The Blightmire Valley.

  A sunken stretch of land that carved the Dreadlands in twain, like an infected scar on withered, dying flesh. Deep as a lake, overflowing with a constant stream of churning rot, there was no path by foot to Dreadskull except by braving a single narrow pass over the valley. I had searched — Titania surely knew I had tried my best — to find some way for them to avoid it. But without wings, no such route existed.

  I had hoped that, perhaps, a solution might present itself to me. A way to distract Dreadskull as they passed through the valley. Be it a commotion stirred with the Fiend Lord or a reckless confrontation picked with the Lord of Rot, I’d have done anything to prevent this very outcome.

  Soaring fast as my wings could carry me, my body melting into a glittering blur, I arrived at the edge of the valley within a minute of closing my eyes.

  Beneath me, a sea of black pus stirred, every bubble bursting with the gurgle of a death rattle, spewing a putrid cloud into the air. No fellflame burned along its surface, nor did any blighted tree corpses dot the cliffs on either side. Even the countless dreadtusks and illusive foolwyrms seemed to refuse to draw too close.

  The valley appeared empty until I drew close enough on my descent to see the truth of it. Rotflies, in swarms so thick they were indistinguishable from the sloshing waves below, filled the Blightmire Valley. What had once seemed to be a distortion of sound caused by the Dream was, in fact, the maddening buzz of a billion wings flapping out of sync to keep the fat bodies of their hosts afloat. Wallowing in the rot, diving in and emerging with the eagerness of a duckling in a pond, the revolting Fellbeasts reveled in its filth.

  “Where are they? Vasco! Lucien! Mother!” The infection was at its strongest as I neared the pass. Fumes strong enough to burn my throat and make my eyes water, strong enough, even, to distort the Dream’s haze into a murky sludge. Over the din of buzzing wings, there was the sound of crumbling stone and loosed bolts whistling through the air. A flash of silver sparkled in the distance and I rushed toward the light.

  “Heroes? Poppycock! Maggots, the lot of you! If this is the extent of your strength, then you needn’t have come at all!” Beelzebub’s voice boomed above the chaos, louder than I’d ever heard it. When I reached them, I came to a screeching halt, hands flying to my mouth.

  How long had they fought? Seconds? Minutes?

  However long, it was too soon to have sustained such damage.

  Lucien fought with one arm, the other hanging limp at his side, a bloody gash from his wrist to his shoulder. Corrosive rot covered his arm, seeping into the wound and blackening his flesh. With every quick movement he made, his teeth ground to hold back a cry of pain.

  Mother was at the back, loading another bolt. Her dress was singed and burnt, putrid steam rising from beneath. Cuts marred her thin cheeks, teeth sank into her busted, bleeding lip.

  At the front, as he ever was, Vasco led the charge in both ferocity and injury. Corrosive burns formed a spiderweb of melted flesh along his bare torso. The scarred half of his face was so smeared with blood it appeared missing. Possessed by a fervor the likes of which no mortal man should ever know, he moved as if he were not half-beaten. Dodging past sprays of rot, battering aside lightning fast scythe strikes — only half of them deflected by his power — and keeping himself at the forefront of Lord Beelzebub’s attention.

  “Vasco!” I swooped down as the ground beneath his feet crumbled. I could not stop him from falling. But as his fingers dug into the sheer cliff side to avoid plunging into the darkness below, I pressed my hands into his back and released a brilliant burst of starlight into his wounded flesh.

  The rot coating his chest evaporated in the light. As the burns faded, his breathing settled and he muttered under his breath, “You made it.”

  “I have! Please, be strong! I’m with you!” My wings fluttered faster to keep me afloat. Another ripple of starlight pulsed from my hands. Drawing the rot from his flesh and into mine, knitting his back together and returning to him the strength my tardiness had cost him.

  Body alight with reflected pain from the three of them, and now burning with that which I’d taken into myself, I held onto him to stay steady until he was safely on the pass once again. I hurried toward the others, but an immense pressure froze me in place. Beelzebub’s crystalline eyes locked with mine.

  The visage he’d shown me thus far was but a pale comparison to this gruesome form. His bulbous body stretched half the length of the pass, pustules raining black ichor beneath him. Colossal buzzing wings conjured a tempest strong enough to nearly drive me from the sky even in the Dream. Mandibles wide enough to devour a human. Scythes large enough to level a building. His grasping claws were gone, replaced by scythes half the size of the first.

