashes as his lips kept moving.

"The moment Apocalys vanished, I wished I was removed from existence."

My eyes shot fully open. But before I could try and tell him how absurd and—and wrong his words were, he shushed me.

"Because I realized then that I would live with the guilt of knowing that I had doomed the soul who would be forged to save our world.'' His thumbs circled my cheeks and his eyes were on my face the way a father would gaze on his infant daughter. Perhaps he saw me this way, his youngest great-something granddaughter who was almost eight thousand years younger than him.

"Even after I died, even when the Gods offered me home in the heaven that bears your name, I still felt that guilt. Still watched out to every Armedes child they sent down—''

"There is no guilt or pain or grief in heaven,'' I countered.

"There is not, but the feeling never died. The Gods didn't blame, didn't hate for not killing Apocalys because they knew I couldn't win despite all the powers they gave me. But their reassuring words did nothing to shake away the feeling. It was so suffocating it tied me in invisible chains, it squeezed my chest, it tore my flesh. And when Aether offered me the chance of being named his angel, even when I reused it, it still—"

"You refused?"

The sole thing I bothered praying for, the only thing I wished to be granted after death had been a word away from Leander. And he turned it down, lived away from the Thrones, because of me.

"It wasn't right. All the praises and gifts and camp songs were already too much for the little victory I had. And then, one day, the Gods called me to their Thrones, to the Source of Life. When they did, I understood it all. I still remember it like it had been this very day, how Eziar's angel came down, handing me a beautiful, small babe."

His hands ran from my face to my neck, stroking gently.