Chapter 31

After a long and interminable Council meeting, the Triumvirate – Maia, Justaria and Laethyn – agreed to allow the Guardians to act with ‘autonomy tempered with oversight’, meaning they wouldn’t interfere in the Guardians’ day-to-day activities, but they might be called to account at any time. Or, to put it another way, even after more than two years, the Council still had no clue how to legislate what the Guardians did.

They proposed an alert system by which means the Council could contact the Guardians at any time. Catriona promised to put it on her list of jobs.

Dreya was initially shocked to discover she had been removed from the post of Secondmage in the order of Dark magic.

“After all I’ve done for the Council over the years?” she demanded.

“It is no reflection on your service, Dreya,” Laethyn assured her, but you have been absent for over two years. You can’t expect us to keep your seat vacant for so long.”

“Besides,” Justaria put in, “we were forced to question whether it is appropriate for a single mage to hold two important offices at the same time.”

“Allowing a Guardian to be one step away from the Triumvirate must be seen as a conflict of interests,” Maia pointed out.

Though she was still less than happy with the situation, Dreya supposed it didn’t matter too much. Laethyn was still in her pocket, and as a Guardian, she could address the Council at any time, so in practical terms, what difference did it make? If anything, it would free her from some of her more tedious and mundane administrative duties. On that basis, then, she decided to accept the ruling with good grace.

The Triumvirate offered to introduce her to her successor in the post, but by that time Dreya had lost interest and declined the offer, saying she had every confidence in the Council’s choices.

Upon leaving the Council building, Cat returned to Calin’s Tower, and Mandalee stayed in Walminster with Shyleen and Windell.

Dreya stopped off at her Tower to put the cheese, which she was still carrying around, safely away in her larder, and the candles in a cupboard. Thus unburdened, she opened up a portal back to Phitonia. This time, going straight to the co-ordinates of the ruins of the Citadel of Doom. There, she intended to order the dragons to find the one called Pavay who had helped Scarlett and the other Chetsuans in Whealhaven, and taken the attacking wizard away. She had warned the dragons to never harm Chetsuans, but to actively help them like that had to warrant some kind of commendation.

Anything Pavay could tell her about the wizard in question would help her track him down on Tempestria. Then, one way or another, she would take the fragment from that wizard with a ‘stern talking-to’ about interfering in this world for which, quite to her surprise, she had come to care, deeply. She suspected that conversation would involve her using a lot of magic and that wizard being in a lot of pain.

*****

When she stepped through the portal, Dreya’s first thought was that she must have made a mistake, but when she checked the co-ordinates, they were correct. The daytime sky was purple, which was consistent, and the grass was distinctively blue, as were all the trees and plants. The Citadel ruins looked about right. Slightly more ruined, perhaps, but no more than one would expect after ten years of neglect.

However, no dragons awaited her there, and none flew the skies as far as her eyes could see. There were no Chetsuan people, either, although she supposed it was possible that they might be wary of living so close to the dragons’ former seat of power.

She closed her portal and opened a new one to the market town of Axford. It was gone. Buildings were left standing, and there were animals, she realised, but no people. No Chetsuans and no dragons. Anger and fury rising, she tore through the city, scaring and scattering the animals in the streets. Finding no joy there, she levitated to try and see further but she could see nothing more. She portalled to Scarlett’s settlement, Whealhaven, but it, too, was abandoned. She opened portal after portal, flying rapidly, covering half the globe. No-one. As far as Dreya could tell, there was not a single trace of sapient life anywhere in the world. Everywhere she looked, it had been extinguished by some unknown force.

Without really knowing why, Dreya returned to Axford market. She walked the streets once more, recalling the shops and businesses she had seen only a short time ago. She still had the map in her pocket. She remembered the pride she had felt, seeing that place, realising the potential of what it could become. All that potential was now gone. It would never be.

Dreya couldn’t wrap her head around it. Even on a Phitonian timescale, she’d only been here a few hours ago, and the whole town had been teeming with Chetsuans. The market had been thriving.

Well, she considered, thriving apart from that Cult…

The sorceress felt chilled to the bone as a horrific idea began to develop. She’d overlooked something. Those Cultists had spoken of Cleansing rather than killing, and while that was hardly an original euphemism, she began to believe it was pointing to something quite specific. She felt the entity in her mind squirming, nervous. It knew something, and Dreya needed to know, too.

There was an obvious way to find out, of course. Whatever killed the people of this world did its work in the last few hours. She just needed to go back. She’d never attempted Temporal magic on an alien world before, but it was only a few hours. It shouldn’t be difficult. She just needed to make sure she didn’t see herself. The Chronicles warned against that, and warned further that Guardians could see themselves and each other even while Timeless. That danger was easily avoided, though. She just needed to return to Whealhaven, safely hidden from Scarlett and her people, at a time when she was sure she had been in Axford. There to watch and wait.

*****

She sat on a fallen tree trunk, watching Scarlett and her people work the land for more than an hour before a shining golden female figure appeared in the sky. Whichever direction Dreya looked, she was always there, as if she were distorting the spatial dimensions, somehow.

“People of Phitonia, Chetsuans and dragons alike,” she announced in a voice dripping with honey. She spoke softly, yet the sound was crystal clear. “I am Purity. I have been among you for some time, now. In that time, I have tried to spread the word of the Creator, implored you to turn aside from your wicked, selfish ways, to cease your toil and your industry, trying to build, create and change that which was Created perfect in the Beginning. I have begged you to devote your lives solely to the worship of the Creator, but you have not listened. I can stay here no longer, but neither can I leave you to fester in evil. That would be cruel. Therefore, I leave you a gift: I shall Cleanse you of your evil, that your world may receive the Blessing of the Creator. This is a second chance for Phitonia. I pray that those who come after you will grow in the Light and reject the Darkness in a way that you could not.”