  “You…” He spoke with such venom it made my stomach churn. “Not content to play the role you’ve been given, you seek to undermine me?” His voice lowered, and his mandibles clacked. “Fetid wench. You should have enjoyed your place as his pet. Now, you’ll watch them die before you join his garden!” Beelzebub raised his stinger and struck the ground, tearing it asunder and cutting off the one path to Dreadskull.

  “You speak nonsense, beast.” Lucien hissed and lurched forward, pointing a spear at the Fiend with his working arm. “Our Promised Healer is no slave to your master!”

  “Silence, fool!” Beelzebub shrieked, raising his sickles and closing in on the wounded Heroes. “I’ve no interest in entertaining your delusions of grandeur! Face your end so that your precious Promised Healer can know the weight of her folly!”

  “I won’t let you!” My voice was barely a whisper, but the fire burning within my breast was no less intense than that within Beelzebub’s eyes. My hands glowed with starlight as I flew to Lucien’s side, outpacing the Fiend by mere moments. Plunging my fingers into the infected wound on his arm, I wrenched the pain from him with both hands and fell to my knees in agony.

  His arm mended, fingers wrapping around the base of his spear to deflect the Fiend’s brutal execution attempt. “With you at last by our side, Little Star.” Lucien’s blows quickened, keeping pace with Beelzebub’s. Feet moving with a dancer’s grace, he ducked between the four-armed strike and landed a solid blow to the chest that sent the Fiend reeling backward. “We’ve nothing to fear!”

  From where I’d fallen, I peered up at Lucien through tear-stained eyes. Gone was even the faintest flicker of doubt in his stalwart gaze. A crooked grin replaced his grimace of pain, even as a glancing blow from his fearsome opponent cleaved a chunk from his arm.

  Without hesitation, I sprang to my feet and rewound the damage.

  “Lucien!”

  Vasco’s voice broke through the sound of clashing spear and scythe. As Beelzebub turned toward the sound, a fist rose to meet him. His stinger shot forward in retaliation, but a cobalt flash knocked it to the side.

  “Feh!” Beelzebub soared into the air and sprayed a wave of ichor at the duo.

  “V, catch!” Lucien leaped backward, hurling his spear as he did so.

  Vasco caught the spear and let the momentum carry him out of harm’s way before twisting in the air to bash it aside. Another flash. The cobalt light beneath his skin grew brighter. He landed and turned his gaze skyward. His eyes widened. “Mother! Look out!”

  Beelzebub came crashing down from the sky, breaking the pass with his stinger. Mother managed to just barely avoid the strike, raising her crossbow as she came to her feet and losing a bolt directly into the Fiend’s eye. He lurched backward with a screech, clawing at his face.

  “Wretched woman! You think a mortal weapon can harm me?”

  My body moved through the lingering pain still blistering my skin. The last bit of rot had yet to clear, but my wings and feet could be still no longer. I reached mother just as his scythe did. As it rent her from shoulder to hip, my hands followed, closing the wound with starlit stitches before her blood could fall.

  “Celeste!”

  “Mother, get down!”

  I flung myself forward, wrapping my arms around Mother and imagining with every ounce of my being that I could move her. Her frame grew solid. She gasped, and her feet left the ground. It was just a shove, but it was enough to push her from the path of Beelzebub’s next lethal blow.

  “What?!” His mandibles clacked, a hissing screech rising from his throat. “Why must you confound me at every turn?! Know your place, fool!” Whatever he meant for me, it never came. Instead, a peppering of silver spears exploded against his carapace, followed by another frustrated screech.

  I dared not to look back. Not when Mother was so close. Scrambling to my knees, I touched her face and let my magic wash over her. “Are you well, Mother? You shouldn’t be here! You mustn’t fight him!”

  Mother reached for her quiver, drawing a bolt from it with trembling hands. Attached at the tip was a glass phial, no thicker than a feather’s quill. Within it was a purple liquid — the Answer. A chilling numb overtook me, my heart plummeting into the pit of my stomach. I reached for her hand, but whatever had allowed me to move her had faded, and my touch passed through her.

  “Mother, wait! Not yet! If you miss…if it doesn’t work…” A horrifying screech shook the pass behind me. A flash of burning pain — a touch of rot coating someone’s arm. Vasco? — followed by a bruising on my side and a sharp gash across my face. “Mother, don’t be r-reckless.”

  “You’re still with me, aren’t you, Dear?” Mother cocked the crossbow and loaded the special bolt. She climbed to her feet; I followed on her heels. “This isn’t like you, Celeste. You, of all people, should understand what I’m feeling. If I can end this, it should be me who does it.”

  “Down, Lucien!”

  A screech. The sound of stone crumbling.

  “I’m with you, V! Keep pushing!”

