Thirty-Four

They emerged from the pool dry and whole. The gash on Mars’s leg had healed. The bruises on Fura’s face were no more.

“Something is different,” Katrìn said, and she leaned her head back to draw in a huge gasp of air.

Mars sensed it, too. The air tasted sweeter, the sun brighter, the courtyard awash with color. He turned to look at the Heart. The color of the Rift had changed from black laced with subdued colors to a crystalline white, as if all those separate colors had blended together into one unified whole.

Without a word, he crossed the courtyard to the keep, marching straight through the dining hall and out the main entrance. He staggered to a halt at the sight before him.

“I don’t believe it,” Fura said, stopping beside him, Katrìn following right behind her.

The Mistgrave was gone. The flat, desolate surface stretching from Skarfell to Hàr Halda lay before them like exposed bone. More draugr cairns than Mars could count dotted the landscape. In the distance lay the giant shape of a riftworm, massive and still, frightening even in death.

Yet as the three of them approached the edge of Skarfell, they saw the riftworm carcasses shrivel, then crumble back to the earth, leaving behind rich, dark soil. Already there were tiny sprouts here and there breaking through the barrenness, the promise of green and growing things. Life restored. Mars thought of Jakulvik, crowded with too many people and too little space, and wondered, For how much longer?

What about the Ice? He closed his eyes, picturing the mine in Valdri. A vision flashed inside his head of the waves of crystal Ice like a vast ocean slowly starting to melt, to liquefy into that same crystalline fluid that filled the Heart now, the magic in it no longer poisonous, but safe. Life-giving. Mars opened his eyes again, the vision fading, but not the hope he felt that it was true. Only, it was more than hope. It was a certainty. The truth echoed deep in his soul, his kull singing.

“When I said let’s change the world,” Katrìn said in a voice breathless with awe, “I didn’t think it would be quiet so . . . fast.”

Mars laughed. “But we sure changed it, all right.”

“Yes,” Fura said, her hand sliding into his. “We did.”

Her touch was so unexpected that Mars clamped his fingers around hers. He turned toward her, barely daring to breathe, incredulous at the notion that she would willingly touch him after knowing what he’d done. “I don’t understand. How—”

“The debt is paid,” she said, nodding once. “All of them.”

“I don’t believe it,” Katrìn said, gasping. “Watch this.” She stretched out her hand to one of Una’s airships lying on the lawn nearby. With a groan of wood and metal, it rose into the air on invisible strings, on the power of the Rift alone.

“No sacrifice needed,” Mars said, astonished.

Katrìn nodded. “And it’s more powerful, too. I feel like I could do practically anything.”

Mars searched inside himself, testing his connection to the Rift as well, and found the same. He was strong in a way he’d never been before. It frightened him for a moment, but then he turned his thoughts to the feel of Fura’s hand in his, the press of her shoulder beside him, finding comfort there.

“I feel different, too,” Fura said, biting her lip. Then she raised her hand as Katrìn had done, and another of the airships rose into the air on invisible strings.

“You’re an adept?” Katrìn said, gaping.

“I think we all are now,” Fura said, glancing at Mars. They couldn’t be sure of that—not yet, but Mars felt it to be true. He remembered his sacrifice to the Heart, his willingness to die for his world and the people in it. To truly save them, to make them free. And so it gave all the people of Riven access to the magic of the Rift.

For a while, they stood there in silence, watching the new world dawning. For a while, life was simple and perfect.

“What do we do now, though?” Katrìn said, breaking their peace with the harsh truth that this wasn’t over. It wasn’t the end. Not by a mile, or a thousand. But at least it was a new beginning.

Fura tilted her head, contemplating the question. “I don’t know. I expected we’d have to fly back to Hàr Halda in one of those airships, but that no longer seems necessary.”

No, it didn’t. They could take a leisurely stroll across the Mistgrave back to Hàr Halda. Or they could go around the city entirely, disappearing into the lowlands. Mars turned his head first to the east, then to the west. In truth, they could go anywhere.

“Yes, but I meant after that.” Katrìn waved, her brow furrowing. “What do we do about your mother and all the rest of it?”

“She’s right.” Mars sighed. “There’s a whole lot of mess waiting for us.” There would be consequences for everything they’d done here. There would be chaos among the kiths, all of them frantic to discover how bad the damage was and what they must do about it. And Elìn still had power among the Torvalds. They would free her and place her back in charge the moment they found her.

And place the rest of us in chains.

Only, it wouldn’t be so simple for them, Mars realized, not with the Rift within such easy reach, the power free and limitless and available to everyone. He wondered if there were others discovering their powers even now. He wondered what they might do. Some would do evil. That was a given. But others would do good. That was a given, too.

Fura’s fingers flexed inside his grip. “We could leave. Find a ship to take us to Vest.”

“Or Osway.” Katrìn sounded strange as she said it, and Mars wondered if she was thinking about her father and her chances of finding him.

The yearning to leave, to find a new adventure, stretched wide over Mars. They had done what they set out to do, after all. They’d changed the world. They could leave it up to others to set it to rights.

Mars imagined the chaos that would be tearing through the kiths, and the fighting that would ensue among the mercenaries at the Fortune’s Den once they learned of Una’s death. There would be panic and fear and suffering. Innocents would die in the tide of violence that would soon spread over the island.

They had wrought these changes, both the good and the bad. They were responsible for them. He remembered the Consortium adepts and their motto, Service over self. In the beginning, their intent had been true. And we’re all adepts now.

Maybe, he speculated, just maybe, they could stop the corruption and decay that had led the Consortium down the path to the Cataclysm from happening again. Maybe they could get it right this time—Rivna not as an ideal, but as a reality.

“I vote we stay,” Mars said, his voice firm despite the uncertainty he felt. “What we’ve done here will have consequences. People will be scrambling for power. We need to make sure the right sort of people get that power. Good people, with good hearts.” He faced Fura, staring into her eyes. “People like you.”

A blush painted her cheeks, her green eyes bright as she stared back at him. “I will need a lot of help.”

He nodded. “Yes, you will. It’ll be dangerous and difficult, and we might not make it out alive. But I’m willing to stay by your side, if you’ll have me.” He raised his hand to his hair, feeling Una’s bond still clinging there. He pulled it free and held it in his palm. With a single thought, he willed the color to change, the red giving way to white. He left the fox, though, a reminder of who he was, where he’d come from.

Then he held the bead out to Fura. “I give you my bond.”

Fura took the bead from his hand, clutching it tight in her fingers. “I accept,” she said, then threaded the bead through her hair, a piece of him to carry with her always.

They stepped into each other’s arms, sealing the pact with a kiss.

After a while, Katrìn made a disgusted noise. Mars and Fura pulled apart in time to see her roll her eyes, but then she grinned at them. But they remained in each other’s arms, bodies pressed together. For the first time, he realized this was what love really was: choosing to serve someone else over yourself.

Mars turned his head and stared out at the valley before them, his heart light in his chest, his spirit easy for the first time in his life.

“We changed the world,” he said. “Now let’s make it better.”

“Yes,” Fura replied. “Together.”

the end