As the light flared brightly, a voice in Dreya’s head cried, ‘Run!’

The sorceress frantically opened a Temporal portal back to her present and dived through, closing it the instant she was on the other side.

Now that she had seen the destroyer, she was attuned to that power, and Dreya realised she was still there on Phitonia. When Dreya’s magical senses detected her, it was as if the sorceress could see her head whip around, sensing her in return.

“What are you?” Purity wondered. “Why were you not Cleansed?”

Dreya had seen Mandalee in full flow, she had just witnessed Nalani run even faster, but this being made them both look like they were standing still. She was virtually on the other side of the world, but she flew so fast, she’d be with her in moments.

‘Hide!’ came that voice again.

She opened a micro-portal to Catriona’s Meadow, embracing Timelessness, praying it was enough to hide from an Angel, for that was what she was. Dreya the Dark had faced down shadow warriors without flinching, but this Angel had slaughtered shadow warriors beyond counting. Fighting would be futile. She would stand no more chance than Windell against Nalani, and she doubted Purity would be as merciful. Dreya stood absolutely still, hardly daring to breathe, as Purity arrived and began to probe the area with her power.

“Where are you?” she wondered. “I know you’re here somewhere. Why can’t I find you?”

‘I can help you escape,’ the voice in Dreya’s mind promised, ‘but I must be more.’

Dreya knew the danger of letting more of that entity out of its box in her mind, but she feared the Angel more. She could not let Purity find her, and she absolutely could not allow her to find Catriona’s Meadow or Tempestria.

‘How can you help?’ she insisted on knowing.

‘I can show you a path through the higher dimensions, help you evade her.’

Dreya accepted its terms and opened the box in her mind just enough to allow a little more of the entity to escape. Once she was safe and free of distractions, she would put it back in its cage. For now, leaving Phitonia undetected was the priority.

Thanks to that entity, she found she could see dimensions that she couldn’t before and crept along one of them in a direction for which she had no name, while Purity’s back was turned. Her micro-portal was huge in this dimension, and she slipped through easily, closing it behind her. From there, she returned to her Black Tower. It was empty apart from her elite guards, whom she ordered to leave.

Closing the door to the room she shared with Catriona, she thought about the lost world of Phitonia. She recalled the meal she had shared with Scarlett and her husband. She remembered Axford, Lex’s cheese, of which the portion in her larder was the last there would ever be. She remembered her demonstration about the Cultist threat – the scale of which she had completely misunderstood. She had thought the danger of Cleansing was a mere collection of candles that they could snuff out one by one. Instead, it was a rogue sun that had roasted the world in an instant. But the thing Dreya remembered most about Phitonia was Amber. The young teenage girl she had saved.

Maybe it was selfish, Dreya allowed, but she had been looking forward to telling Catriona everything she had done. Cat would have seen that Dreya the Dark would be a brilliant second Mum for her child. She would have been proud of her.

Now it seemed a hollow victory. She had saved that girl so that she might live for about one more hour.

Dreya, in her conceit, had imagined Amber growing up, having an amazing and wonderful life, telling stories about the day Dreya the Dark herself came to save her life and teach her to cherish and protect it. She would never have that life. After a mere fifteen Phitonian years – less than four in Tempestrian terms – it was over.

Part of her wished she’d been there to protect Amber again, but rationally she knew that as powerful as she was, she could have done nothing. Against Purity, even her beam cannon would be little more than a torchlight.

What was she going to tell Cat now? What about Jessica and Sara? How could she tell them that their homeworld, and the people that they thought she’d saved, were gone?

No, she resolved. They could never know.

Dreya had always valued truth and preferred to avoid lies, but where was the value in this truth? Her Chetsuan friends could never have gone home again anyway, so in practical terms, what difference did it make? No, surely in this case, there was kindness in a lie. She couldn’t put her fiancée in the position of having to lie, too, however. Therefore, she would have to keep this from her, as well. She hated the idea of having this massive secret between them in their relationship, but there was no other way.

She wanted to tear that Angel apart for what she’d done – and she would – but even when she did, the Chetsuan civilisation would still be gone. Amber would still be gone.

That thought was too much for Dreya. She sat on the floor, huddled in a corner and did something she hadn’t done since she was a child, using the name Andreyanka. She cried, weeping bitter tears over all that was lost, and the horror that she could never share.

How had everything gone so wrong so fast?

Dreya couldn’t stop the images playing in her mind like one of those Earth movies: Scarlett, her husband, her community. Axford, the marketplace, Lex...Amber. Amber most of all. Her face smiling up at her.

Then she imagined that face melting in the Light of Purity’s power. Amber’s tears turning to ashes.

*****

Finally, Dreya dried her own tears, a rage building inside her. She was going to destroy that Angel.

She had been wrong, earlier, she realised. She didn’t need to work on her control. What she needed was more power, the power to destroy an Angel, control be damned. There was only one place she could think of that could give her that power: the higher planes. Specifically, the realm of the shadow warriors.

According to Shyleen, Pryshia had spoken of cracks in Alycia’s Barrier. Cracks surely made by Purity. Well, if Pryshia could use those cracks to Descend, then Dreya could use them to travel the other way. The means was obvious: Kullos had been trying to access the shadow realm via his control device. She needed that device to be complete and whole again, so in the short term, the mission was the same: find all the fragments.

As for what happened after that, well, Dreya had once vowed to kill Daelen StormTiger, but she had stayed her hand, although she had taken his power in the end. She saw now that she had been thinking far too small. If she wanted to stop Purity, it was no use draining one or two shadow warriors of their power. She needed to drain them all.

And if they tried to resist, if they forced her hand, then she would kill them. Every last one of them.