  My eyes low, I refused to look at the battle. Their wounds spreading, burning my flesh, but panic gripped my heart and stilled my feet. I’d seen, twice now, the failure of those who came before me. Was it pride that frightened me so? That my best attempt might fail as theirs had? Or was it the fear that I might succeed?

  If I had forged a blade of evil’s bane that could fell even the mightiest evil…would it mean there was no avoiding the inevitable end? Would ours be just another tale in his library?

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  “Your brother needs you, Celeste. Lucien needs you.” Mother looked into my worried eyes as though she could see them. She wore a smile, faint and fleeting. It vanished when a cry of anguish reached us. “Whatever happens from here, know that I’m proud of you.” She turned away and kneeled down. Then, she raised the crossbow.

  A stabbing pain twisted in my stomach, almost as awful as the knot my disjointed thoughts tied it into. I knew she was right. If this could only end in tragedy, I would not let the cost be their lives.

  I reached Vasco as Beelzebub’s stinger pulled free and his legs gave out. Arms wrapped around his waist, my gaze hardened, and body aglow with starlight, I poured my strength into him and pulled back to attempt to slow his fall.

  His foot landed heavy on the stone. His head raised; mine did too.

  A wall of black rot was heading for us. Too wide to escape, too much to withstand. Vasco could defend against any blow, but not this. Not even he could stop a wave from crashing against the shore.

  Above us, the sky whistled. A bolt of silver crashed down in front of us, a tempest slicing the spray in two, carving a gap just wide enough for the three of us to fit through. Lucien’s arms dripped red, but the intensity of his grin was reflected in the brilliant shine of his spear.

  “We need to bring an end to this quickly.” Vasco said, taking his place at Lucien’s side.

  Lucien nodded. “I was thinking the same, my friend.” He chuckled when my hands touched his arms, reforming the firm muscle and thick skin from the ribbons into which they’d been torn. “He’s a fast one.”

  “Strong, too.”

  “Stronger than you?”

  While they spoke, I struggled to catch my breath, still reeling from the damage I’d taken from them, I had to wonder how they did it. So much pain and anguish, and yet they kept fighting as though victory were certain. I thought them mad when I first saw them fight. And even now, my opinion remained as it was that night. But staring down the nightmarish shape of Lord Beelzebub, I couldn’t help but laugh.

  Were I not here, they would have fought the same. And perhaps they’d even win.

  Vasco shook his head and clenched his fist. “No. I think not. Wouldn’t you agree, Celeste?”

  But with me here?

  I steeled my gaze and nodded. “I won’t let you fall.”

  “I tire of this drivel! Face Oblivion, maggots!” Beelzebub drew his arms back, his wings flaring with a force that drove back the rotted river on either side of the crumbling pass. With a grotesque screech, he launched himself toward us. Arms spread wide, he meant to rip the last foothold from beneath us.

  Lucien moved first, hurling a spear that split the sky right between the Fiend’s eyes. It cut through empty air with a thunderclap, dodged at the last second. Another throw; another miss. Though the Rot Fiend’s speed proved too great to catch, Lucien launched each spear — digging his feet into the ground, twisting his hips, and using his entire body — with the intention of ending the fight.

  “On me, Celeste!” Vasco took off before I could process what he’d said. With a gasp, I flew to catch up to him. Even with my Dream-given agility, keeping pace WAS a struggle. He met Beelzebub as he dodged another spear, throwing a glowing punch with the strength he’d stored up throughout the fight.

  Surprised, Beelzebub had no choice but to try to deflect the attack. The moment Vasco’s knuckles met the edge of his blade, the Fiend’s arm shattered, reduced to dust by an explosive force that continued past him to blast a hole in the side of the valley.

  “What!? How dare you!” Undeterred by my brother’s strength, Beelzebub lashed out with his stinger, snarling when it, too, was deflected. His arm grew back in seconds, appearing mid-swing to catch him across the face. “Damn you, girl! Begone!” He snarled as I healed the damage.

  “No! I will not run from you!”

  "Then you’ll die with them!” Beelzebub’s mandibles opened wide, unleashing a spray of rot aimed not at Vasco, but at me. It pierced through the reflection, into the Dream, and knocked me from the air.

  “Celeste!”

  The voice — my brother or Lucien, I could not be sure — was drowned out by the sound of my scream and the hissing sizzle of the rot as it devoured my flesh. Its putrid stench and stinging black steam masked the gold and lilac smoke my body released when trying to heal. Agony scorched my every nerve, too intense to concentrate or reach for my magic.

  In the distance, the sounds of battle, a storm of cuts, bruises, and burns forming on their bodies and echoing in mine. A broken fist; a melted eye. Growing more intense with every strangled breath I choked down, just to scream again.

  Rot seeped into my eyes and my vision, already blurred by tears and pain, went black. Lungs giving out, I struggled to cry just to feel myself breathe, but with nothing but blighted air to fill my lungs, they burned and shriveled within my tightening chest.

  “— have to keep fighting! — the air! — need to pin him —”

  “— too dangerous! — make it back! — VASCO!”

  My eyes snapped open, wide but unseeing. Something deep within me, a primal urge unknown to me but irresistible, took hold of my body. As if I were puppeteering my broken body with strings of pure willpower, I soared into the air on charred wings, through the crashing waves of rot, following the ache in my brother’s heart and body like a beacon in the dark.

  As I moved, the smothered starlight within me poured from my eyes, returning my vision just in time to see Vasco in Beelzebub’s grip, two of his arms held in a grip powerful enough to crack his shell, while the other scythes clashed against his forearms and elbows, deflecting the vicious strikes in a dazzling array of cobalt sparks.

  I reached out, magic spilling from my fingertips, drawing glittering lines through the air, reaching him in a single breath. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, my legs around his waist. Burying my face in the crook of his neck, I released all the magic within me.

  “What is the meaning of this?!” Beelzebub’s voice cracked, hundreds of eyes blinded by starlight that pierced back through the reflection to drive him back.

  “Thank you, Sister…now, let’s be done with this!” Within the blazing corona of light erupting from my body, Vasco was a burning star of cobalt energy. He released one of Beelzebub’s arms to draw his fist back. Holding tight with the other, he released the stockpiled power with a brutal cry. His knuckles tore through three of the Rot Fiend’s arms as they tried to defend against the blow.

  It crashed into his chest, splintering his carapace. And then, it sent him flying.

  I peeled my eyes open and peered into the distance. Beelzebub would recover when he eventually landed. Were he given the chance, he’d have surely turned the tide of battle. Instead, a silver comet came crashing into him as he sailed over the pass, driving him to the ground and pinning him down beneath a spear three times the size of its wielder.

  “Get him now!” Lucien’s voice echoed through the valley.

  Over the din of buzzing, a bolt whistled through the air and struck its target with a thunk.

  "That should be the end of it I hope,” Vasco said, closing his eyes. “Leave me, Sister. We needn’t both die for this victory.”

  Beneath us, the churning sea of ichor and Rotflies was growing closer. If I were to flee, Vasco would perish in the same agony that had nearly undone me. Such a thing would not happen. Not so long as I yet drew breath.

  “You don’t get to die in a heroic gesture, Brother…you’ve a job still to do!” I clenched my jaw so tight it felt as though my teeth would crack, flapped my wings until my back screamed out in protest. Focusing on his form until it felt solid in my grasp, I twisted the two of us to change course, and with a slight boost from my wings, we crashed onto the far side of the valley.

  Far enough to avoid the lapping waves of rot, close enough to entice the Rotflies closer, just to be crushed in Vasco’s grip. He climbed to his feet, shoulders heaving with every breath he took. “Elysium’s grace…how did you do that?” Vasco shook his head and chuckled, carrying the two of us out of the pit.

  Only once we were in relative safety did I finally dare to let him go.

  “I don’t know…I just knew I had to.” I said aloud. To my disappointment, he gave no response. “You were incredible, Brother.” I continued as we trekked back to the pass, fluttering along a step behind him as I often had when we were children.

  As I spoke, Vasco began to speak as well.

  “I’m thankful that you were with us, Celeste. I never…I always wanted to shield you from such things. I thought if I could just be strong enough…” He sighed. There was a weary smile on his lips. “And yet, we find ourselves again on the other side of a fight I only survived thanks to you. Promised Healer or not, you’ve always been my hope, Celeste. When this is over, I swear to make it up to you.”

  I bit my lip, holding back a smile of my own. “Knowing that you’d brave the Abyss to save me is a greater gift then I could ever deserve, Brother.”

  We traveled in silence the rest of the way. My eyelids grew heavy as they had at the Valeguard encampment. Whatever strength I’d summoned then had returned to me tonight. Greater, even, than it had been before. Somehow, if only for a moment, I pierced through the reflection.

  A frown settled on my face, my arms wrapping around my middle. Beelzebub had done the same. Seen me, heard and spoke to me, even attacked me from the other side of the Dream. Was it the nature of a Dream Walker, or some other similarity between us?

  “V! You’re all right!”

  A flash of pain startled me from my thoughts. I flew to Lucien, reaching out to heal him.

  “I am, thanks to Celeste. Where’s Mother? Is she well?”

  Another voice called out. “I’m quite all right. Just…whew, just rather exhausted. It’s not every day a woman my age slays a Fiend.”

  My eyes widened. My heart stopped.

  “Haha! And what a shot it was! I never doubted you for a moment, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t —” The merry conversation trailed off, seeming far away from me. The last of Lucien’s wounds mended, I flew past them to the shattered pass.

  The road lay in ruin, reduced from a stretch of stale ground wide enough to drive a caravan through, to a collection of jagged pillars, each barely wide enough for an adult to stand upon and too far apart for an ordinary human to leap. At the northern end of the pass, on the largest outcropping of land that remained, was our enemy.

  Beelzebub was still and silent as I approached. His shell splintered, flakes drifting to the ground and disappearing in sizzling strips of black smoke that smelled of carrion. His once brilliant eyes were dimmed and lifeless, not even his wings twitching. From the place where the bolt had landed, thorned roots were starting to spread.

  “So…you’ve come to watch me die…”

  I jumped at the sound of his voice and rushed to his side. Cradling his massive head in my hands, a twisting sensation pierced my gut with an oppressive chill even deeper.

  Oblivion’s Wings.

  But though he was being drawn into her embrace, there was no pain in him. Not the slightest ache.

  “You live, Lord Beelzebub?”

  “Don’t sound so concerned…mere moments have passed since I tried to kill you.” He laughed — a genuine laugh — and rose from his body. His reflection was as it had been at the castle, though now his pustules were filled with sprouting flowers, pale purple that faded to white at the tips, covered in thick thorns. With one of his claws, fingers struggling to move, he plucked a flower from his body, watching as it grew back. Then, he held it aloft.

  “Ahh…so this then was your answer? A flower. I would have never…” He trailed off and shook his head. Another weak laugh. “Never in two thousand years…would I have imagined. But…yes…the roots must…reach all the way to…the real me…”

  “It doesn’t hurt.”

  Beelzebub shook his head. “No…not at all…in fact, I feel…” He sighed and slumped on the ground, lying against his gargantuan reflection. “I can’t remember the last time I felt such clarity…”

  “I could — I don’t want you to —if you’d just…” I reached out to touch him, hands flickering with the last of my starlight, but he shook his head.

  “No…no, do not be foolish. I am…” He trailed off for several seconds. So long, in fact, that I began to panic. I reached out to touch him, and he stirred awake. “No, no…do not waste your gift on a wretch such as me…”

  Though he’d shown me nothing but disdain and malice, as the thorns spread and he began to fade from the dream, I could not help but weep for him. Dropping to my knees, and despite his protests, I reached out and touched him. Searching for the pain, the damage, anything that might undo what my work had done.

  Anything to save him.

  “Why? Why do you try to save me? I do not…” Beelzebub shook his head and laughed. “I cannot understand you…”

  “Because I must! If you can be saved and it is within my power to do so, I cannot allow you to die. Not now! Not…not when — this isn’t what I wanted! I never meant —” My voice cracked. Shoulders shaking with sobs, I pressed my hands firmer against him, radiating a light brighter than what I had left. “I never meant to kill you.”

  “You did not? What then was your answer meant to be?”

  “I wanted to save you! The way I saved the Witherlily, by turning its accursed fellblood into something that creates instead of destroys! I never…” I bit my lip, his form blurred by my tears. “I never wanted this.”

  “So…that must be why he…wanted you so…” Beelzebub yawned and his shoulders went slack. “For the last two thousand years I’ve sought a way to destroy the fellblood, to put an end to all of this…yet every experiment came back a failure…” He raised a scythe and reached out to me, tenderly wiping a tear from my cheek. “You…you aren’t like us…”

  Tasting blood as my teeth sank into my lip, I lowered my head. “I’m so sorry, Lord Beelzebub. I am meant to be the Promised Healer, not a slayer of beasts! There must have been some way…there must be some way to fix this!”

  The Rot Fiend laughed one last time, a tired, heavy sound. The roots had spread to cover most of his body. More flowers than Fiend remained, and what little was left of him was quickly fading to dust.

  “You’ve no need for fairy tales, girl. You…you can be the one…to end this…Celeste…”

  I wanted to say more — needed to say more. To apologize for my failure. To tell him that I would make this right. But when I raised my head to speak, the light had faded from his eyes. And as I watched the last of Beelzebub melt away, leaving behind a bush of thorns and flowers, my strength gave out and I fell to the ground with loud, heavy sobs.

  Thank you so much for reading!

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